Editorial: Who should pick the Lt. Gov.?

Elect a president and you get his running mate, too. It’s like a buy-one-get-one-free offer.

You don’t get to split the deck. You don’t get to take George H.W. Bush but swap Dan Quayle for Newt Gingrich. You don’t get Jimmy Carter without Walter Mondale. It’s all or nothing.

With governors, it isn’t so cut and dried.

In 18 states, including Maryland, New Jersey and Ohio, that’s how it goes. The person running for governor chooses a lieutenant for the ticket, and if you want to vote for John Jones, you know that Mary Smith is along for the ride.

In 17 states, like Delaware and Virginia, the lieutenant governor is a totally separate position with its own race in the election.

Then there are Pennsylvania and seven other states that decide to split the difference. Candidates run for the No. 2 spot in the primary, but on a joint ticket with their party’s gubernatorial nominee in the general election.

(If you were doing the math, you may have noticed it doesn’t hit 50. Five states don’t have a lieutenant governor. Tennessee and West Virginia give the title to the president of the state senate.)

But Pennsylvania may be looking to change things. The Republican-majority Senate voted 46-2 to amend the constitution and let the gubernatorial candidates choose their running mates — with party approval. If the equally GOP-led House gives the nod, it could go to the people for a referendum vote.

While Democrats in the House are said to be opposed, it could lead to a better working relationship between an executive team that might be at odds with each other in philosophy or style.

Gov. Tom Wolf, for example, didn’t pick his former right-hand man, Mike Stack, but was teamed up with him in what the Philadelphia Inquirer called a “painfully distant arranged marriage.” That the Democratic governor seems to get along with his new runner-up, former Braddock mayor John Fetterman, is a happy accident that could have just as easily been strained and bitter.

The goal, sponsor Sen. David Argall, R-Schuylkill County, said, is to avoid rivalries instead of teams. That is admirable, but it also might make voters feel more disconnected from the process.

The most important partnership in politics, after all, shouldn’t be between running mates or party members, but between the voters and the people elected to serve.