308 sLAde goRton: A hALf centuRy in poLitics
that,” Slade says, “the paradox is that a good 90 percent of the industry
was delighted at the result.” Paul MacGregor, who represented the At-sea
Processors Association, calls Gorton “the white knight who rode in and
slayed the dragon and then went off to do other work.”^9
goontheRt ’s o R woRK incLuded educAtion. He decided in 1997 that
the $11 billion directed at helping needy students would be far better spent
if it was handed over to the states and local school districts. Give it to the
people who know where the money’s really needed, he said. Let them ex-
periment and innovate. He pointed to a program aimed at lowering grade-
school class sizes by hiring 100,000 new teachers. Some schools already
had small classes, Gorton said, but federal rules prevented their princi-
pals from spending the money on other programs. “I’m talking about
restoring authority over this money to the people who have dedicated
their lives to education.”^10
Sometimes these brainstorms of his went from inception to the legis-
lative hopper overnight. And if they died aborning—as this one did, with
Clinton threatening a veto—he would regroup and attempt to recruit
more allies. After brainstorming with teachers, principals and school
board members from around the state at education summits, he produced
“a more moderate but no less revolutionary proposal to provide federal
money with fewer federal strings.” Gorton’s “Straight A’s Act” of 1999
would have given the states authority to pool the budgets of a number of
federal programs designed to assist underprivileged kids. There was a
stick and a carrot: Schools that accepted the no-strings-attached federal
money would have to produce better test scores. Otherwise, they’d be
forced back into the old programs. But if their students’ grades or test
scores improved, there’d be a 5 percent bonus.^11
The state association of grade-school principals endorsed the plan, as
did a dozen school superintendents.^ Senator Murray, a former school
board member, was diametrically opposed. She gave it “straight F’s,” as-
serting that “his bill shows a complete misunderstanding of what the
federal role is and why it’s important.... He is saying that we’ll take away
the red tape, which is very appealing and certainly sounds good to every-
one. But I guarantee you this flexibility, as nice as it sounds, will mean
that over time, money will transfer from low-income students to higher-
income students.”^12
Gorton made adjustments, inserting a provision to ensure that money
from Title I, the nearly $8 billion-a-year “War on Poverty” program to