[img_assist|nid=1650|title=State Sen. Vince Fumo|desc=Official Photo|link=none|align=right|width=200|height=270]PHILADELPHIA - On the basement wall of Vince Fumo's district office in South Philadelphia hangs a painting that could end up telling his story better than he would hope. It's the famous "Sword of Damocles" piece, depicting the Greek legend who switched places with a king only to discover a sharp sword looming ominously above him.

"There's always a sword hanging just above you," Fumo said to PolitickerPA.com recently, with a smirk. "The more powerful you get, the bigger a target you become."

The irony is hardly lost on Fumo, the 30-year Democratic state senator and Philadelphia political icon. A massive federal corruption trial, "a cloud" in his words, looms above.

This morning, in James A. Bryne Federal Courthouse here, the lawyers will be picking a jury to determine the fate of Fumo, who faces 139 charges of charges of corruption, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. In an indictment that reads like a textbook on political largesse, Fumo is accused of defrauding taxpayers, a charity and a museum out of millions of dollars he used for personal and political gain, and then seeking to cover it up when authorities started poking around. Fumo has denied any wrongdoing, and in local political circles, what begins today is nothing less than the trial of a lifetime.

It also signals a changing of the guard, with Fumo already having said goodbye to the Senate in an emotional speech in July. Soon, the powerful 1st District, which stretches from the airport to the Delaware River waterfront and includes Center City, will have a new man in Harrisburg. But it is a sign of senator's continuing power that his almost-certain successor, Democratic nominee Larry Farnese, owes much of his ascension to Fumo's support.

It was Fumo, after all, who rallied his Harrisburg colleagues to beef up Farnese's war chest during a fiercely competitive primary in April, even as he mostly stayed on the sidelines in public. And try as they might, opponents of the Center City lawyer were never quite able effectively pin Farnese to the indicted lawmaker. Farnese's long-shot Republican opponent in November, Jack Morley, is taking a similar tack.

The idea that Farnese is in any way beholden to Fumo has always bristled him, and in interviews, he has repeatedly declared that he is his "own man.""The only people I answer to are the people I represent," Farnese told Fairmount-area residents at a pot-luck dinner in June (see video)."His mistakes are his mistakes," he said. "You didn't elect Senator Fumo. You elected Larry Farnese. ... You hold me responsible, and nobody else. I don't need anybody to prop me up."

Nevertheless, it was Fumo holding Farnese's arm high in celebration the night Farnese defeated Fumo's longtime political foe, electricians' union head John Dougherty. In a wide-ranging interview with PolitickerPA.com a couple weeks brining his case to a jury, Fumo spoke more bluntly than he has previously about his glee at Farnese's win.

While still confident that he could have prevailed had he stayed in the race, Fumo called Farnese's triumph "a sweet victory," relishing in the fact that "there was no one except myself, [Farnese] and some key staffers who thought he was going to win."

"The thought of John Dougherty was just anathema," Fumo said, describing conversations he had with voters before the primary. "They didn't want any parts of him, his politics or the thuggery that was going on."

Dougherty declined to comment and Farnese could not be reached for comment last week.

There is no doubt Farnese has a tough act to follow, but Fumo said he has high hopes.

"I don't think it's a question of filling my shoes," Fumo said. "My shoes are going to be hung up. My spikes will be hung up on the wall. Everyone goes out there starting fresh.

"Larry will have a much better foundation of what he has to do, a much better relationship among his colleagues going in than I did back in 1978," he added. "He's going to be much better prepared. ... He's got the intelligence, the street smarts, the ability, the integrity. It's going to carry him a long way.

Friends, enemies and full circle in the 1st District

Things have come remarkably full circle for Vincent J. Fumo, 65. The son of a wealthy South Philadelphia banking family, he won office in 1977 when his predecessor and mentor, the late Henry "Buddy" Cianfrani, was forced from office in the wake of a corruption conviction that, in at least some ways, resembles the case Fumo faces.

Fumo quickly rose in the ranks, becoming the Democrats' ranking member of the Appropriations Committee in 1984. From that perch he controlled the Senate's massive purse strings, and by his own office's estimation, brought more than $8 billion in state funds back to the 1st District.

At the same time, his representation of an overwhelmingly Democratic district and his increasingly tight hold on power meant that serious reelection challenges were few and far between. That allowed him to use his considerable fundraising prowess to help out fellow Democrats at the state and local levels, giving him pockets full of favors to call in and strings to pull. He has faced corruption charges twice before, beating them both times.

In his 30 years in Harrisburg, Fumo has made plenty of friends, and plenty of enemies, too. At the minimum, his departure from politics means that some allies, like City Councilmen Frank DiCicco and James Kenney, will lose a bedrock source of support on which they have long relied, while foes could find openings in public office that have been dominated by Fumo and his disciples. Fumo has long placed allies in political battles he couldn't fight himself, most notably against Dougherty.

