Politicians Doing the Sacramento Shuffle

By Paul Pringle

May 14, 2006 12 AM PT

Times Staff Writer

An old rule holds that the ambitious politician moves up or out.

But the ripple effects of term limits have complicated things in California. Several of the state’s most veteran elected officials, all Democrats, are running sideways or perhaps even down -- anywhere but out of public life.

A former governor is campaigning for attorney general. The attorney general is stumping for treasurer. The lieutenant governor is vying for insurance commissioner. The insurance commissioner wants the lieutenant governor’s job.

“It’s the term-limits shuffle,” said Tom Hogen-Esch, a Cal State Northridge political science professor.

Jerry Brown, governor from 1975 to 1983, agrees. Being termed out as Oakland mayor, he wants to return to Sacramento in a position humbly below his previous job there, replacing Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, who also is being termed out.

“If the idea was to create citizen politicians, term limits failed,” Brown said.

The man who co-wrote the 1990 term-limits initiative, Pete Schabarum, said he never foresaw the musical chairs game.

“I erred in not being a little more definitive in my authorship of the language to eliminate this kind of nonsense: shopping around for one job after another,” he said.

Schabarum himself embraced term limits belatedly; the Republican first spent 19 years as a Los Angeles County supervisor, an office that term limits now cover.

He said he regrets his long service. “I keep asking myself why I ran at all,” said Schabarum, who pleaded no contest in 1997 after being accused of misusing money from a nonprofit foundation.

The limits restrict Assembly members to three two-year terms, and state senators to two four-year stints. California’s eight statewide elected officials also are prohibited from serving more than two four-year terms. The limits do not apply to federal offices.

In the June primary, Lockyer and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante -- both of whom had been termed out of the Legislature -- would appear to be trading down from their current posts, though neither acknowledged as much.

“After the governor, the treasurer is the office with the greatest potential impact on the widest number of people,” Lockyer said.

He had considered trying to move up to governor but decided that the “partisanship” of such a campaign would be “excessive” -- plus, he didn’t have the money.

Bustamante attempted to move up in the 2003 recall election but lost to Arnold Schwarzenegger. The lieutenant governor said he doesn’t view insurance commissioner as a lesser station.

“I thought of treasurer, I thought of controller,” he said. “It may be down-ticket on the ballot, but the position of insurance commissioner is a substantial position. It is a very important guardian, a watchdog.”

The sitting commissioner, John Garamendi, could hang around for another term. He eyes Bustamante’s job as a promotion, at least as a platform to speak out on issues.

“It has the second-best sound system in the state,” he said.

Like the other candidates, Garamendi opposes term limits for legislators. But he sees nothing wrong with capping statewide offices at eight years.

He served two terms as commissioner with an eight-year break in between. His initial tenure -- from 1991 to 1995 -- was exempt from term limits.

Garamendi tried to become governor in 1994 in his second shot at the top spot. Then he made the perfect lateral move four years ago by reclaiming the commissioner’s post. His campaign for lieutenant governor is his fifth for one of the statewide offices.

“It’s time for me to move on,” Garamendi said.

He means up -- but if salary is a measure, he might actually be moving down.

The lieutenant governorship pays $131,250, compared to $140,000 for insurance commissioner. Lockyer also would take a pay cut if elected treasurer, dropping to $140,000 from $148,750.

Not that it’s ever been about the money, the attorney general said.

“I love the work,” he added. “I turned down two jobs in big law firms, probably $1-million-a-year offers.”

The other candidates similarly rhapsodized about political toil.

“A wonderful, wonderful career,” said Garamendi.

“A noble profession,” Bustamante said.

The perks aren’t bad either, and they can’t easily be duplicated in the private sector, said Allan Hoffenblum, a Republican consultant based in Los Angeles.

“These are powerful positions,” he said. “You have a beautiful office, an entourage, a staff, free phones. It’s a very comfortable lifestyle.”

Hoffenblum and political analysts say that, in the term-limits era, performance in office -- a quality that voters ultimately judge -- is what separates the peripatetic public servant from the trough-hopping hack.

“It depends on the individual,” Hoffenblum said.

“People are getting pretty in-depth experience,” John Woolley, chairman of the UC Santa Barbara political science department, said of the June crop. “On balance, it seems to me not a bad thing.”

Before term limits, only a handful of politicians served more than two terms in any of the statewide offices. They included March Fong Eu, who was California secretary of state for 19 years, and Leo McCarthy, a three-term lieutenant governor.

Republican promoters of term limits found inspiration in Willie Brown, the Democrat who reigned as Assembly speaker from 1980 to 1995.

The last governor elected to a third term was Earl Warren, in 1950, and the last to try was Brown’s father, Pat Brown, who lost to Ronald Reagan in 1966.

The younger Brown remains eligible for two more terms as governor because the limits are not retroactive.

But he insists that the attorney general’s office has more appeal because it would allow him to achieve quicker results through indictments, lawsuits and injunctions.

“The governor signs bills and proposes; the attorney general takes action,” he said.

And Brown already has sought to move even higher than governor, in three campaigns for president.

He likened his yo-yo trip through politics to that of John Quincy Adams, the sixth president who served in the U.S. House of Representatives after leaving the White House.

But Brown took care to remove the temptation to linger too long in his first elective office after departing Sacramento: Oakland mayor. He sponsored a city ceiling on the position of two four-year terms.

“I wanted to make sure I left on time,” he said.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Wanted: continued employment as elected officials

Four veteran officeholders are scrambling to land new jobs as term limits continue to shake up California politics:

John Garamendi, candidate for lieutenant governor

Insurance commissioner, 2003 to present, 1991-95

Candidate for governor, 1982, 1994

Jerry Brown, candidate for attorney general

Secretary of state, 1971-75

Governor, 1975-83

(Oakland mayor, 1999 to present)

Bill Lockyer, candidate for treasurer