Super Tuesday Sets McCain on Path to Nomination

When the big enchilada—California and the lion's share of its 170 delegates—moved into John McCain's win column just after midnight, it was clear that the fractious Republican Party was on its way to sending the Arizona senator in to battle the Democratic nominee for the White House.

And while McCain didn't put together the überdominant Super Tuesday that he and his strategists had dreamed of, he methodically ticked off big winner-take-all victories from New York and New Jersey to California and Arizona and emerged with a clearer path to the nomination.

"Tonight, I think we must get used to the idea that we are the Republican Party front-runner for the nomination," McCain said at his Phoenix headquarters. "And I don't really mind it one bit."

For a candidate who has been under stinging attack by the conservative wing of the party and whose campaign last summer appeared mortally crippled by staff and money problems, McCain showed wide, if not deep, strength. His determined march, and a surprisingly robust showing by evangelical conservative Mike Huckabee, who picked up wins in a swath of southern states, made for a tough night for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

Romney, who won states in the west, wanted Super Tuesday to be a contest between him and McCain. But with Huckabee's re-emergence after his early win in the Iowa caucuses last month, the results could signal trouble for a campaign into which Romney has poured more than $35 million of his own money. But at his Boston headquarters, Romney pledged to soldier on. "This campaign is going on," he said. "We're going all the way to the convention."

It was Huckabee who emerged as McCain's closest rival and provided the most surprises—wresting the first contest in West Virginia from Romney (with help from McCain defectors), and then ticking off wins through the south, including Arkansas, Georgia, and Alabama. In a zinger aimed at Romney, Huckabee told supporters at his Little Rock headquarters that the GOP nomination battle has turned into a two-man race—"and we're in it." The former Arkansas governor pledged to stay in the race "as long as there are still votes and delegates to be won."

Romney won Massachusetts, where he lives, and, among a number of other western states, Utah, where he owns a home and is supported by the state's large Mormon population. He also proved popular with the voters who identified themselves as conservatives—in Arizona, won by McCain, 47 percent of conservatives voted for Romney, with McCain drawing just 36 percent. Exit polls elsewhere also showed McCain losing to Romney and Huckabee among conservatives. In Georgia, Huckabee won a majority of conservative votes, including those of party stalwarts still loyal to the Bush administration.