Weinberg, who lost in the May Democratic primary for mayor, appealed to his old supporters to do one last thing for him - "Work as hard for John Street as you did for me."

It was one in a series of appeals that party leaders have been making all over Philadelphia in the last nine days, particulary in the white ethnic wards where Weinberg clocked Street in the primary.

Awakened and scared by a poll that showed Street at risk of becoming the first Democrat to lose a mayoral election since Richardson Dilworth in 1947, the party brass called a meeting of the 69 ward leaders Oct. 8 to ask for an all-out effort on the nominee's behalf.

In his pitch five days later at the East Park Community Center, Weinberg suggested several motives for his supporters to back Street:

First, do it for Street himself.

Second, do it for the party.

Third, do it for me.

"We did a helluva job in the primary!" said Weinberg, a fallen candidate returning home to a hero's welcome. "I think most of us know it was Sam Katz and his negative ads that caused me to lose this election."

As though on cue, a woman hissed.

It was Katz, unopposed in the Republican primary, who inserted himself into a five-way Democratic battle with TV and radio ads that portrayed Weinberg as a no-ideas candidate who, if elected, would turn City Hall into "a rest home for party hacks."

Weinberg and his partisans remain convinced that those ads did him in.

So now it's payback time.

"I believe we owe this to Marty Weinberg," Mark Lopez, a former Weinberg operative who now works for Street, told the volunteers.

The Democratic Party outnumbers the GOP in Philadelphia by a ratio of almost 4-1. Figures compiled Thursday by the election board show that 736,692 Democrats and 191,742 Republicans are eligible to vote Nov. 2.

To win, all Street needs to do is get Democratic votes. But the polls show that a majority of whites and a small percentage of blacks may vote for Katz.

Weinberg himself is partly to blame. He spent $3 million on advertisements that beat up Street. He is now asking his supporters to go back to voters and urge them to support a candidate he earlier portrayed as a bully and a tax deadbeat.

"It will be a tough sell, yeah," said Joe Conte, 40, an auto detailer, who went door-to-door for Weinberg in his East Torresdale neighborhood. "It's not going to be easy at all."

But Conte, who attended the East Park meeting, noted that Street doesn't need all of the votes - or even most of the votes - in white neighborhoods.

"In Ward 66, I figure we can get him 20 to 25 percent - and that's a big help to him," he said in an interview.

The problem for many in the room was that they had never met Street, who for 19 years represented a City Council district in North Philadelphia. They knew him only from the media as a former City Council president and, years ago, as a rabble-rouser and street protester.

David Sofronski, who had been Weinberg's personal driver in the spring, told the crowd: "John Street, believe it or not, is an outstanding candidate. . . . He knows the issues and he knows how to speak to people. He is good. And he is a helluva lot better for us than the Republican Party ever will be."

It was humid in the center, an old corner store with a Formica-top bar and water-damaged ceiling tiles. The door was open, permitting yellow light to spill onto the street.

From somewhere beyond the light came a male voice - not loud, but firm:

"Boo!"

The Oct. 8 meeting at party headquarters on Walnut Street was closed. But the word soon got out. U.S. Rep. Robert A. Brady, the party chairman, had given the ward leaders a stark warning.

Brady recalled his comments: "Anybody who is not going to be for John Street, leave now. Don't bother calling me. Leave now. We're not playing any games."

The Katz team has contended that some of the Democratic committee members in the city's 1,681 voting divisions will be quietly working for their man on Nov. 2. They hint that even a Democratic ward leader or two may "go south" on Street.

John J. Dougherty, the electricians' union leader who serves as Democratic Party treasurer, warned the ward leaders that any flirtation with Katz would cost them.

For one thing, he told them, they wouldn't get the "street money" - at least $100 per division - that the party puts out on Election Day to buy the poll workers lunch and dinner, and help them make up for what could be a lost workday.

The meeting was on a Friday. The next morning, at the Adam's Mark Hotel on City Avenue, Street met with the black ward leaders and elected officials in the city.

One participant, who asked not to be identified, said that Street seemed to believe early on that he could win without asking the party leaders to rally to him.

"There had been no communication between the Street organization and the black ward leaders and elected officials until that meeting," the participant said. "Can you imagine that? None."

