Edwards's roots may fall short

MORRISON, Tenn. -- Stopping at an isolated diner here amid central Tennessee's rolling hills, presidential candidate Senator John Edwards held a closed-door session with employees from a local air-conditioner factory that has been slated to shut down. For the dozen workers, it was a first: None had ever met a presidential candidate, not to mention discussed trade policy with one.

Nevertheless, plant worker Terry Motley, 53, came away unconvinced: "I'm leaning toward Kerry. I want Bush out any way I can."

With Senator John F. Kerry of Massachusetts increasingly appearing the likely Democratic nominee, even here in the South, both Edwards and retired Army General Wesley K. Clark face critical Southern primary votes in Tennessee and Virginia today. Losses to Kerry could undercut arguments that only a Southerner is a viable Democrat below the Mason-Dixon Line.

Polls released yesterday showed the North Carolina lawmaker trailing Kerry by sizable margins in Tennessee and Virginia, with Clark close on his heels in Tennessee and farther behind in Virginia. Edwards seeks to outlast Clark until only he and Kerry remain. But asked if he believed he had to beat Clark today, he told reporters, "You guys decide that stuff, not me."

Clark, too, worked for votes in Tennessee yesterday, continuing to stress his Southern roots and pepper his speeches with folksy language. He told voters in Memphis: "I grew up in the South. I went to Baptist church . . . I can quote Scriptures. I can preach."

Clark focused on his less-than- privileged upbringing as something that sets him apart from some of his rivals. Talking to reporters in Memphis, he noted that voters wonder "what are the candidates like. . . . How did they grow up, and therefore, how are they likely to respond."

Reporters asked him about some of his earlier statements, pointing out that he had said many married women stayed at home after World War II and relied on their husbands as wage earners. Clark said there are "a lot of reasons why wives are out working right now," adding that most jobs don't pay enough for there to be only one wage earner in the family.

And he said families spend "on average 22 hours a week less time with their children" when both spouses are working.

In Memphis, an event held at B.B. King's blues restaurant on Beale Street was filled with a few hundred enthusiastic supporters and a few undecided voters. Joan Vitale, 54, an Alabama native who has lived in Memphis for more than a decade, said she was deciding between Clark and Edwards, in large part because "they're both Southerners."

Vitale said she used to joke to her husband that she planned to vote for Edwards, "the good-looking one."

"But you know, Clark ain't bad-looking himself," she said with a laugh.

Edwards, too, campaigned at a restaurant, stopping at the Prater BBQ restaurant in Morrison, around the corner from the Carrier Corp. air-conditioner plant, which is closing. The stop gave Edwards a forum tailor-made for his populist message -- although interviews afterward with locals made clear that even the working-class constituency he is targeting harbors doubts about his viability against President Bush.

Last week, the Carrier plant's 1,300 workers were told the company would soon send production to facilities with nonunion workers in North Carolina and Texas, and to Mexico. For more than three decades, the plant has been the economic hub of this hardscrabble community.

After spending 10 minutes privately talking to workers and local union members, Edwards mentioned his own youth, spent amid the beleaguered textile mill industry in which his father worked. As in South Carolina, where he won a decisive victory, Edwards has been making liberal use of his biography to woo voters here.

"I see in the eyes of these families, what they're going through, what I have seen before," he said.

But afterward, Monte Casto, 34, of nearby Murfreesboro, Tenn., was not convinced Edwards could beat Bush.

"I think he's a little young. He doesn't have the experience," he said.

Longtime Carrier Corp. employee Rebecca Woods disagreed: "If he's elected, he'll fix NAFTA. He seems to care for us personally."

Joanna Weiss of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Raja Mishra can be reached at rmishra@globe.com.