For most of the campaign, John P. McDermott, the Constitutional Party candidate for mayor, has suffered the fate of nearly all third-party nominees: almost total invisibility.

But he is getting some attention now. He just might hold the edge between victory and defeat.

Privately, insiders in the camps of both Democrat John F. Street and Republican Sam Katz fear that one or two percentage points of the total vote may separate them.

In a situation like that, every mayoral ballot not cast for Katz or Street can be fateful for them. If McDermott were to capture as little as 2 percent of the vote on Tuesday, he could wind up influencing the outcome.

McDermott, 48, a self-employed resident of the Northeast, has a long history of involvement with local Republican politics. He has said he is running on the Constitutional ticket mainly to broaden the party's base and encourage others to run under its banner.

The Constitutional Party is primarily associated with the anti-abortion campaigns for governor waged by Peg Luksik. She scored 10 percent of the statewide vote in 1998.

McDermott favors suspending the Section 8 rent-subsidy program, reducing the size of City Council from 17 to seven members, and capping public spending for sports stadiums.

His issues, like the candidate himself, typify a slice of blue-collar, Northeast Philly that might otherwise vote for the Republican candidate. Some political operatives therefore think he may drain precious votes from Katz.

McDermott himself says he doesn't see this as a race that will be determined by a percentage point or two, and thus he's no spoiler.

Money coming from very far afield

About half of the more than $15 million raised so far by Katz and Street has come from beyond the city limits, mostly from suburbanites with business or social interests in the city.

But a lot also has poured in from farther afield.

At least $1.2 million, or about 8 percent, was contributed by individuals, partnerships or political-action committees beyond Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, the traditional sphere of interest in Philadelphia politics.

It has come from as far away as Arizona, California and Florida, even Europe.

Street has received contributions from 29 states totaling nearly $1 million, or about 11 percent of his total fund-raising so far.

Katz collected at least $260,000 from outside the three states. That's more than 4 percent of his total.

"These are people Sam knows or it's people Sam knows raising money for him" from their acquaintances in other areas, said Bob Barnett, Katz's campaign director.

Most of this auslander money is from New York. But Street has also received sizable sums from Washington-area contributors, including $78,775 from the District of Columbia, $65,000 from Virginia, and $47,500 from Maryland.

He pulled in nearly $50,000 from Michigan. A Street campaign representative said that the candidate met Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer in the summer and that Archer was impressed with Street and promised to raise money for him. Evidently, he came through.

Katz pocketed $2,000 from a friend living in London, $1,000 from another pal who has a company in France, and $1,000 from a supporter in Puerto Rico.

- Robert Zausner

Election Day a mega-payday

Tayoun, the veteran South Philly pol who has been largely relegated to a supporting role since a 1991 conviction of bribe-taking ended his City Council career, calculates that 30,000 people - enough to comfortably fill the Vet - will be on somebody's payroll next Tuesday.

In his fledgling Philadelphia Public Record published yesterday, Tayoun does the math. It starts with the 1,681 polling places, each of which requires a judge of elections, a clerk, a majority inspector, and a minority inspector. That's 6,724, and the Board of Elections says that each gets a minimum of $95 for the day from the City Commissioners, the only substantial outlay of public funds for the Election Day payroll.

But Tayoun estimates that 800 private landlords get checks for the use of their property as a polling place where no city property is suitable.

Then there are the Republican and Democratic committee people, teams of "door knockers" to get out the vote, campaign staff "extras and the like." The total quickly mounts to more than 30,000, based on Tayoun's knowledgeable calculations.

And, he notes, that doesn't count media outlets hiring temps for the day, caterers for victory parties, police officers on overtime, or delivery people running lunch to the poll workers.

Endorsements come late if at all

The Street camp spent much of yesterday dealing in various ways with the Daily News' endorsement of Katz. The Inquirer endorsed the Republican on Sunday.

Nearly every other local paper planning an endorsement also made it within the last few days. If you have ever wondered why they always wait so long, the late A.J. Liebling, a former reporter and one of the great newspaper critics of the 20th century, supplied the answer several decades ago.

"The newspaper of even moderate self-esteem," he wrote, "thinks that if it stated at the beginning of a campaign which candidate it favored, the other fellow might cancel his speaking engagements and quit."

Many of Philadelphia's small neighborhood papers either never make mayoral calls - the Chestnut Hill Local falls in that camp - or had reasons for not doing so this time.

"I really felt that in terms of our readership in University City, we didn't want to fragment our readers," said Robert Christian, editor and publisher of the University City Review.

But the weekly Northeast Times, with a circulation of 140,000 in one of the more Republican-inclined parts of town, declared "Sam Is the Man" in its Wednesday issue. The paper is owned by Philadelphia Newspapers Inc., the same company that publishes The Inquirer and Daily News.

Of the city's two major African American papers, the Philadelphia Tribune has endorsed Street. The Philadelphia Sunday Sun chose not to endorse. Publisher J. Whyatt Mondesire, who has praised Katz and criticized Street, said he did not want to create confusion between his roles as newspaper publisher and leader of the local NAACP, which is not permitted to make endorsements.

The two "alternative" weeklies, primarily distributed in and around Center City, split their vote. The Philadelphia Weekly went for Street, the City Paper for Katz.

The two gay and lesbian weeklies, Philadelphia Gay News and Au Courant, both went with Katz.