Republican gubernatorial candidate Tim James took his 2010 campaign into one of Mobile’s most established neighborhoods in early October 2009, with a fundraising reception at the Delwood home of Mandy and Max Rogers.
The event, scheduled for 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 6, listed former U.S. Rep. H.L. “Sonny” Callahan and his wife, Karen, among its special guests — a significant endorsement of presence, if not of formal words, from the man who represented Alabama’s 1st Congressional District for nearly two decades and who remained one of the most durable figures in Mobile Republican politics.
Three tiers, one long list
The invitation set out a familiar structure of giving. Members of the finance committee were listed at $1,000, the host committee at $500 and the sponsor committee at $250. The combined rosters ran to well over 100 names and touched most of the neighborhoods where Mobile’s Republican money has traditionally lived.
Among the finance committee names were state Sen. Rusty Glover; David Head Sr. and David Head Jr. and their families; Edward and Ann Leatherbury; Greg and Susie Leatherbury; Edward and Knox McMurphy; and Abby and Scott Stimpson. The host and sponsor lists carried names such as Larry Brock, Bill Harvey, John Ladd, Jimbo Mostellar, Joe Colingo, Chris Dyas, Hunter George and Jimbo Yance, along with dozens of others drawn from the city’s legal, medical and business communities.
Who Tim James was
James entered the race with one of the most recognizable surnames in Alabama politics. His father, Fob James, served as governor twice — first as a Democrat, elected in 1978, and again as a Republican, elected in 1994 — and the family name carried both affection and baggage depending on the audience.
The younger James campaigned as a businessman rather than a career politician. He was known along the Gulf Coast in particular for his role in developing the Foley Beach Express, the toll road that carries traffic from Baldwin County’s interior toward the beaches, and he made private-sector experience and a promise of lean government the core of his message.
A crowded field on the coast
The Mobile reception was one skirmish in a broader competition for the same finite pool of coastal Republican donors. Bradley Byrne, the former chancellor of the state’s two-year college system and a resident of the Eastern Shore, was courting many of the same families; State Treasurer Kay Ivey and former Riley cabinet member Bill Johnson were also in the field, and other candidates would follow.
What made Mobile County unusually valuable to all of them was not only its money but its reliability. In Republican primaries the county turns out in numbers that can decide a close statewide race, and its donor networks — overlapping through Mardi Gras societies, church rolls, law firms and the chamber of commerce — can be activated quickly by the right host.
The Rogers reception, arriving in the first week of October, was an early move in that contest. The 2010 primary was still eight months away, but the practical business of a statewide campaign — assembling committees, calling in obligations, and persuading a neighborhood that a candidate is worth its Tuesday evening — was already well underway.
For Callahan, whose long congressional career gave him standing with generations of Mobile Republicans, lending his name to the guest list was a signal in itself. In a primary where every candidate claimed the conservative label, endorsements of that sort were among the few currencies that could still distinguish one from another.