Senate Hopefuls Hit the Airwaves and Churches

Democratic Senate candidates followed an end-of-the-campaign tradition Sunday by touring inner-city churches, while the two leading Republican contenders for Sen. Alan Cranston’s seat squared off in an acrimonious final showdown.

California’s historic U.S. Senate campaigns were winding down with candidates making last-minute pitches before Tuesday’s primary, when voters will nominate four Senate hopefuls. This fall, California voters will select two senators in a single election for the first time.

Democrats Dianne Feinstein, Gray Davis and Leo T. McCarthy visited churches in South Los Angeles and Compton while Barbara Boxer did the same in the San Francisco Bay Area. Mel Levine made an appearance at a Jewish festival.

Most of the Democrats stressed themes of rebuilding Los Angeles and rescuing all the nation’s inner cities by creating jobs, improving health care and setting up business partnerships with blacks and Latinos who reside in the communities where help is sorely needed.

Some of the loudest applause at several churches came when candidates endorsed City Charter Amendment F, which mandates reform in the Los Angeles Police Department.

Visiting churches on the Sunday before Election Day is a traditional way for California’s politicians to end the campaign. This year, however, several candidates have made the house of worship rounds more frequently, in part as a response to the riots that devastated portions of Los Angeles four weeks ago.

Meanwhile, in the close, openly hostile Republican primary between Rep. Tom Campbell and former television commentator Bruce Herschensohn, the ideological distance between the two once again dominated a final televised debate Sunday. Afterward, Herschensohn refused to say whether he would support Campbell if the Silicon Valley congressman gets the nomination.

SIX-YEAR SEAT

The Democrats

McCarthy, the lieutenant governor, spoke at three black churches in Compton, then visited Casa del Alfarero (House of the Potter), a Spanish-speaking Pentecostal congregation just south of downtown. A few blocks away, the charred ruins of a mini-mall served as a haunting reminder of the violence that gripped the city.

“Order has been restored,” McCarthy told about 200 worshipers seated on folding chairs in a cavernous meeting hall. “But there are other questions to answer. Will justice be restored? . . . Most important of all, will hope be restored?”

To accomplish this, he said, requires a commitment to prenatal health care, Head Start programs, jobs and a rebuilding effort that encourages investment in the inner city.

McCarthy’s words were translated into Spanish for the congregation, most of whom cannot vote because they are immigrants from Central America or Mexico who have not attained citizenship.

After he left, the pastor, Daniel D. Moncivaiz, told worshipers they should feel honored by McCarthy’s presence because it shows that politicians, stunned by the riots, are beginning to pay attention to Latino and impoverished communities.

“We’ve invited politicians in the past,” Moncivaiz said in Spanish, “but they never came.”

McCarthy is in a tight race with Boxer, a congresswoman from Marin County, and Levine, a congressman from Santa Monica. The three are vying for the Democratic nomination to fill the seat vacated by Cranston’s retirement.

Boxer also used the last Sunday before the primary to visit churches in San Francisco and Oakland, as well as a National Organization for Women rally in San Francisco’s Washington Square. She reiterated her campaign theme of the need for change in a government that emphasizes military might over domestic health and educational issues.

Levine, who has dedicated most of his campaign to raising money and spending it on television commercials, made a rare public appearance at the Los Angeles Jewish Festival in the Fairfax district, where presidential hopeful Bill Clinton also spoke. Levine, in brief remarks, reiterated his support for Israel. He later attended the Venice Art Walk, an annual fund-raiser for a family clinic.

The Republicans

During a televised debate in San Diego, Herschensohn sidestepped the question of whether he would support Campbell as the Republican nominee by saying he did not want to consider such a scenario until after the election.

Campbell and former Palm Springs Mayor Sonny Bono, the third candidate for the seat, answered the same question by saying they would support the party’s nominee, whoever it is.

But during a question-and-answer session with reporters after the 30-minute debate at KPBS-TV, Herschensohn made it clear that he might withhold his endorsement for Campbell, implying that the two-term congressman from Palo Alto was not “decent.”

At the same time, Herschensohn, who has long talked of his admiration for Bono, implied that he would support a Bono candidacy.

“When it comes to issues, experience can be attained,” Herschensohn told reporters, as Campbell sat an arms-length away with his hands folded. “Decency cannot be attained. Sonny Bono is decent.”

When asked to respond, Campbell refused to be drawn into a war of words with the former Los Angeles television and radio commentator, who trails Campbell by 10 percentage points in the most recent Times Poll released last week.

