I | INTRODUCTION |
New
Jersey, state in the Middle Atlantic region of the United States. Its
long eastern coast faces the Atlantic Ocean. To the northeast and north it is
bordered by the Hudson River and New York. To the west lies Pennsylvania. New
Jersey is separated from Delaware on the south and southwest by Delaware Bay and
the Delaware River. Trenton is the capital of New Jersey. Newark is the largest
city.
New Jersey is the fifth smallest state but one
of the most diversified. Lying between New York City and Philadelphia, in the
heart of the highly urbanized area called a megalopolis by some population
experts, it is the second most urbanized state, behind only California, and the
most densely populated. New Jersey is the only state in which all 21 counties
are officially classified as “metropolitan” by the census. Yet it has wilderness
areas, in the mountains of the northwest and the sparsely settled southern
tidelands. New Jersey is in the forefront of industrial research and
development, but the continuing importance of farming is reflected in its
nickname, the Garden State. New Jersey’s ready access to the markets of
New York City and Philadelphia led to an early specialization in fresh fruits
and vegetable production. As early as the 17th century, colonists described the
area as a garden because of its agricultural bounty.
Proud of its status as the third state to
ratify the Constitution of the United States, entering the Union on December 18,
1787, New Jersey traces its history back more than 350 years. Its name derives
from the island of Jersey in the English Channel, the birthplace of Sir George
Carteret, a co-owner of New Jersey in the 17th century. The state contains many
well-preserved monuments commemorating the American Revolution (1775-1783), many
of whose battles were fought on New Jersey soil, including George Washington’s
famed crossing of the Delaware River in December 1776, to defeat the British at
Trenton.
II | PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY |
New Jersey’s oblong-shaped area encompasses
22,587 sq km (8,721 sq mi), including 1,026 sq km (396 sq mi) of inland water
and 1,039 sq km (401 sq mi) of coastal waters over which it has jurisdiction. At
its longest point, New Jersey measures 270 km (168 mi) from north to south,
including Cape May Peninsula. At its narrowest the distance from east to west is
58 km (36 mi). Toward the south, where the state’s width is greatest, the
distance is 92 km (57 mi). The mean elevation of the state is 80 m (250 ft). New
Jersey has 209 km (130 mi) of coastline.
A | Natural Regions |
Four major landform regions are found in
New Jersey, extending across the state in a northeast-to-southwest direction.
They are the Ridge and Valley province, also called the Appalachian Ridge and
Valley Section or the Newer Appalachians; the New Jersey Highlands, a portion of
the broader physiographic region called the New England province; the Piedmont;
and the Atlantic portion of the Coastal Plain.
The Appalachian Ridge and Valley Section
occupies the northwestern corner of the state. It consists of a prominent ridge
of resistant sandstone called Kittatinny Mountain. The Delaware River, flowing
through the gorge known as the Delaware Water Gap, cuts into this ridge. On
Kittatinny Mountain, a few miles south of the New York-New Jersey boundary, is
High Point, the highest elevation in the state at 550 m (1,803 ft). Between
Kittatinny Mountain and the New Jersey Highlands lies a valley that supports
much of New Jersey’s dairy industry. The floor of the valley is underlain by
limestone with irregular ridges of shale outcrops. The elevation is about 120 to
150 m (about 400 to 500 ft). The valley is part of the Great Appalachian Valley
that can be traced from the Hudson River to Alabama.
The New Jersey Highlands, or the New
England Upland, begin at the southeastern side of the Appalachian Valley.
Geologically similar to New England, the highlands consist of a series of
flat-topped ridges composed of gneiss (a banded rock created by heat and
pressure) and separated from one another by narrow valleys running in a general
northeast-southwest direction. The larger valleys are drained by the
Musconetcong and Pequest rivers. The region is dotted with lakes, many of which
are summer resorts. The largest natural lakes are Lake Hopatcong; Greenwood
Lake, lying partly in New York; Green Pond; and Culvers Lake.
To the east of the New Jersey Highlands is
the Northern Piedmont, also called the Piedmont Lowlands or Triassic Lowlands.
This belt of land, about 30 km (about 20 mi) wide, is underlain by sandstones
and shales of a generally bright red color. Dark rocks known locally as traprock
flowed into this region in past geologic ages; erosion of the surrounding
sandstone has caused these rocks to stand out as prominent ridges above the
plain. These ridges, the Watchung and Sourland mountains, rise more than 120 m
(400 ft). The Palisades, another traprock ridge, terminates in spectacular sheer
cliffs along the west side of the Hudson River, opposite New York City.
The Piedmont Lowlands, also known as the
Newark Basin, is the part of New Jersey most easily accessible to New York City,
and site of most of the state’s major cities. Three rivers drain the region. The
Raritan River empties into the ocean south of Staten Island. The Passaic River
flows through the northern half of the Piedmont basin. It creates a spectacular
waterfall at Paterson, where it flows across First Watchung Mountain. The
Hackensack River joins the Passaic River at Newark Bay, from which they enter
New York Bay via the Kill Van Kull.
A line drawn from Perth Amboy to Trenton
marks the approximate northwestern limits of the Atlantic Coastal Plain. This
plain occupies about three-fifths of New Jersey’s area and can be divided into
two distinct parts, the inner and outer coastal plains.
The inner coastal plain, known as the
Greensand Belt, lies adjacent to the Piedmont and is roughly 30 to 40 km (20 to
25 mi) wide. Its rich and fertile lowland has given New Jersey its reputation as
a garden state. Many truck farms and orchards, as well as an important dairy
industry, flourish there.
The outer coastal plain consists of
loosely consolidated sands and is generally infertile. Its landscape is that of
a gently rolling plain that slopes from a series of small hills, about 60 m
(about 200 ft) high, marking the western margin of the outer coastal plain to
the ocean. At the ocean are a series of shallow lagoons and salt marshes and a
series of offshore sandbars, which form a string of inhabited islands.
The southeastern portion of the outer
coastal plain, which is covered with scrub oak and pine, is called the Pine
Barrens. It is lightly populated, and the infertile soil limits agriculture to
scattered areas of cranberry and blueberry production.
B | Climate |
The climate of New Jersey is extremely
variable. During the summer the state is invaded by moist tropical air that
brings hot, humid conditions. Cold continental air dominates the state for much
of the winter and brings frequent heavy snowfalls.
Total precipitation over most of the state
averages about 1,140 mm (45 in) per year, with slightly less in the southwest
than elsewhere. New Jersey’s average temperature is 1° C(33°F) in January and
23°C (74°F) in July. The highest temperature ever recorded was 43°C (110°F) in
1936, and the lowest was -37°C (-34°F) in 1904. Length of the growing season
varies from less than four months in northwestern New Jersey to almost eight
months in the southernmost counties. The state’s record single snowfall, 890 mm
(35 in), was recorded at Whitehouse in January 1996.
C | Soils |
Broadly defined, all of New Jersey’s soils
are podzolic soils; that is, they are acidic and contain fairly high amounts of
iron oxides. The soils in northern New Jersey are irregular in quality and
contain rock fragments and small stones deposited by the continental glaciers of
the last Ice Age. The soils of the inner coastal plain, unaffected by
glaciation, are the richest in the state, while those of the outer coastal plain
are generally infertile. The newer soil classification system developed by the
United States Department of Agriculture describes the state’s Appalachian areas
as inceptisols, while the coastal plain is characterized as ultisols, common to
the Southeast United States.
D | Animal Life |
Most species of mammals, birds, reptiles,
and fish common to the Northeastern United States are found in New Jersey. In
recent years black bear have returned to forested areas in northern New Jersey,
and coyotes are once again common throughout the state. Other animals found in
New Jersey are the white-tailed deer, skunk, raccoon, squirrel, fox, opossum,
chipmunk, cottontail, woodchuck, and many types of turtles, snakes, frogs, and
toads. The birds include sparrows, mourning doves, warblers, and cardinals. The
southern portion of Island Beach State Park, situated on the Atlantic Flyway, is
a preserve for both native and migrating species of birds. The Edwin B. Forsythe
National Wildlife Refuge at both Barnegat and Brigantine also are important
stopovers for migrating birds along the Atlantic Flyway.
E | Plant Life |
Forests cover 45 percent of New Jersey’s
land. Two combinations of tree species are found. In the north the typical
forest contains a mixture of oak, hickory, red maple, hemlock, and white birch.
In the Coastal Plain, pitch pine, scrub oak, and white cedar prevail. The red
cedar is common to both areas. Although the wood is useful commercially, the
forests serve mainly for recreation.
Two wilderness areas, Mettler’s Woods and
Island Beach, are preserves. Mettler’s Woods, also known as Hutcheson Memorial
Forest, a 107-hectare (264-acre) tract of virgin forest southwest of New
Brunswick, belonged to the Mettler family for more than 250 years before being
purchased by a citizens group and placed under the trusteeship of Rutgers
University. It represents the original forest cover typical of the region.
Trees, many of them more than 20 m (70 ft) tall, include oak, hickory, beech,
sugar maple, and ash. Shrubs include mapleleaf, viburnum, black haw, arrowwood,
and spicebush.
Island Beach, a strip of the offshore
sandbar extending from Seaside Park to Barnegat Inlet, is a state park 1,200
hectares (3,000 acres) of natural barrier island ecosystem, including maritime
forest, coastal dunes, and tidal marshes.
F | Conservation |
With a growing population crowded into a
small state, New Jersey is aware of the great need to conserve its resources.
