Jack Kemp

After working in Jeff Bell’s campaign during the summer of 1978 (as well as interning with the state GOP), I importuned Kemp’s folks and secured an internship in DC for the Fall. Every Thursday and Friday, off to DC on the rickety old local, to room 2244 (or was it 4422?) RHOB. Kemp was something of an icon among College Republicans; he attended numerous meetings throughout the DC area and always tarried after speaking to mingle with awestruck teens. He brought passion and enthusiasm to politics, as well as a willingness to chat on policy with any 19 year-old who wished to engage.

The office, of course, featured many reminders of his previous vocation, including Pat Summerall’s daughter as his receptionist. One picture in particular stood out: a defensive lineman about the size of a truck towering over, and apparently about to squish, a cringing, diminutive QB.

Interns, generally, enjoyed little face time with The Boss, but toward the end of my brief tenure, the student union at JHU decided to run a fund-raising auction and asked each student group to donate some object to the enterprise. As an officer of the College Republicans, it fell to me to secure an autographed football from the erstwhile quarterback.

I grew up in the suburbs of Pittsburgh.  The first time I ever saw the name "Jack Kemp" was when my father took me to a Pittsburgh Steelers football game at the late, lamented Forbes Field in 1957 against the Green Bay Packers. 

Kemp was listed in the program that day as the third string quarterback behind the starter, Earl Morrall and his backup, the Steelers' first round draft pick, Len Dawson.  Prior to reading the program, I did not even know that the Steelers had a third string quarterback.

I actually remember that game, because it was the first National Football League game I ever saw in person, and the two teams, the pre-Lombardi Packers and the hapless "same old Steelers" of the 1950s were exemplars of futility on the gridiron.  Also, the Packers' first round draft pick out of Notre Dame, Paul Hornung was then playing fullback, rather than his later Packer halfback position, and was injured in the game.  Ultimately, however, the real significance of that game to me was my first awareness of Jack Kemp, a man whose vision and ideas did so much to change the course of American history for the better.

Jack Kemp, the former NFL player and nine-term New York Congressman who passed away tonight at the age of 73, played key roles in two New Jersey Republican statewide primaries.   In 1978, Kemp campaigned for Jeffrey Bell, a conservative former Reagan speechwriter who beat four-term incumbent Clifford Case in the Republican primary.  Part of Bell’s campaign platform included his strong support for Kemp-Roth, which sought to reduce income tax rates by nearly 33%. In 1981, Kemp endorsed Tom Kean in his bid for the Republican nomination for Governor.  With endorsements from conservatives like Kemp and Bell, Kean was able to enhance his appeal to GOP primary voters.

Bret Schundler's endorsement of Christopher Christie in the GOP gubernatorial primary is significant, although Steve Lonegan's camp will suggest it is not.  Support from Schundler makes it more difficult for Lonegan to persuade conservative Republican primary voters to oppose Christie, the former U.S. Attorney who has become the front runner for the chance to challenge Gov. Jon Corzine in the fall.  Like U.S. Rep. Christopher Smith, whose endorsement of Christie is like a Good Housekeeping seal of approval within the pro-life community - a vote Lonegan must win big if he is to be successful in the June primary - Schundler is popular enough with conservatives that his support will be helpful.

Thomas Kean employed a similar strategy in his 1981 bid for Governor, using primary endorsements from U.S. Reps. Jim Courter and Jack Kemp, and 1978 U.S. Senate candidate Jeffrey Bell, to appeal to conservative Republican primary voters.

Joseph Biden is the seventh vice presidential nominee from a state that borders New Jersey since William McKinley picked New York Gov. Theodore Roosevelt to run on his ticket in 1900, following the death of Vice President Garrett Hobart, a resident of Paterson. New Jersey hasn’t cast its electoral votes for a border state VP candidate since U.S. Rep. James Sherman (R-Utica) ran with William Howard Taft in 1908. New Yorkers Jack Kemp (1996), Geraldine Ferraro (1984), William Miller, (1964), and Franklin Roosevelt (1920) did not carry New Jersey when they ran with Bob Dole, Walter Mondale, Barry Goldwater and James Cox, respectively. Sherman ran for re-election with Taft in 1912 (he died a few weeks before the election, but Taft decided not to replace him), but New Jersey supported favorite son Woodrow Wilson instead.