ASHCROFT AND CARNAHAN: PLENTY OF CONTRASTS

As Missourians have become aware recently that Mel Carnahan is the most pro-abortion governor ever, a sharp divide has become apparent on that issue between the governor and his U.S. Senate-race opponent next year, John Ashcroft. While incumbent Ashcroft is solidly pro-life, Carnahan is so unswervingly pro-choice that he routinely vetoes even measures banning partial-birth infanticide. This sets Carnahan apart from even other pro-choice members of his party. As an example, U.S. House minority leader Richard Gephardt, though pro-choice generally, has voted for bills banning partial-birth abortion.

What is likely to become even more apparent over the next year's U.S. Senate campaign is how many other issues offer a sharp demarcation between the views of Ashcroft and the governor who wants to replace him. Let's discuss a few.

First take the general approach to government: Carnahan follows the Clinton model of a new government program for every perceived ill we face. Government is doing its job, Carnahan seems to believe, if he has persuaded that year's session of the General Assembly to pass a new government program. This governor boasts of a host of new government programs enacted during his tenure: Expanding Medicaid benefits to families earning nearly $50,000 annually. Passing a grandiose, tax-increasing education reform plan called the Outstanding Schools Act his first year in office. Installing full-service health clinics in the public schools. Establishing early child care -- many would call it state-sponsored day care -- in the public schools.

Then there were the Carnahan proposals so liberal that even the Democrat-controlled Legislature gagged on them. In this category is the state-level version of the Clinton health care plan proposed by the governor in 1994 and rejected by lawmakers that same year.

There are many more such programs that could be named, but they have one feature in common: All tend in the direction of larger and larger government. This is borne out by the fact that the state budget is growing 7 percent a year under Carnahan, or roughly three times the rate of inflation. Even the Department of Social Services, at a time when we're reforming welfare and those rolls are shrinking, is growing its payroll. This year, Social Services payroll topped 10,000 employees for the first time ever.

By contrast, Ashcroft offers a conservative vision that, while repeatedly attacked by opponents as "extremist," is nevertheless one Missouri voters have repeatedly endorsed. (In his last two elections, the senator carried every county.) While Carnahan vigorously opposed last April's right-to-carry initiative, Ashcroft backed the measure that carried 104 counties, only to suffer a narrow (52-48) statewide defeat by losing in Missouri's urban areas.

Ashcroft is the author of that portion of the national welfare-reform bill permitting what has come to be known as charitable choice, or the practice of allowing religious or charitable institutions to deliver social services. What is Carnahan's position on this? For that matter, Ashcroft was through here last week speaking to the issue of preserving Social Security. Where does Missouri's governor stand on this?

Ashcroft has voted for sensible tort reform in our civil justice system. Among Carnahan's strongest backers, and it is reflected in his judicial appointments, are the personal-injury lawyers of the trial bar. We'd hope Missourians will be treated to a discussion of this issue over the next year.

And many more issues besides. Abortion is an important issue. Still, there is a host of other issues on which the two candidates are sharply divided. We hope the campaign will highlight many of these, the better to yield an informed choice next fall.