The Sun threw its weight behind Harry Hughes

In the 10 years leading up to 1978, Maryland had seen two governors come and go. Spiro Agnew had been elected vice president, then resigned five years later in the wakeof a bribery scandal. His successor, Marvin Mandel, stepped down after being convicted of mail fraud and racketeering.

State politics needed some calming down. On Aug, 21, three weeks before the Sept. 12 primary, the Evening Sun endorsed neither of the Democratic front-runners, incumbent Blair Lee III, Mandel’s lieutenant governor and successor, or one-term Baltimore County Executive Ted Venetoulis. Instead, it voiced its support for a dark-horse candidate, state transportation secretary Harry R. Hughes, in an editorial placed on the front page, where no one could miss it.

“It is argued by political professionals that none but votes for Mr. Lee or Mr. Venetoulis … will be effective in this Democratic contest,” the endorsement read. “We doubt that. ... A vote for the right man is never wrong.”

The paper’s endorsement — along with the morning Sun’s, which had appeared the previous day, no less enthusiastic, but running on the customary editorial page — did as was intended. The Hughes campaign caught fire, and on election night, he emerged the winner with 37 percent of the vote, compared to 34 percent for Lee and 24.5 percent for Venetoulis. The momentum carried over to November, when Hughes won the governorship over the GOP’s candidate, former U.S. Sen. J. Glenn Beall Jr.