Increasing urbanization and industrialization have raised land values, and
suburbs are encroaching on farmland. To compensate for shrinking farm acreage,
agriculture has been forced to increase productivity and to practice soil
conservation. The state’s chief conservation problem, however, is to maintain an
adequate water supply.
During the 1960s the New Jersey
legislature passed the most stringent anti-pollution laws in the nation. In 1978
the federal government created the Pinelands National Reserve to protect the
unique Pine Barrens region.
In 2006 New Jersey had 113 hazardous waste
sites, more than any other state, on a national priority list for cleanup due to
their severity or proximity to people. Between 1995 and 2000, the amount of
toxic chemicals discharged into the environment decreased by 17 percent.
III | ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES |
Although most of New Jersey’s early
settlers were farmers, industries such as iron forging, glass blowing, and
leather tanning were operating by the 18th century. Paterson, which produced
cotton, silk, and heavy machinery, and Newark, which made clothing, shoes, and
other items, were important U.S. manufacturing cities in the l9th century. By
1900 industry had surpassed agriculture to become the leading sector of New
Jersey’s economy. In the 1990s New Jersey had a diversified economy. The
importance of tourism was epitomized by Atlantic City, which in 1978 became the
site of the country’s first gambling casino in modern years outside of Nevada.
Newark developed as a major center of the U.S. insurance industry, and several
enterprises in the state engaged in the research and development of
communications and electronic equipment. A large number of New Jersey residents
commuted to jobs in the nearby New York City and Philadelphia metropolitan
areas.
New Jersey had a work force of 4,518,000
people in 2006. Of those the largest share were employed in service industries,
doing such things as data processing and working in restaurants. Services was
also the fastest growing segment of employment, as traditional jobs in
manufacturing and farming declined during the 1980s and 1990s. Of those
employed, 38 percent worked in services; 19 percent in wholesale or retail
trade; 16 percent in federal, state, or local government, including those in the
military; 8 percent in manufacturing; 22 percent in finance, insurance, or real
estate; 22 percent in transportation or public utilities; 4 percent in
construction; and 1 percent in farming (including agricultural services),
forestry, or fishing. Employment in mining was insignificant. In 2005, 21
percent of New Jersey’s workers were unionized.
A | Agriculture |
In 2005 there were 9,800 farms in New
Jersey. Of those 31 percent had annual sales of more than $10,000; many of the
remainder were sidelines for operators who held other jobs. Farmland occupied
319,702 hectares (790,000 acres), of which 68 percent was cropland. Most of the
rest was pasture.
Farm income comes mainly from sales of
greenhouse products, dairy products, eggs, peaches, and blueberries. New Jersey
specializes in producing fruits and vegetables for the eastern seaboard. Its
agricultural products supply the markets of New York City, Philadelphia, and
those within the state, as well as supplying canners and frozen-food
processors.
Poultry farming, once a big business in
New Jersey, has declined since the early 1960s. Although poultry farming is
practiced throughout the state, the remaining concentrations are on the eastern
fringe of the Pine Barrens and in the west central part of the state.
Dairy farming is also a leading but
declining branch of agriculture in New Jersey. New Jersey’s dairy farms are
found mainly in the northwestern and western counties along the Delaware River.
Most of the milk is sold fresh in the state and in New York City and
Philadelphia; only a small share is made into butter or other milk products. New
Jersey is also a large producer of fruits and vegetables, which are either sold
fresh or are frozen or canned. About 18,100 hectares (about 44,600 acres),
primarily in Burlington, Gloucester, Salem, and Cumberland counties, are under
intense cultivation for vegetable production.
Peaches and apples are New Jersey’s most
important tree crops. The production of apples has been declining; but the
success of the peach industry in southern New Jersey has continued, and several
new varieties of peaches, including Sunhigh and Jerseyland, have been developed.
New Jersey is the third leading state in the production of cranberries, which
are grown in the bogs of Atlantic and Burlington counties. Although cranberry
output has declined, the increasing production of blueberries on the sandier
soil of these two counties has placed New Jersey second in the ranks of
blueberry-growing states.
B | Fisheries |
The weight and value of New Jersey’s fish
catch increased in the 1990s. However, the gains were being made because of
increases in the catch of lower-valued species such as squid, skate, dogfish,
Atlantic mackerel, butterfish, and herring. The harvest of species that command
a higher market price, such as lobster, tilefish, fluke (or summer flounder),
whiting (or ling), scallops, black sea bass, and tunas, were all down. Oysters
are no longer taken due to certain shellfish diseases. Menhaden, processed into
such products as fertilizer, fishmeal, and fish oil, are still caught in large
numbers although the industrial processing of the fish is now done in other
states. In 2004 the fish catch for the state was valued at $145.8 million.
Surf clam, ocean quahog, and hard clam
harvests remain the most important for New Jersey’s fishing industry. Hard clams
are successfully aquacultured, or farm raised, in shallow baywaters. A state
program of transplanting hard clams from polluted waters to clean beds has
increased production.
Pollution of habitat is of declining
significance as the cause of changes in New Jersey’s fishing industry. More
critical is the over-fishing of desirable species. Most highly valued species
are listed as “overexploited,” meaning harvests are declining due to
overfishing, or “fully exploited,” meaning any increase in harvest will lead to
decline. Only species low in value and demand are classified as
“underexploited.” The Cape May and Wildwood area remains the most important
commercial fishing port.
C | Forestry |
Forestry in New Jersey is not an
important commercial activity, although some wood pulp and other forestry
products are manufactured. Trees in the state are mostly too small to be of
commercial value. State farms do, however, produce a number of Christmas trees
for sale in nearby cities.
D | Mining |
One of the most important minerals
extracted in New Jersey is basalt, or traprock, which is crushed for use in
construction. Sand, gravel, peat, and clays are also extracted. The sands of
southern New Jersey are excellent for glassmaking. The glassware made there
during colonial days was famous, and these sands are still valued. Greensand
marls, or glauconite, are dug from pits in the southern part of the state and
are sold as fertilizer and water softeners. These marl pits have also produced
some notable dinosaur skeletons.
Mines in the highlands of northern New
Jersey provided much of the iron used during the American Revolution. These
mines operated until the 1960s when competition from cheaper imported ore forced
them to close. Foreign competition, coupled with depletion of the ore body at
Franklin, has led to decrease in importance of zinc production, in which New
Jersey was once a national leader. Oil and natural gas have been found off the
Atlantic coast, but in quantities that do not yet encourage commercial
exploitation.
E | Manufacturing |
The state’s leading industry is the
production of chemicals, in which New Jersey leads the nation. About one-sixth
of all drugs manufactured in the United States come from New Jersey, which has
been called “the nation’s medicine chest.” The chemical industry also produces
cleansers and industrial organic chemicals in quantity. Other leading
manufacturers are printers and publishers, especially those producing commercial
advertising, books, and newspapers; food processors, making such things as
brewed beverages, pastas, canned vegetables and soups, and confections; refiners
of petroleum; makers of instruments, including navigation equipment, surgical
appliances, and photographic equipment and supplies; the makers of industrial
machinery, such as heating and refrigeration equipment and pumps; manufacturers
of electronic and electrical equipment, such as telephones, radio and television
communications equipment, and semiconductors; and fabricators of metal
components, including parts for other industries such as stamped metal, sheet
metal, and industrial valves.
Broadly speaking, manufacturing is
concentrated in two parts of the state. The larger area is found in the
northeast, where Bergen, Passaic, Hudson, Essex, and Union counties are tied to
the port of New York. A second and smaller concentration hugs the Delaware from
Trenton to Camden and is tied to Philadelphia. Since the 1950s industry has
moved into suburban and rural areas, especially Morris, Somerset, and Monmouth
counties in the northeast, and Gloucester and Burlington counties in the
south.
The chemical industry, which makes items
ranging from cosmetics and soap to heavy bulk chemicals, as well as
pharmaceuticals, is concentrated in Passaic, Essex, and Middlesex counties,
particularly in the Raritan River Valley and along the Arthur Kill Channel. A
major segment of the industry is also found in Salem County, along the Delaware
River. Newark, Camden, Clifton, New Brunswick, and Trenton are all drug
manufacturing centers.
Petroleum refining, which services the
vast urban markets of New York City and Philadelphia, is carried on along the
Arthur Kill in northern New Jersey and along the Delaware in the southwestern
part of the state. A large refinery was built during the 1960s at Deepwater on
the Delaware River. The crude oil arrives at the refineries by tanker from
overseas, and pipelines carry a large quantity of refined petroleum products to
consumers.
Electrical machinery, of all types, is
made in various parts of the state. Hudson, Bergen, Essex, Passaic, and Mercer
are the leading counties in electrical goods manufacturing.
Food processing is declining in southern
New Jersey, where much of the vegetable crop now is sold fresh, including “pick
your own,” rather than frozen or canned for market. Beer is brewed in and around
Newark. Automobile assembly plants are located in Union and Middlesex counties,
and aircraft parts and engines are manufactured in Bergen County. The older
industrial cities on the fringe of New York City are the principal centers for
the production of machinery and fabricated metals. The apparel industry is
centered principally in Hudson and Passaic counties as a spillover from New York
City’s garment center. The reduction of nonferrous metals is centered around
Newark and Raritan bays. Structural brick is made in great quantities from the
clay deposits along the Raritan River, while better-grade clay products, such as
porcelain fixtures, are made near Trenton. The manufacture of fine china is
centered in Pomona, near Atlantic City. The glass industry in Cumberland County
supplies containers for the food processing, brewing, and pharmaceutical
industries.
