February 8, 2007
By DAWSON BELL
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER
LANSING
Twenty-four years later, the tax revolt bloodbath of 1983 isn't a fading memory. That's when then-Gov. James Blanchard proposed an income tax hike in response to a state budget crisis and saw his popularity plummet to levels President George W. Bush has recently inspired.
In the aftermath of its approval by Blanchard and a Democratic Legislature, a half million Michiganders signed recall petitions to remove Blanchard from office. He survived. But two state senators who voted for it didn't. They were recalled.
On Wednesday in Lansing, more than a few people, Democrats and Republicans, were wondering whether Gov. Jennifer Granholm's proposed sales tax increase would set up déjà vu.
Even before Granholm unveiled her plan -- a day earlier than planned after it leaked to the media -- groups on the anti-tax right were forming to assail it; the governor mentioned them, she called them the "naysayers," in her State of the Union address.
Macomb County Commissioner Leon Drolet, a former Republican legislator, is heading up a group called Michigan Taxpayers Alliance that formed in recent months to fight tax increases in the Legislature and, if that fails, at the ballot box.
Drolet said Wednesday that Granholm's proposal was "a sucker punch in the gut of Michigan."
Another group headed by another former state Rep. Matt Milosch has issued a series of attacks on Granholm's proposal (without knowing what it would be precisely).
Public opinion on the governor's ideas is likely to form more slowly. But Democrats recognize they could be in for a rough ride if, as in 1983, support and opposition falls almost exclusively along strict party lines.
"It's a very, very tough choice," said one Democratic insider who asked not to be identified, "but we have to get out there and help the electorate understand the choices. The marketing effort has to make this real for people."
Some Republicans said the size and scope of the governor's proposal ("a $1.5 billion tax on haircuts," is what they were calling it), which they said could jumpstart the political opposition.
The Democratic insider said Democrats and the governor concluded there was no point in raising taxes so incrementally they failed to address the longterm imbalance between state revenue and spending. "Our folks are comfortable with the notion that you have to go large or go home," the insider said.
One person intimately involved in the 1983 recalls, John Lauve, who organized the ultimately unsuccessful Blanchard effort, said he doubts the campaign will progress that far this time.
In 1983, he said, Republicans controlled neither the governor's office, the state House or Senate. Today, the GOP is a majority in the Senate and likely will prevent the tax hike from taking place, he said.
Besides, recalls are really hard to pull off in Michigan, Lauve said. "They put on all these extra layers to make sure nobody gets too close to the button," he said.
Drolet said he didn't know if sufficient anti-tax fervor could be generated to fuel a political backlash against tax supporters. But the notoriously droll Drolet said he was ready to play Clint Eastwood for supporters of the tax plan in the Legislature. "Lawmakers have to ask themselves: Do they feel lucky. Well, do they?".
Constitution Party of Michigan - www.ConstitutionPartyMI.net