Picking a Winner The Democrats land a speaker and decide they'll choose among judicial candidates. by JACKSON BAKER The Shelby County Democrats consider their first pick of the election season a proven winner. It's the others they're worried about. David Cocke, the party chairman who has been trying to break into Mississippi Governor Ronnie Musgrove's schedule long enough to land his man as keynote speaker for the Shelby Democrats' forthcoming Kennedy Day dinner, finally got through. Musgrove, who broke the Republican Party's hold on the Magnolia State governorship last year, has agreed to do the honors. The only problem (if that's what it is): Musgrove was available only for the night of Thursday, July 6th. That's the night the party's executive committee decides on endorsees for the August 3rd countywide election. The local Democrats' election subcommittee will have met earlier, on Saturday, June 24th, for what Cocke called a "beauty contest" to review candidates for three judicial races and one school board race and to make recommendations to the full committee. The party's decision to judge the judges was taken, with surprisingly little disagreement, at last Thursday's regular monthly committee meeting. "Obviously we'll have to find another night for the whole committee to review the choices," Cocke said this week of the scheduling conflict, sounding more relieved than otherwise. At least one of the party's decisions -- that for Criminal Court, Division 9, may generate some controversy among Democrats. Three of the four candidates -- Paula Skahan, Linda Harris, and J.C. McLin --have some degree of party support. (The fourth, assistant District Attorney Phyllis Gardner, has already been endorsed by the Shelby County Republicans.) The Democrats' verdicts in other judicial races may be somewhat easier to render. Rita Stotts, recently appointed to succeed retired Judge James Swearengen in Circuit Court, Division 4, has considerable party support. She is opposed by attorney William Cohn, who ran unsuccessfully in a Chancellor's race in 1998. And in the race for the newly created General Sessions Division 15 (Criminal) seat, public defender Loyce Lambert, who was narrowly defeated two years ago by incumbent Horace Pierotti in the race for General Sessions, Division 12 (Criminal), is a sometime Democratic executive committee member herself. Juvenile Court referee Herb Lane, who lost a Criminal Court, Division 4, race to current Judge Carolyn Blackett in 1998, has the Republican endorsement. Two other candidates are lawyers Deborah Henderson and Rhonda Harris. The Democrats will also ponder a choice among the candidates for District 3 (Whitehaven) of the Memphis School Board. They are: Edward Vaughan, who was named by the board to succeed Tajuan Stout-Mitchell after Mitchell was elected to the city council; Joe Towns Sr. (running as J. Edward Towns Sr. to distinguish him from the state-representative son); Jerry Mack; Patricia McWright Jackson (a loser in this spring's Democratic primary for General Sessions Court clerk); and Patricia Jordan Robinson. Cocke said the Democrats might also invite in for a look-see Wyatt Bunker and Jay Wells, the two candidates for the only contested Shelby County School Board in District 6 (Cordova, Bartlett). "Maybe we'll defer to the Germantown Democratic Club on that one, however," said Cocke, who stressed that the party's executive committee reserved the right to withhold endorsements in any or all of the races for which they will interview candidates. Democrats in the past have been less prone to confer their party label than Republicans have and, Cocke acknowledged, are playing a game of catch-up with their GOP rivals, who not only endorsed candidates in the 1998 judicial elections but had wanted to hold judicial primaries until the state legislature passed a last-minute law to kill off the prospect. * It remains to be seen on August 3rd, incidentally, how much resentment still exists in Republican circles against State Rep. Joyce Hassell (District 96, Cordova) for her 1998 vote that tipped the balance against countywide judicial primaries. She may also have to contend with a backlash of sorts to her last-minute decision to seek re-election after losing in a bid for the Republican nomination for assessor this spring. Her GOP primary opponent, Paul Stanley, executive director of Associated Builders & Contractors, had already filed for the position and had thought he even had Hassell's tacit support before her re-entry. * The Division 15 General Sessions race may develop into something like a Red Sox-Cubs World Series. Meaning: one of these former tough-luck losers will probably win. Lane is as well-liked and regarded among Republicans as Lambert is among Democrats, and each carries a measure of frustration from past contests. Lane feels that he was sailing along in 1998 until Blackett clearly got the best of him in a candidate forum at the Jewish Community Center. Blackett, an African American, responded angrily to what Lane insists was an innocent remark to the effect that one couldn't just "walk in off the street" to be a judge. Lane concedes that he went into a tailspin after the encounter and resolves to watch his tongue closely this time. (For the record, Lane is concerned about the presence in this year's race of Harris, who he thinks might draw off some his votes; Lambert has a like worry about Henderson.)

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