The empire struck back.

John Street, struggling to hold the Democratic Party's nearly half-century grip on City Hall, swept the city's black neighborhoods and ran surprisingly well with blue-collar whites to win Philadelphia's closest mayoral election in several generations, narrowly beating Republican Sam Katz.

In victory, the 56-year-old ex-City Council president had to oil virtually every cog in the city's Democratic machine, bringing in President Clinton and party patriarch Ted Kennedy at the 11th hour and rallying hundreds of union members to turn the tide in a neck-and-neck race.

"I know I have not been perfect," a raspy voiced Street told his backers at the Warwick Hotel at about 1:45 this morning, ". . .but I never tried to do anything against the interests of this great city. . .and as I embark on this new responsibility, I'm going to ask you to give us a chance, give us a chance."

"We all love this great city," Street added, noting that while sometimes leaders disagree, "in the end isn't it the people who count the most?"

As Street spoke, a panorama of the city's Democratic establishment who helped put him over the top - including outgoing Mayor Rendell, U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah, District Attorney Lynne Abraham and many others - crowded behind him.

Katz, whose aides were confidently predicting victory to reporters right up until the polls closed, were clearly stunned at the results last night.

As Street's margins slowly widened, the band that had been playing rock 'n' roll at the Park Hyatt Bellevue shut down and aides shut off the big-screen TV that had been showing the tallies.

The GOP candidate who came the closest to capturing City Hall for the Republicans for the first time since Barney Samuel won in 1947 called Street around 1 a.m. to concede and then gave a concession speech that was misty eyed at times, pausing to kiss his wife Connie and his four children while a supporter yelled out, "Too close!"

"You can never reach your dream unless you're willing to try, unless your willing to take risks," Katz told his supporters.

"They had a more effective ability to get out the vote," said Katz supporter George Bochetto, the former state boxng commissioner who briefly was a candidate and who may run in 2003.

The power of the Democratic Party machine - the network of more than 3,000 party committee members and its allies in labor - and the closeness of the vote put an exclamation point on an election that was extraordinary in many other ways.

The candidates, including the four who opposed Street in May's Democratic primary, raised and spent some $25 million, a record not only for Philadelphia but for any municipal election in American history. The out-of-control money race led some to call for limits on campaign spending like those in place in 38 states, although supporters are dubious any reforms will pass soon.

More importantly, perhaps, for Philadelphians, it was an election that saw some small nicks taken out of the massive racial wall that has marked city politics for the last forty years.

Both Street and Katz won widespread praise for running issues-oriented campaigns that were free of racial appeals, and there were early indications of more crossover voting than in prior elections, especially blue-collar white Democrats from the river wards and elsewhere who backed Street.

Early returns showed Street getting more than 90 percent in the city's mostly black neighborhoods in North and West Philadelphia, while doing better in white ethnic neighborhoods like Port Richmond than experts had predicted.

Also critical to Street's success was somewhat stronger than expected showing in predominantly liberal areas like Mount Airy and Chestnut Hill, which is Katz' home turf but where the Democrat seemed to be holding on to about one-third of the vote.

Katz ran strongly, as expected, in the Northeast and the river wards, but pundits said the turnout in those areas was low and signalled less enthusiasm than when Frank Rizzo was the GOP's nominee and nearly won in 1987.

Regardless, it was Philadelphia's closest mayoral election in the modern era. Republican Arlen Specter narrowly lost to incumbent Democrat James Tate by about 11,000 votes in 1967, while W. Wilson Goode's margin over Rizzo in 1987 was about 17,000 votes.

"There wasn't enough turnout in the Northeast - and Street got enough of the Democratic vote," said Larry Ceisler, the Democratic political consultant and Fox-TV analyst, in looking at the early returns.

With driving sheets of rain and high winds, yesterday's voter turnout dropped off shortly in the late evening hours and appeared to be about 40 percent of the city's 988,000 voters, much lower than projections.

The bad weather was just the last obstacle for Street, a long-distance recreational runner who has had to jump enormous obstacles in a lifelong odyssey from rural poverty in Montgomery County to head of America's fifth-largest city.

Early in his political career, most observers, including Street himself, would have been shocked at the prospect of the self-described liberal rabble-rouser becoming mayor.

A lawyer and community activist on behalf of street vendors in North Philadelphia, Street was elected to the City Council in 1979, when the legislative body was tarred by the Abscam scandal and by fistfights, including a notorious one between Street and colleague Fran Rafferty.

In the 1980s, Street shed his sweat clothes and started donning conservative suits as he also moved to the right politically, opposing then-Mayor W. Wilson Goode during the city's fiscal crisis.

Elected City Council president in 1992, he developed a close working relationship with Mayor Rendell in taking a tougher stance with the city's unions, steering Philadelphia away from bankruptcy, and improving the city's image.

Rendell repaid Street for his support many times over when he endorsed Street's mayoral candidacy earlier this year, donating more than $100,000 and taping commericals to convince voters who still recalled the fiery rabble-rouser that this indeed was a new man.

The popular mayor's support was critical in the five-way Democratic primary this spring, when Street came under assault from rival Marty Weinberg, who raised $6 million and spent most of it on TV ads reminding voters of Street's past image, including a 1981 shoving incident with a journalist and past financial woes, including bankruptcy.

Street's calm response and his mastery of the details of city governance impressed voters, and he won with 36 percent of the vote. Almost as soon as won the primary, however, the former council chief had new political problems - some of his own making.

His campaign went into low-gear over the summer, and he was unable to fully reunite the Democratic Party. John F. White Jr., the third-place finisher and darling of liberal voters, surprised political experts by defecting to Katz, and fellow Democrat Happy Fernandez soon followed.

In the last month, Street, who raised $5 million for the fall campaign, poured much of that into rebuilding the Democratic machine and putting together a strong Election Day operation.

He was aided strongly in the effort by organized labor - especially the building trades - who declared yesterday a holiday and worked hard to get union households to vote for Street.

The final push came from Clinton, who praised Street at a rousing pep rally at La Salle University last Friday to energize the Democratic Party's base, especially blacks.

As the numbers dribbled in late last night, many experts said that Street's strong showing was a tribute to the enduring strength of the Democratic Party machine. Party committee members who received $75 apiece from the party for working the polls, or $250,000 altogether, seemed to drive turnout higher in pro-Street neighborhoods.

"Where the party organization targeted voters there was a huge turnout," Weinberg, who endorsed Street and became an enthusiastic supporter, said last night from the campaign's "war room."

Street was able to win yesterday despite several last minute mishaps that should have hurt the Democratic turnout effort.

The stormy weather caused power outages at several polling places in North Philadelphia and West Philadelphia, and a judge refused a request from the Democrats to keep those polling places open an extra half hour.

In addition, a judge yesterday ordered the confiscation of some sample ballots purported to be from "Democrats for Katz" that appeared to be virtually identical to the official Democratic Party ballot except that Katz was listed for mayor instead of Street.

The loss must have been an especially bitter one for Katz, who ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 1991 in the GOP primary and also had a failed campaign for governor in 1994.

The Republican ran what even Street, Rendell and other Democrats praised as a brilliant campaign that came within an eyelash of victory in a city with a 4-1 Democratic registration edge.

He was able to raise some $6 million, and his ideas for the city helped him win the endorsement of the Inquirer and the Daily News, but neither proved enough in the face of the Democratic field operation.

Staff writers April Adamson, Jim Nolan, Chris Brennan and Mark McDonald contributed to this report.