Politics

Background

From the mid-1880s until the mid-1960s, Virginia politics were dominated by Conservative Democrats. After World War I, under the leadership of Harry Flood Byrd, who became Governor of Virginia and later a U.S. senator, this group became known as the Byrd Organization. With a power base in a network of the constitutional officers of most of Virginia's counties, they controlled Virginia's state government. The Byrd Organization largely followed conservative and anti-debt principles espoused by Byrd, who had grown up in a rural setting during the fiscally stressed era following Reconstruction. Although a member of the Democratic Party and an initial supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Senator Byrd became a bitter opponent of the New Deal and related national policies, particularly those involving fiscal and social issues. He became Virginia's senior senator after the death of Senator Carter Glass of Lynchburg in 1946.

The period following World War II saw substantial growth of Virginia's suburban areas, notably in the regions of Northern Virginia, Richmond, and Hampton Roads. The population became more diverse. People of the emerging middle class were increasingly less willing to accept the rural focus of the General Assembly, nor Byrd's extreme positions on public debt and social issues. The latter was nowhere more graphically illustrated than with Byrd's violent opposition to racial integration of the state's public schools. His leadership in the failed policy of Massive Resistance to racial desegregation of the public schools and efforts to circumvent related rulings of the United States Supreme Court ultimately caused closure of some public schools in the state and alienated many middle class voters. The Byrd Organization had never been strong in Virginia's independent cities, and beginning in the 1960s, city and suburban factions increasingly supported efforts to make broad changes in Virginia. In this climate, the Republican Party of Virginia began making inroads.

Rulings by both state and federal courts that "Massive Resistance" was unconstitutional and a move to compliance with the court orders in early 1959 by Governor James Lindsay Almond, Jr., and the General Assembly could be described as marking the Byrd Organization's "last stand", although the remnants of the Organization continued to wield power for a few years longer.

When Senator Byrd resigned in 1965, he was replaced by his son Harry F. Byrd, Jr. in the U.S. Senate. However, the heyday of the Byrd Organization was clearly in the past, ending 80 years of domination of Virginia politics by the Conservative Democrats with the election of a Republican governor, Linwood Holton, in 1969 for the first time in the 20th century, succeeding a longtime member of the Byrd Organization, Democrat Mills E. Godwin. To the amazement of many observers, Godwin changed parties and was elected again as governor in 1973, but as a Republican.

During the last quarter of the 20th century, Virginia's Republicans gained ground against the Democrats. Republican John Warner from Northern Virginia gained one of the seats in the U.S. Senate in 1978. After longtime state senator L. Douglas Wilder became governor in 1989, the first African American to become a governor in the United States, Republicans subsequently gained control of the Governor's mansion after the 1993 election. Republicans finally gained control of the General Assembly in the 1999 elections.

For a number of years, the recurring Republican theme was to reduce waste in state government and taxes. However, this seemed to reach a peak during the administration of Jim Gilmore, with a move to repeal an unpopular car tax accompanied by a failure to provide promised replacement funds to the counties, cities and towns. Subsequently, two Democrats were elected consecutively as governor, and control in the General Assembly shifted back to a more bipartisan balance of power. As governor, both Mark Warner and Tim Kaine were confronted with stabilizing state economics and dealing with a deteriorating transportation funding situation partially caused by the state's failure to index state fuel taxes to inflation, with a "cents per gallon" tax rate unchanged since the administration of Democratic Governor Gerald Baliles in 1986.

21st century politics Former Senator from Virginia Jim Webb Virginia's congressional districts as of 2003. Counties and cities in blue voted for Kaine while counties and cities in red supported Kilgore. Counties and cities in red voted for McDonnell while counties and cities in blue supported Deeds. The counties of Fairfax, Loudoun, Prince William (located in the northeastern part of the state), which, even though they have been trending Democratic in Presidential, U.S. Senatorial, U.S. House, and gubernatorial elections recently, voted for McDonnell (R). However Democrat Dave Marsden would win in a 2010 special state senate election to the seat previously held by now-state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R).

In the 21st century, Northern Virginia is becoming increasingly known for favoring candidates of the Democratic Party at both the state and national level. Fairfax County supported John Kerry in the 2004 presidential election, and also voted heavily for Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election, the first time a Democratic candidate for President carried the Commonwealth of Virginia since Lyndon Johnson in 1964. The area also voted for Democrats Jim Webb in 2006 for U.S. Senate, Tim Kaine in 2005 for governor, and Mark Warner in 2001 for governor. In these three races for statewide office, the margins tallied in Northern Virginia provided the Democratic candidate with a winning margin of victory.

Democrat Jim Webb defeated incumbent Senator George Allen by the slim margin of 49.6% to 49.2% in 2006. However, that margin increased to 58.1% to 40.7% in favor of the Democratic challenger in the counties and cities of Northern Virginia, whereas Webb ran behind Allen somewhat, 46.1% to 52.7%, in the remainder of the Commonwealth. Webb carried Fairfax County, Prince William County, and Loudoun County, as well as the more urban areas of Arlington, Alexandria, and Falls Church. Allen's sole wins in Northern Virginia were the cities of Manassas and Manassas Park, winning the latter two only by the narrow margins of 3.54% and 2.38%, respectively.

