THE CONSCIENCE OF A LIBERAL: Reclaiming the Compassionate Agenda.

• Author: Crowley, Michael
• Position: Review

THE CONSCIENCE OF A LIBERAL: Reclaiming the Compassionate Agenda

by Paul Wellstone

Random House, $23.95

IT IS PAUL WELLSTONE'S MISSION in life to stick up for the little guy--noisily, and at great length. Anyone who watches Senate debates has seen Wellstone holding everything up with a furious tirade about the neglected poor. When he gets going, Wellstone shouts with real anger, his eyes actually bulging. He's like a cross between Ralph Nader and Dick Vitale.

If Wellstone seems extraordinarily good at this, it may be because he's been practicing it for a long time. "My sixth-grade class was outside during recess playing kickball, and an overweight boy was being ridiculed for being a bad player," Wellstone recalls in The Conscience of a Liberal, his new account of life in politics. "I stopped the game and came to his defense with a passionate speech" Wellstone doesn't say whether he was rewarded with an ovation or a painful round of wedgies. But it's clear a politician was born on that kickball court.

Today, Wellstone still relishes the role of lonely hero taking on powerful bullies. But now it's his fellow senators, sometimes from his own party, whom he's challenging. For instance, shortly after his election in 1990, Wellstone tried to prevent the Senate from passing a $20 billion S&L bailout bill with an anonymous voice vote. The newcomer couldn't believe such a thing actually happened. But when he demanded a recorded roll-call vote, Wellstone writes: "[t]he reaction was swift and decisive ... a wave of Democratic senators confronted me. One said, `what makes you so self-righteous?'" The scene quickly begins to feel like something out of The Godfather. "Another group of senators came over with Robert Byrd, chairman of the Appropriations Committee. `Senator Byrd,' they said, `tell Senator Wellstone what a big mistake he's making.'" Yet Wellstone didn't relent. And now, he says, all controversial measures must undergo recorded votes as a result.

Scenes like these, in which Wellstone irritates his jaded colleagues with some stubborn stand on principle, are the highlights of The Conscience of a Liberal, his account of life as the most outspoken left-winger in Washington. Too often Wellstone is indeed self-righteous--not to mention self-congratulatory, preachy, sentimental, and woefully short on practical political advice. But he also brings an admirably fresh, uncorrupted eye to government and political life. And in the end, he leaves us...