United States gubernatorial elections 1997
The 1997 United States gubernatorial election took place on November 4, 1997. The states of New Jersey and Virginia were elected . In both cases the office of governor continued to be exercised by a member of the Republican Party .
In New Jersey, Republican Christine Todd Whitman , who had defeated Democratic incumbent James Florio four years earlier , ran again. The rival candidate was Jim McGreevey , a member of the State Senate and Mayor of Woodbridge Township . While the other eight applicants from smaller parties as a whole achieved a comparatively high share of the vote, neither Whitman nor McGreevey got an absolute majority. Ultimately, 47.1 percent were enough for the governor to defend her office; the challenger was beaten with 46 percent, but ran again four years later and was victorious. Murray Sabrin of the Libertarian Party took third place with 4.7 percent of the vote.
Since the state constitution only allows the governor of Virginia a four-year term, Republican George Allen could not run for a second time. His party set up with Jim Gilmore the Attorney General of the state, who won the election with a sure margin for himself. With 55.8 percent of the vote, he clearly distanced himself from the Democrat Don Beyer , previously Vice Governor of All; this reached 42.6 percent. Sue Harris DeBauche from the Reform Party was a third candidate who received 1.5 percent of the vote.
