Rep. John Shimkus (R) Elected 1996, 5th term
Born:	Feb. 21, 1958, Collinsville
Home:	Collinsville
Education:	West Point Military Acad., B.S. 1980, Christ Col., Teaching Cert., 1990, S. IL U., M.B.A. 1997
Religion:	Lutheran
Marital Status:	married (Karen)
Elected  Office:	Collinsville Township Trustee, 1989-93; Madison Cnty. Tres., 1990-96.
Military Career:	Army 1980-85; Army Reserves, 1985-present.
Professional Career:	High schl. teacher, 1986-90.
DC Office	513 CHOB20515, 202-225-5271; Fax: 202-225-5880; Web site: www.house.gov/shimkus
State Offices	Centralia, 618-532-9676; Collinsville, 618-344-3065; Harrisburg, 618-252-8271; Olney, 618-392-7737; Springfield, 217-492-5090.
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Southern Illinois is a land of prairies, of flat, treeless land sloping imperceptibly down to the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. It was settled almost entirely from the south by farmers coming overland from Kentucky, such as Abraham Lincoln's family. Just beyond the Ohio River, they found hilly terrain, some of which turned out to have coal deposits. To the north they must have been astonished, after miles of thick forest, to see the great American prairie stretch before them, a vast sea of empty land extending past the horizon. The prairie lands proved wondrously rich, and were soon crisscrossed by rail lines taking their produce away and bringing in products of industrial civilization from St. Louis, Chicago and points east. About the same time, vast coal deposits were found in southern Illinois, producing one mining town after another: This was the home turf of John L. Lewis, the imperious leader of the United Mine Workers for half a century and, in the late 1930s and early 1940s, one of the most powerful and eloquent figures in American public life.

The 19th Congressional District of Illinois, which extends more than 200 miles up and down and across the state, covers all or part of 30 counties in the rich agricultural heartland of southern Illinois--most of the land area of the state south of Springfield, from the Ohio River to the Mississippi. Much of it is south of the old National Road, which became U.S. 40 and is paralleled by Interstate 70, the traditional boundary between the part of Downstate Illinois settled by Southerners and that settled by Yankees, and also the boundary between traditional Democrats and traditional Republicans. Its boundaries are jagged, and seemingly without rational geographic basis, but there is a rational political explanation for them. The biggest voting blocs are in Madison, Clinton and Washington Counties, which are part of the St. Louis metropolitan area, and the Sangamon County suburbs of Springfield, the state capital. The district also includes the coal mining area around Mount Vernon, the sparsely settled counties along the Ohio River and prairie counties along U.S. 40 and south of Springfield.

The congressman from the 19th District is John Shimkus, a Republican first elected in 1996. Shimkus grew up in Collinsville, in Madison County. His father was an installer for Illinois Bell, and his mother a township trustee; he is of Lithuanian descent, as is his predecessor in the House, Democratic Senator Richard Durbin. Shimkus graduated from West Point, trained in the Army as a ranger and paratrooper, studied in California, then came back to Collinsville to teach high school. Almost immediately he began running for local office. In 1988 he ran for the Madison County Board, and lost; in 1989 he was elected Collinsville Township Trustee. In 1990, at 32, he beat a 12-year incumbent and was elected Madison County Treasurer, the only Republican countywide officer. He ran for the House against Durbin in 1992, and lost 57%-43%, a closer margin for Durbin than in his previous campaigns. In 1996, when Durbin ran for the Senate, Shimkus easily won the Republican primary with 51% against seven other candidates. In the general election he faced state Representative Jay Hoffman. Both were anti-abortion, anti-gun control, and pro-balanced budget amendment. Hoffman raised more money and had the benefit of AFL-CIO ads but Shimkus won by 50.3%-49.7%. The following August, after taking classes part-time for six years, he received an MBA from Southern Illinois University.

In the House, Shimkus's voting record has been a bit right of center. He got a seat on the Commerce Committee and used it to sponsor one small but locally important piece of legislation: his amendment that qualified the soybean-diesel fuel blend B-20 for the alternative fuels program. The Clinton administration opposed it, arguing that any standard diesel fuel engine would qualify. But Shimkus got it enacted. He got the White House in May 2004 to scuttle proposed Environmental Protection Agency rules to control mercury emissions from coal-fired generators.

