THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 2, 1995 TAG: 9502020005
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines
As Virginia's governor from 1962 to 1966 and as a state Supreme Court justice for 14 years, Albertis S. Harrison, age 88 at his death a few weeks ago, contributed significantly to the Old Dominion's betterment.
The handsome, white-haired Harrison commanded respect without demanding it. His gentlemanly manner and healing touch served Virginia well in the years immediately following the bitter massive-resistance years when Virginia shamefully closed some of its public schools rather than racially integrate any of them. As attorney general, Mr. Harrison pressed the state's legal battle to preserve segregation. But he foresaw that the legal barriers to integration erected by the legislature would fall. He said just that in a letter to massive resistance's architect and steadfast champion, U.S. Sen. Harry F. Byrd.
The barriers fell. Which left Mr. Harrison, who succeeded Gov. J. Lindsay Almong, to salve wounds and nudge a divided Virginia onto the path of progress. Mr. Harrison's temperament, style and respect for law and others' feelings equipped him admirably for the task. He fostered privately funded schooling for black children who were being denied public education in Prince Edward County. He prepared the ground for the community-college system that Gov. Mills E. Godwin subsequently planted. He vigorously promoted economic development.
All that was three decades ago, which perhaps is ancient history in the eyes of most Virginians today. The Old is much changed from those years.
There would have been fewer constructive changes but for the leadership of Mr. Harrison and Mr. Godwin. The times called for departures from the pinchpenny governing ways of an agrarian state, severely wounded in the Civil War, that didn't catch up to the 20th century until after World War II. Mr. Harrison, like Mr. Godwin, understood the essentiality of a well-trained work force to industry. He championed post-high-school technical instruction throughout Virginia.
He was a successful governor. ``During the four years of Harrison's term,'' wrote journalist-and-historian Virginius Dabney in Virginia: The New Dominion, ``more than a billion dollars was invested in Virginia by private industry in new and expanded plants, adding 177,000 new jobs. Per capita income rose from $1,894 to $2,373, giving Virginia first rank among the Southeastern states. Virginia's employment rate remained among the very best in the nation, although there was 8 to 10 percent unemployment in the six coal-producing counties of Southwest Virginia.''
Some of these numbers are modest compared with the bigger ones to which everyone is accustomed in 1995. But they translated into improved lives for a great many Virginians. Mr. Harrison left the governorship with honor, praise and affection. He had earned them all. by CNB