On politics: Tennessee Democrats have some party building to do

Like their brethren across the country, Tennessee Democrats are expecting a big election year for their side of the aisle.

Judging from the talk coming out of the state’s true big Blue Counties — Shelby and Davidson — it appears on the surface Tennessee Democrats are starting to get some of their swagger back at the grassroots level, at least.

If the state’s Progressive blogosphere and the aggressive stance of party activists are any indicator they suggest the tone and tenor of a party about to take back control of a state it held for nearly 100 years with very little opposition, expect for an upstart governor here and there and a historically impenetrable East Tennessee.

Much of this ballyhoo comes from activists hot for a presidential win from Sen. Barack Obama as well as the incredible unpopularity of President George W. Bush nationally.

Some of the confidence for Democrats here seems to have carried over from 2006, when former Congressman Harold Ford Jr. narrowly lost his U.S. Senate bid. That was a high water mark for the resurgence in the spirit of the party, and it seems in some fashion to have carried forward.

Yet, inside the party infrastructure of fund-raisers, consultants and kingmakers there is concern. Tennessee Democrats have been finding wins since the Republican Sweep of 1994 based largely on the individual strength of single candidates. What has suffered during the last almost 15 years has been the age-old goal of party building.

Legacy. What Legacy?

During the 2006 race, a Ford campaign insider with a good deal of national campaign experience sat for a couple of hours at the Nashville Cummins Station headquarters talking quietly about the horse race of the campaign.

There was a story going around town about supposed friction between Ford’s handlers and Gov. Phil Bredesen’s staff and political folks. Ford was in the political fight of his life while the popular — and conservative — Democratic governor was coasting to re-election. Ford’s effort needed every bit of help party loyalists could muster, and the rumor was Ford's people thought the Bredesen folks were not invested enough in the Ford effort.

The Ford advisor spent much of his time dispelling the chatter, but there was talk of Bredesen and the state of the party. The main question was simply, what kind of party will Bredesen leave behind. The best guess two years ago was, simply put, not much of one.

It was ironic hearing that analysis from a Ford staffer, because both Bredesen and Ford were — and are — very alike when it comes to their political strength. Both men rely almost solely on a network of well-connected business people, party operatives, longtime staffers and other political types that are their pawns and their pawns alone to move around on the board.

According to many well-placed Democratic campaign types, the popular wisdom is that Bredesen, in particular, will not leave much of anything in terms of an established apparatus for the Tennessee Democratic Party. He is not able to lend his fund-raising connections, his inner circles expertise or his political network to anyone because it only exists based upon his own personal strengths and characteristics — a conservative, proven corporate type that is socially moderate and vaguely urban.

“Phil Bredesen is a lot like Lamar Alexander when it comes to party building,” one long-time Tennessee politico said last week. “When you mention party building, their eyes glaze over.”

Put in simpler Nashville parlance, the Bredesens and Fords of the world are solo artists.

Wanted: Democratic Party Boss

What is this amorphous party building duty Tennessee Democratic campaign types are fretting about? One Democrat stalwart describe it this way:

“(Party Chairman) Gray Sasser is doing a good job with what he was left. But, they are having to raise money to keep the lights on and pay staff. The ability doesn’t exist at the party level to raise enough money to say ‘Here are four or five seats we think we can win and we are going after them.’”

Political party staffs exist to recruit candidates, raise money and turn out the vote. Staffers and operatives at the highest level in Tennessee’s Democratic Party see a weakness in their own house in those areas, and it is a weakness some say even pre-dates the debacle of 1994.

How does that happen? Largely because other than east of the Cumberland Plateau, Democrats did not have to worry much about losing a partisan race in the state literally since Reconstruction. After nearly 100 years of institutional laziness, 15 years is not enough time to readjust.

Party building, when done effectively, allows what Tennessee Republicans in the state did over the course of the 2002 and 2004 election cycles in the state Senate. The GOP held their own seats while continuing to pick off seats over the course of three cycles until they narrowly controlled the state Senate. This only happened after pouring money into state Senate races for years, dating back to the 1998 cycle where the GOP all but purchased the services of professional campaign managers for a host of ultimately unsuccessful candidates.

The ability to brandish political strength in fund raising and turnout cycle after cycle is not dependent upon the flash and appeal of a lone candidate and their star power in these instances, it is an institutional strength of the party as a whole. Party loyalists are conditioned to support it and operatives are conditioned to expect it and make it happen.

How much will Democrats’ inability to show party building strength matter in 2008? Look to the state House races as a barometer. Both parties are looking to pick up seats there, and the national wind is with the Democrats. If they cannot widen the margin in the General Assembly’s lower house this year, it is a sign they still have a lot of work to do.