Differences Begin to Show as Democratic Senate Candidates Speak at Forum

Divisions began appearing among the five major Democratic contenders for the two U.S. Senate seats at stake in California when the quintet appeared Saturday as official candidates for the first time.

The five also sought support in the campaign’s first organized straw poll, taken among 348 delegates to the Orange County Democratic convention. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer were the big winners.

The delegates gave a narrow edge to Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton over former California Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr. when asked to mark secret ballots for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The Senate campaign was the big draw, however, and it seemed apparent that the Boxer campaign made a major effort to get its supporters to the meeting at the Anaheim Hilton Hotel. Many delegates who stood and cheered Boxer when she was introduced expressed backing for Feinstein as well.

In the contest for the Democratic nomination for the two-year seat held by appointed Republican Sen. John Seymour of Anaheim, former San Francisco Mayor Feinstein got 231 votes to 100 for state Controller Gray Davis.

For the six-year seat held by retiring Democrat Alan Cranston, Boxer, a congresswoman from Marin County, got 196 votes. Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy received 108 and Rep. Mel Levine of Santa Monica got 29.

The voting was not limited to Democrats from Orange County, but party officials said most of those who attended were county residents.

The five major candidates have appeared at joint forums before, but primarily on specific issues such as the environment. This was their first appearance on the same program since the close of filing Friday for the Senate elections.

In the presidential poll, Clinton had 108 votes, Brown 100, former Massachusetts Sen. Paul E. Tsongas 51 and Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin 47. Former Irvine Mayor Larry Agran got 14.

The two sharpest differences between the Senate candidates, emerging during successive 20-minute speeches to the convention, were between Boxer and Levine and Feinstein and Davis.

Speaking first, Boxer talked, as she often has, about the need to cut U.S. spending for defending allies abroad and to use the money to finance neglected domestic programs.

“It’s time that we took care of our own,” Boxer said. “That is not isolationism. That is common sense. We’ve got to be strong internally first.”

When Levine’s turn came, he seemed to aim at Boxer’s comments without identifying her by name.

It has become “trendy” for some liberal Democrats to say, “America, come home,” and to be willing to sever ties of support from friends overseas, Levine said.

“I will not be a party to that isolationist line,” said Levine. A liberal, he also said his campaign is, in part, a mission to point out what is wrong with politics in America and to redefine the Democratic Party.

Levine added: “Our economic well-being here at home will best be served in a world where democracy and free-market economics flourish.

“Our future depends on reaching out to the rest of the world, not cutting ourselves off from it.”

Speaking second, Feinstein reiterated her program for revitalizing the domestic economy, which she outlined in her campaign announcement tour last week. The program would be financed with a $100-billion “peace dividend” to be realized over the next five years, using defense savings.

“I pledge to be an advocate for the American dream, the California dream,” said Feinstein, who narrowly lost the governor’s race to Republican Pete Wilson in 1990.

Davis took her on directly, after calling Feinstein “a fine person.” He criticized her for not joining him in endorsing Proposition 103, the 1988 ballot initiative to roll back insurance rates in California. She sided with the insurance industry.

Davis also said Feinstein, as mayor, had opposed comparable pay for women, while he supported it. Feinstein already had left the gathering, but she denied similar charges during the campaign for governor.

Davis insisted that he is the only candidate who has the “courage to take on the Establishment,” citing battles with Occidental Petroleum over drilling on the Malibu coastline, with an all-male club in San Francisco, and with Govs. Wilson and George Deukmejian.

“Anybody can stand in front of you and make promises,” Davis said.

And Davis challenged Feinstein’s pitch to female voters, accented by campaign posters on display here that declared “2% is not enough,” a reference to the fact that only two of the 100 U.S. senators are women.

“I come from the school of thought that the best person, the most qualified person, should be elected,” he said.

McCarthy generally repeated his announcement speech, pledging to campaign for the middle class in California. He restated his challenge to Levine to limit spending in the primary campaign to $2.75 million, the ceiling set by a major campaign reform bill before Congress. Boxer has joined McCarthy in the challenge.

But Levine said after his speech that McCarthy had spent millions on statewide campaigns over the years, and he did not feel compelled to live by any limit. Levine has compiled a war chest of $4 million for his Senate race, more than McCarthy and Boxer combined.

Also addressing the audience, which had dwindled considerably by then, was a late-starting Democratic Senate candidate, Joseph M. Alioto, son of former San Francisco Mayor Joseph L. Alioto. Alioto’s name did not appear on the straw-poll ballot because the ballots were printed before he became a candidate.