Newswise — Richard Mourdock’s defeat of six-term Sen. Richard Lugar in Tuesday’s Republican primary closes an eventful chapter in Indiana history and opens up interesting possibilities for the fall election, says a historian at the University of Indianapolis.
“Few Hoosiers under 40 can remember a time when Richard Lugar didn’t represent them in Washington,” Associate Professor Edward Frantz says. “With his defeat, Indiana has lost all of its experience and seniority in the Senate.”
Frantz is interim director of UIndy’s Institute for Civic Leadership & Mayoral Archives, which is being developed around a four-decade collection of official documents and other materials dating to Lugar’s tenure as mayor of Indianapolis and architect of the Unigov consolidation.
“Residents of Indianapolis are particularly in Lugar’s debt,” Frantz says. “His leadership helped to transform a sleepy Midwestern community into a city with the resources and self-confidence to host a Super Bowl.” Frantz, whose 2011 book The Door of Hope probes the history of the Republican Party, says Lugar’s career has been bookended by rightward shifts in the GOP, from the Goldwater revolution of the 1960s to the recent rise of the Tea Party and Super PAC funding that helped drive him out of office.
“Through it all, Lugar’s political compass remained remarkably steady,” Frantz says. “He was conservative in the true sense of the word. He didn’t change as much as the people around him did.”
Ironically, Tuesday’s outcome could make Indiana Democrats more competitive in the fall election, Frantz notes. Democratic Senate candidate Joe Donnelly is likely to run as a centrist against the right-leaning Mourdock.
“I expect that the national Democratic Party will see this Senate seat as being in play,” Frantz says. “That could bring big money, as well as visits from President Obama, to the Hoosier State. And even though Obama will have a much tougher time carrying Indiana, the task would be tougher still if Richard Lugar were the Republican nominee for Senate.”
INTERVIEWS AVAILABLE: Dr. Edward Frantz is available for interview on this and related issues. To schedule, contact Scott Hall, UIndy media relations, at (317) 371-5240.
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