Dole's due as a candidate

March 19, 1999

While Bill Bradley is a Democrat from New Jersey and John McCain is a Republican from Arizona, Elizabeth Dole most often seems to be identified as a woman from Washington.

Gender has been the central focus so far of Dole's nascent presidential candidacy. Why is she wearing blue again? Will she ever lose the pearls? Can she demonstrate strength on crime, the military, and foreign policy? Should she kiss the visiting foreign minister on the cheek or only shake his hand? What would become of her famous spouse, First Gentleman Bob? How is she feeling?

Some of this is natural and inevitable. Dole is the first woman taken so seriously as a potential presidential nominee of a major party.

But candidate Dole deserves to be judged on the same qualities as other candidates: experience, issue positions, leadership ability, a sense of direction that the nation will embrace.

We hope that press coverage of Dole will soon shift to these meatier matters and that voters will not be distracted excessively by gender talk.

History offers hope that voters will be sensible, at least compared with politicians and the press.

Catholicism was once thought to be a bar to the White House, but John Kennedy confronted the issue in West Virginia and Houston; by November 1960, it was not a major factor for voters. Divorce was said to be an impediment, but voters proved otherwise when they elected Ronald Reagan.

When Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer were running for the two California Senate seats in 1992, many commentators predicted that one woman might be elected but never two. The voters proved that to be bunk. And Maine followed along, electing Olympia Snowe in 1994 and Susan Collins in 1996. In Arizona, the five top state offices are all held by women. Much was made of Jane Swift's pregnancy as she ran for lieutenant governor here last year, but she won easily in September and November. Voters didn't care.

Dole's gender is, of course, a factor, and it carries historic interest. But judging her primarily through a male-female prism does a disservice to her and the campaign. Most voters, we hope, are beyond that.