The Voters Are Restless in California

No one could call California voters mad as hell, but they’re sending unmistakable signals of restlessness. On the surface, last month’s state election results, with Vice President George Bush and Sen. Pete Wilson cruising to easy victories, represented a placid affirmation of the status quo.

On the November and June ballots though, California voters--who often signal subtle shifts in the national mood--displayed a widening distrust of both elected officials and entrenched interests.

This rancorous distrust was the common thread linking the stunning results on the major ballot initiatives Californians decided this year. It may now be the state’s dominant fact of political life. “There is no doubt people are not happy with the Legislature of the state, with the elected officials and with the way business is being conducted,” said Alan J. Quinlan, a Los Angeles-based pollster and aide to City Attorney James K. Hahn.

Voters registered doubts about corporate interests by rejecting well-funded initiative campaigns from the insurance, tobacco and oil industries, and instead approved cuts in auto insurance rates, a stiff new tax on cigarettes and a ban on drilling in the Pacific Palisades.

Voters recorded their suspicion of big money’s influence on state government by approving two competing campaign finance reform initiatives last June. A Los Angeles Times exit poll at the time found that California voters agreed, 5 to 1, that “campaign contributions from special-interest groups are corrupting the Legislature.” That attitude can only harden as the FBI investigation of alleged influence-peddling in Sacramento continues.

Finally, voters questioned the government’s ability to spend money wisely by picking through two initiatives from Superintendent of Public Instruction Bill Honig that would increase spending on education--perhaps the most popular thing done with taxpayers’ money. When Honig backed an initiative last June to leverage more money for schools by loosening the Proposition 13 limit on state spending, voters balked, fearing it would give legislators too much latitude. By 2-to-1, voters surveyed by The Times agreed that once the limit was raised, legislators will “use the money for whatever they want.” But voters narrowly approved Honig’s November proposal to protect education spending by guaranteeing schools a minimum percentage of the state budget. Unifying the split decision was the belief that legislators and the governor would not make the correct spending decisions.

In their hostility toward elected leaders, these results recall Proposition 13. But they encompass far more complex political impulses. Fueled by high inflation and economic anxiety, the late Howard Jarvis’ tax revolt was a howl of protest against government expansion. Tempered by the strong economy, today’s dissatisfaction seems less shrill, more sullen and complicated by hostility to powerful forces besides government. Though dubious about elected officials--particularly when it comes to spending money--voters do want government to confront other unresponsive interests. While California voters refused to license more state spending this year, they reaffirmed the state’s role in policing the workplace (by restoring, over Gov. George Deukmejian’s objections, the state occupational safety and health program) and carved out broad new state regulatory powers over the insurance industry.

Politicians and activists are only beginning to analyze the implications of these dissonant signals. Most immediately, the tobacco tax and auto insurance initiative victories are bound to bring more measures to the ballot in 1990. Voter Revolt, the group that pushed through Proposition 103, is already considering an initiative on health insurance. “The message is people need pocketbook reforms and if the Legislature is unwilling to bite the bullet, the people will write their own laws,” said Harvey Rosenfield, the group’s chairman.

That message should strike a responsive chord: Most analysts believe Proposition 103’s success reflected almost as much unhappiness with legislative inaction as with insurance industry action. The gridlock that now afflicts state government has been building for some time: As GOP strategist Steven A. Merksamer says, “Almost all major advances in state policy since the early 1970s have come through the initiative, not the legislative, process.”

Secure in their gerrymandered districts and fortified by non-stop fund raising, most legislators are now virtually immune to serious challenge--which leaves little incentive to cross such vengeful insiders as the insurance industry or the trial lawyers. “It is wrong when people are so secure in their offices that they can’t even be touched,” said GOP consultant Otto J. Bos. “Why should they make decisions that even rock the boat ever so slightly?” Deukmejian’s consistent reluctance to advance his own proposals hasn’t helped.

Rosenfield maintains voter unhappiness with Sacramento “has got to translate eventually into dissatisfaction with individual legislators.” But that’s not certain. For legislators, the overwhelming advantages of incumbency provide a breakwater against all but a tidal wave of voter discontent. Ironically, Proposition 73, the campaign-finance initiative that won the most votes last summer, may further help incumbents by limiting contributions without capping overall spending, which tends to lock in incumbents’ financial advantages. It also bans the financial transfers from legislative leaders that help fund most of the successful challenges.

In the near term, prospects for increasing the number of competitive races--an endangered species nationwide--aren’t terrific. After this year’s tussles over campaign-finance reform, another attempt to limit spending (and thus wipe out some of the enormous disadvantage challengers face) isn’t likely soon. Republicans are considering a ballot initiative to rewrite the rules for reapportionment--to impede gerrymanders by establishing criteria that guide the drawing of districts--but voters have never shown much interest in this arcane subject. The U.S. Supreme Court may set new guidelines if it agrees to hear the GOP’s challenge to the last Democratic-controlled reapportionment.

It’s more likely these stirrings of discontent will influence the 1990 statewide races, particularly the gubernatorial contest. Voter restiveness complicates both parties’ calculations. With polls showing a desire for more public services, many Democrats had hoped to accuse Deukmejian (should he seek reelection) of failing to spend enough on education, transportation and other programs to maintain California’s economic competitiveness. But that line of attack now seems a dead end. Though voters may want more services, they have demonstrated an intractable skepticism about government providing those service--even if given the money.

At the same time, this year’s initiative results underline the potential hazards in Deukmejian’s minimalist appeal. Deukmejian has based his career on holding the line against government activity. While the public debate centered on spending and taxes, his Reaganite intransigence served him well. But as the agenda shifts toward regulatory problems, Deukmejian--and the GOP generally--appears out of step, vulnerable on such issues as growth and environmental protection.

Insiders all, none of the candidates currently considered first-tier contenders for the governorship--Deukmejian or Senate Minority leader Ken Maddy for the GOP; Atty. Gen. John Van de Kamp, Controller Gray Davis or former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein for the Democrats--have the inclination or skills to explore the full measure of discontent bubbling in the electorate.

“There is really a profound sense of disgust . . . that government seems to be ineffectual in the face of things that really seem to be bugging people,” says Democratic strategist Richard Maullin. Given the mood and the field, it is difficult to envision a more conductive environment for an outsider candidate to challenge business-as-usual in the state--perhaps a non-politician, like Ronald Reagan, circa 1965.

Frustrated with government, leery of business, and increasingly disengaged from its leaders, the California electorate seems at once anxious for something new and unsure what that might be. Perhaps the overriding question for 1990 is whether a candidate emerges in either party who can focus that unease into a compelling program to “clean up the mess in Sacramento.”

DR, CATHERINE KANNER / for The Times