Gubernatorial Primary Dilemma Could Aid GOP : Alabama Democrats in ‘Civil War’ for Control of Party

Democrats in this “Heart of Dixie” state are locked in a political Civil War as they struggle to pick a nominee to succeed retiring Democratic Gov. George C. Wallace.

On June 24, the Democratic primary election for governor gave a hair’s-breadth victory to state Atty. Gen. Charles Graddick, a conservative and former Republican who campaigned as a “new face” and vilified his opponent, Lt. Gov. Bill Baxley, as a Walter Mondale-type liberal beholden to unions, blacks and other “special interest” groups.

Last Friday, however, a federal court tossed out the primary returns, declaring that Graddick had violated federal election laws by encouraging Republicans to ignore crossover-voting restrictions and cast their ballots for him.

The court ordered the Democratic Party either to certify Baxley as its gubernatorial nominee or to hold a new runoff election between Baxley and Graddick.

Bitter Intraparty Fight

The debate over which option to follow has turned into a bitter internecine struggle within the Democratic Party, between the Old Guard Wallace faction, which dominates the party apparatus and favors Baxley, and the party’s neoconservatives, who feel that they are more in tune with modern political times and favor Graddick.

What is at stake, as one veteran political observer has noted, is nothing more or less than the “heart and soul of the Democratic Party” in Alabama as the state moves out of the shadows cast for nearly a quarter-century by Wallace’s dominance.

In many ways, the feud resembles the struggle for power that erupted among Chicago Democrats after the death of the city’s long-time political boss, Mayor Richard J. Daley.

“As long as Wallace was the dominant figure in the Democratic Party, the competing factions were held in check,” said Margaret Latimer, an Auburn University political scientist. “But now that Wallace is out of the picture, they are off the leash and going at each other tooth and nail.”

Baxley says that he has the names of more than 10,000 Republicans who voted in their own party’s primary earlier, then cast ballots in the Democratic runoff. He maintains that 90% of them voted for Graddick.

Other Challenges Pending

Passions are high, charges and countercharges are flying, still other legal challenges to the runoff election results have yet to be decided. The outcome is unpredictable, even with the best of political crystal balls.

It is clear that one of the biggest beneficiaries of the Democrats’ division could well be the Alabama Republicans, long the invisible party in this heavily Democratic state. There is widespread speculation that, if the Democrats certify Baxley as their nominee without a runoff, then the Republicans might dump their gubernatorial nominee and draft Graddick to run against Baxley in the November general election. This would set up an unusual situation in which Baxley and Graddick would face each other both in the primary and in the general election.

The GOP’s gubernatorial candidate is Guy Hunt, 53, a Cullman County cattleman and former county probate judge who has been given little chance of winning in a state where the Democratic primary has come to be regarded as the race that picks the governor.

GOP Sees Opportunity

Marty Connors, state GOP executive director, denied that Republicans have any plan to replace Hunt on the ballot with Graddick, but he left no doubt as to the new hope the Democrats’ dilemma has given Alabama Republicans.

“I can’t tell you that I’m measuring the curtains for the governor’s mansion,” Connors said, “but what we are witnessing is the birth of the two-party system in Alabama.”

Bill McFarland, a GOP congressional candidate in west Alabama, said the Democrats’ dispute is certain to boost the fortunes of Republican candidates for Congress and perhaps give the Alabama GOP its biggest bonanza since the 1964 presidential election. In that year, the state voted for Barry Goldwater and sent five GOP congressmen to Washington.

This year, Sen. Jeremiah Denton, the first Republican ever to represent Alabama in the U.S. Senate, is up for reelection. And, for the first time, the Republicans have fielded candidates in six of the seven congressional districts.

“I think there’s no question that the potential is there,” McFarland said recently.

Democrats in Dilemma

There is also no question that the Democratic Party is in a difficult bind.

“If they hold a runoff and Graddick wins, as is likely, then they have someone for a nominee who has been labeled as a flagrant violator of the Voting Rights Act and is subject to indictment,” said William Barnard, a University of Alabama political historian.

“On the other hand, if they choose Baxley--unless he can change the terms of the public debate--they’ve got someone more than half of the voting public feels is a usurper and a sore loser.”

One measure of that anti-Baxley sentiment is a bumper sticker that has begun appearing around the state. It reads: “Who Should Choose Our Governors: The Party or the People?” Over the words “The Party” are a hammer and sickle; over “The People” is an American flag.

Blacks, who make up about 25% of Alabama’s Democratic voters and cast an estimated 95% of their ballots for Baxley, vigorously oppose a new runoff.

“I don’t think we ought to put this state through the expense of a $1-million election to give the attorney general another chance,” said Selma attorney J. L. Chesnut, chairman of the Alabama New South Coalition, an influential black political organization that endorsed Baxley.

Wallace Keeping Mum

“Besides, if Charlie Graddick were black, by now he would have been indicted for vote fraud and the Justice Department would be in Alabama, peeping under every rock.”

Thus far, Gov. Wallace has stayed above the fray--at least in public--contenting himself with playing the “grand old man” of Alabama politics. At the opening of the State Farmers Market in Montgomery on Monday, he joked that the Democrats’ dilemma might delay his January retirement date.

“It looks like they are all sort of mixed up about who they want to be governor, so I might just want to stay on myself,” Wallace said.