He was the first Republican to represent this part of Virginia since Reconstruction, and likely owed his victory to Dwight Eisenhower carrying the state in that year's presidential election.

[9] In 1971, he voted for the Equal Employment Opportunity Act[10] and supported federal aid to accelerate the desegregation process.

He was the only member of the House Republican leadership who did not support President Eisenhower's proposal to increase the minimum wage and widen its coverage.

According to John Dean, he was also the author of most of the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution while serving on the Judiciary Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives.

John Dean wrote that Poff actually made that decision based on concerns that he would thus be forced to reveal to his then-12-year-old son that he had been adopted.

[14] By then, it was too late for reconsideration, and eventually Lewis Powell, another Virginian, was confirmed to the Supreme Court in Poff's place.

In 1971, when under consideration for the Supreme Court, Poff said in a newspaper interview that he had supported the Southern Manifesto and opposed desegregation because he believed he would have otherwise been defeated for reelection to the U.S. House.

[15] Poff is also well known as one of the men who, as a member of the House Judiciary Committee, sponsored the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, better known as RICO.