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October 12, 2006
Battle for the Tennessee Senate
As you know by now, seventeen state Senate seats are up for election on November 7, and the Republicans are desperate to at least hold on to their slim margin, which they feel will re-position them to elect a new Speaker. Will they make it, though? Here are the districts and a few words about each. Click on the headings for more info about the present and former candidates (including links: to their websites, to maps of the districts, and more).
District 1 - Tennessee's legislative districts are generally numbered ascending from East to West, and East Tennessee is just chock full of Republicans. It always has been, even when the rest of the state was Southern Democrat. Therefore, incumbent Sen. Steve Southerland (R-Morristown) will cruise to an easy victory over his challenger, school principal Duran Williams.
District 3 - Incumbent Sen. Rusty Crowe (R-Johnson City) is unopposed.
District 5 - Incumbent Sen. Randy McNally (R-Oak Ridge) is unopposed.
District 7 - Incumbent Sen. Tim Burchett (R-Knoxville) is unopposed.
District 9 - Outgoing House of Representatives member Dewayne Bunch (R-Cleveland) defeated his primary opponents and has no general election opposition. This is the district that saw its former rising star, Jeff Miller, burn out suddenly in sundry public ugliness.
District 11 - Outgoing House of Representatives member Bo Watson (R-Hixson) is unopposed. (Former NTSB chair Jim Hall started to run for the Democrats, but later withdrew.)
District 13 - Incumbent Sen. Bill Ketron (R-Murfreesboro) is expected to win re-election over educator Vince Springer, but this one will bear watching fairly closely.
District 15 - Incumbent Sen. Charlotte Burks (D-Monterey) staved off a primary challenge from David Gentry and is unopposed in the general election.
District 17 - Okay, grab a seat and hold on. This is the expensive, hotly contested race that features a controversial former Senator and his bid to retake the position from ultraconservative Sen. Mae Beavers. Bob Rochelle is convinced that he can shake off his income-tax-champion stigma and reclaim the seat, and the Tennessee Republican Party is dead set on making sure he doesn't. Conservative blogger Mark Rose has a category dedicated to this election, and Sharon Cobb, a liberal blogger and journalist, has written about some ugly dynamics in this key race, as have Bill Hobbs, A.C. Kleinheider, and Adam Groves, among many others. I think Rochelle just might pull it off. It'll be close, anyhow.
District 19 - Incumbent Sen. Thelma Harper (D-Nashville) defeated primary challenger Jesse Frank Tucker and is unopposed in the general election.
District 21 - Last month I referenced an interesting dialogue, in a post called "Help the Republicans: Elect the Democrats," that prescribed a medicinal reckoning for the national GOP (more here); but at the state legislature, I feel that exactly the opposite is warranted. I endorse candidates like Bob Krumm, whose positions do not completely align with mine (and, really, whose will?), but whose focus on ethics and real public service is comprehensively refreshing when contrasted to stale old Democrats like Lt. Gov. John Wilder, the Fords, and so on. In his own way, Sen. Douglas Henry (D-Nashville) represents that old guard. I agree with Kleinheider that Krumm won't win -- this time around (UPDATE: especially not with this going on) -- but I must recognize his effort and his genuine spirit. Candidates of all political stripes would do well to learn from Bob Krumm's honest, intelligent approach.
District 23 - This seat opened up just days before the filing deadline when incumbent Sen. Jim Bryson (R-Franklin) decided to run for Governor. In spite of the short notice, a slew of GOP candidates qualified, while only one Democrat dared brave this bastion of suburbanity. When the sawdust was cleared, financial adviser Jack Johnson remained standing opposite Mary Parker. The twist here is that Parker is a conservative Democrat who travels well in Williamson circles, but it seems clear enough that the Republicans will retain this seat.
District 25 - Incumbent Sen. Doug Jackson (D-Dickson) easily defeated Travis Wood in the primary and is unopposed in the general election.
District 27 - Incumbent Sen. Don McLeary, a former conservative Democrat who recently switched to wearing the GOP gang colors, is under serious strategic attack by the whole TNDP, who have found another conservative Democrat, Lowe Finney, to run against him. Inside baseball types have consistently predicted that McLeary will hang onto his seat, given that many of the rural conservatives who voted him in as a Democrat likely vote Republican just as often (but will they this year?). I'm not so sure. I am not foolish enough to say "leans Dem" or anything, but I can't make a prediction.
District 29 - Expect a few fireworks as a do-over of last year's fraud-riddled special election will attract plenty of media attention. Ophelia Ford occupied the seat for a very short time in the 2006 session before being ousted because of the tainted election. Her once-and-again opponent, Terry Roland, is hoping that the uneasy coalition of anti-Ford sentiment, a sense of justice for his being "robbed," and scant GOP voters will be enough to secure him the victory for good this time around. His problem is that general election turnout will be much higher in this heavily Democratic district.
District 31 - Outgoing House of Representatives member Paul Stanley is set to cruise past Democrat Ivon Faulkner to take the seat long held by retired Sen. Curtis Person, Jr.
District 33 - With the 29th District Senate seat and the 87th House position, this seat has contributed to high turnover in Shelby County representation of late. After former Sen. Roscoe Dixon resigned, then-Rep. Kathryn Bowers won election. Soon, though, she was among those indicted in Operation Tennessee Waltz. She stayed in office longer than some, including an embarrassing stint in the special session on ethics, but eventually resigned "for health reasons" and sailed valiantly onward with a Not Guilty plea. Since she had already won this year's primary, the local Democrats came together to name a ballot replacement: Reginald Tate. Around the same time, Republican nominee Michael Floyd withdrew, leaving Tate the de facto winner next month.
So, where does that leave us? By my count, of the seats that will be decided this year, 9 will definitely go to Republicans, 6 to Democrats, and 2 (17 and 27) are too close for me to call. Add those numbers to the incumbents in even-numbered districts, and we have 16 GOP, 15 Dem, with the aforementioned 2 outstanding. (It is assumed that if Sen. Steve Cohen were to win his bid for the 9th Congressional district, his replacement would be another Democrat.) This is why you see such negative advertising in the 17th, and such "all hands on deck" mentality in the support for Lowe Finney in the 27th. Since the Republicans have probably whipped their former defectors into shape (the one wild(er) card being moderate Mike Williams), even a one-seat majority will result in a new Speaker/Lieutenant Governor -- current Majority Leader Ron Ramsey.
Obviously, the Democrats are loathe to have that happen. As I said before, though, I think it would be good for them to lose this power. I mean, how proud could Democrats be of a majority that included John Wilder, Ward Crutchfield, Ophelia Ford and Jerry Cooper? With all due respect to people like Rosalind Kurita and Roy Herron, let us, the voters, clean up that crowd a bit. If the Democrats want control back, they should obtain it with a new generation of clean progressive citizen candidates, and not simply with their old stand-bys.
UPDATES: I had no idea that Groves and I were more or less simultaneously working on similar articles. Compare and contrast. Also, Kleinheider rebuts the bit about Mike Williams' vote for the GOP Speaker candidate.
State Senate Elections | By joe lance | 12:12 PM