ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, October 25, 1996 TAG: 9610250050
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
WHEN THE 103rd Congress convened in January 1993, 6th District Republican Bob Goodlatte was the quintessential backbencher - a freshman member of the party that, for the first time in 12 years, controlled neither Congress nor White House.
Two years later, that changed. The Roanoke lawyer was re-elected without opposition; the GOP mid-term congressional victories made Goodlatte part of the House majority. And the arrival of dozens of congressional newcomers sent him soaring up the seniority ladder.
Goodlatte has used his loftier perch to support much-needed reforms in how Congress is run, to insist on fiscal responsibility, and to work in bipartisan fashion with others in the Virginia delegation on projects of special interest to this region.
In Goodlatte's contest Nov. 5 against Democrat Jeff Grey and Libertarian Jay Rutledge, we recommend the congressman's re-election.
Not that we agree with every aspect of the incumbent's record. For example, his efforts on the Judiciary Committee to ban flag-burning, promote school prayer and censor the Internet are at best unnecessary diversions into hot-button trivia; at worst, they could mess up the Constitution and lead to restrictions of Americans' civil liberties.
Nor do we agree with his support of a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution. Unlike many who support the amendment, though, Goodlatte has matched balanced-budget rhetoric with balanced-budget votes.
During his first year in Congress, for instance, Goodlatte voted against his own party's substitute budget, on the grounds it would do too little to cut the deficit. In his second term, he has supported GOP budget-paring plans - and has not been afraid to oppose GOP budget-fattening plans, as in his vote against funding 20 more B-52 bombers. Before endorsing the tax-cut plan of his party's presidential ticket this year, Goodlatte says, he would have to be shown how it could be done without jeopardizing progress toward a balanced budget.
Though a staunch conservative sometimes driven to excess by his ideology, Goodlatte is no government-hating zealot. Recently, he played a key role in convincing fellow Republicans to increase funding for community-action agencies like Roanoke's Total Action Against Poverty. He also helped reduce funding cuts to legal services for the poor. He hasn't been particularly a friend of the environment, but in a creditable break with the GOP leadership, he did back reform of laws governing grazing and mining on public lands in the West. During this year's budget impasse, he worked to get the compromise among House Republicans that ended the government stoppages.
On items of regional interest, Goodlatte has worked hard, with others, to get the Roanoke Valley on the route of proposed Interstate 73. His involvement may well have been decisive. He also spearheaded establishment of the Mt. Pleasant National Scenic Area in Amherst County, and helped secure money for an access road from the Blue Ridge Parkway to Explore Park.
Grey is an engaging young man from Rockbridge County, waging a low-budget campaign that stresses national Democratic themes. Some are points worth making; unfortunately, those themes also include a reflexive suspicion of free trade, and the standard Democratic demagoguery on Medicare - whose fiscal difficulties, Grey implausibly says, can be solved by erasing "waste, fraud and abuse." Rutledge has added libertarian spice to the race, but is not a serious contender.
Polls suggest either party could end up controlling the next Congress. Re-electing Goodlatte, with his reputation for earnest diligence and mastery of legislative detail, would stand the 6th District in good stead whatever the outcome of House races nationally.
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