This is of little help, as it doesn't say where California's tax rates were from 1950-1977, which is a huge part of the time under discussion. What it does show though tends to lend more support to my view, however. California continued to grow rapidly through 1990, and all of those years California was one of the most highly taxed states in the country. In fact, for a number of years after 1990 California was taxed more lightly in comparison to the remainder of the country, yet this is a period in which people say growth flatlined.
I feel pretty confident that if I analyzed those numbers you would come out with a statistically insignificant result.