Charles Leighton Hardwick (born November 8, 1941) is an American Republican Party politician and business leader who served as Speaker of the

New Jersey General Assembly The New Jersey General Assembly is the lower house of the New Jersey Legislature. Since the election of 1967 (1968 Session), the Assembly has consisted of 80 members. Two members are elected from each of New Jersey's 40 legislative districts for ...

and was a candidate for

Governor of New Jersey The governor of New Jersey is the head of government of New Jersey. The office of governor is an elected position with a four-year term. There is a two consecutive term term limit, with no limitation on non-consecutive terms. The official res ...

Early life

Hardwick was born in

Somerset, Kentucky Somerset is a home rule-class city in Pulaski County, Kentucky, United States. The city population was 11,924 according to the 2020 census. It is the seat of Pulaski County. History Somerset was first settled in 1798 by Thomas Hansford and rec ...

, the son of Joseph Fulton Hardwick (1901–1973), a maintenance worker for

Wonder Bread Wonder Bread is a brand of sliced bread which originated in the United States in 1921 and was one of the first to be sold pre-sliced nationwide in 1930. The brand is currently owned by Flowers Foods in the United States. History The Taggart Bak ...

, and Lucy Belle Hall Hardwick (1902–1946). His mother died of heart failure at age 44, when Hardwick was five years old. He attended Central High School in

Akron, Ohio Akron () is the fifth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and is the county seat of Summit County, Ohio, Summit County. It is located on the western edge of the Glaciated Allegheny Plateau, about south of downtown Cleveland. As of the 2020 C ...

. Hardwick was graduated from The Florida State University with BS and MBA degrees in 1964. He attended college on a scholarship provided by

Career at Pfizer

Hardwick joined

Pfizer Inc. Pfizer Inc. ( ) is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Pharmaceutical industry, pharmaceutical and biotechnology corporation headquartered on 42nd Street (Manhattan), 42nd Street in Manhattan, Manhattan, New York City. The co ...

in 1966 and held a number of positions in government and public affairs and in marketing before becoming vice president of government and public affairs in 1997. He was appointed senior vice president of government relations and public affairs of Pfizer Inc. in March 2001 and previously served as its vice president. Hardwick was a senior vice president of worldwide government and public affairs of Pfizer. He retired in 2005 after 39 years with Pfizer. He was a member of the Pfizer Leadership Team, the company's most senior management committee. During his tenure at Pfizer, the company grew from $500 million in worldwide sales to $50 billion. At Pfizer he was president of the Pfizer Foundation and worked closely with then CEO Hank McKinnell on providing healthcare assistance to HIV AIDs patients in the US and Africa, especially in Uganda. He spent three months in Vietnam working on the eradication of Trachoma, a treatable disease that leads to blindness if untreated.

Early political career

Hardwick entered politics in 1974 as a candidate for Fourth Ward Councilman in

Westfield, New Jersey Westfield is a town in Union County, New Jersey, United States, located southwest of Manhattan. As of the 2010 United States census, the town's population was 30,316,Thomas Long and Everett Lattimore, but lost. The good news for Hardwick was that two years after losing a Council race, he carried Westfield by 4,300 votes.

New Jersey State Assemblyman

In 1977, when Assemblyman Frank X. McDermott gave up his seat to run for the State Senate, Hardwick became a candidate for the

. Running on a ticket with incumbent C. Louis Bassano, he was elected by 3,213 votes over Democrat Vincent P. Baldassano, the Mayor of

Hillside, New Jersey Hillside is a township in Union County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2010 United States census, the township's population was 21,404, reflecting a decline of 343 (−1.6%) from the 21,747 counted in the 2000 Census, which had in ...

