Back Off the Limb

Early this week, Gov. Pete Wilson threatened to kill the entire $68-billion state budget in a disagreement over details of a statewide performance test for California schoolchildren. One had nothing to do with the other. The money to administer the test is not even in the budget, but rather in separate pending legislation. So what was going on here? Pure power politics.

Wilson and any other governor uses the weight of the office to get concessions from the Legislature. However, the overall goal ought to be better and more responsive government, and that hardly characterizes Wilson’s approach in this matter.

Earlier in the budget struggle, before Monday’s final agreement by the Legislature, Wilson decided to repay a $1.36-billion debt to the state pension fund all at once, and he termed his action a “neutron bomb.” He was right, at least in his description. The unilateral action wiped out funding for all the new and expanded programs the Legislature had crafted over the previous seven months.

The budget was 42 days overdue on Tuesday when he made his veto threat. Perhaps realizing he was too far out on a political limb, the governor has now relented.

The Legislature exposed itself to this form of political blackmail by agreeing to negotiate a host of major issues with the governor before the budget was enacted. Even so, it’s an abuse of the governor’s veto power to use a threat in this fashion, especially when doing so would have prolonged the dreary 1997-98 budget spectacle.