Frank Moss

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Frank Moss
Arthur Watkins
Succeeded byOrrin Hatch
Personal details
Born
Frank Edward Moss

(1911-09-23)September 23, 1911
Army Judge Advocate General's Corps
Battles/warsWorld War II

Frank Edward "Ted" Moss (September 23, 1911 – January 29, 2003) was an American lawyer and politician. A Democrat, he served as a United States Senator from Utah from 1959 to 1977.

Early life and education

Frank Moss was born in

center on the football team.[2]

Moss then attended the

double major in speech and history.[3] During college, he was sophomore class president and coach of the varsity debate team.[2] He graduated magna cum laude in 1933.[4] The following year, he married Phyllis Hart (the daughter of Charles H. Hart), to whom he remained married until his death in 2003; the couple had one daughter and three sons.[1]

Moss studied at the George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C., where he was an editor of The George Washington Law Review.[5] While studying in Washington, he worked at the National Recovery Administration, the Resettlement Administration, and the Farm Credit Administration.[2] He received his Juris Doctor degree cum laude in 1937.[4]

Early career

After his admission to the bar, Moss was a member of the legal staff of the

European Theater (1942–1945).[3]

Following his military service, Moss returned to Salt Lake City and was re-elected as city judge, serving in that position until his resignation in 1950.

U.S. Senate

In

independent after losing to Watkins in the Republican primary. The Republican vote was split in the general election, largely over local dissatisfaction with Watkins's having chaired the committee that censured Senator Joseph McCarthy
, and Moss won election with less than 40 percent of the vote.

Moss was an original sponsor of laws to create Medicaid, a program to cover health care for low income people.[6]

Moss was elected to a second term in 1964, defeating

President Ernest L. Wilkinson. He was elected to a third term in 1970 defeating four-term Congressman Laurence J. Burton. He gained national prominence with regard to environmental, consumer, and health care issues. Moss became an expert on water issues and wrote The Water Crisis in 1967. He worked to secure additional national parks for Utah and started important investigations into the care of the elderly in nursing and retirement homes, and into physicians' abuses of the federal Medicaid program. In 1976, his capacity as chairman of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Long-Term Care, Senator Moss made a first-hand investigation of waste, fraud and mismanagement in the Medicaid program by posing as a patient and visiting the East Harlem Medical Center in New York City. Despite having no complaints of symptoms and having had his health checked by his own physician a month before, Senator Moss "was given a costly series of tests" and then told to come back the next day for more unnecessary tests that were billed to the federal government.[7]

In 1974, Moss joined Senator

hospice care programs. The bill did not have widespread support and was not brought to a vote. Congress finally included a Hospice benefit in Medicare in 1982.[8] In 1976 Moss backed a constitutional amendment overturning Roe v. Wade and outlawing abortion.[9]

Moss chaired the Consumer Subcommittee of the

U.S. Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences
from 1973 to 1977.

Moss ran for a fourth term in 1976 against Republican Orrin Hatch. Among other issues, Hatch criticized Moss's 18-year tenure in the Senate, saying "What do you call a Senator who’s served in office for 18 years? You call him home."[10] Hatch argued that many senators, including Moss, had lost touch with their constituents.[11] Hatch won the election by an unexpectedly wide nine-point margin and proceeded to hold that seat for the next 42 years.

Afterwards, Moss returned to the practice of law in Washington, D.C. and Salt Lake City. To date, he is the last Democrat to represent Utah in the U.S. Senate.

References

  1. ^ a b c d McCormick, John S. "FRANK E. "TED" MOSS". Utah History Encyclopedia. Archived from the original on 2007-06-10.
  2. ^ a b c d Hart, Richard R. (2003). A Sense of Joy: A Tribute to Ted Moss. Bonneville Books.
  3. ^ a b c d "MOSS, Frank Edward (Ted), (1911 - 2003)". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
  4. ^
    H.W. Wilson Company
    . 1972.
  5. ^ Bernstein, Adam (2003-02-01). "Frank Moss, U.S. Senator From Utah". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 2016-03-03. Retrieved 2012-01-04.
  6. ^ "Frank Moss, 91, Democratic Utah Senator". The New York Times. 31 January 2003.
  7. ^ "Senator Moss, Posing as Ragged Patient, Sees Medicaid Abuse in New York City", The New York Times, August 30, 1976, p. 1
  8. ^ "National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization: History of Hospice". Archived from the original on 2020-10-18. Retrieved 2008-12-17.
  9. ^ Perlstein, Rick Reaganland: America's Right Turn 1976-1980 Simon & Schuster, 2020.
  10. ^ "Time to Vote Dan Liljenquist, and Dump Orrin Hatch". RichardCYoung.com. 2012-02-24. Retrieved 2013-02-11.
  11. ^ Haddock, Marc (22 March 2010). "On Orrin Hatch's 76th birthday: his career in photos". deseretnews.com. Deseret News. Retrieved 28 July 2011.

External links

Party political offices
Preceded by
Class 1)
1958, 1964, 1970, 1976
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Secretary of the Senate Democratic Caucus

1971–1977
Succeeded by
U.S. Senate
Preceded by
Arthur Watkins
U.S. Senator (Class 1) from Utah
1959–1977
Served alongside: Wallace F. Bennett, Jake Garn
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Clinton Presba Anderson
Chair of the Senate Space Committee
1973–1977
Succeeded by