Seldom has the Law of Unintended Consequences demonstrated its awesome power as spectacularly as it is currently doing in California.
A hundred years ago, California’s liberals – self-styled “Progressives” led by Sen. Hiram Johnson – were outraged at the behavior of the state legislature, which they considered too obedient to the business interests of the day. So they amended the state constitution to provide for direct popular initiatives: laws, and even constitutional amendments, passed by the people of the state as a whole. These could be submitted to the electorate by the petition process, and they simply bypassed the state legislature.
For many years, however, the procedure was not often used. When it was, it wasn’t terribly successful. In recent decades, however, the shoe has shifted to the other foot. It is now conservatives who are furious at the legislature, which is solidly under Democratic control and serves as a lapdog for the state’s unions. So conservatives have begun submitting initiatives to the voters, and have had considerable success. The famous Proposition 13, which sharply limited real estate taxes, was one example; the more recent Proposition 209, which bans affirmative action in state schools, employment and contracts, is another. Neither of these measures could have gotten through the legislature in a thousand years, but both sailed home right over its head.
Now another famous Progressive reform is about to hit the liberals where it hurts. The original reformers thought it would be a great idea to provide in the constitution for the recall of the governor by a vote of the people, if he offended them sufficiently. Over the ensuing century, this has been tried repeatedly, but has never succeeded – largely because of the huge number of registered voters who must sign the recall petition. Now, at last, it appears possible that the axe may fall on California’s lackluster liberal governor, Gray Davis.
Davis first got in trouble when a botched deregulation of electricity threatened to leave the state without power. A few blackouts underlined the point, and Davis made frantic efforts to buy out-of-state electricity at exorbitant rates – contracts he is now trying to wiggle out of. Then, in his successful campaign for re-election, Davis painted a rosy picture of California’s economy. Only after he was safely sworn in again did he mention the little matter of a $38 billion deficit, which would somehow have to be made up. The legislature has been gridlocked ever since, with the Republicans refusing to raise taxes and the Democrats refusing to cut spending. Davis has proposed a budget that uses tax increases to make up about a third of the deficit, and cuts spending to make up the rest. This, of course, pleases no one.
At first, the idea of a recall petition seemed the usual pipe dream, because 900,000 valid signatures of registered voters were required and, in California, paid circulators are almost essential. But Republican Congressman Darryl Issa suddenly put several hundred thousand of his own dollars behind the drive, and it took off. Now it seems very likely to succeed, and the politicians in Sacramento are looking at each other with a wild surmise.
If a majority of the voters indicate that they want to remove Davis (and 51 percent do, in a recent poll, vs. 43 percent who don’t), a second question on the ballot will ask them to choose a successor from among those who have met the relatively easy requirements for appearing there. The list is therefore likely to be long, and to include all sorts of possibilities, from Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger to Democratic Sen. Diane Feinstein. With such a big field, the candidate with the largest number of votes, even if it’s only 15 percent of the total, will become governor of California.
This obviously has its disadvantages, but they have been there, unrepaired, ever since California’s liberals forced the recall system on the state a century ago. And there’s something a little refreshing about the voters having the power to throw their governor out on his ear if they feel like it. If Gray Davis had known this was going to happen, he might have behaved differently.
