Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 27, 1994 TAG: 9410290021
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-14 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Now he wants to expunge every trace of former Gov. Linwood Holton from GOP headquarters in Richmond - lest Holton's memory contaminate the place and stir recollection of a time when Republicans were the party of moderation and progress.
The late Gov. John Dalton is presumably safe. God forbid, though, that Dalton should send an anti-North word from the grave, or he too would be targeted no doubt for Virginia Republican Chairman Pat McSweeney's righteous vengeance.
Holton happened to be in Roanoke Wednesday after he learned that McSweeney is considering removing Holton's large photograph from the wall at GOP headquarters. The first Republican in this century to win the Virginia governor's office, the man who led the state GOP out of exile and political irrelevance, didn't seem to blanch at Chairman McSweeney's latest off-the-wall idea. On the contrary, Holton seemed not at all depressed or humiliated by his apparent failure to meet with McSweeney's approval.
Holton's unforgivable transgression is the same, of course, as Warner's. He seriously questions North's integrity and fitness to serve in the Senate. He finds in North a dangerous, demagogic bent.
The party of McSweeney, North and Pat Robertson may find disloyalty in that, but others will discern an old-fashioned principle: putting what's best for state and nation above political opportunism, rigid partisanship and extremist fervor.
Go ahead, Pat, take down Holton's portrait. Maybe George Allen, only the fourth Republican to win the governor's office in this century, would be willing to store it in the basement at the state Capitol.
Better yet, maybe Allen, who tried before unsuccessfully to dump Mc-
Sweeney as GOP chairman, will try again, before Pat & Co. strip the party of every vestige of a principled past.
by CNB