Thomas Hodge "Tom" Allen (born April 16, 1945) is a former member of the United States House of Representatives

United States House of Representatives

The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

 representing , and the Democrat

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

ic nominee for the U.S. Senate

United States Senate

The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...

 in 2008 against Republican incumbent Senator Susan Collins

Susan Collins

Susan Margaret Collins is the junior United States Senator from Maine and a member of the Republican Party. First elected to the Senate in 1996, she is the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs...

. Allen lost to Collins (61.5% to 38.5%).

Allen was first elected in 1996

United States House elections, 1996

The U.S. House election, 1996 was an election for the U.S. House of Representatives on November 5, 1996, which coincided with the re-election of Bill Clinton as President of the United States. Clinton's Democratic Party won a net of nine seats from the Republican Party, but the Republicans...

, defeating Republican incumbent James Longley, Jr. with 55 percent of votes cast to Longley's 45 percent. Allen was re-elected five times, receiving over 55 percent of the vote each time in his district, until his defeat in his 2008 run for the U.S. Senate. After, Allen was appointed president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers

Association of American Publishers

The Association of American Publishers is the national trade association of the American book publishing industry. AAP has more than 300 members, including most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and scholarly...

 external link and began his term on May 1, 2009.

Early life

Allen was born in Portland, Maine

Portland, Maine

Portland is the largest city in Maine and is the county seat of Cumberland County. The 2010 city population was 66,194, growing 3 percent since the census of 2000...

 to Genevieve (“Sukey”) Lahee and Charles W. Allen. He graduated from Deering High School

Deering High School

Deering High School is a public high school in Portland, Maine which educates grades 9–12. The school is part of the Portland Public Schools district. It is named after the Deering Center neighborhood it serves...

. He went on to Bowdoin College

Bowdoin College

Bowdoin College , founded in 1794, is an elite private liberal arts college located in the coastal Maine town of Brunswick, Maine. As of 2011, U.S. News and World Report ranks Bowdoin 6th among liberal arts colleges in the United States. At times, it was ranked as high as 4th in the country. It is...

 in Brunswick, Maine

Brunswick, Maine

Brunswick is a town in Cumberland County, Maine, United States. The population was 20,278 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Portland-South Portland-Biddeford metropolitan area. Brunswick is home to Bowdoin College, the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, the Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum, , and the...

 before winning a Rhodes Scholarship

Rhodes Scholarship

The Rhodes Scholarship, named after Cecil Rhodes, is an international postgraduate award for study at the University of Oxford. It was the first large-scale programme of international scholarships, and is widely considered the "world's most prestigious scholarship" by many public sources such as...

 to Wadham College

Wadham College, Oxford

Wadham College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, located at the southern end of Parks Road in central Oxford. It was founded by Nicholas and Dorothy Wadham, wealthy Somerset landowners, during the reign of King James I...

 in the University of Oxford

University of Oxford

The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

. During this time he became friends with fellow Rhodes scholar Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

. After Oxford he went on to Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School

Harvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...

 and practiced as a lawyer.

Early political career

He entered the field of politics when he became a staff member for Governor Kenneth M. Curtis

Kenneth M. Curtis

Kenneth Merwin Curtis is an American lawyer and former politician. He is currently a principal in the law firm of Curtis Thaxter Stevens Broder & Micoleau Limited Liability Company, P.A....

 and later for Senator Edmund S. Muskie. Allen was elected to the city council of Portland, Maine

Portland, Maine

Portland is the largest city in Maine and is the county seat of Cumberland County. The 2010 city population was 66,194, growing 3 percent since the census of 2000...

 in 1989 and served as the city's mayor between 1991-1992 before winning election to the House.

Tenure

Allen fought Republican efforts to weaken environmental rollbacks between 1996 and 2007. Allen called for a pay-as-you-go system that would require offsets to pay for new tax cuts and new spending while on the Budget Committee, much like the system Democrats enacted in their first 100 hours of Congressional control in the 110th Congress.

Allen has made health care, campaign finance reform, and small business his legislative priorities.

Committees

• House Energy and Commerce Committee
  • Subcommittee on Health
  • Energy and Air Quality Subcommittee
  • Environment and Hazardous Materials Subcommittee
• House Budget Committee
• House Affordable Medicines Task Force (Co-Chairman)
• House Oceans Caucus

Election history

! Year
! Office
! Winner
! Party
! Votes
! %
! Opponent
! Party
! Votes
! %
! Opponent
! Party
! Votes
! %
|-
| 1996
| rowspan=6 |
| rowspan=6 nowrap |Tom Allen
| rowspan=6 | Dem.

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

| | 173,745
| | 55.32
| | Jim Longley Jr.

James B. Longley, Jr.

James B. "Jim" Longley, Jr. is a former member of the U.S. House of Representatives. He is a Republican politician from Maine....

 (Inc.)
| rowspan=6 | Rep.

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

| | 140,354
| | 44.68
|colspan=4|
|-
| 1998
| | 134,336
| | 60.33
| | Ross Connelly
| | 79,160
| | 35.55
| | Eric Greiner
| | Ind.

Independent (politician)

In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do...

| | 9,182
| | 4.12
|-
| 2000
| | 202,823
| | 59.81
| | Jane Amero
| | 123,915
| | 36.54
| | J. Frederic Staples
| | Lib.

Libertarian Party (United States)

The Libertarian Party is the third largest and fastest growing political party in the United States. The political platform of the Libertarian Party reflects its brand of libertarianism, favoring minimally regulated, laissez-faire markets, strong civil liberties, minimally regulated migration...

| | 12,356
| | 3.64
|-
| 2002
| | 172,646
| | 63.81
| | Steven Joyce

Steven Joyce

Steven Leonard Joyce is a New Zealand politician, who entered the New Zealand House of Representatives in 2008 as a member of the New Zealand National Party...

| | 97,931
| | 36.19
|colspan=4|
|-
| 2004
| | 219,077
| | 59.74
| | Charles E. Summers, Jr.

Charles E. Summers, Jr.

Charles E. "Charlie" Summers, Jr. is a Maine politician and the Secretary of State of Maine. He is also a small businessperson and veteran of Iraq War. He was the Republican candidate for United States Congress in Maine's 1st congressional district several times, including a 2008 defeat to Chellie...

| | 147,663
| | 40.26
|colspan=4|
|-
| 2006
| | 168,709
| | 60.67
| | Darlene Curley
| | 87,589
| | 31.50
| | Dexter Kamilewicz
| | Ind.

Independent (politician)

In politics, an independent or non-party politician is an individual not affiliated to any political party. Independents may hold a centrist viewpoint between those of major political parties, a viewpoint more extreme than any major party, or they may have a viewpoint based on issues that they do...

| | 21,792
| | 7.84

External links

• Profile at SourceWatch
  SourceWatch
  SourceWatch is an internet wiki site that is a collaborative project of the liberal Center for Media and Democracy...
  
   Congresspedia
  Congresspedia
  Congresspedia was a wiki that ran from April 2006 to March 2009, designed to hold information on the workings of the U.S. Congress. It was fully contained within SourceWatch, a larger wiki meant to document the people, organizations and issues shaping the public agenda. The Congresspedia portion of...
  
  
• Rep. Tom Allen at PoliticalBase.com