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1
SENATE RESOLUTION

 
2    WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois Senate are saddened
3to learn of the death of former Illinois State Senator and
4United States Congressman Harris Walter Fawell, who passed
5away on November 11, 2021; and
 
6    WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was born in West Chicago; his
7father, Walter Fawell, served at one time as West Chicago's
8mayor; he grew up on a horse farm and graduated from West
9Chicago Community High School; he then earned a bachelor's
10degree from North Central College in Naperville in 1949; and
 
11    WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was a gifted baseball player
12and earned a brief stint during college with a Detroit Tigers
13minor league affiliate in Greenville, South Carolina; while he
14was in high school, he and two of his brothers were members of
15the 1946 Fox Valley League championship baseball team from
16West Chicago, coached by their father; and
 
17    WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell earned a law degree from the
18Kent College of Law in 1952; his first professional jobs were
19as an assistant state's attorney in DuPage County and then in
20private legal practice; he then served from 1963 until 1977 as
21a Republican in the Illinois Senate, where he became known as a
22champion of local parks and sponsored legislation providing

 

 

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1parks for special needs children and adults throughout the
2State; and
 
3    WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell was known for his fiscal
4conservatism, which included leading a bipartisan
5"Porkbusters' Coalition" in Congress that decried excessive
6government spending on legislators' pet projects; he prepared
7and worked tirelessly for every vote; he was very patriotic
8about his country and was willing to diverge from his party
9when he saw the need; he was opposed to wasteful spending and
10was willing to meet any opponent to represent the taxpayers,
11which would occasionally antagonize people in his own party;
12and
 
13    WHEREAS, Congressman Fawell led the initiative to require
14developers to donate parkland in communities, which did not
15become law but resulted in Naperville's City Council enacting
16a law requiring developers to donate land or cash to the city's
17park district; he was one of only two Republican state
18senators to help support fair housing legislation in the 1960s
19and also is credited with having rewritten much of Illinois'
20property tax code while a state senator in the late 1960s; and
 
21    WHEREAS, At the time of his passing, Congressman Fawell
22had been married to his wife Ruth for 69 years and had been a
23resident of Naperville for more than 50 years; therefore, be

 

 

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1it
 
2    RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE ONE HUNDRED SECOND GENERAL
3ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we mourn the passing of
4former Illinois State Senator and United States Congressman
5Harris Walter Fawell and extend our sincere condolences to his
6family, friends, and all who knew and loved him; and be it
7further
 
8    RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
9presented to the family of Congressman Fawell as an expression
10of our deepest sympathy.