Washington: An E in Olympia

Each workday morning at 6:45, Daniel Jackson Evans, Governor of Washington State, leads the hardier members of his staff in a brisk trot around the Olympia High School track. In his first ten months in office, Republican Evans, 40, has also foundoccasion to hold a press conference in a swimming pool—leaving reporters wetter than wiser—break trail for a slalom contest, scale Mount Rainier and, when time permits, sail his sloop.

What makes Danny run is a staunch belief in a philosophy that he and a few other G.O.P. Governors call a “new federalism.” While the states face increasingly complex economic and social problems, he argues, they, rather than the Federal Government, can devise remedies most suited to their own needs. Evans, a one-time civil engineer, set out last year to test his theory that progressive Republicanism can put matters right. First he defeated a Goldwater supporter in his party’s primary. Next he beat the Democratic incumbent, Albert Rosellini. Since then he has generally got the best of a recalcitrant, Democratic-controlled legislature.

No Qualms. In deference to his skill, the Republican Governors’ Association last July appointed Evans its campaign chairman. Last week he gave the principal address before 2,500 Republicans in Harrisburg, Pa., to honor Dwight Eisenhower’s 75th birthday. “If we are to win in 1966 or 1968 or 1976, we will have to be a party of substance,” he declared. “We live in the age of the Young Society.” Added Evans: “Above all, we must not be the party which forever gets E for excellence in defining the problems and F for failure in coming up with the solutions.”

Back home, Evans’ first-year marks would be E+ and E-. He entered office with a 35-point program, got the Democratic majorities to give him 18 of the measures he sought and substantial portions of six others. His program emphasized increased spending for education, welfare and research coupled with inducements for industrial expansion and reform of an archaic, patronage-ridden administrative structure.

“Who?” The Governor’s refusal to sign questionable legislation has given rise to the gibe that Rosellini has been succeeded by “another Italian, Danny Veto.” On a more constructive level, Evans has promoted interstate cooperation with Oregon, Idaho and Montana, traveled from Boston to Tokyo to seek trade and new industry, pared 1,200 jobs from the state payroll, and reduced the state deficit by $7,800,000.

Though Evans has begun to receive speaking invitations from all corners of the country, he has yet to achieve a national reputation. But he takes his obscurity with good grace. Last fall, he recalls wryly, the state’s Democratic campaign managers tried to capitalize on his relative anonymity with election ads depicting Lyndon Johnson on the telephone asking, “Dan whoT Last April, Evans had a chance to get even. When an earthquake hit the state and fractured the capitol dome in Olympia, the Governor got a call from the White House. As Evans tells it, “The voice on the other end said: This is Lyndon.’ Boy, was I tempted!”