NEWS ANALYSIS : Political Winds Driving Wilson's Shift to the Right : Politics: Making peace with GOP conservatives, the governor has changed in sync with public's mood.

By DAVE LESHER

Jan. 28, 1995 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SACRAMENTO — To chart Gov. Pete Wilson’s rightward trek across the political spectrum, a starting point might be in Anaheim at the state Republican Party convention nearly four years ago.

By that time, barely a year after his election to the Statehouse, Wilson had already set off an intraparty war with conservatives who dominated the GOP machinery.

The new governor had backed the largest tax increase in state history, chose a moderate successor to his former U.S. Senate seat, created a state agency for the environment, supported friendly Republican candidates to challenge his conservative critics from the Legislature, and championed his support for abortion rights.

So when Wilson spoke to his party’s most active members at the Anaheim convention in the fall of 1991, more than 50 protesters gathered outside to tar and feather the governor in effigy. And when the party gathered the next year, Wilson skipped the meeting and left his critics to relish his absence with a lapel button that asked: “Where’s Pete?”

Fast forward.

Today, less than four years later, many of those same antagonists are applauding their former nemesis. Instead of battling the party’s right wing, Wilson’s second inaugural speech this month was an eloquent and powerful recitation of the highest priorities on the conservative agenda--tax and welfare cuts, smaller government, personal responsibility, crime control and immigration.

“He spoke about what is right and what is wrong. I was very impressed,” said the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, head of the conservative Orange County-based Traditional Values Coalition. “I was made a believer that Pete Wilson is sincerely concerned about these basic family values.”

Wilson has always been a difficult subject for political categorization. And to many Wilson observers, the governor’s latest proposals are another demonstration of his reputation as the ultimate pragmatist--a savvy politician who has overcome a bland personality by knowing how to strike the right chord to satisfy the public’s ever-changing mood.

“This is a big change from the Pete Wilson who took office in 1991,” independent political pollster Mervin Field said. “What he’s saying now is a reaction to what (he considers) . . . a sea change in the mood of the American public in respect to the role of government in the lives of people.”

The changes have left Wilson entering his second term in a drastically different environment from the one he faced four years ago. Instead of a hostile Republican Party and a bad economy, the governor is riding a wave of GOP enthusiasm and economic opportunity.

“I almost want to suggest that while the stars seemed to be lined up against him in the first term, the stars seem to be lined up for him in the second,” GOP strategist Steven A. Merksamer said.

Washington political analyst William Schneider said: “I would argue that the most important achievement of his first four years was getting reelected despite all of the problems. That was a political miracle. In his second term, he wants to show that he can solve problems.”

In the coming week, Wilson will display his leadership skills at the National Governors Conference in Washington. He arrives as a seasoned veteran with an extensive record on most of the major topics to be discussed in Congress and by President Clinton--such as welfare, immigration and unfunded federal mandates.

And as Wilson’s national reputation grows, he is also likely to fuel speculation that he will run for President in 1996. The governor flatly dismissed the notion when he was campaigning for reelection last year, but since then he has not discouraged it.

“I think at this moment, he is not going to run,” said Ken Khachigian, a Wilson campaign adviser. “But I think he’s going to be ready for any opportunity.”

Wilson is making an effort to keep a prominent profile during his Washington visit by scheduling a news conference and a speech. The governor raised eyebrows among presidential strategists when his inaugural speech sounded like a review of all the national issues registering high in public opinion polls.

The road to prosperity in California that Wilson’s inaugural speech articulated was a supply side vision in which smaller government and lower taxes combine to fuel corporate expansion, economic health and trickle-down benefits.

The governor’s proposals included a state income tax cut for the middle class, a call for business-friendly government regulations, a crackdown on violent criminals and a lecture about personal responsibility and economic reality for welfare recipients.

On immigration, Wilson was already on the conservative team, hitching his 1994 campaign to the coattails of Proposition 187, the measure on hold in the courts that denies benefits to illegal immigrants. And a few weeks after his decisive November victory, the governor also indicated that he would back the next major conservative battle for social reform--a rollback of hiring preferences.

Wilson has not endorsed a proposed ballot initiative on the issue. Although he supported affirmative action goals as mayor of San Diego, the governor said recently that he believes they have served their purpose. Like the sponsors of the proposed initiative, Wilson said the laws grant unfair preferences to people based on race or gender.

So today, instead of challenging conservatives by calling presidential candidate Patrick Buchanan a racist--as Wilson did in 1992--the governor is now being accused of the same intolerance by civil rights leader Jesse Jackson.

Wilson’s staff rejects the premise that he has changed his place on the political spectrum, contending that he has always been a conservative legislator. The issues in his inaugural speech are not new for the governor, they say. He has proposed welfare cutbacks in every budget he has presented and he has a long record of attacking federal mandates and fighting excessive government regulations.

They also say that he was forced to make some controversial decisions in his first term--particularly raising taxes--because the state faced a dire financial problem.

“If one says that politics is the art of the possible, then Pete Wilson is the practitioner of the art,” Khachigian said. “He played with the cards that were dealt him in ’91 . . . (and now) the agenda is a lot more Republican and a lot more conservative oriented than it was. . . . Frankly, I think it’s one where Pete is much more comfortable. I’ve always felt Pete was more conservative than moderate.”

But independent political observers, such as Field, say the governor’s image has undergone an ideological transformation.

To Wilson’s credit, Field and others said, the governor has managed the shift smoothly whereas a sloppy politician might have been forced to defend a record as a flip-flopper. Wilson’s positions have evolved on several issues--notably taxes, immigration and affirmative action--but Field said the changes have been over time and they have largely been in sync with a public going through the same change of opinion.

“These are not such embarrassing things that come up when a politician on one day is swearing a certain rigid position and the next day it’s revealed he’s doing something else,” Field said. “These have been gradual changes as a result of conditions and . . . the changes he’s made are not ones where he is going against the tide of public opinion.”

Political analyst Sherry Bebitch Jeffe said: “I keep thinking, ‘How does he do it and why not Bill Clinton?’ I think part of it is . . . he has managed to build a record on those issues that resonate with the voters. The impression is that Bill Clinton jumps on bandwagons, Pete Wilson starts them.”