A GOP Maverick Prepares To Lead Anne Arundel

His sharp rise, however, did not come without controversy. One Honolulu newspaper noted "his penchant for grabbing publicity." A rival paper put it in more succinct, if perhaps exaggerated, terms: "His own party leaders treat him with the same fondness they would an enraged tiger."

The state Senate minority leader threatened to resign because of Leopold and accused him of breaking agreements and ignoring the party's interests for his own.

But Leopold has rarely depended on the political establishment. He uses campaign funds sparingly and draws in part from an inheritance his grandfather left him from running a hosiery factory. Leopold invested the money in stocks in the 1960s.

He also acts as a one-man campaign team, adept at one-on-one interactions with voters.

"He was always on the move shaking hands, from island to island, mall to mall," said Virginia Isbell, his running mate in the 1978 governor's race.

But Leopold's bid was a risky gamble that depended on the incumbent governor losing the Democratic primary -- a gamble he lost. After losing a subsequent race for his old state Senate seat, he served briefly as a delegate to the 1980 national GOP convention.

Then, as Isbell put it, "he just kind of disappeared."

He emerged two years later in Anne Arundel. He moved to be closer to Washington, he said, where he was serving on an education advisory panel appointed by President Gerald R. Ford.

To the amazement of some, he ran that year for a House seat in District 31, which no Republican had won before. But Leopold did and, except for a 1990 bid for state Senate, kept on winning for the next two decades.

In his recent three-year campaign for county executive, Leopold said he knocked on roughly 17,000 doors. Demonstrating his approach in his living room, he calls it an art -- creating a rapport during that brief window when a door opens and a resident looks you up and down.

When he stands along roads with his trademark wooden sign, he peers through windshields to meet drivers' eyes. There is, he said, something almost sacrosanct with each connection made.

Although the one-man campaign has won him voters, it has turned some colleagues against him. Fellow legislators have accused him of taking credit for their work -- from bills on crab pots to capital projects. Others say he takes stances only to further his ambitions. He was for abortion rights in Hawaii, then against them in Maryland. (Leopold said he hadn't formed his view on abortion until he arrived in Maryland.)

In the past election, all five former county executives, including three Republicans, lined up against him, endorsing his opponent.

"He only pushes for himself, works for himself," said former delegate W. Ray Huff (D), who shared a State House office with Leopold. "His election was the biggest mistake the voters have made in their lives."

"He's very untrustworthy, and he is the consummate opportunist," then-County Executive O. James Lighthizer (D) said in the late 1980s when Leopold was a state delegate. "He will do anything to get his name in the newspaper, and I want to stress the word anything. In another life he was selling snake oil."

Leopold dismisses the criticism as "the plaintive cry of other threatened politicians" who attack him for his independence. He operates outside the reach of their old-boy network, he said, and stands in the way of their ambitions.

He said he has never taken credit for others' work and offers legislation he has passed on radium tests for wells and math and science scholarships as examples of his accomplishments. He believes he is in good standing among Republicans and points as proof to a 2000 plaque in his home from the National Republican Legislators Association naming him legislator of the year.

As for being self-promoting and opportunistic, he said, "That's practically the job definition of any politician worth their salt. You can't hide your light under a bushel in this line of work."

He calls his independence his strength because it means he is not beholden to moneyed interests. During his campaign, he alleged "that every single county executive, in one way or another, has been in the pockets of the developers." Two top priorities, he said, are trimming finances and managing growth in a county with a population of about 511,000.

Leopold has already moved to quiet at least one of his detractors' criticisms: lack of managerial experience. He appointed as his chief of staff former Annapolis mayor Dennis Callahan, a Democrat who has run the county Recreation and Parks Department in recent years.

"He will help balance John's policy-driven style as a legislator," said O. Tyson Bennett, co-chairman of Leopold's transition team.

Leopold acknowledges that he might have to make personal changes.

With his new job, he said, he no longer has time to write cards for every wedding and Eagle Scout, to knock on doors every week or stand on roadsides searching through windshields for eyes and connections.

"It's time to govern," he said.