Letting The Cup Pass

By Richard Stengel

Mario Cuomo is blessed -- or cursed -- with the ability to see both sides of any argument. As a lawyer, he was trained to plead pro and con and was always deft at making his case. As a man, he is inclined to argue inwardly, to question his motivations, his ambitions.

Openly for the past four months, inwardly for a good deal longer, Cuomo has been weighing the prospect of running for President. Tentative, sometimes coy, playing Hamlet on the Hudson, he has offered only hints as to what was going on inside his mind. But of late the New York Governor seemed to be off and running, what with testimony in Washington, a speech in California, a trip to New Orleans, plans to go to Iowa and New Hampshire. Many Democrats saw him as a figure who could inspire Democratic voters with an eloquent message of national compassion combined with fiscal common sense, although he has been criticized recently for favoring polished rhetoric over nitty-gritty discussion of the issues.

But last Thursday evening Mario Cuomo resolved his inner debate and quietly announced a stunning decision. As he was settling in at the cramped studio of a New York City radio station for a state-wide call-in show, the moderator told Cuomo he wanted to ask him whether he was going to run. "Go ahead," said Cuomo. "I may surprise you. Ask at the end of the program." With four minutes left, the moderator did so. Cuomo put on a pair of glasses, took a typewritten statement out of his pocket and began to read. "In my opinion," he said, "the Democratic Party offers a number of presidential candidates who can prove themselves capable of leading this nation toward a more sane, a more progressive and a more humane future. I will not add my name to that number . . . The decision is best for my state, best for my family, and I think, also, best for my party."

The announcement surprised even his staff. At a news conference the following day, Cuomo seemed to boast of his insular decision-making process: "I did it without telling anybody. The children didn't know." He was so concerned about secrecy that he had told his trusted secretary, who typed the announcement, that a different, noncommittal version was being typed up by someone else.

So why did Cuomo, in a biblical paraphrase he has often used in interviews, "let the cup pass"? Was it, perhaps, timing? "When you are second in the polls and you haven't even gotten in the game yet, there isn't any reason to be discouraged," said a wry and relaxed Cuomo the next day. He emphasized the difficulties of campaigning for the presidency while holding another office. "You can't win without going to Iowa and New Hampshire. One of the candidates has been in Iowa for 50 days. I can't say, 'Hi, I'm Mario Cuomo. I'm only here for a day because I have these guys in New York beating up on me.' "

Cuomo has been irked by newspaper stories questioning whether the law firm of his son Andrew, 29, his closest political confidant, has inappropriately benefited from family connections. Friends who talked to the Governor after the announcement say that he knew scrutiny of Andrew and other members of his family would become even more unrelenting in a presidential campaign.

Former Colorado Senator Gary Hart is now very much alone as the Democratic front runner, and that is not a position he particularly relishes. He knows firsthand the vulnerabilities that come from such exposure: in 1984 he conducted a guerrilla campaign that nearly toppled Walter Mondale, who had been considered virtually invincible.

Without Cuomo, the race to become an alternative to Hart develops into even more of a free-for-all. Both former Arizona Governor Bruce Babbitt and Missouri Congressman Richard Gephardt feel that the absence of a top-tier battle between Cuomo and Hart will open the way for dark-horse candidates to pick up support and financial backing. Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis will no longer be thought of as the poor man's Mario Cuomo. If he enters the race, he will be the only candidate of the urban Northeast, and can carry the flag of pragmatic liberalism. Dukakis says he will make an announcement sometime in March.

Benefiting most may be Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware. Like Cuomo, Biden is considered a powerful speaker, one who can inspire the emotions of party faithful who are left unmoved by Hart's more cerebral approach. Moreover, he and Cuomo were in competition for roughly the same constituencies: organized labor, urban Roman Catholics and party activists. Cuomo's decision may inspire others to enter the race: Senator Dale Bumpers of Arkansas was quietly sounding out possible support last week, and some Democrats were renewing efforts to persuade Senator Bill Bradley of New Jersey to consider a race. At a banquet in Atlanta, Georgia Senator Sam Nunn declared he was not entering the presidential sweepstakes at this time, but then added, "I have not completely closed the door." One factor that could encourage others to enter the race is that Cuomo's putative campaign was soaking up a lot of funding that now will become available. The morning after Cuomo's announcement, Hart's fund raisers stepped up their drive.

Cuomo has always been ambivalent about the desire to be President. He is far more introspective and inner-directed than most politicians. Although he is a powerful campaigner, he did not look forward to the prospect of slogging through the snows of New Hampshire when he could be in Albany in front of a fire writing in his diary.

Some have speculated that Cuomo might see himself as the man the party would turn to in the event of a deadlocked contest. Asked whether he would accept a draft, Cuomo smiled and said, "I will take a draft to the Yankees, to the Mets. A draft for President is not conceivable." Cuomo has said that ever since he got hit in the head by a baseball while playing in the minor leagues, "I've gotten very good about keeping my eye on the ball." Last week the old centerfielder stepped back and let the tempting pitch go by.

With reporting by Bonnie Angelo/New York and Laurence I. Barrett/Washington