Robert H. Michel, who as the House minority leader from 1981 until his 1994 retirement became the longest-serving congressional Republican leader who never experienced majority power, died Friday. He was 93 and had lived on Capitol Hill much of the time since stepping down after 19 terms representing central Illinois.

Michel epitomized the congressional Old School in nearly every way, which worked to his advantage for almost all of his four decades in office. He prized collegiality, collaboration, civility and courtesy as essential political virtues. He evidenced a steady reverence for the institutional prerogatives, customs and limitations of what he fondly termed “the people’s House.”

He could reliably claim to know that his brand of middle-of-the-road policymaking would play in Peoria — because that was his hometown. He was far more comfortable using his sonorous baritone to croon “God Bless America” at the Rotary Club than to parry with pundits on one of the Sunday shows.

He didn’t have special policy expertise, particular oratorical gifts or unusual parliamentary skill, and his leadership style was neither overtly charismatic nor consciously intimidating. Instead, Michel (pronounced “Michael”) got what he needed from the GOP rank and file because he was a patient listener, a flexible goal-setter and gentle persuader.

Called on for his own epitaph, in other words, Michel would likely have settled on the sort of folksy plain-spokenness for which he was famous: “That Bob sure was one doggone decent son of a gun.”