Stories by Tom Field and Elana Varon

Election 2000: IT's First Hurrah

It's the picture-perfect campaign stop, a mere few days into the third millennium: Bethany Covenant Church, a gray-clapboard and white-brick meeting house tucked into the woods off a two-lane highway in Bedford, New Hampshire. The church's tall, white steeple evokes Colonial New England. Inside, Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain of Arizona greets some 300 local citizens, many of whom in a few weeks will vote in New Hampshire's first-in-the-nation presidential primary (and hand McCain a lopsided victory over Texas Gov. George W. Bush).