ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, November 6, 1996 TAG: 9611060054
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
On a night generally kind to incumbents, Sen. Jesse Helms triumphed in North Carolina and Strom Thurmond coasted to a new term in South Carolina at 93.
Republicans drove for continued control of the Senate late Tuesday, picking up seats in Alabama and Nebraska and offsetting a Democratic gain in New Hampshire.
Helms won a fifth term Tuesday, turning back a second straight challenge from Harvey Gantt, the black former mayor of Charlotte.
The rematch offered voters contrasts as sharp as the 1990 contest, though the edges were somewhat smoother this year.
There were plenty of attack ads on both sides, but Helms offered some softer images, as a grandfather and as an effective veteran senator who is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He said he would use the post to help bring more foreign investment and jobs to North Carolina.
Race was an issue in the election, as it was 1990.
One Helms TV ad accused Gantt of enjoying preferential treatment because of his minority status to reap millions of dollars in a 1984 deal to buy a television station. The Gantt camp denied the claim.
With the polls still open in the West, Majority Leader Trent Lott was looking ahead to a GOP agenda of lower taxes and less government in the new Senate - and said Republicans would make sure a re-elected President Clinton was on the same page.
``He talks about how the era of big government is over,'' the Mississippi Republican said. ``We'd like to help him keep his word on that.''
With 34 races on the ballot, Democrats needed to gain three seats to forge a tie in the Senate with the Republicans and four to topple the GOP majority outright.
But in Alabama, Republican Jeff Sessions claimed a seat that had belonged to the Democrats. And in Nebraska, Republican businessman Chuck Hagel won a Democratic seat in his first try at elective office.
Massachusetts Democratic Senate incumbent John Kerry prevailed over Gov. William Weld.
A few Senate veterans faced stiff challenges. Republican Larry Pressler struggled in South Dakota, as did Democrat Tom Harkin in Iowa.
Republicans replaced one senator with another in Kansas, where Rep. Pat Roberts won handily, and Rep. Sam Brownback kept Bob Dole's old Kansas seat in the GOP column.
In all, there were 14 Senate races with no incumbent on the ballot, the most ever after eight Democrats and six Republicans retired.
Democrats on Tuesday elected the country's first Chinese-American governor in Washington state, the first female governor in New Hampshire, and a veteran politician in Indiana who won the costliest campaign in state history.
Voters in 11 states elected governors.
All seven incumbents were easily re-elected - Republicans in North Dakota, Montana and Utah, and Democrats in Vermont, Missouri, Delaware and North Carolina.
In Washington, King County Executive Gary Locke beat Republican Ellen Craswell, a former state Senate leader, to become the first Chinese American governor and the first Asian American to be elected outside Hawaii.
Locke, 46, an urban liberal, supports gay and abortion rights. Craswell, 64, is an ardent foe of abortion, calls homosexuality sinful, and had vowed to fill government with ``godly'' people. Democrat Gov. Mike Lowry is retiring.
Entering the election, Republicans were in no danger of relinquishing their statehouse majority, 32-17, with one independent. The GOP captured its first majority in a quarter century in the 1994 landslide.
Former Gov. Cecil Underwood reclaimed the West Virginia statehouse for the GOP. Underwood, the state's youngest governor when first elected in 1957, was supported by business and said he would use technology to improve education and create jobs. He turned 74 Tuesday and will become the state's oldest governor.
LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines KEYWORDS: ELECTIONby CNB