But in the background, several members of the City Council — none of them from Brooklyn — were also working the crowd. As guests dined on eggs and lox, Mark S. Weprin from Queens, Annabel Palma from the Bronx, and Daniel R. Garodnick from Manhattan, whose wife had given birth to the couple’s second son days before, made their way to each table, shaking hands and greeting people with “Hey, how are you?” and “Great to see you!”
There was no need to explain why they were there.
“The unsaid thing is that they’re all running” for Council speaker, Frank R. Seddio, the chairman of the Brooklyn Democratic Party, said later.
The speaker of the Council, elected by the members, is, arguably, the second most influential official in the city, and the position will become vacant in January, when the current speaker, Christine C. Quinn, leaves office after her defeat in this year’s race for the Democratic nomination for mayor.
Ms. Quinn, who was elected speaker in 2006 (defeating Bill de Blasio, who last week defeated her in the primary) brought a new forceful power to the post, and imposed discipline on a panel that had previously been viewed as unruly. She used her position to block legislation that she (often in alliance with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg) opposed and, likewise, to rally votes for legislation that she supported.
The election to replace her will not take place until January, after the members elected in November take office. But the campaigning has been under way for months, and has intensified since last week’s Democratic primary, since, if history is any guide, almost all members of the Council will be Democrats.
By tradition, county party organizations play a significant role in the election of the speaker, in some instances essentially dictating votes, after horse-trading involving committee chairmanships and patronage jobs. And ideology plays a role, too — although the post will be chosen by Democrats, some of the Council’s Democratic members are significantly more liberal than others.
The choice is complicated, as so many things in New York City politics are, by gender and race. Although whites make up a minority of the city, it appears highly likely that the next mayor will be a white man (both the Democratic and Republican nominees are white men) and also likely that the next comptroller will be a white man (the Democratic nominee is heavily favored). The outcome of the race for public advocate — the only other elected citywide post — is unclear: There will be a Democratic runoff, between a black woman and a white man, on Oct. 1 (there is no Republican candidate).
“If there is no black or Latino on the Democratic ticket, I think there’ll be a lot of pressure to pick a minority member for speaker,” George Arzt, a veteran Democratic political consultant, said. “You can’t have four white men.”
Multiple members have been mentioned as candidates — in addition to Mr. Weprin, Mr. Garodnick, and Ms. Palma, they include James Vacca of the Bronx, Inez E. Dickens and Melissa Mark-Viverito of Manhattan, and Jumaane D. Williams of Brooklyn.
Mr. Williams, who is African-American, said in an interview that picking a member of a minority group as speaker should be “a priority.”
“I think that is something that should be pushed,” he said.
Beyond ethnicity, all of the candidates have strengths and weakness. Ms. Dickens was a close ally of Ms. Quinn, which could be a problem for her if Mr. de Blasio chooses to get involved in the race. She has also been the subject of several negative stories in The New York Post recently about her role as a landlord in Harlem.
Mr. Garodnick, who had originally planned to run for comptroller this fall, withdrew his candidacy after Scott M. Stringer, the Manhattan borough president, decided to drop his mayoral bid and run for comptroller instead. That may have earned Mr. Garodnick some good will with Mr. Stringer’s allies, including Representative Jerrold Nadler of Manhattan.
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