Politics From the Twilight Zone

By Richard Stengel

Their campaigns cost a grand total of $200. They made few speeches, avoided appearing on television, and distributed only a smattering of pamphlets. They kept quiet about their platform, which proposes mandatory testing of all Americans for AIDS and "Nuremberg tribunals" for those suspected of treason. Although the ballot in the Illinois state primary listed them as Democrats, that designation cloaked their true affiliation.

The two candidates who won the Illinois Democratic state primary nominations for Lieutenant Governor and secretary of state in shocking upsets are actually followers of reclusive, ultra-right-wing, perennial Presidential Candidate Lyndon LaRouche. Mark Fairchild and Janice Hart, two travelers from the Twilight Zone of politics, narrowly defeated the handpicked nominees of Adlai Stevenson III. Stevenson won the Democratic primary for Governor with an overwhelming 88% of the vote.

The returns jolted everyone in Illinois politics. "This is insane," said an incredulous Republican Governor James Thompson. "A disaster," exclaimed Democratic Chairman Calvin Sutker. Stevenson was both angry and adamant. "I am exploring every legal remedy to purge these extremists from the Democratic ticket," said he. "But one thing I want to make absolutely clear. I will never serve on a ticket with candidates who espouse the hate-filled folly of Lyndon LaRouche and the U.S. Labor Party."

The victory of the LaRouche candidates left the Democratic Party in agitated disarray and may torpedo Stevenson's chances. Though candidates for statewide offices in Illinois are chosen individually, the Governor and Lieutenant Governor must run in tandem in November. Stevenson is considering forming a third party, a complicated maneuver that would require renouncing his Democratic nomination and organizing a slate of candidates for nine offices. But many Illinois Democrats, including U.S. Senator Alan Dixon, regard that as imprudent. Dixon urged Stevenson to run as a Democrat and promise to eliminate the Lieutenant Governor's office if elected.

After his victory, Fairchild, 28, an earnest-looking electrical engineer who won the Lieutenant Governor's spot, attributed the upset to "anger on the part of the public at the regular Democratic slate." For his part, Fairchild said, he would like to reach some kind of agreement with Stevenson. Hart, 31, the new Democratic nominee for secretary of state, was less gracious. A dark, alarmingly intense woman who has been a LaRouche disciple since she was 17, she spoke at her victory press conference in the flat tones of a military commander: "We will roll our tanks down State Street, and make sure every citizen is armed, with reason and beauty. We will hang traitors and hang people who are responsible for feeding our children drugs . . ." There was more: "He (LaRouche) will put the fear of God in people like Henry Kissinger and the State Department, the biggest hotbed of treason in this nation since Aaron Burr killed Alexander Hamilton."

The bizarre outcome was skewed, in part, by the Chicago races, where Mayor Harold Washington campaigned against the regular Democratic ticket (see box). In the statewide contests, regular Democrats were too cocky; Stevenson did not bother to campaign for his running mates, assuming, like everyone else, that they would be ushered in on his coattails.

Apparently many voters around the state, unfamiliar with the candidates, cast ballots for Fairchild and Hart because their names sounded more ) comfortable to them than those of their regular Democrat opponents, George Sangmeister and Aurelia Pucinski. The fact that Hart and Fairchild were listed first, alphabetically, gave them an edge with uninformed voters. A shoe salesman in Taylorville told the Chicago Tribune he voted for the two LaRouchians "because they had smooth-sounding names. I didn't know anything about any of those candidates." Chicago newspapers later sent reporters out to survey scores of voters; none of them found a single avowed LaRouchian.

That is not surprising, even though LaRouche has run for President in the past three national elections (garnering nearly 80,000 votes in 1984) and his followers court attention at airports by displaying posters such as NUKE JANE FONDA as a come-on for their often virulent pamphlets. LaRouche, 63, a former Marxist, is now the leader of a cultlike, worldwide organization that blames international conspiracies of bankers, Communists and Zionists for the world's ills--including those of the farmers, which may have attracted some votes in struggling rural Illinois. In 1984, LaRouche claimed on a paid political broadcast that "Walter Mondale is an agent of influence of the Soviet secret intelligence services."

Despite the crackbrained ideas, a former official of the National Security Council maintains that LaRouche has "one of the best private intelligence services in the world." His lieutenants have had meetings with U.S. intelligence officials. His international operation, run from a well-guarded estate in Leesburg, Va., provides him with daily reports, while his printing company churns out books, magazines and newspapers that produce both converts and income. With perhaps 2,000 disciples, LaRouche ran hundreds of candidates for office in 1984. Nearly 1,000 are expected to run this year. Though few, if any, are expected to do well. Democrats in Newport Beach, Calif., last week discovered that a LaRouche follower was the lone Democrat to meet the filing deadline to contest a Republican congressional seat.

Whatever the Illinois victories mean for LaRouche's fanatical movement, they exposed a dangerous weakness in the state's electoral politics. Even Governor Thompson, whose re-election bid for a fourth term will benefit from the situation, was troubled. "The bottom line of all this," he said, "is that every politician in the state of Illinois better sit himself down and say, 'I'm never going to take the voters for granted.' "

With reporting by Lee Griggs/Chicago