ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, December 31, 1996 TAG: 9612310119
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: VIENNA
SOURCE: SPENCER S. HSU THE WASHINGTON POST
GEORGE LOVELACE is the first black elected from Northern Virginia to serve in the General Assembly since Reconstruction.
Canvassing the neighborhoods of Vienna early this month, Del.-elect George Lovelace didn't waste time chitchatting about the weather, he said, or complimenting people's gardens.
``I want to make sure you know who I am,'' the 60-year-old Democrat and retired Army colonel remembers telling voters again and again, as he moved door-to-door with a smile and a no-nonsense handshake. ``I want you to take my literature. I want you to read it. Read about my credentials, then make your decision. That's it.''
Lovelace, a 14-year Vienna Town Council member, credits blunt talk and a human touch for his victory in a special election Dec.17.
But residents in Virginia's 35th House of Delegates District also helped Lovelace make history. Winning 51 percent of the vote in the prosperous, overwhelmingly white district, he became the first black elected from Northern Virginia to serve in the General Assembly since at least Reconstruction.
Quietly, almost routinely, a stubborn racial barrier fell in Washington's Virginia suburbs. And almost as noteworthy is the lack of hubbub about it, both in Lovelace's district and in the state capital.
``Never has anybody said anything to me about my color. That's a fact,'' Lovelace said last week, reflecting on what local historians and Virginia political activists mark as a watershed. ``I don't lay on that. You've got to consider I've been in the Army, where it's all about, `What have you done for me lately?' Where performance is your career. It's the same thing in this business.''
Since his election, local Republicans and Democrats have praised Lovelace as a capable, well-prepared and likable politician whose partisan edges have been sanded smooth by years of addressing constituents' complaints about broken street lights and other staple issues of suburban government.
People didn't talk much about his race, they said, but focused on his lengthy civic and military experience. In Lovelace's district, 89 percent of the voting age population is white.
``I like to say, `If you want to play the game, you have to be in the game,''' Lovelace said. ``I've been on the Town Council 14 years. I've lived in the same community. I know my constituents, and everybody has looked at me and seen me, and my picture has been everywhere, so I'm not hiding anything.''
Only one other black state legislator has been elected from a district where white voters formed the majority, Virginia political scientists say. That was Rep. Robert Scott, who was elected to the Virginia House in 1978 from Newport News. There are currently 12 members of the Legislative Black Caucus in the 140-member General Assembly.
Political activists say the number of blacks elected to the statehouse has been held down by the lingering effects of Virginia's backward-looking response to integration in the 1950s. More recently, there have been a shortage of experienced minority candidates willing to run in predominantly white districts with no history of electing minorities.
``It's a wonderful thing, that at long last we can say to the people of the commonwealth that if you are prepared to do a job, then you can be hired to do it,'' said David Temple Jr., an Alexandria Democrat. Temple, who is black, ran three times unsuccessfully for the Virginia House, in 1979, 1981 and 1982, and later served as state deputy education secretary.
Vincent Olson, a Republican Vienna council member first elected in 1976, said Lovelace has been the town's top vote-getter in at-large elections for the last three terms. Even though Olson, who is white, backed Lovelace's GOP opponent, Michael Polychrones, he said: ``George has been a thoughtful man who's worked hard for the town. He's been an excellent town councilman, in my estimation and I think most of the council would support my views.''
Lovelace said he will decline to be pigeonholed by party or faction. Like any conscientious freshman lawmaker, he pledged loyalty to his constituents first. ``I don't want to be captured by some particular interest and be just another number for someone else's agenda,'' he said.
He was born the eldest of five children in then-segregated Evansville, Ind., just north of the Kentucky line. After graduating with a major in physics from historically black Lincoln College in Missouri, he entered the Army via ROTC in 1959. For the most part, it was his first move into integrated American society.
While the turmoil of the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements raged in civilian life, ``I blossomed in the Army,'' Lovelace said. The service led to a combat support position in Vietnam, an advanced degree in telecommunications management, a senior staff position to a NATO communications board, and assignments where he negotiated with U.S. allies on technical standards. He retired as a lieutenant colonel in 1979.
A Vienna resident since 1975, he got his political start there organizing homeowners to get better water and street services.
Lovelace likes the symbolism of how little notice his race has drawn. He said he never thought about the precedent of a victory.
``It's got to be something you're proud of, but it's not something you're going to walk around saying, `Look at me!''' he said. For all that, Lovelace also hopes to set an example. ``As a result of this, maybe there will be others who say, `Gee, maybe I can get involved,' whether or not they're other African Americans, or some white guy sitting out there, or a young woman, like my daughter.''
LENGTH: Medium: 100 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP Virginia Del.-elect George Lovelace says he is proudby CNBhis victory set a precedent. Lovelace, 60, is a retired Army colonel
and a 14-year Vienna Town Council member.