Pease was a member of the Democratic Party and was regarded as a liberal (supporting progressive tax reform, advocating for universal human rights, linking respect for internationally recognized worker rights to international trade, aid, and investment agreements, upholding civil liberties, emphasizing education reform, and other liberal causes).

He served eight terms in Congress, easily winning all eight elections in the Democratic-leaning 13th Congressional District of Ohio.

His long-time Chief of Staff and Legislative Director was Bill Goold whom Pease had hired upon his graduation from Oberlin College.

[citation needed] Pease quickly distinguished himself as a skillful legislator and staunch human rights advocate.

Over the opposition of the Carter Administration, Pease, in his first term of Congress, sponsored legislation, which passed, to cut off US trade with Uganda, which was enduring a brutal reign of terror at the hands of the infamous dictator Idi Amin in which at least 500,000 Ugandans perished.

[3] Pease was the legislative champion of the rapidly growing movement inside and outside of Congress in the early 1980s to link respect for internationally recognized workers' rights, such as prohibiting exploitative child labor in the production of products for export, to international trade, investment and aid agreements to which the US is a party.

[citation needed] Pease authored controversial legislation within the United States Internal Revenue Code (income tax code) that partially disallowed itemized deductions for taxpayers with adjusted gross incomes above certain thresholds, known as the "Pease Limitations.