Since our unusual wartime creation in 1863, West Virginia has always had an independent streak. Mountaineers were meant to be free, after all. And many a West Virginia politician has made a career by railing against mandates from Washington. Our current governor, no less, built his brand by suing the federal government repeatedly as attorney general. And you need not listen long to hear this same anti-Washington sentiment echoed in the halls of the West Virginia Legislature where Republicans now control 123 of 134 legislative seats.

“We know best what’s best for us,” is the refrain.

Every West Virginia Republican officeholder now self-identifies as a conservative. As a political ideology, conservatism has meant different things over the decades, but one of its constants has been the importance of decentralized power. And Republicans in West Virginia have risen to unprecedented power in part by cleverly aligning this tenet of conservatism with our electorate’s default independent nature. Running against Washington has never been easier.

Here’s the problem: Too many so-called “conservatives” forget this when it is inconvenient. Over the past decade, as the West Virginia GOP has amassed supermajority power, we have seen the Legislature seek to limit the power of its own municipalities at every possible turn. What’s good for the goose is apparently not good for the gander. “We know what’s best for you” is the message they have sent to mayors and council members who dare innovate and challenge the status quo.

I can speak to this with some authority. During each of my eight years as mayor of Wheeling, we would make a pilgrimage to Charleston during the legislative session to advocate for the city. Rarely did we have the luxury to spend our time meeting with legislators to plan new projects or discuss innovative ideas; we instead had to use those fleeting moments to play defense against bills that would limit how cities could raise revenues or regulate commerce within their boundaries. But on no topic was the Legislature’s distrust of cities more pointed than when it came to civil rights. In West Virginia, it is illegal under federal and/or state law to discriminate based on one’s race, religion, color, national origin, ancestry, sex, age, blindness or disability. But since 2007, West Virginia cities have been expanding their nondiscrimination ordinances to include additional classes. In Wheeling, for example, while I was mayor, our city council unanimously approved two separate fairness laws to prevent discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, and hair texture (the CROWN Act). To date, 20 West Virginia cities have enacted fairness laws of some sort.

Enter the “conservatives” in the West Virginia Legislature. I cannot recall a single legislative session in the past decade that has not included some effort to repeal municipal fairness laws. Typically, such measures would originate in the ultra-“conservative” House of Delegates only to be stalled in the more cautious Senate. But this year is different. Having interpreted their big wins at the ballot box as a mandate against “wokeness,” West Virginia Republicans see blood in the “fairness law” water. Just last week, Senate Bill 579 — which would nullify each of these local ordinances — passed the Senate by a vote of 25-8, setting up what looks like easy passage in the House of Delegates.

The story does not have to end here. The 2025 House of Delegates has already shown a willingness to push back against this Senate and this governor. There is enough time to frame this issue squarely around the principles at stake. This is not a debate about LGBTQ rights or DEI initiatives. This is instead a debate about democracy and whether local governments should be able to decide what’s best for their communities. It is also a debate about whether the “conservatives” in our Legislature believe in decentralized power both when it is convenient, and when it is not.

Make no mistake, passing a fairness law in any West Virginia city is hard. In Wheeling we had to rent out space to accommodate a 400-person town hall before we passed our 2016 ordinance — that raucous event taking place after months of newspaper headlines and prior public input. We were assured by some that if we voted for it we would burn in Hell, that businesses would flee Wheeling, that no child would be safe in any public restroom, and so on. Those of us who voted for it knew there was a good chance it could cost us reelection. Which is another way to say democracy.

If the current Wheeling City Council wants to repeal our fairness laws, it is certainly within its prerogative to do so. But it would be hypocrisy of the highest magnitude for a legislature of “conservatives” to superimpose their judgment as to what’s best for Wheeling from afar while wearing lapel pins pledging that Mountaineers shall always be free.

Wheeling resident Glenn Elliott served as mayor of Wheeling from 2016-24.