It will be interesting to see who West Virginia governor Joe Manchin selects as Byrd’s successor. Manchin is a socially conservative Democrat. Shortly after his first election in 2004, I interviewed him for an article in NR:

“In West Virginia, people look to see where you stand on life, marriage, and guns,” says Joe Manchin, the newly elected governor of that state, a Democrat with conservative views on social issues. “If you’re on the wrong side of just one or two of those issues, you’ve got a problem. If you’re on the wrong side of all three, you’re mortally wounded.”