THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 30, 1994 TAG: 9410300075
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARGARET EDDS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
``This is it,'' Republican Oliver L. North proclaimed a few days ago in what he suggested would be the final fund-raising letter of his campaign.
``I know asking you for help even this one last time may be more than you can financially bear,'' wrote North, who has set an $18-million-plus national record for fund-raising in a Senate campaign, partially by repeatedly tapping the pocketbooks of thousands of elderly Americans.
``But in all honesty, with just days left to go, victory or success will depend on what you decide to do today,'' he wrote, asking for ``a `last ditch' emergency gift of $20, $30 - or even $40.''
Even as North's letter was moving through the mail, Democrats were beginning their final appeal to likely voters with a ``push poll'' designed to ignite passions.
In Kentucky, employees of a phone bank under contract to a Washington-area telemarketing firm hired by the Virginia Democratic Party were dialing up voters in predominantly Democratic precincts in the Old Dominion.
``The choice for us is clear,'' they said, reading from a script. ``On the one hand are the radical voices of Jesse Helms, Jerry Falwell and David Duke.'' On the other, candidates who will stand for ``equal opportunity, quality health care, and equal protection for all under the law.''
In an election ``so close that every vote will count . . . can we count on you to vote Democrat on Nov. 8?'' they asked.
No matter that many Republicans have disavowed David Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard who won the GOP nomination for governor of Louisiana a few years ago.
No matter that the direct-mail gurus who have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars writing North's fund-raising appeals admitted the strain on supporters with limited incomes.
It is the last week in the commonwealth's highest-profile U.S. Senate race in memory, and as long as the money holds out, both sides intend to do all they can to get voters to the polls.
Over the next nine days, both parties and both major-party candidates will activate get-out-the-vote plans that have been months in the making. In addition, the Democrat-leaning AFL-CIO, the Republican-leaning Christian Coalition and similar interest groups, will contact thousands of their members about the election.
Telemarketing firms and volunteer callers may place 2 million or more phone calls at a cost of about 40 cents per call. Brochures and issues scorecards will be dropped into hundreds of thousands of mail boxes. And on Election Day, thousands of workers - some paid, some volunteer - will stand ready to knock on doors or drive voters to the polls.
``This thing's a jump ball,'' said Mike Russell, spokesman for the Chesapeake-based Christian Coalition. ``It's going to come down to things like getting out the vote on Election Day.''
Increasingly, both major parties rely on professional phone banks to call voters during the last few days of a campaign. On both sides, campaigns work with computerized voter lists honed by the state party organization.
And both Democratic and Republican partisans have used scary messages in past years to motivate their supporters.
For instance, in the 1989 gubernatorial race, which occurred in the course of a prolonged coal strike in southwest Virginia, the AFL-CIO sent members in the coal fields a handbill picturing an armored tank. ``Marshall Coleman's answer to labor relations,'' the message read, referring to that year's GOP nominee.
Similarly, in more than one election in which abortion has been an issue, church members - particularly in Catholic parishes - have emerged from Sunday services to find handbills picturing dead fetuses on their windshields.
One major difference in get-out-the-vote tactics is the Democratic tradition of paying some Election Day workers, particularly in black precincts, to knock on doors and take people to the polls.
That custom came under scathing attack this week from GOP State Chairman Patrick McSweeney, who said it contributes to a Democratic stranglehold on African-American voters.
But Democrats argue that the money, usually about $40 per day, is important economically for low-income supporters. And one GOP consultant, who asked not to be named, last week shrugged off the practice.
``Essentially they're hiring drivers to go out and bring people in,'' he said. ``That's not substantially different to me than hiring phoners to call in'' to neighborhoods.
Strategists say a good turnout effort can make a difference of two to three percentage points in the outcome of an election. Virginia Secretary of Administration Mike Thomas, who managed Gov. George F. Allen's campaign last year, said that get-out-the-vote work ``is always critical.''
But this year, he said, in a close race where the victor may win with a mere plurality of votes, ``it's even more important.''
KEYWORDS: U.S. SENATE RACE VIRGINIA CANDIDATES VOTING by CNB