It's always fun to work names like Maraziti, Meyner, Gallagher, Dwyer and DeFino into the Inside Edge

Back in 1972, when legislators still drew congressional districts with the consent of the Governor -- and when the GOP controlled state government -- court mandated redistricting led to the creation of a new Republican district in northwestern New Jersey at the expense of a Democratic district in Hudson County. 

Joseph Maraziti, a powerful Republican State Senator from Morris County, drew the new district for himself – GOP territory that stretched from the Hopewell Valley in Mercer County to northeastern Morris County, and included Hunterdon, Sussex and Warren.  Democrats scored a home run when the recruited Helen Stevenson Meyner, the wife of former two-term Governor Robert Meyner, to run – but Maraziti won 56%-44%.

There were two options before the Legislature, where Republican control of the Assembly was based on a coalition between 39 Republicans and three Democrats from Hudson County.  One was to place two Democratic Congressmen from Hudson County were placed in the same district: Domenick Daniels of Jersey City and Cornelius Gallagher of Bayonne, both first elected in 1958.  (A year earlier, Life magazine alleged that Gallagher had close ties with organized crime.)

The other was to place Bayonne and part of Hudson County in the neighboring twelfth district, setting up a general election matchup between Gallagher and Florence Dwyer, a 70-year-old Republican from Elizabeth who had served in the House since she unseated Harrison Williams in 1956.  At the time, pundits believed that district would favor Dwyer over Gallagher, but eventually elect a Democrat when Dwyer retired.

The map when for the Daniels vs. Gallagher primary, which Daniels, won with 50% of the vote.  Gallagher finished third with just 15%, behind Anthony DeFino, then the reform Mayor of West New York who had the backing of Jersey City Mayor Paul Jordan and won 32%.

Maraziti lasted just two years.  He had won a seat on the House Judiciary Committee, where he became a defender of President Richard Nixon during the Watergate hearings.  He also had his own ethics problems after published reports alleged that he gave a no-show job to a woman with whom he had a less than professional relationship.  Maraziti was also named one of New Times magazine’s Ten Dumbest Congressmen.  Meyner beat him 57%-43% in this solidly GOP district in 1976.