L. Douglas Wilder, then lieutenant governor, appeared confident on the eve of the 1989 election. (Photo courtesy the Richmond Times-Dispatch Collection, The Valentine)
The election was a squeaker, and the results caused a recount. Media polls exaggerated projections of victory during Virginia’s most expensive political campaign up to that time — $26 million spent in total — and voters queried seemed to have said one thing but done another when they cast their ballots. The defeated opponent blamed partisan bias in major news outlets.
The tempestuous campaign culminated on Nov. 7, 1989, when Virginians elected as governor Lawrence Douglas Wilder, a native of Richmond’s Church Hill neighborhood whose grandparents had been enslaved. Then serving as lieutenant governor, he was a Bronze Star-awarded Korean War veteran who became a lawyer and state senator.
His election to the lieutenant governor position four years earlier had come after a station wagon tour organized by Wilder’s chief strategist, Paul Goldman, to corners of the state seldom visited by office seekers. That electoral achievement put Wilder in the forefront of Virginia and national politics, where he’s remained.
“We forget about how remarkable his victory was,” longtime political analyst, educator and writer Bob Holsworth remarks. “There wasn’t another African American governor for 20 years, and that was Deval Patrick in Massachusetts.”
Wilder didn’t run as a history-making candidate, nor did he encourage others who’d underscore that aspect to campaign for him. The national and international press questioned whether a state that not long before had championed Massive Resistance to public school desegregation would elect a black person to its highest office.
Margaret Edds, in her account of the 1989 campaign, “Claiming the Dream,” observed, “Whatever else it might become, the 1989 race for governor would also be a referendum on racial tolerance. History to the contrary, Wilder and his strategists believed that was a winning proposition.”
Another exposed nerve of political discourse came to the fore that July when the U.S. Supreme Court delivered its opinion in Webster v. Reproductive Health Services, which critics viewed as a chipping away at the Roe v. Wade decision by giving states authority to limit abortion rights.
Republican gubernatorial nominee Marshall Coleman, in a three-way primary, had staked out a position to the right on the issue, opposing abortion even in the cases of rape or incest.
The Wilder camp vigorously debated how or when to bring up the subject. A post-Labor Day ad designed by media consultant Frank Greer featured a fluttering U.S. flag superimposed on Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello. The announcer intoned, “In Virginia, we have a strong tradition of freedom and individual liberty — rights that are now in danger.” The spot, after mentioning Coleman’s views, showed Wilder listening to a woman while the voiceover concluded, “Doug Wilder ... wants to keep the politicians out of your personal life.” The ad’s libertarian edge appealed to conservative voters who might not otherwise have considered Wilder a viable candidate. Holsworth adds, “Wilder was asking them, ‘Would you trust the government to do this?’ ”
Meanwhile, the Wilder campaign tussled with questions raised about his alleged failure to report holdings of 27 acres and stock given to Wilder as payment by the family of Curtis Darnell Poindexter. Wilder defended Poindexter, who killed a Louisa County General District Court judge and wounded the sheriff. Poindexter received a sentence of life plus 48 years. The property, stock and an unrelated Church Hill row house were held by HLS Associates, a trust of which Wilder was sole beneficiary. At his own request, investigators from the office of Attorney General Mary Sue Terry (a Democrat seeking reelection on the Wilder ticket) interviewed Wilder; his son, Lawrence; trustee H. Louis Salomonsky; and Wilder counselor Joel W. Harris. The investigation concluded that there was no conflict of interest and that Wilder hadn’t violated ethics rules. Republicans branded the investigation a whitewash.
“We forget about how remarkable his victory was. There wasn’t another African American governor for 20 years.” —political analyst Bob Holsworth
More complications arose with Labor Day weekend violence in Virginia Beach during “Greekfest,” an event involving thousands of primarily black students from all along the East Coast. There had been ugly incidents the year before, and city officials made efforts to prevent another Greekfest. The students instead came in greater numbers, with groups chanting the refrain to the Public Enemy song “Fight the Power.” As police attempted to clear the streets, rioting erupted, and young people collided with officers and National Guard troops. Arrests extended to bystanders who were not involved.
On “The McLaughlin Group” syndicated television show, conservative columnist Pat Buchanan declared that the national TV coverage of the Virginia Beach fracas would kill Wilder’s chances. He said, “Coleman will be the next governor.”
The Richmond Times-Dispatch, meanwhile, scrutinized Coleman’s finances and his ties to developer and Coleman benefactor Dwight Schar. Coleman had stated Schar had no state business, but a company associated with Schar had issued $8.4 million in loans through the Virginia Housing Development Authority, which provides low-interest loans to qualified buyers. The company in 1988 had earned $600,000 through the loans. The Washington Post further reported that Coleman made a hefty profit from the sale of two investment houses through Schar’s company. While not illegal, Edds writes, these aberrations “appeared to cancel out much of the negative impact of the earlier articles” about Wilder’s finances.
During an Oct. 9 League of Women Voters debate, Coleman, fighting a cold, campaign-fatigued and overly made-up, avoided Wilder’s direct question about his abortion stance three times, according to Edds. He instead focused on charges of Wilder’s lack of upkeep on the Church Hill row house, for which he’d been cited.
Coleman claimed that the house held “enough rats to perform scientific experiments. Why didn’t you just sell one of the Mercedes, buy a Pontiac and fix it up?”
Wilder retorted, “I really can’t believe you’re still chewing this rag.”
In the days prior to the election, polls were indicating, if not a Wilder landslide, his assured win. “A Mason Dixon exit poll got it terribly wrong,” Holsworth remembers, adding that a poll released just after 7 p.m. showed Wilder winning by a margin of 10 percentage points. “By 9 p.m., nobody knew who was going to win.”
J.L. Jeffries, in “Virginia’s Native Son,” writes, “The evening turned into one of the great nail-biters in Virginia political history, and it was only weeks later after a recount that Wilder’s win — by 6,741 votes out of nearly 1.8 million cast — was finally confirmed.” The totals were: Wilder 896,936 (50.1%), Coleman 890,195 (49.8%).
Regardless of the slim margin, Virginia had once again made history.
