With 50 cents and a yearning to get himself out of small-town New Mexico, Rudy Martin and a friend in 1968 hitchhiked from Dixon to Albuquerque.

The pair made it three days on those two quarters, Martin said.

Although the journey to the big city seemed impossible, Martin made it, later getting a gas station job to earn more cash.

"They say you pack up your bags and leave," he said. "Well, I packed up my one bag and left."

These days, the 56-year-old lawyer is trying to make another journey, this time to Capitol Hill.

Some say his road is going to be just as tough.

Martin garnered just two votes in the state Democratic Party's pre-primary convention in March, but he says he's not as far behind in the race as some might think.

"The print media is watching too much TV and not doing its job," he said.

If elected, Martin, an attorney with experience in civil rights and Native American law, said he'd work to help others make similar journeys out of impoverishment.

"The poverty that exists in Northern New Mexico should not exist," he said. "It shouldn't."

Martin would focus on job creation programs in the district, he said, including programs like the Youth Conservation Corps.

"I think I would have to work with the elected officials to create programs that would create employment," he said in a recent interview.

Right now, the area has too small of an economic base, he said.

"If it weren't for the school district, the state and the labs, this place would be dead," Martin said.

He wants to see the United States support a foreign policy "not based on military action," and make sure citizens' "eroded civil rights" are restored.

Martin's other journeys haven't been easy.

He was raised in Dixon by his grandmother, who lived on just $80 a month in welfare, he said.

"I remember growing up as a kid, people telling me, Rudy you'll never amount to a damn thing because you are a welfare kid."

Martin spent time as a single father, but managed to save enough to go to college at the University of Albuquerque and later The University of New Mexico.

Previous to that, he spent eight months in the Navy before getting a medical discharge after a back injury from an accident in 1970.

Martin trails other candidates in the primary contest, in polls and campaign spending. He estimated he'll put down about $30,000 for the primary.

Martin said the he felt compelled to run because he didn't like the qualifications of the other candidates.

"Junior Luján is running because he's daddy's alter ego," Martin said, referring to Ben Ray Luján and his father, House Speaker Ben Luján,
D-Nambé.

With regard to fellow candidate Don Wiviott, Martin said, "Don has the perception that he has a lot of money and he can buy his way into Congress."

Contact Kate Nash at 986-3036 or knash@sfnewmexican.com. Read her blog, Green Chile Chatter, at www.sfnewmexican.com.

RUDY MARTIN

Age: 56

Education: Bachelor’s degree in business administration and Spanish from the University of Albuquerque; law degree from The University of New Mexico.

Career experience: Has worked in the title insurance industry; currently self-employed at his law firm and an agent with ING Northern Annuity, doing financial planning.
Political experience: Briefly ran against state Rep. Debbie Rodella, D-Española, two years ago but withdrew from the race because of a medical problem.

Personal: Married with two grown sons, two grown stepsons and five grandchildren.

Arrests: None

Web site: rudymartinforcongress.com