CHICAGO — Dan Rostenkow ski, an old-style Chicago ward boss who became one of the nation’s most powerful legislators during the Reagan era before a stunning fall to corruption charges that left him branded a political anachronism, died Wednesday.
Rostenkowski, 82, was suffering from cancer and had been spending most of his time at his summer home in Powers Lake, Wis. He died there Wednesday morning, according to members of the Illinois congressional delegation. He served in the U.S. House from 1959 to 1995.
A longtime Democratic committeeman for Chicago’s 32nd Ward, Rostenkowski was a classic meat-and-potatoes politician whose blunt and plain-spoken approach charmed both Washington elites and his Polish neighbors.
A protege of the late Mayor Richard J. Daley, he was known for years as Daley’s man in Washington, focusing on parochial projects good for Chicago. But he took on national stature as a leader of the loyal opposition during Ronald Reagan’s presidency.
His seniority in the House earned him the chairmanship of the powerful Ways and Means Committee in 1981. He held the post until 1994, when he was unseated by an upstart Republican just months after being indicted in a wide-ranging case accusing him of everything from accepting kickbacks to maintaining slush funds.
He pleaded guilty to mail fraud in 1996 and served 15 months in prison. He always insisted he was innocent, and his official record was wiped clean in 2000 when he was pardoned by President Bill Clinton.
His rise from the humble 32nd Ward to the heights of Capitol Hill and his rapid, ignominious fall is a classic Chicago political tale.
The grandson of Polish immigrants, he grew up above his mother’s tavern on Evergreen Street, and his life in the city was rooted around St. Stanislaus Kostka Catholic Church.
After an Army hitch in Korea, he had a tryout with the Philadelphia Athletics baseball team, but politics was his birthright. His grandfather was active in Polish fraternal organizations and made a name in Democratic politics. His father, Joe, was alderman of the 32rd Ward and also served in the Illinois legislature.
When Dan Rostenkowski was 23, he was elected to his father’s old seat in the legislature.
He was off to Congress at 31.
His political muscle as an entrenched member of the city’s Democratic machine won him 18 terms to Congress.
In a 1998 radio appearance, he ruefully acknowledged the implications of how his political career came to an end.
“With all the legislation that I passed, with all the history that I’ve written with respect to the economics of the country, they’re always going to say there’s a felon named Danny Rostenkowski,” he said. “That’s going to be the obituary.”
