BY BARRY WITT
Mercury News Staff Writer

Other candidates for the Senate seat

When California voters select nominees for the U.S. Senate on March 7, they'll see the name of Dianne Feinstein, the Democratic incumbent, on the ballot for the fourth time in a decade.

Whether they'll recognize any of the Republican names is an open question.

The race to determine Feinstein's opponent has been the quietest major statewide campaign in years, with the leading GOP candidates finding it difficult to raise the kind of money needed to buy the television and radio time crucial to getting their names known across the most populous state.

Nowhere is there a Michael Huffington or Darrell Issa willing to spend millions to become known, nor are there any elected officials with a statewide following.

Instead, there's Silicon Valley Rep. Tom Campbell, consistently leading the polls and fundraising when compared with his fellow Republicans. But he's still well behind Feinstein.

Campbell describes himself as a "socially moderate, fiscally conservative'' Republican -- favoring abortion rights, gay rights and gun control while getting favorable rankings from taxpayer groups for his votes on spending measures in Congress.

Given that Republicans have lost four straight Senate races in California and were trounced in the 1998 governor's race, the Stanford University law professor argues that only a middle-of-the-road candidate has a chance to unseat the incumbent by drawing crossover Democrats and independents in November. Campbell lost a Senate primary race in 1992 to conservative commentator Bruce Herschensohn, who went on to lose to Democrat Barbara Boxer.

Sees a 'centrist course'

Campbell believes a victory for him in the primary and in November would be a revolutionary act for the Republican Party, setting it on a winning, centrist course for years to come.

Like Herschensohn, Campbell's chief opponents this year come from the party's conservative wing. They are Ray Haynes, a state senator from Riverside County, and San Diego County Supervisor Bill Horn.

Both consider themselves to be strongly anti-abortion, strongly against gun control and big supporters of Proposition 22, the ballot initiative that would define marriage as being between a man and woman. (Campbell says he opposes gay marriage but also opposes the initiative, arguing it could outlaw domestic partnership registries, which he supports.)

Haynes, an attorney who has been in the state Legislature since 1992, has garnered the endorsements of most major conservative groups. Horn, an apartment house developer and avocado rancher, has been actively wooing veterans groups, featuring his four years as a Marine Corps officer and service in the Vietnam War in his campaign literature and stump speeches.

Both Haynes and Horn are counting on Republican voters to reject Campbell as too liberal and not ready for the revolution Campbell has in mind. At every opportunity, they try to depict Campbell as somewhat wacko for proposing that states and cities be allowed to provide drugs to addicts at government health centers in an attempt to remove the economic incentives from the illegal drug trade and drive down drug-related crimes.

But even if many party members avoid Campbell, Haynes and Horn still run the risk of splitting the conservative vote and handing victory to their more liberal opponent.

Haynes and Horn are so concerned about that possibility that at an early February debate before a state party convention, each asked the other to step aside. Neither was willing to do so.

Three others on ballot