 After facing his first competitive re-election bid in 1952 when he defeated Republican challenger Robert Finch by nearly 11 percent of the vote, King cruised by in future elections, capturing more than 60 percent of the vote in landslide elections in each biennial election from 1954 to 1966.King also was one of the first people involved in the issue of Medicare, and had carried on the battle in the House of Representatives throughout the 1950s and 1960s until President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Medicare Bill on July 30, 1965.After nearly twenty-seven years of service, King was not a candidate for re-election in the 1968 House elections to the 90th United States Congress.