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Over the past few months a growing roster of potential nominees have either been approached by party officials who urged them to run, or floated up trial balloons on their own.
These include State Sen. James Jones of Bristol, 4th District Congressman Norman Sisisky, James Madison University President Ronald Carrier, the Rev. Curtis Harris of Hopewell, State Secretary of Commerce and Resources Betty Diener, State Sen. Virgil Goode of Rocky Mount, Del William Wilson of Covington, Delegate Vivian Watts of Fairfax, Television Newsman Hodding Carter Jr. and retired Gen. “Pete” Dawkins, formerly of Northern Virginia.
Party officials heatedly deny that any formal effort was made to recruit Dawkins for the race, but the mention of his name several months ago brought hoots of derision from the GOP. Dawkins, they say, is actually a Republican and a close friend of Warner. The chairman of the Republican Senate Campaign Committee volunteered to tell Virginia Democrats who the Republicans were on their list of potential candidates if they would submit the list to him for review.
With Fisher’s withdrawal, the scramble to find an alternative to Harrison was taking on something approaching panic at the week’s end. Three other candidates were actively testing the waters. They were Harris, Goode and Wilson. The governor’s office put out the word that two “mystery” candidates were considering running. These may have been Goode and Wilson. In any event the list is expected to grow before this reaches print.
In the meanwhile, Harrison is conducting an aggressive campaign around the state, and it is fair to ask why the party leaders appear to be so determined to do in her candidacy.
The reason has to do with the fact that everything in Virginia politics is, at bottom, focused on the races for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. These offices come up for election next year.
Harrison, according to the party leadership, is perceived as hopelessly liberal. Her concern for womens’ causes, her outspoken campaign style, and her blistering attacks on the party for using the convention method of nominating candidates have convinced Democratic officials that her race against Warner would be a disaster for her and an embarrassment to the party.
The last thing they want, going into next year’s statewide races, is to give the Republicans an opportunity to charge that the candidates on the Democratic ticket belonged not only to the party of a liberal 1964 presidential candidate, but of a liberal senate candidate as well. They believe that even under the best of circumstances Warner will be extremely difficult to defeat. But they also believe that the candidate, if he or she is defeated, would be less a liability to the party next year if that candidate reflected the Virginia Democrats’ emerging moderate image.
And so, in this spring of the Democrats’ discontent, the search goes on, now a little desperately.
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