When Jim Edgar was the governor of Illinois, many people thought he would “move up” and run for Senate. (He chose to get the hell outta politics instead, but that’s not important to this discussion.)
Dick Durbin is a Senator from Illinois. Earlier this year, many people were trying to convince him to run for governor.
So which is better? And why?
Just off the top of my head, I’d say it has to do with what level of issues you want to have influence over. The governor is a single very big fish in a relatively small pond, whereas a senator is one of 100 fish but in quite a large pond. Governors have (generally) relatively little input on the national level but quite a lot of influence on the state level, while senators have some influence on the national level as well as a fair amount of influence on the state level.
Another example: Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) is an odds-on favorite to run for Governor here in Texas in 2002.
I’m not sure if she has actually expressed a desire to do this, especially after just earning a new term in the Senate in 2000.
I would have to agree with the big fish in a little pond vs. medium fish in a much bigger pond analogy. Which is better?
I’d say governer… hey, you get your own house!
I’d offer that it probably also depends on the state that you live in…quick name the governor of South Dakota…while Tom Daschle is arguably one of the more powerful men in D.C.
On the other hand…Jeb Bush, Grey Davis and George Pataki are fairly well known even nationally
Is it just a recent trend, or have most presidents been Governors before they were elected president?
Personally, I’d vote for governor. The house thing is cool, plus you are the boss.
Maybe they should have asked Ashcroft that question in his confirmation hearing:)
During the 1992 elections, Rush Limbaugh once gleefully quoted somebody who made a big stinky to-do about how bad, how utterly awful, any U.S. President would be if he were previously a governor instead of a U.S. senator. He claimed that being a governor gave you no experience dealing with government on a Federal level, and left you totally unprepared to take on the role of Chief Executive in Washington, D.C…
I wonder if he’ll be so quick to condemn our new Republican president for having previously been a governor. 
Although I rarely agree with Al Franken about anything, I will concede that Rush Limbaugh Is A Big Fat Idiot. (Although he has slimmed down since the book came out :))
I would say it depends on the state. For example, the governor of California or New York is always at least rumored to be a presidential contender if they’re around for more than one term. Minus peculiar exceptions like Minnesota, only the governors of California, Texas, New York and Florida are guaranteed some national recognition in political circles.
In the Senate, the states are always equal, so it’s really up to you to make a good impression. A Senator from a small state, like Joseph Lieberman, can make a huge impression and have a lot of power. I doubt you’ll ever hear the governor of Connecticut mentioned as a presidential contender. (Then again, our last president was governor of Arkansas, not exactly a glamourous state.)
Being in the Senate seems to carry greater gravitas to it. You’re part of the “world’s greatest deliberative body,” after all. You automatically have a certain air of statesmanship about you, even if you don’t deserve it. Governor’s don’t necessairly carry that and they receive no nationwide media coverage.
If you want to become president, governor is the way to go. A sitting senator hasn’t been elected president since Kennedy in 1960 and he was the first one since Harding in 1920. Truman and Johnson probably would never have made it to the White House on their own.
Wilson, FDR, Carter, Reagan, Clinton, and Bush the Younger all were governors. TR and Coolidge were governors who became VPs and then president.
William Knowland abandoned his Senate seat from California to run for governor in 1958, in part to set himself up for a presidential run. The incumbent governor, Goodwin Knight, ran for Knowland’s Senate. They both lost their races.
The governor of California is almost always considered a candidate for president (except for George Deukmejian, who was governor for most of Reagan’s presidency). In 1998 California Democrats were trying to get Dianne Feinstein to leave the Senate to run for governor, thinking that they had no good candidates.
Your family life is also less chaotic if you’re a governor. If you’re a senator, you need 2 houses, one in your state and one in DC, you’re constantly flying back and forth, and, a lot of times, your family doesn’t go with you, because your husband/wife has his/her own job, and you don’t want to have to pull the kids out of school, etc. There’s some of that when you’re governor, too, because you have to move to the capital, but once you’re there, you can have what approximates a homelife.
Considering how little power the governor has in Texas, I don’t at all understand why Kay Bailey would even consider giving up her gig in the Senate to run for governor. But it’s widely rumored she wants the job, and I guess she feels blocked from the presidency with Dubya in the White House.
Me, I’d rather be a senator, but that’s just a personal preference. Which one is better depends entirely on what your goals are. It’s a bitch to reform the IRS if you’re in state government, and Dubya’s about to find out that the federal governmemt doesn’t get to do much to fix the schools in Chicago.