THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, October 19, 1995 TAG: 9510190468
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY MASON PETERS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
First District Rep. Eva M. Clayton, preparing to launch her 1996 re-election campaign this weekend, made a point Wednesday of distancing herself from Louis Farrakhan, who organized the Million Man March in the nation's capital Monday.
``All the attention in the press is just building up the guy,'' said Clayton. ``We mustn't confuse the messenger with the message.''
The Democratic congresswoman, the first black and the first female to go to the U.S. House of Representatives from North Carolina this century, said many of the aims of the march should be supported.
``We must recommit ourselves to helping those who need help, and these are the goals of all people of good will,'' Clayton said in an interview from Washington, D.C.
On Saturday Clayton will go to Rocky Mount, where she has kicked off previous successful election campaigns with supporters from 10 counties in the heart of the district. The district sprawls from the Virginia state line to the South Carolina border.
``We expect at least 250 constituents from Edgecombe, Greene, Halifax, Lenoir, Nash, Northampton, Pitt, Vance, Warren and Wilson counties at the 7:30 p.m. rally and fund-raiser in the Carleton House at Rocky Mount,'' said Mike Scott, a spokesman for the Clayton Campaign committee in Warrenton.
There will be the long shadow of a potentially upsetting U.S. Supreme Court decision looming over Clayton's campaign.
On Dec. 5 the high court is scheduled to act on a challenge to the 1992 General Assembly statute that created a new 1st District that favors African-American candidates under U.S. Voting Rights guidelines.
Five Durham Republicans, led by Judge Robinson Everett, a Duke University law professor, are seeking through an appeal to overthrow the redistricting that also established a black-majority 12th Congressional District that stretches from Durham to Charlotte.
The five claim the redistricting violates their civil rights by discriminating in favor of majority black voters.
``Judge Everett's appeal would reject a previous lower court decision upholding the redistricting,'' said Chester Davis, a spokesman for Everett in Durham.
A similar challenge to a Georgia reapportionment in a congressional district was upheld several months ago by the Supreme Court. The court ordered the Georgia legislature to return to the drawing board and come up with another redistricting plan that was not based solely on race.
Should a similar high court decision come down for North Carolina, observers believe there would have to be a lot of legal footwork before a suitable plan was worked out for 1996 congressional elections in the 1st and 12th districts.
But at least one possible Clayton opponent in the district doesn't think the pending Supreme Court action will affect the 1996 race.
Former state Rep. Thomas C. Hardaway, a Democratic attorney from Enfield, said this week that he has been studying obstacles he would encounter ``if I decide to enter the 1st District race.''
Hardaway, at 38 one of the younger black Democratic leaders in northeastern North Carolina, said he had ``recently and increasingly been under a lot of pressure to run against Mrs. Clayton.''
Hardaway said he had analyzed the effects that various Supreme Court redistricting rulings have had in other states.
``The court has gone out of its way to avoid upsetting impending state election processes, particularly those that are already in motion,'' said Hardaway. He said the high court has usually waited until after elections before taking relevant action.
``So there is reason to believe the 1996 congressional election cycle in the 1st District will probably not be immediately affected,'' he said.
Ted Tyler, the perennial 1st District Republican candidate from Rich Square, has indicated he again will oppose Clayton. State Rep. Milton F. Fitch Jr., a Wilson Democrat who is an influential minority leader in the General Assembly, said several weeks ago it was ``too early'' for him to decide whether to enter the 1st District race.
Fitch was a co-chairman of the legislative redistricting committee that created the new election enclaves in 1992. He said on several occasions that he hoped to ``go to Congress someday.'' ILLUSTRATION: Eva Clayton
by CNB