CAMPAIGN 2002: Bush Triumphant.

There have been three national elections in the modern era in which conservatives made massive gains. In 1980, a conservative won the presidency. In 1994, conservatives became a majority of the party that controlled Congress. The 2002 election is another such advance. It is more surprising, and in that sense more impressive, than the others were. Conservatives were likely to do well in 1994, if not quite as well as they did, since a Democratic president was in office. In 1980, Ronald Reagan had a stagflationary economy to run against. This year, Republicans overcame both a weak economy and the midterm curse. No president has ever led his party to control of the Senate in his first midterm -- until now.

Republicans won almost every race in which they had been favored, almost all of the toss-ups, and quite a few races in which they were expected to lose. In races that the Republicans lost, they often did far better than had been expected. Their victories were national in scope. Republicans won not only in red states, but in states of the darkest blue: Maryland, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Vermont elected Republican governors. Republicans retained a majority of the nation's governorships, something they had never dared to hope would happen. Even sweeter for conservatives, the most right-leaning governors enjoyed some of the biggest victories. Bill Owens won in a landslide in Colorado, and Jeb Bush confounded the Democrats by achieving an easy re-election in Florida. Mark Sanford, a similarly bold conservative, beat a Democratic incumbent to become governor of South Carolina.

Primary credit for the victories must go to President Bush. The president's hectic campaigning paid off in spades. The 2002 vote has to be seen as a vote of confidence in the president and a ratification of his victory in 2000. Democratic complaints about the Florida recount, which already sounded tinny after September 11, are politically irrelevant now. Conservatives will continue to disagree with the president on some important matters -- such as immigration, racial preferences, and steel tariffs -- but we must acknowledge that our fortunes are largely tied to his and that he has earned our gratitude.

Credit must, however, be shared with others: Karl Rove, Ken Mehlman, Bill Frist, and Tom Davis, who made sound strategic choices; Ralph Reed, who led the Georgia Republicans to victories up and down the ticket; and Denny Hastert and Tom DeLay, who have held the House Republicans together for four years, sometimes with bubble gum and rubber bands. Republicans seem finally to have created a decent turn- out-the-vote operation.

The most obvious interpretation of the election results is probably the correct one: Voters were concerned about national security, and they trusted President Bush and the Republicans on the issue. Security was not the only issue; the economy was also on voters' minds. But Democrats had at best a slight edge on economics, while Republicans owned the security issue. On Iraq, the Democrats offered clever and shifting positioning where the voters wanted a clear pro-security stand. On homeland security, they obstructed the president's proposals to curry favor with their public-sector union supporters. The natural Republican advantage on the issue was augmented by the Democrats' frittering away of their credibility.