Editor’s note: This op-ed is by Steve Terry of Middlebury who has observed and written about Vermont politics for more than 40 years.
MIDDLEBURY— The last week of a political campaign, especially those that are too close to call, is a place where the participants experience gut-wrenching anxiety with emotions ranging from the slough of despond to exhilarating highs—all in the same hour.
As we get down to the end especially in a very close election such as we are witnessing this year in the governor’s race there can be no mistakes.
Imagine yourself as a staffer on the Peter Shumlin or Brian Dubie campaigns.
A few typical campaign scenes:
It is unlikely that you have had a good night’s sleep for weeks; you are always tired and on edge.
You are fighting with the scheduler to squeeze in one more campaign stop, but others are demanding extra time for extra debate prep time to prepare for the “ live” political debates on the state’s television stations.
Your pollster is worried that overnight voter tracking results may be showing some unexpected weakness, which makes you very unhappy, or it shows a new source of momentum, which makes you very happy.
The out of state media consultant is demanding more resources to run one tougher political ad to counter some last – minute allegations by your opponent. Campaign strategists who wanted the candidate to “ go positive” are arguing with the media consultant who wants one last big push to try to influence the undecided voters, mostly the political independents. You can’t have it both ways, so a hard decision is required ASAP to book the TV time.
Finally, there are the rumors that haunt every campaign: Get prepared for a late October “surprise” that could literally change the election outcome.
The campaign press secretary is swamped by a flurry of calls demanding a deadline response to your opponent’s most recent allegation based on an incident that happened nearly 10 years ago. Tensions are running high as researchers scramble to ferret out facts of the long- ago incident.
Such is the world of campaign staffers and their candidates as the clock runs down to the final day—the day when the scene shifts to the real deciders: the voters. Then the vote-counting waiting game begins when your life as a staffer flashes before your eyes.
The above campaign scenes are played out in most major campaigns, whether for President, Congress or the Governorship.
This is the expected drama that all participants have usually experienced.
But sometimes there are game-changing events that in a flash can and do alter the outcome of an election. It has happened before in Vermont.
Take Madeleine M. Kunin in 1982 and then in 1984. The Democratic House leader from Burlington announced for Governor in 1982 after it appeared that Republican Gov. Richard A. Snelling was not going to run for another term. Then Snelling responded to a newspaper editorial draft and announced that he would run after all! The 1982 Kunin gubernatorial campaign was doomed from that point on, and Snelling beat her by winning every Vermont County.
In 1984, Snelling did not run again, and Kunin jumped back in to wage a campaign against Republican Atty. Gen. John Easton. This race was a nail biter all the way, in which Kunin finally eked out a slim vote majority of 50.02 percent.
The election was not formally decided until noon the next day when Easton conceded the race to Kunin and he was not going to ask for a recount. With that Vermont made history as it elected its first female governor.
Political observers surmised that Kunin won the election because she convinced the Publisher of the Rutland Herald, the late Robert W. Mitchell, that it was time for Vermont to make history and elect a female governor and that she was ready for the job.
Kunin, a former newspaper reporter, knew the importance of landing a major newspaper endorsement and that it be the first endorsement. So Kunin would often call Mitchell over the course of the campaign, usually about mid-morning when he was writing his editorial for the day to give him her bird’s eye view of the race. The result was that in the third week of October 1984, the Herald became the first major Vermont newspaper to endorse Kunin for Governor.
This event changed the tone of the campaign and it helped Vermonters to get comfortable with the notion of electing its first female governor.
So as Dubie and Shumlin campaign teams sweat out the next few days in this very close race, will there be a last-minute game changer that will sway the outcome?
Stay tuned. It has happened before and it can again.
