It's been 100 days since Mark Sanford became South Carolina's governor, and he still hasn't solved our budget woes, jacked up our incomes, made our children smarter or brought us all together as a people.

So it's true, then: Sanford is not Superman.

And anyone who expected anything different of the Lowcountry Republican is probably guilty of unreasonable expectations.

"He's elected for four years," House Speaker David Wilkins, R-Greenville, said. "We have to judge him by four years, not the first 30 days, not the first 100 days."

But since Franklin Roosevelt's first term as president in 1932, the first 100 days of a new leader's term have been used as a benchmark. It's a time to examine early decisions and decision-making processes, successes and missteps.

Success for Sanford has come largely in building his administration and staying true to his own principles as a conservative political independent.

His missteps have come in communication - surprising legislators and others who would generally be in his camp by vetoing routine local legislation or publicly questioning an important economic development project.

At this point in 1999, Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges was well on his way to several major legislative victories. Before that year's legislative session was over, the lottery referendum would be approved and the First Steps early-childhood education initiative would be created and funded. Both were key parts of Hodges' campaign platform.

And Sanford? The income-tax plan he's proposed is a scaled-back version of the one he campaigned on and, with the House leadership squarely against it, there's certainly no guarantee it's going to happen.

His sweeping government restructuring proposal has just recently been introduced, but it's nowhere near being adopted.

Several of his education proposals from the campaign, including vouchers and a board of regents for colleges, have yet to be introduced. Sanford just announced Wednesday his first major education initiative - a plan to give schools more say-so in how they spend state money. Legislators scrambled to sign on to the bill, which must work its way through the General Assembly in record time to pass this session. By law, the legislature adjourns June 5.

Sanford's independent streak was always his greatest calling card during six years in the U.S. House of Representatives. He's still using it as governor.

"He's trying to not just follow a party line," said Laurel Suggs, president of the S.C. League of Women Voters, which monitors and supports legislation. "He's truly trying to make his own way without maybe doing what other Republicans have done."

The top Democrat in the Senate also praises Sanford.

"I just don't have any complaints with the governor," Senate Minority Leader John Land, D-Manning, said. "Other than he's not a Democrat."

State Rep. Todd Rutherford, D-Columbia, isn't as impressed.

"The governor has basically been a nonentity in state politics," Rutherford said. "He had a lot of ideas early on, but I think implementation has been difficult for him."

Democrats are ready to help the governor, Rutherford said, "but we haven't received a call or marching orders to go out and do so."

And although it's not unexpected to hear Democrats criticize a Republican, Sanford has most angered fellow Republicans, some of whom are very powerful.

Wilkins and other top Republicans in the House have been openly critical of Sanford's income-tax plan.

"He's for increasing taxes on cigarettes; I'm not," Wilkins said recently. "It's a huge tax increase with a promise of a possible tax decrease in the future."

But Wilkins also says the rift is only on this issue and won't spill over to others.

"Any governor is going to have some growing pains," Wilkins said. "It's important to recognize that this is the first governor in roughly 50 years that did not have state legislative experience. You would expect it would take that person and his staff some time to learn the ropes."

This is the part that's pivotal for Sanford. Lowering the income tax is not the signature Sanford campaign pledge, but increasing individual wealth is, and reducing taxes on salaries and income is his chosen method.

Sanford said he was surprised by how upset Wilkins was, that the speaker's reaction seemed almost personal. Wilkins vows that it's not, but if he doesn't want something to pass the House, it almost assuredly will not.

But Wilkins isn't the only one scratching his head over Sanford's income tax/cigarette tax plan.

"If I were the speaker, I would have been miffed, also," said state Sen. John Courson, R-Columbia.

Courson said Sanford had spoken to the Senate Republican Caucus about a cigarette-tax increase and income-tax decrease.

"But he did it in the abstract," Courson says. "It was not a firm proposal. And then he came, I think the following day, with that proposal."

Courson said he was surprised by the move. So was Don Weaver, director of the S.C. Association of Taxpayers.

The influential and vocal group in Republican politics has consistently opposed the cigarette tax. Weaver's group supported Wilkins and Ways and Means Chairman Bobby Harrell, R-Charleston, who killed a proposed cigarette tax increase last year.

"There's a lot to be said for Sanford's proposal to eliminate the income tax," Weaver said. "He just needs to find another vehicle to fund it. There is so much blood on the House floor from last year after that fight."

Of course, the true measure of any politician's status is whether his problems or successes resonate with voters. In that case, the chairman of the Spartanburg County Republican Party says Sanford is cruising.

"What Sanford is doing is being applauded more by the activists than by the legislators," says county Chairman Rick Beltram. "We find that once he says something he kind of sticks to his guns no matter how upset the legislators get with him.

"The activists in Spartanburg County today would be more for him than they were in November."