Carter vs. Reagan: Dead Heat

One of the enduring truisms of American politics has been that an incumbent President wields all but overwhelming political power. This axiom holds that almost any challenge to a President has only the barest chance of succeeding. But this pattern may be changing. In the case of Jimmy Carter, his incumbency--and the fact that he is thus blamed for every national problem--may be his biggest electoral handicap.

Matching Carter against a series of potential political opponents, the Yankelovich survey for TIME shows the President able to achieve only a tie with the leading Republican contender, Ronald Reagan. This represents a significant improvement in Reagan's standing against Carter's in the national polls.

Asked to choose between the two men as candidates for President, those questioned in the survey divided evenly, 42% for each man, with 16% undecided. In this test matching, Carter managed to better Reagan only in the Midwest, while losing the Northeast, the West and even his native South to the former California Governor.

Reagan, despite a recent lull in his own campaign efforts, is still the favorite of his party, according to the Yankelovich survey. Twenty-eight percent of Republicans said they preferred Reagan as the G.O.P. nominee, while 24% said they would make former President Gerald Ford their first choice, even though Ford has said he will not actively seek the nomination. Senate Minority Leader Howard-Baker ranked third in the preference poll with 14%, while former Democratic Texas Governor (and former Treasury Secretary) John Connally placed fourth with 10% of those questioned. One understandable handicap for some of the likely Republican contenders at this early stage is that they are far from household names. Even Baker, despite his prominent Senate position, is unknown to 51% of all voters. Far less known are Texan George Bush (65%) and Illinois' Philip Crane (70%).

Inside his own party, Carter remained a distant second choice for the nomination. Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the poll showed, would defeat the incumbent President by a large margin. Kennedy led Carter among Democrats and independents by a stunning 56% to 30%. Last fall, after his successes at Camp David, Carter had reduced Kennedy's lead to ten points, but the gap has widened again. Every region of the country, again including the South, gave Kennedy an advantage, as did Democrats of all ideological stripes, including those calling themselves conservatives.

Some of Carter's top aides profess confidence that Kennedy would lose if he challenged the President. Said one high-ranking aide: "If he runs, Jimmy will beat him, and I think Kennedy knows that." Others disagree. Said one party operative worried about potential Kennedy strength in New Hampshire: "I think he'll beat Carter 2 to 1, even with a write-in campaign." Kennedy's supporters have begun organizing just such a campaign in the nation's first primary state, despite efforts by the Massachusetts Senator to stop them. Another pro-Kennedy effort has sprung up recently in Iowa without the Senator's approval.

Paired against California Governor Jerry Brown, the President also shows a slide in popularity. Carter still leads Brown 44% to 37% among Democrats and independents, but the margin has been cut in half since a year ago.

Carter's weakness is at least partly rooted in a growing desire for more authoritative presidential leadership. The survey showed that despite the ideological gulf that separates the two men, a surprising half of the backers of both Reagan and Kennedy found the other candidate acceptable as a future President.

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