F | Electricity |
Of the electricity generated in New
Jersey in 2005, 52 percent came from nuclear power plants and almost all of the
remainder came from steam-driven power plants burning fossil fuels, mainly coal
and natural gas. There are 1 nuclear power plants in New Jersey, of which three
are at Lower Alloways Creek Township and one is in Lacey Township. Three large
investor-owned utility companies generate all the electricity sold in the
state.
G | Transportation |
No other state has as dense of a system
of highways and railroads as New Jersey. The state’s principal traffic alley
connects New York City with Philadelphia. Through this corridor pass the rail
lines of the Consolidated Rail Corporation (Conrail) and Amtrak, U.S. highways 1
and 130, the New Jersey Turnpike, portions of Interstate Highway 95, several
pipelines, and many interstate communications and power connections.
In 2004 there were 1,476 km (917 mi) of
railroad track in the state. New Jersey’s railroads move some freight into the
ports on New York Harbor.
New Jersey had 62,043 km (38,552 mi) of
public highways in 2005. Of this total, 694 km (431 mi) were part of the federal
interstate highway system. The state has three profitable toll roads, the New
Jersey Turnpike, the Garden State Parkway, and the Atlantic City
Expressway.
Many tunnels and bridges connect New
Jersey and New York. The Port Authority Trans Hudson tubes carry commuter trains
under the river. Conrail and Amtrak have tunnels that go into New York City.
Vehicular traffic moves over the George Washington Bridge, or via the Lincoln or
Holland tunnels. These arteries are operated by the Port Authority of New York
and New Jersey, a bistate commission created in 1921.
Three bridges connect New Jersey with
Staten Island, New York: the Bayonne Bridge, North America’s second longest
steel arch bridge; the Goethals Bridge; and Outerbridge Crossing. The Delaware
Memorial twin bridges link the state with Delaware. Other bridges, notably the
Benjamin Franklin, Walt Whitman, and Betsy Ross, connect New Jersey with points
in Pennsylvania.
New Jersey has 4 airports; but only
Newark and Teterboro, both operated by the Port Authority of New York and New
Jersey, and Pomona Airport, near Atlantic City, have more than local importance.
Newark is the 11th busiest airport in the United States.
New Jersey’s port facilities include a
part of the port of New York along the west bank of the Hudson River; the Upper
and Lower New York bays; Kill Van Kull; and Arthur Kill, as well as the ports of
Newark, Elizabeth, and Raritan. More than 100 piers, mostly handling general
cargo, line the New Jersey shore of the Hudson River from Bayonne to West New
York. The port of Newark, an important petroleum and general cargo port, is
under the jurisdiction of the bistate Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
Adjacent to Newark is the port of Elizabeth, wholly owned by the authority.
Lining the Delaware River from Delaware Bay north to Trenton are such important
ports as Paulsboro, which specializes in handling oil, and Gloucester,
Deepwater, and Camden. These ports are operated in conjunction with the Delaware
River Port Authority of Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
IV | THE PEOPLE OF NEW JERSEY |
A | Population Patterns |
New Jersey had a population of 8,414,350
in 2000, according to the census. That was an increase of 8.9 percent over the
1990 census figure of 7,730,188. The average population density of 454 persons
per sq km (1,176 per sq mi) is the highest of the 50 states. Some 94 percent of
all New Jerseyites lived in urban areas in 2000, and the population distribution
throughout the state is extremely uneven.
The ethnic composition of the population
reflects the heavy influx of immigrants from Europe, particularly in the period
after the American Civil War (1861-1865). After the establishment of a Communist
government in Cuba in the late 1950s many Cubans settled in New Jersey.
Whites compose the largest share of the
population of New Jersey, representing 72.6 percent of the people in 2000. Some
13.6 percent were black, 5.7 percent were Asian, 0.2 percent were Native
American, and those of mixed heritage or not reporting race made up 7.9 percent
of the population. Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders numbered 3,329.
Hispanics, who may be of any race, were 13.3 percent of the people and were
primarily of Puerto Rican or Cuban origin.
B | Principal Cities |
New Jersey’s cities radiate out from New
York City in continuous chains. Living in northern New Jersey, within a 50-km
(30-mi) radius of Manhattan Island, are three-quarters of the people in the
state. Another urban concentration is along the Delaware River, in the
Trenton-Camden area, where 15 percent of the people live.
Communities clustered in the northern
part of Bergen County provide homes for the thousands of commuters to Manhattan.
Most of the larger cities in New Jersey, however, have grown as a result of
their manufacturing and commercial activities. These include Newark, Jersey
City, Paterson, Elizabeth, Clifton, Passaic, Hoboken, Union City, and Kearny in
the north and a smaller urban complex around Camden.
Newark, with a population of 281,402 in
2006, is the largest city in the state. It is an important center for the
manufacture of chemicals, food products, and pharmaceuticals. It is also an
important port and an office and insurance center. Jersey City (239,614) is the
terminus of several railroads and ocean shipping lines and a manufacturing
center for food, textiles, and apparel. Paterson (148,708) was founded in 1791
by the American statesman Alexander Hamilton and his Society for Establishing
Useful Manufactures to encourage American economic independence. Waterpower
potential from the Great Falls of the Passaic led to the growth of Paterson, as
the falls were harnessed by cotton and silk textile mills. Today the leading
industries are the manufacture of chemicals, machine tools, and electronic
components. Other industrial cities include Elizabeth (126,179), with a fine
deepwater harbor on Newark Bay, and Edison (100,499), named after the famous
inventor Thomas A. Edison. Trenton (83,923), the state capital, is a
manufacturer of steel and rubber products and the former home of Lenox, one of
the world’s finest dinner chinas. Atlantic City (40,368), a famous resort and
convention center, is also the home of the state’s only gambling casinos.
C | Religion |
The largest church membership in New
Jersey is Roman Catholic, representing nearly one-half of the state’s
churchgoers. The other large religious groups include the Baptists, the
Methodists, and the Jews.
V | EDUCATION AND CULTURAL INSTITUTIONS |
Public elementary schools in New Jersey date
from 1817, but not until 1871 did public schools become free to all children.
New Jersey’s first public high school opened in Newark in 1838. Public schools
are supervised by a commissioner of education, appointed by the governor, and a
state board of education. Education is compulsory from ages 6 to 16. Of New
Jersey’s children, 15 percent attend private schools.
In the 2002–2003 school year New Jersey
spent $13,884 on each student’s education, compared to a national average of
$9,299. There were 12.7 students for every teacher, giving the state one of the
smallest average class sizes of any state in the country (the national average
was 15.9 students). Of those older than 25 years of age in 2006, 86.1 percent
had a high school diploma, whereas the national norm stood at 84.1 percent.
A | Higher Education |
New Jersey is the home of Rutgers, The
State University of New Jersey, whose main campus is in New Brunswick. Rutgers
was founded as Queen’s College in 1766. The New Jersey Agricultural Experiment
Station is nearby. The university also has campuses in Camden and Newark.
Princeton University, one of the oldest
universities in the United States, was founded as the College of New Jersey by
the Presbyterian Church in Elizabeth in 1746. It houses the renowned Woodrow
Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Also located in Princeton is
the Institute for Advanced Study, where Albert Einstein lived and worked during
his last years.
In 2004–2005 New Jersey had 33 public and
26 private institutions of higher education. Among the notable schools were
Princeton Theological Seminary, in Princeton; Fairleigh Dickinson University, in
Madison and Teaneck; Stevens Institute of Technology, in Hoboken; Rider
University, in Lawrenceville; Seton Hall University, in South Orange; Bloomfield
College, in Bloomfield; Drew University, in Madison; Kean University, in Union;
Rowan University, in Glassboro; and William Paterson University of New Jersey,
in Wayne.
Numerous specialized schools in the state
include New Brunswick Theological Seminary and the Westminster Choir College of
Rider University, a music school in Princeton. New Jersey also has several fine
private college preparatory and parochial schools.
B | Libraries |
Some 309 public library systems function
throughout the state. They are served by the extensive book loan department of
the state library at Trenton and are supplemented by bookmobiles. The city of
Newark has a large public library. Public libraries annually circulate an
average of 6.3 books for every state resident.
The most noteworthy university libraries
in the state are located in Princeton, where the Harvey S. Firestone Library was
dedicated in 1949, and in Rutgers, which also has a school of library
science.
C | Museums |
The New Jersey State Museum, in Trenton,
is noted for its planetarium and its departments of natural history and
archaeology. The Newark Museum contains art, history, and science exhibits and
also has a planetarium. The New Jersey Historical Society Museum is also located
in Newark. The Museum of American Glass at Wheaton Village in Millville displays
the history of glassmaking in the United States, and glassmaking demonstrations
are offered.
D | Communications |
In 2002 New Jersey had 28 daily
newspapers. The state’s first regular weekly began publication in 1777 in
Burlington; the first daily, the Newark Daily Advertiser, was founded in
1832. Among the leading dailies are Newark’s Star-Ledger, the Jersey
Journal of Jersey City, Bergen County’s Record, and the Times
and the Trentonian, both in Trenton.
New Jersey has 25 AM and 57 FM radio
stations and 11 television stations. The state’s first commercial radio station,
WJZ, was established in 1921 in Newark. The first television station, WATV,
began operations in Newark in 1948. WATV later became an educational television
channel in New York City. Radio and television broadcasts from New York and
Philadelphia overpower local broadcasting facilities, and many of the
transmitters for stations in these cities are actually in New Jersey.
