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Legislative campaigns

Playing Political Chess:

Winning partisan control of the Illinois General Assembly is now a game played by a handful of political leaders from the northeast corner of the state. Among the pawns are the contenders in a far-south Senate district

by Kevin McDermott

For state Sen. David Luechtefeld, all the attention he's getting from the state Democratic Party lately is anything but flattering.

Luechtefeld, a first-term Republican from the far-south 58th Senate District, is arguably this year's top "target'' for Democrats. He's one of the Republican incumbents Democratic leaders think they can beat. It means his party leaders will be edgy, his opponent will be well-funded and his success or failure could determine the balance of power in Springfield.

"I don't really pay a lot of attention to that ... [but] obviously, you'd rather not be a target,'' says Luechtefeld. "It tells you it's going to be a tough race.''

It also says something about the legislature's political process, which has come to resemble a far-reaching chess game played by a few political leaders in the northeast corner of the state.

Among the key pawns this year are Luechtefeld, who lives in Okawville, and his Democratic opponent, Southern Illinois University political scientist Barb Brown of Chester. They ran against each other in 1996, and are poised to repeat the dubious record they set then: combined campaign spending of $1.3 million - mostly funded by party interests outside the district - to win the $47,000-a-year job.

Few would view that as money well spent, but there is other math to consider. The Republicans hold the Senate by a 31-28 majority, and the Democratic grip on the House is even narrower at 60-58. Both parties need to win whatever new seats they can, but there's little point in wasting money trying to unseat entrenched Chicago Democrats or northwest suburban Republicans. Instead, the parties' firepower is aimed at seats held by new lawmakers-especially those who, like Luechtefeld, sit in districts that aren't clearly controlled by either party.

In fact, there are a number of reasons why lawmakers become targets. If they were appointed to fill vacancies, for example, they are likely to appear on the opposing party's hit list as a matter of course. The deaths of Terry Deering, a DuBois Democratic representative, and Penny Severns, a Decatur Democratic senator, put in place two of this year's top targets, their respective replacements, Dan Reitz of Steeleville and Kevin Kehoe of Decatur. They're incumbents, but barely, and the opposing party will always attempt to knock them out before they become entrenched.

Issues, too, can make otherwise stable districts into target races. Rep. Richard Myers, a Republican who represents the 95th District encompassing the Macomb area, has been targeted by the Democrats largely because he made comments perceived to be pro-hog farm in a region where the megafarm issue is a hot one.

And some targets wear the title because they've stubbornly remained seated in enemy territory. Sen. Walter Dudycz, a Republican in Democratic Chicago, is one. "Every election, they come after him hard," says Republican Senate spokeswoman Patty Schuh.

"The real battlegrounds are going to be the deep south, and the southern [suburban] counties, and Kane County,'' says House Republican spokesman Dave Loveday. "There's some real opportunity there."

Opportunity - more than policy or ideology - is the whole point.

"It's a question of ... how winnable is that district? How close is it going to be?'' says University of Illinois at Springfield political scientist Jack Van Der Slik. "For both parties ... these are winnable areas.''

The dominance of the four leaders over legislative elections was perhaps inevitable, given their modern dominance over the rest of the political process. It wasn't like that 30 years ago when Gov. Jim Edgar entered politics. "Back then, you could be a member of the minority [party], and not only sponsor a bill, you could pass a bill,'' Edgar quipped in a recent interview.

Today, rank-and-file lawmakers complain they're often superfluous in the legislative process - most don't even get to read the annual state budget before approving it - and they're becoming superfluous even in their own campaigns. A St. Louis Post-Dispatch review of records last year found that some lawmakers get as much as 75 percent of their campaign money from their party leaders instead of their own constituents.

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The legislative leaders - Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan, House Republican leader Lee Daniels, Republican Senate President James "Pate'' Philip and Senate Democratic leader Emil Jones - don't usually announce their targets. Their staffs are a little uneasy even discussing the concept of targeting; it sounds as though they're standing around a map in some underground war room, cynically rearranging democracy like so much artillery.

