Raise a glass, Alaskans, for Rep. Young has outlasted the field

Get up, get up. Stand up and give Congressman Don Young a warm round of applause — even if you are a Democrat who would rather sleep in an abandoned building at 30 below than recognize the Gentleman From Fort Yukon.

Alaska's The Donald is now the senior member of the House of Representatives. He ascended to this pinnacle with the forced retirement of John Conyers of Michigan. Conyers had been a member of the House since 1965; Don entered in March 1973.

[Don Young just became the longest-serving member of Congress]

The senior member does not wear an ermine robe, twirl a bejeweled scepter, or sport a velveteen chapeau sewn with golden thread (a la Henry VIII). He probably doesn't even wear a bespoke suit. His haberdashery is typically off the rack. What sets him apart (some day there will be a her) is only longevity, which cannot be communicated by pomp and circumstance unless you are Queen Elizabeth.

For decades, the senior House member was distinguished by his proximity to power, usually the power of a committee chairman or ranking minority member. Don, despite membership in the majority, is no committee chairman. He was when younger – but times change and so do House rules, which now discourage chairmanships based exclusively on seniority.

Members of Congress have come and gone since Don was first sworn in almost 45 years ago. So have presidents, senators, cabinet secretaries and Supreme Court judges, not to mention newspaper columnists.

How did he do it? First of all he liked the job, wanted to keep the job. He worked hard to get re-elected, especially in the 1970s, when re-election was no sure thing and the Democratic Party was more powerful than it is today. At some point, Don gave up saying he was not a career politician. He liked campaigning, meeting people and, through lobbyists, labor unions and business organizations made sure he was well financed. Above all, he never crossed the oil companies.

Don liked the job so well that he rejected the path of one of his House predecessors, Howard Pollock, who returned to Alaska after two terms in Washington to run for governor. Nor did Don aspire to the Senate, which he never would have been able to reach in the '80s and '90s because fellow Republicans Ted Stevens and Frank Murkowski made themselves, for a long while, invincible.

Unlike congressmen in most states, Don never faced reapportionment. Alaska has had only one House member since statehood in 1959. Reapportionment can expand or diminish a candidate's electoral prospects – depending on who is drawing the map. Don never had to get red-faced with the reapportionment board chairman.

[Alaska Rep. Don Young files to run again in 2018]

Don was not a lawyer, so he did not have an interest in a judgeship, historically the goal of many congressmen. Nor was he interested in becoming a cabinet member – too much national scrutiny, too little security. Plus Don by temperament is a legislator, not an administrator. Cabinet secretaries appear before Congress to answer questions; Don wanted to ask questions (and occasionally rant at witnesses, especially environmentalists).

Don's popularity has been unstable over the years. At times, he has rung up the victory margins that make a lawmaker apparently unbeatable for life. But in several elections, he prevailed by a small margin, most recently in 2008 when Sean Parnell challenged him in the GOP primary.

In the 2016 general election, Don barely received 50 percent of the vote. Some voters thought he was too old, some were weary of his bragging and bombast, and some younger voters, apparently victims of defective parenting, had gone liberal and were never going to support a hoary conservative. But Don has a not-at-all-secret weapon that will prevent a Democrat from ever defeating him: his Republican affiliation, his party badge. If Don gets into dangerous waters, the shoals will be on the right.

Don, who appears to be in robust health, has a shot at one more longevity achievement if he is re-elected in 2018 and serves into the spring of 2019. He can become the longest-serving House Republican in history, surpassing Rep. Joe Cannon of Illinois (1836-1926), who served 46 years, including several terms as speaker during the Roosevelt years – Teddy, not Franklin. The all-time record for service in the House is held by Democrat John Dingell of Michigan (born 1926), who lasted 59 years and 21 days. Don, who served with Dingell, is never going to surpass his record.

Don's critics regularly remind us that Don was lucky – his opponent in the 1972 general election, incumbent Democrat Nick Begich, disappeared before Election Day while on a small-plane flight and was never found. Alaska voters elected the missing Begich – but Don was victorious in a special election a few months later after the seat was declared vacant.

Luck may account for the special election that sent him to Congress. It doesn't account for what he has achieved since then.

Here's a toast to Don Young. When I met him half a century ago, I had no clue the California farm boy would become a congressman into the next century. My imagination failed me. That's my fault, not his, and I will buy him a shot of Irish whisky to celebrate his longevity if I see him where the water of life is served.

Michael Carey is an Anchorage Daily News columnist. Email, mcarey@adn.com.

The views expressed here are the writer's and are not necessarily endorsed by the Anchorage Daily News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)adn.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@adn.com or click here to submit via any web browser.