When Jeb Bush took office in January of 1999, as only the second Republican since Reconstruction to be governor in the Sunshine State, he promised in his inaugural address to shrink the size of government. “While our government has grown larger, so too has the crushing weight of taxes, regulations and mandates on Florida’s families and entrepreneurs,” he said.

What media outlets considered to be radical at the time seems in hindsight tame, even quaint by today's standards. But Bush went on to begin perhaps the greatest sustained conservative policy revolution in American history.

At the time of Bush's election, Florida was a bluish-purple state with an extremely hostile media challenging his every move. And yet he and legislative leaders, through hard work and tremendous courage, began implementing significant conservative policy changes, big and small.

Tax reform, education reform (which........

© The Hill