New York: How Long Are the Coattails?

The candidate forlornly scanned the quiet streets of Watertown, spotted a few homebound workers strolling out of the New York Air Brake Co., and practically broke into a gallop as he headed their way. His smile crinkled, his blue eyes twinkled, and his right hand shot out. One worker nearly got by, and the candidate went after him like a middle linebacker. "Pretty near missed you," he cried. Another worker poked his head out the door and asked, "Is Kennedy here?" Somehow, Kenneth Barnard Keating, 64, Republican Senator from New York, managed not to wince.

Keating has had plenty of practice at restraining winces during the past few weeks. A veteran of twelve years in the House and six in the Senate, he is a respected public servant with a record anybody but a reactionary can admire. Under ordinary circumstances he would be considered a near certainty for reelection. But this year's circumstances are far from ordinary.

For one thing, Keating's opponent is a Kennedy -Robert Francis, 38, recently resigned as U.S. Attorney General. Bobby plays heavily on the family name, constantly evokes the memory of his older brother, has even taken John F.

Kennedy Jr. ("John-John"), 3, campaigning. Such is the Kennedy charisma that Bobby has been mobbed wherever he has gone, while Keating has had to beat the bushes for audiences.

Adding to Keating's difficulty is the fact that New York Democrats enjoy a huge registration edge -normally up wards of half a million -over Republicans. And likely to siphon 150,000 or more votes away from Keating is Henry Paolucci, 43, a history and political science teacher at New Rochelle's Iona College, who will appear on the ballot as the candidate of the Conservative Party, which is angry at Keating for his refusal to endorse Barry Goldwater.

Confirmed Splitters. Goldwater, in fact, is Keating's heaviest burden. With a record 8,500,000 voters on the rolls this year, Johnson is expected to win the state by somewhere between 750,000 and 2,000,000. It is taken for granted that Bobby will run far, far behind Johnson on the Democratic ticket, but for Keating to have a chance it will require ticket splitting of heroic and historic proportions. In this, Ken Keating finds himself in the same dilemma as Republican candidates in a score of other states. For as Election Year 1964 nears its end, the big political question is less whether Barry will win or lose than how many Republicans he will drag to defeat.

Fortunately for Keating, New Yorkers are confirmed ticket splitters, as Republican Senator Jacob Javits, the state's best vote getter and a staunch Keating ally, proved in 1962 when he was re-elected by 983,000 votes while Democrat Arthur Levitt, running for comptroller, was re-elected by 791,000-a split of 1,774,000. New York, in fact, makes it impossible to vote a straight ticket by pulling a single lever in a voting booth or marking a single X on a paper ballot to choose all candidates, instead requires that voters indicate each choice separately. So do 22 other states.* That makes coattail riding difficult, could mean the difference, for example, to Republican Senatorial Candidates Robert A. Taft in Ohio and George Murphy in California.