Elizabeth Hanford Dole

The 101-year-old mother of Sen.-elect Elizabeth Hanford Dole was hospitalized after falling ill at home. Mary Hanford was rushed to Rowan Regional Medical Center in Salisbury Thursday night. She was in fair condition Friday and undergoing tests in the hospital's heart unit, said hospital spokeswoman Zandra Spencer.

The 101-year-old mother of Sen.-elect Elizabeth Hanford Dole was hospitalized after falling ill at home. Mary Hanford was rushed to Rowan Regional Medical Center in Salisbury Thursday night. She was in fair condition Friday and undergoing tests in the hospital's heart unit, said hospital spokeswoman Zandra Spencer.

Texas Gov. George W. Bush has become the strong favorite among New Hampshire Republicans to win the state's GOP primary next year, leading Elizabeth Hanford Dole by a more than a 2-1 margin, a poll commissioned by WMUR-TV/CNN in Durham, N.H., said. The poll, conducted by the University of New Hampshire, showed Bush to be the first choice of 37% of respondents. Dole, former director of the American Red Cross, and U.S. Sen.

Wal-Mart executives said it was a mistake to mail a company publication featuring Republican Senate candidate Elizabeth Hanford Dole on the cover less than two weeks before the GOP primary. The publication, sent to nearly 200,000 North Carolina residents, was meant to promote literacy--not Dole's candidacy, they said. "There was nothing remotely political in the intent," said Jay Allen, Wal-Mart's senior vice president for corporate affairs. "It was a matter of coincidence and an honest mistake."

BRIEFING NOTES: President Clinton's unsteady start is stirring distant concern: Chinese officials are "befuddled by the befuddlement" they see in the new White House, reports Charles Jones, a University of Wisconsin political scientist who was in Beijing recently on a trip sponsored by the U.S. Information Agency. . . . Senate jester Bob Dole (R-Kan.

Companies that do not offer child care and other social benefits will lose workers to companies that do, Labor Secretary Elizabeth Hanford Dole told a meeting of the Durham, N.C., Day Care Council. " . . . In the tighter labor markets of today, employers cannot afford to ignore workers' obligations to their families," Dole said, noting that about two-thirds of mothers with children under high school age are working in full- or part-time jobs.

The job of planning and building highways should rest with state governments, not a Congress that funds so-called "demonstration" projects for individual members, Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Hanford Dole told about 800 state legislators at a convention in Coeur d'Alene, Ida. She said members of Congress were more interested in building vote counts with pork-barrel projects, while needed bridge and highway repairs are going undone.

Favorite daughter Elizabeth Hanford Dole returned home for an old-fashioned political rally welcomed by 1,000 supporters in Salisbury, N.C., who urged her to press ahead with her presidential ambitions. "Salisbury will forever be my home," Dole said after listening to speeches from former neighbors, local politicians and longtime friends in a small gymnasium at Livingstone College.

Consultant Kieran Mahoney left Elizabeth Hanford Dole's campaign, costing her a top advisor just as her GOP presidential effort appeared to be showing signs of progress. Dole aides and Mahoney said the parting was amicable, although sources close to the candidate suggested it resulted partly from a power struggle. The move was announced after a meeting between Dole and Mahoney, who had assumed an unusual amount of control for a consultant.

Elizabeth Hanford Dole's hopes for the Republican Senate nomination in North Carolina brightened last week. Former Charlotte Mayor Richard Vinroot, who had vowed to fight her for the prize, gave up his bid and endorsed Dole. "This is a necessary sacrifice for the good of our party, our state and our nation," said Vinroot. Vinroot announced his decision after Republican National Committee Chairman and Virginia Gov. James S. Gilmore urged him to step aside in a Nov. 3 telephone call.

Elizabeth Hanford Dole has officially joined the race to fill the seat being vacated by Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), her spokesman said. Dole planned to announce her bid for the Republican nomination in her hometown of Salisbury on Sept. 11, but that was put off because of the terrorist attacks. Dole, 65, has said she considers Salisbury home. She has served as secretary of Labor and secretary of Transportation. She also headed the Red Cross.

Elizabeth Dole will announce today that she is entering the race for the Senate seat being vacated by fellow Republican Jesse Helms, according to a GOP source. Dole is expected to make the announcement in Salisbury, her hometown, said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Dole was not immediately available for comment. Dole, 65, has not lived in North Carolina in decades and had long been registered to vote in Kansas, the home state of her husband, former Sen. Bob Dole.

Signaling strong interest in running for the Senate in North Carolina next year, Elizabeth Hanford Dole on Thursday asked county officials in Kansas to remove her from the voting rolls there and said she planned to register "in another jurisdiction" in the near future. White House and national party officials regard Dole as the strongest candidate the GOP could find to run for the seat being vacated by retiring Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.

Elizabeth Hanford Dole has perfectly positioned herself to run for the Senate by following one of the simplest small-town rules: Don't forget momma. Over the last 30 years as she and her husband, Bob, have scaled the heights of the Washington establishment, Dole has returned home nearly every month to go to parties, lunch at the Big Pig barbecue and spend time with her mother, Mary, who turned 100 this year.

Elizabeth Dole, who ended her bid for the presidency after citing problems competing for cash with George W. Bush, planned to endorse the Texas governor this week, according to associates close to both politicians. The officials, who said Sunday that the details were not final, said Dole was expected to endorse Bush on Tuesday in New Hampshire and make two campaign stops with him in Iowa, the sites of the first two GOP presidential contests.

She withdrew last week from the Republican presidential primary because, she said, she could not afford to sustain a viable campaign. But was money the only reason Elizabeth Dole bowed out? We think not. Probably more of a shock than George W. Bush's seemingly bottomless war chest was the humiliation factor of primary politics. Before we elect anyone to the most powerful position in the entire world, we like to have a little fun with the candidates.

Elizabeth Hanford Dole, the first woman to wage a serious campaign for president, abruptly abandoned her bid Wednesday, thwarting history but smoothing the way for the next woman to seek the White House. "The bottom line is money," she said at a Washington press conference, noting the vast sums available to Republican rivals George W. Bush and Steve Forbes. "It would be futile to continue."