S.C. Could Be Pivotal Battle in GOP Races

This could be where the race for the Republican presidential nomination ends.

Or really begins.

Reporters and candidates don’t move into South Carolina for weeks at a time, as they do in Iowa and New Hampshire, the traditional first two stops on the campaign calendar. But in recent years, South Carolina has combined with those two preliminary contests to define, and even settle, the battle for the GOP nomination.

“Iowa and New Hampshire get the attention,” says Republican state Sen. Joe Wilson, “but South Carolina has been the most critical.”

This year, Louisiana, Delaware and Arizona have all squeezed their contests into the February calendar in search of influence and attention. But once again, in virtually any scenario the leading campaigns construct, the March 2 vote in South Carolina looms as a pivotal--and perhaps decisive--showdown.

If front-runner Bob Dole holds onto his leads in Iowa and New Hampshire, a victory here could effectively end the Republican race seven weeks from now. Conversely, even if Dole wins the first two states, if he cannot carry South Carolina he would likely face a long and uncertain struggle.

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“This is the end of the fight for Bob Dole if he wins South Carolina,” says Republican Gov. David Beasley, a Dole supporter. “This is the beginning of the fight for Bob Dole if he loses South Carolina.”

Texas Sen. Phil Gramm has already drawn a line at the border here. Charlie Black, his senior campaign strategist, has acknowledged of South Carolina that it is fair to say that “if Gramm doesn’t win it, he’s out of the race.”

The stakes are no less for Lamar Alexander, another Southerner, and commentator Patrick J. Buchanan. Both already face long odds, but it is difficult to imagine either mounting a serious bid for the nomination without winning in South Carolina.

With his huge financial resources, Steve Forbes could forge on even if he doesn’t run well here--but if Dole carries the state, Forbes, too, would find him extremely difficult to overcome.

South Carolina is so important largely because as the first Southern state to vote--on a day when no other state goes to the polls--it looms over the GOP contest as the gateway to the South--the most vibrant and important region of Republican strength. Within 10 days of South Carolina’s primary, half a dozen other Southern states will select about 371 delegates--and the momentum from South Carolina is likely to be critical in deciding who carries the lion’s share of them.

“The person who wins South Carolina will win the South,” says Trey Walker, the executive director of the state Republican Party, “and the person who wins the South will win the nomination.”

The results in Iowa and New Hampshire could change the picture here, but for now the race in South Carolina reduces to Dole--and the battle to emerge as the alternative to Dole. He is attracting about 40% of the vote in polls, and has the support of the key figures in the political establishment: Beasley, his two-term predecessor Carroll A. Campbell, and the 93-year-old Sen. Strom Thurmond.

Gramm has drawn support from many younger conservative officeholders, has built the only grass-roots organization besides Dole’s, and attracts about 20% support in surveys. Forbes has dusted the state with television ads and runs just below Gramm in the polls. Buchanan trails in single digits. Alexander has lacked the funds to open a state office and is stuck around 5%. For now, the remaining candidates have only a minimal presence.

In the previous two seriously contested struggles for the GOP nomination, South Carolina functioned as a fulcrum in the race.

In 1980, George Bush surprised Ronald Reagan and former Texas Gov. John B. Connally, the two putative front-runners, by winning the Iowa caucus. But Reagan regained his momentum by capturing the New Hampshire primary. Then South Carolina gave Reagan a landslide victory--knocking Connally from the race, and providing Reagan with an advantage over Bush that he never surrendered.

Eight years later, the state cemented Bush’s triumph over Dole. In that race, Dole carried Iowa, but Bush regained his footing by winning New Hampshire. Bush then won a decisive victory here over Dole and televangelist Pat Robertson. That keyed Bush’s sweep of the South on Super Tuesday a few days later, which sealed his nomination.

Even in 1992, Bush’s emphatic victory over Buchanan here restored the president’s footing after his shaky showing in New Hampshire--and ensured that Buchanan’s challenge would never expand to a serious threat.

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South Carolina’s influence is appropriate. If Iowa and New Hampshire represent the Republican Party’s historic roots in the Northeast and Midwest, this state symbolizes the inexorable Southern shift in the GOP’s center of gravity. In a state that led the march to secession in the Civil War, the Republican Party born in the cause of the Union now controls the state House of Representatives, a majority of the congressional delegation, and has held the governor’s mansion for a decade.

Here--as elsewhere in the South--the GOP relies on a virtually all-white but socially diverse coalition of religious conservatives (about one-fourth of the vote here), traditional business conservatives, some rural votes and legions of suburbanites, especially in new communities outside Columbia and Greenville.

Originally rooted in opposition to desegregation, the Republican Party here now speaks to an electorate moved by a broad range of conservative appeals, particularly those aimed at limiting the size of government. Whit Ayres, who polled for Beasley and now works for Alexander, says that two-thirds or more of Republican primary voters here say they prefer conservatives to moderates.

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But in other ways the state defies stereotypes. Despite the substantial influence of religious conservatives, only a tiny percentage of Republican primary voters list abortion as their top concern, says Richard Quinn, a local consultant working with Gramm. And a steady flow of foreign investment to the state has reduced the audience for the protectionist arguments long associated with the textile industry. When Buchanan promised to stand up against imports at a debate here earlier this month, the room remained stonily silent.

Likewise, the cultural tone of the state’s politics has lost much of its twang. Appeals to Southern pride and opposition to gun control can still ring some bells. Gramm is playing that card hard: In his frequent appearances, he usually lengthens his Southern drawl--especially when talking about his “mama.”

But both Beasley and Campbell look like junior bank executives and speak the international language of economic development and educational reform. “The whole folksy thing doesn’t sell: If we want to hear ‘my mama’ we turn on ‘Hee Haw,’ ” says Warren Tompkins, who was Campbell’s key political strategist and is directing Dole’s effort in the state.

To win here, the Republican presidential contenders must attract a mix of voters very much like those they need to win in most places--not only in the primaries but the general election as well. With its Southern-flavored blend of suburbanites and Christian conservatives, South Carolina, in fact, arguably reflects the modern Republican electoral coalition more closely than either Iowa or New Hampshire. And that, as much as anything else, explains why South Carolina has had so much to say about who leads the GOP into the race for the White House.