Robert Meyner

Ned J. Parsekian, a former State Senator from Bergen County, sought the Democratic nomination for Governor in 1969Former State Sen. Ned J. Parsekian, a Bergen County Democrat who ran for Governor in 1969, died on Monday in Sarasota, Florida, according to his law partner, Melvin Solomon. He was 86.

A graduate of New York University and Columbia Law School, and a World War II veteran, Parsekian began his political career serving in the administration of Gov. Robert Meyner. He was Deputy Attorney General, Director of the state Division of Workmen's Compensation, and Director of the Division of Motor Vehicles. He held the post on an acting basis for three years before the Republican-controlled Senate confirmed his nomination.

Parsekian was elected to the State Senate in 1965 and lost re-election in 1967. He briefly considered entering the race to challenge GOP U.S. Sen. Clifford Case in 1966, but declined.  Democrats later decided to back Warren Wilentz, the Middlesex County Prosecutor, for the post.

As Camille Andrews embarks upon a congressional campaign that may or not be a placeholder candidacy, she might consider the recent history of wives running for office while their husbands are also running.

When Nevada Congressman Jim Gibbons ran for Governor in 2006, his wife, Dawn Gibbons, ran for his open House seat.  She finished third in the GOP primary with 25% of the vote, and Jim Gibbons narrowly won the GOP primary. And in 2002, Arkansas First Lady Janet Huckabee ran for Secretary of State and lost 62%-38% in the same election her husband, Mike Huckabee, was re-elected Governor by a 53%-47% margin.

If the Democratic candidate for President is either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama, they will still need to break the curse of the Senate: sitting United States Senators have only won the presidency twice – John F. Kennedy in 1960 and Warren Harding in 1920.  And if John McCain wins the Republican nomination, it will become the first presidential contest between two Senators in American history.

The curse, i.e. the preference for Governors as presidential candidates, was among the reasons Jon Corzine left the U.S. Senate to run for Governor in 2005.  In those days – just three years ago – it is no secret that Corzine had presidential aspirations.  But friends of the Governor say any thoughts of running for national office are pretty much gone.

Richard Codey will resign as Senate President on Monday so that Bernard Kenny can take the post for the final day of his twenty-year career in the Legislature, according to a report in Sunday’s Star-Ledger.  

The last time the Senate did that was in 1962. Robert Crane, a 40-year-old two-term Senator from Union County (and the publisher of the Elizabeth Daily Journal) was dying of cancer.  He was elected Senate President and resigned two hours later.  He died four months later.

The national political environment favored the GOP in 1966.  It was the mid-term election of Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson, and the war in Vietnam had just begun to divide the nation.  

In New Jersey, Republican Clifford Case was seeking re-election to a third term in the United States Senate, and even though Democrats scored huge wins a year earlier (Governor Richard Hughes was re-elected in a landslide and Democrats captured both houses of the Legislative), few believed the popular Case, with strong support from traditional Democratic base voters like organized labor, was going to lose.

Henry Alexander Smith represented New Jersey in the U.S. Senate from 1944 to 1959.H. Alexander Smith was a late bloomer in New Jersey politics. Born in New York, he spent twelve years practicing law in Colorado Springs (his nephew, Peter Dominick, was the Senator from Colorado before losing his seat to Gary Hart in 1974) and worked at the U.S. Food Administration in Washington during World War II. He moved to New Jersey at age 39 to become Executive Secretary of Princeton University, and was elected New Jersey's Republican National Committeeman 23 years later.

After U.S. Senator Warren Barbour died in office at the end of 1943, Smith decided to run for the United States Senate. He was 64-years-old when he defeated Congressman Elmer Wene, a onetime chicken farmer from Cumberland County, by 25,725 votes -- a 50%-49% margin. He was re-elected in 1946 (by nearly nineteen percentage points against Camden Mayor George Brunner) and again in 1952, by a 56%-44% margin over Archibald Alexander.

Robert Meyner was the Democratic nominee for Governor in 1953 when 38-year-old John R. Kerfoot became involved in Camden County politics. He became the Audubon Park Democratic Municipal Chairman in 1965 -- a position he continues to hold. He is a former Councilman, State Senate Sergeant-At-Arms, and had perfect attendance at County Committee meetings for over fifty years.

Kerfoot, an avid PoliticsNJ.com reader, passed away this weekend. He was 91.

When a vacancy occurred on the Camden County Freeholder Board in 2000, Democrats decided to pay tribute to the Kerfoot's long service by appointing him Freeholder. He completed the five weeks remaining in the term of Patricia Egan Jones, who was elected Surrogate.

Under Kerfoot's leadership, Audubon Park has been reliably Democratic. In his first general election as a member of the Camden Democratic machine, he helped delivered his town to Meyner, then former one-term State Senator from Warren with little chance to defeat Republican Paul Troast. Audubon Park went 595-94 for Meyner, who scored an upset victory to win the governorship.

