On Monday came the somewhat surprising news that former Tennessee State Representative and Member of Congress David Davis will not attempt to return to Congress by challenging the man who beat him two years ago, Congressman Phil Roe:
Former U.S. Rep. David Davis announced Monday he will not seek election to the 1st Congressional District seat he lost to current U.S. Rep. Phil Roe two years ago.
“In my opinion, a re-election bid would require a negative campaign that would not be in the best interest of the 1st Congressional District nor the political process,” Davis said in an e-mailed statement of his reason for not going up against Roe. “People are tired of nasty politics, and it is not in my nature to mount that type of campaign.”
Davis lost a bitter August 2008 GOP primary contest to Roe, Johnson City’s former mayor and a retired obstetrician/gynecologist, by fewer than 500 votes after serving only one term.
Everyone who remembers the 2008 Congressional Primary here in the First District recalls how hard-fought that it was, and how David Davis refused to concede because he believed that Democratic crossover vote had cost him the Republican nomination (and hence the election) despite the fact that current Tennessee law allows for crossover voting. Davis attempted to use an obsure law from the Reconstruction/Redemptionist period to justify his claim, but he seemed to forget that when a law goes unenforced for 130 years, common law would dictate that it ceases to exist de facto.
I had supported David Davis, and was nearly prepared to do so again. However, my gut told me that this time he was going to have a much more difficult time getting votes than he had in either 2006 or 2008. Some of Davis' supporters were trying aggressively to paint Congressman Roe as pro-choice because he voted for some bills that had questionable riders on them relating to abortion funding overseas. Since Dr. Roe's specialty has been the health care issue and related matters pertaining to the U.S. Agency for International Development's medical aid to the Third World, I suspect he was aware of what he was voting for and also knew that if he wanted some things passed in his arena of specialty, he was going to have to swallow some things he might not otherwise be inclined to vote for. Because of his overall record on the pro-life issue, it is hard to question Dr. Roe's commitment to the pro-life cause based on that record-National Right to Life does not (Roe spoke at the March for Life). More importantly, I suspect that after David Davis ran his polls leading up to his official decision on Monday, the numbers may have suggested a close race, but also might have showed that the people of East Tennessee weren't buying the idea that Phil Roe is pro-abortion, either.
I suspect we haven't seen the last of David Davis, but when he resurfaces, he will likely be in a much better political position to make a serious run for his old Congressional seat.
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