Toronto - Ontario's Progressive Conservatives are nearing the end of a leadership campaign, no closer to resolving their biggest problem.
This is a split in their party - slightly wider than the Grand Canyon - over whether they should return to the extreme right policies of former premier Mike Harris, who won two elections with them in the 1990s, or the more moderate approach that kept them in power for four decades up to 1985 and made them the longest-governing party in Canadian history.
Memories of Harris are fresher and the race in which four MPPs are running to succeed John Tory, who has retired, has been dominated by whether the party should bring back Harris's policies, the most basic of which were cutting taxes and the power of unions.
Two candidates want to return to Harris, Tim Hudak, generally seen as the front-runner, although not by a big enough margin anyone can be sure he will win, and Randy Hillier, who is too much of a newcomer and maverick to have any chance.
Hudak reminds every time he speaks that Harris's policies swept the province, and the candidate with the best and probably only chance of beating him, Christine Elliott, has replied the Conservatives need a leader who does not focus on the past and looks forward.
The fourth candidate, Frank Klees, who like Hudak was a minister under Harris, has argued Ontario is different from in the 1990s.
About half the Conservatives' MPPs support Hudak, but two who speak for many in the party, - former deputy premier Elizabeth Witmer and Ted Arnott, a spokesman for small towns and rural areas, - are among those who support Elliott and indicated they worry about returning to Harris.
Witmer argued Elliott would expand their party's reach and Arnott said she would show compassion for the disadvantaged, which was not a high priority for Harris.
Hudak has to be given the best chance of winning, because he is assured of Hillier's votes when he drops out, but Elliott should not be ruled out.
The Conservatives have fought constantly over whether they should return to Harris's policies since he retired. Ernie Eves, who succeeded him as premier, never received full support from Harris's admirers and some labeled him, - the worst insult they could think of, - a Liberal in disguise.
Tory, who followed Eves as leader and was indisputably more moderate, obtained only half-hearted help from some Harris supporters and even was undermined by others before he stepped down after twice failing to win a seat in the legislature.
The legacies of Harris in the leadership race have included Hudak promising to tear up generous pay raises Liberal Premier Dalton McGuinty gave public sector unions before the economic downturn, and to help employers keep unions out of their workplaces.
Elliott has responded scrapping the wage agreements would provoke confrontations particularly harmful in difficult economic times and, whether chosen leader or not, she will continue to be a leading voice of the anti-Harris faction in the party.
Conservatives must have some doubt their party would be helped at the polls by returning to Harris's policies, because the former premier had lost popularity before he retired and there is no sign the public is lining up behind Hudak to revive him.
McGuinty has even calculated every mention of Harris helps the Liberals and reminded of Harris's policies every time he could in the two elections he has won.
Only a few politicians are remembered a long time, one example being Bob Rae. Earlier this month, when Nova Scotia elected its first New Democrat premier, his first statement was he will not pile up massive deficits, as the NDP premier did in Ontario as far back as the early 1990s.
Harris also is remembered. Whoever wins this leadership race, the Conservatives will still have two strong factions, one dedicated to bringing back Harris's policies and the other much more moderate, and a party this divided is not on track to win an election.
Eric Dowd is a veteran member of the Queen's Park press gallery.
