University of Virginia Library

Progress In Richmond

The combination of a progressive and
pragmatic governor and legislators who
reflect the changing Virginia political structure
resulted in a remarkable legislative
session that ended Sunday. After years of
domination by pay-as-you-go Organization
men, the General Assembly began this year
to recognize the new political reality in
Virginia-namely that the urban-rural
balance in the state is about to tip decisively
in favor of the city and suburb
dwellers.

There were, of course, some disappointments
in what transpired in Richmond.
The state failed, for example, to rescind
its 1964 call for a "National Constitution
Convention" to modify the "one-man, one-vote"
legislative apportionment ruling, despite
a reminder by Delegate Clive DuVal
that such a convention is "clearly in conflict
with the spirit and terms of our own
constitution." The legislators also failed
to repeal or modify the tuition grant program
for private schools (a holdover
from "Massive Resistance") and failed to
pass a minimum wage law or open housing
legislation and to establish an Equal Opportunities
Commission. They saw fit to
pass, however, an unnecessary and possibly
inflammatory stiff new anti-riot law.

The positive gains for the state that came
out of the Capitol were so great, though,
that they overshadow any shortcomings.
Chief among them were the bipartisan, biracial
Commission on Constitutional Revision
(whose work will be supervised by
the Law School's Associate Dean Howard),
the bond issue that marked the first real
departure from the pay-as-you-go financing
of the Byrd era, and the local option law
on whiskey-by-the-drink. There were smaller
triumphs for progressivism: the re-enactment
of statewide compulsory school attendance
requirements; the ending of state
subsidies for the right-wing Commission
on Constitutional Government; tighter restrictions
on the Ku Klux Klan; more funds
for mental hospitals, family planning and
child welfare. We at the University should
be particularly pleased, of course, with the
funds allotted for higher education-funds
which we earned a greater share of than
any other state institution.

After years of failing to provide the
citizens of Virginia with some of the basic
functions of government-notably good
mental hospitals and educational facilities-the
General Assembly has entered a new
era in which the sacred cows of the
past-pay-as-you-go financing, complete
racial segregation, weak state government-are
no longer being worshipped. We
should all be grateful.