"I believe that to be strategic information,'' Madigan spokesman Steve Brown said recently, declining a reporter's request for a list of targets. But he confirmed the Democrats' view that control of the legislature will be decided in southern Illinois and the south Chicago suburbs, two regions where neither party can plant a flag and expect it to stay put. "We think those [areas] are all in play.''

Few if any areas are as in play as the Carbondale region. Luechtefeld, 57, is a former high school basketball coach who was appointed to the 58th Senate seat in 1995 to finish the term of retiring Republican Sen. Ralph Dunn. Luechtefeld came in as a novice in a sprawling and politically unpredictable district. He held his ground in the 1996 election only after fighting the most expensive legislative race in Illinois history, and one of the closest. Just 127 votes separated him from Brown out of more than 80,000 cast.

Though both candidates have lamented the high cost of the 1996 campaign (each blaming the other), neither is talking about unilateral disarmament this year.

"The Democrats threw over half a million dollars into this race last time,'' says Luechtefeld, casting himself in the role of incumbent underdog. "Obviously, control of the majority is important.''

Says Brown: "I just hope I can stay in the ballpark financially. It's going to be a very hard-fought campaign."

It doesn't help that the district is an inconvenient media market. The closest districtwide market is St. Louis, forcing the candidates to pay big-city rates for a message that is largely wasted on Missourians who have no stake in the race.

Together Luechtefeld and Brown have burned more than $74,000 in cash and services in the first six months of this year alone, though neither faced primary opposition. Most of that money, records show, has come from the parties or party-affiliated sources outside the district. If the 1996 matchup between the two is any indication, the spending will increase sharply in the final weeks of the campaign.

Luechtefeld has been wearing a political bull's-eye for two years, partly because he's relatively new to politics and was initially appointed rather than elected, both signs of vulnerability. But partly it's because the 58th District, and the downstate region in which it sits, has been traditionally Democratic - sort of. They don't call downstate Democrats "Republicrats'' for nothing.

Unlike the reliably Democratic Chicagoans or Republican western suburbanites, southern Illinoisans have refused to gel into the mold of either party. According to the Almanac of Illinois Politics, the 1994 general election saw 12.2 percent of the 58th District's voters cast straight-ticket Democratic ballots, a near dead heat with the 13.1 percent who cast straight-ticket Republican ballots.

Demographics tell much of the story. In the last census, the district was 92 percent white - whiter than the far western suburban home base of Republican Senate President Philip (87 percent). But with 10.4 percent of its families under the poverty level, it was poorer than the urban Chicago district of Senate Democratic leader Jones (9.1 percent).

Economically, the struggling region looks like it should be a Democratic stronghold, with a blue-collar workforce that is strongly pro-labor - owing to its reliance on the coal industry - and an economy driven largely by government jobs at universities,

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prisons and state and federal conservation areas. Downstate lawmakers in both parties have tended to side with liberal Chicago Democrats in calling for more state spending on local schools, infrastructure and job creation.

But on social issues, this could be bungalow belt in Chicago's northwest suburbs. Southern Illinois legislators of both parties have tended to be anti-abortion, pro-gun, pro-death-penalty, and generally conservative on subjects not involving the pocketbook. The late Rep. Terry Deering was typical of the political thinking there: When he wasn't defending organized labor against Republicans, he was defending gun owners against Democrats.

The region's political and demographic dichotomy helps explain why the two House seats encompassed by Luechtefeld's district also are targeted. Rep. Mike Bost, a Murphysboro Republican, was elected in 1994 from one of the more Democratic enclaves of the region, while Deering's replacement, Democratic Rep. Dan Reitz sits in a mostly Republican pocket. Each seat is being viewed hungrily by the opposing party.

This year's Senate rematch is already heating up.

Luechtefeld - who is again expected to stress jobs and economic development in the campaign - says the political peculiarities of the district have worked to his advantage.

"I am a Republican and this is a Democratic district. I have to have lots of help from Democrats to win."

For her part, Brown says her campaign will center on Gov. Edgar's failed education funding/property tax cut plan, and the fact that the Senate Republicans killed it. But she says the key to political success in the region is less partisan than it is personal.

