CALIFORNIA ELECTIONS LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR : Abortion a Factor in Bergeson vs. McCarthy

SACRAMENTO —  State Sen. Marian Bergeson is the prim and proper product of a newly rich Newport Beach neighborhood. Her manner, typically, is modest and polite. She tends to deflect tough questions with a disarming smile and a short, fleeting answer.

At first glance, she seems like one to shrink from confrontation. But listen to what she has been saying about her opponent in the race for lieutenant governor, incumbent Leo T. McCarthy:

He’s a flip-flopper, a job-hopper, a coddler of the common crook. His anti-drug ballot measure is a sham and a gimmick meant to save his political skin. Now he’s hiding from her. He won’t come out and fight fair and square.

And all McCarthy wanted was one more term in what is perhaps the least powerful job in state government.

McCarthy has the name, the resources, the experience and the endorsements. He was Speaker of the state Assembly. He has run for statewide office four times in eight years.

The smart money also said Bergeson would lose the Republican primary to Sen. John Seymour of Anaheim. Seymour is back tending his state Senate district, wondering why his connections to U.S. Sen. Pete Wilson, his network of volunteers and his popular position on abortion failed to stop the Bergeson bandwagon.

Seymour said during the primary that the Republicans needed a tough fighter with the stomach to take on McCarthy. They got her. Bergeson, Wilson’s running mate, is the Republicans’ best hope of electing a woman to statewide office for 1990, which the experts have dubbed the year of the woman.

The campaign for lieutenant governor is often an afterthought for voters whose attention is split by the high-profile governor’s race and dozens of other political campaigns. California’s second-in-command is elected separately from the governor and has few duties under the state Constitution.

This year’s battle may have broader implications, particularly for the politically charged issue of abortion rights.

McCarthy supports the status quo: Adult women have the right to an abortion at any time during pregnancy, and the poor can have their abortions paid for by taxpayers through the Medi-Cal health insurance program. Bergeson opposes abortion except in cases of rape or incest and when considered necessary to save the life of the mother.

The difference between the two candidates could be crucial if the membership changes in the state Senate, where as presiding officer the lieutenant governor has the power to cast a tie-breaking vote. Currently, a majority of the 40-member upper house favors abortion rights and state funding for the procedure.

McCarthy, sensing that California voters side with abortion rights proponents, has labeled abortion the “most clearly defining issue” that divides the candidates.

Bergeson’s position on abortion also differs from Wilson, who generally supports a woman’s right to abortion. That split could prove problematic for Wilson because of the strong abortion rights stand taken by his Democratic rival, Dianne Feinstein.

Still, Wilson has welcomed Bergeson as his running mate. They have made numerous joint appearances, and Wilson has mentioned topics, such as education, on which he would employ Bergeson’s expertise. Although Feinstein and McCarthy are both from San Francisco, they are more distant. McCarthy said recently that he had not discussed his potential role in a Feinstein Administration with the candidate.

McCarthy is a statewide political figure in his own right. After six terms in the Assembly, including three as Speaker, he was elected lieutenant governor in 1982. Reelected in 1986, McCarthy ran against Wilson for the U.S. Senate in 1988 and lost. He has not ruled out another try for higher office.

Serving two terms under Republican Gov. George Deukmejian, McCarthy has had to struggle to stay in the limelight. He got some rare publicity as the state’s acting chief executive just after last year’s Bay Area earthquake, when Deukmejian was out of the country. Mostly, he has had to make his own way.

As lieutenant governor, McCarthy sponsored a legislative package that cracked down on negligent and abusive nursing home operators, and he pushed for stricter standards for the state’s air and drinking water.

Along with Controller Gray Davis, McCarthy used his position on the state Lands Commission to stop new oil drilling and exploration in state waters. After the Alaska oil spill, he and Davis co-sponsored legislation that led to the passage last month of a program to tax oil companies to pay for oil spill prevention and clean up. He has won the endorsement of the Sierra Club and League of Conservation Voters.

“I have taken a sleepy office and transformed it into something it never was before,” he said.

McCarthy’s latest endeavor is Proposition 133, an initiative on the Nov. 6 ballot that would increase the sales tax by a half-cent on the dollar to pay for anti-drug education, treatment and law enforcement. If approved by voters, the sales tax increase would be in effect for four years and raise $7.5 billion.

The measure has been endorsed by Feinstein, state schools Supt. Bill Honig, and virtually every law enforcement group in the state. Even Wilson said he may vote for it. But Bergeson opposes Proposition 133, calling it a “gimmick” to cover up McCarthy’s record on crime as a member of the Legislature.

“It’s a sham,” she said. “I find it ironic that Leo has come to the initiative process to fight crime. If he hadn’t fought every tough crime bill which came before him as Assembly Speaker, I firmly believe our streets would be safer today.”

