I don't know if you guys knew.
I didn't, until today, and I live here. In Missouri. Where things are so weird.
I remember back in fifth grade or so, there was a big deal because our governor got killed in a plane crash. His name was Mel Carnahan. Apparently it was a really really really big deal, because he was running for Senator at the time, and it was just maybe three weeks before the election. I didn't know any of this, because I didn't care about politics when I was ten.
So the Lieutenant Governor was the new Governor for the next few months. Since it was so close to the election, there was no time to remove Carnahan's name from the ballot. So the Democrats said, "Okay, we'll just have his widow, Jean, be the unofficial candidate. If Mel Carnahan wins, we'll appoint her to the Senate, and that'll be great." They used the campaign slogan "I'm Still with Mel."
He was running against the Republican incumbent. In Missouri.
And you guys, he won. My state elected a dead Senator. A Democrat, too, over a Republican. Jean Carnahan filled the office for two years, until Jim Talent won (barely) in a special election.
And the former incumbent, John Ashcroft, got appointed Attorney General by Bush. So he still had a job, until 2005, at least. Then he retired, and now he's a consultant and lobbyist and stuff.
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3 comments:
By Jove, Laura, that is quite remarkable. It reminds me of Nero making a horse a senator.
This summer, while we were at TASP, a crazy guy barged into Colorado's governor office with a gun and tried to shoot the governor. It's not as cool as electing a dead person, but it's still kind of crazy like that.
Oh, good, we're like both Rome and Colorado. Like a fusion of the two. Of sorts.
At least the horse could vote.
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