Sen. Hillary: 'Issues and Ideals Matter'

Just before 11 p.m., with 51 percent of precincts counted, Clinton had 1,698,421 votes, or 54 percent; Republican Rep. Rick Lazio had 1,423,562 votes, or 45 percent, CBS News reported.

"Wow! This is amazing," Mrs. Clinton told supporters in New York City, after a rousing introduction by Sen. Charles Schumer. "Sixty-two counties, three debates, two opponents and six black pantsuits later, because of you, here we are."

"You came out and said that issues and ideals matter," said Mrs. Clinton, with President Clinton and daughter Chelsea by her side.

"She overcame the skeptics, and worked and worked and won," Schumer said.

"I feel like the Mets," Lazio said in his concession speech, invoking last month's World Series. "We came in second."

"Hillary has articulated the issues that the voters of New York care about: health care, education and creating one New York," former Clinton administration official Sidney Blumenthal told United Press International.

"She's not interested in dividing New York into antagonistic groups. She's somebody who brings people together, and clearly tonight she brought a majority of New Yorkers together."

Clinton, who moved to Chappaqua, N.Y., in January, waged the longest Senate race in the Empire State – more than 18 months, facing two Republican opponents. New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani had raised about $19 million for his bid for the seat being vacated by Democrat Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan. He dropped out of the race on May 19 in the wake of a pending separation from his wife and his diagnosis of prostate cancer.

Republican Rep. Rick Lazio jumped into the race on May 20 based on the campaign theme of "Anybody but Hillary." Although the first lady had a head start in campaigning and fund raising by more than a year, Lazio, unknown in the state outside his native Long Island, quickly caught up, and the race remained close for most of the campaign.

The New York race was historic in another way: the amount of money raised and spent. Each candidate spent $30 million, with Lazio outpacing the first lady's fund raising toward the end of the campaign. He raised $11.2 million in September to Clinton's $2.9 million.

Lazio made Clinton's character the focus of his campaign, and he called her a carpetbagger. Clinton promised to work to improve upstate New York's stagnant economy and to support a new prescription drug benefit for Medicare.

Registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans in New York by a margin of 9-5. To win a statewide election, a Republican needs to do significantly well upstate and in the New York City suburbs to offset the Democrat vote in New York City.

However, the first lady enjoyed a strong turnout in New York City, and she did better than expected upstate. She also did well with women.

Perhaps the issue that resonated the most with upstate voters was the suffering upstate economy. Clinton hammered at this issue continuously while Lazio said, at first, that the upstate economy "had turned the corner."

Lazio had been reluctant to acknowledge the problems of the upstate economy, because it would reflect badly on fellow Republican Gov. George Pataki. Pataki won a close race in 1994 against 12-year Democrat incumbent Gov. Mario Cuomo. While the downstate economy has thrived, the upstate economy has been in a tailspin for the past 20 years, after factories closed.

Three major upstate papers – the Buffalo News, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, and the Albany Times Union – all endorsed Clinton.