Three of the last eight became governor without being elected

Connecticut has had eight governors in the past 50 years or so, and three of them first became governor by succeeding governors who resigned before completing their second or third terms.The first and only one of the three governors to leave office because he wanted to was Abe Ribicoff, who resigned in 1961 to become President Kennedy’s secretary of health, education and welfare. He was succeeded by Lt. Gov. John Dempsey, who had come to the public’s attention as the mayor of flood ravaged Putnam in 1955 and became Ribicoff’s running mate in his second term.The next governor to leave office prematurely was Ella Grasso, the first woman in U.S. history elected governor in her own right. Diagnosed with cancer only a year into her second term, she resigned and was succeeded in 1980 by Lt. Gov. William O’Neill, a former House majority leader and party chairman. He was also Grasso’s second lieutenant governor.And finally, there was the departure of John Rowland, the first governor elected to three four-year terms. That distinction is largely forgotten, having been somewhat overshadowed when Rowland became the first and only governor to resign and go to jail. He was succeeded by former legislator Jodi Rell, his lieutenant governor for all three terms.All of these accidental governors would complete the governor’s unfinished term, go on to be elected to two terms of their own and choose not to seek a third term.The point of this brief history is that lieutenant governors are important because there is a real chance of their becoming governor, close to 50-50 in the recent past.With this in mind, consider the candidates for lieutenant governor emerging from the Republican State Convention, who range from highly qualified to highly awful. In the latter category, we have the convention’s nominee, Penny Bacchiochi, who received the support of more than half of the delegates, despite being an admitted liar. The highly qualified candidate was her victim, David Walker, the former comptroller general of the United States, who barely won enough votes from the delegates to qualify for the August primary. Some may even consider him a tad overqualified to be lieutenant governor of Connecticut after a decade as the nation’s chief accountant under Presidents Clinton and Bush. The third nominee is more or less typical of those seeking the office from both parties. Heather Somers is a former mayor of Groton, a member of the city council and the founder of a small business.Bacchiochi is a legislator from Stafford Springs, best known for her advocacy of decriminalizing marijuana, a cause for which she’s also been a paid lobbyist in other states.Bacchiochi was attracting little attention as a candidate until she claimed on the eve of the convention that Walker had attacked her for having a black husband and four black stepsons. Walker angrily denied the charge and after trying to blame a reporter for misquoting her, Bacchiochi finally admitted there was no truth to her statement and apologized. I guess Walker had to accept the apology to show he was a good sport, but after Bacchiochi won the party’s endorsement, he admitted to being “a little surprised” at the delegates’ dumb selection. Both of the also rans, Walker and Somers, are allied with the gubernatorial also rans, Walker with John McKinney and Somers with Mark Boughton, at least for now, but the Boughton-Somers alliance seems shaky at the moment. But no one seems to want Bacchiochi.Tom Foley, the endorsed candidate who will face Governor Malloy and Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman, for a second time if he wins the August primary, is in an embarrassing position regarding a running mate. After he was endorsed by the convention, Foley said he trusted the delegates to choose the party’s nominee but after they proved untrustworthy and chose Bacchiochi, he wasn’t so sure. His spokesman said Foley stayed neutral in the fight and hasn’t picked anyone, but Bacchiochi said she and Foley were “likely running together.” Of course, she has been wrong before.It doesn’t matter much. The candidates run separately in the primary, and the ticket could eventually include any matchup. We can hope, maybe even assume, the Republican primary voters have more sense than the Republican delegates and select Walker or Somers.Simsbury resident Dick Ahles is a retired journalist. Email him at dahles@hotmail.com.