“I am not ignorant of what I just heard,” Campbell said. “I think the Republican Party will choose its nominee by the primary process, not by any pre-defined set of criteria. So the nominee of the Republican Party deserves the support of Republicans. And I expect to be the nominee, and I expect to have the support.”

Campbell, smiling and appearing confident, explained the stepped-up attacks on him during the final weeks of the campaign by Herschensohn and Bono in one simple sentence.

“Because I think I am going to win,” he said with a grin, “and they think I am going to win.”

“That’s not why,” Bono snapped. “He has liberal views, and when he is with liberals he is very liberal, and when he is with conservatives he is very conservative. There is a confusing philsophy there.”

An angry Herschensohn also interjected: “This is a habit that Tom has of arrogance.”

Then, turning toward Campbell and staring him in the eye, Herschensohn interjected: “And I take great exception to him, when I present charges to him, which I always try to do in person, he never looks at me. He is always looking down or somewhere. I tried to look you in the eye during that monologue before, and you are looking down. Look at me!”

During the debate, broadcast statewide on public television stations, the three candidates reiterated oft-stated positions on everything from abortion rights to federal assistance for riot-torn areas of Los Angeles.

But Herschensohn attacked Campbell as a closet Democrat, listing a litany of congressional votes in which Campbell broke rank with most Republicans. The exchange reflected the bitter and personal rivalry between two men with very different visions for the future of the Republican Party in California.

“I don’t want anyone to hide a Democratic agenda under the cloak of the Republican Party,” Herschensohn said.

In response, an unfazed Campbell characterized his voting record as independent and said it was one of his greatest strengths among voters.

“I vote each issue the way I see it,” Campbell said.

TWO-YEAR SEAT

The Democrats

At the First African Methodist Episcopal Church in the Mid-City area, Feinstein pointed to her experience as a tough mayor of San Francisco who exercised influence and control over law enforcement by meeting with the police chief every Monday morning.

“And crime went down 27% in nine years,” Feinstein told about 1,000 worshipers who crowded the pews. “A mayor must have control over a police department.”

Feinstein visited five churches throughout South Los Angeles, an area where the scars of last month’s rioting, arson and destruction are still clear. Outside First A.M.E. Church, a battered wooden newspaper stand bore a handwritten sign saying: “Stop Crying--Vote.”

Feinstein is the heavy favorite in her bitter race against state Controller Gray Davis. The two are running for the remaining two years of the Senate seat once held by Gov. Pete Wilson and now occupied by John Seymour.

Davis also visited several black churches, emphasizing his commitment to minority hiring and willingness to stand his ground on difficult matters that may force him to challenge political leadership.

“If you send me to Washington, I’m not going to wimp out,” he told the congregation of the Messiah Baptist Church in the Crenshaw district.

Davis, who has used riot footage in controversial television ads, reiterated his belief that public safety is the first priority in rebuilding Los Angeles. He did advocate increased investment in minority areas to give residents a stake in their communities and to create more jobs at home.

Presidents Bush and Ronald Reagan were “wacko” to allow manufacturing jobs to escape to other countries, Davis said, singling out the General Motors, Goodyear and Firestone plants that once operated in South Los Angeles. Shouts of “Amen!” and “Yes sir!” came from the audience as he spoke.

Feinstein, in her church appearances, also outlined her $135-billion “Invest in America” program to be financed over a five-year period with defense and security budget savings. The money would go to build schools and other infrastructure, for job training and a community reinvestment program.

Noting that she was mayor during the supply-side Reagan and Bush administrations, Feinstein said: “We heard a lot about the trickle-down. And we waited for it to trickle down. Instead, it gushed up.”

The Republicans

In the Republican primary for the two-year seat, Seymour enjoys a comfortable lead over his nearest rival, conservative Rep. William E. Dannemeyer of Orange County. Dannemeyer spent Sunday visiting the Jubilee Christian Church in San Jose and on Saturday walked precincts in the city of Alameda. Seymour spent the day with his family in San Clemente, an aide said.

Times staff writers Bill Stall and David Lauter also contributed to this story.

A Look at Tuesday’s Legislative Races

On Tuesday, voters statewide will be selecting:

* Candidates for 52 congressional seats.

* Candidates for 80 state Assembly seats.

* In addition, 20 state Senate districts, or half the upper house, will hold primaries, and a special election will be conducted to fill a vacant state Senate seat.

* Record numbers of congressional and Assembly districts with no incumbents have drawn more than 370 candidates into the congressional races, and more than 330 are seeking the Assembly seats, making these the most open and competitive elections in decades.