Dukakis Wraps It Up by Taking California : Beats Jackson Easily in N.J.,2 Other States

Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis, the self-described marathoner, finally crossed the finish line Tuesday, winning the Democratic presidential nomination with overwhelming victories in California and New Jersey over the Rev. Jesse Jackson.

Shortly after the California polls closed, Dukakis had 2,119 delegates, according to an Associated Press tabulation, more than the 2,081 needed for the nomination. At stake were 109 delegates in New Jersey and 314 in California.

With 20.9% of the California precincts reporting, Dukakis led Jackson 63% to 32%. Dukakis beat Jackson by 65% to 31% in New Jersey. In two other primaries Tuesday, Dukakis defeated Jackson by 61% to 27% in New Mexico and 69% to 22% in Montana.

Needed 30 in State

Dukakis started the day with 1,889 delegates and all day his delegate trackers found converts among the uncommitted and those formally with other candidates. He needed fewer than 30 delegates in California to clinch the nomination, but he was expected to win more than 200.

Dukakis, who leads Vice President George Bush nationally in the polls, was already looking toward a bruising battle in the fall. He announced Tuesday that he would begin campaigning immediately and scheduled a swing through the South, which is considered his weakest area.

But, rather than attacking Bush, Dukakis indicated he will attempt to stick to the strategy he followed in the Democratic primaries, in which he rarely attacked his opponents but sought to tout his own record and theme of managerial competence.

‘A Better Future’

“Every day between now and November,” Dukakis said Tuesday night at his victory party at the Biltmore in Los Angeles, “we are going to tell the American people how we would build a better future for this country. They will not be interested in slashing attacks. They want to judge our positive ideas for change.”

He then listed the areas he would emphasize in an effort to contrast himself with Bush and with what he sees as the downside of the Reagan Administration. These areas included warning workers when factories are going to be shut down, helping people pay for health care and taking on the neighborhood problems of drugs, gangs and pollution.

For his part, Bush--whose California victory Tuesday was bunting for a victory he wrapped up long ago--could not wait to get at Dukakis.

“Tonight one chapter ends and the main race begins,” Bush told an overflow crowd of Republican faithful in the city of Orange. “I can’t wait to go out in the political arena and spell out the differences between this candidate and Michael Dukakis. . . . Now, tonight, this is the beginning of the real battle.”

In an earlier television interview, Bush also acknowledged he must move out of President Reagan’s shadow, which he has been trying to do by edging away from Administration policy on issues ranging from offshore oil drilling to negotiations with Panama’s strongman Manuel A. Noriega.

“I have to spell out my own identity, and when you’ve been a vice president and conducted yourself the way I have, I think there is a certain identity--people wondering what does George Bush feel passionately about, and I do feel passionately about peace and prosperity and education, so I’ll have plenty of chance to spell that out,” Bush said.

Jackson Congratulations

Jackson congratulated Dukakis on Tuesday night for clinching the Democratic nomination, and he repeated his contention that he deserves “serious consideration” to be Dukakis’ running mate.

“We’ll have to work together,” he said in an interview on ABC. “Michael Dukakis is due very special congratulations,” Jackson said.

Voter turnout in California was running at about 48% of registered voters, according to the secretary of state’s office, and if that held it would be the lowest in a presidential primary in the state since 43% came out in 1940.

Standing before Democratic activists Tuesday night in California, a state many believe he must win to triumph in November, the 54-year-old Dukakis basked in the success of a race that in retrospect seemed designed for him.

Set Records for Money

Dukakis, who ran in the Boston Marathon at age 17 and has been a careful, tenacious politician in the years since, set records for the amount of money raised by a Democratic nominee in the primary season--$19.5 million--and he used that cash to keep a steady course when he lost the Illinois primary and Michigan caucuses in March.

Long gone by Tuesday were the more flashy Democratic candidates such as Delaware Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. and former Colorado Sen. Gary Hart, both of whom quit the race months ago.

Also left in Dukakis’ wake were Tennessee Sen. Albert Gore Jr., the Southerner who was supposed to benefit from a push in the Democratic Party for a more moderate presidential nominee in 1988, and Missouri Rep. Richard A. Gephardt, who won the highly publicized Iowa caucuses but began to fade after a poor finish on Super Tuesday.

In a campaign dominated by the character issue, Dukakis benefited from his squeaky-clean image as a star student and leader of the movement that reformed Massachusetts politics in the 1960s.

Weathers Minor Scandal

He weathered one minor scandal in his campaign when his manager, John Sasso, admitted last fall that he had given reporters a tape that showed how much a Biden campaign speech resembled one given by British Labor Party leader Neil Kinnock.

Stories about Biden’s plagiarizing speeches and exaggerating his academic record eventually led to his withdrawal, a development that clearly benefited Dukakis because both shared the same Northeastern base and were fighting for many of the same liberal contributors.

Although what Sasso did was considered standard political hardball by many, Dukakis was upset because it smudged his reformer image and because Sasso at first denied to him that he had furnished the tape.

After some hesitation, Dukakis fired Sasso and then rebounded by naming a respected woman political operative, Susan Estrich, as his new manager.

Defied Wisdom

The governor also defied conventional wisdom in modern, media-driven quests for the presidency by winning the Democratic nomination without having the sharpest message in the field.

His call for “better jobs and better wages,” for efficiency in government and for obeying the law in foreign policy left many Democrats unexcited about him for months.

But by Tuesday that was changing as polls showed Dukakis leading Bush in a fall match-up, in part because Dukakis appears to be reclaiming some of the conservative and moderate Democrats who defected to Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984.

In the end, only Jackson was left to battle Dukakis for the Democratic nomination. And on Tuesday the Massachusetts governor continued his unruffled approach to Jackson, who said this week that he would battle Dukakis at the Democratic National Convention if the party platform does not declare South Africa a terrorist state.

“I don’t see the importance of labels here,” Dukakis said after insisting that he abhors South African apartheid as much as Jackson does.

‘Floor Fight or Two’

As for a fight at the convention in mid-July, Dukakis said: “We may have a floor fight or two . . . (but) I don’t see any great divisions within our party.”

If that turns out to be true, Dukakis will get a lot of the credit because he steadfastly refused to attack Jackson when the civil rights leader was slowing the Dukakis momentum in March.

And Dukakis has been conciliatory in California in recent weeks, even when Jackson was accusing him of being too cautious. Some said, in fact, that Jackson actually helped Dukakis erase some of his liberal image by accusing him repeatedly of being a conservative.

Although it has been clear for some time that Jackson was not going to win the nomination, on Tuesday he could note that he will wind up with more than 1,000 delegates, or three times what he won in 1984.

Political writer John Balzar contributed to this story.