The city clerk didn't know. The solicitor's office was not sure. The mayor's office drew a blank.
The question: What happens if the mayor of Cincinnati resigns from office in mid-term?
It's not what professors in bow ties call an ''academic question'' (meaning ''something you will never use in real life, such as the square root of the Magna Carta to the 10th power of Huck Finn.'') It could really happen. If re-elected, Mayor Roxanne Qualls will be parked at a short-term meter that expires in 1999, thanks to term limits. And we all know what happens to people who try to feed an expired meter in Cincinnati.
So, Ms. Qualls may be tempted to seek another public office next year - Hamilton County Commissioner, Ohio General Assembly, even Congress.
And at City Hall, that means:
A.) A blood-bath power struggle so savage that United Nations Peacekeepers will be brought home from Bosnia to restore democracy in Cincinnati.
B.) A new mayor will be chosen by the city manager, who thinks he's King of Cincinnati after winning the power to hire and fire police chiefs.
C.) A special election will force council members to panhandle another million dollars to compete for a pointless ribbon-cutting job.
D.) Council members pick the new mayor.
When I first called for the answer, nobody at City Hall seemed to know, because the most knowledgeable officials were already busy explaining what they don't know during the weekly council meeting.
So Answerman asked The Man Most Likely to Have Looked It Up - Vice Mayor Tyrone Yates, who is a heartbeat away from the mayor's office. The correct answer, according to Mr. Yates and confirmed later by the solicitor's office, is ''D'' - council members must choose a mayor.
That means ''A'' is also correct - call out the National Guard. Under Cincinnati's very special system, the candidate who collects the most money - oops, I mean votes, is elected mayor. So the logical choice for a replacement would be the second-place finisher.
But as everyone in our time zone knows by now, Cincinnati never does anything logical.
This is never more evident than during elections, when council candidates turn feral, and mild-mannered editorial-page editors turn into know-it-all Answerman.
Our own parade of endorsement interviews is a lot like people lining up for flu shots: Candidates hope to avoid getting sick when they read our endorsements, and we enjoy needling them to get a loud reaction. For example, you may have been wondering:
Q. Is there anything they all agree on?
Answerman: Yes. All 18 candidates for city council courageously stated that they are unflinchingly in favor of neighborhoods. Q. What in Price Hill does that mean?
A. Nobody is sure - but scientific studies by political analysts indicate that a majority of voters live in neighborhoods, so it can't hurt.
Q. What do the candidates think of the city manager?
A. If voters pass a Charter reform allowing him to hire and fire the police chief, he may have to pin a badge on himself just to get a paycheck. According to Answerman's survey of those most likely to survive the election, he had two votes for ''amazing he's still sane,'' two for ''exceptionally average'' and five for ''don't let the door hit you on the way out.''
Q. What else did you learn?
A. City Hall is a soap opera - The Dim and The Restless. Roxanne duped Phil into raising taxes, but Phil got even by courting Minette, who was tired of being bossed by Roxanne. Charlie encouraged Dwight to make friends with Phil - and now Dwight's Democratic Party boss has accused Republican Phil of ''grasping for the last straw'' by running ads that stoop low enough to praise Democrats . . .
Q. Ouch. Enough. Why would 18 people spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a job that requires this kind of public abuse and regional ridicule?
A. It's not unlike the unexplained phenomenon in which 300 smut junkies lined up for autographed copies of Hustler magazine from Larry Flynt. It's a Cincinnati thing, harder to define than a ''Charterite.''
Q. Are you comparing politics to pornography?
A. No! I'd never do that. Some nitwit might accuse me of insulting Mr. Flynt, who is a First Amendment hero to perverts, porn lovers and child molesters nationwide. Besides, I genuinely admire candidates who seek public office - until they get elected.
Q. How do you decide endorsements?
A. See answer ''A'' in the quiz above.
Q. So what's your prediction?
A. All of the council members Cincinnati has mocked and scorned for the past two years will be re-elected so we can mock and scorn them for two more years.
Peter Bronson is editorial page editor of The Enquirer. If you have questions or comments, call 768-8301, or write to 312 Elm Street, Cincinnati, Ohio 45202.
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