Holland notes (as Bill Bradley did during the primaries) that "when he was a senator, he was basically opposed to abortion and against gun control and the vast majority of Tennessee voters would agree with those positions and not with his current positions."

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Gore's '96 Tennessee campaign ads didn't talk much about a controversial late-term abortion procedure he supports, or the Brady Bill, or the assault weapons ban.

"We had this guy, a former Ag commissioner in Tennessee," describes the campaign official, "kind of a good ol' Southern pol -- I think his name was 'Cotton' something -- and he would do ads for us, mainly on rural stations, and he'd talk a lot about the values that Gore has, you know, 'the right values for Tennessee.'" The pol, L. H. "Cotton" Ivy, was commissioner of Tennessee's Department of Agriculture.

In Republican East Tennessee, the Clinton-Gore campaign talked about the economic promise of the new economy. In Nashville, the campaign rapped about welfare reform and announced a new $30 million program for genetic breast cancer research.

Speaking before a crowd of about 100 law enforcement officers at the Shelby County Training Academy in Memphis, Gore -- flanked by the Memphis police director, the Shelby County Sheriff and almost two dozen other West Tennessee policemen -- talked tough on crime, like the old Al Gore, the conservative southern senator. He told the crowd that as a police reporter for the Tennessean, "I learned a lot about life and about law enforcement." He even suggested that Dole was soft on crime, since "Dole, the president's opponent, fought hard against the extra 100,000 police officers; fought against the prevention program; fought against the anti-crime bill with the 'three strikes and you're out' provision. If we are going to continue this progress and complete the deployment of these extra 100,000 police officers, we need you to speak out loudly and clearly in favor of the policies that are moving our country in the right direction."

Gore made 14 such trips to the state in 1996 alone; Clinton made eight. Gore visited towns that had never, ever, been visited by a vice president -- Blountville, Brighton, Fruitland, Hendersonville, Spring Hill, Troy.

And Dole-Kemp were right there, too. Among the four candidates, Clinton, Gore, Dole and Kemp, more than three dozen trips to Tennessee were recorded.

"The Dole-Kemp ticket has spent far more time per capita in Tennessee than any other state," Gore told reporters. "They have spent more television money per capita in Tennessee than any other state ... They're behind in so many places that places where they're less behind look like the best opportunities for them. I think that a margin of 8 to 10 points is probably a closer margin than they have in many other places, so that is partly an explanation."

"It is a battleground, and we intend to match them speech for speech and point for point and then some," Gore added at another time. He told employees of airport tarmacs not to plan any vacations until after the election.

At one point it even seemed amusing to Gore. Dole-Kemp were going down in flames, in far more important states than Tennessee, but still they campaigned on the veep's home turf, determined to embarrass him. "They are leaving Michigan, Illinois, Ohio, Florida, New Jersey and California unattended while Sen. Dole's running mate takes a bus trip through East Tennessee," Gore noted at one point, seemingly bemused.

"We were pretty confident about the election," says the official. "One of the only things we were fighting tooth and nail was the campaign in Tennessee." Gore's parents campaigned around the state, as did his oldest daughter, Karenna. "There was a whole operation just in charge of her," the official says.

Clinton kicked in too, the official says. "The president had an impact with some Democratic voters there, but not with the swing voters we really needed."

"We were spending a lot of money. No one ever added it up."

One anti-Gore event illuminated the complex politics of being Al Gore in Tennessee. The tobacco companies held a rally in Carthage, Gore's hometown, right across the street from where the office of the Gore family farm used to be. The event "was obviously designed to poke at the vice president," says the official. "And who was there [participating in the rally] but [Democratic Tennessee Rep.] Bart Gordon, one of our campaign chairmen. That'll give you a sense of the tide we were fighting. I mean, Bart Gordon appearing at a rally clearly aimed at the president and the vice president. It shows you how Gordon and others had to walk fine line down there, too." (Just days before the election, in November 1996, tobacco farmers rallied in Carthage against allowing a Food and Drug Administration proposal to allow the government agency to regulate cigarettes and smokeless tobacco as drugs because of their nicotine content. Giving speeches were Gordon -- and eager Gore-backer "Cotton" Ivy.)

"Not since maybe the Civil War has the Volunteer State played host to as much skirmishing as it has in the 1996 presidential race," wrote Richard Locker, Nashville bureau chief of the Memphis Commercial Appeal.

A Mason-Dixon poll of 823 Tennessee voters released on Nov. 1, 1996 showed Clinton-Gore tied with Dole-Kemp in the state, with 44 percent apiece.

Gore's 1992 pre-election day was spent in more than six states, with a late-night arrival back in the Volunteer State. In 1996, Gore popped by Wisconsin and Ohio, but focused much more on Tennessee -- hopping among Nashville, Chattanooga, Memphis and Knoxville.

"It's a very, very competitive state that could go either way," Gore's then-chief of staff Ron Klain said the day before the election.

But it went for Gore. Clinton-Gore edged out Dole-Kemp by about 40,000 votes, 48 percent to 46 percent. The key to the victory, according to exit polls, were black voters and middle-class women, who voted for Clinton-Gore disproportionately.

"After all that, all the visits by Bill and Al and Tipper, they still only won by a point and a half," grouses Saltsman.

And, as the official points out, Sen. Fred Thompson won reelection that year with nearly 200,000 more votes than Clinton-Gore.

Holland says that Gore will have a similar fight this year, with Frist anticipated to sail to reelection. "It's one of the reasons why the vice president moved his headquarters down here."

The GOP chieftain points out that more Republicans than Democrats voted in Tennessee's primary. He allows that Gore scored more votes than Bush did in Tennessee's Super Tuesday primaries in March but, Holland says, "just barely."

"I think it will be very close," Holland guesses, "but in the end I think Gore will pull it off."

For Albert McCall, 70, a lifelong Republican and distant relation to the vice president, Gore's struggles in his home state are all pretty easy to understand. McCall lives in Carthage, has always voted Republican and will again this year.

As for Gore, "I know him real well," McCall says. "He's kin to me. On my mother's side, his dad was my mother's second cousin."

"I like him," McCall says. "I just don't like his politics."
salon.com | May 30, 2000

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