Surveying Ohio's Democratic landscape

COLUMBUS, OHIO — A campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination that has pivoted on race and gender could be decided here today by another divide, the state's urban north versus the rural south -- pitting Ohio's popular governor against a cadre of big-city mayors.

While Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois have built their own campaign organizations in Ohio, they also have tried to tap into political machines directed by successful Democratic political leaders, local analysts say.

Clinton has the backing of freshman Gov. Ted Strickland, who long represented the southeastern Appalachian region in Congress. Obama has the backing of the mayors of the state's three largest cities, Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati.

The mayors' ties to local political bases could be significant in a state where recent polls showed Clinton with a 6-point lead and 1 in 10 voters still undecided or uncertain.

"I would rather have the mayors in the major cities [than Strickland's backing], because that is where more of the vote will come from," said Herbert B. Asher, a political analyst at Ohio State University who has watched Ohio politics for more than a quarter of a century.

Much like California, Ohio's political texture changes by geography.

The state's social and political personality has its own Mason-Dixon line -- Interstate 70, which bisects Columbus, the capital and largest city.

The north is anchored by old industrial centers like Cleveland, Akron, Youngstown and, separated by farm areas along Lake Erie, Toledo. In the south, with the exception of Cincinnati, the state is rural and, to the southeast, Appalachian coal country.

The split among Democrats also follows a racial fault line, with Strickland, who is white, on one side and Michael B. Coleman, the African American mayor of Columbus, on the other.

The split is rooted in state politics.

In early 2005, with the governor's seat opening the next year, Strickland ended speculation that he would seek the office by announcing he would run for reelection to his congressional district, a ribbon of land from the Pennsylvania line southwest along the Ohio River across from West Virginia and Kentucky.

With Strickland out, Coleman announced his candidacy for governor and quickly became the presumptive nominee. But in May, Strickland changed his mind amid reports of party concerns about Coleman's chances.