E | Music and Theater |
Outstanding concerts and cultural programs
are presented in the New Brunswick Cultural Center, the South Jersey Performing
Arts Center in Camden, and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark. New
Jersey supports many symphony orchestras, including the acclaimed New Jersey
Symphony Orchestra. Many professional theater companies operate throughout the
state, including the award-winning McCarter Theatre in Princeton, and the
Crossroads Theatre in New Brunswick, one of the leading black theater companies
in the nation. The Victorian town of Cape May hosts a classical music festival
in the spring, and Newark sponsors an international jazz festival in the fall.
Rock concerts are held year-round at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands Sports
Complex and at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel.
VI | RECREATION AND PLACES OF INTEREST |
The numerous lakes and the rolling hills of
the northwest and the seashore of the southeast provide New Jersey with one of
its most important economic assets. Many summer cottages dot the shores of New
Jersey’s lakes and ponds, while hundreds of hotels and motels line the seacoast.
Atlantic City, with its gambling casinos, is a magnet for visitors; but Asbury
Park, Ocean Grove, Cape May, Wildwood, and Ocean City are also popular. Asbury
Park, Ocean City, and Ocean Grove were originally associated with the summer
conferences of the Methodist Church.
New Jersey offers a variety of both
freshwater and saltwater fishes. Its streams in the northwest abound in bass,
pickerel, catfish, and brook trout. Bluefish, striped bass, and flounder are
common in the coastal waters. Many inlets of Delaware Bay are famous for their
oysters and clams, but pollution has seriously damaged these shellfish.
Migrating shad can be found seasonally in the Hudson and Delaware rivers.
A | National and State Parks |
The National Park Service maintains two
historical parks in New Jersey. Morristown National Historical Park preserves
the quarters the Continental Army used during two winters of the American
Revolution (1775-1783). The laboratory and home of inventor Thomas A. Edison are
preserved at Edison National Historic Site in West Orange, where more than half
of Edison’s nearly 1,100 patented inventions were researched and developed.
Several sections of the New Jersey
countryside have been set aside for recreational use. The Delaware Water Gap
National Recreation Area preserves relatively unspoiled land on both the New
Jersey and Pennsylvania sides of the middle Delaware River, a section of which
has been declared a national scenic river. A craft village and environmental
education centers are located in the area. Gateway National Recreation Area was,
along with Golden Gate in San Francisco, the first urban region so dedicated. In
addition to marshes and wildlife sanctuaries, the 10,767 hectares (26,607 acres)
of the area contains recreational and athletic facilities as well as historic
structures, old military installations, a lighthouse, and waters of New York
Harbor. Other natural regions with national designations are the Great Egg
Harbor Scenic and Recreational River, in the Pine Barrens, and a section of the
Appalachian National Scenic Trail, which traverses northwestern New Jersey along
the Delaware River.
New Jersey’s state parks highlight
year-round recreational opportunities as well as preserve historic sites. High
Point State Park is one of the state’s largest parks and offers a variety of
activities throughout the year, including ice skating, ice fishing, hiking, and
swimming. Liberty State Park, with a spectacular view of the Statue of Liberty,
hosts a variety of celebrations each year. Tours cross the harbor to Liberty
Island and the nearby Immigration Museum on Ellis Island. Washington Crossing
State Park in Titusville features picnicking, hiking, and horseback riding near
the George Washington Memorial Arboretum, the Revolutionary War Museum, and an
open-air theater.
B | Historical Sites |
Every region of the state is steeped with
historic locations. A walking tour of the historic district of the village of
Hope includes a gristmill, church, and cemetery in this city founded by the
Moravian Church. An authentic Dutch colonial farmstead has been preserved as a
living museum at the Garrestson Forge and Farm Restoration in Fair Lawn. The
Great Falls National Historic Site, in Paterson, gives a glimpse at the nation’s
first industrial city, which was planned by Alexander Hamilton and made famous
by poet William Carlos Williams. Some 56 historic homes are located in
Lawrenceville, including the boyhood home of General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, Jr.,
a leader in the Persian Gulf War (1991). Trenton is home to an impressive
inventory of historic and cultural sites, including the William Trent House,
built in 1719 by the planner of Trenton. The Kuser Farm Mansion, built in 1892
as a summer residence, is in nearby Hamilton. Visitors to Freehold can walk in
the footsteps of Molly Pitcher at Monmouth Battlefield. Molly, whose real name
was Mary Ludwig Hays McCauley, won fame on a sweltering June day in 1778 for
assisting artillerymen in battle at Monmouth by bringing them drinking water in
a pitcher. Veterans of the War of 1812 and the Civil War (1861-1865) are buried
at the historic Finn’s Point National Cemetery in Salem County. The site of the
1937 crash of the zeppelin Hindenburg is marked with a monument at the
Naval Air Engineering Station at Lakehurst (see Airship).
C | Other Places to Visit |
New Jersey’s rich history and landscapes
afford a number of unique destinations. The Great American Wonder and Railroad
Museum in Flemington is the world’s largest model railroad exhibition. The
display includes a doll museum, pipe organ, and theater. This region, known as
the Skylands, is also home to some of New Jersey’s wineries. Other wineries are
located in Hammonton, Absecon, and Egg Harbor. In Camden the Walt Whitman House
and Cultural Museum houses an extensive collection of manuscripts and
memorabilia from the great poet. Also in Camden is the Campbell Museum, an
extensive collection of soup tureens and eating vessels from European households
of the 18th and 19th century. Camden’s waterfront also is home to the New Jersey
State Aquarium and an outdoor amphitheater for the performing arts.
New Jersey’s seaside resorts are popular
attractions; leading resorts include Atlantic City, Asbury Park, Ocean City,
Wildwood, and Cape May. The boardwalk in Atlantic City lives up to its
reputation with amusement piers, casinos, nightclubs, and restaurants. There are
also dozens of beaches for sunbathers and swimmers. Lucy the Elephant, built in
the late 1800s, stands on Margate Beach, one of the boardwalk beaches. Lucy’s
more than 80 metric ton bulk is a National Historic Landmark.
Both units of the Edwin B. Forsythe
National Wildlife Refuge north of Atlantic City are paradises for bird-watchers.
The Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine is dedicated to the rescue of
stranded seals, dolphins, porpoises, sea turtles, and birds. Visitors can view
the New Jersey wetlands on a walk near Cape May Point Lighthouse. Also on the
South Shore, at Sunset Beach, is the remains of the Atlantis, a World War
I (1914-1918) vessel made of concrete.
D | Sports |
The extensive Meadowlands Sports Complex,
in East Rutherford, includes an outdoor stadium, an indoor arena, and a horse
racetrack. The New Jersey Nets professional basketball team and the New Jersey
Devils professional ice hockey team play at the Meadowlands. The Meadowlands is
also home to New York’s two professional football teams, the New York Giants and
New York Jets.
E | Annual Events |
Probably the best known event in New
Jersey is the Annual Miss America Pageant, held each fall in Atlantic City. The
city also hosts the Harborfest and World Championship Ocean Marathon Swim.
Gladstone, headquarters of the United States Equestrian Team, welcomes the best
riders in mid-June for the Festival of Champions. Later in the summer, George
Washington’s Middlebrook Encampment comes alive with an annual Fourth of July
celebration, including battle reenactments. Allaire State Park hosts the
Father’s Day weekend Great Locomotive Chase and Civil War Reenactment. On
Memorial Day weekend, Native American heritage is celebrated at the American
Indian Arts Festival. Whitesbog, where blueberries were first domesticated and
site of one of the earliest cranberry farms in the country, is host to the
Blueberry Festival, in early summer, and the Cranberry Harvest Tours, in the
fall. The East Coast Stunt Kite Flying Championship is in Wildwood in May. The
Antique Fire Equipment Muster, in Millville, is in August.
VII | GOVERNMENT |
New Jersey’s constitution, the third in
its history, was adopted in 1947. It grants considerable power to the governor,
who may serve two consecutive four-year terms and be elected to a third after a
lapse of four years. Constitutional amendments may be initiated either by the
senate or the assembly. The final adoption of an amendment requires the approval
of the voters in a general election.
A | Executive |
The governor is the only elected
executive officer. All other state officers are appointed by the governor and
confirmed by the senate. These include the secretary of state, state treasurer,
attorney general, and heads of the various executive departments. The president
of the senate succeeds the governor in case of death. In 1974, New Jersey became
the first state to provide for public financing of gubernatorial election
campaigns.
B | Legislative |
The legislature consists of a 40-member
Senate and an 80-member Assembly. Senators are elected for four-year terms and
assembly members for two. Legislative sessions begin each year on the second
Tuesday in January and last until business is completed. Special sessions may be
called by the governor or by petition of a majority in each house. A two-thirds
vote in each house is needed to override a gubernatorial veto.
C | Judicial |
All judges in the state are appointed by
the governor with the approval of the state senate, except municipal judges, who
are appointed by the municipal governments. The state supreme court consists of
a chief justice and six associate justices, all of whom serve seven-year terms.
The supreme court hears appeals. Below the supreme court are a superior court,
county courts, and inferior courts with limited jurisdiction.
D | Local Government |
The counties are governed by bodies of
officials known as freeholders, who are elected for three-year terms and are
responsible for the maintenance of county properties and institutions. The term
freeholder originated in colonial times when only property owners, or
freeholders, could hold office.
