SEND IN FEDERAL MONITORS FOR ELECTIONS

What is it about the Missouri Bootheel and honest elections? Elections in Southeast Missouri are once again making news around the state, and it isn't pretty.

On Election Day in November 1996, Republican operatives alleged that some Democrats were operating an illegal vote-buying scheme in Mississippi and New Madrid counties. A hazy videotape made by Republicans was said to show voters being hauled to the polls and later given coupons redeemable for beer at a convenience store owned by Harry "Joker" Warren of Charleston. Warren and other Democrats strenuously denied the charges, but the U.S. attorney's office convened a federal grand jury to look into it as the matter dragged on for months. Warren, who is a brother-in-law to former Gov. and Mrs. Warren Hearnes, was called before the grand jury for testimony along with state Rep. Gene Copeland. Neither was ever charged. Mrs. Hearnes wasn't on the ballot two years ago but is the Democratic nominee for state representative this year.

Finally, months of investigation culminated in a guilty plea to one count of vote buying by Lester Gillespie of Oran. This raised eyebrows at the time, given the fact that Gillespie, a 42-year-old former convenience store employee, is hardly the sort to have masterminded such a scheme alone. It seemed to more than a few observers as though a small-fry had taken the fall for higher-ups.

Fast forward to the primary election of Aug. 4, 1998. One might think that so close a brush with a criminal inquiry by a federal grand jury would be enough to send a clear message that monkey business with elections wouldn't be tolerated.

Still, the very same week that a judge sentenced Gillespie, more irregularities occurred in the Mississippi County primary. Incumbent Presiding Commissioner Jim Blumemberg lost his race for renomination as the Democratic standard-bearer to challenger Steve Ledbetter by five votes. Blumenberg challenged the result in court, suing for a re-count on the basis that voters in the Wyatt precinct were given two ballots -- one for the Democratic primary and another for the U.S. Taxpayers Party. On Aug. 26, Circuit Judge David Dolan, a Sikeston Democrat, took the extraordinary step of ordering a new election to be held Sept. 22.

"Twice in two elections," Judge Dolan wrote in his order, "the election process in Mississippi County has come under close scrutiny. Voters must have confidence in their election process, or they will have no confidence in their elected officials." Indeed.

This past week, two GOP state lawmakers, joined by staff members for U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson and Missouri's two U.S. senators, called for action by the U.S. Justice Department to ensure honest elections in the Bootheel this November. Citing the pending boats-in-moats vote on that ballot and gaming companies' expressed willingness to spend $10 to 12 million to achieve passage of their initiative, the lawmakers warned of possible further corruption.

These aren't frivolous concerns. We have, after all, had one guilty plea. Some of the same gaming companies were involved with massive voter irregularities in Louisiana two years ago that tainted the result of a close election for the U.S. Senate.

U.S. Sen. John Ashcroft has personally asked Attorney General Janet Reno for action to guarantee fair elections in the Bootheel. He has been as frustrated as pretty much everyone else who has done business with her in the lack of any response.

It is time for federal marshals or FBI agents -- or both -- to be posted at polling places in Mississippi and New Madrid counties to guarantee voters the honest count we have been too often denied.