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Election Report Republicans win House; Dixon goes to Washington WITH REPUBLICANS winning everything in sight, Democrat Alan J. Dixon beat the odds and Lt. Gov. Dave O'Neal to win election as U.S. senator. Dixon will go to Washington to sit in the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate and will leave behind to the Republicans his secretary of state position. As soon as Gov. James R. Thompson decides who he will appoint to replace Dixon, the Illinois Republicans will have gained one more executive office. Meanwhile, retiring U.S. Sen. Adlai E. Stevenson III will come home to possibly run for governor in 1982. Republicans made great gains in the Illinois Statehouse in 1980. They won control of the House, 91-86, and the Democrats now hold only a one-vote edge in the Senate. The one branch of state government which the Democrats control is the judiciary. With the election of Democrat Seymour Simon to the Illinois Supreme Court — after a bitter campaign against Republican Robert Sklodowski — the high court has four Democrats and three Republicans. But it was the legislature, of course, which was affected the most by the November 4 elections. The Cutback Amendment passed, and the new House, which will convene January 14 (with the newly appointed secretary of state presiding until a speaker is elected), will be the last 177-member Illinois House. The first task in the House will be for the Republican majority to choose the speaker. The obvious choice would be present House Minority Leader George Ryan, but he is rumored to be in line for secretary of state. But the major task before the House and the Senate in spring 1981 will be reapportionment of the 59 state legislative districts — based on 1980 census data and on political party strategies. This time, because of the Cutback Amendment, reapportionment also means dividing each of those 59 districts into two separate but equal districts for the election of 118 House members in 1982. A Herculean task, perhaps, but it will give everyone plenty to talk about without unbalancing the state budget. The other major effect of the Cutback Amendment is that the state's 110-year-old system of cumulative voting has ended. From now on, House members will be elected in one-on-one contests. The 1980 election is the last time political observors and academic analysts will have to guess why some House candidates won and others lost. Why, for instance, did conservative Republican incumbent Webber Borchers lose to his Republican running mate Michael J. Tate in the 51st District? Some say the GOP was trying so hard to pick up two Republican seats in that district, encompassing Decatur, that their bullet strategy for Tate cost Borchers his reelection. There were about a dozen key House districts where Democrats and Republicans fought for the seats to control the House. The result was a net gain of three seats for the GOP. The Republicans bumped off four Democratic incumbents (48th, 49th, 58th and 59th districts) and held onto their two seats in six other districts (35th, 36th, 45th, 50th, 54th and 55th). The Democrats held off challenges in the 5th and 9th districts, as well as in Borchers' 51st District, and actually gained one seat in the 46th, where Republican incumbent Mary Lou Sumner of Dunlap lost. The newcomer in the 46th is Democrat Donald L. Saltsman of Peoria. In the Senate with 20 district elections this year, the Republicans gained two seats, giving them a total of 29 seats to the Democrats' 30. The key contests for the Republicans were in the 36th District where incumbent Don Wooten (D., Rock Island) lost to Republican challenger Randy Thomas of Silvas, and in the 48th District where Republican state Rep. Mary Lou Kent of Quincy beat Democrat George J. Lewis, also of Quincy, to replace John Knuppel. Knuppel made a try for Congress in the 18th District, but lost to incumbent Robert Michel of Peoria. For the next two years the state will parallel the nation with a Republican executive (albeit more moderate than the president) and one legislative chamber under GOP control. Meanwhile, the 81st General Assembly is winding up its lame duck session where, as they say, anything can happen. We will then have two years of the 82nd General Assembly in which 59 House members will be lame ducks because of the Cutback Amendment. And when the 83rd General Assembly is sworn in two years from now, its 118 member/will be the product of the biggest shakeup in the Illinois legislature since the 1964 at-large election of the House. MORE ELECTION ANALYSIS • A wrap-up on congressional races is reported by Robert Mackay in "Washington" on page 33. December 1980/Illinois Issues/29 |
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