Sheriffs 1970-Style

To many in the U.S., the only sheriffs left ride the limitless wastes of TV. But sheriffs thrive in most of the nation's 3,049 counties, many as political bigwigs, some as serious law enforcers. Of those who ran for office last week, a few seemed more than routine.

> George Kimball, 26, a self-styled leader of the street people around the University of Kansas in Lawrence, became the official Democratic candidate for sheriff of Douglas County by filing for the primary 30 minutes before the deadline, fully aware that no other Democrats were running. He promised "free everything for everybody." As for the marijuana and LSD problem, he said, "I would utilize laws governing fraud, truth in packaging and price fixing to ensure quality goods at reasonable prices." Such talk--and Kimball's hairy, earring-in-the-left-ear getup--so scared the good folk of Douglas County that nearly double the usual number of off-year election voters turned out to defeat him, 14,725 to 2,089. But they overlooked another hippie candidate, Phillip Hill, 22, who ran so quietly for justice of the peace that he was elected. Hill immediately announced that he would start marrying homosexuals and performing group marriages. Said newly elected Kansas Attorney General Vern Miller: "Just make a mental note of his name and how long it is before you hear that he has been arrested."

> The sheriff of Middlesex County in Massachusetts has long done little more than march at the head of the Harvard commencement parade and appoint deputies, who made as much as $40,000 a year in fees for process serving. Critics charged that the office was marked by more than a hint of political patronage and monetary kickbacks. Named to the job earlier this year when the longtime Democratic incumbent died, Republican John J. Buckley immediately reformed the office. He hired guidance specialists for the house of corrections, which the sheriff runs, moved to separate juvenile prisoners from older offenders, used student marshals to help keep the peace in Harvard Square and appointed as deputies old-age pensioners who have a set maximum income. Despite heavy local Democratic registration, such unaccustomed winds of change swept Buckley to a surprise election victory.

> Alabama's Greene County, where the per capita income is less than $1,000 a year, became the nation's first county to be completely governed by blacks. They now fill all 14 local elective offices, including the county commission, school board, the probate judgeship and the sheriff's office--the key political job in much of the rural South. Having narrowly defeated the white incumbent, Big Bill Lee, whose family had held the job for 47 years, Thomas Earl Gilmore, 31, a minister, will be the new sheriff.

> The ski resort of Aspen, Colo., is getting so spoiled by runaway commercialism that Author Hunter Thompson (Hell's Angels), who calls himself "a foul-mouthed outlaw journalist," figured that a shrill anti-progress campaign might just get him elected sheriff of Pitkin County. "Sod the streets, ban autos!" he cried. "Savagely harass land rapists!" By describing the job as "main pig," the shaved-skull exponent of "freak power" put off the conservative electorate, but the ecology issue is so big in Aspen that according to unofficial tabulations, Thompson lost by only 455 votes--1,523 to 1,068.

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