"The personal nature of our politics in southern Illinois is something we take very seriously," says Brown. "This is small-town America. They want you to look them in the eye and shake their hands.'' 
Kevin McDermott is the Statehouse reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Some of this election's legislative targets


One of the most common reasons lawmakers become targets is that they are new to the legislature, either by appointment or election. Issues also can turn stable districts into targets. Other targets have stubbornly remained in enemy territory. The following list was based on information compiled from party operatives. The district number is followed by an identifiable community in that district. (I) indicates the incumbent.

SENATE

7th/Chicago: Walter Dudycz, R (I), vs. Michael McCormack, D. Dudycz holds a seat in Democratic territory, which makes him a perennial target.

19th/Orland Park: William Mahar, R (I), vs. Pam Woodward, D. Mahar successfully promoted electric deregulation last fall - before this summer's power shortages.

29th/Northfield: Kathleen Parker, R (I), vs. Nancy Alessi, D. Strong Democratic showing in 29th in '96. Voters liked Democrats for president and U.S. Senate.

38th/Ottawa: Patrick Welch, D (I), vs. Robert Studzinski, R. This could be a replay of 1994's election, which Welch won by a little more than 300 votes.

40th/Chicago Heights: Debbie Halvorson, D (I), vs. Flora Ciarlo, R. Halvorson has just two years in the Senate, and neither party has a solid claim in the district.

43rd/Joliet: Larry Walsh, D (I), vs. Arlene Albert, R. The predominantly Republican district's racial demographics are changing - and not in Walsh's favor.

50th/Springfield: Larry Bomke, R (I), vs. Gwen Montgomery, D. Democratic candidate took city share of the district last time, but Montgomery is from a rural area.

51st/Decatur: Kevin Kehoe, D (I), vs. N. Duane Noland, R. Kehoe replaced the late Penny Severns. Noland, meanwhile, is recognizable as a representative.

53rd/Danville: Judith Myers, R (I), vs. Don Roesch, D. Myers was seated just last year following the death of Harry "Babe" Woodyard.

58th/Carbondale: David Luechtefeld, R (I), vs. Barb Brown, D. This is a rematch of 1996's most expensive legislative contest.

HOUSE

115th/Carbondale: Michael Bost, R (I), vs. Don Strom, D. Bost is a Republican in Democratic territory.

106th/Mattoon: Dale Righter, R (I), vs. Carolyn Brown Hodge, D. Righter is new to the House as the replacement for Mike Weaver, who left midterm.

116th/ Steeleville: Dan Reitz, D (I), vs. Bruce Brown, R. Reitz was appointed to replace the late Terry Deering in a district that usually favors the GOP.

38th/New Lenox: Renee Kosel, R (I), vs. Scott Pyles, D. Neither party is in firm control in Kosel's south suburban district.

48th/Palos Hills: Anne Zickus, R (I), vs. Michael Howley, D. Swing district.

36th/Oak Lawn: James Brosnahan, D (I), vs. John McCauley, R. Swing district.

37th/Orland Park: Kevin McCarthy, D (I), vs. Maureen O'Hara, R. The pro-life representative is seen as more conservative than his pro-choice opponent.

95th/Macomb: Richard Myers, R (I), vs. Mike Beaty, D. Hog-farm issue may give Myers trouble in his livestock-rich district.

107th/Mt. Vernon: John Jones, R (I), vs. Greg Backes, D. Poshard factor: Southern Illinoisan running for governor may draw big Democratic vote.

118th/Harrisburg: Jack Hill, R, vs. James Fowler, D. Open seat. Poshard factor.

102nd/Decatur: Bill Mitchell, R , vs. Lee Holsapple, D. Open seat.

80th/Flossmoor: George Scully, D (I), vs. Andrew Qunell, R. No strong party control.

59th/Lake Forest: Christopher Stride, R, vs. Susan Garrett, D. Open seat.

89th/Metamora: Keith Sommer, R, vs. Mike Goodman, D. Open seat.

58th/Evanston: Jeffrey Schoenberg, D (I), vs. Joe Walsh, R. Independent-minded Schoenberg lacks strong support from his party's leadership.



Illinois Issues October 1998 | 23


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