Federal Term Limits: State's Grass-Roots Prairie Fire : Prop. 164: Concept of citizen legislators stirs fears that California will not have enough clout in Congress.

By PATT MORRISON

Oct. 4, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

Don’t think of Proposition 164, the measure that would place term limits on members of Congress, as an arcane campaign conducted among well-funded adversaries up in the media stratosphere.

Think of it instead as two people having dinner out and arguing hammer and tongs over whether to have a clock ticking on their state congressional delegation. The debate goes like this:

“For starters, it would put some real people in Congress for a change, like teachers and nurses, people in touch with real problems.”

“ Prop. 164 still wouldn’t change the fact that it costs at least half a million dollars to get elected to Congress. What teacher has that kind of money? And it doesn’t do anything to stop the lobbying or campaign financing that got us in this mess.”

“Those lobbyists won’t have so much influence if they can’t buy politicians once and for all.”

“Are you kidding? Lobbyists will be running the show because they’re there all the time.”

“Once California passes this, other states will too--term limits are on the ballot in 14 states. Colorado already went for it.”

“You think other states won’t be thrilled to vote theirs down and let California go ahead and hang itself? It’s unilateral disarmament.”

“These guys are career politicians!”

“ So what? You want someone who isn’t a career doctor giving you open-heart surgery? Look, we don’t need term limits. With the House bank scandal and all, more incumbents will be voted out this year than any year since 1946. You’re gonna see maybe 140 new members.”

“Yeah, but this is an oddball year. Two years ago, 96% of incumbents got reelected.”

“Everybody knows Congress needs reform, but just tossing out incumbents will make people think the problem is solved and it isn’t.”

“It’s sure a good place to start.”

“ You’re just being vindictive.”

“You’re just being self-serving.”

“ Check, please!”

Proposition 164 is one of those issues that stirs up people because it goes to the heart of a citizen-representative concept of government. It strives to put an end to the “career” in “career politician,” limiting California members of the House to three terms and senators to two.

Its bottom line: If Congress will not change, change the Congress.

California staged a dress rehearsal for this in 1990, when Proposition 140, imposing term limits on the state Legislature, passed despite the vigorous campaigning of Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) and Senate President Pro Tem David A. Roberti (D-Van Nuys), among others. That measure’s legality was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Some of the same forces, and some new ones, are at war over Proposition 164 and its consequences, leveraging voters’ anger at Congress against the fact that most people tell pollsters they hate Congress but like their own representative. Although many of its most vigorous supporters are conservatives such as former Los Angeles County Supervisor Pete Schabarum, who wrote Proposition 140, its appeal also reaches across the political band to Ralph Nader.

Republican Michael Huffington, a Santa Barbara millionaire running for Congress for the first time, gave $50,000--the biggest single contribution--to make sure Proposition 164 got on the ballot. And liberal Orange County academic Mark Petracca has written extensively in support of term limits.

“Term limits is like a prairie fire,” said Petracca, who says he meets people nationwide who are “really energized by government, probably in many cases for the first time”--and often out of anger.

Historically, citizens have a right--and politicians an obligation--to rotation in and out of office, he said. “Professionalism makes a lot of sense for what you do or what I do, for what doctors do,” but “the very nature of professionalization” interferes with what James Madison called ‘a sympathy of thought and a community of interest between the representatives and the represented.’ ”

Petracca, a professor of political science at UC Irvine, draws the line at the notion of term limits as the panacea for legislative reform. “I’m uncomfortable with the idea that term limits is the final word, but if it’s an effective first word, it could keep the (reform) conversation going.”

Huffington, who also supports a ban on lobbying and political action committees’ financing of campaigns, said he wrote his check because he believes that the nation was “supposed to have farmers, nurses, people from all walks of life going into government. It would be a Legislature that has contact with what’s going on in the world because they’d have to go back to the world.”

Supporters like the old-fashioned idea of citizen legislators--or are just so peeved with Congress that they would vote for anything that turns the place upside down.

Standing against Proposition 164 is another broad range of interests, from former Republican state Sen. Bill Campbell to Common Cause. The No on Proposition 164 ranks expanded last week when the California Taxpayers Assn. and the Los Angeles Taxpayers Assn. announced their opposition, joining the League of Women Voters, the Sierra Club, AFL-CIO, California Manufacturing Assn. and California Farm Bureau Federation.

“California taxpayers will be the big losers under Proposition 164,” said Los Angeles Taxpayers President Jay Curtis when the group announced its opposition. “We will be sending more and more tax dollars to Washington and getting even less in return because California’s representatives in Washington won’t have the clout to fight for our interests. Like it or not, chairmanships and other key committee assignments in Congress go only to senior members.”

Some congressional incumbents are understandably concerned about their jobs and believe that the initiative is wrongheaded--but are abashed about saying so.

