The Nation: Four Men for the New Season

Jimmy Carter is but one of a new stripe of moderate flourishing these days below the Mason-Dixon line. Herewith sketches of four other Governors whose elections reflected, and whose actions in office are helping shape the attitudes of the emerging South:

LINWOOD HOLTON OF VIRGINIA

He took office on Jan. 17, 1970, as the Commonwealth of Virginia's first Republican Governor in nearly a century. It was a ringing inaugural. Standing on the steps of the capitol of the Confederacy in Richmond, Holton proclaimed: "Let our goal in Virginia be an aristocracy of ability, regardless of race, color or creed." As if that were not enough for a genteel white Virginia to swallow in one day, Holton went on to invoke a provocative memory: "Let us, as Lincoln said, insist upon an open society 'with malice toward none; with charity for all.' "

White and black Virginia—home of states' rights, the Byrd machine and massive resistance to integration—wondered if the ruddy, ebullient Holton really meant what he said. He did. After 16 months in office, he is justly proud of his efforts to eliminate racial discrimination. He appointed the first black special assistant to serve in the Virginia Governor's office, Educator William Robertson, who has been working effectively to increase opportunities for blacks in both public and private employment. The Governor nominated Ernest Fears Jr. to the post of Selective Service director, the first black in the nation to head a statewide system.

To back up his policies with personal commitment, Holton sent his three school-age children to predominantly black public schools in Richmond. He did so at a time when many white parents were withdrawing their children rather than comply with court-ordered busing (Holton himself does not approve of busing). His gesture was all the more impressive in that he had a technical escape hatch; the Governor's mansion lies on state, not city property, and he could have sent his children to any school he chose.

Now 47, Holton was born in Big Stone Gap in the southwestern mountains of Virginia, the son of the president of a small coal-hauling railroad. He was graduated from Washington and Lee University and Harvard Law School, was a World War II submarine officer. As a Roanoke attorney, he organized almost singlehanded the G.O.P. in Virginia, even though he was defeated twice for the house of delegates and in his first try for the governorship in 1965.

JOHN WEST OF SOUTH CAROLINA

He appears the very model of the Southern politician: balding, rather stout, a devoted Democrat who dutifully worked his way up through party ranks. He spent twelve patient, hard-working years in the state senate and four years as lieutenant governor. In a gubernatorial campaign rife with racial overtones, West displayed a commendable combination of traditional Southern eloquence and a considered program for his state's future. His opponent, Republican Congressman Albert Watson, repeatedly played on the racist theme of unrest in South Carolina's desegregated schools. West calmly denounced such emotional exploitation and mapped out an intelligent program for solving the state's economic, educational and health problems. The voters responded by giving the affable Presbyterian elder a 53% majority.