Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 31, 1993 TAG: 9311030387
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: C3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOHN GOOLRICK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
If there is anything I miss about being a political reporter, it is the scurrying around Virginia in the final days of the campaigns. The candidates are exhausted, but keep going from sun-up to long after dark on the strength of the extra adrenalin that flows from the desire to make that last whistlestop which may mean the difference between victory and defeat.
Nothing is more glorious than October in the Old Dominion with the trees aflame, and nothing made me feel better than the pressure of trying to get the political dispatches done while also desperately trying not to get left behind on the campaign bus, plane, caravan or whatever the mode of transport.
I wish now I had made time to keep a diary of some of those travels with candidates of all parties, including several trips with the late George Lincoln Rockwell, the American Nazi Party leader who was running for governor of Virginia but getting nowhere in the process.
I have vivid recollections of the growing crowds in 1969 that Linwood Holton attracted in his "Victory for Virginia" campaign, when folks began to realize that the truly incredible might happen: A Republican might get elected the state's chief executive.
In 1973, there was former Democratic Gov. Mills Godwin, running now for governor as a Republican, against Democrat Henry Howell of Norfolk. Howell was throwing a king-sized scare into the establishment with his populist themes.
Reporters, this one included, loved covering Howell because he kept up a running commentary on whatever popped into his head. Once, on a rural Augusta County road, I watched him use the loudspeaker in his recreational vehicle to tout his candidacy - though the only living objects in earshot were cows.
One of the most dramatic races came in 1978 when Republican John Warner, getting a late start as the U.S. Senate nominee after the tragic death of Dick Obenshain, flew around Virginia with his wife Elizabeth Taylor and managed to beat Democratic nominee Andy Miller in a real squeaker.
The year before, Charles S. Robb parachuted into the state and got the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governor. Because of his celebrity, the race for second spot got much more attention than had normally been the case. What I remember most is the sight of Robb standing in a department-store line to buy a couple of pair of socks. Pauses for shopping, advisers told him later, are not good campaign tactics.
The same year, Republican attorney-general nominee Marshall Coleman angered conservatives by criticizing the massive-resistance voting record of Democrat Edward Lane. Coleman got a third of the black vote, a rare achievement for a statewide GOP candidate.
In 1982, when Democrat Richard Davis opposed Republican Paul Trible for a U.S. Senate seat, I met an obscure Louisianan brought in by Davis to run his campaign. His name was James Carville, and even then his noted Cajun temper sometimes flared. With help from then-President Reagan, Trible managed to pull off a narrow victory.
I was with state Sen. John Chichester in 1985 on the night he lost the race for lieutenant governor to Doug Wilder, who had to overcome long odds to win. If there had not been torrential rains that day in traditionally Republican areas of the state, Chichester might have won, but he was gracious in defeat and used no excuses.
Now, as the 1993 races reach their denouement, I follow them from afar with great interest, wishing at times I could be flitting with the candidates into Galax or Smithfield or Richmond or Falls Church or wherever as the golden leaves flutter from the trees and the gorgeous days of autumn in Virginia wind down.
It was good work while it lasted.
John Goolrick, a former Virginia political reporter, is now an aide to 1st District Congressman Herbert Bateman.
Keywords:
POLITICS ELECTION
by CNB