We don’t often engage in pure rumor-mongering and political speculation in Fresh Thoughts, but a little item got introduced in the Legislature this week.
It’s called House Joint Resolution 000. It calls for a Constitutional amendment that would smooth the current rules for transition if a governor leaves office and is replaced by a lieutenant governor. Such a thing hasn’t happened since the Michigan Constitution was last overhauled in 1963. The Constitution doesn’t clearly explain how we’d fill the vacant lieutenant governor’s chair if that person replaced a sitting governor.
By now, you see where this is headed…
Lansing has buzzed for a while now about whether Governor Jennifer Granholm would become part of an Obama admnistration. If she did, Lt. Gov. John Cherry, who is expected to run for the job in 2010, would become governor. This new house resolution would then allow Cherry to appoint his successor.
The timing of the resolution intensifies the already raised eyebrows in Lansing. It comes two days after Kelly Keenan, Granholm’s trusted and loyal legal advisor, announced he’s leaving to go into private practice.
Here’s hoping the lame duck legislative session after the election makes the most out of the experience of term-limted, outgoing legislators. Here’s hoping those lawmakers who are about to leave can spend their last weeks in office focused on government reforms and tax policy rather than partisan turf wars over how to fill the seat of lieutenant governor.
2 Comments
Your points are very well-taken, regarding whether mini-legislation should be constructed now regarding lieutenant governor succession.
Is this really a topic which needs addressing now, even as talk grows of a full-blown constitutional convention in the next few years?
This point, while important, can and should be considered as part of the bigger con-con to come.
Remember when Michigan Gov. G. Mennen Williams was chosen for a post in JFK’s new 1961 administration? It took longer than expected, but his final job title was “Under-Secretary of State for African Affairs” — probably challenging but not at all what our outgoing Gov expected.
Regardless, whoever is elected President Tuesday will be roasted by the media and public on their first year’s election anniversary… and maybe our current Gov. Granholm will wish she HADN’T left one tempest for a much bigger one…
I believe that since the adoption of the 1963 Constitution we have in fact had a lieutenant governor succeed a governor who left office during his term. In 1969 George Romney resigned as governor to become secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and Romney was succeeded by his lieutenant governor, William Milliken. That left the office of LG vacant for the next two years, since there was not and still is not any provision for replacing the LG.