“The 1982 U.S. Senate campaign. Everyone said you were a winner,” began TV interviewer Steve Adubato as he quizzed Millicent Fenwick in 1991, the year before her death. “You were 20 points ahead. You were running against Frank Lautenberg; people didn’t know him. “What happened?” “I don’t know,” Fenwick replied. “The next morning, when I woke up, I thought, ‘It can’t be.’” Her dismay was understandable. Fenwick was a nationally celebrated, even beloved Republican congresswoman, who charmed the public and championed social causes with a personality that managed to be simultaneously refined, inte…
