Davis Waits for His Turn as ‘Governor’ : Politics: Lieutenant governor suffers the slings and arrows now. But he says he will ‘act accordingly’ when Wilson is out of the state campaigning for President.

In Gov. Pete Wilson’s suite of offices, some brash young staffers, their heads swollen by presidential campaign fever, deride the Democratic tenant in the small office down the hall as Lite Governor.

The insult is directed at Gray Davis. As lieutenant governor, Davis would become the governor if Wilson wins. But that if is big. In the interim, Davis has been forced to endure all the indignities that go with holding down a job that, by tradition and law, is the political equivalent of being the Maytag man.

Davis goes down the list of slights since he took office three months ago: Wilson told him in December that he needed the lieutenant governor’s quarters for his own staff. The office, though small, provides Davis with a choice corner in the Capitol and a view of lush Capitol Park.

Since then, Wilson has proposed cutting five of Davis’ 19 staff positions, dismantling one of the few important boards of which the lieutenant governor is a member, and, in the coup de grace, suggested an initiative gutting the powers of the lieutenant governor.

“I assumed he would take a more benign attitude toward me. Wrong. The missiles were launched,” Davis said. “If I were the governor contemplating a race for President, I would befriend the lieutenant governor. I do not understand this.”

What Davis does understand--better than most in Sacramento--is that as lieutenant governor, he may have the last word. If Wilson wins, Davis would move into the governor’s suite--unless Wilson can abolish the office of lieutenant governor first. At the minimum, Davis becomes acting governor whenever candidate Wilson is slogging through the snows of New Hampshire.

“Boring as it sounds, I am going to be responsible,” Davis said, sitting in the office from which he is being evicted. As acting governor, “I’m not going to be looking for ways to make his life miserable.”

Then again . . .

“There will be legislation coming down,” Davis said. “There will be other things that require action. I told him in December that if I feel strongly about a bill, I’m going to tell him about it in advance, and notwithstanding him being forewarned, if a bill comes down on my watch, I will act accordingly.”

When Wilson leaves California, Davis could sign and veto bills, issue executive orders and make appointments. Democrats hope he will, though they doubt that he will pull a Mike Curb. Curb is the record mogul who as Republican lieutenant governor promised to cooperate with Davis’ former boss, Gov. Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown, then gleefully grabbed for power when Brown left the state to run for President in 1979.

In those days, it was Davis who was the brash young aide to a governor making a heady run for the White House. Davis assumed that the lieutenant governor’s power was minimal, notwithstanding Article 5, Section 10 of the California Constitution, which states: “The lieutenant governor shall act as governor . . . during absence from the state . . . of the governor.” Davis recalls shrugging off the clause as “a throwback to the horse and buggy days.”

Then, Curb signed executive orders and named a Republican to a state Court of Appeal. Brown sued to permanently hobble the office of lieutenant governor. The California Supreme Court held that the provision “means what it says, and if you don’t like what it says, don’t leave the state,” Davis recalled.

For the past two decades, he notes, voters have been electing governors and lieutenant governors from opposing parties. In November, Davis points out, voters gave him nearly as many votes as they gave Wilson (4.4 million to Wilson’s 4.7 million), knowing they are in different parties.

“It’d be pretty arrogant to assume they don’t know what they are doing,” Davis said. “As the beneficiary of their largess, I would never suggest that.”

Joseph Graham Davis III entered electoral politics in 1974, taking on the powerful Jesse M. Unruh for state treasurer. Davis lost the primary, but emerged as Gov. Brown’s chief of staff. In that role, Davis was credited with placing Brown in the blue Plymouth, a symbol of the new governor’s fiscal austerity, and ran the governor’s office during Brown’s presidential forays.

Davis’ first election victory came in 1982, when he won an Assembly seat in the district that includes Beverly Hills. In two Assembly terms, Davis campaigned to place pictures of missing children on milk cartons, shopping bags and billboards. He used that recognition, and his prodigious fund-raising ability, to become state controller in 1986 and 1990.

Along the way, Davis made few friends among fellow politicians. In a line of work where driving ambition is a prerequisite, Davis’ elbows are among the sharpest. He solidified that reputation in his failed run for U.S. Senate in 1992, airing a shrill television spot comparing his Democratic primary opponent, Dianne Feinstein, to Leona Helmsley, the New York hotelier who was imprisoned for tax evasion.

Memories in politics can be short, however. In his race for lieutenant governor, Davis beat state Sen. Cathie Wright by more than 1 million votes. Just as telling, after spending $3.4 million on the race, Davis sits atop a $500,000 campaign war chest for any future quest--which, most observers assume, will be a run for governor in 1998.

Wilson’s aides may be wary of Davis. But publicly, they take Davis at his word.

“People did not tolerate it when Mike Curb tried to pull shenanigans, and they will not tolerate it if this lieutenant governor attempts to do the same,” said Wilson spokesman Sean Walsh.

As insurance, Wilson is threatening an initiative to change the Constitution so that there would be a special election to replace a governor who leaves office. Davis insists they have nothing to fear. At age 52, he has mellowed. He isn’t even putting up a fight over losing his corner office.

“It’s not that much fun being around here anyway,” Davis shrugged, preparing to move down the street from the Capitol. “You walk onto the first floor and there are these grimaces and stares from these 30-year-old hotdogs who think they are the second coming. I remember. I was one of those 30-year-old hotdogs.”