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“Their best-known collaboration was the 1997 legislation creating the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which provided states with matching grants to cover uninsured children in working-poor families. The program, the largest expansion of taxpayer-funded health insurance for children since the creation of Medicaid in 1965, was instrumental in cutting the percentage of uninsured children by more than half.


The two senators also collaborated on the 1990 Ryan White act, which funded care for uninsured and underinsured patients with HIV/AIDS. And Mr. Hatch worked closely with Kennedy and Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin, the chief sponsor, to pass the landmark 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act prohibiting discrimination against — and requiring accommodations for — people with disabilities.


One factor in Mr. Hatch’s transition from ideologue to pragmatist was the 1980 election, which shifted Senate control to the GOP and gave him the chairmanship of the Labor and Human Resources Committee — and with it responsibility for health-related legislation. He partnered with Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), chairman of the House health subcommittee, to accelerate the approval process for lower-cost generic drugs. The 1984 law, known as the Hatch-Waxman Act, is credited with significantly increasing consumers’ access to generics.”