ENTRY

Dan Daniel (1914–1988)

SUMMARY

Dan Daniel represented Danville in the House of Delegates (1960–1969) and served as representative from Virginia in the United States Congress (1969–1988). Prior to his election to public office, he served as the state and then national commander of the American Legion (1951; 1956), a platform he used to lobby for veterans’ rights and benefits. A conservative whose views on integration aligned with those of United States senator Harry F. Byrd Sr., Daniel supported Massive Resistance and voted in favor of keeping the poll tax. During his nineteen years in Congress, he worked to strengthen national defense, supported United States president Richard M. Nixon during the Watergate scandal, and helped write the Omnibus Anti-Drug Act of 1985. On January 19, 1988, Daniel announced that he would not seek reelection to Congress due to his struggle with heart disease. He died four days later of an aortic dissection at the University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville.

Civilian Conservation Corps in Virginia

Wilbur Clarence Daniel was born on May 12, 1914, in Pittsylvania County and was the son of Reuben Earl Daniel, a sharecropper, and his second wife, Georgia Lee Grant Daniel. He attended Mecklenburg County public schools until age fifteen, when he went to work as a store clerk to help support his family. In 1933 Daniel (called Clarence until adulthood, when he acquired the nickname Dan) joined the Civilian Conservation Corps in Spotsylvania County. He married Daisy Rivers Greene Fines on June 2, 1934, in Hyattsville, Maryland. The childless couple separated three years later. By 1939 Daniel had discovered that Fines’s divorce from her first husband had not been made final at the time she married Daniel. He sued for a declaration of annulment, which the Stafford County Circuit Court granted on September 16, 1939.

In July 1934 Daniel began working as a shipping clerk for a clothing-manufacturing company in Fredericksburg. He also played semiprofessional baseball, and by 1937 a major-league team was scouting him. In that year he fractured his shoulder after falling from a bus and at a hospital received ether twice. The procedure may have weakened his lungs, and Daniel developed tuberculosis. He was treated at the Blue Ridge Sanatorium in Charlottesville from the autumn of 1937 until April 1939 and at a Danville sanatorium from then until July 1939. While hospitalized he met Ruby Gordon McGregor. They married in Chatham on September 30, 1939, and had one son.

Dan River Mills Postcard

Daniel moved to Danville, where he worked first as a cloth handler and then as a junior foreman at Dan River Mills. During World War II (1939–1945) he enlisted in the navy but received a medical discharge because of a collapsed lung, the result of his treatment for tuberculosis. After four years of adult evening classes, Daniel graduated from high school first in his class in 1948. He won steady promotion at Dan River Mills, from supervisor of hourly employees, to employment manager, and finally in 1957 to assistant to the chairman of the board.

Daniel joined the local chapter of the American Legion in 1944. He served as state commander for the 1951–1952 term and four years later was the first Virginian to be named national commander. Throughout his Legion service Daniel championed the conservative themes of the 1950s: limited government, self-reliance, nationalism and a strong national defense, and above all anticommunism. With three million members the American Legion was a formidable pressure group, and Daniel was able to lobby nationally for veterans’ rights and benefits.

Senator Harry F. Byrd

In Virginia politics Daniel comfortably aligned with the Democratic Party organization controlled by United States senator Harry F. Byrd Sr. Daniel opposed integration of the public schools, supported Massive Resistance, and publicly called for a congressional investigation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. He also served on Virginia’s Commission on Constitutional Government, which developed philosophical attacks on the civil rights movement and theoretical justification for states’ rights and nullification.

Daniel represented Danville in the House of Delegates for nine years beginning with the assembly session of 1960. His committee assignments included Education, Finance, General Laws, Militia and Police (which he chaired during the 1968 session), Privileges and Elections, and Public Property, as well as the Commission of Veterans’ Affairs and the Virginia State Crime Commission. A Byrd loyalist, Daniel supported retaining the poll tax, helped gerrymander legislative and congressional districts to protect organization stalwarts, and often joined his colleagues in thwarting Governor James Lindsay Almond Jr.‘s legislative proposals after the governor deserted Byrd on Massive Resistance. Although Daniel attended the Democratic National Conventions in 1960 and 1964, he followed Byrd’s lead in remaining silent on the party tickets and, by implication, in supporting the respective Republican presidential candidates.

During the first administration of Mills Edwin Godwin Jr., Daniel shifted from conservatism to conservative moderation by endorsing a state sales tax, an increase in teachers’ salaries, a statewide system of community colleges (which he helped construct as a member of the House Committee on Education), and a 2 percent automobile titling tax earmarked for improvements in transportation. In foreign affairs he remained strongly conservative; in 1966 he publicly denounced opponents of the Vietnam War as cowards unworthy of their country.

Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr. and President Johnson

In 1966 Daniel managed the successful statewide senatorial campaign of Harry F. Byrd Jr. The following year he leaked to the press his intention to seek the Democratic nomination for governor in 1969. Unfavorable reaction in the press forced him to retreat to the more attractive option of running for the House of Representatives. In 1968 Democrats in the Fifth Congressional District (comprising the cities of Danville, Galax, Martinsville, and South Boston and eleven counties in the southern part of Virginia along the North Carolina border) unanimously chose Daniel. Garnering 70,681 votes in the November election, he soundly defeated the Republican candidate, Weldon W. Tuck, who received 34,608 votes, and an independent candidate, Ruth LaCountess Harvey Wood Charity, a prominent Danville attorney and civil rights activist, who tallied 24,196 votes.

