Democratic Governors Under Siege

Shell-shocked by defeat in four of the past five presidential elections and stunned by the loss of the Senate in 1980, the Democratic Party has drawn some solace from its continued dominance of the nation’s Governors’ mansions. Halfway through Ronald Reagan’s second term, Democratic Governors still outnumber Republicans 34 to 16, defying political analysts’ speculations about party realignment.

This year, however, Republicans hope to turn the tide: of the 36 Governors’ seats up for election, 27 are held by Democrats. Moreover, with 15 Democratic Governors not seeking re-election, the party has lost the advantage of incumbency in several key races. Political observers expect the Republicans to make a net gain of at least six states. The President recognizes the opportunity for the G.O.P.: a crucial test of Republican strength this year, Reagan told a meeting of the Republican Governors Association in Washington last week, will be in the gubernatorial and statehouse contests. The electorate, said Reagan, had a chance to vote out “liberal Democratic Governors, setting them aside for Republican Governors . . . of energy and new ideas.”

The payoff for this year’s gubernatorial contests may come in 1990. Following that year’s census, 17 to 19 congressional seats will probably be reassigned. About 20 states will be affected by the shifts, with political power continuing to migrate from the Northeast and upper Midwest to California, Florida, Texas and other conservative Sunbelt states. The battle for statehouses and Governors’ mansions will determine which party gets the advantage in redrawing congressional district lines in key states. The motto of the Democrats’ political strategists has become, “Elections are the battles. Redistricting is the whole war.”

But this year Democrats are under siege in the West and South, the regions likely to benefit from reapportionment. In California, bland but durable Republican incumbent George Deukmejian looks unbeatable, and G.O.P. candidates are strong in New Mexico and Oregon. Three Western states are losing popular Democratic incumbents–Bruce Babbitt of Arizona, Ed Herschler of Wyoming and Richard Lamm of Colorado–leaving Republican challengers with at least an even chance of victory.

In the South, where Democrats have dominated state capitals since Reconstruction, races in Alabama, Texas, Florida and South Carolina are too close to call. Only in Tennessee, where Governor Lamar Alexander is required by law to leave office after his two terms, do the Democrats seem likely to pick up a seat currently held by a Republican.

Democratic prospects are brighter in the Northeast, where Mario Cuomo of New York and Michael Dukakis of Massachusetts hope to enhance their national prospects with big re-election wins. Yet their once secure colleague, William O’Neill of Connecticut, has been losing ground to charismatic Republican State Legislator Julie Belaga; the latest polls show O’Neill clinging to a narrow lead.

With the stakes so high and relatively few compelling issues being debated, several Governors’ races have taken on the same rancorous tone that has turned many congressional contests into slugfests. Milking the “character issue,” candidates are sharpening their tongues and their TV ads to draw blood from their opponents. Four of the more intriguing races:

TEXAS: Bitter Rematch

“Raise taxes and blame me,” Governor Mark White told reluctant legislators after calling them to a second special session last month. “I’ll explain it.” The firstterm Democrat has been doing his best to defend his risky move of pushing through a sales-tax hike to alleviate the state government’s economic crisis. The Texas oil bust is so severe that the state treasurer had warned that government checks could bounce by December. Confronted with a $2.8 billion deficit, White, 46, felt he had to take drastic action. In addition to the tax increase, he pushed lawmakers into imposing $573 million in budget cuts.

Surprisingly, White’s desperate measures seem to have worked to his political advantage. After trailing his Republican opponent Bill Clements by 12 or more points in late August, White has rebounded and is now believed to be running neck and neck with his rival. He still has plenty of detractors in Texas’ rural areas, where many residents are vehemently antitax and also hostile to White’s educational reforms, particularly his “no pass, no play” rule for student athletes and competency tests for teachers.

Clements, 69, a self-made millionaire and former oilman, became Texas’ first Republican Governor in this century in 1978 but lost to White four years later. Clements berates White for his “Mondale mentality” of taxes and spending programs. But Clements made a tactical blunder when he claimed he had a secret program for curing the state’s financial woes and then declined to divulge its details, prompting White to taunt, “Where’s the plan, Bill?” Both candidates are considered error prone. The election, notes Austin Political Consultant George Christian, “may hinge on who makes the last mistake.”

