By: Patrick o'Connor

MACON, Ga. — Jim Marshall was willing to risk his congressional career on a single vote.

Now he has 28 days to explain to voters why he backed the $700 billion bailout when so many voters in this sprawling central Georgia congressional district called the Democrat and told him to oppose it.

There are dozens of Jim Marshalls in Congress this week, back home explaining to agitated constituents why the financial rescue plan needed to happen. But Marshall’s political case is precarious — he won only 51 percent of the vote in 2006 in a district President Bush carried 61 percent to 39 percent.

He was so worried about the overwhelming opposition to the bailout that he quickly cut a campaign ad defending the vote.

“I just had to go with what I thought was best for the country and accept that if people were going to kick me out of office, so be it,” said Marshall, who is considered one of the most conservative Democrats in the House.

Marshall is locked in a tight race with Republican Rick Goddard, a retired major general in the U.S. Air Force who ran the biggest military installation in Georgia.

Goddard leaves no doubt that he will try to tip this issue in his favor.

“We have leaders who, in my opinion, are making reckless judgments,” Goddard said Monday during an interview in his campaign office in Warner Robins, Ga. “I just think it wasn’t thought through.”

But as the stock market continues to spiral downward and small businesses around the country find their credit frozen, Marshall and other vulnerable members of Congress are hoping that Main Street will accept the bailout vote as a necessary evil. Political analysts say it’s the GOP brand that continues to be damaged by the market meltdown, not Democrats.

“Marshall has handed Goddard and the Republicans a hot issue that they didn’t have a couple weeks ago,” said Nathan Gonzales, political editor for the Rothenberg Political Report. “But it’s still going to be a fight for Goddard. It looks like the bottom is falling out of Republican numbers nationwide.”

Very few truly vulnerable incumbents in either party backed the overwhelmingly unpopular rescue plan. In fact, they were advised by their campaign committees to oppose the bailout. Marshall at least has some political cover from his state’s senators — Republicans Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson both voted for the bailout.

Yet the uncertainty is even more acute for those lawmakers who switched from no to yes, but few of those 58 lawmakers have tough reelection fights.

Michigan Republican Rep. Joseph Knollenberg is locked in a tough fight and switched his vote, but he believes that loans for automakers will help his constituents understand his decision. Other potentially vulnerable vote-switchers include Republican Reps. John R. Kuhl of New York, John B. Shadegg of Arizona and Jean Schmidt of Ohio, along with a pair of freshman Democrats from Arizona — Reps. Gabrielle Giffords and Harry E. Mitchell.

The bailout remains enormously unpopular with the public. Many offices estimated the early-round calls and e-mails were 99-1 against. But those numbers have evened significantly as the Dow Jones Industrial Average slumps lower and more Americans feel the pain of a tighter credit market.

Marshall’s district in central Georgia is just starting to feel those pangs.

“Credit is tight,” said Mike Bishop, reclining on the porch of Georgia Motors in Warner Robins, where he handles financing. “They seem to be grading people tougher and tougher.”

On Monday, Marshall addressed a group of business leaders at an office park near Robins Air Force Base, the biggest military installation in the state.

After the congressman explained his vote, one questioner asked if the massive outlay of federal cash would threaten future military contracts. Another asked why private business couldn’t bail itself out. And a white-haired man asked Marshall what to do about his 401(k). “I don’t know what to do,” Marshall replied. “Where do you go?”

“People are really angry about the bailout,” said Alan Gardner, a defense contractor who asked Marshall why private business couldn’t rescue itself. “I don’t know if the bailout was right or wrong, because I’m not in Washington. All I know is that I’ve lost 30 to 40 percent from my 401(k), and my wife and I are almost at retirement age.”

Gardner has no plans to punish Marshall for his vote in favor of the rescue package; instead, he said he’ll vote for whichever candidate he believes would make the best decisions moving forward.

Steve Hockett, a local defense contractor, summed up the feelings of many who showed up for Marshall’s speech Monday. “I hope you recognize, sir, that the American people have lost tremendous confidence in Congress,” Hockett said.

Goddard, Marshall’s opponent, is channeling the bailout critics.

After getting an earful from voters at the Georgia National Fair in Perry, Goddard believes voters are overwhelmingly opposed to the rescue package.

“The average Georgian doesn’t like tax dollars to be obligated like that,” Goddard said. Marshall “has to explain the rush to judgment.”

It’s easy, of course, for congressional challengers to come out against the bailout when they didn’t have to take the vote themselves. Goddard took some hits in the local media for waiting for almost a week to pan the bailout plan — after polling on the issue was released. He defended that delay on Monday, saying, “I’m not about to announce my position if I haven’t even seen what is in the bill.”

Marshall did not arrive at his vote decision lightly.

The week of the vote, he met with credit union executives and a principal of GE’s finance arm. During his session with the credit union executives, the congressman rained on their sunnier assessment of the economy. One joked as he left, “Well, now I’m depressed.”

In closed meetings with Democratic colleagues, Marshall laid his political career on the line.

“Look, many of you come from safe seats,” he told colleagues. “You can vote yes, even though this is far from perfect. I am prepared to give up my seat to make sure this is passed.”

After the congressman’s bold declaration was leaked to reporters covering the meeting, Marshall became a coveted interview for national media outlets such as National Public Radio.

Knowing it would be a close vote, Marshall decided to cast his in favor of the rescue package as early as possible.

So he voted and left, wondering as he walked back to his office in the Cannon House Office Building whether he would have to help his staff find jobs if he lost the election. Marshall said this vote was a tough decision but not as hard as the choice he made back in the 1960s to leave Princeton to join the Army infantry and go to Vietnam.

The day after casting his initial vote for the plan, Marshall went to the Washington office of Perkins Coie and shot an ad explaining that decision.

“I don’t like this rescue plan any better than you do,” Marshall says in the ad. “And I’m not interested in bailing out the responsible people who dragged us into this credit mess.

“But I’m not going to stand by and let this crisis undermine our economy and damage the financial future of everyone in America, their jobs, their savings, their dreams,” he said, before signing off: “You elected me to do what’s best for America, not what’s easy.”

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