- [Announcer] Funding for "Governor's Perspectives with Kent Manahan" has been provided by NJM Insurance Group, serving the insurance needs of residents and businesses for more than 100 years.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, committed to helping Americans lead healthier lives and get the care they need.

Seton Hall University, Seton Hall School of Law, and by Connell Foley, LLP.

[uptempo music] [uptempo music] [uptempo music] [uptempo music] - Welcome back to "Governor's Perspectives".

I'm Kent Manahan.

For more than a decade, I've been interviewing New Jersey's current and former governors, getting their views and perspectives on issues that impact all of our lives in this state.

As chief executives elected by the people, they have a unique understanding of what it takes to lead one of the wealthiest, most diverse, and most densely populated states in the nation.

That leadership comes with a great deal of power as laid out in New Jersey's 1947 Constitution.

2023 marks the 75th anniversary of the signing into law of that document in 1948.

In this program, we'll explore those gubernatorial powers and how they evolve through three state constitutions with two former governors.

But first, here's an excerpt from a public television Emmy Award-winning documentary that lays out those extraordinary powers.

- The peoples who wrote the New Jersey Constitution were very suspicious of strong authority from an executive because they were fighting the King of England at that time.

So the Constitution of 1776 gave the governor only a one-year term, and the governor was not elected by the people, the governor was elected by the legislature.

He was really a creature of the legislature.

That was about the weakest governorship you can imagine.

- For over a hundred years, in New Jersey, from the 1844 Constitution to the 1947 Constitution, we probably had, arguably, one of the weakest governors in the country.

You served a three-year term.

You couldn't run for reelection.

The legislature had almost all the appointments that you could possibly make; the governor made almost none.

He was like a figurehead.

- A governor could only serve one term.

He could serve another one, but it could not be consecutive.

So right from the start, the governor was a lame duck.

- They had three years to get it done.

If you could outlast the three years, 'cause you disagreed with the governor, you were still there, the governor was gone.

- You almost wonder why somebody became the governor of New Jersey, I think because it had some stature and it didn't have much responsibility.

[uptempo marimba music] - [Kent] No one constitutional power makes the 1947 Governor distinctly powerful.

It's the combination of powers that the framers bestowed on the office that sets the governor in Trenton apart.

First, the framers gave the governor a chance to serve two consecutive four-year terms, just like the U.S. President.

Next, they made the governor the only office elected by all the people of the state.

- The governor's the only statewide-elected official sitting in Trenton.

Now a couple years ago, New Jersey passed an amendment to the Constitution, so we have a lieutenant governor elected as well, but even that person runs on a ticket.

They don't run independently.

- So there's no competitors, on a statewide basis, no attorney general, no treasurer, no insurance commissioner, or things of that sort, people who are elected in other states, so that focal point is on the governor.

- Other governors would just shake their heads.

"So you get to appoint all those people?"

Boy, I wish I had that power.

- In most states, roughly about two thirds of them, you have potential political rivals for the governor.

- That doesn't happen in New Jersey.

There's one person who is elected by everybody from Cape May to Mahwah; there's one person who can, therefore, command the attention of everybody statewide.

That's the governor.

- Until we elected a lieutenant governor, there was no important power in a state which wasn't appointed by one person, the Governor of New Jersey.

I don't know of any other states where that's true.

[people clapping] [speaker drowned out by applause] - In times such as these, which are very rapidly complex, changing times, when you need transformational change, it has to come from the governor.

And if it doesn't come, then you have a void.

- The governor is the leader, and that's the possibility and the problem.

When you've got a state where the governor is so powerful, and so much more powerful than anybody else, you gotta have good governors.

You gotta have a governor will make use of those powers, will unite the state, and do things to move the state forward.

- With us now to discuss the power of the office they once held, that coveted office in New Jersey, former governors Tom Kean and Jon Corzine.

Welcome back to the program, governors.

Good to see you.

- Good to see you.

- Good to be here.

Good to be with Tom.

- Yeah.

- Well, let me start with you, Governor Kane.

In 1981, you were elected governor by the slimmest margin in state history.

Four years later, you were reelected by the largest plurality in state history.

Governor, from your experience, what should we know about the importance of the 1947 Constitution and the Executive Branch?

- Vitally important.

It made the New Jersey governorship the most powerful governorship in the entire country.

I used to tell other governors what I could do and their mouths would drop!

And then the Governor's Association nicknamed me the Ayatollah Kean, because I could do things they couldn't do.

- I once read "King Kean", I think you said, they called you?

- Yeah, because you just could do these things, which other governors could only envy.

And it made the New Jersey governorship a place where you could really get things done.

And the legislature had to meet with you and negotiate with you, because you had all this power.

