THE 91ST: A HOUSE THAT WILL BE LESS THAN HOMEY

Despite Richard Nixon's continuing lead in the presidential race, it is highly unlikely that his coattails will be sufficiently strong to give the Republicans control of the House. The current breakdown is 245 Democrats, 187 Republicans and three vacancies. The G.O.P. thus needs a net gain of 31 seats to win control, but ticket splitting is expected to be so widespread that even a top-of-the-ticket Republican runaway would not guarantee such a gain. Despite the volatility of this year's politics, the House appears headed for a relatively minor alteration in its membership and a relatively moderate alteration in its ideological temper.

Conservative Coloration. As of this week, the outlook is for a Republican pickup of 22 seats. That would give the 91st Congress a Democratic edge of 226 Democrats to 209 Republicans. It would also give the House a more conservative tilt, making it more hostile to foreign aid than even the pinch-penny 90th, more sympathetic to defense appropriations, less anxious to enact fresh domestic programs, more eager to transfer federal projects to state and local control.

It generally takes about 275 Democrats to give the House a liberal coloration; Lyndon Johnson had 295 in the hyperproductive 89th that put most his Great Society programs on the books. Once the Democratic membership dips to around 240, the tenor of the House becomes decidedly conservative, because so many of the Democrats are either Southern conservatives or machine men from the Northern cities. To reduce Democratic totals to a figure considerably below 240, the Republicans are counting on big victories i the Middle Atlantic region, where the party may gain six House seats and in the 14 Rocky Mountain, Southwest and Far West states, where a net pickup of seven is probable.

Whatever the eventual figures, the new House is not likely to be a homey place--for anybody. In all likelihood Democrats will bear the responsibility for running a House over which they will have little real control. The Republicans will probably elect more Representatives than at any time since the 33rd Congress (1953-54), when they had a majority in the House. But they are unlikely to elect enough to win formal control. Thus, aging Massachusetts Democrat John McCormack, 76 is likely to be elected to a fifth term as Speaker, and Michigan Republican Gerald Ford, 55, will probably be thwarted once again in his ambition to swap the job of minority leader for the Speaker's gavel. Whoever is President, moreover, will be in for serious trouble. A Democratic Congress, even a conservatively oriented one, would probably be hostile to Nixon; a conservative Congress, even one controlled by Democrats, would probably thwart Hubert Humphrey regularly.

Democratic control would also leave the key House committees in familiar hands. Arkansas' Wilbur Mills would chair Ways and Means; Texas' George Mahon, Appropriations; South Carolina's Mendel Rivers, Armed Services; and Mississippi's William Colmer, Rules.

Some particularly close and significant House contests:

EAST

> MASSACHUSETTS: Two years ago Republican Margaret O'Shaughnessy Heckler scored a double upset, first by winning the primary from former House Speaker Joe Martin and then by defeating her Democratic opponent in the general election. Once again, the pert, petite, 37-year-old mother of three faces a difficult race, largely because the lines of the 10th District, which stretches from Republican Wellesley to Democratic Fall River, have been drastically redrawn. Democrat Edmund Dinis, 44, flamboyant District Attorney for Southeastern Massachusetts, should make it close in a contest where the only real issue seems to have become whether Heckler, as a second-term legislator, can bring more goodies to the district than a freshman can.

> NEW YORK: In Long Island's 5th District (Nassau County), Democratic-Liberal Candidate Allard Lowenstein, a Viet Nam dove and one of the key organizers of Eugene McCarthy's presidential bid, faces Republican Conservative Mason Hampton in a tight race. Lowenstein, 39, has 200 youthful volunteers and a troupe of celebrities (Actor Robert Vaughn, Economist J. Kenneth Galbraith) working for him in a McCarthyesque campaign. Hampton 37, benefits from a 3-to-2 Republican registration edge, plus a residue of resentment, among some regular Democrats, of Lowenstein's anti-Johnson, anti-Humphrey efforts. In Brooklyn's newly created 12th District, State Assemblywoman Shirley Chisholm, 43 is a slight favorite to become the nation's first Negro Congresswoman. Republican-Liberal Candidate James Farmer, 48, who is well known in the overwhelmingly black community as former national director of the Congress of Racial Equality, agrees with Mrs. Chisholm on most issues, but his campaign aides emphasize the issue of sex. "Women," says one, "have been in the driver's seat in black communities for too long now." With 62% of the voters women, and 80% Democrats, that's where the ladies may stay.

