Dukakis Cancels Trip as Lt. Gov. Turns Mutinous

Gov. Michael S. Dukakis was supposed to be in Europe today, promoting business for Massachusetts. But he was forced to stay home by a mutinous Lt. Gov. Evelyn Murphy’s promise to take control of the state’s fiscal mess as soon as he left.

The Dukakis camp is now calling Murphy “Alexandra Haig,” and Murphy, running a distant third in the Democratic primary for governor, said Dukakis is acting “weird” by not letting her assert herself.

Dukakis angrily replied that Murphy is playing politics in her lagging bid to win the gubernatorial nomination.

Earlier, Murphy said: “I’ll put my proposals on the table if he continues on his trip. When I’m in charge, I’ll show you how I make some decisions.”

She did not make public any details of her fiscal plan.

“This is Alexandra Haig with Nixon’s secret plan,” Dukakis spokesman Stephen Crawford said.

He referred to then-Secretary of State Alexander M. Haig, who said he was in charge of the White House when President Ronald Reagan was wounded in an assassination attempt, and to former President Richard M. Nixon, who said during the 1968 presidential election that he had a plan to end the Vietnam War but never made it public.

A Dukakis Administration source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Murphy refused to provide the governor with details of her proposal when he asked her during a telephone conversation Wednesday afternoon.

Dukakis said of that conversation: “What I heard was a candidate who was trying to use this state’s fiscal situation for personal political gain.”

Murphy has been trailing her two Democratic opponents, Francis X. Bellotti and John Silber, who have tried to link her with the state’s fiscal collapse under the Dukakis Administration.