Court seems cold to halting 2008 elections

A federal judge may have provided a glimpse last week of how the court is leaning in a lawsuit that could change the way state legislative districts are drawn.

A group of Republicans asked the federal court to halt the 2008 elections as part of the lawsuit it brought against state elections officials in November.

The lawsuit says the current district lines are unconstitutional because they were based on incorrect census data. As a result, several counties have been wrongly combined to form voting districts, the lawsuit says.

The court has not ruled on the merits of the suit, but a three-judge panel ruled in January that it would not halt the 2008 elections.

Last week, Chief U.S. District Judge Robert Conrad Jr. issued an opinion related to the January ruling, saying North Carolina would be significantly harmed if a group of Republicans were allowed to halt the 2008 elections.

The drawing of legislative district lines is done by the legislature every 10 years. The district lines being challenged were drawn in 2003 -- three years after the 2000 census.

Under those circumstances, the redistricting process is presumptive, Conrad said in his opinion. And legislators -- not the courts -- can best determine what data to use, he said.

"The inherently legislative nature of the redistricting function support granting of deference to the judgment of the General Assembly in deciding which data to use," Conrad said.

Hello, it's Hillary

On slow days, Harry Payne often answers the phones.

The chairman of the Employment Security Commission picked up the phone at work last Thursday and got a surprise.

On the other end was Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Clinton was calling for Muriel Offerman, a deputy chairwoman at the commission and, more important to Clinton, an undecided Democratic superdelegate.

Payne, who is married to News & Observer columnist Ruth Sheehan, took the message and thanked Clinton for her husband's work in North Carolina after Hurricane Floyd. He briefly considered lobbying for an ambassadorship to the Bahamas but decided against it.

"That was my 15-second brush with greatness," he explained to Dome.

Wright's last vote

Medical tests kept state Rep. Joe Kiser from the special session Thursday when Thomas Wright, a Wilmington Democrat, was expelled from the state House.

Kiser, a Lincoln County Republican, said he had scheduled a CAT scan long before the session was announced. The CAT scan went well.

Kiser said he would have voted to expel Wright. The vote was 109-5.

The five members who voted against expelling Wright were Rep. Earl Jones, a Greensboro Democrat; Rep. Earline Parmon, a Winston-Salem Democrat; Rep. Mary McAllister, a Fayetteville Democrat; Rep. Larry Womble, a Winston-Salem Democrat; and Wright himself.

Edwards hedges on TV

John Edwards praised both Democratic presidential candidates during an appearance last week on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno," but he declined to endorse.

Edwards suggested he might be willing to accept a Cabinet post in a Democratic administration.

"I want to serve my country in whatever way I can," he said. He did not rule out a third run for president.

Edwards also disclosed that he played a pickup basketball game with Barack Obama when the Illinois senator visited Edwards' home outside Chapel Hill last month.

Edwards declined to say who won but indicated it was a competitive game.

"When I play, I play to win," Edwards said.

(David Ingram of The Charlotte Observer contributed. )