Dougherty Sinks Duck

Organized labor picked the wrong horse in the Democratic Primary in the Sixth Congressional District, where former Frederick Mayor Jennifer Dougherty was the voters' choice yesterday to try to unseat veteran Republican U.S. Rep. Roscoe Bartlett this fall.

Dougherty says she hopes to bring in a broad swath of Democrats, Republicans and unaffiliated voters to help her now that she's the Demoratic nominee.

Andrew Duck, an Army vet, and defense consultant whom Dougherty defeated with about 44 percent of the Democratic primary vote, had been backed by many in the AFL-CIO and won the endorsement of the National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers' union.

Dougherty, who says she has many fans in organized labor, says her approach in the general election will be the same as in the primary. "I am a grass roots campaigner and I believe in doing it one vote at a time. Every vote adds up. The phone calls we made were personal. "

She said that Duck had offered this morning to help her in the general election.

Meanwhile, Herb Smith, a political science professor at McDaniel College, said the district is a tough one for any Democrat. Redistricting in 2002 made it a Republican-leaning district, one of only two in Maryland.

"It is every registered Republican from Deep Creek Lake to the Susquehanna River," he said. The district spans parts of eight Maryland counties, beginning in Baltimore County in the east and stretching to the state's western border. It inclues a small part of Montgomery.