Analysis: Stimulus sets Sanford's finale

COLUMBIA -- Gov. Mark Sanford's lengthy, unsuccessful fight to block federal stimulus money for South Carolina's schools has the Republican heading toward a second lame duck year as he wraps up his final term.

Most governors have only one. But Sanford spent this year fending off the stimulus cash, getting little of note accomplished in the Legislature while holding fast to his small government principles. His final year will begin in January with an agenda to restructure government that legislators say they'll stall.

The stimulus fight did help Sanford, the chairman of the Republican Governor's Association, bolster a reputation as an uncompromising conservative. It also raised speculation about a 2012 White House bid. For now, Sanford has said he only is interested in helping Republicans win governor's races this year and next.

Even as a former congressman, Sanford came into the governor's office in 2003 as an outsider with hopeful allies. Leaders in the GOP-controlled Legislature were giddy they'd be the first to have a Republican governor to work on tax breaks, increasing economic development and limiting lawsuit awards.

He'll foreshadow his 2011 departure on Monday by signing an application for $700 million in federal bailout cash - an order of the state Supreme Court and a demand of a Legislature whose ever-critical leaders says he's no longer a factor in the state's affairs.

"His relevance has decreased because of his tactics," said Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, R-Charleston. "Here was a guy who had some great ideas, who came into office with great promise, but his execution is the worst I've seen."

During the past six years, the governor's sparring with legislators has gone from press releases to squirming piglets he famously carried to the doors of the House to protest budget vetoes. Even a horse-drawn carriage showed up outside the Statehouse when he complained of a government structure mired in the 19th century.

"His strategy of constantly attacking Republicans is what has got him where he has few allies," McConnell said.

Still, Sanford eked gains. He convinced legislators to take his vetoes more seriously and follow rules in overriding them; the Senate overhauled its rules, reducing the ability of a single lawmaker to block bills. He counts small business tax cuts, more choice in some schooling, and overhauls of the state's lawsuit limits and workers' compensation laws as victories.

Along the way, he's repeatedly railed against what he considers flawed systems: a lack of truly conservative Republicans, how the Supreme Court works, and - especially - the lack of power given governors of South Carolina. On this, too, he's won some power for his successors: rolling the departments of Transportation and Motor Vehicles under his control, and successfully fighting in court over limits to how lawmakers can approve legislation.

But even Sanford says he hasn't done enough. The Legislature as empowered by the 1895 Constitution leaves the governor too weak, he said Thursday as he also wondered aloud about his many opponents, including one of the lawyers who won the stimulus fight.

"There is something fundamentally strange about a Republican-controlled House and Senate overriding a governor's veto so that they can be represented in court by the past chairman of the Democratic Party of South Carolina," Sanford said.

The lawyer, Dick Harpootlian, discounted the notion of a conspiracy.

Dwight Drake, another lawyer who took Sanford to court to spend the money, said he does indeed have clout.

"The power of any governor comes from two things: It comes from the power of their ideas and the power of their ability to persuade others, especially the Legislature of the correctness of those ideas. The problem this governor has is his ideas have had no power. They've been bad ideas," Drake said.

Sanford, meanwhile, is under no illusion about the obstacles he faces for a term-limited agenda that includes spending limits, private school tax credits and an optional flat tax tied to a cigarette tax increase.

"The reality of the last legislative term of any governorship is that you're not going to get as much as you want - nearly as much you want," he said. "That's reality."