Posted on 11/17/2004 2:32:23 PM PST by BroncosFan
Will New Jersey get a Lieutenant Governor?
By STEVE KORNACKI PoliticsNJ.com
November 16 - If the state Assembly gets its way, Garden State voters will have the option next fall of approving a constitutional amendment that would create an office of lieutenant governor and make its occupant next in line to the governorship. Opinion polls show the public overwhelmingly favoring the concept, so now that the amendment has won the necessary supermajority approval in the lower house the only obstacle blocking New Jersey from becoming the 43rd state with a lieutenant governor seems to be the state Senate, which has yet to consider the proposal.
Under the Assembly’s plan, which has been championed most prominently by Speaker Albio Sires (D-West New York), the winner of the 2005 gubernatorial election would have the option of appointing a lieutenant governor, whose main duty would be holding a Cabinet post of the governor’s choosing. The only job the lieutenant governor would be ineligible for would be attorney general. In 2009, the state would elect its first lieutenant governor, who would run on the same ticket as his or her party’s gubernatorial nominee. Each party’s gubernatorial candidate would select his or her running-mate after winning the primary.
Under the current arrangement, of course, Acting Governor and Senate President Richard J. Codey (R-West Orange), now oversees half of the legislature and the entire executive branch, making him the most powerful official in any state government in the country. Codey has resisted creating the new office, arguing that lieutenant governors in other states are not crucial to the functioning of government. Instead of funding salaries for a lieutenant governor and staff, Codey has said, the state’s constitution should simply be adjusted so that the Senate president would give up his or her legislative job before being sworn in as governor.
Since the lieutenant governor proposal is a constitutional amendment, Codey is powerless as governor to stop it. But in his capacity as Senate President he can keep the measure from being posted. Advocates for a lieutenant governor believe Codey’s solution does not go far enough and are hoping that public pressure—from editorial boards and possibly Codey’s potential ’05 gubernatorial rivals—will compel him to put the Assembly’s plan to a vote.
“[Codey’s plan] would solve the separation of powers issue but it wouldn’t solve the problem of the governor not being elected by the people and it also wouldn’t solve the problem of the new governor possibly being from a different party than the one who leaves,” said Jon Shure, the president of New Jersey Policy Perspective and a supporter of the Assembly legislation.
Shure said he believes Codey’s objections are rooted in “institutional concerns” about the power of the state Senate, and speculated that serving as governor might alter his perspective. “In that sense it may make him more open to this, rather than if he’s just the Senate president,” he said. Supporters argue that the creation of another statewide elected position will open the doors for women and minorities to increase their share of power. New Jersey ranks among the lowest states in the country when it comes to women holding elected office and no member of a minority group has ever been elected governor or to the U.S. Senate.
“The leadership ladder in New Jersey doesn’t have many rungs,” Shure pointed out. But some skeptics say the real value of the lieutenant governor’s post would be to political professionals -- ambitious pols, party bosses, and political consultants -- who would be able to trade off of the new job. The new office would also provide fodder for political junkies in a state where there a precious few statewide elections.
Consider one rumor now making the rounds: that if the Senate clears the amendment and places it on next fall’s ballot, Sen. Jon S. Corzine will announce that, if elected governor, he’ll appoint Cory Booker, the former Newark councilman and mayoral candidate, as lieutenant governor. If that happened it would be a cunning and savvy move by the senior senator. A young and articulate Yale-educated lawyer, Booker is gifted with the potential for wide statewide appeal that could help Corzine in a general election. But more to the point, the prospect of his elevation to state office would probably mean that Sharpe James, Newark ’s mayor and Booker’s rival, would join the Corzine camp in the Democratic primary. If Booker became lieutenant governor, James’s toughest mayoral foe in 2006 would be out of the picture.
One Trenton insider dismissed the talk as “typical political chattering”—and quite likely that’s all it is. But it’s also an example of what happens in politics every time there’s a new job to fill.
In this article it names Acting Governor Codney as a Republican. That's a typo, right? I thought he was a Democrat.
It even has the feel of an FBI wiretap transcript.
Yup. Good catch. Dick Codey is an old-time white ethnic Catholic pol. A real Tammaney Hall throwback. Never held a real job a day in his life, now holds two at taxpayer expense. Even looks the part -- fat & sloppy, meaty face . . . God I hope he, rather than Corzine, carries the Dem. banner in '05.
A conflict of interest!
Too funny!
In New Jersey, much like Illinois (and we'll throw in California, too), there are 2 parties, one is the "Establishmentites", those in which corruption, elitism, statism, liberalism (a.k.a. "business as usual") made up of perhaps 95% of the 'Rats and 60%+ of the GOP. The other party is the "Anti-Establishmentites", who stand for everything that the establishment does not. Establishment GOPers prefer Establishment 'Rats to ANY anti-establishment Republican (reference Bret Schundler, Sen. Pete Fitzgerald, Alan Keyes, Tom McClintock, etc.).
In Massachusetts, we have state legislators who also work as city councilmen.
Newark's corrupt Mayor Sharp James is also in the NJ legislature. He refuses to vote on anything until he gets his 'cut' first.
A conflict of interest!M
Not in New Jersey. Public officials are allowed to "double-dip."
In NJ..........ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING GOES!
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