NEW JERSEY'S REPUBLICANS: MORE POWER TO THE PEOPLE

Over 100 public officials in New Jersey have been successfully prosecuted in the last six years. A large majority of residents believe the state is headed in the wrong direction. An even large number disapprove of the job that the Democratic-controlled state legislature is doing. A once popular Governor who seemed to have so much potential for cleaning up state government's finances and its shadier political practices now watches as his ratings wane.  And, four Democratic legislators - two senators and two assemblymen - face corruption charges and will not seek reelection while a fifth will not run again because he is the target of a federal investigation.

All of this would certainly seem to suggest that the 2007 should be a good election year for the state's Republicans. After all, midterms are typically a referendum on the sitting governor or the party in power. This year citizens will presumably ask themselves to what extent Jon Corzine has made progress on his major campaign promises and whether he and the Democrats in the legislature are helping to improve the quality of life in the Garden State.  Anyone who has paid any attention to New Jersey politics would probably admit that they expected more action on fiscal integrity, permanent property tax reform, and ethics reform from a financial wizard and political outsider like Corzine.

On these terms, Democrats should be worried about losing seats in the legislature on November 6th. However, the Democrats actually expects to win more seats and increase their current 50-30 advantage in the general assembly and 22-18 majority in the senate.  Safe Democratic districts, and their are scores, will  remain in the party's hands. Huge campaigning funding advantages, massive get-out-the-vote efforts, and some attractive local candidates may well enable the Democrats to expand their majorities in each chamber.  But what about the party's lack of progress on key policy issues and the matter of corruption? Shouldn't both factors hurt the Democrats at the polls?

How New Jerseyans deal with the corruption issue is complicated.  While most of politicians prosecuted in the last six years have been Democrats, citizens here do not seem to attribute corruption to members of one party. Nor are they readily willing to switch parties over a political scandal, especially if switching parties means supporting candidates with whom they may disagree on major fiscal and social issues. 
This helps explain why in the 2003 midterm, when serious ethical and legal questions were being raised about then Governor Jim McGreevey, the Democrats gained seats in the legislature. And, why Doug Forrester, the GOP's gubernatorial candidate in 2005 against Corzine, saw his campaign flounder when he focused on ethics issues and corruption. More voters wondered about what types of programs a Governor Forrester would cut and, in any event, did not regard the super-rich Corzine as susceptible to corruption. 

Which brings us to this year's races and what the Republicans can do to help their prospects for picking up some seats and maybe winning control - outright or shared - of the state senate.  While the corruption issue will not by itself enable GOP candidates to carry the day, Republicans are wise to connect the headline grabbing issue with high taxes, wasteful spending and failed programs supported by their opponents.

But corruption does not explain why the state's debt is so large, state government's enormous obligations to public worker pension and health care funds, or the need for a permanent source of funding for transportation. Nor will eradicating corruption, as important a goal as that is, enable state government to pursue other popular, but expensive policy goals like preserving open space, expanding the public higher education system, and providing more units of affordable housing available. To show voters that they are prepared to lead the state, to deal with its fiscal problems, and help improve the quality of life here, Republicans need a positive agenda that lists some specific plans.

On Wednesday, GOP leaders unveiled a platform for the legislative campaigns that addresses the corruption issue and purports to put the state on the right path by giving more power to the people.  State GOP chair Tom Wilson , Senate Minority Leader Leonard Lance, and Assembly Minority Leader Alex DeCroce presented "Choice for Change" which they described as a multi-pronged reform and empowerment agenda that will help heal a broken government that is unresponsive to the public.  This platform, we are told, is consistent with core Republican principles like tax relief, fiscal responsibility and clean government.

The key points of the Republican's agenda are: instituting initiative and referendum, which would require a constitutional amendment, so that citizens can directly change laws; cutting waste by $1 billion and asking citizens if they want to use this money for property tax relief; opposing any effort to raise taxes; asking citizens if they want to cap state spending; passing comprehensive campaign finance and ethics reform; asking voters if a two-thirds majority should be required in the legislature for taxes to be hiked; letting citizens decide if voters should approve all future state debt; letting people vote on a new school funding formula; and, making it easier to recall elected officials.

It is hard to disagree with proposals that bring government closer to the people and grant citizens various powers. But the Republican reforms are chock full of mischief and inadvertently represent an admission by the GOP leadership that their party doesn't have solutions to the big problems facing the state or ideas about how to make progress on goals desired by many citizens.  Take initiative and referendum. What would prevent a well-funded campaign to hike income tax rates on the wealthy to provide funds for more school aid or property tax relief, even if such a policy dramatically hurt the state's business climate? Are Republicans open to that possibility?

What happens if the court orders New Jersey to make good on its obligations to public worker pensions funds? Would Republicans support tax hikes for this or, due to their principled anti-tax position, instead require massive cuts in government spending and state aid, possibly undermining the quality of life here? Is adhering to a precept like capping state spending a good thing if it prevents the state from spending more on homeland security, health care for the uninsured, or open space preservation?  What about requiring  a two-thirds majority in the legislature for tax hikes?  Heck, it's hard enough to get a majority in this taxophobic state. How again do we plan to pay for road and bridge upkeep if not through, say, a gas tax hike? 

Then there's the proposal to let the people vote on a new school funding formula. Most New Jerseyans live in the suburbs. If suburbanites, including residents of well-heeled communities, decide to channel more state aid their way and give much less to the Abbott districts, won't the state Supreme Court step in and stop it? You can count on that. The only way a plebiscite on a school funding formula works is if a constitutional amendment changing the "thorough and efficient system of education" clause is put on the ballot. You have to wonder why the GOP leaders aren't recommending that.

Raising citizens' expectations by presenting divisive, unworkable proposals as solutions to complex policy problems is demagoguery. New Jersey's Republicans, especially people like Lance, DeCroce and Wilson, are better than that. They are right to say that the Democrats in power have been evasive and duplicitous and have lacked the courage to come clean with citizens about the state's problems and what they plan to do about them.  But realistically, citizens who are busy making a living and tending to personal and family responsibilities do not have much time to participate in the formulation of solution to complex policy problems. Political leaders can at the very least help the process along by developing and laying out some specific policy alternatives. To attract more voters this November, Republican legislative candidates would be well advised to provide these alternatives rather than say to citizens, "Here, you do it."

David P. Rebovich, Ph.D., is Managing Director of the Rider University Institute for New Jersey Politics (www.rider.edu/institute). He also writes a regular column, "On Politics," for NEW JERSEY LAWYER and is a member of the editorial advisory board of CAMPAIGNS AND ELECTIONS Magazine.