Let’s Bring Unity To Executive Branch

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State Sen. Tony Rand, D-Cumberland, is pushing a constitutional amendment that would make each party’s candidates for governor and lieutenant governor true running mates who would campaign as a ticket and win or lose together. That amendment deserves endorsement by the General Assembly and ratification by the voters.

Under the current electoral system, candidates for governor and lieutenant governor are nominated independently of each other in separate primaries and run as free agents in the general election. Under the Rand amendment, there would be no primaries for lieutenant governor. Instead, the parties’ executive committees would choose lieutenant gubernatorial nominees after candidates for governor were chosen in primaries. Presumably, the committees would rubber-stamp the choices of those at the top of the ticket.

The change would promote party unity and give voters a clearer idea of a prospective governor’s policy agenda. The lieutenant governor’s constitutional responsibilities are to preside over the Senate and break tie votes. Those duties are an executive check and balance. But that check in reality does not exist if the lieutenant governor is constitutionally independent of the governor and free to pursue a separate policy course.

While he’s at it, Rand should broaden his amendment to shorten North Carolina’s ballot by ending the independent election of Council of State officials and making them statutory members of the governor’s Cabinet. Separate election of such office holders as commissioner of labor, attorney general, commissioner of agriculture, state treasurer and others dilutes executive power and makes for policy confusion.

An attempt to shorten the ballot would raise protests that it would put too much power in the hands of the governor, but that’s a red herring. As long as the separation of powers is maintained, there is no threat of gubernatorial tyranny.

The executive branch of state government should speak with one voice. The Rand amendment that would team the top two office holders would be a good step in the direction of executive unity.

Passing Into Racing Lore

NASCAR drivers and fans are making a somber pilgrimage to Rockingham. The running of Sunday’s Dura-Lube 400 at North Carolina Motor Speedway will be more of an afterthought than a festive event. The deafening roar of the engines will be muted by the death last Sunday of Dale Earnhardt in the final lap of the Daytona 500.

The cars now passing through Southern Pines and Aberdeen en route to the Saturday and Sunday races are a funeral procession for Earnhardt, arguably the greatest driver in stock car history and certainly one of the sport’s most commanding personalities.

It has been said ad infinitum about the Man in Black that you either loved him or hated him. And that may have been true during the early and middle years of a racing career that spanned four decades. On and off the track, Earnhardt carried a chip on his shoulder the size of an engine block. He was anything but diplomatic with drivers, fans and the media, and when he got behind the wheel of a race car, it was with a hell-bent-for-leather, get-out-of-my way attitude. His driving skills and aggressive personality translated into 76 wins and seven Winston Cup championships.

In recent years, though, Earnhardt became less of a villain and more of an engaging anti-hero. The Intimidator wore a hint of a grin and had a gleam in his eye, and race fans who once despised him softened their attitudes.

A big part of Earnhardt’s appeal was his spiritual connection to stock car racing’s dusty, dirt-track past. In an era when NASCAR became an enormously successful, mainstream sport, he was a throwback to its Southern beginnings. He would have been comfortable in a 1950s garage populated by Lee Petty, Junior Johnson and Curtis Turner.

Earnhardt was laid to rest Wednesday in his hometown of Kannapolis. As he passes into sports legend, we hope NASCAR will revisit the track safety issues raised by this tragedy, and we thank the Intimidator for the roaring, flat-out memories.