Where have all the governors gone?

The governorship is a natural launching pad for a Senate campaign, but no governors are challenging for the Senate in 2006, and the 109th has the fewest number of former governors sitting in the Senate in a long time.

Governorships and Senate seats are by far the two most prominent statewide offices. It is a recruiting coup to persuade a sitting governor to challenge for a Senate seat, as governors often have the best political operations in their state.

Today, however, only nine former governors are sitting in the Senate. By contrast, there were 12 in the 108th and 16 in both 1990 and 1980.

The dearth of gubernatorial candidates for Senate can be partially explained by the poor climate for Republicans, which deterred some from running. Imagine how much stronger Republicans’ fortunes would be if they had Tommy Thompson challenging Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.), Jeb Bush against Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Mike Johanns against Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) and John Hoeven against Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.). And strong Democratic governors such as Janet Napolitano (Ariz.), Mark Warner (Va.) and Phil Bredesen (Tenn.) all passed on Senate races.

It is not just 2006. No governors were elected to the Senate in 2004 either, and in 2002 Lamar Alexander (R) was the only former governor to join the Senate, 16 years after he had left the Tennessee governorship.

And think back to 1994, when Republicans took control of Congress. They brought in 14 new Republican governors, leading pundits to observe that Republicans had a strong Senate bench for the future. None of those 14 became a senator.

Add to this the recent examples of senators leaving office to run for governor — Jon Corzine (D-N.J.), Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska), Dirk Kempthorne (R-Idaho) — and you begin to wonder which office is more desirable.

The reduced number of governors in the Senate is likely to have a negative effect on governing. Given the complexity of Medicare and other federal programs that states play the leading role in administering, the experience of those who have been on the front lines is invaluable.

So why do we see a decline in the number of governors in the Senate? Governorships have changed. Many Southern states were once like Virginia in limiting their governors to one term, and their state constitutions defined a weak office. Others had only two-year terms for governor, as only Vermont and New Hampshire have today.

Today the office of governor is much more appealing. You get to run things. You are one leader, not one in 100. The Senate is seniority-driven, so impatient politicians seek the governor’s mansion. You tend to be able to run for governor more as a moderate or pragmatist than you can for Senate. Finally, the governorship is a potential steppingstone to the presidency, with four of our last five presidents serving as governor and never serving in Congress.

Republicans hold 28 governorships to Democrats’ 22. Democrats, however, have very good odds of winning in New York, Massachusetts, Ohio, Arkansas and Maryland and will be competitive elsewhere. On the other side, several Democratic governors in the Midwest suffer low popularity related to slow growth. Like the other institutions up for grabs in 2006, Democrats are likely to net a gain, and the end result will be close to parity between the parties.

Control of the governorships is important for state policy, and important down the road in redistricting, especially if the 2006 winners are reelected in 2010. And if the winners’ arms can be twisted to run, they may end up in the Senate next decade. We need them, and they can’t all be president after all.

Fortier is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.