Cleveland, whose population is only 35% Negro, in 1965 came within a hairsbreadth of becoming the first major U.S. city to elect a Negro mayor. It may still be the first. Currently, the leading contender in the Oct. 3 Democratic primary is Carl Stokes, a Negro state legislator who, running as an independent two years ago, fell short of winning the election from Incumbent Ralph Locher by only 2,143 votes.
Stokes, 40, a handsome, articulate lawyer with an outstanding record in the Ohio House of Representatives, has based a low-key campaign on the lackluster administration of Mayor Locher, 52, and the apathy...