Baptists bring city to its knees.

Charlotte lawyer Frank Whitney spent a half hour driving two blocks to his law office one morning in June, joining hundreds of commuters stuck in a traffic jam as 50,000 Baptist conventioneers clogged the streets of downtown Charlotte. But if his fellow commuters were cursing the blessed, Whitney likely was saying a prayer: Please, Lord, don't let the Republican National Committee hear about this.

Whitney, a longtime GOP activist, has been trying to land a national convention for Charlotte since 1997. A former federal prosecutor now with Kilpatrick Stockton LLP, he led a committee that worked with the city in bidding for the 2000 conventions. Charlotte got cut early. He figures Texas has the 2004 Republican convention locked up, thanks to Dubya. But competition should be wide open in 2008. Whitney would tolerate even the Democrats but figures that, since their conventions tend to be larger, Charlotte won't get one. Either way, the last thing Whitney wants is for word to get back to party bosses that Charlotte can't manage a proper, pious group such as the National Baptist Convention USA.

By the second day of the Baptist pilgrimage, Charlotte had tamed traffic by calling in off-duty cops, opening lanes that had been closed for construction and offering city buses as free shuttles. That cost $10,000 to $15,000 in police pay alone. Now the city is dickering with the Charlotte Convention and Visitors Bureau over the tab. Both opted not to bill the Baptists, who spent an estimated $10 million in Charlotte. Neither wants to scare off future conventions. A major political convention could bring in up to $150 million in extra spending.

City officials say the jam was a result of a frugal group of conventioneers. Some stayed in motels 30 miles from downtown, driving in each morning in cars or church vans. Visitors argued those were the closest rooms available, and convention organizers told the city they couldn't afford shuttle service. "We had transportation available, but they turned it down," Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory says.

The city had no backup plan. "This Baptist convention was not well-planned," Whitney says. "It just was not planned at the level that a national political convention is planned or a national trade association is planned." The 2008 convention bids probably won't take place until 2006. Whitney is already practicing his pitch -- and saying his prayers.