In 1979 Time magazine characterized NCPAC, the Conservative Caucus and the Committee for the Survival of a Free Congress (headed by Paul Weyrich) as the three most important ultraconservative organizations making up the New Right.
While Durrette was generally considered the favorite having been Reagan's co-chair in Virginia, he lost the nomination to Marshall Coleman by 0.46 votes in a contentious convention in Roanoke.
NCPAC became one of the first groups to circumvent the contribution limits of the [Federal Election Campaign Act] (FECA) by exploiting the "independent expenditure" loophole permitted under a 1976 U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
[7] Four of the six incumbent Democratic Senators targeted by NCPAC in 1980, John Culver (Iowa), George McGovern (South Dakota), Frank Church (Idaho), and Birch Bayh (Indiana), were unseated.
Initially, the group targeted a list of 20 Senators for defeat, including Pat Moynihan of New York, Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts, Paul Sarbanes of Maryland and John Melcher of Montana.
After a shot of "out-of-staters" carrying a briefcase full of money off an airplane, one cow remarked, "Did ya hear about those city slickers bad-mouthing Doc Melcher?
"[7] In a 1981 fundraising letter for the NCPAC, Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina warned, "Your tax dollars are being used to pay for grade school classes that teach our children that cannibalism, wife-swapping, and the murder of infants and the elderly are acceptable behaviour.