Theodore F. Randolph

In 1860, a coalition of Democrats and Know-Nothings elected Randolph to the New Jersey General Assembly from Jersey City. In the Assembly, he sat on the Special Joint Committee on National Affairs, leading the unsuccessful effort to avert the American Civil War. That effort culminated in resolutions appointing New Jersey delegates to the Washington Peace Conference in February 1861.[1]

In November 1861, following the outbreak of the American Civil War, Randolph won a special election to fill a vacancy in the New Jersey Senate. He was re-elected to a full three-year term in 1862.[1]

In the Senate, Randolph was the chief ally of Governor Joel Parker, and they joined in criticism Abraham Lincoln's operation of the war while opposing anti-war efforts. His legislative leadership thwarted Copperhead efforts to limit war appropriations and defeated calls for an armistice.[1] He also introduced a relief bill in 1865 to extend equal benefits and enlistment bounties to black soldiers, arguing that whites should not do injustice to an "inferior" race. However, he opposed the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution on the grounds that slavery was already doomed and the Amendment would eliminate the change for a negotiated peace with the South.[1]

Randolph was also chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, which position he used to reform corporate taxation, create a state comptroller's office, and oppose a plan under which the state would assume responsibility for paying local bounties to army volunteers.

With Governor Parker term-limited, Randolph campaigned to succeed him as Governor in 1865. However, he finished second in the Democratic convention balloting to Theodore Runyon, the Copperhead mayor of Newark. Runyon went on to lose the general election to Republican Marcus Lawrence Ward.[1]

After Ward's term, no Republican would be elected Governor for nearly thirty years. Randolph won the Democratic nomination to succeed him and defeated John Insley Blair in the general election to begin a nine-term streak of Democratic governors.[1]

In his inaugural address as governor, Randolph advocated prompt readmission of the Confederate states, the revision of state election laws, new corporate taxes, equity in individual taxation, and the creation of a new riparian commission.[1]

He began to implement his program within months by urging the legislature to create a uniform system of corporate taxation to replace the existing "transit duties" which some corporations paid in lieu of any other tax. This law was particularly aimed at the monopolies granted to the Delaware and Raritan Canal Company and Camden and Amboy Railroad and Transportation Company. Though the legislature successfully repealed the transit duties system in 1868, no uniform railroad tax was passed until 1873.[1] In 1869, the legislature ended certain corporate exemptions and levied a two percent corporate income tax. However, this tax was found unenforceable and repealed in 1872.[1]

His term in office saw expanded government services and increased costs. His administration took steps to reform and improve state correction, education, and asylum facilities. His prison reforms were partly motivated by an interest in making the system self-sustaining by improvement management and increasing the productivity of convict labor. On recommendation from a special commission, Randolph urged the legislature to expand Trenton State Prison and create a "house of correction" to employee short-term convicts in an environment free from hardened criminals. The expansion passed, but no special house of correction was established. In his final annual message, Randolph claimed his prison reforms had saved the state nearly $200,000.[1]

In education, Randolph's administration expanded the free public school system statewide and laid the groundwork for a new "lunatic asylum" in Morris Plains, which opened in 1876.[1]

In his last year in office, 1871–72, Randolph secured action on his plan for election reform. The legislature passed a stringent law that disenfranchised the recipient and provider of any election bribe and put guilty corporations in jeopardy at losing their charter. However, the law had little effect, and bribery complaints continued to increase.[1]

With both houses controlled by the Republican Party in 1871, Randolph spent most of his last year vetoing bills, though he claimed he only did so in cases where the bills were "clearly unconstitutional, where unintentional mistakes had been made, or where the ends of Justice were clearly to be violated." His vetoes included bills which would, in his view, promote railroad expansion at taxpayer or property owner expense and reorganize municipal government for partisan purposes. The most important of these was of the Republican bill to reorganize Jersey City. The bill passed over his veto.[1]

Apart from his legislative reform agenda, Randolph's tenure was marked by his successful handling of two crises in 1870 and 1871.[1]

The first was the "Bergen Riot," a violent dispute between competing railway companies. Randolph called in the National Guard to quell the violence, and the two companies settled their differences in court.[1] In July 1871, Randolph averted a threatened riot in Jersey City when he prevented Irish-Americans from disrupting a parade planned by Orangemen on the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne. Though he publicly criticized the Orangemen for inciting sectarian violence, he issued a proclamation declaring his intention to protect the right to peaceful assembly for all citizens and an order to raise three thousand troops as necessary to prevent violence. Civil authorities ultimately handled the threat without military assistance.[1]