Battle Shapes Up for Control of State GOP

Three months after suffering its most sweeping defeat in decades, a state Republican Party that is groping for its future faces another bruising battle.

As party delegates convene today in Sacramento, long-outnumbered moderates will mount a rare challenge to the conservatives who have held control for years.

With public teeth-gnashing as the backdrop, the party this weekend will also take the measure of several prospective presidential candidates hoping to curry support for the March 2000 primary.

Although that in theory could engender optimism--two Republicans, Texas Gov. George W. Bush and former Red Cross executive Elizabeth Dole, led Democratic front-runner Al Gore in a recent Times poll--it has paled next to the continued GOP fixation on what went wrong in November and what direction to take now.

“Where we go from here is to get back on message and be a party that gets the message out,” said John McGraw, the party vice chairman who hopes to fight off a moderate to win the chairmanship.

Asked what that message was, however, the usually optimistic McGraw turned rueful. “If I knew that, I’d be the most famous campaign person in the country,” he said.

Things have become so depressing in Republican circles that one senior GOP activist has taken to comparing their straits with the last days of the Vietnam War, when all anyone cared about was getting out alive.

“It’s kind of like the guys on top of the embassy in Vietnam, waiting for the last helicopter to take off,” the activist said. “Everyone’s waiting to grab on, hoping they aren’t going to miss it.”

At least one of the presidential prospects invited to Sacramento will try to draw the party’s attention away from its traditional squabbling over social issues.

“My message is going to be to . . . stop fighting about abortion and start focusing on education,” said Lamar Alexander, who as a former secretary of education believes he is best positioned to lead that charge. “This is the issue families sit around kitchen tables talking about.”

In November, on the heels of their worst statewide showing since 1958, a defeat that included a 20-point shellacking of gubernatorial nominee Dan Lungren at the hands of new Gov. Gray Davis, Republicans did what members of losing parties usually do--blame each other. The blame game may peak this weekend with the sharpest collision in years between GOP moderates and conservatives.

The factions have long been at each other’s throats, but remained in a queasy alliance as long as Republican Gov. Pete Wilson was the titular head of the party. Now leaderless, the two sides are free to flay away.

Moderates Hope to Start a Trend

Whether they win or lose, moderates will have a stronger presence in Sacramento than they have at past conventions simply because they are riled up about the party’s performance, analysts say. Essentially, moderates hope to form the leading edge of a national effort to wrest control from conservatives.

“The Republican Party is at a crossroads, and what happens at this convention will certainly send a message across the nation,” said Nicholas S. Bavaro, who is challenging McGraw for the chairmanship.

“If we don’t become an inclusive party, if we don’t sober up and pay attention to the real issues, we will . . . be the party of 35% [of the state’s voters],” he added. “We will be insignificant.”

Though voiced for years, those sentiments have rarely been backed by action. This year, however, Bavaro is battling McGraw and, for the vice chairmanship, moderate former Assemblyman Brooks Firestone is challenging attorney Shawn Steel.

As Alexander indicated, the ideological split here has centered on abortion. Political analysts have contended that the party’s stand against abortion rights has come to symbolize Republican intolerance in the minds of voters.

In truth, the split over abortion is only one difference in a party whose left and right flanks are separated by a vast gulf of disagreement.

In a Times poll taken in September, conservative Republicans opposed abortion rights by 47% to 39%. Among GOP moderates, 62% favored abortion rights and 21% were opposed. In the same poll, conservatives opposed a permanent ban on offshore oil drilling, 69%-21%, while moderates were evenly split on it. Historically, the two factions have also divided over handgun controls, affirmative action and the need for environmental regulation.

Conservatives argue that the problem is not their policies but their approach.

“We practice the politics of cowardice,” said Barbara Alby, a former assemblywoman and a California representative to the Republican National Committee. “We blame everyone else for not appealing to voters.

“The problem, once again, is us. It’s our stridency and our know-it-all presentation. And if we don’t find a way to show our heart, we will continue to have problems in elections.”

Unpopular Stands Have Cost Party

Although parties can bounce back quickly from defeat--state Democrats were trounced here as recently as 1994--Republicans also have to battle demographic trends.

The party’s backing of measures gutting affirmative action and curtailing benefits to illegal immigrants ravaged its support among minority voters. Its white male domination and anti-abortion stance hurt the GOP among women.

And even among the most loyal Republicans, a shrinking cadre of white men, attention has shifted to issues on which Democrats prevail.

Republican registration in California is 35% of the electorate, creeping downward from 39% in 1990. Although Democratic registration is also lagging, at 47% it still outnumbers that of Republicans. And independent voters, whose numbers are rising, have increasingly gravitated to the Democratic Party.

Those are trends that the party’s candidates in the 2000 presidential and U.S. Senate races will try to combat. Trying to make a good impression this weekend will be seven potential presidential contestants: former Vice President Dan Quayle, U.S. Sens. John McCain and Bob Smith, conservative activists Gary Bauer and Alan Keyes, publishing heir Steve Forbes and former Tennessee Gov. Alexander.

While presidential candidate and current Vice President Gore has already laid a strong foundation among California Democrats, none of the Republicans has matched him among GOP voters. Forbes is acknowledged as the only candidate with the financial resources to build an operation this far ahead of the primary, but he has yet to capitalize on that advantage.

Texas Gov. Bush--who like Elizabeth Dole was invited but will not attend the convention--has been entertaining California supporters in Austin but has yet to hire staff here. He is, however, accelerating his courtship of Republicans such as Assembly leader Rod Pacheco, who this week made the second of three scheduled trips to visit Bush.

Chairman candidate McGraw said that many California activists are content to remain unaligned until Bush decides whether to run. “He’s kept a lot of people on the sidelines,” he said.

The U.S. Senate race poses its own problems for Republicans. With only two statewide Republican officials having survived the November rout--Secretary of State Bill Jones and Insurance Commissioner Chuck Quackenbush--the party has a dearth of known candidates. Some members of Congress have already opted to stay put rather than challenge incumbent Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein, whom Republicans consider formidable.

“There aren’t a whole lot of serious people out there,” said one Republican consultant.