In 1964, Foley was unopposed for the Democratic nomination for Washington's
5th congressional seat, which included Spokane. He faced 11-term
Republican incumbent
Walt Horan in the
general election and won by seven points, one of many swept into office in the
1964 Democratic landslide. He was re-elected without significant difficulty until 1978, when in a 3-person race, he won only 48% of the vote. Two years later, he narrowly defeated Republican candidate John Sonneland (52% to 48%). Though the fifth district became increasingly conservative, Foley didn't face serious opposition again until his defeat in
1994. Foley voted in favor of the
Voting Rights Act of 1965, the
Civil Rights Act of 1968, the
bill establishing
Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a
federal holiday, and the
Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987 (as well as to override
President Reagan's veto). During his first term in the House, Foley was appointed to the
Agriculture Committee and the
Interior and Insular Affairs Committee. He served on the latter committee through 1975, when he became chairman of the Agriculture Committee. In 1981, when Foley was appointed
Majority Whip, he left the Agriculture Committee to serve on the House Administration Committee. Six years later, January 1987, he was elected House Majority Leader.
Speaker of the House In June 1989,
Jim Wright of
Texas resigned as
Speaker of the House of Representatives (only the fourth speaker ever to resign) and from Congress amid a
House Ethics Committee investigation into his personal business dealings. In the June 6 election to succeed Wright, Foley was the victor, receiving 251 votes; his Republican opponent, Minority Leader
Robert H. Michel, received 164 votes. During the
101st Congress, Foley presided over the House as it passed a landmark update to the 1963
Clean Air Act, measures protecting persons with disabilities, the
Americans with Disabilities Act and the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, as well as the
Budget Enforcement Act of 1990. The budget act, a part of the massive
Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1990, established the "
pay-as-you-go" process for discretionary spending and taxes, and was signed into law by President
George H. W. Bush on November 5, 1990, contrary to his
1988 campaign promise not to raise taxes. This became a significant issue during the
1992 presidential campaign. In 1993, the
103rd Congress passed an
omnibus budget bill through which the government was able to raise additional revenue and balance the federal budget. Signed into law by President
Bill Clinton on August 10, 1993, the measure stirred controversy because of the tax increases it imposed. However, in Foley's bid for a 16th term in the House, his
Republican opponent,
George Nethercutt, used the issue against him, citing the caption of the federal case brought by Foley, "Foley against the People of the State of Washington". Nethercutt vowed that if elected, he would not serve more than three terms in the House, though he ultimately served for five. Foley lost in a narrow race. While Foley had usually relied on large margins in Spokane to carry him to victory, in 1994 he won Spokane by only 9,000 votes, while Nethercutt did well enough in the rest of the district to win overall by just under 4,000 votes. Since Foley left office, no Democrat has garnered more than 45 percent of the district's vote. Foley became the first incumbent Speaker of the House to lose his bid for re-election since
Galusha A. Grow in 1862. He is sometimes viewed as a political casualty of the term limits controversy of the early 1990s. President Clinton attributed Foley's defeat to his support for the
Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994. Foley lost his seat in the
Republican Revolution. ==Later career==