Fumo's legislative accomplishments have been numerous, from leading the rates fight against electric and other utilities to the landmark state gaming law he wrote in 2004.

Even after his indictment in early 2007, he continued to wield considerable power in Harrisburg. He was a key architect of a massive transportation funding bill a few months later. A day after he spoke with PolitickerPA.com, he was at the Navy Yard in South Philadelphia announcing an initiative to support hydrogen fuel cell research. A couple weeks later, he was being lauded for helping bring a massive new fresh produce center to the southwest Philadelphia.

And on the eve of his trial, The Inquirer cautiously praised him in an editorial for his increasingly vocal opposition to slot parlors planned for the Delaware River waterfront.

"We've still been keeping up with that pace," Fumo said of his work schedule.

But try as he might to maintain the façade that he's just another lawmaker, the end is clearly on his mind. Waiting outside his office, a call came in from his lawyer. The secretary's tone of voice gave the sensation he had been calling often.

A few days later, he made a rare admission of feelings of weakness in an interview with The Inquirer. "Apprehensive," is how he described his mindset. "Anxious. Fear."

Mulling a legacy

In the interview with PolitickerPA.com, at the conference table in his office in South Philadelphia, Fumo reflected on his time in office, his hopes for the district, the city and the state going forward, and the legacy he has crafted.

"You kind of don't get to dictate your legacy, it is what it is," he said at a conference table in his office, his slick grey hair and perfectly pressed pink striped shirt betraying the brief flashes of nervousness he as he fiddled with the telephone cord in front of him. "Life is about making people better, not only yourself and your family, but everybody you touch. I've always said that immortality is living in the hearts of people who know you and who love you after you're gone. That's your immortality."

If he and his lawyers can't convince 12 jurors, his immortality could have a very different dynamic. Fumo is beloved in many Philadelphia circles for the ferocity with which he has represented his 1st Senatorial District and the truck loads of state funding he brought home as the ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee. He is despised in other circles for what constituents long suspected was a leaning toward corruption, thoughts at least partially vindicated by the legal mess in which Fumo has found himself. Often times, those circles overlap.

A posting on the YoungPhillyPolitics blog earlier this year succinctly summed up public opinion about Fumo.

"Let's face it," the poster wrote. "It was never any great stretch of the imagination to expect that Vince Fumo might end his career being labeled a crook. There was always an air of shadiness to is powerful dealings and his money deals. People recognized that he brought a lot of money to the city even as they suspected he liked to take a little taste for himself."

Should Fumo be convicted of even one obstruction charge, he could face 10 years in prison, a downfall that would rival, if not surpass, any in recent Pennsylvania political memory. And should he beat the rap, this morning still marks the end of a storied political career, one that has touched politicians across the state, and one whose end will most certainly impact the political battles to come.

Loyalty is, by his own admission, a cornerstone of Fumo's life. A large framed card hangs in his office giving the definition of the word, signed by his staffers. One of them wrote, "We are family."

"It means, most of all, that [loyalty's] not a one-way street, it's a two-way street," Fumo said.

If he can't beat the rap, it may the irony of Fumo's career that the same loyalty that propelled him up for years is, by some accounts, what helped bring him down. At the outset of his defense against the indictment, he was represented by longtime friend Dick Sprague, one of the most feared lawyers in Philadelphia. His approach to the case was said by some to be too confrontational for a federal corruption trial, and eventually, the two had a high-profile falling out a high-profile falling out.

That left him scrambling to find a new lawyer, and prosecutors used a trial delay Fumo himself had fought for to pressure former aides to plead guilty and testify against their old boss. A member of his own family even flipped.

The man who seemed invincible even at the time of his indictment now seems anything but. An increasing number of political insiders are quietly convinced that he can't simply can't beat such a wide array of chargers. Rumors abound that Fumo turned down a deal from prosecutors for 2 or 3 years in prison, though his lawyer did not return calls seeking comment.

Although Fumo wouldn't discuss the specifics of the case, and insisted he harbored only minimal regrets from his time in the office--"there have been some outbursts on the Senate floor I wish I hadn't done," he said--he acknowledged disappointment that his career will end in a courtroom and not in the Capitol.

"I certainly would have preferred other forums," he said. "But you play the hand you're dealt, and this is the one I've been dealt. You can't control everything in life. But you still go ahead and fight, do what you think is right. We didn't pick the forum. We didn't pick the fight."

And should he be acquitted, his time in the limelight of politics is almost surely over.

"I'm 65 years old," he said. "I've been doing this for a long time.

"I don't want to run for office again," he added. "And I think one way or another I'm always going to be a senior statesman, someone people go to for advice. That's the role I would play, win or lose."