WASHINGTON - After all the rallies, the handshaking, the millions of dollars spent and the barrage of negative television and radio advertising by the candidates of both parties, the country today remains about where it was politically 24 hours ago - split down the middle.

But in a campaign in which no central issue seemed to sway the voters across the nation, President Bush, by investing a huge amount of his time and prestige, bucked the history of first-term presidents in a midterm election.

Such presidents in the past nearly always have seen their party lose congressional strength two years after their own elections. In the past century, the party of a first-term president averaged a loss of about 30 House seats, and since the end of World War II, it has dropped an average of 25 House seats and four in the Senate.

Both Roosevelts gained

Only twice in the last hundred years has a party gained seats in such a situation. The Republicans under Theodore Roosevelt added nine in the House in 1902, and the Democrats under Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1934 picked up nine House seats and 10 in the Senate.

If the Republican Party retains control of the House of Representatives, as appeared likely last night, that, together with its close contention for leadership of the Senate, will be a notable political achievement for the president. Yet it does not augur an easy time for him in dealing with Congress in the two years remaining in his term.

The results overall appeared to confirm this fall's cliche that politically the country has become a "50-50 nation," with the prospect of further congressional gridlock.

A breakdown yesterday in the mechanisms for assessing why voters cast ballots as they did means it will probably take days to sort out what they were trying to say with their votes.

Though local issues from state to state no doubt were critical factors in the outcomes, Bush's popularity, built in large part on his leadership of the war on terrorism, probably buttressed his party.

Democratic National Chairman Terry McAuliffe suggested as much last night, observing that the president's whirlwind campaigning paid off, along with support for him after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 and his efforts to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction.

Many Republican candidates aggressively pushed the issues of homeland security and national defense, with the implication that Democrats in the Senate who balked at Bush's version of a new Department of Homeland Security were soft on defense.

Expensive campaign

Although this was one of the most expensive off-year elections in history, with much of the money poured into negative commercials, the flood of campaign money achieved little beyond cementing a basic status quo.

In terms of presidential politics, the re-election victory in Florida of the president's brother, Jeb Bush, was a psychological and pragmatic boost for the man in the White House after the 2000 election fiasco that put him there.

The overwhelming defeat of Democratic candidate Bill McBride indicated little or no backlash in the state against the marathon recounts of 2000 that put Florida's election machinery under a microscope.

Also, with the state still in the hands of a Republican governor, the president can look forward to the same kind of strong sibling support that was critical to his election two years ago.

Last night, when Jeb Bush thanked "the president of the United States for coming down and lending a hand to his little brother," he left unsaid what his victory could mean in two years to his big brother.

As for the Democratic hopefuls for 2004, there was little in the overall results to cheer them, not even Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, who was re-elected unopposed.

House Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri dodged a report that if the Democrats failed to win control of the House and make him speaker, he would resign his leadership post to focus on a 2004 presidential bid.

Hart looks to 2004

Another prominent Democrat who did not hesitate, somewhat surprisingly, to express interest in running two years hence was former Democratic senator and presidential candidate Gary Hart of Colorado. He dismissed as "ancient history" the possible political impact of the sex scandal that drove him from the 1988 race.

With the Senate outcome in doubt last night, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said both parties must cooperate in a projected lame-duck session of Congress if anything is to be achieved, regardless of the lineup in each legislative body.

"Nothing will get done at all unless it is done in a bipartisan way," the South Dakota Democrat told CNN.