James Charles Slattery (born August 4, 1948) is an American politician. He served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 to 1995 representing Kansas's 2nd congressional district as a Democrat, was the Democratic nominee for governor in

1994 The year 1994 was designated as the " International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations. In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 days, omitti ...

and was the Democratic candidate for U.S. Senator in 2008.

Early life, education, and early career

After serving in the United States Army, Slattery earned a

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

(J.D.) from Washburn University School of Law in 1974. While at Washburn, he was a member of the Kansas Beta chapter of Phi Delta Theta. In 1982, Slattery was inducted into Washburn's prestigious Sagamore Society. Prior to his election to the Congress, Slattery served in the Kansas House of Representatives, as a reserve Army officer and founded a successful real estate company.

U.S. House of Representatives

Elections

;1982 Incumbent two term Republican Jim Jeffries of Kansas's 2nd congressional district decided to retire. Then-State Representative Slattery decided to run and defeated Republican nominee Morris Kay 57%-43%. ;1984 He won re-election to a second term against Jim Van Slyke with 60% of the vote, winning every county except

Clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolinite, ). Most pure clay minerals are white or light-coloured, but natural clays show a variety of colours from impuriti ...

. ;1986–1990 Over the next few years, he won re-election with no problem in 1986 (71%), 1988 (73%), and 1990 (63%)/ ;1992 After redistricting, he represented more counties in the southeastern part of the state. He defeated Jim Van Slyke 56%-41%. He performed strongly in the northern part of the district, but did poorly in the southern part, mostly new territory for Slattery. He lost two counties: Coffey and Linn while winning five counties with less than a 50% majority: Wilson, Woodson, Allen, Bourbon, and Franklin counties.

Tenure

Slattery served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 to 1995 in the

Kansas Kansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the west. Kansas is named a ...

delegation. He was a central player on many key issues, including environmental protection, health care, telecommunications, and budget cutting efforts. He worked to limit production of the B-2 bomber, and was the chief sponsor of the successful amendment to terminate spending on the Superconducting Super Collider in 1993. Slattery gained success as a Democrat in a relatively conservative congressional district, Kansas's 2nd congressional district. He considered running for governor in 1990 against incumbent Gov. Mike Hayden, an unpopular governor following changes in property tax law. Slattery decided not to run in 1990, however, and Joan Finney became the first female governor of Kansas. In 1993, Slattery orchestrated the House campaign that killed the Superconducting Super Collider. The SSC would have been about three times as powerful as

CERN The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN (; ; ), is an intergovernmental organization that operates the largest particle physics laboratory in the world. Established in 1954, it is based in Meyrin, western suburb of Gene ...

Large Hadron Collider The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle accelerator. It was built by the CERN, European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008, in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists, ...

, most notable for discovering a particle consistent with a

Higgs boson The Higgs boson, sometimes called the Higgs particle, is an elementary particle in the Standard Model of particle physics produced by the excited state, quantum excitation of the Higgs field, one of the field (physics), fields in particl ...

Committee assignments

Slattery served on the Energy & Commerce, Veterans' Affairs, Budget, and Banking Committees.

1994 gubernatorial election

Finney served one term as governor, and Slattery decided to run for the open governorship in 1994, stepping down from Congress. However, he faced Republican Bill Graves. Slattery lost that race, a victim of the Republican landslide of 1994.

Post-congressional career

Law career

Slattery lived in

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States between the East Coast of the United States ...

and was a partner in a Washington, D.C. law firm, Wiley Rein LLP after his defeat. In 2019, he left Wiley Rein, where he had worked for more than two decades, to start his own firm, Slattery Strategy. Jim Slattery has been practicing law since 1975 and has advised domestic and international clients who have matters pending before the U.S. Congress, federal agencies, and regulatory bodies. His extensive client list has included large publicly traded corporations and smaller family-controlled businesses. He has special experience in public policy matters related to health care, railroads, International trade, Ukraine, and Iran. Slattery maintains strong relations with senior Democratic leaders in the U.S. House and Senate. He has also done various consulting and pro bono work, including successfully advocating for the release of a

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

student who had been imprisoned in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

. His youngest son, Mike Slattery, lives in Mission, Kansas. Mike was elected to the Kansas State House in 2008, defeating his Republican opponent Ronnie Metzker. Mike edged out fellow Democrat Andy Sandler by three votes in a hotly contested primary.

2008 U.S. Senate campaign

Slattery declared his intention to run for the United States Senate in March 2008 against incumbent

Pat Roberts Charles Patrick Roberts (born April 20, 1936) is a retired American politician and journalist who served as a United States senator from Kansas from 1997 to 2021. A member of the Republican Party, Roberts served 8 terms in the U.S. House of R ...

, and officially announced his run in a statewide tour on April 29. Slattery was defeated by Roberts. The loss was the 25th consecutive setback for Democrats running for U.S. Senate seats from Kansas (24 regular elections plus a 1996 special election following the resignation of

Bob Dole Robert Joseph Dole (July 22, 1923 – December 5, 2021) was an American politician and attorney who represented Kansas in the United States Senate from 1969 to 1996. He was the Party leaders of the United States Senate, Republican Leader of th ...

). The state last elected a Democrat in 1932, George McGill, who lost his re-election bid in 1938.

Iran

In February 2015, Slattery claimed to have visited Iran in December 2014 from an invitation by the Iranian government where he attended the World Against Violence and Extremism conference making him the first American lawmaker to visit the country after the

Iranian Revolution The Iranian Revolution (, ), also known as the 1979 Revolution, or the Islamic Revolution of 1979 (, ) was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty in 1979. The revolution led to the replacement of the Impe ...

. He claimed to have met with then-President of Iran

Hassan Rouhani Hassan Rouhani (; born Hassan Fereydoun, 12 November 1948) is an Iranian peoples, Iranian politician who served as the seventh president of Iran from 2013 to 2021. He is also a sharia lawyer ("Wakil"), academic, former diplomat and Islamic cl ...

stating that Rouhani was "deeply committed to improving this relationship with the United States". The visit came at a time during negotiations leading to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. In 2019, Slattery assisted with the release of Xiyue Wang, a Princeton University student who was imprisoned in Iran from 2016 to 2019 after being accused of espionage.