William Proxmire

Edward William Proxmire (November 11, 1915 – December 15, 2005) was an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as a United States senator from Wisconsin from 1957 to 1989. He holds the record for being the longest-serving senator from Wisconsin. Known as a political maverick and an aggressive critic of wasteful government spending, Proxmire invented and awarded the tongue-in-cheek Golden Fleece Award to appropriations he found particularly egregious. He was a member of the Senate Banking Committee, the Senate Appropriations Committee, and the Joint Economic Committee. On the Joint Economic Committee, he exposed numerous instances of wasteful spending on military programs such as the C-5 aircraft and the F-16 fighter, as well as other government programs such as the development of a supersonic transport airplane (SST).

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