Ironically, Texans found his Yale background as alien as the Yalies found the Lone Star State resident. In 1978, Bush ran for Congress from Texas against Democrat Kent R. Hance. Hance, a graduate of the University of Texas and of Texas Tech University, looked at Bush's Yale degree and immediately saw his opening.

Hance painted a picture of Bush as an Ivy League carpetbagger, trying to wreak havoc on a state he did not understand.

"We tried to make it Texas Tech Raiders versus the Yale Bulldogs," says Hance, who is now one of Bush's biggest supporters. "He was well-educated and we used that against him; a lot of people around here feel that a lot of the problems around here in the last 100 years have been created by Ivy Leaguers."

With that strategy in hand, Hance defeated Bush with more than 53 percent of the vote.

In the 2000 presidential contest, no one is likely to accuse Bush of being insufficiently Texan, nor does an Ivy League bias hold much water considering the two Democratic front-runners are graduates of Harvard and Princeton.

For Bush, the challenge will be proving that he is more than simply gregarious and good-natured. He will need to show that he has moved beyond the flippancy and lack of direction of his college years and has acquired the sobriety needed to lead the nation.

He will need to show that at Yale, he received an education.