Is it better to have a vote or a microphone?
Sen. Graig Meyer’s exit raises a bigger question about whether it's a better job to be a state senator or a state party chair.
There is nothing more exciting for a county party than a vacant seat in the General Assembly. From the mundanity of procedural tasks and petty squabbles, they are suddenly thrust to the peak of their constitutional role.
In a body of 170 legislators, rarely does a session elapse without a departure or two. That’s where Democrats are now with the news that Sen. Graig Meyer is leaving the Senate to run the N.C. Justice Center. It’s a plum job, especially for a member of the minority party, and it comes with a nice pay bump too.
I don’t have any special insight into what the Orange, Caswell, and Person County Democratic parties are going to do. But because Person County is in the district, one name naturally comes to mind: Anderson Clayton.
To be clear, I have no indication Anderson Clayton is pursuing this Senate seat. But it would make some sense.
The chairwoman of the state Democratic Party proudly hails from Roxboro, and has made the quixotic task of persuading rural voters to turn back to her party a centerpiece of her agenda.
She’d be an instant force to be reckoned with should she trade the party gavel for a back bench in the state Senate.
But that got me thinking about a broader question. Which is actually the better job in North Carolina politics, state senator or state party chair?
The case for the Senate is pretty easy to understand.
As a state senator, you can build something with your own name on it. You can advocate for a positive agenda, file bills, and take positions that are distinct from your caucus. Even if you are in the minority, you can still say what you are for, not just what you are against.
More than that, you represent actual people, including the ones who did not vote for you, and that gives the job a weight that party posts simply do not have. It is also a clearer path to building a public profile.
Of course, the job has obvious limits. Legislators are not as independent as they look. You still do get pressure from your caucus leadership, and the calendar is a grind. Plus, if you are a Democrat in today’s Senate, your odds of moving major legislation are slim to none.
The party chair job is almost the reverse.
A chair is not really a policymaker. A chair is a messenger, fundraiser, organizer, recruiter, surrogate, and sometimes attack dog. The work is more oppositional by nature. You are often prosecuting the case against the other side, defending your own candidates, and cleaning up disputes inside the coalition.
That can be useful, and even be energizing for the right person. But it also pushes you into the role of operative.
It is easier to turn elected office into something bigger than it is to turn party management into something bigger. Once voters know you as the person carrying the message, it can be hard to persuade them that you should now be the one they rally behind.
Michael Whatley is dealing with some version of that right now. He did make the jump, and he did it successfully enough to become the Trump-endorsed Republican nominee for U.S. Senate. But his candidacy still shows the challenge. Being the party man and being the principal are not quite the same thing, even when you have the full backing of the president.
The upside is that you get a statewide footprint in a way few legislators do. You travel from Bertie to Buncombe. You meet county chairs, donors, activists, candidates, consultants, and elected officials all over the map. You are tied into every major race and you see the whole board, not just one district.
If your next move is a national party job, the DNC, or a presidential campaign, that may well be the better perch. You are building relationships, not just a voting record.
But the weakness of the role is easy to see too. You have visibility without much authority, plenty of people to please, and not a lot of control. When things go wrong, you catch it. When things go right, the candidates usually get the credit.
That is why, to me, party chair sounds like the harder job. It looks more exhausting, more constrained, and more thankless.
So which is it?
I don’t have any special insight into Anderson Clayton’s ambitions, and I’m not pretending otherwise.
She catches a lot of guff online from the right, much of it cheap and unserious. I disagree with her on a lot, probably most things on policy. But I respect her. Her heart seems to be in the right place. She clearly cares about North Carolina, and she has taken on a hard job with real energy.
That is part of why this question interests me.
If the goal is career advancement, I think the answer is fairly clear. Party chair can be a launchpad into national politics or party infrastructure. A Senate seat is probably better if your ambition is to become a major elected official.
But if the real question is where you can do the most good for North Carolina, I’m not sure there is an easy answer. A state senator gets a vote. A party chair gets a microphone.
Making a difference is not always the same thing as holding the better title. And on that question, I’m not sure the answer is obvious at all.
