“Continuity of Representation”

By Matt Rooney | The Save Jersey Blog

Al CoutinhoWhen N.J. Democrats and the late Alan Rosenthal conspired to produce a deep blue legislative map in 2011, Save Jerseyans, we were told that a premium was placed on “continuity of representation.”

I’m no Jeffersonian, but I also can’t understand why anyone without an agenda would think one-party rule should be protected. But that’s what they wanted, and that’s what we got.

Here’s the end result… we’re once again living up to our reputation as one of America’s slimiest political climates.

Assemblyman Al Coutinho (D-Essex) resigned from the General Assembly earlier today, reportedly under the cloud of an ongoing investigation by the N.J. Attorney General’s office. Coutinho represented Belleville and part of Newark, a composition that made his district one of the state’s bluer pockets. 

It’s impossible to craft forty equally-competitive districts. I get it. But when the Essex machine meets to select Coutinho’s replacement in the 29th Legislative District, you can be damn sure that the replacement will represent the same corrupt machine that birthed Coutinho.

Continuity of representation? Or corruption? Think on it.

Matt Rooney
About Matt Rooney 8405 Articles
MATT ROONEY is SaveJersey.com's founder and editor-in-chief, a practicing New Jersey attorney, and the host of 'The Matt Rooney Show' on 1210 WPHT every Sunday evening from 7-10PM EST.

2 Comments

  1. Not that I'm very impressed with the Bayshore Tea Party lately, but one thing they did do very well was craft a 40 district competitive map in 2011. It got no press of course.

  2. This is the problem in New Jersey. The gerrymandering of the districts to keep the status quo and protect the incumbents is really starting to hurt the people of New Jersey. This is the reason the same people get re-elected every single time in the NJ Senate and the NJ Assembly.

Comments are closed.