Wilson Under Fire : His Policies Get No Respect From the GOP Right : Politics: The ‘Caveman Caucus’ is a thorn in his side. How to remove it? Send a right-winger to Congress to make room for state moderates.

On the eve of last weekend’s bitterly divisive Republican State Convention, an adviser to Gov. Pete Wilson belittled the threat of anti-Wilson dissidence.

Of GOP conservatives, who are seething over Wilson’s support for higher taxes and his moderate stands on some social issues, the strategist scoffed to a reporter, “They are not players. . . . They are in this thing for their own glorification.”

Not players?

The past few weeks have shown that the ugly battles pitting Wilsonian moderates against the Republican right wing for the soul of their party--and helping to create California’s budget impasse and fueling two messy special elections--have spilled over into reapportionment.

Conservative Republican legislators are very definitely players. Their votes are needed to pass redistricting plans. Conversely, as one legislator put it, “A veto override is a compelling way for Republicans to express dissatisfaction with Wilson’s leadership.”

Still, no matter how the vendetta of reapportionment turns out, conservatives may wind up as unwitting pawns in Wilson’s game.

Despite his hard-line opposition, at some point in the process Wilson could move to blunt right-wing rage by “surrendering” to conservative demands for a set of favorable congressional lines. If you look closely, that’s not so bad for Wilson.

Or he could elect to dig in, railing against any and all “incumbent protection” plans--whether they favor conservatives or Democratic incumbents whose seats are threatened by demographic changes, or both. If reapportionment is lobbed to the courts, that’s not so bad for Wilson, either.

The seemingly arcane battle over how to redraw district lines to reflect demographic changes will determine the direction of California’s government and politics in the ‘90s. That has implications not only for public policy but for Wilson’s political future.

Wilson complained to Republican convention delegates that the Democrats had thwarted his anti-crime legislation and that movement on other issues he’s targeted has been too slow. That’s a setback for Wilson’s policy agenda. It also hurts Wilson’s ability to shape a legislative record on which to run for re- election in 1994 and to build momentum for a possible presidential bid in 1996.

The solution? A Republican-oriented reapportionment. But not any old GOP gerrymander. Wilson needs to remove obstructionist conservative legislators, particularly members of the Assembly’s “Caveman Caucus,” and replace them with moderates willing to do his legislative bidding. It would also would burnish Wilson’s national image if he could deliver a passel of new GOP votes to Congress.

How can Wilson accomplish that political double play? Well, to get rid of a thorn in your side, you remove it. And then, if California political history is a guide, you send the thorn and its allies to Congress.

That’s what Democratic Assembly Speaker Willie Brown did in the post-1980 reapportionment, when he signed off on congressional districts for then-Assemblyman Howard Berman, his former opponent, and Berman allies who could threaten Brown’s leadership.

Similarly, how congressional lines are drawn this year could break up the Caveman Caucus. That would hobble Wilson’s policy nemesis--and, perhaps, make potentially promoted Republican state legislators happy enough to vote to maintain a likely Democratic legislative majority. And that would make for happy Democrats--something right up there on the wish list of the current legislative leadership.

A politically savvy move, perhaps, but it won’t do much to moderate the state’s congressional delegation--a Wilson prerequisite from the start. In tandem with Wilson’s people, the White House lobbied hard against a plan, floated by conservative Rep. John T. Doolittle (R-Stockton), that would minimize Republican gains but shore up the districts of incumbent right-wingers.

So what? In the end, Wilson can’t deliver a record to run on from Washington. It has to come from Sacramento. As one cynic remarked, “If it comes down to a battle between Wilson’s interest in (moderate) congressional Republicans and the Legislature, Wilson will screw Congress if he can get legislative lines (he likes).”

That would put Wilson squarely on the side of Brown, a beleaguered right-wing target, and of Assembly Democrats whose programs have been annually thwarted by right-wing opposition.

But this “accommodation scenario” flies in the face of the highly charged partisan rhetoric whipping around the Capitol. Wilson has been firm in his angry pledge to veto any conservative--and/or Democratic--oriented plan. Brown has taunted the governor with bald Democratic gerrymanders and sweetheart deals certain to trigger a Wilson veto and a legal battle. What goes?

Can you say “court”?

It could very well be that, deep down in their gut, both Wilson and Brown are looking to the judiciary for their salvation. Trapped in an escalating game of political chicken, nobody involved is going to blink until ordered to do so--the game has gotten too public; there is too much face to be lost.

Each man may have other, very different reasons for risking judicial intervention.

It is not inconceivable that district lines drawn by a court dominated by Republican appointees and mandated by law to overturn discriminatory incumbent-protection schemes would produce a moderate Legislature and a congressional delegation acceptable to Wilson.

Nor would it break Brown’s heart, or that of Democratic incumbents whose tenure is threatened by redistricting, if a court date meant replaying the post-1970 reapportionment scenario. Late judicial intervention meant that there was not enough time to draw new lines before the next election. The state Supreme Court ordered lawmakers to run under the old lines--and went on to fashion a plan more favorable to Democrats than their own legislative art work.

Perhaps Brown is betting that lightning might strike twice--despite a more conservative judiciary. Or, more likely, if lawmakers run one more time in their old districts, Brown could protect Democratic legislative majorities until 1994, when the courts may order a new reapportionment plan, based on census data adjusted for urban and minority undercounts. That would be a boon to Democratic cartographers.

There is another judicial wild card in this reapportionment. Proposition 140 was born out of frustration with the perceived failure of reapportionment to foster responsive government. If its term limits survive court scrutiny, Prop. 140 could increase redistricting’s importance.

Regardless of how frequently individual officeholders change, it is reapportionment that defines what each district’s representation looks like over time. And unless there is a 1994 remap, the legislative lines that come out of this go-round will be the ones in place in 1996, when massive turnover may occur.

In the 1990s, reapportionment has become the political equivalent of bungee jumping. There are lines that, if structured properly, should protect incumbents from an electoral free fall. But sometimes these lines don’t--or can’t--do their job.

That’s what makes reapportionment, like other high-risk sports, so intense, so dreaded, so all-consuming for the pros. And so exhilarating for the victors--whomever the courts may rule them to be.