It is amazing how different the Senate will be from the one that was elected once the dust settles sometime in...oh, say February... When all of the vacancies have been filled there will be between 13 and 14 different U.S. Senators(depending on how Minnesota turns out) than when the 110^th congress was sworn in on January 3^rd of 2007. Nearly half(6) of those changes are at least partially due to vacancies by the death or resignation of a senator.

The issue of the method of appointing new senators has been the subject of some controversy as a result. We all know about Rod Blagojevich's scandal causing the vacant Seat of the president-elect to remain that way until the Illinois Legislature can remove the governor from office. Most have heard of Caroline Kennedy's intent to obtain David Patterson's nod as Hillary Clinton's successor once she becomes Secretary of State. Colorado Governor Bill Ritter has his own decision to make in regards to the to-be-vacant seat of Secretary of Interior Designate Ken Salazar, whose brother, Rep. John Salazar appears to be vying for(among others). Controversy arose around Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour's efforts to hide the special election to fill the seat of Trent Lott's seat in attempt to ensure that his selection of Roger Wicker would be made permanent. This also became an issue when the health of Sen. Tim Johnson(D-SD) came into question, which caused South Dakota's Governor Mike Rounds to sidestep the issue entirely. The only real non-controversial decision was the one to fill the seat vacated by the death of Sen. Craig Thomas(R-WY). This was only the case though because Wyoming law did not allow the governor(Dave Freudenthal(a Democrat) to select the successor by himself. The Republican leadership in the legislature selected a list of individuals that the governor could pick from, ensuring that there would be no shift in the party affiliation of the new senator. If that had not been the case, it is entirely possible that Freudenthal would have selected a Democrat to the seat(although not a given, Freudenthal is not the man to play party politics. He rarely endorses any Democrat for office. Ever.).

The problem with the process we have now is especially evident in the cases of New York and Illinois. Rod Blagojevich is the nightmare scenario of a conflict of interest, to the point that all 50 Senate Democrats sent the Governor a letter stating in no uncertain terms that they would not seat any senator that the “good” governor appointed. On the other hand, New York shows a different problem: Caroline Kennedy, one of the most well-connected unelected Democrats in the country pulling out all the stops in order to try and get a freebie appointment by David Patterson. The problem with both of these situations is that the-as Sarah Palin calls it- Old Boy's network calls the shots. There is no public vetting process, no need to raise money, no need to do anything other than make enough phone calls and cozy up enough to the governor to get appointed.

Say what you want about the state of our current democratic process, but it is infinitely better than gubernatorial appointments to these seats. It's becoming much more clearer that one of two things needs to happen. Either A:)State legislatures eliminate the ability of the Governor to make appointments to senate seats on his own. B.)Amend the constitution to prohibit governors from making appointments to senate seats(good luck) or C.) get governors to do what Deleware's Ruth Ann Miller did. Fill the seat with a placeholder(in this case, Biden's Chief of Staff Ted Kaufman) to hold the seat, but agrees to not run for the special election the next year.

Gubernatorial appointments muddy waters. It gives someone automatic incumbency, an advantage that guarantees a boost in popularity, all without ever having to go through any vetting by an opponent or the media. A special election at least lets the voting public make a decision as to who will be their next Senator. The downside of course is that the seat is left vacant and the state is left underrepresented while the state waits to select a new senator.

In reality, no system is perfect. Money and connections will always influence who gets into elected office. That's a fact of life. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't make an effort to try to reduce conflicts of interest and the influence of these things on our political system.

A little note, since North Dakota went through this process in 1992, when longtime Senator Quentin Burdick died. George Sinner actually did a good job in reconfiguring the delegation, and there isn't much doubt that the delegation would have turned out very different given the circumstances. Here's the situation as I understand it:

Kent Conrad was retiring from the Senate because of a campaign promise to not run again if the budget defecit was reduced during his term. Then-Congressman Byron Dorgan was running for his seat. Three months before the 1992 election to replace him, Quentin Burdick died, and Governor George Sinner appointed Jocelyn Burdick, the senator's wife, to fill his seat. A special election was held and Kent Conrad ran for and obtained the Dem-NPL endorsement for the seat, and won the special election. On December 14^th, Conrad resigned from his Class 3 seat to be sworn in to his Class 1 seat. Dorgan then resigned from his House seat and was appointed a month early to his new senate seat(which he had won the election for a month earlier by a full 20 points. North Dakota's Congressional seat was left vacant until Earl Pomeroy was sworn in on January 3^rd, 1993, just like every congressman was that year. In this case a Democratic Governor smoothed over the transition. If a Republican had held the office it certainly would not have ended up the same way. On the other hand, if the Governor was unable to make an appointment to the seat and the special election was held as scheduled, the only thing that would be any different would be that Dorgan would not have had seniority over the incoming Senate Freshmen(and women) that year. Other than that, nothing else would be different.Z

| save this article / add to your favorites list