Mack Mattingly

Infobox Senator | name=Mack Francis Mattingly


jr/sr=United States Senator
state=Georgia
party=Republican
term_start=January 5, 1981
term_end=January 3, 1987
preceded=Herman E. Talmadge
succeeded=W. Wyche Fowler, Jr.
date of birth=birth date and age| 1931|01|07
place of birth= Anderson, Indiana
dead=alive
date of death=
place of death=
spouse=(1) Carolyn Mattingly (1936-1997
(2)Leslie Davisson Mattingly
children=Jane, Anne
alma_mater=Indiana University

Mack Francis Mattingly served one term as a United States Senator from Georgia, the first Republican to serve in the U.S. Senate from that state since Reconstruction.

Mattingly was born in Anderson, Indiana on January 7, 1931. He served four years in the United States Air Force and was stationed at Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia in the early 1950s. In 1957, he earned a bachelor of science degree in Marketing from Indiana University. Afterwards, he worked twenty years for the IBM Corporation in Georgia, and later operated his own business, M's Inc., which sold office supplies and equipment in Brunswick, Georgia.

Mattingly first became active in the Georgia Republican Party, when he served as chairman of the 8th District Goldwater for President in 1964. He would become an unsuccessful candidate for the U.S. Congress, 8th District in 1966. By 1968, he would become a member of the Georgia Republican Party State Executive Committee and serve as vice-chair from 1968 until 1975. In 1975, he became chairman of the Georgia Republican Party, a position he held until 1977.

He achieved notoriety when he defeated longtime Georgia Democrat Herman Talmadge in the Ronald Reagan landslide of 1980. He served in the Senate from January 1981 until January 1987. He served on the Appropriations Committee, chairing first the Subcommittee on Legislative Branch Appropriations, and later the Subcommittee on Military Construction Appropriations. Mattingly also served at various times on the Senate Banking Committee, the Governmental Affairs Committee, the Joint Economic Committee and the Ethics Committee. He is perhaps best remembered as a proponent of the line-item veto, a position that earned him recognition by President Ronald Reagan during his 1985 State of the Union address.

In November 1986, Mattingly was defeated in his bid for re-election by Former Atlanta Congressman Wyche Fowler. In 1987, President Reagan appointed him Assistant Secretary General for Defense Support for NATO in Brussels, Belgium. In 1988, Mattingly received the Secretary of Defense medal for Outstanding Public Service. In 1992, President Bush appointed Mattingly Ambassador to the Republic of the Seychelles. He served in this position until 1993.

Mattingly ran against Democrat Zell Miller in the 2000 special election to replace the deceased Senator Paul Coverdell, but Miller succeeded in holding the seat to which he was appointed.

Mattingly married Carolyn Longcamp in 1957, and fathered two daughters, Jane and Anne. Carolyn Mattingly died in 1997. In 1998, he married Leslie Davisson.

Mattingly currently lives on St. Simons Island, Ga. He continues to be active in Republican politics, and he serves on a number of corporate boards. He recently endorsed Arizona Senator John McCain for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.