When Anthony M. Bucco assumes the Senate Minority Leader post on Tuesday, he will join an exclusive club of four father/son duos who have each risen to the top leadership positions in the New Jersey Legislature under the current State Constitution.
Bucco’s late father, Anthony R. Bucco, served as Co-Majority Leader of the New Jersey State Senate from 2002 to 2004 when each party held twenty Senate seats.
Leonard Lance served as the Senate Minority Leader from 2004 to 2008. His father, Wesley Lance, was the President of the New Jersey State Senate in 1959.
John A. Lynch, Sr. was the Senate President in 1966. His son, John A. Lynch, Jr., was the Senate President from 1990 to 1992.
Thomas H. Kean was the Assembly Speaker from 1972 to 1974 and the Assembly Minority Leader from 1974 to 1977. His son, Tom Kean, Jr., was the longest-serving Republican legislative leader in state history; he served as the Senate Minority Leader from 2008 to 2022.
There’s an honorable mention for two prominent political families. Col. Arthur Foran was the Senate President in 1940; his son, Walter Edge “Moose” Foran, named after a former New Jersey Governor, served as the Senate Republican Budget Officer. Alfred Littell was the Senate President in 1951; his son, Robert Littell, who served in the legislature for forty years, served as Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee chair and Senate Republican Budget Officer.
Robert Littell also served as acting Senate President for roughly ten minutes on January 8, 2022, between the time Donald DiFrancesco left office, and Richard Codey and John Bennett were elected Co-Senate Presidents during the 20-20 legislative split.
Editor’s note: I have always maintained that Bob Littell was the acting Governor of New Jersey for a few minutes that day, raising the number of governors New Jersey had in one week from five to six. As Senate President, Donald DiFrancesco had become governor in February 2001 after Christine Todd Whitman resigned to join President George W. Bush’s cabinet. But DiFrancesco’s Senate term expired one week before Gov.-elect James E. McGreevey took office, leaving Attorney General John Farmer, Jr. to spend about ninety minutes as acting governor until Codey and Bennett could be elected and sworn in. But during the minutes between Littell’s election as acting Senate President and the election of Codey and Bennett, he was next in the gubernatorial line of succession and as probably acting governor during that time. –DW
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