Personal character is likely to play a central role in the 2000 presidential campaign, as voters look for someone to address the issue of moral drift amid prosperity.

What are Americans going to want after President Clinton? They’ve got peace. They’ve got prosperity. They’ve got a declining crime rate. It’s pretty clear they’re looking for something different. Otherwise, why is Al Gore, Clinton’s faithful No. 2, lagging in the polls?

It’s looking more and more as if the answer is . . . moral authority. Americans are feeling a bit insecure. It’s not the old, more familiar kinds of vulnerability, such as fear of the atomic bomb during the Cold War. Or fear of seeing inflation erode the American Dream. Or fear of losing one’s job or health insurance.

Or crime. Crimes usually have a rational motive. Today’s violence is unnerving precisely because it is senseless and random. Children get attacked at a day care center—a presumably safe place. Workers get attacked at an office building. There are ways to protect yourself from most crime. But how do you protect yourself from random violence? Everyone feels vulnerable, especially if they have children.

People see a link between these attacks and the deterioration of American culture. The senseless violence people see on television news shows mirrors a culture dominated by sensationalism, brutality, and sex. Institutions that had been pillars of values in society—schools and churches, for instance—have lost authority. What has replaced them? The answer is the one parents fear most. Kids are getting their values from sources that are value-neutral, such as the Internet.

Do people want more regulation and censorship? No. They want leaders with moral authority—alternatives to celebrities and sports figures who degrade the culture. Americans have just about stopped looking to politicians for moral authority. Almost 60 percent of the public approves of the way Bill Clinton is handling his job. He addresses the issue of violence with concern and sympathy. But moral authority? Not this president.

Conservatives say the problem isn’t gun control. It’s culture control. The Right wants to declare a culture war and attack the liberal establishment for supposedly abandoning faith and traditional values. But Americans seem to be tired of Left-Right confrontations. Restoring America’s moral values isn’t supposed to be an us-against-them proposition. Democrats have another answer: You’ve got a problem, we’ve got a program. Vice President Gore calls it the "quality of life" issue. He has a plan to deal with family leave time, suburban sprawl, and traffic congestion.

Is that what’s shaping up for the 2000 campaign—a debate between the culture warriors on the Right and the policy wonks on the Left? Not if the American people have anything to do with it. What Americans are looking for isn’t culture wars or government programs. They’re looking for someone to address the issue of moral drift amid prosperity.

Democrat Bill Bradley talks about restoring America’s basic sense of goodness. The GOP’s John McCain has lived the inspiring personal story of a heroic prisoner of war. What about George W. Bush? With his talk about "compassionate conservatism," he wants to project concern for values. As for his past, Bush is portraying himself as a hell-raiser saved by prayer. For many voters, that’s an inspiring image.

For many Americans, the brand name "Bush" connotes moral authority. Consider that in June, the Gallup Poll asked Americans whether they approved of the way "former President George Bush" handled his job during his one term, which ended in 1993. More than 70 percent said they approved. What can that mean? Possibly that people associate the name "Bush" with character and integrity in the White House. Has the controversy over George W.’s refusal to answer questions about his "youthful indiscretions" damaged that image? Not at all.

Bush has skillfully framed the issue as one created by a snooping press hounding the candidate. After all, no one has come up with a scrap of evidence that he ever used drugs. When a public figure stages a showdown with the press, guess which one the public sympathizes with? Clinton will tell you. Still, Bush’s equivocations sound awfully familiar. "Bush is supposed to sell himself as a candidate who’s ‘not like Clinton,’" GOP values czar William J. Bennett complained. "The nation needs a candid leader. No baloney."

Questions are already being raised about Bush’s gravitas: the "frat boy" image. The drug controversy makes the problem worse—especially because the American public doesn’t know much about him. If Bush says, "Judge me on what I am today," most voters don’t know what he is today. He has to reintroduce himself.

That’s just what Clinton had to do in 1992, when questions emerged about his past. In the end, voters were willing to set those questions aside. They had bigger concerns that year than character.

Bad news for Bush: the issue of moral leadership is likely to be central next year. Character questions will probably matter more for Bush than they did for Clinton, in part because of Clinton’s personal record. Who ever said politics was fair?

William Schneider is a resident fellow at AEI.