Pete Wilson and the "Adopt an Initiative" Strategy
When Pete Wilson sponsored his anti-welfare initiative in 1992, it was Wilson's own people who drafted it and managed the campaign. That loss, so closely linked to Wilson, was a loss of his own political clout as well. In 1994, Wilson changed tactics. Instead of launching his own initiative he waited and later "adopted" initiatives set in play by other, much more extreme political forces. The first was the "Three Strikes" crime bill and the second was Proposition 187 on immigration.
- Three
Strikes, You're Out - Wilson Changes His Mind.
The "Three Strikes, You're Out" initiative, Proposition 184, begun by the father of a young woman gunned down by a repeat criminal, called for an automatic life sentence for anyone convicted of a third felony - even when that felony is nonviolent (such as stealing a bike). The "Three Strikes" effort went from grassroots movement to national obsession following the 1994 murder of Polly Klaas, also at the hands of a repeat criminal.The "Three Strikes" measure was also launched as a bill in the Legislature. Republican Assemblyman Richard Rainey mounted a campaign for a more moderate alternative, which would have limited life sentences just to violent crimes. According to Marc Klaas, Polly's father, when he first met with Wilson at the Capitol, the Governor himself expressed concerns about the Reynolds approach and encouraged Klaas to look at the Rainey alternative. Wilson's thinking made a dramatic turn-around a short time later when his likely Democratic opponent, Kathleen Brown, endorsed the Reynolds proposal (in an effort to shore up her own image on the crime issue). Quickly, Wilson also endorsed the "Three Strikes" initiative, used his clout to block the Rainey alternative in the Legislature and made "Three Strikes" a centerpiece of his re-election effort.i The state GOP gave the YES on 184 effort more than $400,000.
- Proposition
187 - Wilson Puts Immigration on the Ballot.
Wilson's history with Proposition 187 is nearly identical. In the fall of 1993, three conservative immigration proposals surfaced as potential 1994 initiatives. Two of these were similar to Wilson-backed bills introduced in the Legislature, relatively moderate proposals such as requiring hospitals to make an account of undocumented immigrants served with public funds.The third, the "Save Our State" initiative (which later became Proposition 187), was far more extreme. It proposed excluding undocumented immigrants from public health care and undocumented immigrant children from California's public schools. Its backers came from the fringe of the anti-immigrant movement. SOS newsletters were peppered with overtly racist rhetoric such as, "Wake up and smell the refried beans."
By early 1994, the two moderate measures had folded, citing a lack of funds and public support. The SOS measure, however, persevered, pushed by a small band of conservative activists. The SOS campaign had all the signs of a half-baked effort destined to become a political footnote. The SOS campaign began its signature drive with $11,000. In mid-March, with less than six weeks to go, the campaign reported having collected just 150,000 signatures of the more than half million they would need to qualify for the November ballot.
With a month left to go, the California Republican Party made a decision to adopt "SOS" and assure its presence on the November ballot. The party rolled out a 200,000 piece fundraising mailing for the initiative and helped field an army of paid signature gatherers to finish the task of qualification. Shortly after, Wilson endorsed 187 and made it the core of his reelection effort. "It became almost hard to distinguish the YES on 187 campaign from the Pete Wilson campaign, " says Patrick J. McDonnell, who covered the immigration initiative for the Los Angeles Times.
- 1996
and Affirmative Action.
In 1996 Wilson is working the same strategy again, on the hot button issue of affirmative action. Once again, an extreme initiative was about to fall short of the signatures it needed to make the ballot. Once again Wilson and the GOP swooped in to save it, with more than $480,000 in contributions, because it served their partisan interests to do so. In a September conference call, which Wilson presumed to be private, the Governor asked business leaders to give generously to Proposition 209, as a way of boosting GOP Candidate Bob Dole's California Presidential campaign. Wilson said, "There is a real analogy between the experience two years ago in 1994 when I was seeking reelection and Proposition 187 was on the ballot."Wilson did not create the public emotions on crime, immigration or affirmative action, but he did fan those emotions for political gain. More importantly, the initiatives that Wilson adopted for political purposes were far more extreme than what Wilson himself had been advocating beforehand. Wilson apparently learned a political lesson from the 1992 defeat on his anti-welfare initiative. By not sponsoring his own initiatives from the start Wilson saved himself the political responsibility of guaranteeing their qualification. He also bought himself another six months to hedge his bets and see how political winds on the issue were blowing before he had to decide what to do.
The result is a dangerous political whirlpool in which extreme initiatives get adopted by mainstream leaders trying to capitalize on popular emotion. The public votes to send a message, but it is the detail of the law that Californians must live with, long, long after the politician involved has moved on to other ambitions.