The Majority Leader of the New York State Senate is elected by the majority of the members of the New York State Senate. The position usually coincides with the title of Temporary President of the State Senate, who presides over the session of the State Senate if the Lieutenant Governor of New York (who is ex officio President of the State Senate) is absent. The Temporary President of the State Senate becomes Acting Lieutenant Governor for the remainder of the unexpired term in case of a vacancy in the office of lieutenant governor. In case of a vacancy in the offices of both the governor and lieutenant governor at the same time, the Temporary President of the State Senate becomes Acting Governor. If the double vacancy occurs until three months before the mid-term state elections, a special election for Governor of New York and Lieutenant Governor is held. If the double vacancy occurs later, the Temporary President of the State Senate acts as governor until the end of the unexpired term. The Temporary President of the State Senate retains both his majority leadership and his seat in the State Senate while acting as lieutenant governor or governor.
There was a lengthy dispute over the leadership of the Senate during June and July 2009. On June 8, 2009, Democrats Hiram Monserrate and Pedro Espada, Jr., joined the 30 Republican members of the State Senate to attempt to issue a motion to replace current Majority Leader Malcolm Smith with Minority Leader Dean Skelos. Following the precedent of 1913, the temporary presidency and the majority leadership would have been separated again under this scenario. Since the office of Lieutenant Governor fell vacant after Lt. Gov. David Paterson succeeded to the governorship upon Gov. Eliot Spitzer's resignation, the majority leaders (Bruno, Skelos and Smith) have acted as lieutenant governors. The motions put forward on June 8 also sought to select Pedro Espada as Temporary President of the State Senate, which would have installed him as acting lieutenant governor. The Democrats have disputed the legitimacy of the motions put forward on June 8. The New York State Senate has been providing a running update of the legal proceedings since June 11, 2009. The dispute ended July 9, 2009, when Senator Espada announced he would return to the Democratic caucus and take on the position of majority leader, while it was also announced that former majority leader Malcolm Smith had assumed the title of president pro tempore, and John Sampson would serve as Democratic conference leader with the understanding he would assume the presidency at an undetermined future date. Following the 2010 election and the Republican victory in the Senate, Senator Dean Skelos from Long Island serves as both Temporary President and Majority Leader.
Read more about Majority Leader Of The New York State Senate: History, Presidents Pro Tempore 1874 - 1938, Majority Leaders Since 1939
Famous quotes containing the words majority, leader, york, state and/or senate:
“The principle of majority rule is the mildest form in which the force of numbers can be exercised. It is a pacific substitute for civil war in which the opposing armies are counted and the victory is awarded to the larger before any blood is shed. Except in the sacred tests of democracy and in the incantations of the orators, we hardly take the trouble to pretend that the rule of the majority is not at bottom a rule of force.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)
“Most of the ladies and gentlemen who mourn the passing of the nation’s leaders wouldn’t know a leader if they saw one. If they had the bad luck to come across a leader, they would find out that he might demand something from them, and this impertinence would put an abrupt and indignant end to their wish for his return.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“The American who has been confined, in his own country, to the sight of buildings designed after foreign models, is surprised on entering York Minster or St. Peter’s at Rome, by the feeling that these structures are imitations also,—faint copies of an invisible archetype.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I thought that a Jewish state would be free of the evils afflicting other societies: theft, murder, prostitution.... But now we have them all. And that’s a thing that cuts to the heart ...”
—Golda Meir (1898–1978)
“We have been here over forty years, a longer period than the children of Israel wandered through the wilderness, coming to this Capitol pleading for this recognition of the principle that the Government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed. Mr. Chairman, we ask that you report our resolution favorably if you can but unfavorably if you must; that you report one way or the other, so that the Senate may have the chance to consider it.”
—Anna Howard Shaw (1847–1919)