Cramped Primary Suits Boston Fine

The late congressman loved a good fight, and the band of hopefuls vying to succeed him has been only too happy to oblige.

In the days leading up to today’s special primary election, the personal attacks flew among seven Democrats competing for the seat left vacant when Rep. John Joseph Moakley died of leukemia last spring.

More refined campaigning came from two Republicans seeking the job held by the legendary Democrat, who represented South Boston on Capitol Hill for 27 years. But their politeness is unlikely to win out. Registered Democrats outnumber Republicans 4 to 1 in the state’s 9th Congressional District--which has had just three representatives in the last 70 years.

A flurry of door knocking and handshaking Monday marked the end of the intense 12-week battle among Democrats John E. Taylor, Bill Ferguson, Bill Sinnott, Cheryl A. Jacques, Stephen F. Lynch, Brian A. Joyce and Marc R. Pacheco. Polls late last week showed Lynch, a state senator, leading with an expected 39% of the vote.

Jacques, his closest rival at 18%, spent much of the race painting Lynch as a friend of the “radical right” and an abortion rights foe. “He will go to Washington, he will join the Republican extremists to take away a woman’s right to choose,” Jacques, also a state senator, said in a final debate Sunday.

Lynch, insisting that “there are no Republican, right-wing extremists” in Massachusetts, noted that Moakley had opposed abortion.

During the campaign, Joyce--also a member of the state Senate--sent out mailings that contained unflattering references to the live-in partner of Jacques, who is a lesbian. Joyce, who drew 12% in last week’s polls, offended many Moakley loyalists by announcing his candidacy before the veteran legislator had died.

Pacheco, yet another state senator, earned 10% in the polls. Sinnott, Ferguson and Taylor each drew 1%. Boston Herald columnist Joe Sciacca observed on their behalf: “Thank God they rounded up to the highest number.”

Republican Jo Ann Sprague, a Korean War veteran and also a state senator, said Monday that she was undaunted by the formidable slate of Democrats in today’s primary. Sprague said she expected to win in the Oct. 16 special election. “I’m willing to take on anyone who comes out of that primary,” said Sprague, favored to win her party’s nomination over state GOP committee member Bill McKinney. “People don’t vote the party any more. They vote the record.”

Sprague supports the National Rifle Assn., the death penalty, gay marriage and abortion rights.

With the crowded field, the resulting political food fight has been vintage Boston electioneering, said political analyst Lou DiNatale of the University of Massachusetts--Boston.

“In Massachusetts, politics is a blood sport--and it’s the state pastime,” DiNatale said.

He said the bumper-boat atmosphere helped Lynch, a product of South Boston who occupies Moakley’s old state Senate seat.

One Democrat who made a stab at the seat but abruptly bowed out was Max Kennedy, a son of the late Robert F. Kennedy and a nephew of Edward M. Kennedy, the state’s senior U.S. senator.

DiNatale predicted an easy victory for the Democrat who wins the primary. In the coveted Boston district once occupied by U.S. House Speaker John W. McCormack, “the Republicans, they’re just whistling in the wind here.”