Results of the 1977 State Assembly Election, New Jersey District 20

Hardwick was re-elected in 1979, 1981, 1983, 1985, and 1987. Hardwick did not seek re-election in 1989, but instead ran in the Republican gubernatorial primary. After his defeat, his running mate, Peter J. Genova, withdrew from the race and Hardwick was able to run again for the State Assembly. In a strong Democratic year, Hardwick's 1989 re-election bid was the most difficult of his six re-election campaigns. He finished just 173 votes ahead of Democrat Neil Cohen, who won the second Assembly seat, and 2,187 votes ahead of Democrat Brian Fahey, the former Mayor of Westfield. He was not a candidate for re-election to an eighth term in 1991.

Assembly Leadership

Hardwick was elected Assembly Assistant Minority Leader in 1984. In 1985, when Minority Leader

Dean Gallo Dean Anderson Gallo (November 23, 1935 – November 6, 1994) was an American politician and businessman who served as a member of the United States House of Representatives, representing from 1985 until his death from prostate cancer in Denvill ...

resigned to take a seat in the

U.S. House of Representatives The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...

, Hardwick was elected Minority Leader. With popular Governor

Thomas Kean Thomas Howard Kean ( ; born April 21, 1935) is an American businessman, academic administrator and politician. A member of the Republican Party, Kean served as the 48th governor of New Jersey from 1982 to 1990. Following his tenure as governor, ...

heading the Republican ticket in 1985, Hardwick organized a statewide campaign organization to help Republicans win a majority in the

for the first time in twelve years. Republicans picked up 14 seats to take a 50–30 majority, and Hardwick was elected Speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly. Hardwick was assumed to be the next Assembly Speaker and scheduled a vote for the post on the Thursday after Election Day. On Wednesday, Greg Stevens, Kean's Chief of Staff, began making calls to secure votes for Walter Kavanaugh of Somerset County for Speaker. "Hardwick was no lapdog for the administration, but he had the support of his caucus and Kavanaugh dropped out within hours." Hardwick was elected Speaker of the New Jersey General Assembly. He became the first Republican Speaker since Kean held the job in 1973. Republicans held their majority in the 1987 mid-term elections, giving Hardwick a second two-year term as Speaker. During his fourteen years as an Assemblyman, Hardwick's legislative record included addressing the social issues around gambling, especially compulsive gambling, implementing guidelines for strip searches for people arrested for minor offenses and improving the adoption process by providing the health histories of biological parents when feasible. He wrote op-eds often that were published in ''The New York Times'' and elsewhere. In 1988 he was vice-chairman of the Republican National Convention Platform Committee. President Reagan named him to the Presidential Advisory Committee on Federalism. He was elected President of the Republican State Legislators Association a national organization of the GOP. He was on the executive board of the

American Legislative Exchange Council The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a nonprofit organization of conservative state legislators and private sector representatives who draft and share model legislation for distribution among state governments in the United State ...

(ALEC).

Candidate for Governor of New Jersey

With Kean term-limited, Hardwick set his sights on the

Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

nomination for

governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

. He announced on February 9, 1989. Eight Republicans entered the primary, with U.S. Rep.

Jim Courter James Andrew Courter (born October 14, 1941) is an American Republican Party politician, lawyer, and businessman. He represented parts of northwestern New Jersey in the United States House of Representatives from 1979 to 1991. In 1989, he uns ...

, who had represented parts of seven New Jersey counties in Congress, was the early front runner. The other candidates included: Attorney General

W. Cary Edwards William Cary Edwards (July 20, 1944 – October 20, 2010) was a New Jersey politician who served as the Attorney General of New Jersey from 1986 to 1989. Early life He was born on July 20, 1944, in Paterson, New Jersey or Ridgewood, New Je ...

and State Senators

Gerald Cardinale Gerald Cardinale (February 27, 1934 – February 20, 2021) was an American Republican Party politician, who served in the New Jersey State Senate from 1982 until his death in 2021, representing the 39th Legislative District. He also served one ...

and

William Gormley William L. "Bill" Gormley (born May 2, 1946) is an American attorney and Republican Party politician whose career in New Jersey's state Legislature spanned four decades. Representing the state's 2nd Legislative District, which includes most o ...

