The Party’s Over? : Government Loses in California

On Tuesday, San Jose voters elected a dead politician. The City Council candidate, who died last month, won 62% of the vote. What happened in San Jose captures the mood of Californians who bothered to vote in the primary.

Much has been written about the record-low turnout, the historic rejection of all the bond issues, the mean-spirited electorate and nasty campaigns. But what do Tuesday’s results portend for California’s government and politics?

Elections are driven by who turns out to vote. According to The Times exit polling, the electorate that showed up Tuesday was largely composed of the classic high-propensity voter: older, white and more affluent. They don’t like politicians; they hate to spend taxpayer money. The disproportionate impact of this group has been increasing for some time. But never has the erosion of the electorate accelerated so quickly and seldom has it hit with such traumatic repercussions as it did last Tuesday.

One reason voters didn’t show up was that they didn’t see any big choices to be made. The major parties’ nominations for governor and U.S. senator appeared to have been decided. Only the margin of victory remained in doubt.

Lower-ballot races didn’t generate any heat, either. Candidates with money tend to target likely voters, which perpetuates the unrepresentative nature of the electorate. As one forlorn caller to a radio talk-show put it last week, “If you don’t pay attention to the people who haven’t voted, they won’t vote.”

This helps to explain the bond-issue massacre. Older, middle-class property owners whose opposition to spending and taxes is virtually an article of faith lined up to torpedo the bond proposals and the renter’s credit. Returns show that the earthquake bond did well in counties recently hit by quakes, but not in those where the ground has not moved.

Which points up a disturbing pattern in Tuesday’s balloting: self-interest appeared to outweigh any sense of the public good. That kind of voting behavior can only further destabilize an already balkanized commonwealth.

There are other elements of the voters’ across-the-board rejection of bond issues that raise questions of governance. For years, passage of bond issues was a virtual certainty. But in 1992, a $1-billion transit-bond issue, backed by Gov. Pete Wilson, failed. In November, 1990, 12 of 14 bond measures were defeated. And this year, polls taken after the Northridge earthquake clearly showed a voter preference for taxes over additional bonding authority to pay for repairs.

The good news is that voters seem to have figured out that financing government with bonds is no free lunch. They are beginning to understand that there are real costs to bond financing that come right out of taxpayers’ pockets.

The bad news is that there is little political will to finance public services by any other means.

One, voters don’t trust government. Period. Two, the recession and the changing nature of the state’s economy have made Californians more cautious about any spending--their own and their government’s. Three, politicians have learned the joys of taking refuge in delayed-payment bonds, yet another manifestation of the post-Prop. 140 political climate. With the term-limit clock running, politicians have little hesitation ordering up expenditures and leaving the bill for future generations.

There’s something else at work in the extraordinary defeat of the school bond. It reflects an older electorate detached from the public-school system. Along with the lackluster race for state schools’ chief, it may also reflect a perception among some Californians that state government is irrelevant, if not detrimental, to improving the quality of schools. These voters may see education as a local matter and choose to put their energy there.

But the over-arching message of the primary is the message of term limits, of Ross Perot, of elections and public-opinion polls over the past few years: Californians are frustrated and angered by a system of state government and politics they perceive as unaccountable and unresponsive. Last week, Californians displayed that anger and frustration by staying away.

The pros and pundits decry the California electorate as “disengaged.” Is it? Or is it re-engaged ? It may not be that Californians have lost their sense of community as much as the concept of community is undergoing redefinition. That offers both hope and a challenge to governance.

Californians may be turning away from participating in formal governmental, political and societal institutions. They may be refocusing their lives--and participation--around “communities,” which seem more meaningful and responsive. People are connecting with a generation, a church or the Internet. They are not connecting with institutions of government and politics that lack a clear relevance to their daily lives.

There’s a hint of that in the media’s coverage of Tuesday’s results. Election wrap-ups marked the political state of California: Wealth won. Latinos won. Crime fears won. The Christian right won. Gays won. Women won.

But what about California?