"I am not stepping aside for anyone. I don't care how much money my opponent may have, and I don't care about his grandiose ambitions. I am not surrendering to the most expensive press, television and radio blitz in the history of any New York Senate campaign. I have worked too hard for the people of New York to allow this kind of ruthless and unprincipled campaign to ride me out of office."

Beneath the glitter of national publicity, the New York senatorial race has become a bitter affair--especially bitter for the incumbent, Kenneth B. Keating.

Keating is on the defensive. He has been put there by a series of Democratic charges disputing his status as a "liberal." Under the heading, the "Myth of Keating's Liberalism," the attacks come in television and newspaper ads, in campaign literature, and from Robert F. Kennedy himself. By citing specific Keating votes, the Kennedy camp insinuates that the Senator is against housing, against aid to education, against labor, against medicare, against--until the last minute--the test ban, and against the war on poverty. "I'm supposed to be against everything that's good," Keating angrily observes.

"Don't believe these distortions and falsehoods you read," he tells his audiences. He brands Kennedy's the "most reprehensible campaign that has ever been conducted for the Senate in this state." Keating's manner, usually mild and totally lacking in flamboyance, changes as he lists his opponent's sins: he pumps his arms up and down in small chops and his voice rises in anger.

At every opportunity, Keating defends his record. In speech after speech--even in talks he claims "nonpolitical"--he reiterates his support of the civil rights bill, the tax cut, Medicare, the test ban treaty, and the poverty bill in the last session of Congress.

Something ought to be said about the Senator's own tactics. He has charged Kennedy with funneling 60 million federal dollars into the hands of Nazis by ending a 20-year dispute over the World War II seizure of the General Aniline & Film Corporation. He has charged Kennedy with walking out on civil rights by resigning as Attorney General when the Civil Rights Act had yet to be implemented: And, finally, he has charged that through the Valachi hearings Kennedy did an unnecessary disservice to Italian-Americans.

Keating has continually insisted that he does not charge Kennedy with being pro-Nazi, anti-Negro, or anti-Italian; the only thing he claims to question is Kennedy's judgment (and there're his qualifications). Similarly, Keating denies he is actively seeing the backing of any voting bloc and criticizes his opponent for appealing to such groups; yet Keating's bid for bloc support is as plain as the title of one of his campaign throwaways: "Why is Nasser Working to Defeat Keating?"

The atmosphere surrounding the Keating campaign, like the Senator himself, is subdued. It lacks what one reporter who has covered both candidates calls the "Presidential aura" of the Kennedy campaign.

Perhaps a public relations man for one of New York's local television stations summed it up best when he said after a Keating visit to the studio: "It'll be different next week when Kennedy comes. Now, I'm not partisan--I'm not even registered--but when we did a radio program with him, 50 girls walked off their jobs to see Kennedy."

Keating used to be thought of as quiet, dignified, and unimposing; but in this campaign, he has projected the image of a man who is outspoken, angry, and self-asserting.

Despite the change, Keating has been unable to eliminate the image of the past. He is not the magnetic, crowd-drawing candidate that Bobby Kennedy is. Keating can walk from Madison Square Garden onto Seventh Avenue without a soul stopping him to shake his hand or ask for his autograph. He can go to a state Baptist convention in the Bronx to find that scarcely 100 people have showed up to hear him in a hall that would seat four or five times that many.

Certainly, then, Keating does not have Kennedy's "electricity." He will arrive at a street corner for a scheduled "walking tour" of the area and if the advance men have done their work well, an enthusiastic crowd will greet him. For the first few minutes he will be surrounded.

But the crowd does not stay with him. They shake his hand or catch a glimpse of him--and then move on. After he has walked a block and a half, he is relatively free from the pushing and shoving of a mob.

Though Keating lacks electricity, he does possess a certain warmth that wins respect. He almost always wears a huge smile. But not infrequently, he stops to listen to a complaint or a request; then, with his hand clasping his petitioner's, the smile leaves his face and he listens intently. When the quick tete-a-tete is finished, he moves on and his face lights up once again.

For his age (he is 64), Keating displays an amazing amount of energy. Last week, when he was running some 30 minutes behind schedule, he was faced with the choice of cancelling a speaking engagement or not attending the funeral of Herbert Hoover. Keating missed neither.