Word: byrds
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...Harry Byrd Sr. served one term as Virginia's Governor, five full terms as Senator, and for half a century ran the Old Dominion's Democratic Party as if it were a company town. Son Harry Jr., however, has had trouble controlling the legacy he received after his father's retirement in 1965 and death a year later. In 1969 Virginia Democrats rejected the Byrd machine's conservative gubernatorial candidate in favor of a moderate who ultimately lost to Republican Linwood Holton. Last week "Young Harry," 55, himself abdicated the Byrd throne that...
...Byrd's explanation was philosophical. Virginia's Democratic state central committee is requiring party candidates to sign a loyalty oath that binds them to support all Democrats running in the next election. Byrd argued that the rule would force him to support men he did not know. Vowing that he "would rather be a free man than a captive Senator," he defected...
...changed offices last fall, and today acquaintances who want to get in touch with him are told to dial the answer to the question "What do you use to blast your way through the ice, Amundsen?" Those still interested in making the call can reach him at TNT BYRD...
Virginia went for Nixon in 1960 and 1968, but the statehouse remained firmly in Democratic hands, as it has for eight decades. Now the old Byrd machine is moribund, and the G.O.P. is respectable in the South. A. (for Abner) Linwood Holton, 46, a close Nixon ally who ran unsuccessfully for the governorship four years ago, was the easy victor over William Battle...
...helped, the G.O.P.'s biggest strength was Democratic weakness. Many conservative Democrats could not forgive Battle his ties with the Kennedys. The state A.F.L.-C.I.O. and the Crusade for Voters, a black political-action group, could not abide Battle's support by the lingering vestiges of the Byrd organization. Many liberals with no love for either Nixon or Holton wanted most of all to exercise the old Democratic guard completely and start fresh. The combination handily managed to put Holton over...