A Caretaker for New York
Looks like David Patterson may just kick the can down the road:
Sen. Bill Clinton? Sen. Mario Cuomo? Don’t completely rule it out. The former president and the former New York governor are among several boldface names being touted as possible “caretakers” for New York’s Senate seat — people who would serve until the 2010 elections but wouldn’t be interested in running to keep the job.
That’s probably a decent idea. But I have to say that in my view both the Illinois situation, the Delaware situation, and the New York situation all basically serve to illustrate the over-arching point that states would be well-advised to adopt a rule whereby Senate vacancies will be filled by special election. The constitution lets them do this, they just need to walk through the open door. Meanwhile, as a pure tactic matter I’m baffled that Patterson didn’t just act quickly to designate NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo. That would have been the obvious thing to do, and nobody would have serious second-guessed it had it been done swiftly. Instead, dawdling created this Caroline Kennedy opening and how Patterson’s put himself in an awkward position that he could have easily avoided.
50 Responses to “A Caretaker for New York”
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January 1st, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Meanwhile, as a pure tactic matter I’m baffled that Patterson didn’t just act quickly to designate NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo. That would have been the obvious thing to do, and nobody would have serious second-guessed it had it been done swiftly.
Let’s not overlook the fact that Andrew Cuomo is a moron and a fool.
Not sure that we need to do away with gubernatorial appointments just yet. Special elections can be expensive as hell, and the problems of New York and Illinois seem fairly unique. The Delaware situation seems to have been resolved fairly neatly, and the Colorado situation has thus far proven so dramaless as to not even be worth mentioning.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Happy New Year Matt.
Pedantic note- it’s Paterson, not Patterson.
Holding a special election is a good idea, but governors should also be allowed to make an interim choice of the same party so that the balance in the Senate is not changed (with the choice not running in the election).
Among reasons though for resistance to special elections is the timing (if close to a regular 2-year election), whether there is a primary as well (if not, someone clearly a minority choice can win) and, in these days of budget constraints, the cost of the election to the state.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Having a special election before the next national election may be a good idea, but there still should be some mechanism for filling the seat quickly in the interim (probably preserving the party as well). Maybe every member of Congress should designate an emergency successor.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:45 pm
“Patterson’s put himself in an awkward position that he could have easily avoided”
Should’ve seen it coming.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:51 pm
I am also baffled that Patterson didn’t appoint a Senator already. What is he thinking? While the Illinois mess keeps on going, it makes any such decision more and more suspect. Idiot!
January 1st, 2009 at 3:55 pm
B. Clinton in the Senate would be a distracting sideshow, and an open invitation to a permanent cycle of media soap opera and celebrity coverage. Very bad idea.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Meanwhile, as a pure tactic matter I’m baffled that Patterson didn’t just act quickly to designate NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.
I think since there is no vacancy until Clinton is confirmed as Sec. State by the Senate, it would be presumptuous to start designating anyone.
January 1st, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Isn’t the reason that Governor Paterson hasn’t made an appointment is that Hillary Clinton hasn’t resigned yet?
January 1st, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Be careful when getting sucked into the speculation, Matthew. Paterson said earlier that he didn’t like the idea of a caretaker–he could be emphasizing that this option is still open less as a serious idea and more to emphasize the fact that he continues to be against the Caroline Kennedy idea. Like the Caroline Kennedy idea, I’m wary of any speculation that doesn’t come from Paterson or his aides. People who were for Kennedy started the pro-Kennedy rumor; now people who are against Kennedy are starting a “Caretaker Senator” rumor again.
January 1st, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Someone correctly pointed out a while back that there’s an excellent rationale for interim appointments: in the not unthinkable event of a catastrophe that annihilates Washington and kills many elected officials, we would need a functional Congress as soon as humanly possible to deal with the response. A special election in such circumstances would be unduly expensive, time-consuming, and frankly traumatic.
And I frankly don’t see why New York makes the case against this process; Kennedy’s inept “campaign” has demonstrated that governors are under ample pressure to choose wisely, and that a poor choice will be sure to face formidable primary opposition.
January 1st, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Someone correctly pointed out a while back that there’s an excellent rationale for interim appointments: in the not unthinkable event of a catastrophe that annihilates Washington and kills many elected officials, we would need a functional Congress as soon as humanly possible to deal with the response. A special election in such circumstances would be unduly expensive, time-consuming, and frankly traumatic.
