Top 10 Contested Officeholders

In 1984, Frank McCloskey, former mayor of Bloomington, Indiana, ran to represent the state's 8th Congressional District. Running against Republican state representative Rick McIntyre, McCloskey was eventually declared the winner by 72 votes. A recount put McIntyre up by several hundred, but the Democrat-controlled U.S. House of Representatives refused to seat either until they had conducted their own recount. After the house delcared McCloskey a congressman by a single-digit margin, Republicans walked out of the chamber en masse. Newt Gingrich, a low-ranking congressman at the time, accused the Democratic leadership of blatant thuggery. Some cite the ill will arising from this exercise in partisanship on both sides as a contributing factor in the unyielding party-line system in Congress today.