Montana Vote Could Set Course for State’s Future : Election: It has lost one of its two House seats. Residents must choose between conservative and liberal.

This year, Montana chooses a future. The turbulent winds of wide-open Western politics will prevail either to the left or to the right just as sure and strong as the spring Chinooks blow warm out the Rockies.

Here in the Beaverhead Valley, the streets are empty, and it’s high noon at a local meeting hall. The audience is sprinkled with cowboys--real cowboys--small-town merchants, mothers, children, a hunting guide, a few local politicians and some retirees. Their friend, veteran Republican Congressman Ron Marlenee is talking of the enemy:

”. . . Defenders of Wildlife, they want to set predator-control policy. . . . Representatives from Connecticut want to set grazing policy; Willie Nelson, farm and tax policy. The Animal Liberation Front wants to deal with animal research. The Fund for Animals from New York City wants to come in and tell us how to run our state fish and game. . . . The world’s foremost toxicologist, Meryl Streep, wants to set chemical policy . . . Ted Turner and Jane Fonda, land use and dietary policy . . . EPA, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act . . . the Americans with Disabilities Act . . . the two-headed spotted alleywalker, mascot of the hot-tub liberals. . . .

“Folks, this is not a skirmish, this is an all-out war. The Congress of the United States is involved in a hostile takeover of your community, your farm, your home. . . .”

Over on the other side of the Continental Divide, another group of Montanans is gulping through an enchilada dinner on a snowy hillside at the Black Eagle Community Center. There are some lawyers, a few grain growers, teachers, government workers, business owners, a few artists and elected officials. Their friend, veteran Democratic Rep. Pat Williams is also speaking of the enemy, a different enemy:

“There are those who believe that government can only get in the way, that it has no appropriate role in improving the individual lives of our citizens. That crowd is not new. They were against child labor laws when government came in and righted that terrible wrong. They were against the first federal aid to education bill. . . . They were against the Montana pension reform act . . . the plan which Franklin Roosevelt brought to Washington and which became Social Security. . . . When Montana showed America how to create set-asides for great scenic areas of this country by marching to Washington with petitions to create Yellowstone National Park, they were against that. They were against the setting-aside of Glacier National Park. They were against this great American political invention called wilderness set-asides. . . .

“There is a thing, interestingly enough, that they’re not against. There is a government action that these nay-sayers, these national Republicans, are for, and that is any kind of a legislative action that will continue to line the pockets of the rich at the expense of the middle class. . . .”

Montana’s choice in the 1992 elections is unconditional, it is nothing less than a referendum on tomorrow in what they call “The Last Best Place.”

By the vagaries of the 1990 census, Montana is losing one of its two congressional seats. Nobody is stepping aside. So one or the other of its two incumbents will forge ahead with the voice and mandate of Montana. Either Marlenee, (pronounced MAR-lin-nay) an eight-term flinty conservative farmer from Scobey, out on the state’s eastern plains, or Williams, a seven-term urban liberal from Butte, up on the flank of the Rocky Mountains.

Environmentalist or land-use advocate?

Pro- or anti-government?

Night or day?

Marlenee puts it succinctly: “Montana is at a crossroads. This is a watershed election. . . . What philosophy will prevail? Pat and I have canceled each other’s votes time after time after time. This time, you make the choice.”

Montana will decide, but the remainder of the nation will be watching. And not necessarily with detachment. The deed to nearly a third of Montana is held by all Americans through the federal government. And this land is among the wildest, most pristine in all the Lower 48. Also, it’s among the most bitterly disputed.

No issue has the national profile or so cleanly divides the candidates in this election as the future of this six million acres of disputed federal land, a cumulative area the size of Vermont. How much should be set aside for new wilderness? How much opened up for timber harvest or mining or campgrounds for recreational vehicles?

A bill is now pending in Congress to protect about 2.2 million acres of this land, or, conversely, to allow multiple-use development on 3.8 million acres. Marlenee is pulling for less wilderness; Williams is tugging in the other direction.

“In the next few months, Montanans will be deciding which road to take, . . . the road to make Montana a playground or the road to productivity and jobs,” said Dave Whalen, the leader of the local Elks Club in Dillon and a Marlenee supporter.

Tom Boland is a Great Falls attorney who supports Williams and sees the choice from the other side of the stream.

“Why aren’t we promoting Montana for what it is, the proverbial ‘Last Best Place’? Everybody else is trying to clean up the mess of the industrial revolution. Why should we in Montana try and make this a new Rust Belt?” he said.

Polls and experts agree that most Montanans already have made their choice in this two-man race; the undecided vote at this early date may be less than 10%. Williams may have a thin edge, but it is nothing to let him sleep easy.

In urbanized states such as California and New York, senators represent statewide interests and members of Congress are more like city council members. Montana, if not the opposite, is vastly different. And this election is sure to make it so.

In the short run, Montana is suing over the apportionment of congressional seats in the remote hope of keeping both its representatives. State officials argue that with 799,065 people in one of the least densely populated states, Montana would be unfairly represented in the House with only one lawmaker. The state has almost twice as many residents as the least-populated congressional district, Wyoming’s at-large seat.

A federal court panel of local judges sided with Montana in its appeal, and the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in the case this month. But few handicappers believe that the state will prevail, and Marlenee and Williams are campaigning as if the winner gets it all in November.

The list of issues in which the two men offer contrary philosophies, if not 100% contrary positions, are about as long as any list you care to draw up.

The arts, for instance, have become a matter of raging debate in the campaign as a result of Williams’ leadership in funding the National Endowment for the Arts. Christian broadcaster/politician Pat Robertson has pledged to assist in the campaign against Williams, while the arts community has rallied behind him.

But what is more absorbing, certainly from afar, is the unmistakable knowledge that here in Big Sky Country, in the year 1992, Montana has no choice except to choose the course of the New West. As Missoula Mayor Dan Kemmis said: “This is the most important political event in Montana in more than 20 years, a defining moment, as it were.”

In an interview, Williams reflects: “Montana in many ways is the brow of the last hill in America. And Montanans are deeply interested in the direction of the state’s environment. The challenge is to keep it ‘The Last Best Place’ while people can still live and work here and not have to move away.”

Marlenee knows the modern arithmetic: Recreation and retirement are on the upswing, while the timber, mining and farming interests he champions are struggling. Outsiders may not sympathize, but the old-timers here still might.

“I suppose we are threatened by the march of time and by the fact that we have kept Montana a desirable place to live. . . .” he said. “You come to places like Dillon and you see the faces, the faces of people who are native to the land. Other than that, the West has disappeared, the faces gone. . . .”

Times researcher Doug Conner in Seattle and special correspondent Margaret L. Knox in Missoula assisted with this story.