A National Cleansing

The outcome of Tuesday's elections, was, to say the least, a surprise. In the middle of only the third impeachment proceeding in history, the Democrats actually gained seats in the House. Democrats have not picked up seats in a midterm election while having a President in office since the presidency of James Monroe.

While there were several disappointments on Tuesday, including the election of Jesse "the Body" Ventura as governor of Minnesota and the success of an anti-affirmative action referendum in Washington state, on the whole, these midterm elections have had a cleansing effect on American politics.

We have spent the last 10 months mired in presidential scandal and the ugly partisanship of impeachment proceedings. The atmosphere in this country has been one of both negativity, complacency and disgust with the political process. But Americans came out yesterday in unprecedented numbers in several states and they reaffirmed their desire to bring politics back to moderate and decent grounds.

No election better exemplified the hope for a cleaner and more dignified brand of leadership than the Senate race in Wisconsin, where Russell D. Feingold held his seat against challenger Mark Neumann. Feingold waged a war of principle in his campaign by refusing to exceed a spending cap of $3.8 million and to honor the soft-money ban of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform bill, which continues to fail in the Congress. His challenger, on the other hand, accepted soft money contributions steered his way by Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ken), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

New York voters as well expressed their distaste for the base brand of politics practiced by three-term incumbent Senator Alfonse M. D'Amato, by purging themselves of his leadership. In the past, D'Amato has shown himself to be the worst sort of political opportunist, flip-flopping on the issues and exploiting ethnic and racial stereotypes for his political gain. The victor in the Senate race, Representative Charles E. Schumer '71 has shown himself to be a devoted public servant and will hopefully serve New Yorkers better than his predecessor did.

The make-up of the 106th Congress is not that different from the current one, in terms of numbers. Republicans still hold narrow majorities in both houses. But the spirit of American politics seems to have taken for the better. The victories of the Bush brothers in Texas and Florida indicate that the moderate wing of the Republican Party, and not the reactionary wing, has a future. The Democratic resurgence in the South, marked by the capture of two Senate seats and two governorships (in Georgia and South Carolina), is a welcome shake-up to the country's regional political divide.

We look forward to a better year in Washington, one in which civility prevails over rancor and scandal finally takes a backseat to the important issues that the citizens who voted in Tuesday's elections want to face.