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The Senate did not love him back. An archconservative, Byrd was regarded by many as a lightweight hanger-on to the influential group of Southern conservatives led by Georgia's Richard Russell. What no one realized was that Byrd was already planning his move to gain power in the Senate. His strategy: to emulate Russell's mastery of the Senate's rules. "Senator Russell"—out of reverence, Byrd always called him that—also advised him to study the book of precedents. Byrd did, religiously, just as he had earlier pored over his butcher's manual. In 1963 Byrd also earned a law degree from Washington's American University, after seven years of part-time study. He was 45 years old.
Loyal to the Southern wing, he voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. He also excoriated welfare cheats, Viet Nam War protesters and the Supreme Court. Yet Byrd was making himself useful to the Senate leadership. He was elected secretary of the Senate's Democratic Conference in 1967, easily beating Joseph Clark, a liberal from Pennsylvania who had often criticized the procedures of the Senate. Byrd quickly became Majority Leader Mike Mansfield's de facto right-hand man by mustering Democrats for crucial votes, doing little favors for Senators, and taking care of routine chores that neither Mansfield nor his official deputy (first Russell Long, then Edward Kennedy) cared for. Byrd, however, enjoyed the work and decided he deserved to be majority whip. Says he: "I was doing the work, and I thought I might as well have the title." In 1971 he snatched the job from Kennedy with three votes to spare.
The new whip had also begun to shift to the center. He became an advocate of gun control and civil rights legislation. "I developed a new perspective on the Constitution and the law," says Byrd, who now considers it "unjust" and "cruel" as well as unconstitutional to discriminate against anyone because of his color.
As Byrd's views changed, so, it seemed, did his personality. For years, his hardtack demeanor and his relentless driving of aides belied a genuine, though rare, warmth. In 1972, for example, Byrd was the only Senator to show up at the funeral of Senator Joseph Biden's wife and infant daughter, who died in an auto accident; Byrd stood inconspicuously in the back of the church. Now his increasing self-confidence has begun to take some of the chill out of Robert C. Byrd (never Bobby or even Bob). Says one Senate aide: "The big news in the Senate this year is that Robert C. Byrd is a human being."
Even his attitude toward fiddling has loosened up. Though Byrd used to perform only at rural gatherings, he has begun to play at more Washington parties; at one he serenaded the President with Amazing Grace, Carter's favorite hymn. Byrd is even planning to cut a record with a West Virginia country music group, the Blue Grass Neighbors. As if to apologize for going commercial, he has also undertaken another, more dutiful, fiddling job: recording mountain tunes for the Library of Congress.