The smaller municipalities are called
cities, towns, boroughs, townships, or villages, depending on their form of
government. Most have a mayor and a city council, but some have city managers or
commissions. Smaller municipalities usually have a mayor-committee or
mayor-council form of government.
E | National Representation |
New Jersey elects two U.S. senators and
13 members of the U.S. House of Representatives. The state casts 15 electoral
votes.
VIII | HISTORY |
A | Early Inhabitants |
The first human settlement of the area
that is now New Jersey probably occurred about 10,500 bc, after glaciers that had covered the
region retreated. The first culture, the Paleo-Indians, hunted mammoths and
other prehistoric animals. They were followed in about 7000 bc by the Archaic culture; these people
lived in the developing forests and depended on hunting deer and birds and
gathering plants. As the regionally distinctive Northeast culture developed,
agriculture became important as a source of food.
When Europeans first came to the New
Jersey area, they encountered the Delaware people, who called themselves the
Lenni Lenape, meaning “original people.” These peaceful tribes, who spoke
Algonquian languages, numbered about 10,000 people at the time of European
contact. Primarily farmers, the Delaware supplemented their major crops of corn,
squash, and beans with fish, wild game, berries, nuts, herbs, and roots. They
made an important advance in agriculture by learning to use ashes from burned
trees as fertilizer.
The coming of Europeans began the rapid
decline of these native inhabitants. Many died of diseases introduced by whites.
The remainder were forced from their ancestral homes by the white settlers’
quest for land. However, treatment of the Native Americans was relatively more
humane in New Jersey than in other parts of America. Little violence occurred,
and the white settlers acquired native land peaceably, by treaty. As their land
holdings shrank, different groups of Delaware migrated west, eventually settling
in several sites from southern Ontario, Canada, to Oklahoma. Although an attempt
was made in 1758 to provide the remnants of the Delaware with a reservation at
Brotherton, now Indian Mills, New Jersey, most of the remaining Delaware left
New Jersey around 1800.
B | Exploration and Settlement |
Italian explorer John Cabot saw the New
Jersey coast in 1498, but the Italian navigator Giovanni da Verrazzano was the
first European to explore and chart it, in 1524. The first Europeans to set foot
in New Jersey were sailors from the Dutch-owned ship Half Moon, commanded
by English explorer Henry Hudson, in 1609. Dutch adventurers, fur trappers, and
traders followed, and about 1620 a trading post was established at Bergen, now
part of Jersey City. Other Dutch settlers established Fort Nassau on the
Delaware River in 1623 and Jersey City at the mouth of the Hudson River in the
early 1630s. Small Swedish settlements were planted in southern New Jersey,
beginning with Fort Elfsborg in 1638. The Dutch West India Company claimed the
areas of New Jersey and New York as the colony of New Netherland, and in 1655
the colonial governor, Peter Stuyvesant, expelled the Swedish.
The English had never recognized either
Dutch or Swedish claims to New Jersey. England based its claim to New Jersey on
Cabot’s voyage and on the power of its navy. In 1664 the Dutch surrendered New
Netherland to the English, who renamed the area west of the Hudson River New
Jersey, for the island of Jersey in the English Channel.
C | Proprietary Government |
King Charles II of England granted all
of the captured Dutch colony to his brother, James, Duke of York. James in turn
granted a proprietorship over New Jersey to Lord John Berkeley and Sir George
Carteret. Unaware of this transaction, the royal governor of New York parceled
out tracts of land in Monmouth County and at Elizabethtown (now Elizabeth) to
Puritans from New England and Long Island.
Almost immediately, conflict arose
between the proprietors and the Puritans over land claims and the right to
establish a government. Political and religious differences intensified the
friction; the proprietors were Anglicans and loyal to the king, while the
Puritans were dissenting Protestants. Sporadic riots broke out over the demands
of the proprietors that landholders pay them rent. However, the colony continued
to grow. By 1670 English settlers, mostly Puritans from Connecticut and Long
Island, had founded settlements at Newark, Woodbridge, Piscataway, Middletown,
and Shrewsbury. Immigration of non-English colonists later swelled the
population and magnified the religious differences.
The Dutch briefly regained possession
of New Jersey, but lost it again to the English in 1674. Meanwhile, Berkeley
sold his share of the colony to two Quakers. When one of them, Edward Billinge,
went bankrupt in 1676, his creditors took control of his share under a deed that
divided New Jersey in half from Little Egg Harbor to a point north of the
Delaware Water Gap. Carteret retained control of the eastern half, while the
creditors, including prominent Quaker William Penn, controlled the western half.
This touched off a long-lasting boundary dispute and enduring political,
economic, and social differences between the two Jerseys. The Quakers gravitated
toward Philadelphia, while those in the eastern half turned toward New York
City.
In attempting to establish a colony,
the Quakers in West Jersey soon went bankrupt, so they formed a joint stock
company and sold shares to finance their efforts. The company shareholders
became the board of proprietors, who acted as landlords and government of the
colony. In East Jersey, Carteret’s heirs also formed a stock company in 1682,
and its shareholders became that area’s board of proprietors.
Under the original two proprietors, the
charter for the government of New Jersey was the Concessions and Agreements of
the Lords Proprietors, which provided for religious freedom, trial by jury, and
a representative assembly. In 1677 Penn wrote a second charter for West Jersey
called the Concessions and Agreements, which guaranteed freedom of religion and
personal liberty, and provided for the annual election by secret ballot of a
representative assembly with limited powers of taxation. By the time New Jersey
was united as a royal colony in 1702, a tradition of self-government had been
established.
Settlements were sparse and scattered.
In the 1680s and 1690s West Jersey was settled by English, Irish, Welsh, and
Scottish Quakers. The Burlington Quaker Meeting, which dictated terms of
settlement—and nearly everything else—among the local Society of Friends,
allowed settlers to spread across the countryside in farms of more than 240
hectares (600 acres). In East Jersey, Essex County and what later became Morris
County were largely owned by the Scottish partners of the proprietors, who tried
to transplant their ways to New Jersey. They set up huge estates, imported
several hundred indentured servants, and refused to sell land to independent
farmers. The Dutch brought the first African slaves into Bergen County. By the
1680s English landowners from the West Indies settled in and purchased larger
numbers from the slave markets of New York City. In 1702 the population of East
and West Jersey was about 14,000.
D | Royal Government |
In 1702 the boards of proprietors in
both sections of New Jersey turned their governing authority over to Queen Anne,
who united the two into a single royal colony. However, the two proprietary
organizations continued to act as landlords, holding title to all unclaimed land
in New Jersey.
Under royal government, local self-rule
was curtailed and the colony was bound more closely to England. Despite
political unification, each section insisted on maintaining its own capital. The
assembly, which shared colonial rule with the royal governor, was forced to hold
its sessions in Perth Amboy and Burlington in alternating years. Differences
between the two sections remained, but they united to present a common front
against the royal governor. In trying to restore harmony and obedience to royal
authority, the governors were forced until 1738 to divide their attention
between New Jersey and New York, and many of the crown’s representatives were
incompetent. This enabled the colonists to exercise a greater amount of
self-government than the monarchy desired. Especially important was the
assembly’s power to collect taxes for the governor’s salary. Governors who
remained responsible to the king and opposed the interests of the colonists
often went unpaid.
The Great Awakening, a religious
movement that swept through the colonies in the 1740s, further undermined royal
authority, as well as that of the Anglican Church. Led by Presbyterian ministers
William Tennent and his son, Gilbert Tennent, preachers crossed Bergen, Essex,
and Hunterdon counties. Their fiery sermons made Protestants repent their sins
and seek salvation. The awakening left churches in turmoil, as the newly saved
attacked more conservative ministers, who refused to accept their conversion
experiences as genuine. Within a decade, in Sussex and other wilderness
counties, orderly denominations became a chaos of jealous, competing sects.
Religious fervor also sharpened farmers’ anger when proprietors questioned their
land titles during the so-called “land riots” of the late 1740s. Hundreds of
farmers squatted on their land, defying efforts by sheriffs and militia units to
evict them. When several were arrested, their friends stormed jails in Somerset,
Newark, and Perth Amboy to free them.
From 14,000 in 1700, the number of
inhabitants doubled to more than 30,000 in 1726. It continued to grow rapidly,
reaching about 120,000 by 1775. Immigrants poured into the colony from New York
and Philadelphia, giving it a diverse and multilingual character. Dutch
continued to trek into Bergen County, dotting the valley of the Hackensack River
with Dutch Reformed congregations. The small Swedish group in Salem was swamped
by an influx of Irish Quakers and Scots from Ulster, who made up a quarter of
Salem’s population by the time of the American Revolution in 1775. Large numbers
of peasants from Germany settled in Hunterdon and Sussex counties. As a result,
the English province of New Jersey was probably only half English in ethnic
origin on the eve of the revolution, and counties like Hunterdon, Middlesex, and
Salem were less than 40 percent English. Bergen and Somerset counties were,
respectively, half and two-thirds Dutch by the 1760s. The growing number of
Scots-Irish, Welsh, Dutch, German, Swedish, Belgian, French, and black settlers
in New Jersey made British rule that much less popular.
Of the royal governors, only Robert
Hunter and Lewis Morris received cooperation from the assembly. Even Morris, who
before becoming governor was a strong defender of the assembly’s prerogatives,
went without salary for two years. In 1763 William Franklin, the son of
statesman Benjamin Franklin, was appointed governor. He could muster little
support for the British in the French and Indian War (1754-1763) that was raging
along the American frontier, as Great Britain and France fought for control of
North America. The presence of a large number of Quakers and other pacifist
sects partly accounted for this lack of concern. The basic reason, however, was
that New Jersey was too preoccupied with its own problems and development to
come to the aid of the king.
