REGIONAL REPORT / SOUTHERN POLITICS : An Ugly Past Is in Conflict With Area’s Quest to Be Truly ‘New’ : Charges of racism are still quickly leveled, along with cries of ‘Uncle Tom.’ Education is a key issue in many races.

A week before Election Day, the Deep South is caught in a struggle between its racist past and its present quest to be truly “new.”

In Alabama, for example, the issue of race is so pungent that the incumbent white Republican governor only needed to run pictures of his white Democratic challenger sitting in a car with a black man to bring charges of racism.

And, in South Carolina, the black gubernatorial challenger castigated as “Uncle Toms” black people who publicly supported his white GOP opponent, the incumbent governor.

In trying to live up to the title of “New South,” Southern politicians are fighting to push the region out of the nation’s educational basement, with myriad promises by gubernatorial candidates to markedly improve education.

Republicans made gains in the region in recent years, fueled in part by white fears that the Democrats are too sympathetic to black concerns.

Polls suggest that those inroads may be blunted somewhat this year by a perception among voters that the GOP is the party of the rich, an image fostered by the budget battle in Washington.

Incumbent GOP senators in Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia are standing for reelection, along with Republican governors in Alabama, Florida and South Carolina.

Although there is much talk about anti-incumbent fever among voters because of the savings and loan scandal and the budget and tax circus, that fever runs up against a strong reality: Southern voters, more closely connected to the military-industrial complex than those in most other regions, are loathe to change political horses during foreign-policy crises like the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

Around the region are the usual assorted antiquated laws that voters will be asked to throw out, such as an 1890 provision in Mississippi that requires the governor and treasurer to hand-count the state’s money twice a year.

Here is a roundup of key campaigns:

Florida

When Lawton Chiles, a Democrat and respected former U.S. senator, challenged incumbent Republican Gov. Bob Martinez, many political commentators saw the race as Chiles’ to lose. Now, they are saying he might do just that.

Recent opinion polls show the two candidates neck and neck, a come-down for Chiles.

Early in the race, Martinez, serving his first term, was viewed as vulnerable on two emotional issues, taxes and abortion rights.

After running as an anti-tax candidate, the governor in 1987 persuaded the Florida Legislature to widen the sales tax base to include services, then changed his mind and simply raised tax rates. Last year, he called the Legislature into special session to enact restrictions against legal abortions. The Legislature said no.

Opinion polls show that most Floridians support abortion rights, but Chiles, who says he supports abortion rights despite his personal opposition to abortion, has refused to club Martinez with the issue.

South Carolina

Sen. Strom Thurmond, the 87-year-old Dixiecrat-turned-Republican, has only token opposition in his run for a seventh term. As a measure of his esteem, the onetime segregationist has even been endorsed by several black Democrats.

GOP Gov. Carroll A. Campbell Jr. also seems to have a sure ride to his second term, but his Democratic opponent, state Sen. Theo Mitchell, is not making it gentle. Mitchell has lambasted the popular governor on issues ranging from race relations to aid for victims of Hurricane Hugo.

North Carolina

In perhaps the most-watched Senate race in America, a recent Charlotte Observer poll put black Democratic challenger Harvey Gantt, former mayor of Charlotte, 8 percentage points ahead of incumbent GOP Sen. Jesse Helms.

Despite the poll, most of the state’s longtime political analysts still bet that Helms’ strength among old-line segregationists will catch up to Gantt’s support among newly migrated progressive voters. In any case, the race is a metaphor for the struggle between the Old South and the New South.

Georgia and Tennessee

Democrats are expected to elect governors in both these states.

Zell Miller, Georgia’s lieutenant governor for 16 years, trounced noted black civil rights activist Andrew Young in the Democratic primary, and polls show him well ahead of GOP candidate Johnny Isakson, a real estate mogul and state representative.

The two white men, both moderates, have traded charges over who has a racist history, but their most volatile dispute centers on how they would dispense the expected cash bonanza from a state lottery that they both espouse. Both vow to use the money to improve schools, but Miller would distribute it through a governor-appointed commission. Isakson says he would send the money directly to schools.

In Tennessee, Democratic Gov. Ned McWherter, a hefty cigar smoker, also wants to be an education governor, but he probably will have to levy a state income tax to finance the $700-million plan he wants to implement.

His weak GOP opponent, state Rep. Dwight Henry, is trying desperately to scare voters with talk about taxes, but his effort seems hopeless.

Mississippi

Republicans, who have been strengthening their party in this state, suffered a setback when Rep. Larkin Smith died in a plane crash last year.

The party was stunned further when a Democrat, Gene Taylor, won Smith’s southern Mississippi seat in a special election. Now, Smith’s widow, Sheila Smith, is trying to win back the seat for the GOP.

She’s not given a good chance. A magazine, Campaigns and Elections, says: “Ousting a Mississippi incumbent is tougher than running a Frederick’s of Hollywood in Tehran.” Bearing that out, GOP Sen. Thad Cochran is unopposed.

Virginia and West Virginia

Sens. John W. Warner, Republican of Virginia, and John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV, a West Virginia Democrat, appear headed for easy reelection. Their strongest opponent seems to be voter anger at Congress’ fumbling over the budget.

Rockefeller is outspending his Republican opponent, John Yoder, a Harpers Ferry lawyer, by 47 to 1. Yoder has tried without much success to arouse public indignation about Rockefeller’s acceptance of $20,150 from savings and loan interests during the 1980s.

Alabama

The governor’s race in this state has turned nasty recently as opinion polls show Guy Hunt, the Republican incumbent, even with Democrat Paul Hubbert, executive secretary of the Alabama Education Assn.

Hunt’s television ads show Hubbert seated next to Joe Reed, the black associate executive secretary of the education group, and link Hubbert to failed presidential aspirants Jesse Jackson, Michael S. Dukakis and Walter F. Mondale. The ad campaign is a racist effort to scare white voters, Hubbert’s supporters charge. But the Hunt campaign says the ads center on liberal political beliefs, not race.

Staff researcher Edith Stanley contributed to this story.