A Political Emphasis on Small in N.H.

While voters in larger states may meet presidential hopefuls as a once-in-a-lifetime experience, New Hampshire citizens meet them once a week. And candidates discover that citizens here aren’t intimidated by celebrity status.

These voters tell candidates what they think, and this is the difficulty. The problem for candidates at such early stages of the first presidential primary race is translating people’s opinions into an understanding of how to present the major issues. The candidates are visiting a state with a tradition of intense town government and an extremely large Legislature--424 members from a population of 1 million. Everybody knows somebody in government, leading to strong, vocal convictions about how to recognize good management and proper goals. When it comes to politics, these Yankees are not taciturn.

New Hampshire people know that they have a critical, sometimes pivotal, influence on the future direction of the campaign. In fact, they could redirect the South’s Super Tuesday regional primary. Local polling and high-level opinion research, however, are expensive for candidates; by federal law each can spend $465,000 in the state.

Republican Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas, for example, has already been to the state a dozen times, yet he has no definite polling plans. Instead, his campaign is relying on 250 members of “a leadership team,” according to Paul Jacobson of Dole’s staff, “six advisory committees, an executive and a steering committee. They’re all local people.”

Candidates come early to the state to generate funds, solidify commitments and reinvigorate their staffs. They must also move hand-to-hand at voter gatherings in high school auditoriums, Kiwanis Club luncheons, county fairs and “coffees” in homes. There they learn what’s on the New Hampshire mind, which may, at this stage, be a more diffuse agenda than candidates wish.

Last week Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.) spoke in the same Peterborough home where Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) came to speak three weeks earlier. Many of the same people attended and compared the slick stand-up style of Biden with the sit-down, bow-tie folksiness of Simon.

One man, a Unitarian minister, challenged Simon to square his vote for closing the Palestine Liberation Organization office in Washington with his otherwise generous civil rights vote. Simon had his staff send written material to the questioner in explanation.

In New Hampshire, small is important. Candidates used to world problems and broad sociological maneuvering must consider this phenomenon and assimilate their information in discrete samples. Dealing with people who expect to be heard can be bewildering to a man on the presidential run, but the situation isn’t going to change.

“The candidates believe the whole world revolves around them,” said Joseph Grandmaison, Democrat state chairman, “It is a very humbling process they’re put through here. And I honestly think that if they become successful, it makes a better person of them because it renews them emotionally with problems that most of us face.”

A candidate learns New Hampshire people aren’t given to cocktail party conversation. Fantasy or fads--harmonic convergence, for one--are left to other parts of the country. In the end, candidates court voters here by a piecemeal collection of personal conversations, appearing on sidewalks more often than television screens.

“It’s the same old story--the candidates just have to get out on the street,” said Elsie Vartania, Republican state chairwoman. “If they’re asked the same questions half a dozen times a day, then they become aware that’s something they have to address.”

The process for candidates is challenging and prickly, for New Hampshire residents have learned to ask savvy questions about national and international policies. Queries about a favorite local highway project are rare. This apparent high-mindedness stems from the citizens’ self-conscious pleasure in hosting the first primary on the national schedule for the last 35 years. Candidates learn to be ready for any issue because good and bad reactions travel fast.

Size, logistics and differing local traditions preclude constant small-town input in most other states. But whether New Hampshire voters live in the largest city (Manchester, pop. 90,000) or a village center, the people anticipate direct involvement with the candidate. For example Al Lambert, Democratic chairman of Hancock (pop. 1,300), maintains that after the Iran- contra hearings, “people are insisting upon honesty” and that “the budget deficit is fast becoming a main issue. In fact, they’re saying the only honest one is (former Arizona Gov. Bruce E.) Babbitt because he’s the only one calling for taxes.”

In nearby Peterborough (pop. 4,500), Dennis Chapman, Republican chairman, says that the “Oliver North hearings” created no problems, but agrees that yes, the deficit is an issue of major concern. The sizes of their towns do not diminish their importance or the voters’ demand to participate; it’s not a bad way to run a primary.