ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, February 16, 1997 TAG: 9702170035
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: ROBERT LITTLE STAFF WRITER
THEY'RE THE ODD COUPLE in the General Assembly - a white male conservative and black female liberal who have teamed up to ``retire'' Virginia's state song.
Sitting blithely between state Sens. Steve Newman and Louise Lucas, Wayne Byrd tapped his pointy boots and smiled through his mustache as the gritty sound of a 50-year-old recording strained everyone's ears.
"Carr-y me back, to old Vir-ginny," the Satchmo-like voice sang. "...That's where this old darkey's heart am long to go."
Newman sat to Byrd's right, the entire weight of his body seemingly supported by the five fingers digging into his temple. The white Lynchburg Republican crumpled deeper into his seat each time the word "darkey" or "massa" was sung.
To Byrd's left was Lucas, leaning against a column with her arms folded. The black Portsmouth Democrat glared at the panel of lawmakers before them, peering down her nose and wrinkling her brow in a way that seemed to say: "Now, do you see why we don't like this song?"
For six years, Newman and Lucas have served together in the General Assembly, but you wouldn't normally find them on the same side of a room, much less sharing a lectern and lobbying together for a bill's passage.
In the lyrics of Virginia's state song, however, the two have found common adversaries - memories of Virginia's slave-owning heritage, and historical purists like Byrd (president of the Heritage Preservation Society in Danville) who want to keep them alive.
The unlikely political duo of a liberal black woman and a friend-of-Falwell white man has become a conspicuous sideshow of this year's session.
But Newman and Lucas are more than a spectacle - they're an influential legislative pair. And by the end of June, "Carry Me Back to Old Virginia" will likely be history because of them.
"Without her help, I think this would have went where it's always gone - nowhere," Newman said.
"I'd get in bed with a rattlesnake to get that song gone," Lucas said.
Then she paused a moment and grabbed Newman by the arm.
"Oh, you're not the rattlesnake, Steve," she said.
With her high heels and foofed hairdo, Lucas is the same height as her young (he's 32) colleague.
The similarities, however, pretty much stop there.
|n n| Newman is one of that new breed of young Republicans huddled in the corner of the Virginia Senate. They eat, sleep and vote conservative. The "nay" buttons on their desks ought to be worn clean from all the times they've bucked the majority.
"I'm not a politically correct person," he's proud to say. "I'd usually be the last guy in here to stand up and plead for something like this."
Lucas sits clear across the chamber on the Democrat side, and her voting record is about as conservative as the red leather suit she wears on Valentine's Day. Liberal? "I don't mind anyone saying that about me," she said.
Consider the legislation they've sponsored:
Lucas wants home detention for inmates to count as good time in reducing their sentences. Newman wants to let police officers and deputies shoot inmates when they try to escape from labor crews.
Lucas co-sponsored a bill to legalize any sexual act committed privately by consenting adults. Newman wants to make sure that Virginia, which already doesn't recognize same-sex marriages, doesn't recognize gay marriages performed in other states.
But they both say they really like each other.
And they both want to get rid of Virginia's state song.
"Yes, it's an unlikely relationship," Lucas said. "But it works."
|n n| Actually, the two first teamed up a year ago to champion legislation. Lucas, not the legislature's biggest death penalty fan, nonetheless decided that serial murderers ought to face the ultimate punishment. When Newman proposed it, she helped get it passed.
So when Newman decided this year that the state song ought to be retired to "emeritus" status, he knew where to look for support.
Newman and Lucas come to the issue from different perspectives. Newman represents people who like the state song, and he considers emeritus status a graceful way to cast it adrift. Lucas represents people who hate the state song, but she figures emeritus status is the only way to reach an agreement.
When the Senate approved their plan, opposition came from two sources - Newman's fellow Republicans who thought the song's history should be preserved and Lucas' Black Caucus colleagues who think emeritus status is too good for it.
"We're simply instilling in the Code the reality of today - we don't have a state song, no one ever sings it or plays it," Newman said.
"Emeritus means it's not dead, but it's a little bit dead, and that's better than before," Lucas said.
Newman and Lucas' bill to retire the state song isn't law yet. The House of Delegates still has to pass it (a vote is tentatively scheduled for Monday), and the Senate will get another chance to vote before the plan would go to the governor's desk.
But most members agree that the two have forged an adequate coalition, that their bill will pass and that the state song will die July1.
And after that?
"Steve and I will do it again, if we can," Lucas said. "We'll keep working together. I think we're good at it."
"I have a great deal of affection for Louise," Newman said. "I think we both help each other see different sides that we might not have seen otherwise.
"I doubt that I'll be anywhere near her campaign, though, when that time comes. I doubt that it would help her much, anyway."
To leave a message for state legislators, call (800)889-0229 between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. weekdays, or write in care of General Assembly Building, Richmond 23219. To track the status of bills, go on line at www.roanoke.com and click on ``The Richmond Archive.''
LENGTH: Long : 113 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: (headshots) Newman, Lucas KEYWORDS: GENERAL ASSEMBLY 1997by CNB