ustxtxb_obs_1989_11_10_50_00004-00000_000.pdf

income tax” into his campaign logo. “I think our fragile economy cannot withstand an income tax,” Mattox said. Mattox added that for many years Hobby has been talking. “behind the scenes” about a state income tax. So there you have it. Three variations on a single theme. This is not to suggest that Democratic candidates should embrace a state income tax as their campaign issue. In all likelihood it will not be considered until after 1991, when reapportionment is out of the way. But Bill Hobby has served an essential and important function. \(Aid as he departed he kicked the chair out from under Jim Mattox, offering a broad outline of a tax program to compare to Mattox’s lottery Hobby’s stature publicly advocated an income tax. Speaking as both the state’s most powerful elected official and a recognized leader in the business community, Hobby has made the future more approachable. His speech makes almost all of the most compelling arguments, except to note that unlike the sales tax, state income tax payments can be deducted from federal tax returns. \(We would also argue that with the introduction of an income tax, the sales tax should be reduced along with property The speech that Bill Hobby made on November 2 was an event of such historical significance that we have reprinted it in its entirety. Read it, perhaps in the spirit of an East German dissident, allowed at last to hear the truth, not from a coreligionary, but from the government itself. And then consider how unfortunate it is that this man’s name will not appear on the ballot in 1990. L.D. Politics of Choice GOVERNOR BILL Clements must have been watching the news from Tallahassee. The Governor once promised to include legislation imposing new restrictions on abortion rights on the agenda of a special session. But Clements has backed off. And his decision not to include the abortion issue in any legislative special session has angered many of his New Right allies. The Florida debacle has put Clements, not to mention the Texas GOP’s current gubernatorial frontrunner Kent Hance, in a difficult spot. By now the political fate of Florida Governor Bob Martinez should be on the mind of every New Right politician in the country. An already wounded and weak Martinez had staked much of his political future on a special legislative session he called to impose restrictions on abortion rights. Martinez wanted to appear tough and change the public perception that he was weak and indecisive. The pressure was on. Every major news magazine and daily newspaper in the nation described the Tallahassee special session as the first major state-based abortion battle to follow the Supreme Court’s Webster decision a decision that allowed states more freedom in limiting access to abortion. And news magazines and dailies dutifully filled their news holes with stories of Martinez’s political defeat. The formula behind the special session that fizzled isn’t difficult to understand, State legislators cowered when confronted with highly organized populist opposition. Not only did pro-choice forces spend more than $100,000 on print and television media, they also managed to attract more than 10,000 marchers to the state capital for the largest demonstration ever witnessed in Tallahassee. Following the Florida session, the national political landscape began to shift, and George Bush’s holy alliance with the New Right appeared to spell trouble for him. Bush’s problems started when the U.S. House voted to allow the federal government to pay for abortions for poor women in cases of incest or rape. The 216-206 House vote was significant, since the House has never been as friendly to the pro-choice movement as has the Senate. Just last year, abortion rights supporters lost a similar House vote by 216-166. Bush would later back down from his initial suggestions that he intended to allow more liberal use of federal abortion funds, but not before he made it clear that abortionrights activists in a Southern capital and recent pressure from Congress were putting him in a jam. An unnamed Bush senior adviser, quoted in The New York Times, brought the President’s position on Congressional negotiations over abortion funds into focus. “I hate this issue,” the White House staff member said. The people who are making the difference now are not so much the revitalized old hands, but the recent converts, like a Republican woman in Virginia who voted for Douglas Wilder for governor because of his stance on abortion. The outcome of the Virginia election could hold an important lesson for Texas gubernatorial candidates. The campaign is noteworthy for at least two reasons. If elected, Wilder will be the first black ever elected governor in the United States. If he defeats his Republican opponent, J. Marshall Coleman, he will have done so with the support of a pro-choice constituency. Wilder has hammered at Coleman’s antiabortion positions while repeating his own pro-choice preferences and the issue has bolstered his standings. Even if Wilder does not win \(the election was held on the day the Observer gutsy strategy that by all accounts resulted in increased support at the polls. If a black can wage such a hard-fought and serious campaign in the cornerstone of the Old Confederacy, and do so as a strong pro-choice candidate, does that suggest that Texas Republicans are more vulnerable than they might have imagined? Both announced Democratic candidates, Ann Richards and Jim Mattox, are solidly pro-choice. Kent Hance favors severe restrictions on abortion. If Hance doesn’t start waffling on the issue, his Democratic opponent in the general election could use it against him. The implications for the Governor are even more immediate. Clements’s office denied that the Florida battle played a role in the decision not to include abortion restrictions on the agenda of any upcoming special session. But something changed Bill Clements’s thinking on the issue. What has changed the political climate is a modest political awakening brought forth, ironically, by Ronald Reagan. In returning more power to the states, Reagan shortened the distance between government and the individual. .It is now easier for voters to see public policy decisions as having a direct impact on their lives. In Florida, it is a shorter ride to Tallahassee than to Washington. Of course, the price for such new democracy has been too high. Strategies on how best to deal with the Supreme Court’s reversals of civil rights not to mention the loss of much-needed federal funds, and the devastation wrought by housing policies have yet to surface. But in Reagan’s third term, people seem to be issuing in an age of new responsibility. And many of these new movement converts are discovering that elected officials bend not only when treated well by high-priced lobbyists; genuine political movements that begin outside the system do make a difference. Movement politics are so circumscribed it would be premature to count on the changing tide in abortion rights to carry other issues with it. But what sets recent events apart from other resurgences in political activism is where the battle was fought and won. Politicians at the state level are much less insulated from public pressure. They are more responsive to constituent concerns and often less skilled at dodging voters who are genuinely committed to specific issues. What happened in Florida could provide some direction for the waging of political battles in Texas. A.F. 4 NOVEMBER 10, 1989