Give governor loyal lieutenant

In the early decades of our democratic republic, U.S. presidents occasionally faced political opposition from not just Congress but vice presidents. Fortunately, our system evolved into the more efficient current format, in which voters choose both the president and vice president on a single ticket, not in separate races. It's past time that our state's voters do the same by electing both the governor and lieutenant governor on a single ticket.

We're not the only advocates of restructuring state government to support that practical idea, which would bring South Carolina into line with most states. The indisputable advantages include enhanced unity in the executive branch and more coherent continuity if the lieutenant governor needs to succeed the governor.

Those elements are often lacking in the current system. For instance, Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges was paired with Republican Lt. Gov. Bob Peeler from 1998-2002. And while current Gov. Mark Sanford and Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer are both Republicans, they can hardly be described as effective political allies.

Another idea now being advanced for reforming our lieutenant governor's office is to simply eliminate it. S.C. Senate Rules Committee Chairman Larry Martin, R-Pickens, pitched that notion Thursday during the annual Legislative Workshop for the media in Columbia. He recalled that while lieutenant governors have routinely tried to gain promotion to the governorship, John West was the last one to succeed -- and that was way back in 1970.

Sen. Martin's idea is to scrap the office (and its cost), making the S.C. president pro tem the first in line of succession if the governor's office is vacated.

He also cited our lieutenant governor's lack of policy-making power. He said that while candidates for the office take "great positions" in their campaigns for it, "After they get elected, guess what? There ain't a thing they can do about it."

If the governor and lieutenant governor ran on a ticket, they would presumably share policy goals. The warning that gubernatorial candidates would pick running mates based on geographical balance for political advantage sounds more like a plus than a minus. And like the governor, the lieutenant governor is elected statewide, not by a comparatively few voters in a state Senate district.

Anyway, if our state's chief executive were to leave office early, why should Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, a ruling power of sorts in our legislatively dominated state, have to accept a demotion by becoming a mere governor?