Opposition to royal authority continued
to mount as Britain attempted to enforce laws restricting trade and imposing
taxes on the colonies. See also Navigation Acts; Sugar and Molasses Act;
Stamp Act; Townshend Acts. Following the lead of Massachusetts and Virginia, a
provincial congress met in New Brunswick on July 21, 1774, and elected delegates
to the First Continental Congress. Four months later a group of New Jersey
patriots, again following the lead of rebellious colonists in Boston, burned a
cargo of tea in Greenwich. As unrest spread, many royal officials yielded to the
provincial congress. In June 1776 William Franklin, who remained loyal to
Britain, was arrested, and the reign of royal governors ended in New
Jersey.
E | American Revolution |
On July 2, 1776, the provincial
congress, meeting at Burlington, adopted a constitution declaring New Jersey’s
independence. In August, New Jersey’s delegates to the Continental Congress
signed the Declaration of Independence, and William Livingston became the
state’s first governor. The transition from colonial status to statehood had
been smooth, but the burden of defending independence fell heavily on New Jersey
during the American Revolution (1775-1783).
As with most states, New Jersey had
many citizens who opposed American independence. These Loyalists organized six
battalions, who presented a constant frustration to the more than 17,000
citizens of New Jersey who took up arms against the British. The advance of the
British from Fort Lee to the Delaware River in the winter of 1776 was the signal
for open Loyalist activity to increase. When the new state legislature was
forced to flee Princeton in early December, despair gripped the state. However,
General George Washington secretly crossed the Delaware and on December 26 won
an important victory in the Battle of Trenton. A victory at the Battle of
Princeton a week later permitted Washington’s army to return to New Jersey. They
spent the remainder of the winter and early spring encamped in Morristown.
In June 1778, as the British retreated
from Philadelphia across New Jersey, Washington’s forces attacked in the Battle
of Monmouth. The battle ended in a draw after American General Charles Lee
delayed his attack, then retreated. Lee was dismissed by Washington and later
court-martialed.
Washington spent the winter of 1778 and
1779 at the Wallace House in Somerville, with his troops camped nearby at
Middlebrook. The army also camped at Morristown in the severe winter of 1779 and
1780. Deaths from starvation and exposure were common, and housing and medical
supplies were poor. In June 1780 the British were beaten back in the Battle of
Springfield, the last major engagement in New Jersey.
F | Early Statehood |
The New Jersey constitution, reflecting
the prevailing fear of despotic government, vested virtually all powers in a
popularly elected bicameral legislature. Each county, regardless of population,
sent one representative to the upper house, while the lower house was chosen on
a proportional basis. All citizens over 21 who owned a certain amount of
property were allowed to vote. However, women’s right to vote was rescinded in
1807. The governor, judges, and other government officers were elected or
appointed by the legislature, so had little power of their own. Two New Jersey
towns served briefly as the nation’s capital: Princeton from June to November
1783 and Trenton from then until December 1785.
From 1781 to 1789, while the states
were united under the agreement known as the Articles of Confederation, New
Jersey’s economy was hampered by restrictions on commerce. Consequently, New
Jersey was one of the five states represented at the Annapolis Convention to
discuss interstate commerce and was a moving force behind the calling of the
Constitutional Convention. At the Constitutional Convention, New Jersey proposed
that the national legislature be a unicameral body in which all the states would
have equal representation. The New Jersey Plan was supported by small states,
while larger states sought a system based on population. Under a compromise plan
adopted by the convention, the New Jersey proposal became the basis for
representation in the United States Senate. Assured of equality with the larger
states in at least one house of Congress, New Jersey became the third state to
ratify the Constitution of the United States on December 18, 1787.
The unanimity that greeted the
Constitution was short-lived. New Jersey was again divided as permanent
political parties replaced the old competing factions. At first the Federalist
Party was in control, but by 1801 a strong Democratic-Republican Party, led
nationally by Thomas Jefferson, had come to power. In presidential elections,
New Jersey supported Andrew Jackson in 1832 and Whig candidates by narrow
margins until 1852. In 1844 liberal elements mustered enough support to write a
new state constitution that eliminated property qualifications for voting,
provided for the popular election of a governor for a three-year term, and added
a bill of rights.
In 1790 Trenton became the state
capital, replacing the joint capitals of Perth Amboy and Burlington. The state’s
population was then 184,000; by 1850 it had risen to 489,555 and was
concentrated largely in the north. The growth of this area was spurred by the
Society for Establishing Useful Manufactures, a group founded by American
statesman Alexander Hamilton, which established Paterson in 1791. Paterson, the
first planned industrial city in America, was an early leader in textile
manufacturing and a pioneer in the construction of railroad locomotives.
New Jersey’s location—between New York
City and Philadelphia and between New England and the South—dictated the need
for transportation facilities. By 1830 the legislature had chartered more than
50 turnpike companies, and about 880 km (550 mi) of roads were built, almost all
in the northern part of the state. In 1831 the Morris Canal, built to exploit
the iron resources of Morris County, linked the upper Delaware River with the
Atlantic Ocean. Three years later the Delaware and Raritan Canal connected the
Delaware and Raritan rivers, providing a short all-water route from New York
City to Philadelphia. This canal remained in operation until 1934.
The toll roads and canals changed the
nature of rural life and hastened the movement of farmers into cities. The
Delaware and Raritan Canal permitted shipment of anthracite coal from the Lehigh
Valley, which cut the livelihood of farmers who shipped firewood and charcoal
for city markets. To keep up with growing competition from outside the region,
farmers turned to more modern iron plows and tools. By 1839 these improvements
cut the need for farm labor to half the number of the 1790s, setting adrift
thousands of laborers and tenants who had little choice but to seek work in
nearby towns.
The greatest improvements in
transportation took place within the railroad industry. Inventor John Stevens, a
pioneer in steamboats, operated the first American steam locomotive in 1825 in
Hoboken. In 1830 he and his two sons were granted a monopoly for their Camden
and Amboy Railroad between New York City and Philadelphia. Although other
railroad lines were constructed, the Camden and Amboy remained dominant in the
industry and came to wield great influence over state politics. The construction
of railroads, turnpikes, and canals contributed to the growth of northern New
Jersey, but southern New Jersey remained rural and underpopulated.
As railroads forged links to the
marketplaces of New York City and Philadelphia, New Jersey’s small towns became
industrial centers by the 1860s. Camden and Trenton became foundry
subcontractors to Philadelphia’s iron and locomotive manufacturers. Paterson
became a center for silk, then machine shops, then a major supplier of railroad
locomotives. Newark specialized in manufacturing leather trunks, shoes, tools,
coaches, and jewelry. By 1860, it was one of the most industrialized cities in
the country.
Industry turned cities into places of
sharp social contrasts. As early as the 1840s and 1850s, wealthy businessmen
took advantage of new coaches and horse-drawn cars to commute to work while
their families were lodged in safe suburban enclaves like Clinton Hill and
Woodside in Newark or Llewellyn Park in West Orange. The middle classes were
largely made up of storekeepers, clerks, and skilled artisans. Many of the
latter were German immigrants, who earned decent wages as piano and instrument
makers, furniture carvers, brewers, and confectioners. At the bottom of this
urban world, forming perhaps half of the cities’ populations, were a mass of
unskilled, low-paid workers. Some came from Jersey’s farms, but a growing number
were Irish Catholic immigrants. These unskilled refugees from the potato famine
that swept Ireland in the 1840s were desperate for any sort of work. On Newark’s
streets and Jersey City’s wharves, three-quarters of the unskilled workers were
Irish. They worked as stevedores and day laborers, moving freight and digging
sewers. In the 1850s their efforts earned them less than a dollar a day, half
that of skilled artisans. With luck, they might make $250 to $300 per year,
while their families needed twice that to survive in an urban environment.
G | Civil War |
New Jersey did not play an important
role in the movement for the abolition of slavery. In 1804 a law for the gradual
emancipation of slaves was passed, but not until 1846 was slavery permanently
abolished. Even then, slaves were bound over to their masters as apprentices,
and the difference between the two conditions was often slight. The Underground
Railroad was active in the state, helping runaway slaves from the South reach
safety in the Northern states and Canada. But New Jersey officially obeyed the
federal Fugitive Slave Laws, which required state officials to help return
runaway slaves to their Southern masters.
As the outbreak of the American Civil
War (1861-1865) neared, antiwar elements had strong support among New Jersey
industrialists, who feared the loss of valuable Southern markets for their
products. Even though the state responded warmly to a visit by President Abraham
Lincoln in 1861, it was the only Northern state that did not give him all of its
electoral votes in the presidential elections of 1860 and 1864.
If New Jersey was not unanimous in its
support of the crusade against slavery, it responded vigorously to secession by
Southern states and to Lincoln’s call to arms. New Jersey put more than 88,000
men in uniform. About 6,300 New Jersey residents were killed during the war,
among them General Philip “Fighting Phil” Kearny.
H | Industrialization and the Trusts |
The demand for supplies in the Civil
War brought New Jersey prosperity that continued into a postwar boom period.
This boom accelerated the shift in population from rural to urban areas. Large
numbers of immigrants continued to arrive from Ireland, Italy, and Eastern
Europe. In 1880 immigrants made up one-fifth of the population, and by 1910 more
than half the 2,587,167 residents of New Jersey were foreign-born or the
children of immigrants.
