Dan Walters: Jerry Brown would undermine a spending limit he sponsored

California voters shocked the state’s political figures by passing Proposition 13 in 1978, and none more so than Jerry Brown, who was seeking his second term as governor.

Brown had denounced the property tax limit measure as “a ripoff (and) a legal morass” but performed one of his characteristic political pirouettes after its passage, labeling himself a “born-again tax cutter” and declaring, “Voters have told us they want a tax cut. They don’t want a shell game.”

Brown sponsored a hefty state income tax, which helped him win re-election, and then almost immediately launched his second presidential campaign as a strident advocate of a balanced federal budget.