POLITICS

Playing out the string is a familiar notion to Chicago baseball fans, who for too many summers have seen their local favorites take the field long after any chances of winning a pennant have vanished just to complete the 162-game schedule.

While hope once again beckons for a meaningful September as the White Sox and the Cubs head to spring training this month, the looming primary figures to be a similar exercise in futility for most Republican presidential hopefuls and their Illinois supporters.

The most obvious example, of course, is the full slate of delegates headed by Secretary of State George Ryan that is pledged to Texas Sen. Phil Gramm. While some may be elected in their respective congressional districts, their standard bearer already has dropped out of the race after faring poorly in the early going.

The 59 GOP delegates at stake in the Illinois primary (another 10 will be chosen later by the state convention) are a worthwhile prize; indeed, they represent one of the largest hauls available in any state. But by the time voters head to the polls here, almost 55 percent of the 1,990 Republican convention delegates will have been chosen, and the party's nomination may well be sewn up.

The possibility that the Illinois primary, once one of the nation's earliest indicators of popular sentiment, may be irrelevant in the grand scheme stems from a growing trend among states to schedule their delegate selection activities earlier in the season to lend more weight to the outcome and draw greater attention to the event.

A generation ago, the campaign kicked off with New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation primary in early March. Then, other states didn't join in until April or later; when John F. Kennedy won the Democratic nomination in 1960, only 15 states had primaries.

Now, though, 29 states will be finished with delegate selection by the time the Illinois primary rolls around in mid-March.

Most will have picked their delegates in the two weeks preceding the Illinois vote. Republicans in seven states — including megastates Texas and Florida — will choose 362 delegates on March 12, so-called "Super Tuesday." A week earlier, 10 states, including all the New England states but New Hampshire, will choose 259 delegates on March 5. Sandwiched in between is a March 7 vote for New York's 102 delegates.

Thus, only about 900 spots at the San Diego gathering will be left to fill when Illinois and three neighbors, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, vote on what some pundits are calling "Big Ten" Tuesday.

And again in 1996, as has become traditional, two very atypical states — Iowa and New Hampshire — will have played disproportionate roles in the presidential nominating process.

Recall, for example, the impact of Iowa, a state older, whiter and more rural than the nation as a whole, and less populous than 29 other states.

The spin from the Hawkeye State had Kansas Sen. Bob Dole a wounded winner, because he garnered just 26 percent of the caucus vote there. At the same time, pundits considered conservative commentator Patrick Buchanan a victor, despite his second-place finish, because he was only three points behind Dole.

Consider, though, how many votes each man actually received in quest of Iowa's 25 delegates, and compare them to some Illinois figures.

Dole tallied slightly more than 25,000, while Buchanan won almost 23,000. In Illinois, four years ago, GOP delegates pledged to President George Bush piled up vote totals of 30,000 or better in 11 of Illinois' 20 congressional districts. Buchanan himself polled almost 187,000 GOP votes in Illinois in 1992 — almost twice as many as total caucus votes in Iowa this year — yet lost by better than 3-to-l to Bush.

Like Iowa, New Hampshire is hardly an average state. Less populous even than Iowa, with fewer African Americans than Peoria, the Granite State has neither income nor sales tax. And the total GOP vote in New Hampshire this year was slightly more than what Republican leaders expect to crank out in DuPage County in two weeks.

42 * March 1996 Illinois Issues

Still, no Republican in the last half century has won the White House without capturing the New Hampshire primary, a fact that perhaps reflects the media's fascination with the winner as much as the ability of New Hampshire voters to choose wisely.

While the presidential sweepstakes could well be a foregone conclusion by March 19, voters in both parties will have meaningful choices to make for federal office. On the Republican side, Lt. Gov. Bob Kustra and state Rep. Al Salvi of Mundelein top the field of contenders for the nomination to succeed Democratic U.S. Sen. Paul Simon, who is retiring.

Vying for the Democratic bid are U.S. Rep. Richard J. Durbin, who has been endorsed by Simon and Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun, and former state Treasurer Pat Quinn, who's running as an "outsider" despite spending most of his adult life in politics.

Although 11 of the 18 congressmen seeking another term face no primary opposition, open seats in two other districts have sparked crowded races.

Ten Democrats and five Republicans filed to succeed U.S. Rep. Cardiss Collins in the Democratic-leaning 7th District, while two Democrats and seven Republicans are seeking Durbin's job in the 20th District, which could be a toss-up in November.

And two Democratic state representatives from Chicago, Rod Blagojevich and Nancy Kaszak, are sparring for the right to face U.S. Rep. Michael Patrick Flanagan, a surprise GOP winner in 1994 over former U.S. Rep. Dan Rostenkowski in the 5th District.

At the legislative level, competition is the exception.

In the Senate, where 40 seats are at stake, 30 of the 38 senators running have no primary opposition, and 18 drew November byes as well.

In the House, 85 of the 110 incumbents running are unopposed in March, and 39 of them have no general election opposition, either. *

Charles N. Wheeler III is director of the Public Affairs Reporting program at the University of Illinois at Springfield.

Illinois Issues March 1996 * 43