DIGGING UP ... DETAILS

If you believe the Republican radio ad, Attorney General Hubert Humphrey III
is "soft on crime."

The evidence?

Twenty-five years ago, Humphrey, then a DFL state senator from New Hope,
voted (along with several prominent Republicans) to reduce the penalty for
possessing a small amount of marijuana -- .05 ounces, enough maybe for two
joints.

If you believe the Humphrey campaign, St. Paul Mayor Norm Coleman isn't any
tougher on crime.

The evidence?

Twenty-eight years ago, when he was president of the Hofstra University
student senate, Coleman wrote a student newspaper editorial urging the
university not to punish students who had been convicted of violating
selective service laws and possessing marijuana.

These records were unearthed by a breed of political archaeologists who
research the opposition, poring over the public and not-so-public record,
looking for skeletons.

The DFL and Republican parties have substantial opposition research
operations.

"We have a research director who works year-round for the party," said Tony
Sutton, executive director of the Republican Party of Minnesota.

"The purpose is to maintain an accurate record of our opponents, who they
are and what they've done. Quite frankly, there's no better indicator of
somebody's future performance than their past record."

Research or ancient history? The DFL Party conducts year-round research on
all state constitutional and legislative races, keeping files for each
office, said Tom Kelly, communications director for the party.

"It's not nasty, dirty research," he said. "It's just making certain the
record's straight."

Indeed, when Coleman's university writings became known last year, the DFL
sent someone to the Hempstead, N.Y., campus to check aging microfilm and to
make copies.

The material was made available to the various DFL gubernatorial candidates,
including Humphrey, before the party convention endorsed Hennepin County
Attorney Mike Freeman in June.

When Republicans began running the Humphrey "soft on crime" ad that harks
back to a vote 25 years ago, the Humphrey campaign trotted out Coleman's
words from a time when he was a long-haired student activist.

"I don't think that old information, information from 28 years ago, is
something we would have highlighted in our campaign," said Eric Johnson, a
top lieutenant in the Humphrey campaign. "We obviously only used it in
rebuttal."

So is all this research or ancient history?

Legitimate research, said the GOP's Sutton, adding that the Humphrey and
Coleman examples are not comparable.

"It's one thing for somebody on the student council to sit there and pass a
meaningless resolution that has no weight, versus a public official who is
sitting in a legislative chamber passing legislation that actually affects
lives."

As for a vote made in 1973, voters will decide whether Humphrey is the same
person he was 25 years ago, Sutton said.

A critical campaign tactic

The research "can be absolutely critical in maintaining your credibility
both with the press and with the public," said Johnson of the Humphrey
campaign.

Opposition research is both offensive and defensive.

Jenn Hathaway was press secretary to former state Sen. Ted Mondale's DFL
gubernatorial campaign. She said that when Mondale was attacked for his key
vote in the state Senate that led to an overhaul of the workers'
compensation system, his campaign staff members began checking out the labor
record of his opponents in the primary election. It was a defensive move.

Some of the research goes no deeper than clipping newspaper stories and
letters to the editor by or about political challengers and potential
challengers. It also involves taping public pronouncements by politicians
and collecting their campaign literature.

Some research is more complicated. The public record can yield considerable
information, especially for longtime officeholders who have taken votes and
made public decisions.

"It is very time-consuming, very tedious," said Chris Georgacas, Coleman's
campaign manager.

Georgacas is a disciple of opposition research. As chairman of the
Republican Party in the early 1990s, he reinstituted the party's research
function.

A campaign rarely can win without opposition research, he said.

"Political campaigns ultimately are about providing voters with choices. In
order to provide choices, competing campaigns have to provide voters with
comparative information or context for various candidates' competing
claims," he said.

Copyright 1998 Star Tribune. All rights reserved.

Checked-by: Don Beck