Lakian is vice chair of Limits II, the groupwhich petitioned successfully to place thequestion of term limits on the 1994 Massachusettsballot. Lakian is also pro-choice on abortionrights.

Originally from Worcester, Lakian moved to NewYork for business reasons. Lakian now lives inWoods Hole, in what was previously his summerhome.

"I want to replace the name Kennedy withLakian, someone who came from the first floor of athree-decker in Worcester," he said last month ata forum at Harvard Law School.

In 1982, Lakian waged an unsuccessful campaignfor Governor against Michael S. Dukakis. A BostonGlobe article that year accused Lakian of lyingabout biographical information in interviews andin his campaign literature.

Among other fabrications reported, The Globesaid Lakian falsely claimed that he had takencourses at Harvard and that his father had died ofinjuries sustained in World War II.

"I think there's that degree of slight fluffput into every candidate's brochure, everycandidate's advertisements," Lakian told TheGlobe in 1982.

A 1985 trial cleared The Boston Globe of libelcharges, as a Suffolk County jury ruled that theinformation in the article was essentiallyfactually correct.

Lakian was not available for comment, accordingto Mimi Healy, his campaign scheduler.

MILDRED F. JEFFERSON

Dr. Mildred F. Jefferson has a lot of firsts onher resume: first person from Panola County,Texas, to graduate from Harvard Medical School,first Black woman to graduate from Harvard MedicalSchool, and first woman to be elected to theBoston Surgical Society.

In November she would like to add one more:first person to defeat Sen. Kennedy in 32 years.

Jefferson is a general surgeon at the BostonUniversity Medical Center and Assistant ClinicalProfessor of Surgery at Boston University Schoolof Medicine.

She is a founding member of the state andnational Right to Life movement and is currentlythe president of Right to Life Crusade, Inc. Sheserved three terms as president of the nationalRight to Life Committee.

The surgeon has had considerable experiencewith Republican campaigns at the state level.Jefferson worked in the 1984 Reagan-Bushre-election effort and both the 1988 and 1992Bush-Quayle election campaigns. She was the Bushdelegate from the state's eighth congressionaldistrict to the 1992 GOP convention in Houston.

A Boston resident, Jefferson labels herself a"Lincoln Republican," which means she subscribesto a political philosophy based on"humanitarianism, individualism and enlightenedcapitalism."