Former Oregon Sen. Bob Packwood Passes Away

In the end, none of it mattered.

Over two dozen women, both acquaintances and former employees, accused Packwood of making unwanted or uninvited sexual advances.

Two weeks after his reelection in 1992, the Washington Post published testimonies from accusers, bringing the accusations to the public’s attention.

By 1993, the Senate Ethics Committee had begun a formal investigation.

Packwood had left the chamber he had entered in 1968 as a 36-year-old upstart by September 1995.

Sen. Wayne L. Morse, a Democrat who had served in the Senate for 23 years, was narrowly defeated by Packwood in his first Senate contest.

Packwood, who was the great-grandson of a participant in the 1857 Oregon Constitutional Convention, established himself as a Republican who was prepared to take on members of his own party.