The burgeoning population placed great
demands on the farmers. In 1864 the legislature had created the State College of
Agriculture at Rutgers University. Subsequently the lawmakers added a State
Agricultural Experiment Station from which scientists relayed modern cultivation
and husbandry methods to farmers throughout the state. Poor land was gradually
set aside for dairy and poultry farms. The more fertile soil was made to yield
abundant vegetable crops. Besides feeding their own state, New Jersey farmers
began sending produce to New York City and Philadelphia.
The greatest force behind the postwar
boom was the railroad. In 1871 the Stevens family leased their railroad lines to
the Pennsylvania Railroad, but the Pennsylvania’s monopoly ended in 1873, when
the state was opened to competing lines. Track mileage nearly doubled, and a
coastal line was built, fueling the growth of seaside resorts. Aided by easily
corrupted politicians from both parties, the railroads exerted tremendous
influence in the legislature. But they were forced to share power with the new
industries that set up headquarters and factories in New Jersey.
The modernization of the transportation
system, the large skilled labor force, and proximity to markets, as well as
lenient corporate laws, attracted industrial titans to New Jersey. By 1875 John
D. Rockefeller, the founder of the giant Standard Oil Company, had refineries in
Bayonne; inventor Isaac Merrit Singer had opened a sewing machine plant in
Elizabeth; and Joseph Campbell and Abraham Anderson had established a soup
company in Camden. Bridge-building pioneer John Augustus Roebling was producing
steel bridge cables in Trenton, and John W. Hyatt was making celluloid in
Newark. The brilliant inventor Thomas Alva Edison established laboratories in
Menlo Park and West Orange.
New Jersey’s lenient corporate laws
also attracted industries that purchased their corporate charters in New Jersey
but conducted their business elsewhere. These charter fees greatly aided the
state’s economy and reduced the tax burden on citizens, but they gave New Jersey
the notorious reputation as the “mother of trusts.” Abuses by trusts,
corporations organized to eliminate competition and control entire industries,
led to passage of antitrust laws in many other states. By 1904, 170 of the
nation’s 318 largest trusts were chartered in New Jersey, some after having been
ruled illegal in other states. Among these were the seven largest trusts in the
nation: American Sugar Refining, Standard Oil, Amalgamated Copper, American
Smelting and Refining, Consolidated Tobacco, U.S. Steel, and International
Mercantile Marine.
New Jersey saw an influx of wealthy
industrialists, most of them commuters who lived in palatial homes in Somerset,
Morris, Monmouth, and Essex counties. Their lives contrasted sharply with the
miserable working conditions and housing of the factory workers who were crowded
into the slums of Newark, Paterson, Jersey City, Trenton, and Camden. Because
the big trusts controlled both political parties, labor unions found it
difficult to organize in the state.
As early as 1828, textile workers in
Paterson, including children, staged a strike, but labor reforms were slow to
follow. In 1851 the legislature excluded children under age ten from factory
work. In 1877 the state required all salaries to be paid in lawful money, not
paper scrip issued by employers. A law to compensate workers injured on the job
was passed in 1911, and in 1933 the state passed its first minimum wage
law.
The Paterson strike was the first of
many bitter and often futile struggles between labor and management in New
Jersey. Many strikes were broken with violence by company-hired detectives with
the aid and cooperation of local police. Gradually such unions as the Knights of
Labor, the American Federation of Labor, and the Brotherhood of Locomotive
Firemen and Engineers gained in membership. However, the trade union movement
met violent opposition well into the 1930s. The Paterson silk strike of 1913
became a landmark in the struggle of workers to win collective bargaining rights
throughout an industry.
Agriculture was greatly transformed by
big-city markets. From 5,230 sq km (3,250 sq mi) tilled in 1879, cultivation
steadily dropped to 2,900 sq km (1,800 sq mi) by 1929. Yet the number of
agricultural workers remained roughly the same. Surviving family farms became
larger operations, with substantial investments in outbuildings and machinery.
Hog, cattle, and sheep raising were often replaced by production of poultry and
eggs, fruits and vegetables, and milk for nearby city markets. By 1900 Union
County farmers specialized in pumpkins, squash, string beans, and tomatoes.
Large dairies sprang up, including one that would emerge as a brand name, Tuscan
Farms. Growing flowers for market had been virtually unheard of, but by the
1890s, greenhouses were built in counties within wagon distance of the cities.
Morris County became a center of rose culture, while Bergen and Passaic
horticulturists raised potted plants and cut flowers. “Agribusinesses,”
large-scale farming operations by corporations, also appeared in New Jersey. In
South Jersey, Campbell Soup operated a vegetable farm and canning factory in
Moorestown, and the 809-hectare (2,000-acre) Del-Bay farms in Bridgeton employed
700 workers (who stayed in 100 tenant houses) in peak season.
I | The Progressive Era |
Political and economic reform came
around 1900 with the national rise of the Progressive movement, dedicated to
curbing abuses by governments and industry and to improving life for workers,
immigrants, the poor, and other groups. Led in New Jersey by Mark Fagan, Everett
Colby, and George L. Record, Progressives broke the power of the Democratic
Party bosses, Robert Davis in Jersey City and James Smith, Jr., in Essex County,
and paved the way for the election of Woodrow Wilson as governor in 1910.
Wilson, who had been president of Princeton University, embarked on a program of
reform aimed at regulating the big corporations and eliminating abuses by the
political machines.
In his two years as governor, Wilson
secured laws to regulate political campaigns and utility rates, to provide
compensation for injured workers, and to require factory inspections, in order
to restrict the illegal employment of women and children. He brought about
direct primaries and new forms of election in cities and towns to loosen the
hold of political bosses in both parties. Wilson was also responsible for the
antitrust laws known as the Seven Sisters Acts, which were passed shortly after
he became president of the United States in 1913.
J | World War I and the 1920s |
The reform movement came to a halt as
New Jersey mobilized for World War I (1914-1918). Refineries in Bayonne and
Linden and ammunition plants in Kenvil, Kingsland, Morgan, Parlin, and Pompton
Lakes were supplying the United Kingdom and France even before the United States
entered the war. German submarine activity off the coast and explosions at the
Kingsland and Black Tom munition dumps turned many New Jersey residents against
Germany. Thousands of American soldiers sailed to Europe from Hoboken. Camp
Merritt near Cresskill and Fort Dix near Wrightstown were built as troop
centers. Picatinny Arsenal near Matawan was expanded, and Port Newark was
developed. The war accentuated the growth of industry and the movement into
urban areas. New Jersey manufacturers suffered a slight decline after the war,
but generally production levels remained high.
The 1920s were a golden age for
downtown cities, which were beginning to be eclipsed by suburban sprawl. New
office towers, hotels, and neon-lit movie palaces graced Newark, Jersey, and
Camden. Jersey City Mayor Frank Hague dominated Hudson County, controlling
prosecutors and influencing the election of governors and United States
senators. He approved huge construction projects like the Holland Tunnel,
completed in 1927 to connect the city with New York City, and the Pulaski
Skyway, opened in 1932 across the Passaic and Hackensack rivers.
But vehicle tunnels under the Hudson
River and piers built by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey dispersed
railroad and shipping volume, and with them waterfront jobs, away from Jersey
City and Hoboken. The silk and worsted trades died off in Paterson and Passaic
as women’s fashions changed and factory owners shifted to lower-wage sites in
the South. Newark’s share of state employment dropped from one-quarter in 1909
to one-tenth by 1939, as factories moved to the cheaper suburbs.
In sharp contrast, the outlying
sections of Bergen, Essex, Union, Mercer, and Camden counties underwent a
suburban boom. Paterson and Passaic spilled over into Clifton, which grew by
30,000 in the 1920s. While Newark’s population approached its plateau, Irvington
grew from 25,480 to 56,733, Nutley from 9421 to 20,572, and outlying Maplewood
changed from a village of 5,283 to a commuting center of 21,738. As automobile
registration spiraled, the legislature supplemented a modest $7 million highway
bond issue in 1916 with $77 million authorized in the 1920s. In 1927 the state
highway commission recommended major east-west motor arteries to funnel commuter
traffic from the great bridges, the Benjamin Franklin, soon to span the Delaware
River at Camden, and the George Washington being built over the Hudson River at
Fort Lee. Public Service Electric and Gas, hurt by a 1923 trolley drivers’
strike, started to phase out its suburban electronic trolley fleet for
diesel-powered buses.
K | The Great Depression |
Like all other industrial areas in the
country, New Jersey was hit hard by the Great Depression, the economic troubles
of the 1930s. By 1931 municipalities could no longer collect property taxes;
unemployed homeowners forced tax delinquencies to 28 percent in Newark and
Camden and 30 percent in Paterson. The Red Cross distributed food in Elizabeth
and New Brunswick, and barter systems developed in Paterson and in Newark’s
Clinton Hill, allowing the unemployed to exchange service for food.
By the summer of 1933, federal relief
programs, part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s economic strategy known as the
New Deal, were sustaining 142,000 big-city residents—one of every ten. The New
Deal’s Public Works Authority built the Margaret Hague Medical Center in Jersey
City and Camden’s 515-unit Westfield Acres public housing project, and provided
loans to construct the Lincoln Tunnel and to electrify the Pennsylvania
Railroad’s Jersey Division. The federal Works Progress Administration (WPA)
provided money for county roads, forest preserves, and writing programs. As late
as 1936, 700,000 people were on the state’s relief rolls or working on New Deal
projects.
