booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

a real high.” Gardner said the people knew the real score: “Basically, in the last four years,
the governor has done nothing.” He headed out for one last lap of the state on Spud One.
U.S. Senators Dan Evans and Slade Gorton barnstormed with Spellman.
Dotzauer, puffing a cigarette despite a wheezing head cold made worse by the
obligatory morning jog with the candidate, was so tired he alternated between caution and
confidence. He told one reporter they’d win “by a point or two” and another he figured it
would be eight. It turned out to be 6.6. On Nov. 6, 1984, despite another Reagan landslide,
Booth Gardner was elected Washington’s 19 th governor. He captured 53.3 percent of the
vote to John Spellman’s 46.7. Gardner prevailed in 23 of the state’s 39 counties, including
every major population center save Spokane, which Spellman carried by just over 2,000
votes. Pierce County gave its native son a 70 percent landslide.
Setting aside the Sturm und Drang, Gardner won because he was a winsome fresh
face with an aura of managerial competence. Spellman lost because the brutal recession
had forced him to make
unpalatable yet fair, even
courageous, decisions.
He was also hurt by the
intransigence of the right
wing of his own party. The
irony was that Dotzauer
could run Gardner like a
Spellman, while Excell had to
transform his Mr. Nice Guy
into the aggressor. “I’m a
good manager,” the governor
had noted on the eve of the
The Gardners celebrate victory. Photo courtesy Dick Baldwin.
election. “I guess maybe I’m
not a very good salesman.” Spellman conceded gracefully and told reporters he had no
regrets about the hardball campaign. It was their only chance. Nor did Excell: “Maybe if
we’d had another week or another couple of days … Who knows?”
At Gardner’s whooping headquarters, they were touting their man as presidential
timber –a “new generation” Democrat who could help his party rebound from Reaganism.
Booth was “in touch with a new and emerging wave in American politics,” Kneeland told
the reporters.
Just as Larry Faulk had warned Spellman that he’d be next if they didn’t stop Booth
in Tacoma, one of Spellman’s post-mortems would prove prophetic for his successor: “In
terms of the Legislature, it was a lot worse than I thought it would be.”
Dick Larsen, who enjoyed special access to the campaign and often bit the hand that
fed him, just for drill, said the key question for the governor-elect was “Where’s the beef?”
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