Harvard Students Start Work On Mass. Gubernatorial Races

With more than nine months left until the November election, Harvard students have already begun to line up behind Democratic and Republican candidates for governor of Massachusetts.

Six gubernatorial candidates have supporters on campus, but only one student group has begun to do active campaign work.

The most active supporting group is endorsing Democrat Michael S. Dukakis, former governor of Massachusetts, with more than 30 students involved with the Cambridge arm of the Dukakis campaign, Timothy G. Massad, a Law School student, said last week.

Massad and Peter T. Gelfman '85 are organizing "Students for Dukakis" on campus, working in conjunction with Olivia A. Golden, a Kennedy School student who is acting as Cambridge coordinator for the Dukakis campaign.

Lt. Gov. Thomas P. O'Neil III, a Democratic challenger to Dukakis, has also found support among Harvard students, Barbara Burten, an O'Neill campaign coordinator, said yesterday, adding that she expects to establish an active committee on campus sometime this month.

Several Harvard students have contacted the campaign headquarters of Gov. Edward J. King, who is expected to run for re-election, John J. McLaughlin Jr., director of colleges for the campaign, said yesterday.

Of the Republican candidates for Governor, John Lakian, Guy Carbone and John Sears have already generated support in the Harvard community.

James E. Higgins '83, executive director of the Massachusetts College Republicans, will go to the March 6 Republican convention as a Cambridge Ward 6 delegate for Lakian. Higgins, who is the statewide college coordinator for the Lakian campaign, said yesterday that he hopes to recruit Harvard students as volunteers for the main campaign organization. "It's difficult to find many interested students so early in the campaign," he added.

Harvard Republican Club president John A. Hawkins '82 has worked closely with the Sears campaign since early fall, Hawkins said yesterday. Carbone, a former Harvard professor of engineering, said yesterday that several Harvard students have volunteered to work on his campaign.

The "Students for Dukakis," who began organizing early this fall, have focused on calling registered Democrats to inform them about the February 6 caucuses, Gelfman said last week, noting that the state Democratic party will use open caucuses to elect delegates to the May 22 endorsing convention for the first time this year. "We're not looking beyond the caucuses yet," he added.

Still another group of students are organizing for November's elections--supporting a candidate for Lt. Governor. Three Harvard undergraduates are working with the campaign headquarters of Democrat Evelyn Murphy, a 1979 Institute of Politics Fellow.

The Harvard-Radcliffe Democratic Club expects to endorse a candidate for governor in early February before the caucuses, Jess A. Velona '83, president of the club, said this weekend