Hecht upset will live forever in state lore

Wednesday, May 17, 2006 | 7:31 a.m.

On the night in November 1982 that he pulled off what some analysts consider the biggest upset in Nevada political history, U.S. Senator-elect Chic Hecht turned to his longtime friend and campaign strategist Art Marshall.

"I didn't win," Marshall recalls Hecht saying, "Howard Cannon lost."

Marshall, now a member of the Nevada Gaming Commission, remembered his friend Tuesday, the day after Hecht died from complications of prostate cancer at age 77: "Chic Hecht understood. He was pretty astute - a smart guy, but never a grandstander."

While such a victory might have catapulted the longtime downtown clothier and former state senator to a long career on Capitol Hill, he was handily defeated six years later when Democrats fielded a strong candidate and made political hay from one national publication labeling Republican Hecht among the least effective members of Congress.

Still, his remarkable defeat of Cannon, then the Senate's seventh ranking member, will long live in Nevada election lore.

"Chic's victory was the most significant upset I ever witnessed," longtime local political analyst Sig Rogich said Tuesday. "But the timing was perfect for Chic to win. The stars lined up for him in that election."

Cannon carried the double burden of championing an unpopular cause - the return of the Panama Canal to Panama - and voter distrust: His name had come up in connection with a Teamsters scandal. Despite those and other factors, Hecht's victory was stunning.

"It turns out that Hecht's greatest accomplishment is the fact that he got elected," Nevada historian and political analyst Michael Green said. "And to do so, he ran a brilliant campaign."

Hecht surrounded himself with an all-star lineup of political movers and shakers, either working on his campaign or advising him.

In addition to Marshall, they included: former Ronald Reagan adviser Jude Wanniski, who coined the term "supply-side economics"; former presidential aide Lyn Nofziger; longtime Las Vegas Mayor Oran Gragson; noted California political ad man Ken Rietz; and former Nevada Lt. Gov. Ed Fike. Ex-Gaming Control Board member Glen Mauldin became Hecht's state campaign chief.

Hecht also garnered strong support from Republican U.S. Sen. Paul Laxalt of Nevada. And President Reagan made two trips to the state, which analysts at the time credited as a key to victory.

Hecht had intentionally entered what would be a five-man GOP primary just before the filing deadline, keeping a low profile until the final three weeks, when he spent $400,000 on a late media blitz to win the Republican nomination.

He eschewed campaign buttons, signs and billboards, raising money through a relentless telephone campaign. He used the proceeds to fund effective radio, TV and newspaper ads, and direct mailers, spending $505,000 more in the general election.

He also avoided speech-making - he had a lisp - or interviews with reporters. He had the smallest campaign headquarters in Las Vegas for a major office seeker and didn't even open an office in Reno or Carson City. Instead, he regularly toured small Nevada counties where he believed he could get an edge over Cannon.

When the votes were tallied, Hecht had out-polled Cannon by 5,657 votes.

It would be his biggest political achievement.

Once on Capitol Hill, Hecht offered no significant legislation. And he was timid on the nuclear waste issue. "Until all the cards are on the table in regard to the proposed Yucca Mountain site, I will not join those voices of opposition and dissent," he said in 1984.

That statement came at a time when most local and state political figures, including U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and then-Gov. Richard Bryan, were trying to shut down the site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas before the first tunnel could be dug.

Rogich said that he doesn't believe the nuclear waste issue did Hecht in, but acknowledges it may have cost Hecht some votes in 1988. The reason Hecht lost the re-election bid, Rogich said, was more about who challenged him.

"Chic Hecht simply ran into a buzz saw," Rogich said. "The Democratic Party had united behind Dick Bryan."

Bryan beat Hecht by just over 14,200 votes, and served two terms before leaving the Senate.

Marshall, a Democrat, believes Hecht leaves a legacy in state politics: "He showed that in Nevada you can get elected if you are the right guy at the right time, regardless of your party."