In October 2004, Shimkus returned from a visit to Iraq and criticized the news media for not fully reporting the conditions there. By not reporting good news--that passenger airplanes were flying into the Baghdad airport, for example--he said the press was hurting the morale of the U.S. military. Shimkus remains a lieutenant colonel on active duty in the Army Reserves, and occasionally teaches at West Point. On an internal assignment, the former high school teacher took the chairmanship of the House page board and imposed stricter review procedures for applicants.

Illinois lost one House seat in the 2000 Census. When the state's redistricting plan was produced by Speaker Dennis Hastert and 3d District Democrat William Lipinski, they decided to eliminate the 19th District seat held since 1998 by David Phelps, a conservative Democrat and former professional gospel singer from far south Illinois. Phelps decided to run against Shimkus in the new 19th, of which Shimkus had been representing 63% of the voters and Phelps 34%. Chicago-based Democrats, interested in colleagues who could help them with O'Hare expansion and other Chicago priorities, did not care much about Phelps. The result was a spirited contest. The candidates disagreed on whether the Bush tax cuts should be made permanent, on trade promotion authority, on prescription drugs. The AFL-CIO spent more than $1.5 million attacking Shimkus; Shimkus was helped by campaign ads paid by the pharmaceutical industry. But the numbers were all for Shimkus. In the portions of the district he had represented he won 59%-41%, with a popular vote margin of 29,000. Phelps, in the portions he had represented, won by only 53%-47%, with a popular vote margin of 5,000. Overall Shimkus won 55%-45%. He was reelected easily in 2004. But the seat could be contested if Shimkus runs for another office; in 1996, he said he would limit himself to 12 years in the House.

Committees

• Energy & Commerce (11th of 31 R): Energy & Air Quality; Health; Telecommunications & the Internet.

Group Ratings (More Info)
	ADA	ACLU	AFS	LCV	ITIC	NTU	COC	ACU	NTLC	CHC
2004	20	5	14	0	90	66	95	88	94	100	--
2003	10	--	13	10	--	64	90	84	--	--	--

National Journal Ratings (More Info)
	2003 LIB	--	2003 CONS		2004 LIB	--	2004 CONS
Economic	39%	--	60%		44%	--	56%
Social	42%	--	56%		25%	--	73%
Foreign	23%	--	71%		45%	--	54%
For National Journal's complete 2004 Vote Ratings, as well as previous ratings dating back to 1995, please click here.

Key Votes Of The 108th Congress (More Info)
1. Drilling in ANWR Y 2. Approve Bush Tax Cuts Y 3. Medicare/Rx Bill Y 4. Bar Overtime Pay Regs. N 5. DC School Vouchers Y 6. Ban Human Cloning Y		7. Restrict Gun Liability Y  8. Ban Partial-Birth Abortion Y  9. Ban Same-Sex Marriage Y 10. Fund Iraq War Y 11. Bar Cuba Embargo Funds Y 12. Intelligence Reorg. Y

Election Results (More Info)
	Candidate	Total Votes	Percent	Expenditures
2004 general	John Shimkus (R)	213,451	69%	$544,784
	Tim Bagwell (D)	94,303	31%	$38,229
2004 primary	John Shimkus (R)	unopposed
2002 general	John Shimkus (R)	133,956	55%	$2,144,611
	David Phelps (D)	110,517	45%	$1,278,758
Prior winning percentages: 2000 (63%); 1998 (61%); 1996 (50%)

2004 Presidential Vote Bush (R) 192,678 (61%) Kerry (D) 123,172 (39%)

2000 Presidential Vote Bush (R) 164,541 (56%) Gore (D) 121,210 (41%)

For 1992 and 1996 presidential results in the Nineteenth District, please see the Almanac 2000 online. Please note that these older returns reflect district lines as they existed prior to 2002 redistricting.

• Cook Partisan Voting Index: R + 8
• District Size: 11,646 square miles
• Population in 2000: 653,647; 52.2% urban; 47.8% rural
• Median Household Income: $38,955; 9.1% are below the poverty line
• Occupation: 28.2% blue collar; 55.4% white collar; 16.4% gray collar; 14.4% military veterans
• Race/Ethnic Origin: 94.0% White, 3.5% Black, 0.5% Asian, 0.2% Amer. Indian, 0.0% Hawaiian, 0.7% Two+ races, 0.1% Other, 1.1% Hispanic origin
• Ancestry: 21.6% German, 8.8% USA, 8.6% Irish
• Click here for statewide demographic data.