Sandy Int. Gov. Byrne

How long was the wedding? Ninety-four. August 20th. Ninety-four. You were in it. Oh, give me more. That was really. I saw the jacket. I can't even imagine what I was wearing. I still got the album in the other room. Maybe there were maybe just in some pictures. But I didn't recognize you from the back. That's good. That's good. Are you going to adjust the camera? No. Five, four, three, two, one. Wait, before you go, Sandy, what are you doing about time? Oh, no. I need you guys to keep. When this is closed, we don't hear them out there. We didn't hear that. Oh, if you can roll. So, Brendan, just keep eye contact with me. So if someone arrives in New Jersey from out of state, out of space,

and says, who's Brendan Bern? What's the answer? Guy who changed a lot of things in New Jersey, starting from day one in the governor's chair, I started changing things. One of the first things I had to do as soon as I sat down in that chair was to solve the gasoline crisis where everybody was backed up by the gas station and it was chaotic. And we had to do something. And we did the odd, even a gas approach where we overnight solved that problem by establishing some order to your availability of gasoline. Of course, one of the many situations in which no one was happy, even if you eased the situation, it wasn't what they wanted. They didn't want there to be a gasoline crisis.

Yeah, you were in the middle of it. But at least not the last time. No, no. But that was one of the first times. And then we had to go right from there because I had become governor in the midst of Watergate. And I had to deliver the message that things were going to be different. And they were different in a lot of ways, one of which was, I made everybody who was part of my administration file of financial statement. That hadn't happened before. That had not really happened before. It was a broad thing. And then I made the polling booth available because I remember as a young lawyer as a young Democrat lawyer, we would go around with the books, the election books, and we would literally take them out and take them to neighborhoods and register for them. I made it so you could have vote by postcard.

And so those were some of the things. Out of way, we had to do it. There was no settling in. We had to do things right away. Ethics questions came naturally to you. You may have been elected because it was said that you were the guy who couldn't be bought. Said by organized crime people that you were the guy who couldn't be bought. You were the prosecutor in Essex County. Was that part of what you felt to be your responsibility as you walked in that door? That's really the reason I became a candidate for governor because the Democratic Party had a number of candidates in 1973. And with a couple of weeks ago, literally less than two weeks ago, they settled on me as the guy who could carry the message that this was going to be different from Watergate. And so there had to be an early priority. Being prosecutor, how did that train you for the job?

Was it on the job training? One of the things that being prosecutor does for you is makes you make decisions quickly. I mean, your prosecutor is in court or has people in court every morning, every day, immediately. And so you have to make those decisions. And when you're trying your case, you've got to make decisions every few minutes that determine the outcome of a trial. And so I think the fact that you're disciplined to do that is important. Did you expect, as you were coming up as a Democrat lawyer, that you might actually be governor of New Jersey? Well, the answer was no, but keep in mind that back in the 50s when governor-minor was governor, I was for several years in secretary.

And so I was every day in the governor's office with him. As a matter of fact, when I became governor and my own right in 74, I said to the press that the first day in the office, I was walking around looking for the governor. Because I had spent several years being minus right in my hand. Of course, you came from a political family. It was sort of a local politics. It was everybody. Everybody gets into it, I think. But it got those juices running? It got me to know what was going on. And my father was a local officer. My father had run for office a number of times, locally in Weston. Yeah, I know the ups and downs of it. When you walked into that governor's office, looking for the governor before somebody told you it was you,

what else was on your agenda? These are the things I have to make happen in this first term. Well, first of all, I think we had to reform the taxation system. We had to do something about funding the schools. And I had gone through the campaign by hedging on that. And everybody thinks I was a coward. And maybe I was. But I really hadn't finally made up my mind as to how I was going to approach that. Wasn't just that you had to get elected before you could do something about it? No, it wasn't. Yes, it was in a way. But I had genuinely wanted to look at some alternatives. And John Russo, who was a state senator, had a proposal for a statewide property tax. And that had some merit. And so I wanted to take a final look at that. I had been inclined to do an income tax. And I had said during that first campaign that I was going to look at an income tax.