- Prior to 1947, Governor Corzine, that governorship was not really sought after.

It wasn't so coveted, from what I've read in history, and we should point out that 1947 Constitution, we celebrate 75 years of that constitution this year, because it was enacted the year later in 1948.

But prior to that time, the legislators were more the political clout in terms of governmental issues going on in Trenton.

- Well, I'm no historian, but I'm under the impression that, or not under the impression, the term of a governor was three years and they couldn't succeed themselves.

So you were fundamentally a lame duck before you even got started.

And I think that allowed what exists in New Jersey, which is a wide fragmentation at the local level for power to seep into the hands of power brokers, if you would.

There was a guy named Frank Hague, who was the Jersey City mayor, that basically ran the state for about 30 years.

I maybe overstating it, but I don't think so, basically picking governors.

The Constitution did not give the authority, plus the way the legislature was allocated gave much more power to the local authorities.

And so the 1947 constitutional allocation of authority really did make the Governor of New Jersey really important.

All the appointing powers, initiation powers, concentration of both finance and legal constraints in one office, as in the treasurer and the attorney general.

- Legislators could basically just wait out the governor.

- Absolutely.

- Because the governor couldn't succeed himself, or herself, in that position.

Governor, take us back to those political boss days in New Jersey, which which were just mentioned.

Frank Hague, Hudson County.

He was very influential, of course, with the Democratic Party, but he was also, from what I've read, influential with the Republican Party.

- He was, well, they had...

He wasn't the only one.

They had a guy called Hap Foley in Atlantic County for the Republicans, Hague for the Democrats in Northern New Jersey and Jersey City, and they really dictated, because they controlled enough legislators, so nothing got done unless they gave it the Okay.

And the reason we didn't reform anything earlier was because among others, [indistinct] said "No."

There was a guy called Arthur Vanderbilt who was our chief justice, and he was a scholar and a pretty tough proponent of changing the Constitution, but he just disliked Hague, he thought he was a crook and said so, basically, publicly, which didn't make Hague love him.

And so Hague blocked everything Vanderbilt wanted to do.

And actually, Governor Driscoll, I think, got Vanderbilt to go out of state for a while while they were doing the convention so that he and the two of 'em wouldn't go like this.

But, so Hague finally... That was one of Driscoll's jobs.

He negotiated, with Frank Hague, to get the constitution and get that thing done.

- And Hague was willing to go along with it, apparently.

- Well, with some things he got on his side.

- But he basically almost disappeared after that, or faded away, in a sense.

- Yeah, he didn't have the power, quite anymore, after that.

I mean, which he must have figured out, but maybe he was getting to the age where he didn't mind anymore.

- There is some legacy, though, of political power at the local levels, regionally and in the counties, even today.

- Does it limit the power of the governor in that sense?

Because local rule is what- - Home rule is still a very, very important feature of both the '47 and pre-'47 constitutions.

So one of the topics that's actually being debated now is about when people go on the ballot, whether they get the line from - [Kent] Means a lot!

- The county...

Committees and leaders, which is really a throwback to some of the old days of the Frank Hague years in other areas, and there's a real debate about it.

- And that's a reform that should be done.

- Yeah.

- The idea that county leaders can simply put who they want in a line.

- Because voters look at that line.

- Yeah, yeah, and they vote, generally go along with who's on top of the line, and it means that the bosses have a way over influence on who's gonna be nominated to be governor, for instance.

- The correlation between getting the line and getting the nomination, if you have a high percentage of the counties, is close to 95%, and I can't even recall anybody... - So some of that still lingers... - Me.

- You didn't get the line?

- No, and we overturned.

I've been legislative leader when the Republicans were in control.

We overturned the law for a while to allow me to get the nomination over the bosses.

And I was the only one who did, for 50 years or 60 years or something.

And Brendan Byrne was governor and he was fine with letting that part of the law go.

And then they took it to court and the court basically said, "No, they've got a right to do that."

So after I got elected, the court went back and it went back, back to the line again.

- Let's talk about the powers of the governor's office.

I mean, veto power.

You can conditionally veto a state budget.

The president of the United States can't do that with the federal budget.

- One of the things we are able to do, which no other governor can do, we can veto the authority minutes.

So it's something as powerful as the Port Authority of New Jersey, New Jersey and New York.

- [Kent] You can veto it.

- We could stop it cold in its tracks, and I did!

I vetoed the minutes and a governor hadn't done that before and they got very upset.

But this is a power that no other governor has in the country, to veto, particularly by state, minutes of an authority.

So you do that, you can change the budget, actually change the budget, which very few other governors can do.

- You also have appointment power.

- [Governor Kean] Yes.

- That very few other governors around the country have.

- I alluded to that.

