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Last Updated June 22, 2005
West of Grand Island, Nebraska is wheat and livestock country. For miles on end you can see nothing but rolling brown fields, sectioned off here and there by barbed wire fences, and in the distance a grain elevator towering over a tiny town and its miniature railroad depot. The winds, rain and tornadoes that come suddenly out of the sky remind you that the original settlers likened this part of the country to an ocean and thought themselves in their wooden wagons almost as helpless as passengers at sea in a rowboat. Settlers passed through here on the Oregon Trail in the 1840s, then set down roots in the 1880s, but the rain they hoped for fell too unreliably, and wheatlands gave way to pasture and open range. It is a beautiful but hard land, exacting much from its people, as the novels of western Nebraska's Willa Cather make poignantly clear. Dozens of small counties today have fewer people than they did in 1940 or 1900. Although soaking rains in 2004 were helpful, severe droughts in recent years have seemed a kind of endpoint, as ranchers sold off their herds that were thinning and sickening as the grasslands turned dry and brown, and reservoirs and aquifers were running dry. In North Platte, Bailey Yard is the world's largest railroad classification yard, covering 2,850 acres and handling 10,000 rail cars every 24 hours. Farther west on I-80 is the town of Sidney, home of Cabela's, the world's largest mail-order and Internet business for hunting, fishing and camping gear. The 3d Congressional District of Nebraska has one-third of the state's people spread out over nearly 85% of its acreage. Except along the interstate and around Scottsbluff, the 3d has been losing population for decades and several of the western ranching counties are among the poorest in the nation; one such is Loup County, in the center of the state, which has the nation's lowest per capita income. The district includes 69 of Nebraska's 93 counties, and has moved so far east that it's on the outskirts of Lincoln. Still, it remains one of the nation's top-ranked ag districts, with more farms than all but one other congressional district and more cattle and calves than any other place in the nation. Geographically and politically, the 3d District is where the Midwest becomes the West. For years people here welcomed farm subsidies even as they angrily opposed federal interference. Politically, it is heavily Republican and sometimes ornery: In 1992 Ross Perot got more votes than Bill Clinton. It voted 71% for George W. Bush in 2000 and 75% in 2004. The congressman from the 3d District is Tom Osborne, a Republican first elected in 2000, a man who had never run for office before but who was better known than most congressmen are after serving 20 years. He grew up in Hastings and excelled at basketball, football and track in high school and at Hastings College. He graduated in 1959 and played professional football for three years in Washington and San Francisco. Then he went to the University of Nebraska to work as a graduate assistant in the football program. He stayed for 36 years, working first under coach Bob Devaney, then becoming NU coach himself in 1973; he also got a master's degree and doctorate in educational psychology. He was head football coach for 25 years, at first compared unfavorably to Devaney, but over the whole period exceedingly successful. He won three national championships before retiring in 1998; he had perfect seasons in 1994, 1995 and 1997. His team was 87-11-1 in the 1990s and 60-3 over his last five years. After retiring he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1999; the three-year waiting period was waived for only the second time. Months after Congressman Bill Barrett announced that he was retiring, Osborne announced he was running. He had been urged to run for the Senate seat being vacated by Bob Kerrey, but declined; he said he did not want to commit to serve the six-year term. From the beginning, it was apparent that Osborne would win. Nevertheless, he campaigned hard. He traveled 60,000 miles and made more than 650 scheduled stops during the campaign; he often drove alone hundreds of miles to events to save the cost of paying a staffer to drive. At first he was uncomfortable shaking hands and asking for votes, but enjoyed talking to people in small groups; Nebraskans were delighted to meet him. He won the primary with 71% of the vote. His Democratic opponent, Rollie Reynolds, was a distant relative who called Osborne "my hero" and "everybody's hero." This was a positive campaign all around, with Osborne refusing to take PAC money; at 63, he won 82%-16%. In the House, his voting record was in the middle of Republicans, though a bit dovish on defense issues. He tends to local issues with seats on the Agriculture, Education and Workforce, and Transportation and Infrastructure Committees. Although he voted for it, he was less than enthusiastic about the new farm bill, which he called too complicated but the best that could be done; he obtained additional ag research dollars for Nebraska. With Democrat Leonard Boswell, he sponsored a National Animal Identification System to safeguard the nation's beef supply; he urged caution in resuming cattle imports from Canada because of its problems with mad cow disease. To promote rural development, he encouraged a revival of pheasant hunting in Nebraska. Based on his coaching experience, he sponsored with Bart Gordon a bill to regulate "unscrupulous" sports agents by restricting when they may contact student-athletes; that bill passed in September 2004. Osborne filed a bill to require the attorney general to list steroid precursors and other performance-enhancing drugs as controlled substances, which would make over-the-counter sales illegal; in October 2004, Bush signed that bill. Osborne said that he was "pleasantly surprised" by his ability to pass legislation; but he confessed frustration with the slow pace of activity, the partisanship, and lack of discipline in the House, complaining that some things never seem to get done. His new crusade: Stop beer advertising during the broadcast of college sports events. Osborne was reelected with 93% of the vote in 2002 and 87% in 2004. In December 2004, eight days after Governor Mike Johanns was nominated secretary of agriculture, Osborne said he would not run against Senator Ben Nelson in 2006. In April 2005, he announced he would run for governor instead, setting up a primary challenge in 2006 with Governor Dave Heineman, who succeeded to the office when Johanns resigned. Not long after Osborne's announcement, a crowded Republican field began to take shape in the 3d; Democrats are unlikely to be competitive in this open seat race.
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