"So what if Rep. Virgil H. Goode Jr. isn't ready to join the Republican Party? He has made himself quite at home at the Republicans' big weeklong party.

Goode, who in January bolted the Democratic Party after 26 years and declared himself an independent, is the only non - Repuublican who will have the GOP's blessing in a congressional race this year.

On Monday, lifelong Virginia Republicans wore red 'Welcome Virgil!' lapel stickers and gave Goode a throaty cheer when he was introduced to them hours before the Republican National Convention was called to order.

For the GOP, Goode's move is as important as it was unusual.

It is important because it instantly deprived his old party of its last majority in the state, symbolic though it may have been. Before Goode's move, the Democrats held six of the state's 11 House seats. Now, its 5-5-1 with the independent siding with the GOP.

Goode, of Rocky Mount, is strongly favored against Democratic challenger John Boyd, the leader of a national black farmers' advocacy group. And Republicans could pick up a seat with the retirement of Democratic U.S. Rep, Owen B. Pickett in Hampton Roads' 2nd District.

So, in a year when the GOP is battling to retain its majority in Congress, it's easy to understand why, Goode gets hugs and handshakes from people who - at least technically - were his adversaries when he served in the General Assembly and during his first four years in Congress.

'I've liked Virgil since the first year he was in the legislature,' said Tucker Watkins, chairman of the GOP in Goode's 5th Congressional District, which includes Nelson, Buckingham, Fluvanna and part of Albemarle Counties.

...

As for Goode, he says party has never been as important to him as philosophy in the first place, and his conflict with what he saw as a liberal Democratic agenda is why he broke with the Democrats.

'The last Democratic National [Convention] I went to was in 1992 up in new York,' Goode said in his sharp Blue Ridge Mountain twang.

'That year, I didn't vote for the platform because I didn't like it'" (The Associated Press, The Daily Progress, August 1, 2000).