KBA Honors Senator Robert J. Dole with the Courageous Attorney Award

Topeka, Kansas (June 21, 2019) During its Annual Meeting at the Maner Conference Center, the Kansas Bar Association honored attorney Senator Robert J. Dole with the Courageous Attorney Award. This award is given to a lawyer who has displayed exceptional courage in the face of adversity.

Senator Bob Dole serves as special counsel in Alston & Bird’s Legislative & Public Policy Group in the Washington, D.C. office. The 1996 Republican nominee for president and former U.S. Senate majority leader is one of the most sought-after advisers in the public policy arena.

A renowned statesman who spent 35 and a half years in Congress, Dole was first elected to Congress as a U.S. Representative from his home state of Kansas in 1960 and then to the U.S. Senate in 1968. He gained national prominence as chairman of the Republican National Committee from 1971 to 1973. In 1976, President Gerald Ford tapped him to be his vice-presidential running mate. He served as chairman of the Senate Finance Committee from 1981 to 1985. Elected Senate majority leader in 1984, at the time of his retirement, Dole held the record as the nation’s longest-serving Republican leader—a record he held for 22 and a half years.

Dole has received national acclaim for his leadership on behalf of the disadvantaged and disabled. He is a major spokesman on issues involving veterans, hunger and nutrition, agriculture, and men’s health. He is respected on both sides of the aisle for his views on bipartisanship, deficit reduction, economic growth, and health care, and for his mastery of foreign affairs. He was the leading force and a major fundraiser for the beautiful World War II memorial in Washington D.C. that has honored and validated so many survivors of that titanic struggle while inspiring generations of Americans who have marveled at its structure and meaning.

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