Looking at Lieutenant Governors

Throwback Thursday

For today’s Throwback Thursday, we are looking at the state-level number twos. Why? We’ll get to that in just a minute, but first…

Veepology Round-up

There isn’t a ton of VP news right now. Vance is continuing his role at vice president of trolling. This is the newest incarnation of the VP providing red meat to core constituencies and being the president’s attack dog. It was role honed by Nixon and Agnew, but performed by most modern vice presidents. Vance’s particular role—which includes getting into it with the Pope—reflects fundamental changes in how American politics work. Vance is also doing a bit of traveling, mixing work and pleasure with a trip to Italy and a trip India. He’ll be meeting luminaries in both places.

Interesting that when my Senator, Chris Van Hollen flew to El Salvador and met with their VP. Van Hollen was inquiring about the status of Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a Maryland resident who was “accidentally” deported to El Salvador. Courts have ordered his return, but both El Salvador and the administration are refusing to comply. Putting aside the awfulness of all of this, Central America is a fascinating political science laboratory of a half-dozen relatively similar nations that have gone in very different directions. I’ll need to look into their VPs and see if in anyway that role parallels the broader trajectories these nations have taken.

All good, but again, why are we talking about Lieutenant Governors this week?

As we discussed last week, Vice President Harris is considering a run for governor California. For Veepologists, an interesting question is, given her experience as VP, would she try to engage her Lieutenant Governor and make them an asset? As discussed below, there are structural barriers to doing this in California. But governor of our largest state, the sixth largest economy in the world, and ground zero for an array of natural disasters is a demanding gig. The Golden State Governor could use some help.

This post was originally published on October 9, 2024.

The people of North Carolina must be grateful that their governor, Roy Cooper was not selected to be Kamala Harris’ running mate. If Cooper were running for VP, Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, who claimed power every instant Cooper left the state, would be overseeing disaster response. Robinson, to put it mildly, is an utter buffoon. An African-American Republican, Robinson has made pro-slavery comments on porn sites and has been sued by the Girl Scouts.

Half of his staff resigned, which astounded this Veepologist, because with eight resignations that means the Lt. Governor of North Carolina has a staff of 16. What on earth do they all do?

Post-VP debate, there isn’t too much Veep news, so I thought it would be fun to talk about Lt. Governors. They are sort of like Vice Presidents, but even less so. In his classic Slaughterhouse-Five Kurt Vonnegut wrote:

A chaplain's assistant is customarily a figure of fun in the American Army…. He was powerless to harm the enemy or to help his friends.

Across the fifty states, the role varies quite a bit (there is a National Lieutenant Governors Association which has a relative wealth of information). Many states, such as North Carolina, elect the Governor and Lieutenant Governor separately. They can, as in the early days of Presidents and Vice Presidents, be from different parties. This gives the two figures little incentive to cooperate and can even lead to the sort of power grabs such as Robinson’s attempts to usurp Cooper’s authority.

Lt. Governors UNITE! (From nlga.us)

North Carolina is not alone in this. California also elects their top two officials separately. I was intrigued when California State Senator Steven Bradford announced his candidacy for Lt. Governor. The Lt. Governor has a number of statutory responsibilities—seats on the Boards of all of California’s state higher education systems and some other commissions. They are also President of the State Senate, but generally stay away unless needed to break a tie. Sen. Bradford says he is running, not in the hopes of becoming governor, but to take on this committee work. I checked in with a friend who knows a bit about CA politics who assured me that these duties are far from onerous. The real issue is that California politicians are term-limited and have to find new jobs. The Golden State’s number two’s duties pale relative to that of the state Attorney General. But it is far more statutory responsibility than the VP (who besides presiding over the Senate is on the Smithsonian Board of Regents for some reason.)

California Lt. Governors have sought to expand their role. In the late 1970s California Governor Jerry Brown (a Democrat) was traveling out of state a great deal (at least in part to plot a run for national office). Lt. Gov. Mike Curb, a record producer and Republican, would declare himself acting Governor, arguing that under the California Constitution he had the full power of the governor when Brown was out of state. Curb would appoint judges and make policy. Eventually Brown and Curb established a modus vivendi.

California also has recall initiatives which can threaten the governor. The only successful one in recent history was against Gray Davis in 2003, which placed Arnold Schwarzenegger in the governor’s mansion. This potential gives the Lt. Gov. some interesting incentives vis-à-vis the governor when recall initiatives emerge. There are parallels to Latin America where Presidents keep their distance from VPs because impeachments and removals from office are common.

Our nation’s second largest state has an even more unique model of the lieutenant governorship. In Texas, the number two is de-facto, number one. The Texas Lt. Gov. has over 80 statutory responsibilities and, most importantly, doesn’t just preside over the state Senate occasionally. The Lt. Gov. of Texas is truly the master of the Senate, they establish Senate committees, make committee assignments, and decide on questions of parliamentary procedure. I don’t know why Texas does this, a great topic for a future post.

But that question is academic. The reason to study VPs and their ilk is because high-level political operations are hard and just as presidents can use help, so presumably can governors. Having an experienced and allied politician as a sort of junior partner can be useful in making decisions, communicating policy, and implementation. California and Texas are the two largest states of the United States. Both would be major nation-states in their own right. California on its own has an economy larger than the U.K. or India. The Texas economy is larger than Russia or Canada. Both California and Texas, along with many other U.S. states (most notably New York) are central to world-spanning industries. Decisions made at the state level have global consequences.

The Lieutenant Governor is also just Down the Hall.

Notes: I’ve decided to make this week Lt. Gov. week, so later we’ll look at the office in my home state of Maryland. But of course, we’ll be keeping an eye on things on the VP front. Meanwhile, I write about other things as well. Here on my main website is a post about a Jewish Fast Day, the Fast of Gedaliah, which this year occurred the day before the first-year anniversary of October 7. It hit hard.

This post and anything written here represents my views only, and not those of any organization with which I am or have ever been affiliated.