Races of the week: Pearce vs. Smith

New Mexico's 2nd District

"Expect the unexpected" is a good description of politics in New Mexico's 2nd District, which, pundits and pots note with a chuckle, is home to Roswell, the mother city of UFO's and other inexplicable phenomena.

When veteran Democratic Rep. Harold Runnels died unexpectedly in August 1980, the Democratic powers in the Land of Enchantment stage-managed the nomination of then-Gov. Bruce King's nephew David to replace him. The late congressman's widow Dorothy and Republican Joe Skeen, who had lost two close bids for governor in 1974 and '78, both went to court to get on the ballot. And when the efforts of both proved unsuccessful, Mrs. Runnels and Skeen both took the write-in route of election, both making the case that no one should be, in effect, appointed to Congress. Voters agreed and, with 38% of the voters writing in his name, Skeen successfully topped the field. In the process, he became only the second person in U.S. history to be-- elected to the House as a write-in candidate.

Twenty-two years later, the 77-year-old Skeen-bravely battling Parkinson's disease-- announced that he was retiring from Congress. The smart money had it that 2nd District Republicans would nominate to replace him one of two well-heeled "self-funders" capable of personally underwriting a campaign. But the smart money had not reckoned with Steve Pearce, former two-term state legislator and small businessman. With widespread contacts he had made while 2nd District GOP chairman and through groups such as the 4-H, Hobbs oilfield services company head Pearce belted out a simple message: 1) Taxes were bad, 2) government regulation was too intrusive 3) abortion was wrong and 4) in these perilous times abroad, there were too few veterans left in Congress. (Pearce, a U.S. Air Force combat pilot in Vietnam, received the Air Medal and Distinguished Flying Cross.)

Pearce's short but simple message resonated with party activists and, to the surprise of many pros, he won the endorsement of the district Republican convention in March. In the June primary, he topped his two better-- funded opponents and secured the nomination.

With revered lawmaker and powerful Appropriations Committee Member Skeen departing and Democrats holding a strong 52%-to-34% lead among registered voters in the 2nd, it was widely felt that Pearce would have difficulty keeping the district in Republican hands. Moreover, the Democrats' had defied earlier expectations and rather than nominate the liberal Smith-Las Cruces Mayor Ruben Smith, opponent of gun control and oil exploration, proponent of abortion-they gave their 2nd District standard to the more conservative Smith-- 60-year-old State Sen. John Arthur, Smith.

"No drilling plays well with the environmentalists, but in the 2nd Congressional District, I'm betting there's not that many extreme environmentalists," declared J. A. Smith, who also gambled that his pro-life and pro-2nd Amendment stands would not cause him to lose a grueling primary with Ruben Smith and then would be helpful in attracting many of the conservative Democrats who had long crossed party lines to support Skeen.

He was right on the first part. The question now is whether Smith can beat Pearce in November by convincing voters that he is the "real deal" as far as being a conservative.

And on that point, doubts are beginning to emerge. Although the senator's positions on guns and abortion are well-known and often written about, Smith's stand on another crucial cultural issue is, for whatever reason, almost never discussed: his promotion of what many consider special rights for homosexuals. As state senator, Smith voted for so-called "hate crimes" legislation and actually voted against a sense of the senate resolution opposing same-sex marriages.

And on the issue that Steve Pearce did so much to put on the forefront of his primary campaign-no more taxes-opponent Smith is indeed on thin ice. "I've also supported taxes for alternative energy sources," he told the Roswell Record's Eric Paul Erickson. "Wind and solar."

Even if some can rationalize Smith's stands on homosexual rights and energy taxes as minor apostasies in an overall conservative record, there is one vote he will cast that belies it all: that very first and most important vote in January for control of the House. A "Rep. John Arthur Smith (D.-N.M.)" will cast that first vote to make Dick Gephardt (D.-Mo.) speaker and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) majority leader, and to give the gavel of Ways and Means to Harlem's Charles Rangel, that of Appropriations to Wisconsin's David Obey, and that of Judiciary to Detroit's John Conyers.

Can there be any doubt, then, that the only vote a conservative can cast in New Mexico's 2nd District this November is for Steve Pearce, the real deal?

(Pearce for Congress, P.O. Box 2696, Hobbs, N.M. 88241; 505-899-4891)

Copyright Human Events Publishing, Inc. Jul 15, 2002
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