Not that I was going to impose it. And I did say early on that we did not need an income tax to balance the budget. We needed something to fund the school. Were you prepared when you proposed an income tax to have the kind of reaction that you got? Not quite. I know that it was on popular. And as a matter of fact, for years, governors had been toying with an income tax. Or even proposing an income tax. One of my predecessors proposed it. It got nowhere with it. It built kale, proposed it. And from his own, a settlement got four votes. So I knew that. I was a tremendously unpopular thing to do. I mean, to ask a legislator the vote for any kind of tax. An income tax especially. And by the way, in New Jersey, we used to have a statewide newspaper called the North Indian Newt. And they were hysterical about an income tax.

And even in my name, the partisan evening news was hysterical about it. So you knew there was going to be negative reaction? Sure. But the amount of vitriol that was thrown at you in a very personal way, was that shocking? A little bit. I met with the first day that there was an income tax collected from people in New Jersey. It was the day we opened the medalance race track. And that day we had 70,000 people. What should have been the highlight of my career, opening the medalance. You know that. We made it happen. It would not have happened if my opponent had won that election. But anyway, 70,000 people were ready to kill me. I mean, literally some of them were ready to kill me. They were afraid for me on that night. Were you booed? Oh.

Yeah. A booed like you wouldn't believe. And rightly so. I mean, I would have booed myself because this income tax nobody wanted. But nobody had another way of funding the schools. And we had to fund the schools. Matter of fact, we ultimately had to close down the schools because we hadn't resolved to fund them. You're the kind of guy who everybody likes. You're used to being liked. To get that kind of hatred directed at you. Did you just say, well, you know, this is now the arena. I'm in. I've got to get past it. Or did you say, I'm going to win these people back over. Well, I thought I was going to win them back over. As a matter of fact, one of my great memories is in that income tax fight, I went one day to present trophies to the high school wrestlers at the German gym in Princeton.

And I was handing out the trophies. I was being booed. You were all my mother. I was being booed. And I was being booed. And a couple of weeks later, I got a nice letter from somebody who said, I was in that audience and I did the booing. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You know, and that fella actually did a commercial for me when I ran for reelection. So that people do come around. And I think people now are not a bit upset with me. Oh, for God. Ironically, they're upset with Jim Florel for raising it. They're not so upset for me. They were imposing it. You mentioned the metallands. One of the great achievements of your tenure? Yes. I think the fact that two things happened in my first term that changed the image of New Jersey. One was building the sports complex in the middle end.

And the other was legalizing gambling in Atlantic City. And those two things made New Jersey a destination in itself. It was hard to see New Jersey that way before those two items. And so, I do take credit. Atlantic City would not have happened either. Are there any other governor in the last century anyway? Of course, I would have done it. First of all, no other governor would have done it. And Tom Kane will tell you he vigorously opposed it. And Bill K. Hill damn naturally died for Atlantic City. That's one thing could not have happened without me. Do you have any mixed feelings about how Atlantic City turned out? Having accomplished as much as we should have.

And it's not perfect that there are still probably places on the boardwalk. But think of what Atlantic City would be today without Casino. As very park is just coming out of that stage. It was virtually abandoned. As a matter of fact, before we did Casino in Atlantic City, we looked at other opportunities and other alternatives. And we actually went out to say the Disney people. And the Disney people said you want us to put a Disney world in Atlantic City. We don't make money with Disney world in Florida until after Thanksgiving. And you want us to do it in three months in Atlantic City. We couldn't do it. Going for Casinos was really the only alternative. Did you, though, get the payoff financially from the Casinos that you had hoped? Did the state get the windfall that...