The labor movement won a major victory
in 1935, when the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), known as the Wagner Act,
was passed. The law recognized workers’ rights to form unions and bargain
collectively, but workers in many New Jersey industries had to strike to win
recognition for their unions. After bitter strikes, the Union of Electrical
Workers negotiated a contract for 12,000 RCA Victor workers in Camden, the
United Automobile Workers of America won recognition as the bargaining agent at
General Motors in Linden, and the Machinists Union became the bargaining agent
at Wright Aeronautical in Paterson.
L | World War II |
Experience arising from World War I
helped New Jersey make a rapid transition from peacetime to wartime production
during World War II (1939-1945). Again, New Jersey supplied chemicals, textiles,
munitions, and other vital military materials. New Jersey shipyards turned out
aircraft carriers, battleships, and heavy cruisers, and about one-fourth of the
destroyers built for the U.S. Navy during the war. The Curtiss-Wright Company in
Paterson built 139,000 aircraft engines from 1940 to 1945. The war was a
stimulus to research and technology that were important in the postwar years.
The Westinghouse Lamp Division in Bloomfield refined some of the earliest
samples of enriched uranium for the Manhattan Project, the massive United States
effort to produce the atomic bomb.
M | Late 20th Century |
New Jersey’s transition to a peacetime
economy was smooth, despite a population increase of 675,000 during the 1940s.
Returning soldiers enrolled in colleges under the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act
of 1944, popularly known as the GI Bill of Rights. In 1945 Rutgers officially
became the State University of New Jersey. Increasing numbers of applicants led
many colleges to expand, and during the 1950s and 1960s voters approved several
bond issues to finance better facilities for higher education.
One of the most important achievements
of the postwar decade was the adoption on November 4, 1947 of the state’s third
constitution, which modernized state government. The constitution enhanced the
governor’s authority to appoint officials and veto legislation, making the
office one of the most powerful among the states; replaced revenues dedicated to
particular spending with a state general fund, and lengthened legislators’
terms, providing greater stability and continuity in government. The
constitution pledged the state to maintain “a thorough and efficient system” of
free public schools. Racial segregation was banned in the militia and schools,
and discrimination was outlawed in civil and military activities. The
legislature was prohibited from granting exclusive privileges to any
corporation, and the right of collective bargaining was specifically
guaranteed.
While urban areas continued to grow,
many residents moved from the central cities to the rapidly expanding suburbs,
particularly those outside Philadelphia and New York City. Highway construction
boomed in the 1940s and early 1950s, creating toll roads such as the Garden
State Parkway and New Jersey Turnpike, which became the most heavily used
highways in the Northeast. The Interstate Highway Act of 1956 financed a new
generation of four- and six-lane freeways to replace narrow highways and open up
land on the outskirts of Morris, Sussex, and Somerset counties. Mortgages
financed through the Federal Housing Administration and the GI Bill of Rights
pumped millions of dollars into tract housing, making possible such mass
developments as the community of Willingboro, formerly known as Levittown,
outside of Camden. Manufacturers seeking efficient, single-story plant layouts
were drawn to industrial parks developed in towns like Teterboro and Rockleigh.
Offices for white-collar workers were built in campus-like centers such as those
developed by Prudential Insurance in Livingston and Prentice-Hall Publishing in
Englewood Cliffs. Suburban shopping centers and enclosed malls followed, and the
suburbs became virtual cities on their own.
New Jersey’s large cities, increasingly
populated by blacks and Puerto Ricans, experienced all the symptoms of urban
decay seen in other parts of the nation. As urban conditions worsened in the
early 1950s, the state and federal governments intervened with programs of
wholesale demolition and urban renewal to attract private businesses and jobs.
In Newark efforts focused on Gateway Center, an office and hotel complex
adjacent to the Pennsylvania Railroad Station. Provisions of the Federal Housing
Act of 1949 cleared more acreage for public housing projects like Newark’s
Columbus and Stella Wright Homes, which became high-rise ghettoes for
minorities. Other projects included Jersey City’s Transportation Center,
Newark’s campus complex for Rutgers University, the New Jersey Institute of
Technology, and the New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry. However, these
steel and glass showplaces mainly employed suburban residents who drove to work
and rarely walked around the city.
The redevelopments had little impact on
black unemployment, which climbed above 10 percent in the early 1960s as factory
jobs moved to the suburbs. In Camden, Trenton, and central Newark, black
underemployment was probably more than 30 percent. Many youth turned to crime,
and family life was disrupted. Inspired by the civil rights movement, black
leaders rallied to the antipoverty programs of the 1960s to revive
neighborhoods. They failed to halt decay, but new political leaders rose in the
black community, notably state Senator Howard Woodson of Trenton and Kenneth
Gibson of Newark, who became the city’s first black mayor in 1971. Frustration
over decayed inner cities touched off riots by blacks in Newark, Jersey City,
Plainfield, Englewood, and New Brunswick in 1967 and 1968, during which youths
looted stores and set fires.
Legislative reapportionment became an
important issue during the 1960s, after the 1964 decision by the Supreme Court
of the United States mandating “one-person, one-vote” electoral systems. A state
constitutional convention in 1966 provided for new senate and assembly districts
and for an enlarged legislature. The Democratic-controlled legislature later
redrew the districts for congressional elections, but Republicans objected. The
state supreme court then approved a plan that ignored county borders, and the
controversy continued for years.
Attempts to bring suburban resources to
the aid of central cities caused bitter disputes. In 1975 in the Mount Laurel
Township decision, the New Jersey Supreme Court rejected suburban zoning
restrictions against low-rent multiple dwellings. The court ruled that suburban
towns were obligated to house their “fair share” of the poor in metropolitan
areas. The decision touched off two decades of legal challenges and evasions.
The only suburbs that saw a substantial influx of blacks were the historically
black sections of Englewood and the East Orange-Plainfield extensions of the
poor black areas of Newark. Racial inequities were also the object of the
court’s decision, in Robinson v. Cahill (1973), which declared
that local property taxes were an inadequate base to support the constitution’s
guarantee of a “thorough and efficient” public school system. Under pressure,
the legislature in 1976 enacted a state income tax and school-aid formulas to
close the gap in school spending between wealthy suburbs and poor inner
cities.
The state was a social innovator but
failed at tackling problems related to metropolitan areas. It established the
Hackensack Meadowlands Development Commission in 1968, which built the stadium,
arena and racetrack of the Meadowlands Sports Complex; small cities developed
around the complex, which further threatened the commercial vitality of nearby
large cities. The legislature adopted a state lottery in 1969, and in 1976 a
voter referendum approved casino gambling for Atlantic City. The measure was
portrayed as economic stimulus for the predominantly black resort town, but its
impact on minority employment was questionable. However, it proved a model for
other states interested in casino gambling as a way to provide jobs.
N | Recent Developments |
New Jersey adopted one of the country’s
most stringent sets of environmental regulations, starting with the Coastal Area
Facility Review Act of 1972. The law required state approval of housing,
business, energy, and waste-disposal structures along coastal areas and beaches.
The state spearheaded efforts at reclaiming wetlands, particularly the Pine
Barrens in South Jersey, and in protecting seashores from polluters.
Environmental efforts were supported by Republican Governor Thomas H. Kean
(1982-1990) and his Democratic successor, James J. Florio (1990-1994), who as a
congressman had sponsored federal “Superfund” legislation to clean up hazardous
waste sites.
By the mid-1980s New Jersey had begun
to run out of sites for the disposal of household garbage and other solid waste.
Legislation enacted in 1987 required each county to limit or recycle most of its
solid waste. To deal with nonrecyclable waste, the state began construction in
1988 of a waste-fueled electric power plant in Warren County.
In the 1980s, Kean launched an
advertising campaign to promote the state to tourists and business. By the early
1990s, the state’s population growth had leveled off, and service industries
dominated the economy. Florio, elected in 1989, served one controversial term.
In response to the recession of the early 1990s, he implemented a sweeping tax-
and education-reform package that aroused great anger and hurt the popularity of
the Democratic Party throughout the state.
In the 1993 election Florio lost to
Republican Christine Todd Whitman, who promised significant tax cuts. Whitman
reduced personal income taxes during her first term but alienated conservative
Republicans by opposing a state law banning without exception late-term
abortions. She was reelected in 1997 by a very narrow margin. In 2001 Whitman
resigned as governor after she was appointed to head the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) by President George W. Bush. Donald DiFrancesco, the
president of the New Jersey Senate, became acting governor.
In the 2001 election Democrat Jim
McGreevey was elected governor. McGreevey announced his resignation in 2004,
more than a year before his term was to expire, after revealing that he had a
homosexual affair while he was married. In the 2005 gubernatorial election, one
of New Jersey’s U.S. senators, Democrat Jon Corzine, was elected governor.
Corzine named Congressman Robert Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey’s Hudson
County, to fill his Senate seat until his term expired. In the November 2006
midterm elections Menendez was elected to a six-year term. In December 2006
Corzine signed legislation making New Jersey the third state in the country to
permit same-sex civil unions (see Gay Rights Movement in the United
States).
In December 2007 Corzine signed
legislation abolishing the death penalty in New Jersey. Corzine also commuted
the sentences of death row prisoners to life imprisonment without the
possibility of parole. New Jersey became the first state since 1965 to abolish
the death penalty. See also Capital Punishment.
The history section was contributed by
Joel Schwartz. The remainder of the article was contributed by Charles A.
Stansfield, Jr.
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