Wilson Vows to Put Tax Cut on State Ballot : Politics: Governor tells conservatives he will act if Legislature fails to pass 15% reduction. His slow recovery from throat surgery limits speechmaking.

Gov. Pete Wilson promised a leading national conservative organization Monday that he will place his controversial California tax-cut program on the November, 1996, ballot if the Legislature rejects it.

“It is my hope still and my intention to get the Legislature to go along with a tax cut,” Wilson said in an appearance before GOPAC, a Republican organization controlled by House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.). “If in fact they don’t, we can and will go to an initiative.”

Wilson has proposed 15% across-the-board reductions in state personal and corporate income taxes, but the measure’s prospects in the Legislature appear to be dwindling. In the past, Wilson has suggested that he might push a ballot initiative if the plan fails, but Monday was the first time that he firmly committed himself to such a fight.

Wilson’s comment, in response to a question from the audience, was one of the few things that he said during his unusual appearance before the group. Still recuperating from throat surgery last month, the governor had his speech read by Craig Fuller, his recently appointed campaign chairman.

“I am by doctor’s orders, temporarily I hope, two kinds of an oxymoron,” Wilson joked in a cracked and barely audible voice. “A non-speaking politician and a nondrinking Irishman.”

In fact, Wilson and his aides appeared deeply frustrated by his continuing inability to speak for himself. “This is very strange and very frustrating,” the governor said in an assessment seconded by some audience members as they left the room.

Gayle Wilson, the governor’s wife, told reporters that her husband’s recovery probably will take at least another two weeks. That would be about a month longer than Wilson’s doctor had estimated before the April 14 surgery.

Aides insisted that the governor’s slow recovery is not a sign that his condition is more serious than anticipated. Instead, they said, Wilson’s doctor attributed the continued irritation to a surgical procedure that was more extensive than expected.

Dr. Gerald Berke--the director of head and neck surgery at UCLA Medical Center, who performed the operation--told the governor’s aides Monday that Wilson’s condition required him to scrape more tissue from the vocal cords than he had expected in order to remove a nodule that had developed due to Wilson’s heavy speaking schedule.

Berke, who originally predicted that Wilson could give public speeches less than a week after his surgery, told the governor’s aides Monday that Wilson has inhibited his recovery by speaking regularly in private.

“Privately, he’s still the governor and he’s still continuing to do work and talk to staffers--so that is pushing his timetable for recovery back,” said Sean Walsh, the governor’s spokesman.

Dr. David M. Alessi, an otolaryngologist affiliated with Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, said it is not unusual for complete recovery from throat surgery to take a month. He said it would have been unlikely for Wilson to recover in the first week, as the governor’s office had announced he would.

“I would suspect, in hindsight, both he and his doctor wish they had not made that comment,” Alessi said Monday. “For somebody who has a moderate-sized nodule and who does what the governor does, that (longer recovery) is not unusual.”

Wilson aides said the governor is likely to break his no-talking regimen again today when he is supposed to give a 30-minute address to a House committee that is studying unfunded federal mandates. Wilson aides said a final decision on the governor’s attendance will be made this morning, but, if necessary, the state’s finance director is prepared to give the testimony.

Wilson is scheduled to formally announce his presidential candidacy in mid-May, aides say.

Wilson’s appearance before GOPAC was the opening stop on a three-day Eastern tour. The speech marked the first time that the governor had appeared on the same stage as his leading Republican rivals, and the event was broadcast nationwide on C-SPAN. But Wilson’s continuing throat problems drained much of the potential drama from the appearance.

He faced some sharp questions on his commitment to reduce taxes and on the risk that a successful presidential campaign would turn over the California governorship to Lt. Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat. But Wilson was only able to croak out short answers.

Still, he attempted to allay the conservative audience’s fears, endorsing federal tax cuts, promising the initiative fight on his state tax-cut plan and guaranteeing to pass another ballot initiative in 1996 requiring a special election for succession of a departing governor. “It will be on the ballot, (and) we know from polling it will pass 2 to 1,” he said. “I have never seen Californians or anyone else turn down the opportunity to create for themselves the opportunity to vote for anything.”

Dan Schnur, a Wilson spokesman, said the governor’s voice problems were unfortunate but not serious.

“Of course, it is preferable for him to deliver these messages himself, but it’s still several months before most people are going to be paying attention to campaign politics at all,” Schnur said. “So if it had to happen, this is the best time you could hope for.”

Wilson held a Monday night fund-raiser in Washington, where aides said he hoped to raise more than $400,000 for his presidential campaign. Another fund-raiser is scheduled for Wednesday in New York City.

In addition to testifying before Congress today, Wilson is scheduled to meet with Pennsylvania Gov. Thomas J. Ridge, a moderate Republican who, like Wilson, supports abortion rights and gun control.

Brownstein reported from Washington and Lesher from Sacramento.