Word: rodino
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...center of Congress's rising movement toward impeachment of President Nixon sits savvy, silver-haired Peter W. Rodino, 64, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. He is an old-line ward politician with a sharp eye for a beneficent compromise and a shrewd politician's sense of when to wage a fight...
Born in a Newark tenement, Rodino remains a resident of the same Italian-American community he has represented in Congress since 1948. He has never faced a serious challenge to his seat in New Jersey's Tenth District, and has successfully outclassed growing opposition from his district's black residents, who outnumber the whites. Rodino has been able to win by consistently wide margins because he stays close to his bedrock Italian-American constituency and his liberal voting record makes him attractive to black voters. He has also persistently and successfully refuted charges linking him to his state...
...Rodino has had a lifelong fondness for fiction and poetry (his favorite poem: Milton's On His Blindness). As a young man he wrote a poem with a final quatrain that places wry perspective on the work now before him: "For those of you who will with scales in mind,/ The sins of erring man be called to weigh,/ Remember crossroads run a double way-/ And some go wrong who blessed with sight are blind...
...also has an abiding love of opera, with the works of Verdi and Puccini particular favorites. He and his wife Marianna, 62, have two children, Peter, 22, a student at Seton Hall University law school, and Margaret, 30, wife of Newark Judge Charles A. Stanziale Jr. Rodino served for two years as chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Nationality, and has been a staunch proponent of immigration reforms. He has also supported bills that would restrict employment of illegal aliens, who frequently are in competition for jobs with blue-collar workers in his district...
Though he has chaired the Judiciary Committee only since January 1973, Rodino has moved forcefully yet methodically on proceedings leading to impeachment. "I must conduct this inquiry in a thorough manner," he says, "because it affects the whole direction of our country." He is operating with an unqualified commitment from the House leadership for full financing of his inquiry, and has been given use of ten additional offices for his impeachment staff...