"Duke, Is There Perhaps Something You Forgot to Tell Me?" Pete Wilson's First-Term Struggle with the California Budget

California governor Pete Wilson entered office in 1991 just as cuts in federal defense spending and a recession hit the state. Faced with the need to make painful budget cuts, the Republican governor and Democratic speaker of the assembly Willie Brown cooperated to resolve the budget crises in Wilson's first term through deficit financing and borrowing—a pattern that subsequent administrations have pursued.