Other Key Democrats to Watch in Miami Beach

BEYOND the presidential and vice-presidential candidates, attention at the Democratic Convention will focus on some key figures, people who are either instrumental in running the convention or who could emerge as influential brokers on the floor. Among them:

LAWRENCE F. O'BRIEN. The party's national chairman will also likely be the convention chairman, a chore for which he volunteered. O'Brien, 55, a shrewd, talented political dealer and insider in both the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations, has been a focal paint in his party's comeback from the 1968 debacle, shepherding the Democrats toward party reform and modernization of convention rules, holding the line on financial and emotional expenditure during the primary fights of the campaign year. O'Brien would be a key broker and troubleshooter in case the convention finds itself in deadlock. He showed much foresight in scheduling the event for July, earlier than the 1968 convention, in order to provide the largest possible margin of time in which to heal the wounds of Miami Beach before the election.

PATRICIA R. HARRIS. A successful black attorney from Washington, D.C., she heads the Credentials Committee, a ticklish assignment in view of the 1,000-odd challenges mounted. Mrs. Harris, 48, was initially opposed by party reformers who contended that she was too close to the old guard (she was L.B.J.'s Ambassador to Luxembourg). Georgia's Julian Bond called her appointment a "cynical trick"; he thinks that O'Brien figured "politicians like myself will be reluctant to oppose Mrs. Harris because she is a woman, because we don't want to be called chauvinist pigs, because she is black." But Mrs. Harris has worked hard to demonstrate her support for reform.

RICHARD E. NEUSTADT. He chairs the Platform Committee, which has distilled the party's planks out of the findings of a series of ten regional grassroots hearings, from the testimony of the presidential candidates, and from a massive document outlining "issue alternatives" researched by the Democratic Policy Council. Neustadt, 53, associate dean of Harvard's School of Government, comes from outside the professional political establishment; he has been an adviser to three Presidents and is a leading commentator on American politics. His 1960 book Presidential Power is a standard reference work on the Executive Branch.

JAMES O'HARA. A little-known liberal Congressman from Michigan, O'Hara, 46, chairs the Rules Committee. His task: to steer toward delegate approval far-reaching changes intended not only to make future conventions fairer, but to divest them of both the boredom and the hoopla --long-winded speeches, planned demonstrations, conscripted marchers.

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