DEFINING ISSUES IN AMERICAN POLITICS

A President or Governor can occasionally make or break a career on the basis of one preeminent initiative that becomes known as his or her legislative centerpiece. Ronald Reagan comes to mind. He staked pretty much everything on the across-the-board cuts in marginal income tax rates that he had promised in his 1980 campaign.

Recall summer, 1981, culminating in the August House vote that enacted the tax cuts. Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker declared that Reagan was shoving in all his chips in a "riverboat gamble" on tax cuts, as the tonic needed for an economy that had tumbled into deep recession six months after his inauguration.

The first Reagan tax rate cuts kicked in January, 1983. That very month, the American economy began an awesome boom, launching 96 straight months of economic growth and nearly 20 million net new jobs in the longest peacetime economic expansion in American history. The Gipper's bet scored big, as he: won 93 states in two elections; became the first President since Eisenhower to finish two terms; saw George Bush elected to succeed him, the first sitting VP to win the White House in 152 years; and departed Washington more popular than at his first inauguration.

Reagan has imitators today. Pledging a Reagan-style tax cut, New Jersey Gov. Christie Todd Whitman trailed by 21 points with five weeks to go in last fall's gubernatorial election, before pulling off a stunning upset over the heavily favored incumbent, Jim Florio. Her term will be made or broken on how well she carries out that pledge. As Gov. Whitman presses her case, she has already cut some taxes and is being widely mentioned for a vice presidential nomination.

For President Bill Clinton, the Big Enchilada is Health Care, Hillary Style. This President and his minions have staked everything on this fight, which is why you see them grimly slogging on, even as public support for HillaryCare has fallen to an all-time low of 38 percent, with a majority opposed (this week's CNN poll).

And what of Missouri's current Governor? Does he have one defining initiative? I could be wrong, but I'd wager Mel Carnahan would agree with me: his term will be made or broken on the reputation of Senate Bill 380, his 1993 education centerpiece. If SB 380 -- with $350 million in higher taxes -- is seen to be just what the doctor ordered for Missouri education, then Mel Carnahan will deserve the credit. If, on the other hand, SB 380 is seen to have been a bummer, then well, draw your own conclusions.

Mel Carnahan helped conceive SB 380. He fought for it. In an impressive performance on behalf of a fatally flawed bill, this governor lobbied, horsetraded, persuaded, cajoled and twisted arms in Capitol hallways. Since SB 380's May 1993 passage, he has many times declared his pride in its enactment and pledged to campaign for any lawmaker who voted with him. No other initiative is quite as clearly and unmistakably his.

I belong to a group that believes SB 380 to have been one of the worst legislative enactments of my lifetime. Magnified by this year's SB 676, its first progeny, SB 380 dramatically eroded local control of schools, centralizing power in Jefferson City bureaucrats and an unelected state school board. It either did or did not enact a ghastly educational fad called Outcomes Based Education (OBE), depending on your source. But early indications are that SB 380 is, at the least, moving us toward OBE, and thus threatening to accelerate, still further, the already well-advanced dumbing down of American education.

Reform? Most objective observers agree: SB 380 was not nearly as good a reform bill as was 1991's Proposition B, the ill-fated education funding proposal Missouri voters slam-dunked, 2-1.

In January, standing at the rear of the Senate chamber on this year's first legislative day, I listened as President Pro Tem Jim Mathewson extolled the wonderful benefits of SB 380. Alongside me as the Pro Tem addressed the senate from the rostrum was one of the chamber's shrewdest Democrats. I whispered to him what a bummer SB 380 was. He whispered his confirmation: "Since it passed, every Democrat who has run in a special election -- where it became an issue -- has lost." (That unbroken string of Democratic SB 380 defeats continued in April's special elections.)

Last week, the Missouri Supreme Court added insult to injury. Without a dissenting vote, the court dismissed an appeal from a lower court ruling by Judge Byron Kinder, which formed the judicial pretext for SB 380, and for the state's largest-ever tax increase, which it contained. Without Judge Kinder's "order", SB 380 would never have been enacted. Throughout the winter and spring of 1993, Judge Kinder's "order" was cited by proponents as absolutely requiring passage of SB 380, a theme repeated so often as to resemble a mantra, lest we have a "judicial takeover of public schools."

Now, a unanimous Supreme Court has vindicated those of us who, during SB 380 floor debate, argued that Kinder's decision mandated no such action.

With election campaigns being waged across Missouri, this fall and two years hence, I wouldn't want to be in Mel Carnahan's shoes, having to defend this turkey.

Peter Kinder is associate publisher of the Southeast Missourian. He represents the 27th district in the Missouri Senate.