Malcolm Wallop, American politician, United States Senator from Wyoming (1977–1995), died he was 78.

Malcolm Wallop was a Republican politician and former three-term United States Senator from Wyoming  died he was 78..

(February 27, 1933 – September 14, 2011^[1]) 

Early years

Wallop was born in New York City, graduated from the Cate School in Santa Barbara, California, and attended Yale University, where he was a member of St. Anthony Hall. His roots in Wyoming stemmed back to pioneer ancestors in Big Horn.^{[citation needed]} After his graduation from Yale in 1954, Wallop served in the U.S. Army as a first lieutenant from 1955 to 1957. He worked for a decade as a cattle rancher and small businessman, having entered politics in 1969 as a successful candidate for the Wyoming House of Representatives. He served two terms, followed by a stint in the Wyoming State Senate from 1973 to 1976. In 1974, Wallop sought the Republican gubernatorial nomination but was defeated by Richard R. "Dick" Jones, a trucking executive from Cody and Powell in Park County in northwestern Wyoming. Jones went on to lose the general election in a heavily Democratic year to Edgar Herschler of Kemmerer in Lincoln County in southwestern Wyoming.
In 1976, in another nationally Democratic year, Wallop unseated three-term Democratic U.S. Senator Gale W. McGee by a margin of nearly 10 points in a rare bright spot for Republicans that year.

Marriages

Wallop was married four times:^[2]

• Vail Stebbins (1956–65; divorced); (three sons and one daughter)
• Judith Warren (1967–1981; divorced)
• French Carter Gamble Goodwyn (1984–2001)
• Isabel Thompson (2005–2011)

Senate service

In his first term, Wallop authored the legislation that established the Congressional Award program to recognize outstanding volunteerism among America's youth. The 1977 Wallop Amendment to the Surface Mining Control Act was hailed by property rights advocates for forcing the federal government to compensate property owners whose ability to mine was undercut by regulation. Three years later, Wallop successfully amended the Clean Water Act to protect states' interests.^{[citation needed]}
His bill to cut inheritance and gift taxes in 1981 was a key component of President Ronald Reagan's tax reform package and is remembered as one of the most substantive changes to tax policy that decade. Four years earlier, Wallop was partially responsible for phasing out President Jimmy Carter's Windfall Profits Tax. In 1982, he was re-elected by a 14-point margin over Democrat Rodger McDaniel, a Wyoming state legislator. Six years later, Wallop won his final term by earning just 1,322 more votes than another state senator, Democrat John Vinich.^{[citation needed]}
Wallop's later career was characterized largely by his participation in the foreign policy and trade debates of the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was a member of the Helsinki Commission and travelled extensively in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union as an arms control negotiator. Wallop was also a strong advocate of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and U.S. participation in the World Trade Organization. From 1990-94, he was the top Republican member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. In 1992, Wallop was a key force behind passage of the far-reaching Energy Policy Act.^{[citation needed]}
In 1994, Wallop opted out of a race for a fourth term. He was succeeded by Republican Craig Thomas.

Post-senate career

Immediately upon his retirement from the Senate in January 1995, Wallop founded the Frontiers of Freedom Institute, a Virginia-based non-profit group that lobbies for constitutionally limited government and a strong national defense.^[3] George Landrith is the current president of the Institute, a position he has held since 1998. One of the Institute's early staffers was Myron Ebell.^[4]
In 1996, Wallop served as General Chairman of the Steve Forbes presidential campaign.^[3] Wallop died after a protracted period of illness in Big Horn, Wyoming. He was 78.

Aristocratic connections

Malcolm Wallop was the second son of Jean Wallop and the Hon. Oliver Malcolm Wallop, son of Rt. Hon. Oliver Henry Wallop, 8th Earl of Portsmouth, making him a first cousin, once removed, of the current Earl of Portsmouth.^[5] As a result he was in remainder to the Earldom and subsidiary titles. His sister, Jean, is the current dowager Countess of Carnarvon, having married Henry Herbert, 7th Earl of Carnarvon in 1956; he was Queen Elizabeth II's horse racing manager.^[6] Senator Wallop was therefore an uncle of the current Earl of Carnarvon. Among his cousins are the present Earl Cadogan and the Marquess of Abergavenny.^[7]

Works by Malcolm Wallop

Wallop, Malcolm. "The Environment: Air, Water & Public Lands," In A Changing America: Conservatives View the 80s from the United States Senate, edited by Paul Laxalt and Richard S. Williamson, pp. 133–56. South Bend, Ind.: Regnery/Gateway, 1980.
Wallop, Malcolm, and Angelo Codevilla. The Arms Control Delusion. San Francisco: ICS Press, 1987.

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