Election Set For Newt's Seat

Georgia Gov. Zell Miller has set Feb. 23 as the date for a special election to replace departed House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

The Monday date for the election comes one day after Gingrich officially resigns from Congress. Once the nation's preeminent conservative political voice, he stepped down while facing an effort by House Republicans to oust him after party losses in November elections.

Miller chose a nonpartisan election, meaning candidates will appear on the ballot with no party designation by their names. If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote, a runoff between the top two finishers will be held March 16.

Johnny Isakson, chairman of the state school board and a former Republican candidate for governor, is the favorite to win the Sixth District seat, north of Atlanta. At least five others, including former House historian Christina Jeffrey, have also announced they will run.

Jeffrey, a Kennesaw State University political science professor, was hired by Gingrich as House historian in 1995, then fired by the speaker after a controversy over her 1986 review of a Holocaust course that she said should have included the Nazi point of view.

She insisted that her comments were misconstrued.

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