So we would have a functional Senate but no House?
January 1st, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Only Democrats would fuck something up this bad. Having the Governor appoint the Senate replacement should be good for the party. Instead, as usual, the Democrats can’t play their positions and intraparty squabbles fuck themselves in the foot!
All the hate against Caroline Kennedy is typical of a Left that doesn’t understand what having real power means. Instead of getting someone who can balance no seniority with a vibrant national base, they want to appoint some party hack who could easily lose in 2 years. All these House members that get bandied about are going to be totally useless.
Democrats, what fricking idiots.
January 1st, 2009 at 4:29 pm
Not to mention that appointing a “placeholder” is the epitome of political idiocy. Who the hell are you trying to please? When given a chance to increase your power – i.e. giving a Senate candidate a leg up by letting them run as an incumbant – only fricking Democrats would decide that was too much hassle and take the politically cowardly route and appoint a “placeholder.” FICK! Republicans are laughing at this garbage. Obama needs to get these fools to play their positions and stop fugging things up.
Next idiot who says “placeholder” is a good idea should be fired. This ain’t romper room. This is the big time. Act like it! ugh!
January 1st, 2009 at 4:34 pm
Instead, dawdling created this Caroline Kennedy opening and how Patterson’s put himself in an awkward position
Paterson was in an awkward position from the get-go: no matter what he would do, the concern trolls would be out in fall force to criticize him. Paterson is no dummy. He’s waited to make his position so awkward even the media knuckleheads can see it … so the tone of any criticism will be more sympathetic
January 1st, 2009 at 4:35 pm
The Gov is afraid of pissing some people off? He could learn something from Blago–pissing people off can be fun! Just make a decision already.
January 1st, 2009 at 4:36 pm
I think as long as Governors appoint the new Senator a caretaker approach is the best, then you let the voters pick in the next election. The way they handled it in Delaware seems ideal.
One compromise that could fill an open seat quickly while still preserving some balance of power would be to have the State Legislature pick some one.
January 1st, 2009 at 4:42 pm
How about Bill Parcells? He’s well-known in NY but not actually from there, and you can be sure he’ll get bored of the job and want to move on after a few years.
January 1st, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Jon Stewart for Senate!
January 1st, 2009 at 5:19 pm
Meanwhile, as a pure tactic matter I’m baffled that Patterson didn’t just act quickly to designate NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.
Hmm…replacing a high-profile female with another white guy. Not a great idea.
January 1st, 2009 at 5:27 pm
I’m not sure how Delaware fits the pattern. Despite some complaining that the seat is being kept warm for Beau Biden, a caretaker appointment seems the best way to go in any state without a special election statute. If the people of Delaware want to elect Beau Biden to the Senate in 2010, so be it. Obviously some states have more appropriate choices available than others (Bill Clinton and Mario Cuomo both strike me as superb options for such a move, but I don’t know who would work in Illinois even outside of the current circumstances) but in general kicking it to the voters should be the preferred way to go.
January 1st, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Well at least the Kennedy embarrassment got to play itself out during this harmless post-election season, rather than say, during the real primaries, where it could have been seriously damaging to the Democrats.
January 1st, 2009 at 5:54 pm
It’s all well and good to talk about a special election, but as someone who actually worked the elections, and two weeks of early voting, I’m still exhausted and would hate to have to do this all again for a special election.
There’s a LOT involved in arranging for special elections, not the least are the folks who work the polls and give up their time and energy to do so.
January 1st, 2009 at 6:14 pm
There’s much to be said for Matt’s idea, but apart from the other objections, I’ll note three things. First, the appointment by an official in a democratic society isn’t necessary undemocratic. A hurried election might especially favor someone with name recognition or cash on hand without need for time to raise money. Second, an election actually costs the public a lot of money, quite aside from what it costs the candidates.
And third, just because the governor of Illinois is crook and the blogosphere is fascinated by Kennedy’s ego isn’t itself a reason to change the rules. Thank goodness for a government of laws, in fact, because among other things it doesn’t mean someone impulsively reacts to every crisis by making up his or her own rules, perhaps with the backing of voters. Remember the war on terror?
January 1st, 2009 at 7:05 pm
Well, one of the reasons might be because Cuomo is a slimy character. The other reason could be that it would be considered inappropriate by “some” for a male to take away one of only 11 Senate seats held by women, by fiat. The radical, hairy leg feminists concerned with representation in the United States Senate. You know how they are.
