Campaign Notes the Senate

Alan Dixon didn't know it at the time, but his support of Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas last fall would help derail his 42-year political career. Like many women around the country, Carol Moseley Braun was outraged at how the white, clubby, male-dominated Senate handled Anita Hill's sexual- harassment charges against Thomas. Braun decided to do something about it. Last week the 44-year-old Cook County recorder of deeds beat Dixon and lawyer Al Hofeld for the Democratic nomination.

Braun's low-budget, grass-roots movement benefited from Hofeld's slick $5 million campaign, which attacked Dixon as a backslapping political hack. While Hofeld and Dixon split the white male vote, Braun edged past them, with strong support from blacks and women providing the margin of victory. If she wins the general election against Republican Richard Williamson, 42, a former Reagan Administration official, Braun will become the first black woman ever elected to the U.S. Senate.