Tillie Fowler, whose roots in Florida politics ran deep, rose
to become one of the highest-ranking Republican women in
the House. Representative Fowler served on the influential
Armed Services Committee, a key assignment since her
district encompassed the Jacksonville naval facilities, before
honoring a pledge to retire after four terms.
Tillie Kidd was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on December
23, 1942, daughter of Culver and Katherine Kidd. She was
raised in a politically active family; her father served for
more than 40 years in the Georgia state legislature. Kidd
received an AB in political science from Emory University
in 1964 and a JD from the Emory University School of Law
in 1967; she was admitted to the bar that year. She moved
to Washington, DC, to work as a legislative assistant to
Representative Robert Grier Stephens Jr. of Georgia from
1967 to 1970. In 1968 she married L. Buck Fowler, and
the couple lived in Washington as Tillie Fowler accepted
a position as a counsel in the Richard M. Nixon White
House Office of Consumer Affairs from 1970 to 1971. The
Fowlers moved to Jacksonville in 1971, where they raised
two daughters: Tillie Anne and Elizabeth. After more than a
decade as a mother and housewife, Tillie Fowler re-entered
politics. She was elected to the Jacksonville city council and served from 1985 to 1992 as its first female and, later, as its
first Republican president in 1989 to 1990. She also served
as chair of the Duval County tourism development council
from 1989 to 1990 and chair of the Florida Endowment for
the Humanities from 1989 to 1991.1
In 1992, when Democrat Charles Edward Bennett, a
22-term Representative, announced his retirement from the
House, Fowler entered the race for the northeast Florida
seat, which encompassed Jacksonville and portions of St.
Johns and Duval counties. Her opponent in the general
election was Mattox Hair, a prominent state legislator. With
a well-financed campaign that focused on congressional
reform and term limits, Fowler won with 56 percent of the
vote.2
She ran unopposed in the succeeding three elections.
When she entered the 103rd Congress (1993–1995), Fowler
was appointed to the Armed Services Committee and the
Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
Fowler soon earned a reputation as a moderate
conservative who supported budgetary restraint but
approved of federal funding of abortions in rape cases, an
increase in the minimum wage, and federal funds for the
National Endowment for the Humanities. Fowler advocated
an overhaul of the welfare system, which she described as “anti-family” in 1993. She also championed increased
federal funding for women’s health care and cancer research.
Having first been elected to Congress in the “Year of the
Woman,” Fowler believed that women would have a unique
impact on the institution but cautioned that most problems
could not be solved through the lens of gender. “I think as
mothers, home-workers, as people who usually had to juggle
a lot of different priorities, we get pretty good at that. I
think we bring a different view to issues such as child care,”
Fowler said at the time. “But I also don’t believe that there
is any one set of issues that is just women’s issues because
I think women’s perspective is needed in defense; that’s
one of the reasons I wanted to be on the Armed Services
Committee. I think women are all concerned with defense
issues and I think our perspective is needed there.”3
On the Armed Services Committee, Fowler became a
regular critic of the William J. (Bill) Clinton administration’s
defense budgets and foreign policy during the 1990s. As
defense budgets were trimmed in the post-Cold War years,
Fowler maintained that the cuts were so deep that they
affected the military’s core capabilities. Much of her concern
came as a Representative with a heavy naval presence in her
district, including the Mayport Naval Station and facilities
in Jacksonville. She pointed out that defense cuts occurred
at a time when the military’s mission had been expanded
into peacekeeping and humanitarian causes. Fowler also
dissented from the Clinton administration’s policy in the
Balkans. She twice visited American troops in the region,
praising their work but criticizing the open-ended goals of
Washington policymakers who, she said, were attempting
an experiment in “nation-building.”4
A longtime opponent
of deploying American troops to Bosnia, Fowler nonetheless
did not underestimate the significance of U.S. relations with
the Balkan nation. “I have supported the involvement of our
sea and air forces, our intelligence and logistics assets, and
our most diligent diplomatic efforts,” she commented. “But
I have never felt that our interests were so vital that they
warranted putting our ground troops at risk.”5
Fowler rose quickly through the ranks of the Republican
Party. She served as a Deputy Whip in the 105th Congress
(1997–1999). In the 106th Congress (1999–2001) she won
election as vice chair of the GOP Conference, the fifth-ranking Republican position in the House. It made her the
highest-ranking woman in the party. During that Congress
she also rose to chair the Transportation Subcommittee on
Investigations and Emergency Management.
Fulfilling her 1992 campaign pledge to retire after four
terms, Fowler did not seek re-election to the 107th Congress
(2001–2003). At the time, the move was widely praised
as a highly ethical decision, in no small measure because
Fowler made it despite her high profile in the Republican
leadership. “I take great pride in the fact that we not only
changed Congress, but we changed America,” Fowler said
upon announcing her retirement.6
In 2001 Fowler joined a Washington, DC-based law
firm. In May 2004, Secretary of Defense Donald Henry
Rumsfeld appointed Fowler as one of four members of an
independent panel to investigate abuse of Iraqi prisoners of
war. The panel recommended a sweeping overhaul of the
U.S. military’s procedures for the handling of prisoners.
On February 28, 2005, Fowler suffered a brain hemorrhage
while in Jacksonville. She died two days later on March 2.7
[ Top ]