- And a lieutenant governor that is not elected like other states, but runs on the ticket.

The governor decides who that person will be.

- Well, maybe the most important consolidation of power is in the Attorney General and in the State Treasurer, 'cause those are the two most important powers of how you operate now.

And I'm sure Governor Kean operated in a way that gave the Attorney General independence, and I certainly think I did with the people who were in the office, but the idea that the Attorney General is an appointment of the Governor is a very, very important power.

And the attorney general has responsibility over the county prosecutors.

So, it was a huge consolidation of power in the Executive Branch, and the same really goes for the State Treasurer where all of the resources are allocated and the budget is created, and that gives the governor a chance to put their policies in place.

- Well, you speak of policy, as a reporter in this state covering politics for many, many years, I know the buck stops with the governor.

It also starts with the governor in terms of policy.

Policy comes out of the Executive Branch.

Tell me though, Governor Kean, was there a moment in time when you actually realized how much power you had, new in office perhaps?

- Yeah, there was one time, there was, and I used the power that I wasn't sure I had.

The state was being developed very fast because the economy was doing very well and the wetlands were disappearing.

And I got a bill through the Assembly to control development of the wetlands, particularly down the shore, but they blocked it in the Senate, the lobbyists.

And I put out an executive order under the governor's emergency powers, which said, "No development can go in the shore until there's a wetland protection bill."

And the builders immediately went to court.

And the court- - You were sued.

- The court upheld it, and said that, they said, "Actually, we'll consider it."

Builders couldn't take it, considering it, 'cause they were trying to make money.

So they came into my office and said, "What do you want?

We give up."

- How about you, Governor Corzine?

Was there kind of an aha moment?

- There was a very clear one in my governorship.

First budget I put together, Tom wouldn't have liked this, but I wanted to raise taxes, and... [Kent and Governor Kean chuckle] And the legislature was up for election in the following year and they had no interest in signing off.

We had a $4.5 billion dollar gap that had to get closed and it wasn't all gonna come from cutting spending.

And so we got to the end of the fiscal year and we had to shut down government, and it went on for eight days.

I used the same power that Tom was talking about, the emergency power.

I called the legislature into session for eight consecutive days, each day with a new executive order, went and gave a not-so-fancy speech, "Get the budget done and I'm not compromising."

And ultimately, we got a package about eight days.

But it came, because you had the executive authority that was granted in the constitution to be able to draw leverage in the debates with the legislature on how you were gonna shape a budget.

And it was really important.

And the guy who gave me the advice on that happened to be Stuart Rabner, who is now our Chief Justice and I'm not a lawyer so I walked around with Stuart, hand in hand practically, as I went through that whole process.

But he pointed out how powerful the governor could be if he wanted to do it.

- Was it difficult to take criticism?

And by that I mean meeting the public, hearing their views, what they didn't like about you were doing, and also surrounding yourself with people who would tell you the truth, who would not always tell you what you wanted to hear, but would lay it out in the pros and cons.

Was that tough to take, Governor?

- No, it wasn't tough to take, but it's very important that you do surround yourself with the kind of people you're talking about who are gonna give you the straight talk.

I had three main people who reported to me directly and they've all been friends of mine for 20, 30 years in some cases.

And Gary Stein, who later went to the Supreme Court, and Kerry Edwards, my Attorney General and Greg Stevens, who was my chief of staff, I have known them for years, they'd known me for years, so when they thought I was wrong, they had no problem coming to the office saying they were wrong 'cause they'd known me long enough to do that.

- Was the same for you?

- Absolutely.

Nobody does anything by themselves.

You're responsible, but you are only as good as the people that you surround yourself.

I mentioned Stuart Rabner, who is one of the finest minds and came out of a prosecutor's office in the US Attorney's Office.

And one of the things we wanted to do was make sure we ran a clean administration.

I thought, "Well, there isn't a better way to do that than have a fine mind and someone who had proven themselves in that area."

The same went in other areas of government that we were involved with, but you're only as good as the people you surround yourself with.

- Best job ever?

- Yeah, probably.

- Best job ever.

- Absolutely.

I gave up the United States Senate to be the governor because it was such an attractive place to be able to get the initiatives that you care about done.

- Do governors tend to look to Washington, to run for president?

Is is it kind of a natural next step?

- Some of 'em do, and it doesn't help their governorships.

- [Kent] In what way?

It's distraction?

- [Governor Kean] It's a very tough job being governor of New Jersey and you've got a concentrate on the people of New Jersey and what you're gonna do for 'em.

You start thinking what you're gonna do down the road in Washington, then you start worrying about fundraising nationally, then you start worrying about what you do in the governorship, how it gonna affect the national campaign, and they're not good governors, when that happens.

