COUNTY CLERK CLAIMS NO IMPROPRIETIES

CAIRO, Ill. -- Alexander County Clerk Sue Harrington and at least one candidate for the Cairo Board of Education aren't concerned about a call for federal intervention in Tuesday's elections because they said they've done nothing wrong.

"It's a bunch of crap," Harrington said. "Everybody gets a fair chance in my office."

Harrington and six school board candidates are being accused of what amounts to voter fraud by three candidates who are running as a team. Those three candidates -- Delores Purdiman, Anthony Peairs and Chauncey Hughes -- have written a letter asking U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno to send federal observers and examiners to oversee the elections. They said they have made similar requests to state authorities.

In all, 12 candidates are competing to fill four positions on the school board.

Purdiman, Peairs and Hughes maintain that Harrington is allowing six ineligible candidates to participate in Tuesday's elections. Thomas S. Burris, Vernon Stubblefield, Julian Howard, Danny Brown, Phillip L. Matthews and Ronnie Garrett, all failed to turn in legal petitions to qualify for election, they said. They claim to have proof that many of the voters who signed the petitions of those candidates did not give their correct addresses, which would make the men ineligible for election.

"Basically, we identified six candidates who did not have enough signatures to get on the ballot," said Bruce Crosby, a spokesperson for Purdiman, Peairs and Hughes. "We demonstrated that none of them had 50 good signatures."

Harrington refutes that argument. The men are being allowed to participate because they have done everything the right way, she said. They turned in their petitions as required, she said, and a school board electoral review committee and Alexander County Circuit Court Judge Mark Clarke have heard complaints from the trio and ruled in favor of the defendants.

"They were trying to make me say that signatures on voter registration cards didn't match up with signatures on the petitions," she said. "I couldn't say that. Even the state board has told them everything that we're doing is according to law."

The trio, who have been endorsed by the community civil rights organization United Front, also claim that Harrington is denying them the opportunity to be present when the votes are counted. With so many improprieties observed before the election, they said, they have no faith in Harrington or any of the judges to be fair when counting the ballots.

"Other candidates or their representatives have observed ballot counting in the past, why not now," Crosby said. "We don't trust Sue Harrington, and if she would like us to trust her, she should allow us to observe the counting of the votes.

"It seems in this process we've found resistance from the county clerk, the clerk of the circuit court, the sheriff's department and from the judge. That's why we've brought the federal government into this."

Stubblefield, a former school board member and one of the candidates who was challenged, said he doubts federal observers will respond to the intervention request because no one has demonstrated a need. Everything is being done according to law, he said, and the accusers are simply "pushing to get overturned something that the circuit judge deemed out of his jurisdiction to hear."

He said his motivation and credibility haven't been affected by the allegations of voter fraud.

"This tends to refuel my campaign," he said. "I guess that I enjoy the passion of the contest. And my credibility is not something that I see as having been challenged. The 75 individuals who signed my petition signed in good faith as registered voters of Alexander County and the Cairo school district."

The trio of candidates and the six accused of being ineligible are all African Americans. Stubblefield said the allegations and negative publicity have weakened the black community and tainted the elections.

"We have people who have worked hard to get a black majority on the board since the district is about 90 percent black," he said. "This definitely weakens the black community because instead of moving towards that mythical unity we all want to speak about, we're forcing the black community to choose between nine candidates.