Season Openers

The political season begins in earnest May 5 with primaries in Ohio and Alabama. Both states are seeing their hottest political battles in years; both will have significant effect on the political plans of Richard Nixon.

OHIO

What started out as a Republican dream ticket has turned into a nightmare for party professionals and jeopardized a good chance for the Republicans to pick up a vital seat in their drive to win control of the Senate in 1970. Robert Taft Jr., 53, son of the late Senator and scion of the wealthy Cincinnati family, was to have run for Governor, with Incumbent Governor James Rhodes, 60, going for the Senate seat of retiring Democrat Stephen Young, 81. Instead, the two Republicans are locked in combat for the Senate nomination, with the only real campaign issue being Rhodes' integrity.

LIFE magazine reported that Rhodes had income tax problems stemming from alleged misuse of campaign funds. The magazine also said that he had been excessively chummy with a jailed Mafia hoodlum. Taft, billed as "Bob Taft--a Man You Can Trust," is exploiting the "integrity" issue. He recently said that "Ohioans are tired of the Governor's lifestyle," stressing the word life.

Rhodes, who denies wrongdoing, has been hurt by LIFE'S accusations. Barred from seeking another term this year, the Governor had had the Senate nomination sewn up. But young Bob, whom everyone thought would run for Governor, really wanted to follow his father into the Senate. The charges against Rhodes gave him his opening.

The campaign has been a study of contrasting styles. The bespectacled Taft has a patrician manner, is cool and distant; he eschews personal contact, approaching a handshake as if it were a tarantula. After a recent factory speech, Taft started to leave and a foreman had to remind him to "shake hands with some of the employees, Bob." Rhodes, the burly and gregarious son of a coal miner, is a charming, indefatigable backslapper and campaigner.

Despite his problems, Rhodes remains a strong candidate. He has been an effective and enormously popular Governor, and he has strong support among blacks, labor and Ohio's 55,000 state employees. Taft got off to an early lead, but Rhodes has been closing the gap. Whoever wins the primary will still have a long way to go; his Democratic opponent is almost certain to be popular ex-Astronaut John Glenn.

ALABAMA

Several months ago, former Governor George Wallace told intimates that he must "win big" this year in his effort to regain the Governor's mansion if he wanted to be a credible presidential threat in 1972. Now there are signs that Wallace, 50, may not win at all. His power has declined precipitously since 1966, when he was able to hand-pick his wife as his successor. Polls show Wallace running neck and neck in the Democratic primary with his former protege, the reserved, effective incumbent, Albert Brewer, 41.

Noting that much of President Nixon's Southern strategy has been directed toward undercutting him as a presidential candidate, Wallace tells voters that he needs a signal victory to keep the pressure on Nixon. "If I don't win," he warns, "Nixon will turn to the left. We'll keep our foot in their backs until they get their foot off our necks."

Wallace is counting on his winning tactics of eight years ago to pull him through again. Accompanied by the country music of "Johnny Dollar and the Dollar Bills," Wallace still promises defiance of federal desegregation orders, and he plays hard on the old theme of the ingrained inferiority and persecution complexes that grip much of Alabama. "They used to say how rude and crude we all were, us rednecks," he told one hollering crowd recently. "Well, last year they were saying, 'Yessir, Mr. Wallace, and yessir, Mr. Alabama.'" Wallace claims that because of him, many of the speeches by Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew sound "as if written here in Alabama."

There is some question whether Wallace's earthy brand of ol' time politics will work in Alabama any more. It is becoming more urban and sophisticated. And Brewer has this kind of voter. Crowds come to his rallies mostly in cars, not pickup trucks. His audiences are younger and better-dressed than Wallace's, and many of them resent Wallace's use of the Alabama statehouse apparatus for his national grandstanding.

Says Brewer in his high-pitched voice: "I won't ever do anything to embarrass you and make you ashamed you voted for Albert Brewer." This is a pointed reference to Wallace's past antics, which. Brewer charges, have cost Alabama vital outside investment.

Brewer has the support of organized labor, a former Wallace bastion. He has gone out of his way to avoid antagonizing the state's crucial 300,000 black voters, and as of now he is slightly favored. Wallace dismisses his opponent as "Sissy Britches," but beneath his cocky exterior he has shown some signs of desperation. Wallaceites recently passed out phony photos showing Brewer greeting Black Muslims Muhammad AH and Elijah Muhammad. Last week Wallace erupted with the puzzling charge that his opponent had piled "evil abuse" on Wallace's dead wife, although Brewer has never mentioned her.

Five lesser candidates in the May 5 Democratic primary may force a runoff. This would deprive the feisty little ex-Governor of the big win he needs in order to retain his national clout. But nobody is counting George out yet. Much depends on whether Wallace still evokes the Populist yearnings of traditionalist Alabama. Says State Senator C.C. Torbert: "If they vote with their minds, it will be Brewer; if they vote from their hearts, it will be Wallace."

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