You don’t? Ok, let me help. Try and picture the typical, white, male, liberal’s reaction were a white governor to appoint a white man to take Obama’s (the only african american in the senate) seat.
Ya’ll white liberal males seem better able to recognize racial insenstivity, but ya’ll ain’t always so good at recognizing problematic gender issues. You know the kind I mean, Matthew. Like cheering our tax dollars being used to provide Afghani war lords, who often take underaged and unwilling “brides” with viagra.
January 1st, 2009 at 7:08 pm
“How about Bill Parcells? He’s well-known in NY but not actually from there, and you can be sure he’ll get bored of the job and want to move on after a few years”
Yes! Let’s import our fat white guys now, because we don’t have enough of them running the show here already. And there are actually zero qualified women in New York State to take over one of the WOMAN held Senate seats, we do need to go out of state to find a white male. What an excellent idea!
January 1st, 2009 at 7:38 pm
@Hlem
HAH!!
January 1st, 2009 at 9:02 pm
I’m pretty (as in 99%) sure the Parcells line was a joke.
January 1st, 2009 at 9:20 pm
Maybe they can use some of the bailout money to hire Matt a proofreader.
January 1st, 2009 at 9:30 pm
The obvious way to prevent the Senate appointment from being a Gubernatorial favor to hand out is to require the appointment to be approved by the state legislature. The universe of people who could get quick approval is rather small, and likely doesn’t include total hacks. Some degree of hackiness, to be sure, but not total hacks.
January 1st, 2009 at 9:31 pm
Governor Paterson should appoint Tina Fey to open Senate seat. It would give the seat to a woman. It would thank her sufficiently for her efforts in the past election. And it would set her up for a run at the presidency in 2016, which would probably get a lot of red-state idiots to vote for her by hormones or accident.
January 1st, 2009 at 9:50 pm
Requiring a governor to name a senator from the same party as the previous senator would not work, because you cannot prohibit a senator from changing parties after he or she is elected or appointed.
Therefore, if a Dem senator died and a GOP governor was required to name a Dem replacement, the governor could simply have a GOP ally switch parties for the purpose of receiving the nomination, and then switch back after they are formally seated. Or, pick a conservative Dem who will caucus with the GOP in the Senate, with or without officially changing parties.
There might also be constitutional problems with restricting appointments by party, because making eligibility for the Senate contingent on which party you are registered in doesn’t sound consistent with equal protection of the laws, or with court rulings that states cannot add qualifications for members of Congress, other than those already listed in the Constitution.
January 1st, 2009 at 10:11 pm
TKD, several states have such a requirement, including Arizona, as was discussed when there was some possibility that McCain might be vacating his seat for higher office. Some of them require the governor to chose from a list of candidates chosen by the vacating senator’s party committee, which would make the sort of shenanigans you envision unlikely.
January 2nd, 2009 at 12:11 am
Patterson is opposed to the idea.
January 2nd, 2009 at 3:29 am
KCinDC — Then someone should challenge those laws on constitutional grounds, because it is unconstitutional to add requirements for eligibility to the Senate beyond those enumerated in the constitution. It wouldn’t be legal to require a governor to appoint someone with a professional degree, or someone who is exactly 33 years old. It seems to me that requiring them to be from a particular party would also be unconstitutional.
January 2nd, 2009 at 10:16 am
Stay on Caroline’s point. There are currently two senators representing NY. Appoint a third? HRC may or may not become Sec of State depending on how they finesse a real constitutional issue. He could have said: “if an opening does occur in the next few months, I intend to appoint X” Then he’s pissed a bunch of people off and the public lobbying will continue. (”Did you know A about X? No, well I heard he/she’s sleeping with XX or XY” “no.” “and he paid for C.” “He just got it because of his name.” “Right, we should have an election.”)
January 2nd, 2009 at 10:27 am
in the not unthinkable event of a catastrophe that annihilates Washington and kills many elected officials, we would need a functional Congress as soon as humanly possible to deal with the response.
I don’t know–we haven’t had a functional Congress since the Ford administration at least, and the country seems to have survived . . .
January 2nd, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Hmm…replacing a high-profile female with another white guy. Not a great idea
Indeed, because genetic tokenism should be our first concern when choosing leaders.
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