EAST MARLBOROUGH >> For Congressman Joe Pitts, his political career began simply with some cardboard posters and a couple of two-by-fours. That’s how he recalled his first successful campaign to fill the about-to-be-vacated 158th seat in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives in 1972.
He was not the endorsed Republican candidate, but some friends convinced him to run. So this science-math teacher got busy.
“I didn’t know anything about politics, but I thought about ways to get my name out. I bought some two-by-fours, and nailed them together. On one I posted a sign that said, ‘Elect Pitts on April 25.’ The next one said, ‘Stop here to meet Pitts,’ and stood by the side of roads throughout the district. . . I also knocked on a lot of doors,” he said.
He was told later that people figured if he was dedicated enough to stand out there in all weather, he deserved the votes. And he got the votes by a margin of eight over rival Russell Jones in the primary.
With that victory in the largely Republican district, he began a career in the state House and the U.S. House of Representatives that lasted 44 years: 12 terms in the state House and 10 in the U.S. House.
But on Jan. 3, 2017, as a new U.S. representative for the 16th District is sworn in, he’s saying goodbye to that job and moving on to a new phase of his life.
He’s not going away mad or tired either, he said. In fact, he’s happy not to have to raise money anymore. Additionally, he’s in good health, he’s proud of his accomplishments, he has some new opportunities, and he wants to have more time to play with his grandchildren, whom he adores.
Looking back at his time in the Pennsylvania House, he said in his last eight years there as head of the Appropriations Committee, they passed eight budgets in a row without raising taxes. And that was very satisfying to him.
He also has great memories of spearheading the artistic restoration of the state Capitol building in 1981.
An artist himself, he helped dig up old historic relics that had been sitting around, and he got them sorted out, cleaned up and respectfully displayed. Even today in his Willowdale office, he has hanging on the wall a primitive Pennsylvania flag which had been tucked carelessly away. He’s had it cleaned up, remounted and framed.
In that connection, art in all media has always been his passion, from the time he built his family home in Unionville from the ground up, through his Sunday afternoons spent with painting and sculpture, to the show he curated in Washington, D.C., of stamp designs sketched by President Franklin Roosevelt.
He moved on to the U.S. Congress after 10-term Republican U.S. Rep. Bob Walker decided to retire in 1996. He won the primary race with 45 percent of the vote and then defeated Democrat James G. Blaine in the November election.
He spoke about his initial day driving to Washington to begin the first of his 10 terms there.
“I drove into that beautiful city with all the memorials – the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial and the White House – never imagining that I would someday have to vote on a war or impeaching the president.”
Pitts, 76, is widely known for his conservative stances on national and local issues, and he acknowledges that he has had disagreements with his congressional colleagues “on the other side of the aisle.”
He’s not bitter about his battles, however. He said he has worked on many bipartisan issues with success. And as for his constituents back home who disagree with him, he says he is not afraid to say forthrightly what he believes, but it is important to him to let those people know he is listening to them and has heard them. That includes voices from a demographically varied constituency that ranges from Quakers to Amish, and farmers in Lancaster to large industrial businesses in Chester and Berks counties.
Currently, as chairman of the House Health Subcommittee, he is working on several bipartisan issues that include speeding up the approval of drugs that have proved useful, curbing drug use in the horse racing industry and dealing with preparation for pandemics.
As far as emotional experiences are concerned, one thing Pitts will never forget is the day America was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001.
“I was at breakfast and a lady came in and said that a plane had hit one of the Twin Towers. I thought that was odd, but an accident.
“Then we heard ‘another plane’ and we said, ‘uh oh, we are under attack.'”
Then as he drove to the Capitol he saw black smoke coming from the Pentagon and heard about the plane crash in Pennsylvania.
“It was an act of war. ….When we got there, they told us to send our staff home, and then they told us to just go away,” he said.
There was such chaos in the city, it took him an hour to get home when usually it was only a 15-minute ride. He remembers looking out his window from his apartment and seeing the flag at the Capitol at half-mast, and the feelings it conjured up inside of him.
Pitts as congressman will always be remembered for the alliances and friendships he formed with small countries throughout the world – places like Pakistan, Burma, Western Samoa, Mongolia and Indonesia. He hosted the ambassadors in his rural Pennsylvania region and he made efforts to help them when they needed things like medical supplies, emergency relief and fire trucks. One time he even rode a yak in a Central Asian country.
“I can do more with five minutes on the phone now (with those ambassadors) than lobbyists can do in months,” he said.
Pitts is looking forward to his time back home in Unionville running “grandparent camp” and spending time with his adult children.
But he has another opportunity that has him excited: His alma mater, Asbury University in Kentucky (where he met his wife, Ginny), is setting up an academic center in his name, and they have called upon him to occupy an office for doing seminars and lectures on government. It will mean he is there three or four days a month, or maybe more.
Through this program, he said, the university will be able to offer its students firsthand knowledge of how the nation operates.
In the meantime, he said he will work until his last weeks to assure that drugs that have proven effective for medical conditions make their way through the bureaucracy for approval faster.
Pitts concluded, “It’s a wonderful honor to represent the people of (Pennsylvania’s) 16th District.”
