ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, June 10, 1996 TAG: 9606100050
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: WARREN FISKE STAFF WRITER
NOTE: Strip
TUESDAY'S REPUBLICAN PRIMARY represents a clash of values - the value of party loyalty vs. the value of being independent-minded.
Voters will decide the case of U.S. Sen. John Warner vs. the Republican Party of Virginia on Tuesday.
Warner faces a tough challenge in a Republican primary election in which the main issue isn't so much his performance over 18 years in office as it is loyalty to his party.
The dispute may seem petty to some voters, who will decide whether to renominate Warner or replace him with Jim Miller, a former federal budget chief.
But to other voters, a core value is at stake. Was Warner's refusal to support two Republican nominees for statewide office an act of treason that should be punished by his removal from office? Or was it a gutsy expression of conscience that should be rewarded with another term?
Miller acknowledges that he might not be a candidate today if Warner had not opposed former Iran-Contra figure Oliver North's 1994 bid for the U.S. Senate, and refused to endorse home-schooling leader Michael Farris' 1993 run for lieutenant governor. Many Republican loyalists hold Warner responsible for both men's defeats.
"Under ordinary circumstances, a three-term incumbent U.S. senator would be unassailable," Miller said. "But the fact that he has offended so many conservatives in the party means that people are willing to look at someone else."
Many GOP loyalists bristle at the suggestion that Virginians have no stake in their fight with Warner. The very strength of a political party, they say, lies in the principle that all its leaders support every nominee.
The role of political parties, said former state GOP chairman Patrick McSweeney, is to give voters clear choices. "If the party's voice is not expressed by the people it has elected, then the message becomes confusing to voters."
Warner's disloyalties, he added, are dispiriting to thousands of party activists who adhere to the discipline of supporting and working for whoever wins the party's nomination.
"When you get 14,000 people two years in a row at the Richmond Coliseum," said McSweeney, referring to the GOP conventions that nominated Farris and North, "and you get one person saying, `I don't care, I'm going the other way,' the activists start thinking, `what's the point of doing anything when one person can sabotage everything?'''
Warner responds that party loyalty must take a back seat. to obeying one's heart. "The issue," he said, "is whether a politician can follow his conscience and be re-elected."
Was mum the word?
Many Republican leaders say Warner wouldn't be in trouble today if he had simply kept his mouth shut. "It would have been acceptable if he expressed his dissent by remaining silent and sitting out the election," said Jim Ferriera, an Abingdon activist. "But he crossed the line by speaking out and starting a third party."
The repercussions of Warner's decision are still felt. Because his hand-picked independent candidate, Marshall Coleman, received more than 10 percent of the vote in 1994 and was endorsed by supporters of Texas billionaire Ross Perot, their Virginia Independent Party won official third-party status and is entitled to automatic slots on state ballots this fall for its presidential and congressional candidates. So far, the party has fielded three candidates for the House.
Warner says he would have failed as a leader if he had remained silent. "You bet, I could have said nothing," he said. "But that was not why I was elected. I was elected to give my best, my honest judgment on all issues and to exercise leadership.
"I can't yield my independence to a political party or anyone else. If I can't be my own man, then I can't feel good about my work."
Among Warner's supporters is Caldwell Butler, a former congressman from Roanoke, who was one of the first Republicans to break with his party in 1974 and support the impeachment of President Richard Nixon.
"John knew what the risks were when he made these decisions, and he did it anyway," said Butler. He believes the increasingly religious conservative tone of the state GOP has made it difficult for moderates, such as Warner, to fit in. "I don't think you can characterize it as anything else but courageous.''
"I don't think the public cares all that much about party," Butler added. "I don't think they elect people to go up there and follow the marching orders of whatever the party tells them to do."
The discussion about loyalty symbolizes other differences between Warner and Miller. In general, the two candidates don't disagree on many issues. What separates them is that Miller is running to the right of Warner and promises to be a much more consistent conservative vote on social issues such as abortion and gun control. "Unlike John Warner, I'll be there when the party needs me," he said.
"No one is saying John Warner doesn't have a right to vote his conscience," Miller said. "But the question is: Where does John Warner's conscience lead him?"
Miller's focus: loyalists
Miller's campaign is centered on the core of conservative activists who are highly motivated to vote against Warner and urge others to do so. North gave a rousing endorsement to Miller at the GOP state convention in Salem two weekends ago. Farris has been urging his home-schooling followers to back Miller. The Christian Coalition, founded by religious broadcaster Pat Robertson, is distributing 750,000 voter guides that cast Miller in a positive light, compared with Warner.
Typically, about 15 percent of the state's almost 3 million voters participate in Republican primaries. Political scientists say Miller's best chance of winning would come from a below-average turnout dominated by Christian conservatives, gun-rights advocates and party insiders.
Warner is seeking to take full advantage of the fact that all voters - not just Republicans - can vote in the primary. He is trying to broaden participation, advertising heavily on television and urging independents and business conservatives to cast ballots.
Warner has raised about three times as much money as Miller, who has been unable to respond to Warner's television commercials because he can't afford video ads of his own. And Warner is betting that the vast majority of the electorate simply won't care about his battles within the Republican Party.
"There are roughly 700,000 people in this state who share Republican goals," Warner said outside the GOP state convention, where Miller handily won a straw poll of delegates. "How many of them do you think are here?''
The answer: about 3,000.
LENGTH: Long : 121 lines KEYWORDS: POLITIC CONGRESSby CNB