In the 2004 presidential election, 53% of Northern Virginia voters voted for John Kerry, the Democratic candidate, and 46% voted for George W. Bush, the Republican candidate. This contrasted with the rest of Virginia, which gave 43% to Kerry and 56% to Bush. Kerry also carried Fairfax County, the most populous county in Virginia, and Fairfax City, the first time those jurisdictions had voted Democratic since Johnson's national landslide in 1964. The strongest support in the area for the Democrats lies inside the Beltway, in Arlington, Alexandria, and parts of Fairfax County. The more distant areas (i.e., Loudoun County and Prince William County) are generally more conservative, though as they have increased in population they have also become more liberal. Both Mark Warner in 2001 and John Kerry in 2004 lost Loudoun and Prince William counties. Tim Kaine won both counties in 2005. In 2006, despite not polling as strongly as Mark Warner statewide, Democratic senate candidate Jim Webb won both Loudoun and Prince William counties. In 2005, 65% of the voters of Northern Virginia voted for Democrat Tim Kaine for governor over Jerry Kilgore, who received only 32% of the vote, easily 14 points lower than George W. Bush's showing only a year earlier.

The 8th, the 10th, and the 11th congressional districts lie within Northern Virginia. The current congressman from the 8th district is Jim Moran (D), the current congressman from the 10th district is Frank Wolf (R), and the current congressman from the 11th district is Gerry Connolly (D). All three districts voted for Jim Webb in the 2006 Senate election.

In the 2005 gubernatorial election, the entire region continued to move away from the Republicans. Fairfax County, Arlington County, the cities of Alexandria, Fairfax City, and Falls Church, and for the first time, Loudoun County and Prince William County, went to Tim Kaine, the Democratic candidate. The area continued to be more Democratic the closer it was to Washington, D.C., but Richmond resident Kaine was able to accomplish what Northern Virginian Mark Warner had been unable to do just four years earlier in 2001: carry Loudoun County and Prince William County (as well as win over 60% of the vote in Fairfax County).

In 2006, Democrat Mark Herring swept every precinct in the 33rd state Senate District on January 31, en route to beating Republican Loudoun County Supervisor Mick Staton by a margin of 62 to 38 percent, providing evidence for the claim that Loudoun is transforming into a liberal county. The district sits primarily in Loudoun County but also includes nine precincts in western Fairfax County: Floris, Fox Mill, Frying Pan, McNair, Franklin, Kinross, Navy, Lees Corner East, and Lees Corner West.

In 2008, economist Nancy Pfotenhauer, a spokesperson and adviser for the John McCain presidential campaign, created controversy by referring to the areas of Virginia not included in Northern Virginia as "real Virginia", picking up on a Republican talking point that Sarah Palin promoted; namely that red states are the "real America" and more "pro-America". Joe McCain, brother of John McCain, also called Arlington and Alexandria in Northern Virginia "communist country".

In the 2008 presidential election, the majority of Northern Virginia voters voted for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. Over 70% of registered voters in Arlington, Alexandria and Falls Church voted for Obama. Fairfax County, Loudoun County, Manassas and Prince William County also went to Obama, with Obama receiving 60% of the vote in Fairfax County compared to Republican candidate John McCain's 39%. Obama's win in Fairfax County, the most populous county in the state, marks the second time a Democrat has carried that county since the 1964 breakdown of Democratic predominance in the South (the other being the 2004 presidential elections when the county went to John Kerry). Obama's victory in Northern Virginia continues the trend of Northern Virginia favoring Democrats over Republicans.

In the 2009 gubernatorial election, though Arlington, Alexandria, and Falls Church would back Democratic state Senator Creigh Deeds in his unsuccessful run for governor, Republican former state Attorney General, and future Governor, Bob McDonnell, who overwhelmingly defeated Deeds 59% to 41% across the state as a whole, won Fairfax County, Loudoun County, Manassas, and Prince William County. However, a January 2010 special state Senate election in the Fairfax county based 37th State Senatorial district, which was held following Ken Cuccinelli's (R) resignation from the Senate of Virginia upon his election as state Attorney General two months earlier, was won by then-Delegate David W. Marsden (D). Marsden's victory would suggest that despite McDonnell's performance in northern Virginia during the 2009 gubernatorial election, the Democratic trend in the region has not been reversed.

A 2011 Washington Post poll found that 47% of Virginians favored the legalization of same-sex marriage, while 43% opposed it and 10% had no opinion. It found 55% favored allowing same-sex couples to adopt children, while 35% opposed that and 10% had no opinion. The same poll found that 64% of residents Arlington, Alexandria, Fairfax, Fairfax County support same-sex marriage, 63% of residents of Loudoun, Prince William, Manassas, Manassas Park, Stafford, Fauquier, Culpeper, Madison, Rappamannock, Warrenton, Clarke County, Frederick, and Winchester support same-sex marriage, while only 42% of the rest of Virginia supports same-sex marriage.