SOUTH

> GEORGIA: After Charles Longstreet Weltner dropped out of the 5th District race two years ago rather than support fellow Democrat Lester Maddox's gubernatorial bid, Republican Fletcher Thompson won an easy victory. Thompson, 43 has since projected an image of intelligence, dedication, and the kind of stolid conservatism that sells in most of the South. But Atlanta is an exception, and many natives are proud of the fact that Weltner, 40, had become known as a liberal spokesman for the "New South" and a strong civil rights supporter during the two terms he served in Congress before his voluntary, and short-lived, retirement. He is counting on votes from Atlanta's Negroes and moderate-liberal whites. Though the nationwide trend toward conservatism will hurt Weltner, the wounds should not be fatal.

> NORTH CAROLINA: One of the most colorful races in the nation pits Millionaire Democrat Smith Bagley, 33, grandson of Tobacco King R. J. Reynolds, against Republican Wilmer ("Vinegar Bend") Mizell, 38, a former St. Louis Cardinal pitcher who now pitches for Pepsi-Cola (as a public relations man) and godliness (as a lay preacher for numerous churches, including Methodist and Baptist). Both candidates are strongly conservative, and the race comes down to a straight urban-rural struggle. Bagley should carry Winston-Salem, but the rural ridings belong to Mizell, and may well provide the margin of victory.

MIDWEST

> ILLINOIS: Even his Polish name and his fervent opposition to civil rights legislation may not be enough to save five-term Democratic Congressman Roman ("Pooch") Pucinski, 49, in Chicago's 11th District. Once a liberal, Pucinski now yields to no man in talking down open housing and talking up law and order. Nonetheless his overwhelmingly white, blue-collar constituents are showing considerable interest anyway in Republican John J. Hoellen, 54, a Chicago alderman of comparably conservative views, in a race where race is plainly uppermost.

> IOWA: Only two Democratic Congressmen survived the G.O.P.'s stunning 1966 comeback in Iowa, and John C. Culver, 36, a Harvard friend of Teddy Kennedy's, was one of them. This time Culver is likely to be the lone Democratic survivor--if he is lucky. Joan Kennedy, Teddy's wife, will stump for Culver, Nelson Rockefeller for Challenger Tom Riley, 39, in a race where personality counts far more than the issues. Both candidates are liberally inclined, both are dovish on Viet Nam, both stress the need for law. and order, with justice. It will probably be Richard Nixon and the scope of his victory, however, that will determine the outcome in the 2nd District.

> OHIO: When the lines of the 22nd District were redrawn, seven-term Democratic Congressman Charles Vanik, 55, decided to move in and challenge 14-term Republican Frances P. Bolton, 83. She got her dander up and warned that Vanik would not "have an easy timeof it running against what he likes to call 'a nice old lady.' " She was right, but the nice old lady's age--plus the Democratic leanings of Cleveland suburbs like Euclid and Shaker Heights --give Vanik a slight edge.

WEST

> CALIFORNIA: In the state's 29th District, embracing the big Mexican-American barrio on Los Angeles' east side, three-term Democratic Congressman George E. Brown, 48, is being pressed hard by Republican J. William Orozco, 47. Two years ago, Orozco came within 3,000 votes of upsetting Brown in the G.O.P. landslide created by Ronald Reagan. His close identification with Reagan, whose popularity is diminishing in the area, might now cost him votes. But Brown, one of the most outspoken doves in Congress (he was one of seven Representatives to vote against the 1968 defense-appropriation bill), could be unseated--partly because of his own uncompromising views on the war, partly because of Orozco's appeal as a Mexican American.

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