Racial and Ethnic Minority Governors

by Karl Kurtz

Prof. Chris Mooney of the University of Illinois Springfield has compiled the following list of governors from racial or ethnic minorities. If you know of any others, please add a comment below.

The first one on the list, Pinkney B.S. Pinchback, was one-fourth African-American and served as governor of Louisiana for two months after his predecessor was impeached.  "The Carpet Bagger" provides a lengthy and interesting biography of him.

Name	Party	State	Dates	Heritage
Pinkney B. S. Pinchback	R	LA	1872-1873	African American
Ezequiel Cabeza De Baca	D	NM	1917	Latino
Octaviano Ambrosio Larrazolo	R	NM	1919-1921	Latino
George Ryoichi Ariyoshi	D	HI	1974-1986	Asian American
Jerry Apodaca	D	NM	1975-1979	Latino
Raul H. Castro	D	AZ	1975-1977	Latino
Toney Anaya	D	NM	1983-1987	Latino
John Waihee	D	HI	1986-1994	Hawaiian
Robert Martinez	R	FL	1987-1991	Latino
Douglas L. Wilder	D	VA	1990-1994	African American
Benjamin J. Cayetano	D	HI	1994-2002	Asian American
Gary Locke	D	WA	1997-2005	Asian American
Bill Richardson	D	NM	2003-	Latino
Deval Patrick	D	MA	2007-	African American
Bobby Jindal	R	LA	2008-	Indian American
David A. Paterson	D	NY	2008-	African American

Comments

[icr]

This blog seems to consist almost entirely of fluff.

I wonder, does this mean that state legislatures are largely superfluous except when it comes to passing a budget?

A more specific query: how does the state of New Hampshire work with a huge(424 members) unpaid volunteer legislature with an average age of 60?

I understand the legislature has a small (numbers?) professional staff. My cynical suspicion is that the legislators are largely window-dressing and the real authority lies with the professional staff, the Governor's office and lobbyists.

I'd like to be wrong.