Bergeson noted that McCarthy voted to decriminalize marijuana in 1975, he once voted to reduce sentences for first-time rapists, and he helped block passage of a bill to require life in prison for habitual sex offenders. McCarthy was Speaker when the Assembly Criminal Justice Committee, whose members he appointed, gained its reputation among conservatives as a “graveyard” for public safety bills.

McCarthy brushed off Bergeson’s criticism of his voting record, and his campaign provided a list of more than 100 bills he voted for that he considers tough on crime. He also noted that he has been endorsed by most of the state’s police officials and rank-and-file law enforcement groups.

“There is real irony in suggesting that smoking one marijuana cigarette is something we should be centering on in this election, with a couple (of) hundred thousand coke addicts in California, with Colombian drug networks setting up in Los Angeles,” McCarthy said. “There is a stupidity to being so out of focus on the drug epidemic.”

Bergeson, however, said the effort to decriminalize marijuana was not a trivial act. It sent a message that it was all right to use drugs, she said, and that attitude helped fuel the drug epidemic of the 1980s.

Bergeson has also attacked McCarthy for changing his position on two of the most emotional issues in politics: abortion and the death penalty. She said he did so only to enhance his chances for higher office.

Bergeson has always opposed abortion because, she said, she believes life begins at conception. McCarthy said he came to support abortion rights more than 15 years ago, although while Assembly Speaker he opposed public funding of abortions for poor women.

Both candidates support the death penalty, although McCarthy came to his position in 1985, long after the issue was settled by California voters. McCarthy, who twice co-authored legislation to abolish the death penalty, said he became convinced over the years that it did not make sense to enact tougher penalties for most violent crimes while allowing some murderers to be released in as little as 12 years.

“I changed my mind on it,” McCarthy said. “I’m as comfortable as one can be when trying to decide when to take a life.”

McCarthy, 60, and Bergeson, 65, served together in the Assembly a decade ago when McCarthy was the powerful Speaker and Bergeson was a quiet first-term member. Both came to state politics after years in local government--McCarthy as a San Francisco County supervisor and Bergeson as a Newport Beach school board member.

Bergeson has spent much of her legislative career--six years in the Assembly and six in the Senate--on matters of interest to schools and local government. On various issues, she has been at odds with the powerful California Teachers Assn. and the state’s trial lawyer lobby, experiences that helped turn her into a battle-toughened lawmaker. She once had a public shouting match with Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) on the Assembly floor.

“She hates to lose,” said Karen Coker, a lobbyist for the County Supervisors Assn. of California. “She throws a punch in a way that sometimes you don’t know you’ve been hit until you’ve been knocked out for good.”

Bergeson used that tenacity two years ago to help win enactment of legislation expanding state-paid prenatal care to 25,000 additional poor pregnant women--the kind of expensive program traditionally favored by Democrats.

Wendy Lazarus, vice president for policy of Los Angeles-based Children Now, credits Bergeson with having performed “damage control” to blunt the moves of the more conservative Deukmejian Administration.

“She’s really been a persistent advocate for health and nutrition programs for working women and their children,” Lazarus said. “She’s had the influence of a leader, brought some other people along on this.”

Bergeson is no liberal. In addition to her opposition to abortion, she has supported prayer in the schools and opposed efforts to prohibit discrimination against homosexuals. She was one of the few lawmakers who spoke out against divesting the state’s pension funds of stock in companies that do business in South Africa.

As chair of the Senate Local Government Committee, Bergeson has spoken of the need to form a state policy on growth management. Her critics say she failed to deliver.

“She talks the talk but doesn’t walk the walk,” said Paula Carrell, Sacramento lobbyist for the Sierra Club.

Environmentalists were especially frustrated when Bergeson helped kill a bill that would have stopped cities and counties from approving new development until they could ensure that financing existed for public works such as schools, roads, water and sewers. The measure was passed by the Assembly but died in Bergeson’s Senate committee, where she voted against it.

“On the one simple, straightforward bill presented to her, she went with the development industry--in spades,” Carrell said.

In an interview, Bergeson called the bill a “no-growth” measure. She said it would have left cities and counties open to court challenges whenever they approved a housing development over community opposition.

This campaign has been mainly a war of press releases and separate appearances. Bergeson has proposed a series of debates, but only one is scheduled, on a public television station in Orange County.

“I think McCarthy realizes that if he is put on the spot, he will lose,” said Ron Smith, Bergeson’s campaign consultant. “His whole strategy is to hide. I don’t think that’s an acceptable way to run for public office.”

McCarthy denied that he is avoiding Bergeson and said he would agree to a second debate with her in San Francisco.