Troubled Democrats Losing Key Governors This Year

WASHINGTON (AP, Feb. 22) -- Georgia Gov. Zell Miller says he knew it was time to hang it up "when I counted the candles on my birthday cake and cringed."

The candle count was 65, and will grow by another with his birthday on Tuesday. That's 66 reasons, as Miller sees it, to join a class of long-serving Democratic governors heading off into the sunset -- and leaving the party's political horizons a little more bleak.

With more retirements still possible, the departing Class of '98 already includes Colorado Gov. Roy Romer, Florida Gov. Lawton Chiles, Nebraska Gov. Benjamin Nelson and Nevada Gov. Bob Miller. Their combined service totals more than 40 years.

"You can't replace these guys. You can't overstate what they mean to the party, politically and policy-wise," said Gov. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, one of the few rising stars in the Democratic gubernatorial ranks.

At least six Republican governors are leaving office, including 15-year veteran Gov. Terry Branstad of Iowa. But the problem runs deeper for Democrats, who are losing grasp of the nation's statehouses.

Implications for 2000 elections

Heading into the November elections, there are 32 Republican governors, 17 Democratic governors and one independent. The ratio of Republicans to Democrats has practically reversed itself in the last decade.

"Good grief, Chiles? Miller? Romer? These guys had tremendous experience and credibility, and it will be several years before Democrats develop guys who carry that kind of water," said Gov. David Beasley of South Carolina, chairman of the Republican Governors Association.

The departures could hurt Democrats in 2000, because governors traditionally form key political bases for presidential candidates. Florida, Georgia and Colorado are particularly important presidential states, and Democrats have no guarantees of holding any of those gubernatorial seats.

"When a presidential candidate and governor are from the same party, it's an election-year advantage," said Ralph Whitehead, who has worked on Democratic campaigns from his home state of Massachusetts.

"This makes the mayors more important," said a senior adviser to Vice President Al Gore, who has cultivated relationships with the largely Democratic field of big-city mayors.

Georgia's Miller said the departures underscore the need to field more moderate Democrats in governors' races.

"I think the Democrats have got to realize that the days when people voted for candidates because they had a 'D' beside there name are gone with the wind, especially in the South," he said.

'Governors come and go'

Miller said political power is not the only thing at stake; Democrats are also losing the perspective of politicians born in the Depression and raised during a world war. "We've seen things nobody else has seen," he said.

The governors, gathered in Washington for the National Governors Association meeting, tried to play down the significance of their departures.

"That's a lot of years and a lot of experience, but I don't get too philosophical about it," said Florida's Chiles. "Life will go on, even for Democrats."

Romer, who is also general chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said: "These are very important persons, but governors come and go." Like the rest of the departing class, Romer was prohibited by state law from seeking another term.

"But even if I were not term-limited, I would say I need to move on anyhow," Romer said. "There is a certain freshness you need as governor and none of us need to be growing stale in office."

Miller and Chiles were considered two of the more colorful and populist governors in the nation. Typical of Miller was his aw-shucks assessment of the changeover: No big deal, he said, the departing governors are nothing but "old rats in a barn."

For continuous breaking news, see AP Newstream

Associated Press news material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium.

Sunday February 22, 1998

• Troubled Democrats Losing Key Governors This Year
• Lawyer Floats Idea of Lewinsky Defense Fund