Ueberroth Steps Away From Race : Senate: The former baseball commissioner fails to file for Senate contest. His decision leaves 3 Republicans and 3 Democrats vying for seat Cranston is vacating.

Peter V. Ueberroth tantalized California’s political world for 48 hours by taking all the the legal steps needed to run for the U.S. Senate--all but one. Less than an hour before the filing deadline Friday, Ueberroth stopped at the political water’s edge.

“I am not going to be a candidate,” Ueberroth told The Times in a telephone call.

In a 10-paragraph statement issued a few minutes later, the Laguna Beach businessman said he is worried about California and the nation and will take “a much more pro-active role in the future,” but not as a candidate for the U.S. Senate from California in 1992.

The 54-year-old business whiz of the 1984 Olympic Games and former commissioner of Major League Baseball thus joined a long list of celebrities who have toyed with the idea of running for statewide office in California and didn’t. Ueberroth himself has previously hinted at running--or declined to discourage speculation--and ultimately decided against it.

With his decision, the lineup for the six-year Senate term to succeed by Democrat Alan Cranston remains at six major candidates--three Democrats and three Republicans.

Conservative Los Angeles television commentator Bruce Herschensohn, a Republican, became the last to file for the office Friday, submitting his papers at the office of the Los Angeles county registrar of voters in the City of Commerce. His opponents in the June 2 Republican primary are Rep. Tom Campbell of Stanford and Palm Springs Mayor Sonny Bono, one of those who did convert his celebrity status into political action.

The Democratic candidates are Rep. Barbara Boxer of Marin County, Rep. Mel Levine of Santa Monica and Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy of San Francisco.

Also this year, California voters will elect a second senator, filling the final two years of the Senate term won in 1988 by Republican Pete Wilson. After Wilson resigned from the Senate in January, 1991, to become governor, he appointed John Seymour, then a state senator from Orange County, to the vacancy until the next general election.

Joining Seymour in a contest for the Republican nomination for the two-year term are Rep. William E. Dannemeyer of Fullerton and Bill Allen of Claremont, a member of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission.

The Democratic candidates are former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein, who lost to Wilson in the 1990 governor’s race, and state Controller Gray Davis.

The Ueberroth shadow had haunted the Republican contest for the Cranston seat for months. The speculation became muted last year when Wilson appointed him to chair a state task force to restore California’s economic competitiveness. At that time, Ueberroth told Wilson and others he had no plans to run for the Senate.

On Wednesday, Ueberroth stunned the political community by paying a $2,502 filing fee and taking out nominating papers for the six-year Senate seat. By Friday, the paperwork was complete. All Ueberroth had to do was submit the papers to the Orange County registrar of voters and he would be on the ballot.

California political circles were held somewhat breathless for two days because Ueberroth would change the dynamics of the Senate contest in an instant. He has wide, positive name recognition in California and had the ability to raise considerable amounts of money for his campaign, even starting months after the others.

In the end, Ueberroth said in a statement that he had been told he would have to raise more than $12 million between now and November “for the main purpose of buying media to discredit Republicans in the primary and the Democratic opponent in the general election.”

“That is to me a waste of money and counterproductive to this state’s need to work together for solutions rather than harp on individuals’ negatives,” he said.

Still, Ueberroth rejected the idea, circulating widely, that he did not have the stomach for a rough-and-tumble political campaign.

“That is simply not true,” Ueberroth said. “I enjoy the debate.”

Even though he is not running in 1992, Ueberroth said: “Because I am worried about the future of the state and our country, I have decided to take a much more pro-active role in the future. The world is changing and California must change to be competitive and to provide a quality future for the next generation.”

Ueberroth said he did not know whether that role would involve elective politics.

“I’m not pleased with what I see and I think that there’s a need for change,” he said in a telephone interview. “I have the time and I have the energy.”

He said he would return campaign contributions that had been given him in anticipation of his candidacy. But Orange County officials said his $2,502 filing fee was non-refundable.

Herschensohn formalized his GOP campaign four hours earlier.

“This is the gateway to the 21st Century, when the shackles of the IRS and other huge federal bureaucracies will be cut off from the ankles and wrists of American taxpayers,” he said in prepared remarks.

About 25 supporters waved placards bearing Herschensohn’s photograph and chanted, “We choose Bruce.” They were confronted by a smaller group of abortion rights advocates protesting the candidate’s beliefs that abortion should be outlawed in most instances.

But Herschensohn, a former aide to President Richard M. Nixon, said he was not worried about what impact the issue might have on his campaign.

“I always say what I mean, and that’s it,” he told reporters. “People either like the things that I say and vote for me on that, or they’ll vote for someone else because they don’t like what I say. That’s America. That’s democracy.”

COUNTY RACES: The field of candidates took shape as filing ended for most L.A. County races. B1.

LEGISLATIVE CONTESTS: Filing ended for races that will determine if Democrats keep control of the Legislature. B6.