Rep. Campbell Quickly Makes It Clear That He’s Not a Gingrich Clone

The glass on two of the four framed prints in Tom Campbell’s office is broken from the 3,000-mile move, but he hung them anyway. There is a suitcase full of dirty laundry on the floor across from his desk. And for several weeks now, he has been sleeping in the guest room at his mother-in-law’s house in suburban Arlington, Va.

As California’s newest congressman, sent to Washington after a special election in December, Campbell is hardly what one would call settled. But there is one thing he has wasted no time accomplishing in two months in Congress: blowing to smithereens any notion that he is a Newt Gingrich clone.

Just six days after stepping off the plane, Campbell took his place as one of only four Republicans to support President Clinton’s veto of a Republican welfare-reform bill. A devoted environmentalist, he also supported the president’s veto of a Republican-backed Interior Department spending bill he thought would be bad for the California desert.

And during last month’s State of the Union address, when the ever-feisty GOP freshmen had to be warned not to hiss at the president, Campbell once leaped to his feet in support of Clinton’s proposed $10,000 tuition tax credit and found himself the only member of his party standing.

“A true majority tolerates diversity; it does not insist upon orthodoxy,” the 43-year-old lawmaker said, borrowing from an eloquent speech made without notes Dec. 15 when he was sworn into office as the first GOP congressman to represent San Jose in more than 20 years.

The race to replace liberal veteran Rep. Norman Y. Mineta, who resigned his unexpired term last year to work for aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, grabbed national attention as Democrats sought to portray Campbell as Gingrich’s evil twin. It is a strategy expected to be widely used this fall in an attempt to dethrone the GOP.

Campbell’s handsome victory was seen by some as evidence that the House speaker’s unpopularity does not necessarily spell death for Republicans attempting to hang onto the majority they took 40 years to win.

And that may be the reason Campbell’s occasional defections will be quietly tolerated by an ironfisted leadership that has thus far expected obedience from the ranks, experts say.

“Tom Campbell turned around the perception that the 1996 congressional campaigns would be about Newt Gingrich and, for that, Newt Gingrich is a grateful man,” said Larry Sabato, professor of political science at the University of Virginia. “Campbell has more leeway to vote against Gingrich on the floor of the House than most.”

The GOP leadership certainly isn’t squawking.

“What? What about Tom Campbell?” a harried House Majority Leader Dick Armey said after abruptly shooing away reporters following a recent budget-strategy session. The budget he won’t talk about. Tom Campbell he will.

“Tom’s a great guy,” Armey gushes. “He’s a great economist. He’s 100% solid on economic issues. He’s in the moderate wing of the party on the social issues, but he’s a good person and I am proud to call him my friend.”

Campbell landed in Washington and walked straight into a budget war that twice shut down the government. Mother Nature followed up with the worst East Coast blizzard since the Depression.

Campbell has not had a minute to find a place to live. The last time he came to Congress--he served two terms and left to run unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in 1992--Campbell was sworn in wearing cuff links that belonged to his late father. This time he barely had a moment to throw his only blue suit in a valise.

“It was terribly fast,” the congressman said. “I had expected there to be a couple of weeks after the election, but the secretary of state certified it almost immediately and I got on a plane. I wanted to serve.”

His independent streak should have come as no surprise. Campbell’s previous stint in Congress, followed by two years as a state senator from Stanford, make him a known political commodity: pro-choice, pro-gun control, pro-environment, pro-business, conservative spender.

His most recognized attribute is his intellect. He earned simultaneous master’s and bachelor’s degrees in economics in record time from the University of Chicago, followed by a doctorate, a Harvard law degree, a clerkship for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Byron White and a post in the Reagan administration. He then became the youngest tenured professor at Stanford Law School and landed a seat in the House in 1988--all before his 36th birthday. The Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call named him one of the 10 brightest members of Congress in 1990.

His most noticeable characteristic is his soft-spoken demeanor. Former congressional staffers say he gets angry, but it’s hard to tell; his voice doesn’t rise and he never curses.

Still, former aides remember him frequently emerging from committee votes that tallied 40 to 1--Campbell being the one. He seems to be blazing the same trail this term, but the Congress he returned to in December is vastly different from the one he left in 1992.

Then, the House was dominated by Democrats. Now, Campbell’s party is in control. His phone calls get returned. He has access to the members who write the bills. And he may have come at precisely the time when his moderate views could pull some real sway.

“This isn’t six months ago when the GOP would crush anyone who disagreed. He’s coming at a time when Republicans feel a little chastened,” said Washington political analyst William Schneider. “They lost the budget fight. They realize they may have come too far, too fast, that they may have been too abrasive. Tom Campbell is interesting to them as a different face they could put on things.”

Already sensing considerable leverage possibilities, Campbell is envisioning a moderate Republican caucus, a group of potential swing votes not unlike Southern Democrats were in their party’s glory days.

“There were four Republicans who voted the way I did on welfare, but there may have been 40 who thought the way I did. I am beginning to think there were,” Campbell mused. “If we are cohesive, what could come of it is a force that has the ability to influence a broad range of issues.”

Meanwhile, Campbell has nine months left to accomplish something before he faces reelection in November. He is keeping his agenda short and simple: balance the budget in six years with no tax cuts; an antitrust exemption that allows health care providers to defect from HMOs when they disagree; and a federal mandate to keep armories open year-round to shelter homeless people--not exactly a GOP cause celebre.

Some experts see Campbell’s dual image of fiscal conservatism and social compassion as the sort of image the GOP might seek to promote if its tough-guy, storm-the-barricades approach fails at the polls in the fall.

“He has a long and distinguished record in moderate voting,” Sabato said. “If the Republicans decide they need to change tack, he could become one of the most important members of the House.”