PENNSYLVANIA: Coal Town Contest

Like a novel by John O’Hara, this race stars two men from the same small city: William Worthington Scranton III, 39, scion of the state’s most powerful political family; and Robert Patrick Casey, 54, a tall, black-browed Irishman whose father once worked in the coal mines around Scranton. The young Scranton was a blueblood rebel in the ’60s, a bearded, pony-tailed Yalie who demonstrated against U.S. involvement in Viet Nam. After graduation he bought three small weekly newspapers in northeastern Pennsylvania and became a fledgling crusader for liberal causes, endorsing George Mc-Govern in ’72. Then he grew bored with journalism and became a disciple of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, traveling the world evangelizing for Transcendental Meditation. By the mid-’70s he had given up his unconventional ways and was picked by the G.O.P. in 1978 to be Lieutenant Governor–at 30, the youngest and one of the least experienced in the commonwealth’s history. Today, Scranton is a clean-cut Reagan booster and the Republican nominee for Governor.

Casey, a successful lawyer who made a name for himself as a corruption-fighting auditor general in the early ’70s, lost three previous attempts for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. Ironically, Scranton’s father, a popular Governor from 1963 to 1967, once urged Casey to switch parties and run for Governor as a Republican. “I am more in the mainstream of Pennsylvania,” Casey says. Playing on Scranton’s quirky past, he adds: “I really don’t know what his political philosophy is. To go from George McGovern to Ronald Reagan defies definition.” Casey’s commercials lampoon Scranton’s poor attendance record as president of the state senate; he was absent from his duties there 84% of the time. “They gave him the job because of his father’s name,” charges one Casey TV spot. “At least he could go to work.”

Scranton paints Casey as an agent of the status quo, a believer in old, failed Democratic programs. “I think there is an appetite out there for an activist, for a progressive,” says the young Republican. “The problem with the Democrats is that their activism is 20 years out of date.” But with the drug war emerging as an issue this year, Scranton has been hurt in recent weeks by his record of using “recreational drugs” like marijuana back in his counterculture days. Scranton’s early twelve-point lead has vanished, and Bob Casey may just overcome his patrician townsman.

MICHIGAN: Breaking Barriers

Announcing his candidacy on Lincoln’s birthday, William Lucas told Michigan voters, “It is within our grasp to make history.” Although he trails badly in the polls, Lucas’ race has attracted national attention: he is the first black Republican ever to run for Governor. A former FBI agent, the soft-spoken and methodical Lucas was a Democrat when elected sheriff and then executive of Wayne County, which includes Detroit. He drew praise and criticism alike for cutting the county debt by laying off workers and selling a financially hemorrhaging public hospital. An ardent supporter of Ronald Reagan’s, he switched parties 17 months ago, calling the G.O.P. the true party of opportunity.

Although Lucas has unveiled an ambitious tax-cut proposal, Incumbent Democrat James Blanchard has ridden the state’s economic resurgence to a 2-to-l lead. Blanchard boasts of cutting the state’s unemployment in half and of erasing Michigan’s $1.7 billion debt. He has won support from farm and business interests, moderate Republicans and the majority of blacks, who make up 12% of the state’s electorate. The Governor has tried to handle the race issue carefully, realizing that some blacks support Lucas out of a sense of racial pride. “I can understand that feeling,” says Blanchard. “But I think to support a candidate who has changed his party to get ahead would send the wrong message–that the black vote can be manipulated by symbols instead of performance.”

ALABAMA: Warring Democrats

It used to be that winning a Democratic primary in Alabama was tantamount to election. But this year the Democratic contest to replace four-term Governor George Wallace has produced such confusion, litigation and widespread disgust that it may lead to the election of the first Republican Governor since Reconstruction. Attorney General Charles Graddick beat Lieutenant Governor Bill Baxley by 8,756 votes in a primary runoff last June. But a three-judge panel threw out the results, ruling that Graddick, a one-time Republican, had illegally encouraged thousands of G.O.P. voters to cross party lines and cast ballots for him. Rather than hold another runoff, the party certified Baxley as the official nominee.

Since then, both candidates have remained on the stump while the case has ricocheted through the courts. Last week U.S. Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell turned down Graddick’s request for a second primary, and the matter is now before the full court. Although Graddick continues to campaign as a write-in candidate, he may eventually throw his support to G.O.P. Candidate Guy Hunt, a shy and unassuming businessman-farmer. Fed up by Democratic squabbling, Alabama drivers are sporting bumper stickers that read SEND ‘EM A MESSAGE! VOTE REPUBLICAN. That message could turn Southern politics upside down. –By Jacob V. Lamar Jr. Reported by Bonnie Angelo/New York and Richard Woodbury/Houston, with other bureaus