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New Hampshire is a less unionized state. But even there, the state AFL-CIO'S membership list of 37,000 is a fertile field for harvesting Mondale votes. Last month some 60 union volunteers kept eleven phone banks manned throughout the state, soliciting help for the Minnesotan. AFL-CIO Field Representative Charlie Stott estimates that 15,000 of the roughly 110,000 people expected to vote in New Hampshire will be members of the AFL-CIO. This kind of union activity can be duplicated in almost any state where Mondale needs the labor push. Glenn's aides said last week that they plan to ask the Federal Election Commission to investigate their charge that the Mondale campaign organization has failed to report fully the assistance it has received from labor in Iowa and New Hampshire.
On the issues, Mondale and his rivals are in surprising accord, though their emphasis and rhetoric tend to highlight their differences. All of the candidates favor some land of freeze on nuclear arms. Cranston, McGovern and Hollings urge that the U.S. try such a freeze unilaterally to see if the Soviets go along. Askew would freeze the number of warheads and missiles and the total destructive power but permit modernization of weapons under these limits. All would hold real military spending increases to 3% or 6% a year, except McGovern, who would slash such spending by 25%, and Jackson, who would cut it by an unspecified amount. All would kill the multiwarhead MX, and all except Jackson, Cranston and McGovern push for a single-warhead, mobile missile. (The Reagan Administration argues that the MX is needed to guarantee U.S. security until a new single-warhead missile is operational.) Only Cranston and Glenn would develop the B-1 bomber. Hollings alone advocates a draft.
On the deficit, Hollings' call for a flat one-year freeze on virtually all federal spending and a 3% limit on annual increases thereafter is the most sweeping proposal. The other candidates urge various combinations of defense-budget cuts; a delay in the indexing of income tax rates to inflation; postponement or cancellation of Reagan's third-year, 10% tax cut; surtaxes on high-income earners; and steps to close tax loopholes and to check the rise in medical costs.
In foreign affairs, all except Glenn stress the need for U.S.-Soviet summit meetings to reduce tensions. All would cut off U.S. aid to the rebels fighting the Marxist-led government in Nicaragua, and all would halt military aid to the Salvadoran regime unless death-squad activity stops. McGovern would withdraw U.S. military aid and troops from Central America, including Honduras. None of the Democrats would loosen U.S. ties to Israel, although McGovern and Jackson urge a more even hand in the Middle East. Yet even Jackson praises Israel as "the most brilliant flower in God's garden."