By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 13, 1997; Page B1

Freshman orientation at the House of Representatives had barely begun and Virgil H. Goode Jr., a Democrat from Virginia's tobacco and moonshine belt, was already chafing at Washington's way of choosing up sides.

"They said all the Democrats go over on this side of the room and all the Republicans go over on that side," he recalled. "I said, you know, that's probably right smart for the leadership. If all those freshmen got together and they had 73 votes and they didn't care whether it's Democratic or Republican, that'd scare some of them in the high leadership."

A Democrat who reveres Franklin D. Roosevelt but votes with Christian conservatives on social issues, Goode occupies a sweet spot on the political spectrum: the swing vote. With Republicans' advantage over Democrats down to 22 seats in the new Congress, such aisle-crossers can count on courting from both parties, giving a newcomer like Goode leverage that once would have come only with seniority.

Indeed, one of the first moves Goode made after his election was to join the "Blue Dog" Democrats, a three-year-old coalition of House moderates and conservatives who aim to reach out to Republicans to pass centrist legislation.

"Virgil clearly understands what it's like to work both sides of the aisle," says Rep. Gary A. Condit of California, a leader of the Blue Dogs, explaining that Goode is one of several freshmen who "aren't too preoccupied with making the leadership or the powers that be happy."

Goode, 50, has a farm boy's long face and a haystack of brown hair that has only just begun to gray. He grew up in the district, Virginia's 5th, that hugs North Carolina and takes in Charlottesville, Danville and Martinsville, a textile town that calls itself the "Sweat Shirt Capital of the World." His roots can be heard in a mountain twang so thick he often has to spell his name because people have trouble understanding him. (Goode actually rhymes with "dude.")

During his 23 years in the Virginia Senate, where he was the most conservative Democrat in a mighty conservative place, Goode's partisan fickleness often galled the state's Democratic bosses, who are happy he's now in Washington and out of Richmond. "I told him if he needs money for his reelection, just call," said Thomas W. Moss Jr., the speaker of the House of Delegates.

Moss remembers how Goode challenged scandal-scarred Democratic U.S. Sen. Charles S. Robb for the nomination in 1994, drawing 34 percent of the vote. Or how Goode let his name be used on a GOP billboard in his district when Republicans were on the verge of taking over the House of Delegates in 1995. Democrats branded their colleague a traitor.

And then, last year, Goode stalled legislative business until his party gave Republicans a share of committee chairmanships. He argued it was "the fair and right thing to do" -- not exactly what Democratic leaders were worried about as they watched their decades of dominance slip away.

During last fall's campaign, Republicans never tired of crashing Goode's campaign events to ask him his choice for president. "The nominee of the convention in Chicago," he'd reply each time, never deigning to speak President Clinton's name.

Even after Goode was elected to Congress, he was still causing trouble: He complained publicly when the Democrat who replaced him in the state legislature used his endorsement in a newspaper ad without Goode's approval.

So why is he a Democrat?

"My daddy was a Democrat," he says simply. Over the years, he has teased Republicans about switching parties, but now says he does not plan to.

"If I agree with them, I'll vote Democrat. If I agree with the Republicans on an issue, I'll vote with them," he said.

What about party loyalty?

"Don't come and argue that with me," he said. "You better come and argue how it's going to be good for those I represent. That's what I want to hear, rather than who put the bill in."

Dampening partisan rancor is such a priority for Goode that he made it one of his three campaign planks, right up there with balancing the budget and protecting Social Security and Medicare. He promised to "learn" the folks on Capitol Hill a little country courtesy, and gave voters pencils, emery boards and blue cards that said, "Work together in Congress."

If Democrats still controlled the House, Goode could expect to be one lonely guy, cut out of any good assignments. But with Democrats looking for every vote they can get, his elders are taking his freelancing well. The House minority leader, Rep. Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri, said he welcomes Goode's open mind and thinks the Blue Dogs are on to something.

"I'm hoping we can find bipartisan answers," Gephardt said. "Because they're moderate and they're middle-of-the-road, they have a natural ability to do that. That's a plus."

Even now that Goode has come to Washington, he still likes to play the outsider. In speeches back home, he calls Congress "the Feds." Up here, he sits behind the tiny, battered desk that was one of his Richmond trademarks. Lobbyists who visit are forced to squat on an oak stump that he kept in his statehouse office to protest the fancy furniture legislators bought themselves.

To those not wise to Goode's backwoods shtick, he can seem bizarrely naive. A fellow freshman Democrat, Rep. William Pascrell of New Jersey, ran into him at a Hill hangout called Tortilla Coast and suggested the two get together to "bend elbows." Goode, a teetotaler who alternates between orange and cranberry juice at parties, stared blankly.

"I had no idea what he was talking about," Goode recalled.

He's too cheap to buy an office subscription to The Washington Post, so his young legislative aides are pooling their own money to buy one. His office makes today's photocopies on the back of yesterday's faxes.

In the early morning and late at night, he answers his office telephone and offers to take messages for his aides.

Back in Rocky Mount, his law office has a wood stove, a bare concrete floor and milk crates for chairs. Home for the weekend, Goode put an arm around his 32-year-old wife, Lucy, sipped a Dr Pepper and leaned against a dusty antique dish cabinet as he watched housewares being auctioned for $3 and $4 a lot in a steamy room packed with plump, perspiring constituents.

Out in the evening chill of Windy Gap Mountain, Goode pondered how home is different from the House.

"Well, I know more people here," he said slowly.

He went on: "You walk down the street in Rocky Mount, everybody's gonna say, `Good morning!' But they're not gonna say `Good morning' walking down D Street going to the Capitol. Sometimes I've said it to people, and they look atcha like you're crazy."

Under the dome, though, Goode has found his fellow members to be rather to his liking.

"I think most of them are trying real hard -- they just have so many people pushing on 'em, wanting so much stuff. And sometimes it's tough to say no," he said.

Still, Washington ways elude him. The other day, a lobbyist asked Goode if he wanted to play golf before an upcoming lake festival back in the district.

"No, I'm not a golfer," Goode said. "I'll be out there on the street, handing out my pencils."