SYRACUSE — The ballot in today’s special election for the state Senate’s 48th District carries the names of Democrat Darrel Aubertine and Republican Will Barclay but the race is just as much a face-off between Governor Spitzer and the Senate majority leader, Joseph Bruno.

Mr. Aubertine is a dairy farmer from Cape Vincent, first elected to the 118th Assembly in 2002. Mr. Barclay was elected the same year in the adjacent 124th Assembly district. His father, H. Douglas Barclay, served in the New York Senate between 1965 and 1984.

In a race that grew nasty, the two men sought to replace a Republican senator, Jim Wright, who retired in January after 15 years to take a consulting job.

Mr. Wright’s departure left the Republicans with a 32-29 edge in the Senate, where they have held power since the mid-1960s. It’s a margin of control that has been eroding steadily over the past decade.

A loss here, where Republicans usually win, carries an ominous overtone for Mr. Bruno and the Republicans, who face yielding total control of state government to the Democrats, already in command of the Assembly and the governor’s mansion. Mr. Spitzer made it clear early in his term that we wanted a Democratically controlled Senate and he worked to win a special election last year on Long Island.

Polls and political observers described the race as virtually dead even going into today’s vote.

Each candidate will likely spend more than $1.3 million on the campaign, which barely lasted six weeks, making it the second most expensive Senate election in state history. Most of the money came from the state parties or the party leadership — only about 1% of each candidates’ total contributions have come from inside the district.

The candidates spent most of that money on negative television ads attacking each other both politically and personally.

Meanwhile, both the Republican and Democratic leadership have loaned key political operatives to the campaigns.

No Democrat has held the North Country seat for at least a century and enrollment would appear to favor Mr. Barclay — 78,454 Republicans to 46,824 Democrats but there are also 35,000 independent voters. But Mr. Aubertine is a Democrat who has been elected three times in his district, a traditionally Republican territory. Polls showed him with a strong lead in his home turf of Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties.

The two candidates took each other to court over who would get the Independence Party line. A judge initially ruled the line would be left blank but the state Court of Appeals yesterday awarded the line to Mr. Barclay.

A snowstorm forecast for today also could keep away all but the most passionate voters.