N.H. Primary Is Independents’ Day

In the past few presidential elections, Larry Howard has backed--in succession--Democrat Walter F. Mondale, Republican George Bush and Democrat Bill Clinton (twice).

This year, after teeter-tottering between Republican John McCain and Democrat Bill Bradley, Howard has decided to support Bradley in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary. His serial loyalties may confuse some, but to Howard it’s simple. “I’ve always voted more for the person than the party,” says the affable 68-year-old artist.

Here in New Hampshire, Howard is hardly alone. In fact, political independents now make up nearly 40% of the state’s registered voters, surpassing both Democrats and Republicans for the first time. And come Tuesday, these free-floaters could also be more influential than ever.

Not only do both parties offer competitive primaries, but each features a candidate--Bradley and McCain--pushing reform agendas aimed squarely at the maverick voters who give this state its famed political fickleness.

With independents expected to comprise up to a quarter of Tuesday’s turnout, the result is a swirl of cross-party crosscurrents. Former Sen. Bradley must not only woo Democrats but lure independents from McCain as well. Republican George W. Bush has to fret whether Al Gore’s strong showing in Iowa has hurt Bradley so badly that independents will back McCain instead.

It’s like a game of three-dimensional political chess, played across the snowy hamlets and booming high-tech haunts of this candidate-saturated state.

And it’s a kind of intramural politics that may become more common as an increasing number of states change their laws to give voters the freedom to ignore party labels and vote their fancies on primary day.

Independents will cast ballots in three of the early primary states: New Hampshire, South Carolina and Michigan. On March 7, California will have its first presidential campaign experience with the so-called blanket primary, which allows voters to cast their ballot for any candidate, regardless of party affiliation. Twenty other states allow independents to vote in the primaries; in the rest, participation is limited to partisans, with Democrats voting for Democrats, Republicans for Republicans and independents shut out of the primary process.

The movement toward more open balloting corresponds with a larger trend over the last few decades: a weakening of party strength reflecting an increased disdain toward political institutions and politics in general.

Two-thirds of Americans remain affiliated with one or the other major party. But “with little appreciation for the value of parties,” many now place a higher premium on the right to vote in primaries for whomever they like, without regard to labels, said Charles Elder, a political scientist at Wayne State University in Michigan.

Tanya Wilkie is one of those voters who shops for candidates the way others might seek out the freshest produce or cheapest gallon of gas.

This week found her in the 114-year-old Newport Opera House in western New Hampshire, amid burnished wood and a crowd of Bradley boosters who half-filled the tiny town’s community playhouse. Wilkie came out to see the former New Jersey senator, even though she had pretty much narrowed her choices to Gore and Bush, “both excellent, educated men” with Ivy League credentials she admires.

Wilkie, 48, who teaches at the local vocational high school, has always been a registered independent, a way of splitting the difference she sees in the two major political parties. “Democrats care more about social issues. Republicans care more about economic issues,” she explains. “I’m concerned about both, so I pick and choose.”

The rules in New Hampshire make it easy for voters like Wilkie to jump back and forth. On primary day, independents can re-register, then ask for either a Republican or Democratic ballot. After voting, they can immediately switch their registration back, and many do. In the state’s 1996 primary, nearly two-thirds of those requesting Republican and Democratic ballots changed back to independent status before even leaving their polling places.

(Under California’s “blanket” system, voters will be handed a single ballot, containing the names of every candidate.)

The fleeting fidelity of the politically unaffiliated has proved pivotal in New Hampshire. In 1996, independents helped elect Gov. Jeanne Shaheen, the state’s first Democratic governor in more than two decades, and two years later gave Democrats a majority in the state Senate for the first time in 86 years. In recent presidential primaries, independents powered Republican Patrick J. Buchanan to a strong second that humbled President Bush in 1992. Four years later, independents helped Buchanan beat GOP front-runner Bob Dole.

This time, independents seem to be giving the biggest boost to McCain, who has tailored his anti-Washington campaign for New Hampshire’s anti-establishment voters. A University of New Hampshire poll last week found McCain actually trailing Texas Gov. Bush among Republicans but enjoying such a sizable advantage among independents that he led overall. “If McCain wins New Hampshire,” said poll director Andrew Smith, “he’ll have independents to thank.”

Academics and political strategists alike are quick to distinguish between truly independent voters and those who decline to affiliate with one of the major parties but generally support its candidates. “It’s a myth to think of independents as a third party or some foreign body,” said Mark Longabaugh, director of Bradley’s New Hampshire campaign. “What you tend to see is most independents leaning toward one or the other party and voting regularly in their primaries.”

Still, in a close contest, Longabaugh and others agree New Hampshire’s roughly 40,000 to 50,000 true political independents (out of 270,000 registered independents) could provide the margin of victory for a major party candidate.

The McCain camp has been particularly aggressive in targeting unaffiliated voters, here and elsewhere. Last fall, in the run-up to New Hampshire’s registration deadline, the campaign even urged Democrats to change their affiliation to independent so they would have the option of supporting McCain in the primary.

The campaign has mapped a similar strategy to win independent support in California, with sign-ups staged recently in Sacramento, Palm Springs, San Diego and Orange County.

But the Arizona senator’s gain in New Hampshire is potentially Bradley’s loss, which may explain why Vice President Gore has had nothing but praise of late for McCain. Or why Bradley, at his session with Newport voters, felt obliged to take on McCain as well as Gore.

“John McCain and I have the same position on campaign finance reform,” Bradley said, “but we have totally opposite positions” on everything from abortion to gun control to health care. “There are really differences between us.”

Still, in the odd way labels and political loyalties often get muddled, one recent poll of New Hampshire independents found that close to 40% of Bradley supporters named McCain as their second pick--compared with about 3 in 10 who picked Gore. Similarly, most independents backing McCain said their second pick was Bradley, who finished ahead of all of McCain’s fellow Republicans.

At Lebanon’s Upper Valley Senior Center, during a Bradley visit last week, Larry Howard freely admitted the seeming oddity of choosing between a left-leaning Democrat and a rightward-tilting Republican.

Yes, he said with a smile, Bradley and McCain have diametrically opposite positions on just about every issue, save campaign finance reform. But “they both seem very sincere and very anxious to do the right thing for the American people,” he said. “I think they’re honest, and that matters more to me than issues. Besides, they’re going to have to work with Congress anyway if they get elected.”

Gore on Abortion Under fire by Bradley, vice president says his views on abortion have evolved. A19

Father Figures Former President Bush goes to New Hampshire; McCain sees “panic” in GOP. A22