HARRISBURG, Pa. — This week's Pennsylvania election might be viewed as a tie, with the Democrats' 3-2 margin in appeals court races and gains in county government countered by Republican successes in the battleground of suburban Philadelphia.

Partisans out to spin the results offered a less equivocal take.

Republican state chairman Robert A. Gleason Jr. pronounced his party "victorious across the commonwealth" and claimed momentum going into next year's presidential and legislative contests.

Nonsense, Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell told reporters during a midafternoon conference call.

"They're declaring victory? Gosh, they should go to work for Madison Avenue," Rendell said. "They got schlumped. No question about it."

Democrats won both open seats on the state Supreme Court and new control of 13 courthouses, while Republicans won two of three Superior Court seats and four new majorities among county boards of commissioners.

"It would be hard to say that voters made a clear statement in the off-year election that advantaged one party over the other," Muhlenberg College pollster and political science professor Chris Borick said.

Rendell will soon have to nominate four people to fill vacancies on the state appeals courts, including the spot that will open after Supreme Court Chief Justice Ralph J. Cappy, a Democrat, retires at the end of the year.

Several Democrats said Wednesday that retaining Cappy's seat in the 2009 election — and with it a 4-3 court majority — is critical for their prospects during the ensuing legislative redistricting.

"We were absolutely massacred in 2000, I mean massacred," said Abe Amoros with the state Democratic Party. "What this does, it guarantees the Democrats will have a level playing field after the 2010 Census."

It is difficult to guess what the political atmosphere will be like in 2009, but Republicans said they were encouraged by a sense that things have changed since last year, when incumbent U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum was defeated, Rendell cruised to re-election and Democrats seized control of the state House.

"Having been here for the last few years, it's not been the greatest time for the party," Republican State Committee spokesman Mike Barley said. "But I think you can really see it in the grass-roots volunteers — they're a lot more energized."

Republicans will build on Tuesday's results, said Rep. Mike Turzai, R-Allegheny, head of his caucus' campaign committee.

"We all know that the governor has been trying to throw his weight around, and the important things we noticed were all the courthouses in the collar counties stayed Republican in the southeast, and we also picked up I think big wins on the Superior Court," he said.

Turzai's Democratic counterpart, Luzerne County Rep. Todd Eachus, argued that Republicans lost some surprising and tactically important county races, including in Centre, Schuylkill, Northumberland and Lackawanna counties.

"In the places where we think we need to play, and sometimes need to play offense, and sometimes need to play defense, in both cases we think the trends are moving our way," he said.

Democrats are eager to fight for any seats in the Philadelphia suburbs opened next year by Republican retirements, he said.

The populist movement to vote against returning incumbent judges to the bench was a complete flop, and that could lower the pressure on the Legislature to approve other changes, said Franklin & Marshall College political scientist and pollster Terry Madonna.

"I think the danger is you diminish and weaken the impact you have in terms of the real reforms: ethics, campaign finance, open records," he said.

Rendell said he still believes the state will pass a better open-records law.

"We shouldn't just respond to the fear of the public," Rendell said. "We should try to do some of those things because they're the right thing to do."