Udall family is latest political dynasty

DENVER -- The baby-boomer generation of the West's quietly influential Udall family has reached a milestone: Three relatives are running for the U.S. Senate.

When Rep. Tom Udall, D-N.M., 59, entered the race on Nov. 29, he joined two cousins as candidates. His second cousin, Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., is seeking his third Senate term. Udall's first cousin, hiking companion and boyhood pal, Rep. Mark Udall, D-Colo., 57, is seeking his first.

Tom's and Mark's fathers, Stewart and Morris "Mo" Udall, were renowned in the rise of the modern conservation movement and key Democratic players in the Kennedy-Johnson years and beyond.

"The Udalls have been pre-eminent Rocky Mountain westerners for half a century and more," says former Montana Democratic congressman Pat Williams, northern Rockies director of Western Progress, a regional think tank.

"Stewart and Mo were two of the most widely respected members of Congress in the history of the Rocky Mountain West," Williams says, adding that the sons reflect their fathers' public-service instincts.

From the Adamses, Clays and Claibornes to the Kennedys, Gores and Bushes, family political dynasties have existed since the nation's earliest days.

If the cousins all win next November, though, "It certainly would be an unusual circumstance," says assistant Senate historian Donald Ritchie, who has tracked congressional family trees.

Polls show both of the Udalls as early favorites for the open, swing-state seats of retiring Sens. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Wayne Allard, R-Colo. Smith, 55, a GOP moderate who broke ranks with the White House on Iraq a year ago, faces a strong Democratic challenge in Oregon, another swing state.

"Colorado has senator and representative brothers," Ritchie says of Sen. Ken Salazar and Rep. John Salazar, both Democrats. "And Michigan has senator and representative brothers" — Sen. Carl Levin and Rep. Sandy Levin, also Democrats. "But it's a little more unusual when it gets into threesomes."

The Udalls say they did not intend to mirror each other as they trailed their dads into politics. Both first won their House seats in 1998 — Tom as the two-term attorney general of New Mexico, and Mark as a one-term Colorado state representative. Their fathers began in the House, too.