And in 1985, Kerfoot was one of just three Democratic Municipal Chairman in the state to deliver his town for Peter Shapiro in his race against Governor Thomas Kean. Earlier this month, Kerfoot's organization delivered a huge plurality for Robert Menendez over Thomas Kean, Jr.
For the true political junkies, Kerfoot began his career as a lieutenant under the legendary Camden County Democratic boss, George Brunner, who served as Mayor of Camden and as the Democratic State Chairman.

His viewing will be held at Henry Funeral Home in Audubon on Tuesday from 6PM to 9PM and on Wednesday 9AM to 11AM. The funeral services are private.

Robert Meyner was the Democratic nominee for Governor in 1953 when 38-year-old John R. Kerfoot became involved in Camden County politics. He became the Audubon Park Democratic Municipal Chairman in 1965 -- a position he continues to hold. He is a former Councilman, State Senate Sergeant-At-Arms, and had perfect attendance at County Committee meetings for over fifty years.

When a vacancy occurred on the Camden County Freeholder Board in 2000, Democrats decided to pay tribute to the Kerfoot's long service by appointing him Freeholder. He completed the five weeks remaining in the term of Patricia Egan Jones, who was elected Surrogate.

Under Kerfoot's leadership, Audubon Park has been reliably Democratic. In his first general election as a member of the Camden Democratic machine, he helped delivered his town to Meyner, then former one-term State Senator from Warren with little chance to defeat Republican Paul Troast. Audubon Park went 595-94 for Meyner, who scored an upset victory to win the governorship.

And in 1985, Kerfoot was one of just three Democratic Municipal Chairman in the state to deliver his town for Peter Shapiro in his race against Governor Thomas Kean.

For the true political junkies, Kerfoot began his career as a lieutenant under the legendary Camden County Democratic boss, George Brunner, who served as Mayor of Camden and as the Democratic State Chairman. Kerfoot celebrated his 91st birthday on July 28.

Governor-elect Jon Corzine has retained five members of his predecessors cabinet: Secretary of Agriculture Charles Kuperus, Commerce Secretary Virginia Bauer, Commissioner of Health Fred Jacobs, Commissioner of Military and Veterans Affairs Glenn Rieth, and Commissioner of Personnel Rolando Torres. He has brought in five new cabinet members, and six cabinet posts remain unfilled. Corzine has kept 31% of Richard Codey's cabinet; the last time a new Governor succeeded a Governor of his own party -- in 1961 -- Richard Hughes kept 71% of Robert Meyner's cabinet.

The first woman to run for Congress in New Jersey was Gertrude Reilly, a Socialist who won 4% of the vote in her 1914 challeneg to Democratic Congressman Joseph Eagan in a Hudson County district. Reilly ran against Eagan again in 1918 and won 9%. Dr. Jennie Sharp, a member of the Camden Board of Education, was the second won to run; she won 4% as the Progressive Party candidate in the first district.

Mary Theresa Norton, a Hudson County Freeholder, became the first New Jersey woman to serve in Congress. With the support of Jersey City Mayor Frank Hague, she defeated Republican Douglas Story with 62% of the vote in 1924. Norton remained in Congress for 26 years, becoming the first woman to chair a full House committee.

Susan McNair of Paterson became the second woman to win a major party nomination for Congress when she challenged two-term Republican George Segar in 1926. She won 27% of the vote. Besides Norton, Democrats and Republicans did not nominate a woman for Congress again until 1940, when Mary Duffy won 42% against a freshman Republican, Albert Vreeland, in an Essex County district.

Florence Dwyer, a Republican Assemblywoman from Elizabeth, became the first Republican woman to run for Congress -- and the first woman to unseat an incumbent -- when she ousted Democrat Harrison Williams with 51% of the vote in 1956. (Williams won a U.S. Senate seat two years later.) Dwyer's 1962 re-election campaign against Democrat Lillian Golf marked the first time two women faced off in the same House race; Golf won 40%.

Two other women ousted incumbents: Democrat Helen Stevenson Meyner, the wife of former Governor Robert Meyner, in 1974; and former Ridgewood Board of Education President Marge Roukema, a Republican, in 1980. Both had run once before without success -- Meyner won 43% against then-State Senator Joseph Maraziti in an open seat race in 1972, and Roukema won 47% in 1978 before defeating Democrat Andrew Maguire in 1980. Two Monmouth County women ran strong races against incumbent Congressmen: Democrat Katherine White, who won 47% of the vote against James Auchinclosss in 1960; and Marie Muhler, a GOP Assemblywoman, who won 49% against James Howard in 1980. No other women have won more than 45% against a sitting Congressman in New Jersey.

Norton was the only woman to be nominated for an open House seat until 1972, when Democrats ran Jerry English, a former interim State Senator (and future state Environmental Protection Commission), and Meyner. English lost to GOP State Senator Matthew Rinaldo, who won the seat Dwyer was vacating after sixteen years.

In all, New Jersey has sent five women to Congress: Norton, Dwyer, Meyner and Millicent Fenwick , who won an open seat in 1974, and Roukema in 1980. Since Roukema's retirement in 2002, New Jersey becomes the nation's most populous state without a women in its congressional delegation.