The End Justifies the Means

Sometimes I have to admire California’s mean and cynical brand of politics.

An example:

On Tuesday I attended a luncheon put on by Handgun Control Inc., an organization whose title perfectly describes its purpose. The two speakers, without intending it, raised the old question of ends and means: Does a good cause justify rough political tactics?

One of the speakers exemplified a good cause. She was Sarah Brady, wife of Jim Brady, the presidential press secretary who was badly wounded in the 1981 attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan. The other, from a grittier background, was Assemblyman Mike Roos of Los Angeles, friend of Speaker Willie Brown and a power in the lower house.

Sarah Brady and Mike Roos, two sides of politics--idealism and cynicism. As I watched them I could see how these qualities came together last year to pass an important gun control law.

Brady spoke first. She’s a warm, strong woman who’s been severely tested by life. Her husband’s injury, and her subsequent fight for gun control, has made her a symbol of fighting back.

She told how her husband had attained his dream, top of his profession, presidential press secretary. “That dream was shattered on a rainy afternoon by a single bullet from a Saturday night special,” she said. Before surgery, a doctor told her, “He’s been shot in the left temple . . . he may not live. He may be paralyzed.”

As always happens when I hear the Brady story, I thought of our youngest daughter, Jennifer, who suffered severe head injuries when a burglar beat her with a hammer in our home. She was three years into her long and ultimately successful recovery when Brady was shot. Watching television news stories about his extended rehabilitation had been both painful and inspiring. Our family knew the courage he needed.

We also were aware of the rage that the crime victim and family feels. Sarah Brady took this rage and directed it at a specific evil: The refusal of American government to pass laws to prevent criminals and the deranged from getting guns. She, and later her husband, spoke at press conferences and congressional hearings. The immensity of their tragedy could not be ignored. Their motives could not be cast as anything other than pure.

But idealism alone does not legislation make. In California, Sarah Brady and the other gun control supporters needed Mike Roos, and they were helped by the fact that Roos also needed them.

A few years before, he’d gotten tangled up with W. Patrick Moriarity, the fireworks king who was convicted of bribery and fraud after a political corruption investigation. Roos backed a Moriarity fireworks bill, and also got a 100% return on an investment in a Moriarity-owned condominium project. The scandal wounded Roos’ promising career.

Gun control offered an opportunity to shore up his image. Believing in the cause, he was welcomed by the gun control crowd.

When he began, chances were slim. The National Rifle Assn. had stepped up its tactic of bombarding legislators with phone calls, telegrams and letters from pro-assault association members.

The crucial moment was a vote in the Assembly Public Safety Committee. Roos, short a Democratic vote, decided to turn to freshman Assemblyman Charles W. Quackenbush of Saratoga, a Republican. Quackenbush represented a moderate Northern California district but was under heavy pressure from GOP conservative legislators to vote no. He and Roos made a deal. In exchange for some some small changes, Quackenbush agreed to vote aye in committee.

This is where cynicism and meanness came in. Aware of the old legislative joke that “I’m with you until the roll call,” Roos thought he’d better make sure his new ally didn’t switch.

“I took $15,000 of my campaign funds and we did a phone bank on Quackenbush,” Roos told the Regency Club audience. Every registered Republican in Quackenbush’s district was called during the day and urged to immediately phone the lawmaker’s office. Big contributors and other power players were given Quackenbush’s home--and car--phone numbers. So were any Republicans known to favor gun control.

It was cynical for Roos not to take a man at his word. It was mean of him to subject his colleague to such an intense telephonic siege. But the opposition, he would argue, had been playing cynical and mean politics for years, and winning.

The bill passed the committee. The measure would face other assaults before it was signed into law by Gov. George Deukmejian, but Quackenbush had cast the big vote. Does a good cause justify such tactics? Always.