CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS : Wins in 14 States Fuel U.S. Term Limit Drive : Initiatives: Caps on congressional service have already prompted lawsuits. Backers hope for a constitutional amendment.

Energized by a 14-state sweep, proponents of congressional term limits Wednesday set their sights on a constitutional amendment that would allow them to skirt the legal questions imperiling their burgeoning movement.

Noting that most states embraced restrictions on officeholders by 2-1 margins Tuesday, triumphant leaders of the nationwide term limit drive claimed they have a “clear and unequivocal mandate” that demands an immediate response from Congress.

“This is a watershed election,” Cleta Mitchell, chair of the U.S. Term Limits Council, said Wednesday. “We demand that Congress honor the clear mandate of the people, and send a term limit constitutional amendment to the states for ratification within the first 100 days of the new Congress.”

In Florida, meanwhile, opponents filed a lawsuit in federal court Wednesday against that state’s newly approved term limit law, which passed with a whopping 77% of the vote.

And in California, term limit champions cautioned that their crusade to fundamentally reform the way Washington works is by no means finished.

“This is a milestone, but the battle is not won by any stretch of the imagination,” said former Los Angeles County Supervisor Pete Schabarum, a commander in the campaign to pass California’s Proposition 164. “We must keep the momentum going so people elsewhere will pick up the ball and run with it.”

At a briefing in Washington Wednesday, term limit boosters said the 14 measures received an average of 67% of the tally and a total of 20 million votes. They said the initiatives received more votes than President-elect Bill Clinton in each of the states where they were on the ballot--except Arkansas, where Clinton has been governor for 12 years.

Despite such impressive results, the election was not an unqualified success for term limit supporters. Clinton opposes the curbs, and several candidates who made them a cornerstone of their campaigns--including Republican U.S. Senate contenders Michael DeWine of Ohio and Terry Considine of Colorado--were defeated.

Moreover, there were at least 110 new members elected to the House Tuesday--marking the largest such turnover since 1948. Term limit critics say those results are powerful evidence that voters can already effect change if they simply get mad enough.

“To argue that we need term limits to drive people from office in a year when we’re getting all these new members strikes me as ludicrous,” said Gary Jacobson, a political scientist at UC San Diego.

Proponents, however, used other Election Day statistics to make their case. Despite the batch of new faces, 88% of those House incumbents who sought reelection won this year. This is proof, term limit backers say, that political careers should be legally capped.

“The voters can’t do it because the incumbents cheat,” said James K. Coyne III, president of the Virginia-based Americans to Limit Congressional Terms. He argued that politicians “exploit their power in office to advance their careers,” specifically with publicly financed mailings and campaign contributions from special-interest groups.

Gloomily confronting their multiple defeats Wednesday, opponents of congressional term limits comforted themselves with two possibilities. Some predicted that the new Democrat-led Congress--in a sudden burst of cooperation with the Democratic President--would overcome gridlock, calming voters and derailing the term limit train.

“Clearly, the voters were in a mood to make change,” said Rep. Vic Fazio (D-Sacramento), the most powerful member of the California congressional delegation. “Now, they will see a change with a tremendous influx of new members. With the president in sync with the Congress, maybe some of the pressure (for term limits) will go away.”

Other foes found solace in predictions that the U.S. Supreme Court will ultimately declare the curbs on officeholders unconstitutional.

Despite the public’s overwhelming fondness for term limits, many legal scholars on both ends of the ideological spectrum believe the new measures are probably illegal. Basing their views on a 1967 Supreme Court decision, experts argue that the exclusive qualifications for Congress--age, citizenship and residency--are set out in the U.S. Constitution and may not be altered or augmented by the states.

Term limit supporters respond that the Constitution permits states to regulate the “time, place and manner” of elections. That clause, they argue, gives states authority to limit the number of years a representative may serve.

But Gerald Gunther, a professor of constitutional law at Stanford University School of Law, called that argument “totally harebrained. That suggests term limits are a regulation of something other than one’s qualifications for office, and I don’t believe that is so.”

Gunther and other scholars say it is unlikely a court will rule on such a case until 1996 at the earliest. That is the year Colorado’s term limit law kicks in, and it marks the first time an incumbent’s career could actually be hurt by the restrictions.

Florida attorney Barry Richard, however, argues that harm to term limit states will begin immediately. On Wednesday, he filed a lawsuit making that claim.

“The day that a delegation from the 14 states that passed (term limits) shows up in Congress, they are short term. So they’re not going to have the influence of those coming from (other) states,” Richard said. He also said the law will “have a chilling effect on the willingness of people to run for those seats” because their tenure would be capped.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of two plaintiffs--a lobbyist who served in the state Legislature and the executive director of the Florida Press Assn. It alleges that Florida’s state ballot measure is unconstitutional because it “significantly diminishes plaintiffs’ voting and political rights” by depriving them of the freedom to cast ballots for lawmakers who would otherwise seek reelection.

Passage of the 14 laws Tuesday means that 175 members of the House--or 40% of the lawmakers--will be operating under the restrictions. That figure includes the delegation from Colorado, which became the first state to go for congressional term limits in 1990.

Coyne said there are at least 50 House members poised to introduce a term limit bill on the first day the new Congress convenes. But he expressed little optimism that the congressional leadership will move quickly to take up the constitutional amendment.

“I am afraid that the leadership of the U.S. Congress is going to continue to stonewall and oppose,” said Coyne, a former Republican congressman from Pennsylvania. “They’re going to try to hide, they’re going to obfuscate, they’re going to pretend that something else (such as campaign finance reform) will do what term limits would do.”

But Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands), the third-ranking Republican in the House, disagreed.

“I think this election is the beginning of a new kind of communication between the people and Congress,” said Lewis, who opposed Proposition 164 but said he would support a constitutional amendment on term limits. “I believe many members of Congress will respond to this message . . . If we don’t, I’m sure the voters will express their disappointment.”

If Congress does not act, term limit proponents vowed to press on. Leaders said drives are afoot in most states, and predicted that five--Nevada, Idaho, Utah, Oklahoma and Maine--would have a ballot proposal by 1994.

The measures passed vary in the length of terms they permit, from six to 12 years. In Missouri and Washington, the limits would not kick in until other states adopt similar curbs.

In California, House members are now restricted to three terms and Senators to two. There is no penalty for time served, so the earliest a California incumbent will be barred from serving is January, 1999.

In addition to California, Missouri, Washington, and Florida, the states that passed measures are Ohio, Nebraska, Montana, Arizona, Arkansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Michigan, Oregon and Wyoming.

How L.A. City Voted President

100% Precincts Reporting Votes % Bill Clinton(D) 595,203 63 George Bush* (R) 200,998 21 Ross Perot (I) 143,767 15 Andre Marrou (L) 3,307 0 Ron Daniels (P) 2,126 0 Howard Phillips (A) 972 0

U.S. Senate (Full Term)

100% Precincts Reporting Votes % Barbara Boxer (D) 578,988 63 Bruce Herschensohn (R) 279,722 30 Genevieve Torres (P) 28,992 3 Jerome McCready (A) 19,395 2 June R. Genis (L) 14,581 2

U.S. Senate (Part Term)

100% Precincts Reporting Votes % Dianne Feinstein (D) 619,942 68 John Seymour** (R) 234,946 26 Gerald Horne (P) 24,846 3 Richard B. Boddie (L) 15,501 2 Paul Meeuwenberg (A) 13,235 2