Democrats Let ‘Wedge’ Issue Slip Through

The odds on President Clinton winning reelection got a little longer last week because of what fellow Democrats did--or didn’t do--in a state Senate committee. Shown an escape route from a Republican ambush, they froze.

They rejected a GOP offer to let Californians vote on affirmative action at the March primary, when the inflammatory issue would be far less dangerous for Clinton and other Democratic candidates than in the November election.

Thank you very much, the Republicans said privately. Now they can tell the public with a straight face that it never was their goal to politicize affirmative action, to make it a “wedge” issue. The Democrats forced them into it.

Very soon, the apolitical academicians who drafted the proposed state constitutional amendment will begin raising $1 million to collect the 693,000 voter signatures needed to place it on the November ballot. Their main money source will be GOP contributors, who might not have kicked in for a March ballot measure, but clearly understand the value of a popular wedge issue in November.

The academicians wanted the Legislature to place the initiative on the March ballot because that would spare them fund raising and get the issue settled faster. GOP lawmakers reluctantly went along because politically they couldn’t oppose the legislation, which would forbid preferential treatment based on race or gender in public hiring, contracting and student admissions.

But white Democrats are paralyzed. They’re leery of the broad electorate, which so far overwhelmingly favors the initiative. But they want to avoid alienating minorities, especially their legislative colleagues; African Americans particularly are passionate defenders of race-based preferences.

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“We Democrats once again have shown the absolute ability to take a gun to our heads and blow our brains out,” says one California Clinton strategist, asking anonymity.

“Some feminists honestly think they can beat this thing. They think women will wake up and see it as a white male conspiracy. Somebody has got to say, ‘Get a life! This one’s over.’ We ought not to be talking about defeating it, but dealing with it.”

Dealing with it, specifically, by steering the measure to the primary ballot, where the parties won’t be competing. The initiative is likely to attract an unusually high turnout of white males, who tend to vote Republican.

Clinton’s reelection race will turn on many factors, including future events, the economy and his GOP opponent. A polarizing fall battle over affirmative action cannot beat him alone, but it would be a hazardous bump in the road certain to slow him down.

The President’s dilemma was illustrated by a recent statewide survey by the Times Poll.

Two-thirds of the voters favor the anti-affirmative action initiative, including a majority of Democrats. Although Clinton is more popular in California than elsewhere, his job performance here is approved by only a small plurality of voters. And those who do rate him positively favor the initiative by a large margin, so he would risk alienating his base by not supporting the measure.

Looked at another way, a plurality of voters who favor the initiative disapprove of the President. This is not a group he particularly wants voting, but it will have a special incentive to if the initiative is on the ballot.

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There’s no way Clinton can win reelection without again carrying California.

That’s why he will make the 18th trip of his presidency to the state next weekend. And it’s a reason he has been reviewing federal affirmative action programs, trying to find a happy middle ground.

But this is a losing issue for the President. Opposing race and gender preferences will anger minority leaders and feminists. And merely tinkering with the system probably won’t satisfy voters.

There is talk among some state Democrats, in the Senate and the party, of sponsoring a rival proposal that would add socioeconomic preferences to the present list. But Republicans aren’t interested and without their help, no measure can obtain the two-thirds legislative vote to get on the ballot.

There also is an attitude that the Legislature can wait all summer to place the initiative on the March ballot. But GOP acquiescence in that maneuver will fade as the party gears up for what it really wants--a November wedge issue.

It’s against this background, paradoxically, that Democrats on the Senate Governmental Organization Committee rejected a March-bound measure identical to the academicians’ initiative. “Democrats can’t break out of their psychological constraints,” says the legislative sponsor, Sen. Quentin L. Kopp (I-San Francisco).

They also often can’t hear the electorate.