The poker player; as a governor, Bruce Babbitt was not only smart, he was effective - includes related article on other state governments

Washington Monthly, Feb, 1988 by David Osborne

The Poker Player

As a governor, Bruce Babbit was not only smart, he was effective By David Osborne

Bruce Babbit has made his name nationally with a series of unique and politically risky stands on issues. But in Arizona where he was governor for nine years, he is known for making such ideas reality. Because he has trouble communicating on television, however, Babbit has been unable to project his greatest asset: his capacity to lead in office.

In Arizona, the name Bruce Babbit is virtually synonymous with the word leadership. A look at Babbit's years as governor tells a remarkable -- and remarkably unknown -- story. In the most conservative state in the union, in the fact of a Republican legislature and a fiercely antigovernment business community, Bruce Babbit transformed the very nature of the governorship. In the process, he forced Arizona to come to grips with the most basic issues clouding its future; its fragile environment, its substandard education system, and its inadequate social services.

To understand the Babbitt story, one must understand the context. When Babbitt assumed office in 1978, Arizona still embraced the frontier ethos in which the old Arizona had taken such pride. Arizona was the last of the contiguous 48 states to join the union, in 1912. By 1940 it had only 500,000 people, spread out in small, desert towns and over vast Indian reservations. But World War II brought military bases and defense plants, and the postwar boom brought air conditioning and air travel. Defense contractors and aerospace and electronics companies poured in, bringing an army of young engineers and technicians with their wives and their children. With their crew cuts and their conservatism, they transformed Arizona into a bastion of Sunbelt Republicanism.

But even as the Republicans cemented their control in the 1960s, rural legislators held onto the reins of seniority -- and thus power. In the 1950s Arizona declined to participate in the federal Interstate Highway System; in the 1960s it turned down Medicaid. State government was tiny, the governor a figurehead. And Arizonans had little truck with Washington.

The task of dragging Arizona into the modern era fell to Babbitt. He is a lanky scholarly type whose habitual slouch, thoughtful manner, and awkward style of speech hide an enormous drive. He has sandy hair, a lined face that has begun to sag, and large pale eyes. On a dais, when he tries to sound like a politician, his body stiffens and his eyes bulge. In a small group, when he is in his natural, analytic mode, Babbitt can be brilliant.

Despite his weakness as a public speaker, Babbitt captivated the Arizona electorate. (He was elected governor in 1978 with 52 percent of the vote and reelected four years later, during a recession, with 62 percent.) Summing up the Babbitt yeas, the Arizona Republic -- a conservative newspaper -- called him the "take-charge governor." In a comment echoed by many others, an environmental activist told me, "He is without a doubt the smartest, quickest elected official I have ever met." "Babbitt played it on the precipice," added a state senator. "He is constantly pushing this state forward, and he has an uncanny ability to pull it off."

"This guy called us dailyc

In addition to his brains and his daring, Babbitt was not hurt by his name. In Arizona, a Babbitt carries the status of a Kennedy in Massachusetts,a Rockefeller in New York, a Du Pont in Delaware. "The Babbitts came here in the 1800s," said Alfredo Gutierrez, until 1987 the minority leader in the state senate. "They built an immense empire in the state senate. "They built an immense empire in northern Arizona. There are Babbitt car dealerships, Babbitt department stores, Babbitt trading posts, Babbitt property managers, Babbitt everything. And they own an enormous amount of land."

A large Roman Catholic family, the Babbits were known for their commitment to the Flagstaff community. As a boy, Bruce was the "in-house genius" according toa childhood friend. In 1956, he was valedictorian of his class at Flagstaff High. He attended Notre Dame, where he served as student body president and studied geology -- his link to the grandeur of northern Arizona. From there he went to the University of Newcastle in England on a Marshall scholarship to study geophysics. But a summer project in Bolivia changed his life.

Babbitt went to Bolivia in 1961 on a research project with Gulf Oil. Ferried to and from a lavish base camp by company helicopter, he was struck by the contrast between the opulence of Gulf Oil and the poverty all around him. He decided he was more interested in people than rocks, more concerned with where the continent was going then where it had been.

He returned to the United States and enrolled in Harvard Law School, returning to South America during his summer vacations to work on a variety of social action projects. In 1965 he headed south for the civil rights march on Selma, then joined the War on Poverty as a field agent for the Office of Economic Opportunity in Texas.