Conspicuously absent was Councilwoman Marian Tasco, leader of Mount Airy's 50th Ward, who supported Street rival John White Jr. in the primary.

A few days before the Adam's Mark meeting, Street appeared at a 50th Ward meeting. There, he received an earful. Tasco's committee members told him they were worried that if he won the election, he would freeze them out - and Tasco, too.

Tasco commented later: "They really let it flow.. . . They just felt he was going to be disrespectful to them and to me."

Tasco is among a number of Democrats who over the summer and in September complained that Street had been slow to reach out to them and seek their support.

State Rep. Dwight Evans, a losing candidate in the mayoral primary, said he had no patience for such an attitude.

Street, he said, is the Democratic nominee. It is vital for the interests of Philadelphia to have a Democrat in City Hall. Already, he said, Republicans run the state legislature; they control the Congress. "We can't let one party have it all."

His advice to those who remain bitter from the primary is this: "He won. He's the nominee. Let's get over it."

That has been the message everywhere in party circles in recent days.

Almost every night, Street has attended one ward meeting or another to firm up his party support.

Last Sunday night, State Sen. Vincent Fumo, a key Weinberg supporter, threw a fund-raising event for Street at his favorite dinner hangout on the Delaware. It marked the first time he had done anything overt to help Street.

On Thursday, a group of 16 Northeast Philadelphia ward leaders met with Street on a Mayfair street corner to belatedly give him their endorsement.

"Five months ago, there wasn't a group that worked harder against John Street than the Northeast ward leaders," said State Rep. Michael McGeehan, whom Street mistakenly referred to as "Mc-you-un."

"But since that time . . . we have gotten to know John Street," McGeehan said. "He cares about the same things we care about in Northeast Philadelphia. That's good, decent schools . . . safe streets."

Yesterday, more than 1,000 trade union members held a banner-waving rally for Street in the Northeast.

Union leader Pat Gillespie declared Nov. 2 a union holiday and urged members to take off work to help Street.Joe Rauscher, leader of the AFL-CIO council in Philadelphia, said that unions had set up a "war room" from which the council planned to call every union member in the city at least twice and ask each to vote for Street. Each union member, he said, also will get two letters.

"Historically, we are Democrats," he said.

More is at stake here than Street's election, Rauscher said. "If we don't get this done, if we don't elect John Street, organized labor will be seen as a paper tiger."

Today, Weinberg and Street are supposed to go door-to-door together in the Northeast.

Tomorrow, the Democratic City Committee is scheduled to rally its rank and file at a pre-election cocktail party at a union hall on Delaware Avenue. Tipper Gore, wife of Vice President Gore, is expected to attend.

On Oct. 29, President Clinton is expected to come to town to fire up the city's Democratic base. Jesse Jackson may also attend.

Everywhere, every time, the message will be the same - vote for a Democrat.

Addressing several hundred people at an enthusiastic rally Friday night in North Philadelphia, Street asked: "How many of you are Democrats?"

Nearly every hand shot up.

Katz "wants you to think he's a Democrat just like you," Street said, standing on a steamer trunk so the crowd at the Hope Worldwide center could see him.

"But let me tell you," Street said, "he's a Republican like the Republicans in Harrisburg. He's a Republican just like the Republicans in Washington."

Every Wednesday night, come wind, come flood, come snow, the Democratic committee members of the 62d Ward in the Lower Northeast meet in the furnished basement of Marge Tartaglione's corner rowhouse.

You'd better be there or have a good excuse.

Tartaglione, chairwoman of the city commissioners, said she expects her people to go house-to-house on Election Day. Each will have a "street list" showing the registered voters on their blocks.

Her people must ring the bell and ask the Democrats to vote. If the voters need a ride, they must provide a ride. If no one's home, they must go back.

No one expects the 62d Ward to cast its majority for Street. But Tartaglione, who was a Weinberg loyalist, pledges that she will deliver as many votes for Street as she can.

"We are Democrats here," she told her committee people last week from her seat on the sofa. "And if you don't want to work for the Democrats, you don't have to come to these meetings. . . . We are going to work for all Democrats, whether we like them or not. . . . We are going to work for John Street."