Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 26, 1990 TAG: 9007260482
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-15 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY L. GARLAND
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
But to those who were privileged to know him, Stafford will always be regarded as a man well worth admiring. In 16 years in the House and Senate, I served with more than 300 legislators. In the measurement of integrity and common decency, I place him near the top.
The choice of a political party is a mysterious process. Some do it by inheritance; others from a perceived self-interest. Stafford was born a Democrat in one of the state's most persistently Democratic counties. Had he remained of that party he would certainly have enjoyed a much easier road in politics. Once seated in the General Assembly, he could have looked forward to scant opposition at home and a steady rise to the chairmanship fo a major committee, savoring the deference of his juniors and the flattery of lobbyists.
But Stafford made an intellectual and moral commitment to conservative principles of government. Believing them to be threatened by the Democratic Party as it had become, he renounced that party and never looked back. Of all the former Democrats who have joined the Republican Party over the years, I have never known one who seemed more serene in his choice, or less interested in the special petting that converts traditionally claim as their right of passage.
His attitude toward his adopted party might be expressed this way: "I have joined you not because I think you are perfect, but because I am convinced that the other party is plainly pursuing a wrong course for the country. Conscience requires that I do all I can to uphold your cause, and you owe me nothing out of the ordinary."
A stranger's first impression of Stafford might have been that here was your typical Southwest Virginia good ol' boy. But appearances can be deceiving. Here was truly an intellectual ideologue who had carefully calibrated where he stood and why.
It would be wrong to say that he never pulled a punch for the sake of expediency, but let it be recorded that I never met a self-proclaimed "conservative" who trimmed his sails less frequently.
Everybody who served with him knew where he stood, but a finely honed intellect stood in the way of that excess of zeal which so limits effectiveness in a legislative body. The very odd thing is how seldom he intervened in debate - despite his 20 years' seniority - but when he did, he was listened to, and he swayed votes on both sides of the aisle.
Stafford's understanding of politics was instinctive, but it was also based on a deep understanding of history and economics. His considerable intellectual power might be measured by his great success as a champion of tournament bridge. To play that difficult game requires a prodigious memory and the ability to visualize the probable arrangement of cards you cannot see, and to formulate in a few seconds a strategy of bidding and play.
His prowess as a politician reached its apotheosis in a losing campaign for Congress in 1984. In the mists of that distant past, it was not thought an act of lunacy to challenge an incumbent member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
It takes no liberties with Stafford's memory to say he regarded 9th District Congressman Rick Boucher as the embodiment of the virus of the Leviathan State that Stafford saw as the ultimate destroyer of the American experiment in self-governing democracy.
The "Fightin' Ninth" had been a hotbed of Republicanism when the rest of the state had little use for the party of Lincoln. But the district had changed, and Stafford understood that. He knew the poverty and despair that had settled in many places, and the temptation of a formerly self-reliant people to see government as their savior.
But he resolved to contest the election on the grounds of a profound difference in political philosophy. He lost narrowly, but he organized the most credible challenge to an incumbent congressman that we have seen in recent years. And he did it on ground that had grown somewhat hostile to his basic message, which might be summarized as follows: "Government can give you nothing it has not first taken away, and you will do better in the long run to repose trust in yourselves, your community and a free market."
It is not my purpose here to make Stafford seem larger in death than he was in life. But the life that late he led does contain an important message for our time.
While his skills as a lawyer might have earned him more munificent fees elsewhere, he followed the advice that Booker T. Washington gave: "Put your bucket down where you are."
Pearisburg might be small and a bit off the beaten path. But Pearisburg had bred him, and to it he owed something. Death found him there as life had found him, going to Ruritan meetings and enjoying mid-morning coffee, news and jokes with the regulars at the cafe on courthouse square.
Stafford believed with all his heart that the greatness of America was more likely to be found in the common sense of the common people. In the shifting tides of American population, the vitality of the small places may be drained away. But Stafford had a vision of America that he believed was worth fighting for, and fight he did - not as a demagogue riding the cause of the moment, but as a steady soldier of what he saw as the well-tested verities of our long national experience. To say he will be missed is an understatement.
by CNB