"PART of this position," former Orange County Adminis- trator Bill Rolfe said in connection with his recent e-mail to Orange supervisors urging them to consider a more history-sensitive site for a Wal-Mart store, "is throwing ideas to see if you get any bites. I like to go fishing once in a while."

Alas, Mr. Rolfe will have lots of time to go fishing: The board, meeting Friday night in special session, fired him on a 3-2 vote. Evidently, some board members--most of whom favor allowing the Wal-Mart Supercenter (and associated big boxes) on land near the Wilderness component of Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park--suffered red faces and quiv- ering wattles when the contents of Mr. Rolfe's e-mail became front-page news in The Free Lance-Star. A couple of board members reportedly critical of Mr. Rolfe's overall performance seized upon the Wal-Mart memo as evidence that a loose cannon was rolling around Orange. Truth and justice have had better days, but the cold fact is that a county administrator serves "at the pleasure of the board," and Mr. Rolfe failed to keep his bosses pleased.

Keeping one's honor clean, as the Marines sing, is not always easy, but Mr. Rolfe leaves the service of Orange County with his spotless. He worked hard for two years to clear the bureaucratic thicket for Wal-Mart, but then its location--at one point only a quarter-mile from the national battlefield park and smack-dab in non-park land where the warring armies operated--became a national issue. Historians signed petitions. Out-of-state legislators whose constituents' ancestors fought in the Wilderness raised a hue and cry. Actor Robert Duvall (a descendent of Robert E. Lee, whom Mr. Duvall portrayed in the movie "Gods and Generals") declaimed. A thoughtful person at this point asks, "Might these plaintiffs have a point?"