I think it is. ...that Casino interests were telling us we were going to get before we got Casino gambling? Well, we never... I don't think we ever intended or ever expected to get a huge windfall from... from gambling. We expected to get a profit from it. We are. We do get a... South Jersey is thriving now. And South Jersey is thriving because of Casino. It hasn't solved all of our problems. And people look for simple solutions to all of our problems. When I would campaign in the seventies, I would have a question and answer period. The first question always would be, why can't you run the state with a lottery money? And I would give presents to the first person that asked that question because I expected it and how to deal with it. People want simple solutions to everything.

People want Atlantic City to be what Vegas is. And Vegas isn't everything Vegas is either. I can't be... Barrow said, I didn't say all the things I said. Friend of yours. Yeah. Very kind. You didn't get your name on Atlantic City, but you did get your name on the arena at the Meadowlands for a while. Yeah. What happened? First of all, the way that was supposed to be is Bill Cahill was supposed to get his name on the racetrack. It was supposed to be a Cahill racetrack. And I was supposed to get my name on the arena. I didn't want my name on the racetrack because it was surely be called Burn Downs. And so Bill Cahill finally decided that he didn't want it. And I liked the idea

and it stayed on that arena for a long time. And people still come up to me and say, I still call it the Friends of the Rotterdam Arena. Christy Whitman decided to take it down. Sell the name. Well, she thought we could get some money by selling the naming rights. Which is a fashionable thing to do. Christy Whitman was not my number one fan because I had insisted that she keep Bob Mulcai in the executive director's for president's spot for three years because I was on the sports authority and Tom Cahill had put me on there. And I thought it would be a huge mistake not to let Bob Mulcai continue to run it. I remember you telling me that you took your grandchildren before your name came down. Oh, well, I took Brandon Burnett III to show him how personally injured, how hurt were you by that change

from burn to continental? It depends on who you ask. If you ask Ruthie, she thinks I was hurt. And she was hurt. If you ask me, I thought it was part of the inevitable of life. So you don't have your name on anymore. I got a farce now because you know that. Yes, I actually did know that. Another one of your major accomplishments? I thought so. As a matter of fact, I think that of all the accomplishments, and we had a lot of them. We really did have a lot of all the accomplishments. The one that was not inevitable was saving upon ends. And nobody had thought of it and nobody was committed to it. I had to drum up my own support for saving the planet. And why was it important enough to use your political capital to do that?

Because it kept 20% of New Jersey out of development. And by the way, we got the most densely populated state in the whole United States and to have 20% of it restricted was a major accomplishment. I think it inspired things like the highlands and the coastal protection. So that this parts of New Jersey that are not concrete. How does it feel to have your name on a forest? I love it. I get down there once in a while. I used to go canoeing there, but my back hurts me now. Because you don't get any support when you're canoeing. And let's try it. You mentioned, and it hurts my back. You mentioned canoeing. You and I have played tennis. You're a golfer. You're a walker. And still active in all of this sports

and athletic activity that's really been a big part of your life. Well, I've always been interested in sports. You know, they have a sports riders launching every late January or early February in New Jersey. The New Jersey sports ride. I have been going to that ever since I've become governor. And I'm interested. And I'm interested in seeing these kids move on. When I first started going to the sports riders' luncheon, I took my daughter and they wouldn't let her in. Now I go to it. The majority of the recipients of honors are women. And I think that in itself inspires me. The no one realized that New Jersey is moving along and becoming more and more enlightened. Of course, you're not only a participant. You are also an enthusiastic observer of sports. Oh, yeah. And we've had some good sports teams in New Jersey. We've got a little disappointed

that the giants have not at least had some recognition of the fact that they're in New Jersey. And the jets also, although the... I think New Jersey identifies more with the giants than with the jets because they were here and they were here first. And I think the jets came over because we had a better facility for them. I think Leon has to brought them over. It was a New Jersey guy, but he saw the jets more or less at sufferance. But anyway, we're proud of both teams. When we look at your wall here in the office, we see lots of sports figures who've been your friends over the years. And some of us also remember when you had a fight of sorts

