Burnt Orange Report

Why Herseth's Win Matters

By Andrew Dobbs

Last night was a very good night- Stephanie Herseth, a progressive Democrat who had lost a race for congress less than two years ago won election the the US House from South Dakota, handing the state its first all Democrat congressional delegation since 1937. Herseth's win give the Democrats a 2-0 record in special elections heading into the general election. Republicans say that this is unimportant, but they are dreadfully wrong. From the Nation:

Special elections results, especially when they follow upon one another and begin to form patterns, mean a great deal in American politics. In the last two election cycles where Democratic challengers defeated Republican Presidents, those wins were preceded by patterns of Democratic wins in special elections for House seats vacated by Republicans. Before the 1976 presidential election, Democrats swept a series of special elections in traditionally Republican districts--even winning the Michigan House seat vacated by Gerald Ford when he accepted the vice presidency in Richard Nixon's collapsing Administration. In 1976, after assuming the presidency, Ford was defeated by Democrat Jimmy Carter.

Similarly, before the 1992 election, President George Herbert Walker Bush was embarrassed when his Republican party lost special elections for seats it had held. Of particular significance was the June 4, 1991, election of Democrat John Olver to the western Massachusetts seat vacated by Republican Representative Silvio O. Conte, a close Bush ally. (...)

But there is no question that the South Dakota result represents bad news for the GOP. Coming not long before fall elections, when Republicans must defend the White House and narrow margins of control in the House and Senate, a pair of special-election wins for Democrats running in traditionally Republican House districts will set off alarm bells within the headquarters of the Republican National Committee. (...)

During the contest that preceded Herseth's election by a 51-49 margin over Republican Larry Diedrich in Tuesday's statewide voting, the Democratic and Republican Congressional campaign committees poured more that $2 million into television advertising that targeted fewer than 300,000 South Dakota voters. Vice President Dick Cheney and First Lady Laura Bush swept into the Plains state to campaign for Diedrich. And, after Herseth won, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi was declaring early Wednesday morning that "Stephanie Herseth's win to tonight sends a clear message to President Bush and Congressional Republicans: Americans are ready for change."

Allowing for predictable hyperbole, Pelosi is hitting closer to the mark than the Republicans who claim this one election has no meaning. The Democrats do, indeed, seem to be on something of a roll in special elections for the House this year.

Between 1991 and 2003, Democrats failed to win a single special election for a House seat vacated by a Republican.

In 2004, Democrats have won two such seats: First in the rural 6th District of Kentucky, where former state Attorney General Ben Chandler secured a lopsided special election victory in February, and now in South Dakota with Herseth.

For all the protests from Republicans about how the South Dakota race was unique, it is difficult to imagine that if President Bush were riding high in the polls and public confidence in the stewardship of Republican House and Senate leaders were equally high Herseth could have prevailed. South Dakota knows how to vote for Democrats--the state sends two Democratic senators to Washington--but the House seat Herseth won had been safely in Republican hands for years. Republican Rep. John Thune regularly won the seat with as much as 75 percent of the vote until he gave it up in 2002. Former Governor Bill Janklow then won the seat with a solid margin over Herseth. (Janklow's involvement in a deadly driving accident cut his Congressional career short, provoking the special election.)

The author fails to mention that in 1994 the coming Republican landslide was foretold by a string of surprising GOP wins in special elections. Special elections are like spring training in baseball- they dont' necessarily mean that your team is going to win a pennat but if you are struggling real hard you have to shape up quick or you'll be in last place real soon. Right now the GOP is looking bad- two losses in two states that should have been sure things where they poured enormous amounts of cash. $2 million in South Dakota is a fortune and Cheney and Laura couldn't even save Diedrich. Albeit, it was quite close but Herseth is going to have a lot of help in the Fall.

Essentially, the GOP is very weak right now. They have lost two special elections for the House, they are looking at losing Senate seats in IL, OK, CO and AK and Bush's numbers are in the tubes. Unless something dramatic happens, a Democratic sweep is a very real possibility. A Herseth loss would have meant the GOP has stemmed the Democrats' momentum but as we saw last night, things are looking up for our party in 2004.