By BARBARA HIPSMAN and BOB SPRINGER

Politics

1984 congressional elections: return of the star wars

WE SEEM to love sequels.

And, as with films like Return of the Jedi, sequels are not necessarily plodding, two-bit productions lacking in magical special effects, abundant props and lots of razzle-dazzle. Any sequel worth its weight in popcorn, however, must begin with a reference to the original . . .

Republicans enjoyed a 14-10 advantage over Democrats in Illinois' congressional delegation after the 1980 elections. But the 1980 U.S. census had shown other states gaining population more rapidly than Illinois, so two of the state's congressional seats were shaved for 1982 races. Reapportionment, accomplished by skilled Democratic mapmakers and approved by a federal court, created 22 districts that put two veteran GOP House members out of work.

Former Rep. Robert McClory of Lake Bluff, elected to Congress in 1962, retired to avoid a GOP primary election contest with Rep. John Porter of Evanston in a new 10th District dominated by lakeshore territory alien to McClory. Rep. Edward Derwinski of Flossmoor, sent to Capitol Hill in 1958, was thrown into a new 4th District shared by Rep. George O'Brien of Joliet. O'Brien won the March 1982 duel.

Republicans walked into last November's elections on the defensive; they knew that the party holding the White House traditionally sustains losses in nonpresidential voting years. The Republicans were also under heavy assault for a dismal, and seemingly worsening, economy. Finally, one Grand Old Party congressman, Tom Railsback of Moline, had lost the previous spring's primary in the new 17th District to a conservative state senator named Ken McMillan of rural Bushnell.

So Republicans knew the best they could hope for, assuming a miracle or two, would be to come out of last fall's voting with a 12-10 edge over Democrats—losing only McClory and Derwinski. There were no miracles. Instead, only expensive, larger-than-life productions in four races gave Democrats their current 12-10 advantage and spawned 1984's probable scripts.

Democrats won two of the four 1982 contests, including the one in the central Illinois 20th District. There Springfield attorney Richard Durbin won 1,410-vote plurality (out of 200,109 ballots cast) over 22-year veteran Paul Findley, a Pittsfield newspaper publisher. In the other race McMillan's rightist credentials proved unsatisfactory to blue-collar voters of the Quad Cities area. Effectively supported by a grass-roots campaign organized by the Illinois Public Action Council, the decidedly uncharismatic Lane Evans of Rock Island captured 52.8 percent of the nearly 179,000 votes cast.

Republicans held on in the final two. In the 18th, President Reagan's opulently financed floor leader, Rep. Robert Michel of Peoria, won with 51.6 percent of the vote over political newcomer G. Douglas Stevens. The race was a Hollywood dream. It drew foreign news crews to Peoria for a splashy rally featuring Reagan, born-again crooner Pat Boone (still in white buck shoes) and the man who brought the Ten Commandments down from the mountain, Charlton Heston.

Stevens has indicated he wants to run again. Some Democrats think they need a stronger candidate, while others think Michel's biggest hurdle is behind him and he will be nearly invincible next year.

In the 19th District last year, arch-conservative Dan Crane of Danville (brother of Illinois Congressman and unsuccessful 1980 contender for the GOP presidential nomination Philip Crane) bested Democratic novice John Gwinn of Champaign by 7,600 votes of 182,000 cast. Crane has since become the Democrats' No. 1 target of 1984. There's no lack of would-be congressmen hoping to play the role of his antagonist.

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Gwinn indicates he'll try again. Ditto, says state Sen. Terry Bruce of Olney, an assistant Senate Democratic leader who lost to Crane in 1978. The field also is likely to include lawyer Thomas Lindley, newly arrived to Danville from Chicago. Lindley, who has served on the board of the Illinois Public Action Council, is expected to be a major factor in a primary battle with Bruce. The coalition of union, consumer and activist groups proved in 1982 to be a powerful organizing tool for Democrats in Evans' and Durbin's victories and in Stevens' and Gwinn's close losses.

Crane also faces a likely primary challenge from state Sen. Max Coffey of Charleston. Coffey says he thinks voters in the expansive district, bordering Indiana from Vermilion County south to the Wabash River, have decided Crane enjoys espousing dogma and slogans more than putting his nose to the legislative grindstone.

Republicans, besides hoping to hang onto Crane's seat, if not Crane, are aiming their national guns at Evans and Durbin. McMillan has indicated he'll try again against Evans. Several politicos in the district think the GOP needs a more moderate candidate than McMillan, one who can garner more support in the Quad Cities area. Some reportedly would like to see former state Rep. Ben Polk make a try. But Polk, who works for the state Children and Family Services Department, now makes Springfield his home and reportedly isn't terribly interested.

Durbin's situation was less clear as of late June. Republicans think his first stab at reelection should be a vulnerable time, but prospects of a strong GOP opponent seemed beyond the horizon.

The 1984 congressional picture is complicated in three other districts.

For one thing, Democrats think O'Brien is vulnerable. So do Republicans, but GOP strategists think O'Brien's Achilles heel could be struck in a party primary next spring, and the district would remain in the Republican fold after 1984.

A second complicating factor is the vacuum created in southern Illinois by a run for U.S. Sen. Charles H. Percy's seat by five-term Rep. Paul Simon (D-22nd Makanda). As this column was written (June 20), Simon hadn't announced his candidacy, but all signs pointed toward it. State Sen. Kenneth Buzbee (D-58, Makanda), said he'd definitely like to fill Simon's congressional shoes, as did state Rep. Jim Rea (D-117, Christopher). Another name floating around the Statehouse for Simon's seat was that of former Illinois House Democratic Leader Clyde Choate, a powerful southern Illinois-styled politician who now lobbies for Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

But the Democrats say without Simon, there's no guarantee the district that reaches down to the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers would stay Democratic.

Another vacuum, at least as far as Republicans are concerned, is in the 14th District, being vacated by Rep. Tom Corcoran of Ottawa, who hopes to be Percy's undoing in next spring's GOP primary. State Sen. John Grotberg (R-25, St. Charles) and state Rep. Jill Zwick (R-65, Dundee) were both intimating in June that they'd be running for Corcoran's seat by Labor Day. No one expected the district to elect a Democrat with Corcoran out of the running.

And so it would seem that although the congressional primary is yet months away, fall campaigning will take on a decidedly familiar ring — much like the start of a good summer sequel to an exciting first-run movie. Just like any movie, the reviewers surely will be on the spot to tip us off to the plot, but unlike a movie, no one will know the ending until November 1984 when it's written by the voters.

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