with Muhammad Ali in the ring? Oh, absolutely. How was that? We went two rounds to a draw. And Muhammad Ali was a great competitor. I made a great in supporting this for charity. And I remember we're in the ring and we were sparring around to me, throw a right. And I said, hey, I'm left handed. So he said, throw a right. So I throw a right and he goes down. And that was the picture. And for him to be willing to be on the floor with me, standing over him is the symbol of a great sportsman. Do you have sports heroes? Oh, yeah. Back when I was a kid, a lot of sports. I was a great admirer of Bill Bradley who was playing basketball for Princeton and for the next in Georgia.

I'm especially proud of the New Jersey athletes who made it. The Joe Medwek, for instance, 50 years, 60 years ago. Political heroes? Everybody, everybody, everybody, my age, I think, who's at all inclined to be a Democrat, has John Kennedy as a hero. I have several of the speeches, almost memorized. I have the, for instance, the last paragraph of the speech he was going to give in Denver in Dallas, rather, memorized. So, yeah, John Kennedy. Also, Alex Stevenson, I thought, I'm not sure how good a president he would have been. Maybe he was cerebral. But he was an inspiration. And I would have liked to have seen him as a president, and I say.

You mentioned my friend in your wife, Ruthie. 14 years. It's hard to believe it's been 14 years, but I know it's been 14 really good years. Hi, it has been. I'm proud of her, and I appreciate her putting up with me, because I get impatient, and she calls me on it, but she puts up with me. She's a very bright lady, and people in New Jersey, including the governor, of course, I recognize that she's a leader, and has called on her on several occasions to critical things for her. Has Ruthie changed her thinking on some issues? I know Ruthie is an ardent feminist. She's got very strong ideas of her own. Any areas that she's moved you from one position to another? Well, I think I've always been a feminist. You know, in my day as governor,

I had more women in key positions, and I mean, I had a woman transportation commission for one. So she's bolstered my commitment to women. I mean, she thinks half of all of it, or maybe all of the jobs, or I got a woman for a while, because I'm an atom for someone. Is that a good point? All that way with it. Ruthie is fond of saying that you got into so much trouble as governor because she did so much. That's coming from clearly a biased party. But is that a fair thing to say? Well, there's no question that when you change things, you develop enemies. And if you leave things alone, you don't start up anything. Almost everything I did had its enemies, had its critics.

And yeah, I mean, a lot of people didn't like the pilots, and I remember going down there one time, or some man threatened to shoot me if I'm with that. Someone with daddy put his arm around me. It was fun. But anything like that, you've got change. You've got resistance. And so I was willing to take that. But I wanted New Jersey to be different in several significant respects. I wanted it to be more responsible. I wanted it to have school funding. I wanted it to have some glamour. I wanted it to ultimately have an Atlantic city that I could make work. And I didn't make it work. So modesty aside. As you look back on those years, you say, Brendan, well done? Each one of those things I had to fight for.

Even the sports complex did not have a huge following. And neither Charlie, Sam, and nor I, when we ran in 73, made it a big issue. And so I even had to sell the sports complex because there were those people who thought it was a bare thing because it was going to take the cities and diminishing their importance and make the metal land something else. Some of the most progressive people were not for that. Not only that, but some of the political people who had Mama's part, thought I was going to ruin Mama's part. Having been out in public with you, I see how people respond to you, enormously warmly, enthusiastically,

remembering what we talked about earlier. Now, you were such a despised figure for a while. Has all of that just receded into the past because you are now, I think, a much loved senior statesman. That may be, but you kind of accept that what I did was controversial. And when I was reelected by 300,000 votes more or less, by approval rating among the people in New Jersey was 37%. Now we're near 50%. And so I've been writing that and every once in a while, when things got good, I remind myself that in 1977, 888,000 people voted against me. Go, Hunter Bern, your approval rating with us is 100%. Thank you.

Thank you. Bless you. Bless you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.