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| 1 | SENATE RESOLUTION
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| 2 | WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois Senate are saddened | ||||||
| 3 | to learn of the death of former Illinois State Senator and | ||||||
| 4 | United States Congressman Harris Walter Fawell, who passed | ||||||
| 5 | away on November 11, 2021; and
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| 6 | WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was born in West Chicago; his | ||||||
| 7 | father, Walter Fawell, served at one time as West Chicago's | ||||||
| 8 | mayor; he grew up on a horse farm and graduated from West | ||||||
| 9 | Chicago Community High School; he then earned a bachelor's | ||||||
| 10 | degree from North Central College in Naperville in 1949; and
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| 11 | WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was a gifted baseball player | ||||||
| 12 | and earned a brief stint during college with a Detroit Tigers | ||||||
| 13 | minor league affiliate in Greenville, South Carolina; while he | ||||||
| 14 | was in high school, he and two of his brothers were members of | ||||||
| 15 | the 1946 Fox Valley League championship baseball team from | ||||||
| 16 | West Chicago, coached by their father; and | ||||||
| 17 | WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell earned a law degree from the | ||||||
| 18 | Kent College of Law in 1952; his first professional jobs were | ||||||
| 19 | as an assistant state's attorney in DuPage County and then in | ||||||
| 20 | private legal practice; he then served from 1963 until 1977 as | ||||||
| 21 | a Republican in the Illinois Senate, where he became known as a | ||||||
| 22 | champion of local parks and sponsored legislation providing | ||||||
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| 1 | parks for special needs children and adults throughout the | ||||||
| 2 | State; and | ||||||
| 3 | WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was known for his fiscal | ||||||
| 4 | conservatism, which included leading a bipartisan | ||||||
| 5 | "Porkbusters' Coalition" in Congress that decried excessive | ||||||
| 6 | government spending on legislators' pet projects; he prepared | ||||||
| 7 | and worked tirelessly for every vote; he was very patriotic | ||||||
| 8 | about his country and was willing to diverge from his party | ||||||
| 9 | when he saw the need; he was opposed to wasteful spending and | ||||||
| 10 | was willing to meet any opponent to represent the taxpayers, | ||||||
| 11 | which would occasionally antagonize people in his own party; | ||||||
| 12 | and | ||||||
| 13 | WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell led the initiative to require | ||||||
| 14 | developers to donate parkland in communities, which did not | ||||||
| 15 | become law but resulted in Naperville's City Council enacting | ||||||
| 16 | a law requiring developers to donate land or cash to the city's | ||||||
| 17 | park district; he was one of only two Republican state | ||||||
| 18 | senators to help support fair housing legislation in the 1960s | ||||||
| 19 | and also is credited with having rewritten much of Illinois' | ||||||
| 20 | property tax code while a state senator in the late 1960s; and
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| 21 | WHEREAS, At the time of his passing, Congressman Fawell | ||||||
| 22 | had been married to his wife Ruth for 69 years and had been a | ||||||
| 23 | resident of Naperville for more than 50 years; therefore, be | ||||||
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| 1 | it
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| 2 | RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE ONE HUNDRED SECOND GENERAL | ||||||
| 3 | ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we mourn the passing of | ||||||
| 4 | former Illinois State Senator and United States Congressman | ||||||
| 5 | Harris Walter Fawell and extend our sincere condolences to his | ||||||
| 6 | family, friends, and all who knew and loved him; and be it | ||||||
| 7 | further
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| 8 | RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be | ||||||
| 9 | presented to the family of Congressman Fawell as an expression | ||||||
| 10 | of our deepest sympathy.
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