RIP Congressman John B. Anderson...
John B. Anderson, an Illinois Republican who cultivated a free-thinking reputation during his 20 years in the U.S. House of Representatives, and who mounted a serious third-party bid for the White House in 1980, died Dec. 3 in Washington. He was 95. After entering Congress in 1961, Anderson spent many years in lock step with Republican Party orthodoxy and was a supporter of ultraconservative Sen. Barry Goldwater's presidential bid in 1964. B ut Anderson, who had voted against many of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society economic and social programs, gradually came to embrace them. As part of his incremental political evolution, he spoke of being deeply moved while attending funerals for civil rights activists. He began to travel more widely, seeing the effects of housing discrimination and racism. His signature legislative achievement came in April 1968, days after riots sparked by the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. tore through Washington. King'...