Reelected to the House of Representatives nine times, Daniel did not disappoint his conservative constituency. During nineteen years in Congress, he often received 100 percent ratings from the conservative Americans for Constitutional Action. He served on the Armed Services Committee in each of his terms and chaired its Readiness subcommittee during the 100th Congress (1987–1988). Daniel was also appointed to the Committee on the District of Columbia during the 94th and 95th Congresses (1975–1976, 1977–1978). He sat on the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence during the 99th and 100th Congresses (1985–1986, 1987–1988) and during the latter was named to its Program and Budget Authorization subcommittee. Daniel worked tirelessly to strengthen national defense. He called for massive military operations to defeat the communists in Vietnam but ultimately acquiesced in American withdrawal. Daniel opposed détente and prodded the military into creating forces adept at antiterrorism and brushfire wars.

President Richard M. Nixon

During the Watergate investigation Daniel supported Richard M. Nixon until the release of audiotapes finally demonstrated the president’s complicity in obstructing justice. Daniel was one of thirty-four friendly legislators invited to the White House on the evening of the president’s resignation. During Ronald Reagan’s administration Daniel became a leader of the Boll Weevils, a group of conservative Sunbelt Democrats who supported supply-side economics and increases in defense spending. He helped write the Omnibus Anti-Drug Act of 1986, which provided money for interdiction, enforcement, rehabilitation, and education.

On January 19, 1988, Daniel announced that because of heart disease he would not seek reelection. Four days later, while visiting his son in Charlottesville, he was admitted to the University of Virginia Medical Center after suffering chest pains. Daniel died of an aortic dissection later that afternoon, on January 23, 1988. He was interred in Highland Burial Park, in Danville. In 1990 Averett College (after 2001 Averett University), of which Daniel had been a trustee, established a professorship bearing his name. Three years later Danville leaders named a 170-acre recreational facility Dan Daniel Memorial Park.

MAP
TIMELINE
May 12, 1914
Dan Daniel is born in Pittsylvania County, the son of Reuben Earl Daniel, a sharecropper, and his second wife, Georgia Lee Grant Daniel.
1933
Dan Daniel joins the Civilian Conservation Corps in Spotsylvania County.
June 2, 1934
Dan Daniel and Daisy Rivers Greene Fines marry in Hyattsville, Maryland. The childless couple will separate three years later.
July 1934
Dan Daniel begins working as a shipping clerk for a clothing-manufacturing company in Fredericksburg.
1937
A major-league baseball team scouts Dan Daniel. In the same year, Daniel fractures his shoulder after falling from a bus and at a hospital receives ether twice. He then develops tuberculosis, possibly as a result of the treatment he received for his shoulder.
Autumn 1937—April 1939
Dan Daniel receives treatment at the Blue Ridge Sanatorium in Charlottesville.
1939—1945
Sometime during World War II, Dan Daniel enlists in the navy. He receives a medical discharge because of a collapsed lung, the result of his treatment for tuberculosis.
1939
Dan Daniel moves to Danville and gains employment as a cloth handler at Dan River Mills.
April—July 1939
Dan Daniel receives treatment at a Danville sanatorium.
September 16, 1939
The Stafford County circuit court grants Dan Daniel a declaration of annulment of his marriage to Daisy Rivers Greene Fines, whose divorce from her first husband had not been made final at the time she married Daniel.
September 30, 1939
In Chatham, Dan Daniel marries Ruby Gordon McGregor, whom he met while hospitalized. The couple will have one son.
1944
Dan Daniel joins the local chapter of the American Legion.
1948
After taking evening adult education classes for four years, Dan Daniel graduates from high school first in his class.
1951—1952
Dan Daniel serves as state commander of the American Legion.
1956—1957
Dan Daniel serves as national commander of the American Legion. He is the first Virginian to be named to that position.
1957
After having been promoted from junior foreman to supervisor to employment manager, Dan Daniel is promoted to assistant to the chairman of the board at Dan River Mills.
1960
Dan Daniel is elected to the House of Delegates from Danville.
1966
Dan Daniel manages Harry F. Byrd Jr.'s successful statewide senatorial campaign.
1967
Dan Daniel leaks to the press his intention to seek the Democratic nomination for governor in 1969. After the press reacts unfavorably, however, he opts to run for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.
November 1968
Democratic candidate Dan Daniel soundly defeats Republican Weldon W. Tuck and independent Ruth LaCountess Harvey Wood Charity in the race to become the Fifth Congressional District's representative to the U.S. Congress. Daniel will be reelected to that office for nine consecutive terms.
January 19, 1988
Dan Daniel announces that he will not seek reelection because of heart disease.
January 23, 1988
While visiting his son in Charlottesville, Dan Daniel suffers chest pains and is admitted to the University of Virginia Medical Center. He dies of an aortic dissection later that afternoon. He is interred in Highland Burial Park, in Danville.
1990
Averett College (later Averett University), of which Dan Daniel had been a trustee, establishes a professorship bearing his name.
1993
Danville leaders name a 170-acre recreational facility Dan Daniel Memorial Park in honor of former U.S. Representative Dan Daniel.
FURTHER READING
  • Hayes, Jack Irby Jr. “Daniel, Wilbur Clarence ‘Dan’. In Dictionary of Virginia Biography, vol. 3, edited by Sara B. Bearss, 692–694. Richmond: Library of Virginia, 2006.
CITE THIS ENTRY
APA Citation:
Hayes, Jack & Dictionary of Virginia Biography. Dan Daniel (1914–1988). (2020, December 07). In Encyclopedia Virginia. https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/daniel-dan-1914-1988.
MLA Citation:
Hayes, Jack, and Dictionary of Virginia Biography. "Dan Daniel (1914–1988)" Encyclopedia Virginia. Virginia Humanities, (07 Dec. 2020). Web. 09 Jun. 2023
Last updated: 2021, December 22
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