THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, February 24, 1995 TAG: 9502240524
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY MASON PETERS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
Democratic Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. and Republican Sen. Jesse Helms should win easily if they seek re-election next year, but if Hunt challenges Helms for a Senate seat, the election will be too close to call, a poll showed Thursday.
Few think Hunt will try to avenge his 1984 defeat by Helms, called the costliest and dirtiest election fight in U.S. history.
The Mason-Dixon survey showed that Hunt would hold a tiny lead if a rematch were held, but the margin of error - plus or minus 3.5 percentage points - means the race would be a dead heat.
The poll showed that when pitted against Helms in a hypothetical Senate race, Hunt holds a 46 to 45 percent lead over the senator.
But such a rematch is unlikely.
``The governor has let it be known he'll not run for the Senate again in this lifetime,'' said Hunt's press secretary, Rachel Perry.
Nor does it seem likely that Helms, sitting comfortably in a long-coveted seat as chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee, would relish another demeaning bare-knuckles battle with Hunt.
Both are riding higher than ever in voter support if they don't run against each other, said Del Ali, vice president of the Mason-Dixon Media Research company in Columbia, Md.
``There is only one Democrat in North Carolina who could definitely give Helms a strong run - that is Gov. Hunt,'' Ali said.
``There is no certainty who would win, but it would be a great race,'' he said.
Hunt's popularity has increased to 48 percent since his 1992 election, when it was 44 percent, the poll showed, while 19 percent of the voters said they wanted to replace the governor.
Forty-seven percent of the voters interviewed said they wanted to re-elect Helms, with 35 percent saying they would vote against him.
In the Albemarle area, 49 percent of those questioned said they wanted to re-elect Helms and 34 percent said they wanted to replace him.
When matched against several possible GOP challengers for the governor's seat, Hunt runs well above 50 percent in voter popularity, the survey showed. The most frequently mentioned Republican gubernatorial candidates include Richard Vinroot, mayor of Charlotte; Leo Daughtry, majority leader of the state Senate; and Harold Brubaker, speaker of the state House of Delegates.
The poll showed Hunt's current leads over the likely GOP challengers are:
Hunt-Vinroot: 53 percent to 26 percent.
Hunt-Daughtry: 56 percent to 17 percent.
Hunt-Brubaker: 54 percent to 19 percent.
Against possible Democratic challengers other than Hunt, Helms, too, fared well.
If Hunt stays out of the Senate race, as expected, other Democratic candidates seeking Helms' seat are likely to be Harvey Gantt, a Charlotte architect defeated once by Helms; Michael Easley, state Attorney General, who lost a Democratic Senate runoff against Gantt; former U.S. Rep. David Price of Chapel Hill; Daniel T. Blue Jr., former speaker of the state House; state Sen. Beverly Perdue, of New Bern; Charles Sanders, retired Glaxo chief executive in the Research Triangle; and Bob Etheridge, superintendent of public instruction.
In the new poll, Helms' leads over the possible Democratic challengers are:
Helms-Gantt: 54 percent to 37 percent.
Helms-Easley: 50 percent to 39 percent.
Helms-Price: 51 percent to 37 percent.
Helms-Blue: 52 percent to 35 percent.
Helms-Perdue: 50 percent to 36 percent.
Helms-Sanders: 52 percent to 33 percent.
Helms-Etheridge: 49 percent to 36 percent.
``Senator Jesse Helms appears to be in pretty good shape for 1996,'' said Ali. ``Compared to his last two campaigns, Helms seems to be starting from a position of greater strength. His favorable name recognition (46 percent) is highernow than at any time during his last campaign, and his 37 percent unfavorable recognition is lower than at the end of 1990.''
Of possible Helms' challengers, Gantt has a slight edge over Easley in a Democratic primary, the poll showed. Among Democrats questioned, 29 percent favored Gantt and 22 percent supported Easley.
The Mason-Dixon poll, one of several commissioned this month by The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, was conducted between Feb. 19 and Feb. 21 among 809 registered voters. All said they voted regularly.
The sampling included 404 men and 405 women; 645 were white, and 161 were black. There were 460 Democrats interviewed, 282 Republicans and 67 independents.
KEYWORDS: POLL by CNB