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 No. 315 September 3, 1998 A FISCAL POLICY REPORT CARD ON AMERICA’S GOVERNORS: 1998
by Stephen Moore and Dean Stansel
Executive Summary
This report presents the findings of the Cato Institute’sfourth biennial fiscal policy report card on the nation’sgovernors. The grading mechanism is based on purely objec-tive measures of each governor’s fiscal performance. Thosegovernors with the most fiscally conservative records--thetax and budget cutters--receive the highest grades. Thosewho have increased spending and taxes the most receive thelowest grades.Two governors receive an A on our 1998 report card: Wil-liam Janklow of South Dakota and John Rowland of Connecticut.Three governors receive the grade of F: John Kitzhaber ofOregon, Lawton Chiles of Florida, and Mel Carnahan of Mis-souri.The governors of America’s most populous states and theirgrades are Pete Wilson of California, C; George W. Bush ofTexas, B; George Pataki of New York, B; Tom Ridge of Pennsyl-vania, B; Jim Edgar of Illinois, D; George Voinovich of Ohio,D; John Engler of Michigan, B; and Christine Todd Whitman ofNew Jersey, B.There has been a clear trend toward more spending at thestate level during the past two years. This year many gover-nors recommended budget increases of more than 7 percent,roughly three times the rate of inflation. Since 1996 statespending has grown roughly 50 percent faster than federal ex-penditures. Inflated budgets are now being promoted even byRepublican governors who came into office in 1994 and 1995promoting tax-cutting agendas. In our 1996 report we notedthat the governors had moved states in a pronounced fiscallyconservative direction. Now we are much less sanguine. _____________________________________________________________
Stephen Moore is director of fiscal policy studies at theCato Institute. Dean Stansel is a fiscal policy analyst atCato.
 
Introduction
Today, more than at any time in half a century, stategovernments in America are under the command of Republicans.Nowhere is the GOP’s ascendancy at the state level more evi-dent than in the party’s nearly two-to-one lead over theDemocrats in governorships. Thirty-two of the governors areRepublicans, 17 are Democrats, and one, Angus King of Maine,is an independent. Only 2 of the 10 most populous states,Florida and Georgia, have Democratic governors. That is adramatic shift in party control from 15 years ago when only22 governors were Republicans. Adding to the Democrats'woes at the state level is the fact that the GOP has stead-ily gained seats in state legislatures across the nation aswell. Since 1992 the Republicans have picked up nearly 500seats in the state legislatures and have gone from control-ling 27 percent of the state legislative houses to control-ling just under half of them.It is in this new era of Republican domination ofstatehouses that we provide the results of the Cato Insti-tute’s fourth biennial "Fiscal Policy Report Card on Amer-ica's Governors."
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The study is a comparative analysis ofthe budget and tax records of 46 governors. (Jane Hull ofArizona, Paul Cellucci of Massachusetts, and Jim Gilmore ofVirginia are not included because they assumed office toorecently for it to be possible to fully assess their rec-ords. Tony Knowles of Alaska is excluded because of peculi-arities in Alaska’s budget that make interstate tax compari-sons problematic.) The report card provides an index of thefiscal restraint imposed by each governor. Those who cuttaxes and spending the most receive the highest grades.Those who raised taxes and spending the most receive thepoorest grades.The grading mechanism is based on purely objectivemeasures of fiscal performance. With a few minor refine-ments in the grading system, the study is based on the pro-cedures developed in the previous three studies. All of thespending and tax data come from the Bureau of the Census,the National Association of State Budget Officers, the Na-tional Conference of State Legislatures, and individualstate budget and revenue departments.Table 1 presents the overall fiscal policy grades ofeach of the 46 governors. (More detailed tables are foundin Appendix A.) Two governors receive an A on our 1998 re-port card: William Janklow of South Dakota and John Rowlandof Connecticut. Three governors receive the grade of F:Page 2
 
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Table 1Overall Fiscal Policy Grades___________________________________________________________________________________OverallDateFiscalTookPolicyGovernorStateOfficeScoreGrade___________________________________________________________________________________William J. Janklow (R) South DakotaJan-9575AJohn G. Rowland (R)ConnecticutJan-9574AGeorge E. Pataki (R)New YorkJan-9570BGeorge W. Bush (R)TexasJan-9569BGary E. Johnson (R)New MexicoJan-9561BDavid M. Beasley (R)South CarolinaJan-9561BFob James Jr. (R) AlabamaJan-9559BPhilip E. Batt (R)IdahoJan-9559BJohn Engler (R)MichiganJan-9159BGary Locke (D)WashingtonJan-9758BJim Geringer (R)WyomingJan-9558BChristine T. Whitman (R)New JerseyJan-9457BTom Ridge (R)PennsylvaniaJan-9556BBill Graves (R)KansasJan-9556BDon Sundquist (R)TennesseeJan-9555BBenjamin J. Cayetano (D)HawaiiDec-9455BMike Huckabee (R)ArkansasJul-9652BFrank O'Bannon (D)IndianaJan-9751BBob Miller (D)NevadaJan-8951BPaul E. Patton (D)KentuckyDec-9549CKirk Fordice (R)MississippiJan-9249CParris N. Glendening (D)MarylandJan-9549CE. Benjamin Nelson (D)NebraskaJan-9148CMike Foster (R)LouisianaJan-9647CLincoln Almond (R)Rhode IslandJan-9547CJames B. Hunt Jr. (D) North CarolinaJan-9346CCecil Underwood (R) West VirginiaJan-9746CAngus S. King Jr. (I)MaineJan-9546CTommy G. Thompson (R)WisconsinJan-8745CArne H. Carlson (R)MinnesotaJan-9144CZell Miller (D)GeorgiaJan-9144CHoward Dean (D)VermontAug-9144CMichael O. Leavitt (R)UtahJan-9344CRoy Romer (D)ColoradoJan-8743CMarc Racicot (R)MontanaJan-9343CEdward T. Schafer (R)North DakotaDec-9242CPete Wilson (R)CaliforniaJan-9141CJeanne Shaheen (D)New HampshireJan-9741CFrank Keating (R)OklahomaJan-9540DTerry E. Branstad (R)IowaJan-8340DTom Carper (D)DelawareJan-9339DGeorge V. Voinovich (R)OhioJan-9139DJim Edgar (R)IllinoisJan-9138DMel Carnahan (D)MissouriJan-9335FLawton Chiles (D)FloridaJan-9132FJohn A. Kitzhaber (D)OregonJan-9527F________________________________________________________________________________
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