Huckabee Had Rocky Times With Arkansas Republicans

David Sanders, Arkansas News Bureau in a recent article identified ways in which Gov. Mike Huckabee had 'Ups and Downs" and rocky times with the Republican Party:

The numerous out-of-town journalists who've dropped in have focused their on-the-ground assessments, justifiably so, on Huckabee's commutations, lavish gifts and scheme to supplement his income with money from a tobacco lobbyist. The conservative press continues to suffer apoplectic shock trying to figure out how the party of Reagan could possibly nominate a candidate whose populist rhetoric sounds more like John Edwards than the Gipper.)

In July of 1996, Huckabee entered the governor's office with high expectations. Arkansas had missed out on the rest of the South's Republican realignment during the 1980s. Republicans here thought Huckabee would lead their party into the political promised land. And why not? Most of Bill Clinton's political machine had moved to Washington. Of those who remained in Arkansas, politics took a back seat to more pressing matters. Special Prosecutor Ken Starr was busy investigating Whitewater and had accumulated an impressive list of convictions, which included the sitting Democratic Gov. Jim Guy Tucker. Of course the 1996 elections were said to have ushered in a new Republican era. Win Rockefeller was elected lieutenant governor, U.S. Rep. Tim Hutchinson was headed to the U.S. Senate (a first since Reconstruction), the 3rd and 4th District Congressional seats were Republican and the GOP increased its seat count in the state Legislature.

But Huckabee's relationship with the party faithful got off to a rocky start when he retained high-profile agency heads who worked in the Clinton and Tucker administrations. Despite cutting taxes in his first legislative session, Huckabee also embraced the ARKids First program, which was then the cornerstone of an agenda pushed by an advocacy group started years earlier by Hillary Clinton. Even then, some were concerned that Huckabee's conservative instincts didn't stretch beyond social issues. . . .

In 2000, Huckabee insisted on controlling the state party's separate Victory Committee, but the committee's finances were so poorly handled that a Federal Election Commission investigation resulted in the largest fine ever handed down by the FEC to a state party. That same year Republican Rep. Jay Dickey lost the 4th District seat he'd held for eight years.

In 2001, when conservative Republican lawmakers opposed a higher sales taxes and fees the governor supported, he began calling them "Shiites." Huckabee's positions on fiscal policy became indistinguishable from Democrats' positions. A year later, he openly campaigned against a ballot initiative to remove the sales tax on food and medicine. While he and Rockefeller won re-election in 2002, Sen. Tim Hutchinson didn't.

In 2003, Huckabee not only begged lawmakers for new taxes to make up a budget shortfall, but he rebuffed conservatives' (Republicans and a couple of Democrats) plan to cover the shortfall by tapping one-time money and cutting pork. In 2004, President Bush won re-election, but Huckabee campaigned for some Democrats - even some who had Republican opponents - and Republicans lost state legislative seats for the first time since 1990.

In 2005, a term-limited Huckabee frustrated conservatives when he pushed a bill to give in-state college tuition and scholarships to the children of illegal immigrants. The next year, Democrats swept Republicans in every race for statewide constitutional office and Republicans lost legislative seats for the second consecutive election cycle.

Shortly after becoming governor in 1996, one of Huckabee's top aides predicted that his boss would do for Arkansas what Gov. Carroll Campbell did for South Carolina, meaning that Arkansas would cast aside its Democratic past and whole-heartedly embrace Republicanism by the time he left office. Yeah ? that didn't happen. Under Huckabee: taxes up, government up, Democrats up and Republicans down. In the end, Republicans may prefer Huckabee keep his vertical politics to himself.

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