Seven-term Rep. Robert T. Matsui (D-Sacramento) is a member of the heavy-hitting Ways and Means Committee. “One reason the (California) delegation isn’t into (denouncing) it is it’s so self-serving for us,” he said. “It’s almost embarrassing. People will say: ‘Of course, he’s trying to save his neck.’ We have no credibility in trying to be objective about this. If I go campaign against it, people are going to look at me and nod and say: ‘Um, sure, Bob.’ ”

He believes steadfastly that “politics should never be a part-time or temporary vocation. . . . The needs of government today are so critical and the issues so complex . . . there’s a learning curve” that defies six-year limits.

Citizens do not dislike career politicians in principle but “they are upset with the fact that we’re not getting anything done. The issues have to be separate,” Matsui said.

Term limits are on the ballot in 13 other states. (Nevada’s initiative was challenged and the state’s Supreme Court removed it from the ballot last month). If all 14 pass, term limits would govern up to a third of Congress and the results could be interpreted as a national referendum.

Proponents of term limits say such a sweeping victory would put pressure on Congress to allow debate on a constitutional amendment so that all states would be on an equal footing in Washington.

California’s measure was written to try to sidestep some of the legal tripwires and political objections that have been raised. Proposition 164 allows for write-ins. It is not a lifetime ban but a consecutive one. And even the longest-serving veterans start with a clean slate: The term limits clock does not start ticking until 1993.

Each side has been pleading poverty, but each expects an aggressive (read expensive and bare-knuckles) campaign running into the millions, as it did with Proposition 140, the state term limit initiative.

When a term limits initiative was on the Washington state ballot in November, 1991, opposition money flooded in from an unlikely alliance of powerful special interests and the measure was defeated--only to be resurrected for this fall’s ballot as the term limits bandwagon rolled onward.

Schabarum, who left the board of supervisors in 1991 and is stumping the state on behalf of Proposition 164, predicts that incumbents will spend money from their campaign funds to buy ads and mailers. “I know that’s what’s happening--it happened on 140,” he said.

In addition to Schabarum, the measure is being supported by People’s Advocate, the anti-tax watchdog group founded by the late Paul Gann. “We’re an independent committee, doing our thing, and he’s doing his thing,” said Ted Costs, head of the group.

Limit Congress, the group that grew out of Schabarum’s Proposition 140 effort, will soon launch radio ads, campaign coordinator Timothy Carey said. “Fund raising is really tough,” he said, because “anybody who does business with Congress isn’t gonna give money to throw out the guys they’ve bought and paid for.”

The campaign consultant for the anti-Proposition 164 committee, Californians Against Taxation Without Representation, says millions have not materialized on that side, either; the committee formed only last month.

“I would have liked more time; fund raising is just beginning,” Doug Jeffe said. “We’re obviously working against a difficult political climate. . . . (But) this is not an anti-term limits campaign--it’s anti-164.”

Some Proposition 164 opponents warn that a little reform could be a dangerous thing. It could be like trying to shorten a three-legged stool by removing one leg, when what is needed is not only term limits but a curtailment in special interests’ influence, and campaign financing reform.

Money follows incumbency and incumbency follows money; where to break in?

Kim Alexander is a policy analyst for Common Cause, which opposes Proposition 164. “It’s really important that voters make the distinction between the philosophical idea of term limits, and Proposition 164.”

She said “challengers are unable to compete with incumbents. The solution isn’t to remove incumbents--it’s to level the playing field,” by leavening the influence of money and special interests.

Term limits “idealizes the kind of candidate we can have,” Alexander said. Studies by Common Cause show that “the new politicians are going to be indebted to the same special interest groups that have always financed campaigns. The grass-roots candidates, the people raising $50 contributions--they don’t win in their primaries.”

For Petracca, “while I’m very active in (supporting) term limits, (the country needs) a larger look at what needs to be done to reform America. Most of the reasons people give for supporting term limits are wrong--they expect it will lead to smaller government, will throw the Democrats in Congress out of Washington (and) the third expectation is term limits as a silver bullet. They’re not a silver bullet to solve anything other than the lack of turnover.”

For some people, that has been enough. Carey of Limit Congress said: “Every day the House of Representatives helps our campaign just by being the House of Representatives.”

Fad or Prairie Fire?

Colorado has already adopted a 12-year term limit on its congressional delegation, and 14 other states have congressional term-limit measures on their ballots Nov. 3. Map shows the number of years that House members would be allowed to serve under each state proposal.

Arizona: 6

Arkansas: 6

California: 6

Florida: 8

Michigan: 6

Missouri: 8

Montana: 6

Nebraska: 8

North Dakota: 12

Ohio: 8

Oregon: 6

South Dakota: 12