TOURNOUT RECORD IS SHATTERED

JACKSON -- Voters in Cape Girardeau County rolled out in record numbers Tuesday, smashing a turnout record set eight years ago.

The 28,886 Cape County voters were 3,584 more than the record number that turned out in 1984, when Ronald Reagan won a second term in the White House and John Ashcroft captured his first term as governor.

Not only was Tuesday's election a record turnout in actual numbers, it also was percentagewise, with 82 percent of the county's 35,165 registered voters casting ballots.

There were some early signals of the huge turnout with a last-minute rush of new registered voters - including nearly 2,000 the final two days of registration - and 1,553 absentee ballots, which, if not a record, was close to one.

Nationwide, an estimated 104 million Americans went to the polls Tuesday, the most ever.

Statewide, Missouri voters also shattered previous records for participation in the electoral process. Seventy-eight percent of the registered voters turned out Tuesday, compared with the record set in 1976 of 76.4 percent. Overall, 2.4 million Missourians voted, topping a record of 2.1 million set in 1984.

Deputy County Clerk Betty Hahs said Wednesday that things generally went smoothly on election day, even with the large turnout and the may candidates and ballot measures for voter to consider. Many polling places had long lines during most of the day while others reported steady traffic.

The large number of ballots slowed down the processing of returns at the county administration building. Votes were finally totaled around 11 p.m., about 90 minutes to two hours later than normal.

Hahs, who is elections supervisor and is retiring from the clerk's office at the end of the year after 27 years of service, attributed the large turnout to strong voter interest in candidates and issues.

"People were just more concerned with this election than anytime I've seen," said Hahs. "Unemployment is up, the economy is down; people wanted change and felt like the only way they were going to do it was to get out and vote."

Republicans in Cape County cast 4,136 straight-party ballots while Democrats cast 2,510. There were also seven straight ticket votes for the Libertarian Party.

One unusual feature of the 1992 election in Cape County was the large number of votes gathered by Libertarian candidates. That was probably due more to opposition toward incumbents or lack of interest or knowledge of the two major party candidates.

Libertarians had candidates for all statewide offices and the U.S. Senate, except for governor; however, the party's presidential candidate, Andre Marrou, received only 87 votes.

The other Libertarian candidate with the closest vote total was Franklin M. Nugent, the candidate for lieutenant governor, who had 625.

Since independent candidate Ross Perot came out of Cape County with 5,199 votes - 18.34 percent of the total - one explanation could be that some Perot supporters looked to Libertarian alternatives in moving down the ballot rather than turning to major party candidates.

Janet Lewis, the Libertarian candidate for state treasurer, got the most votes of any candidate from that party in Cape County with 1,649, which was double the next highest collected by Mitchell J. Moore, who received 814 votes. Moore was in the race for attorney general.

Jeanne F. Bojarski received 675 votes for the U.S. Senate, and Eric Harris got 629 votes for secretary of state.

On Wednesday the clerk's office was attempting to do the final canvass for the election, which involves rechecking tally sheets.

As part of that process, the write-in votes collected by Harold Reed for U.S. Congress in the 8th District will be verified. Reed, who lives in Glen Allen, filed with the secretary of state as an official write-in candidate, which means clerks are required to count his votes.

Hahs said Reed got about 100 votes in Cape County.