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Preston Bryant is a Republican who has represented Lynchburg and part of Amherst County in the Virginia House of Delgates since 1996.

George Allen and his penguins

By PRESTON BRYANT
JAN. 19, 2004

“Welcome fellow penguins!”

That’s what then-Gov. George Allen said 10 years ago upon taking the stage at his inaugural ball and looking out over a sea of tuxedos and ball gowns. And it’s the very line he used again Saturday night when he climbed another Richmond stage to greet more than 600 friends and supporters all gussied up in formal wear to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his becoming Virginia’s 67th governor.

The place for it was the Science Museum of Virginia, a capital city landmark that’d been decked out with lots of “A-Team” memorabilia that had folks reminiscing all night about the election that was never to be. You know, that was the election where Mary Sue Terry, a seven-year attorney general who’d only recently resigned to run for governor, was to be a shoe-in for the Old Dominion’s highest office. Few expected the race between Terry and Allen, a one-term congressman and former state legislator, to be much of a race at all, and for a time, it sure looked to be a yawner.

You see, in the blistering hot summer of ’93, Allen was 30 points down in the polls and his campaign’s coffers were as dry as so many Virginia creek beds. But the 41-year-old political boy wonder trudged on, traveling all over the state in a borrowed motor home, preaching his message from one small town to the next of “common-sense, conservative, Jeffersonian principles.”

And a funny thing happened. The people began to take notice. And the crowds grew. And the money began pouring in. And the pundits became less certain about Terry as the press became less skeptical about Allen. And the political sands began to shift. And by the time Election Day rolled around, it was Allen who was – amazingly – considered the shoe-in for the high office he was never to have held.

When the polls closed, Allen had reversed that 30-point deficit. He’d beaten Terry 58 percent to 42 percent.

That Allen victory was important for lots of reasons. In terms of Virginia politics, it allowed a Republican to claim the governor’s office for only the third time in history. But it wasn’t just any Republican who’d grabbed the brass ring – it was a charismatic, fire-breathing sort around whom a new GOP had been born and who would kickoff an era in which state Republicans would finally come into their own.

In terms of national politics, Allen’s election was among those first boomerang Republican wins we began seeing in the wake of Bill Clinton’s ’92 presidential election. Along with Allen’s victory in ’93, there was that of Christine Todd Whitman, a Republican who became governor in Democratic-dominated New Jersey. There also were two anomalous big city mayoral wins for Republicans that year: Richard Riordan’s in L.A. and Rudy Giuliani’s in NYC. The following year, New York Republican George Pataki came from way behind to knock out his state’s incumbent liberal governor, Mario Cuomo. And then, of course, we saw Newt & Co. achieve that historic Republican takeover of Congress. Republicans across the nation soon thereafter began taking control of lots of state legislatures and winning even more gubernatorial races.

All of this happened as certainly as light begets light. Looking back a decade ago, you can see pretty clearly that Allen’s win over Terry was one of a few national GOP victories at that time that proved to be a sign of many more to come.

But this past weekend, it was less Allen’s role in national politics a decade ago – or even today, for that matter – than it was his four gubernatorial years that so many A-Team penguins were chatting up. Folks were talking about Allen’s work to reform parole and overhaul an outdated juvenile justice system. They were going on about his push to bring about real welfare reform that’d successfully freed so many from their Great Society dependency. There was lots of chatter about Allen’s education reform, which focused on promoting higher academic standards for all. And then there were folks talking about his creating more than 300,000 new jobs for Virginians, breathing heavy sighs comparing those days with these.

Most governors would consider their reigns successful if accomplishing just a couple of these things. But to have been a part of achieving all that and so much more is to have been a part of something extra special.

Allen spoke admiringly to his fellow penguins of his hero, Ronald Regan. He prevailed on all to trust the free enterprise system and not rely on the “nannyism” (a favorite Allen word) that comes with big government. And he reminded everyone of the importance of having good tax and regulatory policies that are conducive to job creation. His words of the political faith were lost on none of the faithful who was there.

Thinking back on what Allen’s done over the past 10 years certainly makes one think of what the future might hold for him. There was little doubt that within a couple years of leaving the governor’s office he’d bump Chuck Robb from his perch in the U.S. Senate. And there was even less doubt that Allen would become a force within the Senate, going on to be a top campaigner for other big Republicans around the country.

Allen continues to hold sway – unlike any other state Republican – over the legions of party workers who toil daily in the GOP vineyards. It just a matter of time before the Allen charisma that’s captured so many Virginia Republicans spreads to capture conservative partisans in states all across the country.

And by the time another decade goes by, who knows, Allen just may be climbing yet another, bigger, more prominent inaugural stage to once again look out over a ballroom of gussied-up Republican faithful and shout that familiar welcome to all of his fellow penguins.

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