Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 28, 1995 TAG: 9503280053
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: DANVILLE LENGTH: Medium
Patrick McSweeney, who is considering a challenge to incumbent Republican Sen. John Warner next year, spoke at Sunday's celebration of a Confederate flag monument outside the Danville Museum of Fine Arts and History.
The Confederate flag had flown occasionally outside the museum until its directors stopped the practice in response to complaints from some black residents who denounced the flag as a symbol of slavery. The 22-foot marble monument was a gift to the city from the Danville chapter of the Heritage Preservation Association.
Larry Sabato, a political science professor at the University of Virginia, said McSweeney's presence at the event could be seen as an attempt to reach out to the GOP's right wing. He said that if McSweeney decides to run against the more centrist Warner in a primary, he'll have to reach out to the most hard-core conservatives in the party.
``One way to score with them is to undertake politically incorrect activities, and this certainly qualifies,'' Sabato said. ``In my experience with the Virginia Republican Party, the most conservative candidate in the field usually wins the nomination.''
But McSweeney, who said he was speaking at the event as a private citizen and not as a GOP leader, said neither politics nor race fueled the celebration. He called for an end to ``the never-ending cycle of hate and guilt.''
``Culture isn't disposable like yesterday's newspaper or stale bread,'' McSweeney said. Since many blacks' ancestors also perished while fighting in the Civil War, preserving Southern heritage ``is a biracial phenomenon,'' he said.
The Danville museum served as the Confederate capitol for a week in 1865 after Richmond fell.
McSweeney was one of six speakers at the event. Two prominent black professors also spoke.
``People give you a hard time about this flag, because they say it represents slavery,'' said Edward Smith of American University in Washington, D.C. ``That's pure nonsense.''
Many blacks, however, say the flag is an offensive reminder of the oppression of slavery.
McSweeney seemed to be taking a page out of fellow Republican Oliver North's book by visiting Danville. During last year's U.S. Senate race, North championed the right to wave the Confederate flag.
McSweeney clearly wants to be viewed as a candidate similar to North, Sabato said, and that means marketing himself as the most conservative member of the Republican field. Warner also will face primary opposition from former Reagan administration budget director Jim Miller, who lost the 1994 GOP Senate nomination to North.
``Of course, what would help him in a primary might well kill him in a general election,'' Sabato said of McSweeney. ``This was extremely politically incorrect.''
Memo: NOTE: Shorter version ran in Metro edition.