Harvard Voters Back McSweeney

The Harvard students who voted in the Cambridge election last week gave their City Council votes to candidates with a Harvard connection--and turned in more than their share of blank ballots for School Committee.

At Quincy House, where the residents of Eliot, Kirkland, Leverett, Lowell and Winthrop houses vote, James J. McSweeney got 29 of the 92 first-choice votes cast--more than any other candidate.

McSweeney, who came in tenth in the city and did not win a seat on the council, had door-dropped campaign literature in the houses and was supported by the Harvard-Radcliffe Republican Club. His supporters stood outside the main gate to Quincy House holding campaign signs on the day of the election.

Francis H. Duehay '55, who came in third in the city, garnered 22 of the first-choice votes cast at Quincy. A progressive concerned with environmental issues, Duehay has said that he relies on the votes of Harvard students.

Kenneth E. Reeves '72, who received the most votes throughout the city, received 16 of the first-choice votes cast at Quincy House. Reeves campaigned at Harvard registration and in a speech at Winthrop House.

The votes from Harvard students for School Committee paralleled those of the rest of the city, with Henrietta Davis coming in first.

But while only one of the 92 ballots for City Council cast at Quincy House was declared invalid--meaning that it was improperly filled out or blank--17 of the School Committee ballots were invalid. In the city as a whole, there were about three times as many invalid school committee ballots as invalid City Council ballots.