And it's happened to people in both parties and I just think there isn't a better job than being Governor of New Jersey, and people will do that job.

A couple years later, after you finish that job, if you wanna go nationally, that's fine, but I never did.

But some people do and that's fine.

- Is there a national bug do you think, particularly in the Democratic party?

- First of all, I wanna identify with what Tom said.

It's a big job and you have more elements of initiative in the New Jersey governorship than almost any place, probably any place in the country.

But that also gets you to feeling that maybe, if you learn how to do it here, you can do it there.

But New Jerseyans don't like people taking their eye off the ball.

We don't have a huge amount of press coverage in the state.

We don't have a lot of television.

I don't have to tell you this, and you need to have the bully pulpit of the governor working on New Jersey issues.

I think it's very important.

And people that do it well, I think are rewarded, then they can take on those national challenges.

- [Kent] Move on, possibly, to Washington.

- But I'll repeat what I said before.

I chose to come from Washington to this job because it was such a unbelievably powerful ability to accomplish the things that you believe in.

- Let me just, in the few minutes we have left, turn your attention to the legislative races and just get your reaction.

What happened?

The Republicans didn't do that well, the Democrats did, in this election.

- Well, there are a couple of things.

I think there was a national trend going on, which I don't think anybody saw, that Republicans lost major seats, governorships, everything, all across the country.

And so they should look themselves in the mirror and say what kind of images the party have right now, and how does that reflect in New Jersey?

That's one thing.

Secondly, in my experience, when Republicans win, they win economic issues, usually.

It's the cost of living in the state, and taxes, and all of that.

This time, they're all off on other issues.

- And your reaction, Governor Corzine?

Interestingly, some political pundits have said "The Democrats did well because, this time, Governor Murphy wasn't at the top of the ticket."

- Well, I think that I wouldn't buy into that.

I think the governor is reasonably well regarded by the public, this far into a second term.

And I think his leadership of the Democratic Party and the leadership of the legislature has been strong.

And as Governor Kean just said, Democrats were talking about affordability and there were culture wars going on out of the campaigns on the other side, and that's a split that I think Republicans have across the country, and is the best benefit that I think Democrats could have.

- Have the parties been successful at expanding those bases?

In the Republican party, has that been a priority since the last election, the last legislative election two years ago?

- I think the Republican State Chairman has been working on it, but it's difficult and there's a lot of moving parts and I think you gotta do more to expand that base.

I think where you have centrist, center-right candidates, they've done pretty well over the years in New Jersey and [indistinct] Murphy almost lost reelection to one of those kind of candidates.

And I think that should be a message the Republican Party, or at least large parts of the state are looking for.

- There is one issue that I think is very dominant, almost as dominant as affordability, and that is reproductive rights, and I think you're gonna hear that over and over again as we go into 2024, and it is pretty strong- - In the presidential... - Well, and in down ballot races too, because this is something that the majority of Americans, by almost any poll, feel strongly about.

And I think many Republicans got the wrong position relative, particularly to women who are a very, very important constituency, about 53% of the vote.

- Well, do you think that influenced this election, in this legislative election?

- It's a little less in New Jersey because I think most people accept that we're- - More centrist, democratic state?

- More centrist on this issue.

But I think when some of the other cultural issues came up, I think that ends up bothering people that that's the case that's being made.

I would certainly be playing that, as a campaigner, if I were out running.

- People don't like to have that rights taken away and that was a right, - Exactly, yeah.

- That got took away, but the New Jersey, it's a settled issue.

I mean, we've been a right-to-choose state as long as I can remember.

No matter who's, Republican or Democratic governors.

And even you got a Republican governor like Chris Christie, who was right-to-life, I think, in his beliefs, he never touched the issue.

And so I think for the Republicans to allow that to become an issue in New Jersey, is crazy.

I mean, because I- - [Kent] A big mistake.

- It is.

Well, they did, they did allow it to become an issue.

And logically it's not an issue and it shouldn't be an issue.

And maybe it's an issue in Louisiana or someplace, it's not an issue in New Jersey.

And so Republicans shouldn't allow the Democrats to allow that, allow them to make that issue.

- Well, Governors, this is always an interesting conversation.

We always learn so much from hearing your perspectives, particularly on the Office of Governor in New Jersey, which you both served in.

We appreciate your time.

Thank you for being with us.

- Good to be here.

- Thank you.

- [Announcer] Funding for "Governor's Perspectives with Kent Manahan" has been provided by NJM Insurance Group, serving the insurance needs of residents and businesses for more than 100 years.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, committed to helping Americans lead healthier lives and get the care they need.

Seton Hall University, Seton Hall School of Law, and by Connell Foley, LLP.

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