By Abraham McLaughlin
Christian Science Monitor
Jan. 12, 2003
In politics, as in life, big crises make for big opportunities. Think of Abraham
Lincoln and Franklin Roosevelt. They dealt with grave crises and became two
of America's greatest presidents.
So it is with the nation's crop of 24 new governors, who are being inaugurated
this month. These rookie chief executives are taking office as their states
descend into the biggest fiscal troubles since World War II and the Great Depression.
The pitfalls for these newcomers are huge, far bigger than those faced by governors in the spend-easy 1990s. Yet the potential payoffs are big, too. If they preside over an economic rebound, they can sell themselves as saviors. And, as every governor knows, four of the past five presidents ascended from a statehouse to the White House.
Crafting a strategy
Already, many newcomers are learning the importance of thrifty, egalitarian gestures:
• In Massachusetts, Republican Gov. Mitt Romney won't accept a salary,
his way of helping with a $2 billion budget gap. And on Inauguration Day last
week, he served food to the homeless and coached basketball at a youth center,
making a pitch for volunteerism during tough economic times.
• Like many governors, Maine's John Baldacci, a Democrat, last week held
a low-key inaugural lunch, a casual barbecue that was a far cry from the 1995
black-tie dinner for Gov. Angus King, where guests feasted on 1,700 pounds of
salmon and one ton of shrimp.
• Maryland's Bob Ehrlich, a Republican, plans to sell the state's yacht,
plane, stadium skyboxes and other property to help deal with a $1.8 billion
budget gap.
Much of the governors' success depends, of course, on whether their economies recover, something over which they have little control. Yet it's often better "to come in at the bottom of an economic valley than to come in at the mountaintop," said Larry Sabato, a political scientist at the University of Virginia. Assuming the economy cycles upward, "They can run again as the person who saved the state."
In all, how these governors perform, and whether the economy rebounds, will help determine whether they become a group of mostly unpopular one-termers or presidential contenders. Sabato figures some will succeed.
"There's a near-guarantee that there's at least a president or two in there," he said, citing Gov. Romney; Gov.-elect Ehrlich; Arizona's Janet Napolitano, a Democrat; Oklahoma's Brad Henry, a Democrat; Minnesota's Tim Pawlenty, a Republican; Kansas' Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat; and Tennessee's Phil Bredesen, a Democrat, as potential political stars.
But first they'll have to weather a fiscal-political storm. States have already dealt with about $50 billion in budget gaps for this year. Next fiscal year, the shortfall could reach $85 billion.
And Uncle Sam hasn't done much to bail them out: In his economic-stimulus plan this week, President Bush offered states a total of $10 billion over 10 years. Also gone are most rainy-day funds that recently bailed out some states. Wisconsin's Jim Doyle, a Democrat, takes office with $201 in the state's rainy-day fund.
For many new governors, this may mean having to take the perilous path of raising taxes. Already, two fiscally conservative Republicans, veteran Govs. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas and John Rowland of Connecticut, have proposed major tax increases. So has Democrat Gov. Jim McGreevy of New Jersey.
But the special trouble for many of this year's rookies is that during their campaigns, they promised, or implied, that they wouldn't raise taxes. South Carolina Republican Mark Sanford even promised that he'd abolish the state income tax.
The other option, of course, is to cut spending. This can be done, but carefully.
'Dividing the pain'
"What will demonstrate leadership is dividing out the pain in a way that seems fair and equitable," said Tobe Berkovitz, a communications professor at Boston University. All in all, perhaps the biggest thing these rookies can count on is voters' low expectations of them, given the fiscal crises. In Michigan, Gov. Jennifer Granholm "is starting out with basically everyone feeling sorry for her," said political observer Bill Ballenger. "She's got nowhere to go but up."
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