ORTH BERGEN, N.J. - It won't be as dramatic as the Clinton-Lazio race across the Hudson River, but the main election in New Jersey will answer its own compelling question: Can $65 million buy a seat in the US Senate?
That's how much money Jon Corzine, the Democratic candidate, has spent on his campaign, setting a US record not likely to be broken for some time.
Another unusual thing about this vast sum: All of it has come out of his own pocket.
Corzine was chairman of the Goldman Sachs investment house for many years. His net worth going into this race, his first stab at public office, was about $400 million.
His opponent, Bob Franks, is a far more conventional political figure - a four-term congressman and, before that, the state Republican chairman - who has raised about $5 million.
Yet, with just days to go, some are tagging this contest as too close to call.
The polls show Corzine leading by margins ranging from 2 to 9 percentage points. But somewhere between 14 and 19 percent of likely voters are still undecided, an astonishingly high number at such a late date.
There are sharp differences between these two candidates. Corzine is perched a fair distance out on the left wing of Democratic politics. He calls himself a ''progressive,'' and advocates universal health care, universal preschool, universal college education, and the registration of all handguns.
Franks calls himself a ''moderate Republican.'' He supports gun control and a higher minimum wage, but puts more emphasis on cutting taxes and decries Corzine's agenda as too expensive.
More than that, Franks is trying to turn his chief liability into an asset, accusing Corzine of ''distorting democracy'' and ''tilting the playing field'' by flooding electoral politics with so much money.
Still, despite all the money, the issues, and the down-to-the-wire horse race, there is a dispiriting feel to this campaign.
On Thursday, Corzine dashed from one union stronghold to the next, shaking hands and amiably but unexcitedly chatting with a handful of workers. At one point, inside a truck-repair factory in North Bergen, he asked a few mechanics, ''Are we getting our information out to you guys?'' They shrugged.
That same day, Franks appeared at what was billed as a ''rally'' in a Cuban restaurant in nearby Union City. Fewer than 20 Cuban-Americans - all shouting ''Viva Bush!''- showed up. Franks shook hands, talked with some TV reporters, said, ''This is a tremendous welcome! Thank you!'' and left for his next small event.
''New Jersey is a hard place to campaign,'' said Janice Ballou of Rutgers University's Eagleton Institute of Politics.
For one thing, the state has no VHF television station. To reach voters in northern New Jersey, candidates must make news and advertise on New York City stations. To reach voters in southern New Jersey, they must do the same on Philadelphia stations.
Tens of millions of dollars can go a long way toward hurdling the obstacles. By now, Corzine is a fairly well-recognized figure as he darts around the state. Franks, who has only begun to buy TV ads, is not.
Another difficulty of campaigning here is that, although this is physically a small state - the nation's fourth smallest, slightly smaller than Massachusetts - it is hard to reach the voters in person. There are no major urban centers; the most populous city, Newark, has only 275,000 people.
Finally, over half the state's voters are not registered with either party. They are therefore unreachable by the phone-banks and the door-to-door mobilization drives that candidates routinely rely on in most states.
This explains why the polls show so many undecided voters. It also explains why, despite the appearance of a tight race, most observers think Corzine has the better chance of winning.
