Governors in the American Federal System

Thad L. Beyle and Lynn R. Muchmore

The center of the state system, and its chief proponent in the eyes of the people, is the governor. The governor's prestige and his power to move people and ideas within his state are the strongest weapon s in each state's arsenal. The future of the American system could well be determined by his performance.

This was the agenda and the challenge Terry Sanford issued to governors and states in 1967. Sanford cited ten principles that should by followed in revitalizing the states and their governorships: make governors the chief executives in fact; revise state constitutions; reduce constraints on gubernatorial tenure; provide governors more budgetary power; allow governors to become chief planners; grant governors greater reorganization authority; reduce separately elected executive officials and eliminate independent boards and commissions; reduce the stultifying effects of some aspects of the state personnel systems; provide more adequate staff for governors; and open governors' offices to new ideas and to the experiences of other states and governors.

By the late 1970s political scientist Larry Sabato was able to report: "Within the last fifteen years, there has been a virtual reform in state government. In most of the states as a result, the governor is now truly the master of his own house, not just the father figure."

Many of the efforts at reform were based on the view that the state government performance is critical to an effective federal government system. Further, like Sanford, most contend the governorship is the focal point and the leader of each state. While these were not predominant views prior to the 1960s, the activities and accomplishments of the last two decades have brought more support to them.

Recent Changes and Reforms in States

The changes that have occurred in the states are significant and varied. They range from structural, to fiscal, to programmatic, to managerial, to intergovernmental. Several of these aspects have direct relevance to the governorship: constitutional revision, reorganization, cabinet systems, functional reorganizations.

Constitutional Revision. Beginning in 1959 with the creation of the new states of Alaska and Hawaii, and continuing with the legislative reapportionment cases of the sixties, a surge of constitutional revision has occurred. Excluding those two new states, "between 1965 and 1976, new constitutions became effective in nine states: Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Montana, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Louisiana, and Georgia. Since then, no state has adopted a new constitution although numerous states have amended their constitutions or plan to hold constitutional conventions". Several other states have had revisions proposals defeated at the polls. As political scientist Mavis Mann Reeves has noted, however, "diligence was frequently rewarded ... as portions of the rejected documents were submitted piecemeal by the legislature and adopted. These frequently revised entire articles and contained major reforms." The reforms have generally aimed at modernizing these basic documents, removing outmoded constraints on governors and legislatures and providing a more flexible framework for state government.

Reorganization. Between 1965 and 1977, twenty-one states engaged in comprehensive reorganization, and nearly every state participated in partial reform. As the Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (ACIR) noted:

no other period in history has witnessed such intense activity. The reorganization activity that began during the 1960's resulted from pressures on the states to establish the policy, organization and fiscal machinery to enable them to meet the demands made by an increasingly urban population. They also sought to rationalize functional responsibilities, to create clearer lines of authority, and to increase accountability.

Nine of the states shoved toward the traditional model "in which the reduction of the number of agencies is accomplished to some degree within the existing pattern of agencies headed by elected officers and boards and commissions"; four states moved toward the cabinet model, "whereby heads of reorganized departments are all appointed by and responsible to the Governor"; three states moved toward the secretary-coordinator model, "in which the structure and authority of agencies is unchanged and the Secretaries (appointed by the Governor) have primarily a coordinating function"; and, the five other reorganizing states' adopted combinations of these models. In every case, the executive branch was consolidated to a certain degree as was the power of the governor.

Cabinet System. There has been an increase in the number of states using a cabinet system over the last decade from 26 in 1969 to 40 as of 1982. These cabinets generally are coordinating bodies organized either in whole, or as subcabinets with specific functional responsibilities. However, while few states have provided these cabinets with policy-making authority, they do often serve as "an effective problem-solving group involved both in identifying priority issues and areas, and in developing new ideas and approaches to executive branch operations ... [especially] for issues that cut across departmental lines." Most importantly it does afford "the governor the opportunity to interact directly with key executive branch officials."

Functional Reorganization. The "copy-cat" concept or "decision by emulation" is a well recognized phenomenon in the states. Jack Walker calls this "a national system of emulation and competition" among the states, which often has a regional base. "The rule of thumb [state decision makers] employ might be formally stated as follows: look for an analogy between the situation you are dealing with and some other situation, perhaps in some other state, where the...