The Upset of Upsets?

A Republican Governor of the state of Mississippi? There has been no such thing since 1876, when one Adelbert Ames resigned under fire in his Reconstruction regime. In most elections since then the G.O.P. has either put up no candidate or furnished merely token opposition. About all the winner of a Democratic gubernatorial primary had to do was clear his throat and start polishing his inaugural speech.

But not this year. Heading for the Nov. 5 general election, Republican Rubel Phillips, 38, a former Democrat who was a state public service commissioner, is putting up a strong enough fight to have Democrats, for the first time in decades, showing concern.

The Democrats began worrying early this month, when the G.O.P. plastered the state with full-color Phillips billboards, bought considerable television time, launched Phillips on a series of hearty handshaking tours throughout Mississippi.

Then came unmistakable signs of apathy among the Democratic rank and file. Two weeks ago, the party nominee, Lieutenant Governor Paul Johnson, appeared on statewide television to whoop it up before Democrats who were supposed to gather in large numbers at the state's 82 county courthouses. But few turned up, and many of them wandered away in the middle of Johnson's speech.

Last week Democratic leaders organized a rare postprimary rally--a $25-a-plate dinner in Jackson featuring top Democratic brass, including the seven-man congressional delegation from Washington. Party publicists hoped that 7,500 would attend. But no more than 3,500 gathered in the half-empty hall.

Those who did show up heard some changed talk from party leaders, who had previously devoted most of their energies to attacking the Kennedy Administration. Paul Johnson complained about "Republican carpetbaggers" and cried: "The birth of a two-party system in the state would divide the conservative white vote." Governor Ross Barnett shouted: "I'm fed up with these fence-riding, pussyfooting, snow-digging Yankee Republicans." And U.S. Senator John Stennis said that Mississippi Democrats must "get out and vote and thwart this challenge brought on by the Republicans."

That, for Democrats, is the great worry. No one doubts that Mississippi has enough Democrats to defeat Republican Phillips. But those Democrats have become so accustomed to perfunctory, no-contest general elections that they might not take the trouble to vote. Were that to happen, Mississippi might experience the upset of all political upsets.

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