Will Roy Moore crack the Bush base?

The "Ten Commandments Judge" is mulling a run for president from the right. Even his conservative admirers say he probably can't damage Bush -- but they hope he doesn't try.

By Fred Clarkson

May 4, 2004 | Alabama's renegade Chief Justice Roy Moore was already the darling of the far right when he rallied cheering supporters on the steps of the state courthouse last August. Nationally known as the "Ten Commandments Judge," Moore had installed a 5,280-pound granite sculpture of an open book inscribed with the commandments shortly after he was elected in 2001, and then defied a federal court order to remove it. Observers couldn't help being reminded of Gov. George Wallace's infamous stand in the schoolhouse door, rallying Alabama segregationists in defiance of a federal court order to integrate the University of Alabama.

Now, almost everywhere Moore goes, people ask him to do something else Wallace did: run for president.

The possibility that Roy Moore could challenge President Bush in November may not be costing Karl Rove any sleep -- yet. But the chance that the popular conservative judge could do to Bush what Ralph Nader did to Al Gore in 2000 -- split his ideological base, and cost him the presidency -- has analysts crunching numbers and weighing Moore's chances. Moore and his spokeswoman did not return telephone and e-mail messages from Salon, but Moore's public statements have been consistent in recent months. He is keeping his options open, he says, and he will decide if he will run when he has exhausted his court appeals in the Ten Commandments case.

Meanwhile, the 57-year-old Moore is acting more and more like a candidate as he crisscrosses the country, speaking at gatherings of Christian rightists, home-schoolers and state conventions of the far-right Constitution Party, which was on 41 state ballots in the 2000 election, and is courting Moore to head its ticket. If he ran on the Constitution Party ticket, he would probably be on more state ballots than Nader this year. With 320,000 members it is the third-largest party in the U.S, in terms of registered voters.

Will the dynamics of the race change if Moore throws his hat in the ring? Hastings Wyman, a former aide to the late Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., and editor of the Southern Political Report, thinks so. Wyman told Salon that he thinks Moore has the potential to "do to Bush what Nader did to Gore." Other Republican and Democratic strategists aren't so sure, but no one thinks Bush can stand much erosion in his base. Certainly some Republican leaders take Moore seriously enough to quietly court him, hoping to keep him in the party and preserve the president's Christian far-right constituency.

The deadline for Moore to declare himself is the June 22-26 Constitution Party national convention, in Valley Forge, Pa. Even a few months can be an eternity in politics. But in recent weeks, Moore has spoken to Constitution Party state conventions in Oregon, Montana, Pennsylvania, Nevada and Ohio. And a Moore for President Web site has popped up. Meanwhile, Moore, like many a pol before him, is keeping his finger to the wind and everyone at the edge of their seats.

And the judge doesn't discourage comparisons with Alabama hero George Wallace, by the way. When a reporter for the Seattle Times observed that the judge's analysis of the two major parties sounded like Ralph Nader's, Moore agreed, and added, "As somebody from our state, George Wallace, once said, 'There's not a dime's worth of difference between them.' It's all about power. I think the people need a choice."

Next page: Moore gets "treated like a rock star" by the Christian Coalition