. Hardwick largely embraced Kean's tenure as governor, pointing out some of their similarities; part of his stump speech was to ask: "How can a Republican Assembly Speaker with a gap-toothed smile, who isn't a lawyer, expect to be Governor?" But without mentioning the Governor, he attacked Kean's proposals for property tax reform and to create a coastal commission to control growth on the Jersey shore; he was highly critical of Kean's decision to renominate New Jersey Supreme Court Chief Justice

Robert Wilentz Robert Nathan Wilentz (February 17, 1927 – July 23, 1996) was Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court from 1979 to 1996, making him the longest-serving Chief Justice since the Supreme Court became New Jersey's highest court in 1948. Ear ...

, a liberal. Hardwick also picked a public fight with New York Governor

Mario Cuomo Mario Matthew Cuomo (, ; June 15, 1932 – January 1, 2015) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 52nd governor of New York for three terms, from 1983 to 1994. A member of the Democratic Party, Cuomo previously served as t ...

, attacking New York's income tax on New Jerseyans who commute to New York. Hardwick had spent 25 years as a commuter, and his issue had appeared to strike a chord among many GOP primary voters. The Hardwick campaign actively sought votes from the state's Right to Life Organization and the National Rifle Association. He also received endorsements from some police officer groups and attempted to attract unaffiliated voters of those groups into the Republican primary. He said he is counting heavily on the Right to Life organization, the National Rifle Association and police officers' groups that have endorsed him to bring independent voters to the polls to register as Republicans and vote for him. Hardwick won some early victories, including a win at a non-binding Middlesex County Republican Convention, where he took 51% of the delegates in a county Courter represented in Congress. A WCAU-TV poll conducted May 29–31 showed a very close race, with the top four candidates—Courter, Edwards, Hardwick and Gormley—separated by just six points, a statistical dead heat in a poll that had a margin of error of +/-5%. The poll showed that 16% of likely Republican primary voters remained undecided just a week before the election. Courter won the primary by 27,013 votes over Edwards, 112,326 (29.02%) to 85,313 (22.04%), with Hardwick finishing third with 85,313 votes (22.04%). Courter went on to lose the General Election by a massive 541,384 against Democratic U.S. Rep.

Jim Florio James Joseph Florio (August 29, 1937 – September 25, 2022) was an American politician who served as the 49th governor of New Jersey from 1990 to 1994. He was previously the U.S. Representative for New Jersey's 1st congressional district from 19 ...

Results of the 1989 Republican Primary for Governor of New Jersey

Family and Retirement

After leaving the legislature, Hardwick moved to New York City. Mayor

Rudy Giuliani Rudolph William Louis Giuliani (, ; born May 28, 1944) is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 107th Mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001. He previously served as the United States Associate Attorney General from 1981 to 198 ...

appointed him to serve as Vice Chair of the New York City Council on the Environment. He also served on the Boards of the

New Jersey Performing Arts Center The New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC), in downtown Newark, New Jersey, United States, is one of the largest performing arts centers in the United States. Home to the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra (NJSO), more than nine million visitors (i ...

, New Jersey After 3, Inc. and the Academic Alliance Foundation (for AIDS care in Africa). Hardwick's first wife was Patricia Johnson Hardwick, his childhood sweetheart in Akron, Ohio. She managed his first campaign for the State Assembly. They had two children: Virginia Lee (Ginger) Hardwick and Charles Leighton Hardwick, Jr, and three grandchildren, Jacob, Sarah and Ben Lapidus. After their divorce, he married Sheilagh Mylott. In 2008, they adopted a son, Austin, whom they "fell in love with" after becoming his foster parents when he was four days old. He now lives in

Palm Beach Gardens, Florida Palm Beach Gardens is a city in Palm Beach County in the U.S. state of Florida, 77 miles north of downtown Miami. , the population was 59,182. Palm Beach Gardens is a principal city of the Miami metropolitan area, which was home to an estimated 6 ...

References

External links

, - , - , - {{DEFAULTSORT:Hardwick, Chuck Living people 1941 births Speakers of the New Jersey General Assembly Republican Party members of the New Jersey General Assembly People from Westfield, New Jersey