THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 7, 1994 TAG: 9408070042
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY MASON PETERS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: GATESVILLE LENGTH: Long : 105 lines
If anyone can hold together the far-flung, over-hill-over-dale Democrats in the 1st Congressional District, it will be Ike Battle.
Isaac Andeaux Battle is a 71-year old, combat-tested ex-Army master sergeant who in a surprise election a week ago was picked as party chairman to bring straying Democrats back into line.
It won't be easy.
But Battle is used to challenges. He spent four years as a noncommissioned officer back in World War II before integration came to the armed forces. He went on to become a history buff, a polished educator and school principal with multiple teaching degrees, and a widely respected Gates County community leader.
With a background that ranges from military tough guy to baseball coach to school superintendent to church deacon, Battle seems peculiarly suited to herding wandering Democrats back into the party corral.
``I'm going to do it,'' Battle said Friday.
Battle's political destiny was shaped in 1992 when the North Carolina General Assembly, prodded by U.S. Justice Department lawyers, created two new black-majority congressional districts in the state - the 1st and the 12th.
The 1st was suddenly transformed from a cozy northeast enclave of conservative white Democrats who occasionally voted for Jesse Helms into 28 strung-out counties that stretched from the North Carolina-Virginia border almost to South Carolina near Wilmington, with a population that was 57 percent black.
Two years ago, the district elected U.S. Rep. Eva M. Clayton, D-Warren, as the state's first black and first female to go to Congress this century. And at the same time the traditional Democratic Party unity of the old 1st District began to collapse.
``The 1st District ended up with parts of eight new counties down toward South Carolina and Wilmington that had no previous political contact with the northeast,'' Battle said.
``One of the first things I'm going to do is have an old-fashioned regional political rally to bring all of the counties together,'' Battle said. ``I hope to have it as soon as October in Greenville - Greenville's about the midpoint of the new district.''
Battle's big problem is keeping involved older white Democrats who feel politically uprooted from the comfortable, straight-ticket atmosphere that characterized the 26-year reign of the late Rep. Walter B. Jones Sr.
After 38 years as a Democratic party worker, Battle knows better than most the value of political togetherness.
``We're all Democrats, and we have to work together,'' Battle said, ``That's where my work is cut out for me.''
Why does Battle care?
``From the time I was a boy, born and raised in Rocky Mount, I wanted to be like my father,'' he said. ``My father was a great man.''
Father was Camillus Manual Battle, a respected mechanic in the Rocky Mount shops of the Seaboard Airline Railway who shaped Ike Battle's early years.
Then came World War II, and young Battle joined the Army Corps of Engineers and was sent to the South Pacific, where General MacArthur was battling his way back to the Philippines. Engineers were front-line troops in the steamy jungles, building the roads and bridges that the infantry needed.
``There was a place called Sansapor - it was supposed to be already secured,'' Battle said. ``We came in with our heavy equipment and when we were about 50-yards off the beach, the Japs opened up.
``The man in front of me got what I was supposed to get.'
Battle said that from that moment he has realized how fortunate he's been throughout his life.
``Medals? I've got a box of them somewhere,'' he said in an interview at his Gatesville home. ``I'd have to look and see to tell you what kind they are.''
Peace brought him to Elizabeth City State University and Pennsylvania State University, where he received his degrees in science and education.
From 1952 to 1959 he taught school and coached baseball and basketball in Sunbury, N.C. Then it was on to Harrellsville, where he was principal of the A.S. Cherry School from 1958 to 1966.
After that the duties, the awards, and the honors come thick and fast. He was assistant superintendent of Hertford County schools from 1972 until he he retired in 1983.
``I still teach occasionally at Chowan Community College,'' Battle said. ``I don't think I'll ever really retire.''
Battle is on the ECSU Board of Trustees, a member of Gov. James B. Hunt's Employment Security Commission, a member of the Albemarle Commission, a member of the N.C. service council of the American Red Cross, and he's not too busy to serve as chairman of the deacon board and treasurer and Sunday school teacher at New Hope Baptist Church in Gatesville.
He moved easily into the chairmanship of the 1st District Democratic party, although he had only recently decided to seek the job that opened when Perquimans County Judge James Carlton Cole resigned to run for the District Court bench.
Challenging Battle was state Sen. Frank W. Ballance Jr. of Warren County, who had been Eva Clayton's campaign manager in the historic 1992 election that sent her to Congress.
What happened in Kinston when Democrats picked a chairman was a lesson in leadership. Ballance could have had the post if he wanted to fight for it.
But when the meeting came to order and quibbling began about a quorum, Ballance arose and told the stunned Democrats that he was withdrawing.
``This isn't the time for controversy,'' said Ballance, ``This is a time for unity.''
Then he endorsed his old friend in a move that surely prevented a house divided. Isaac Andreaux Battle, quiet but wiry-tough, was chosen by acclamation.
``Now it's time to get to work,'' he said last week. ``You'll be hearing from me.'' by CNB