Hand-in-hand with this initiative is his establishment of a state commission, modeled on the Reagan-era Grace Commission, to document ways the state can save money while accomplishing its priority missions.

The governor's recent budget vetoes telegraphed the same message. They emphasized three important principles: for the integrity of trust funds, against wish-list budgeting, and for his intention to challenge the kind of leg- ally questionable budget writing that makes it difficult to exercise his power of the line-item veto.

Gov. Sanford is headed in the right direction. A recent survey by USA Today of fiscal management in the 50 state governments puts South Carolina in the top 10 for rapid growth of expenditures in the past six years. The state also had a relatively low rank for the quality of its fiscal management.

The USA Today survey put South Carolina government spending expansion at a rate of 7.9 percent a year between 1997 and 2002. This was not only well above the average for all states of 6.7 percent annual budget growth. It was also twice as fast as the rate of inflation plus the rate of population growth for the state over the same period. The USA Today report put policy decisions, not just higher costs and more people, as a factor in driving spending upward.

Higher spending by itself does not suggest poor decisions. Extra spending for education and health, for example, clearly reflects widely held priorities. But USA Today's survey concludes that "the financial problems racking many state governments this year have less to do with the weak national economy than with the ability of governors and legislators to manage money wisely."

The USA Today figures note that South Carolina did not raise taxes during the 1997-2002 period despite the rapid growth in state spending. Nationwide, six states won an Excellent rating for fiscal management; 15 ranked as Good; 10 were rated as Poor; and 19, including South Carolina, were lumped together as merely Fair.

In contrast, the survey showed that two neighboring states, North Carolina and Georgia, held their spending increases below the national average, and both were ranked Excellent in fiscal management.

The lesson of these comparisons is evidently not lost on Gov. Sanford.