Richard Codey, longtime New Jersey legislator and former governor, to lie in state in Trenton

Former Gov. Richard J. “Dick” Codey, the longest-serving legislator in New Jersey history and a governor who made mental health central to the state’s political conversation, will lie in state Thursday in the New Jersey State House Rotunda as the public gathers to say goodbye.

From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Jan. 22, members of the public are invited to file past Codey’s flag-draped casket in the Rotunda at 125 W. State St. in Trenton. The former governor will be escorted there on Thursday morning by the Honor Guard of the New Jersey State Police.

“Governor Dick Codey was one of a kind and exemplified the very best our state has to offer. As we come together in mourning, we honor and celebrate Governor Codey’s lifelong commitment to public service and the profound impact he had on our state,” Gov. Mikie Sherrill said in a statement announcing the arrangements.

The solemn observances in Trenton come 11 days after Codey died Jan. 11 at his home in Roseland following a brief illness. He was 79.

A third-generation funeral director from Essex County, Codey spent more than five decades in public life, including service as Senate president and, ultimately, as New Jersey’s 53rd governor. He represented the 27th Legislative District, covering western Essex County and part of Morris County, and served continuously in the Legislature from Jan. 8, 1974, to Jan. 9, 2024, a tenure unmatched in state history.

Codey was born and raised in Orange, where his family owned a funeral home and where, as a teenager living above the business, he learned to sit with grief long before he entered politics. Drafted into the family work when his father became county coroner, he once recalled, “I was 14, taking bodies out of train wrecks. You grow up quick.”

He was first elected to the General Assembly in 1973. He served there from 1974 to 1982 before moving to the Senate, where he rose through the ranks and became Senate president in 2002. Over the years, he developed a reputation as a steady hand and a pragmatic dealmaker, a Democrat who prized relationships across the aisle as much as within his own party.

Codey served as acting governor several times under New Jersey’s old succession rules, including a three-day stint in 2002. He assumed the office again on Nov. 15, 2004, following the resignation of Gov. Jim McGreevey, and ultimately was recognized as the state’s 53rd governor after a law clarified the status of extended acting governors.

In the 14 months he led the state, Codey focused on ethics, public accountability, and public health. He appointed the state’s first inspector general, strengthened pay-to-play restrictions, pushed a ban on smoking in indoor spaces, and supported funding for stem cell research and mental health services. He also created a task force to combat steroid abuse in high school and college sports and helped secure the deal that led to the construction of MetLife Stadium.

Long before it was common for elected officials to speak openly about mental illness, Codey made the issue central to his public life. In 1987, he went undercover as an orderly at Marlboro Psychiatric Hospital, assuming the identity of a deceased criminal to document patient abuse and unsafe practices from within the institution. His findings led to a state Senate task force and sweeping reforms in psychiatric care, helping pave the way for Marlboro’s closure in 1998.

That work continued after he left the governor’s office, including through the Codey Fund for Mental Health, which he saw as a way to ensure the cause would outlast any one political career.

For all the seriousness of his work, Codey was known as much for his warmth and humor as for his legislation. Friends, staff and former constituents remember a leader who relished late-night diner stops on the drive home from Trenton, told self-deprecating stories about being asked to leave two high schools, and could ease tense rooms with a well-timed joke.

Away from the State House, he spent decades coaching basketball, especially cherishing a national AAU championship he won in 2019 while coaching alongside his younger son, Chris.

At home, Codey treasured time with his wife of 45 years, Mary Jo, and their sons, Kevin and Chris, later delighting in his grandchildren. He often rattled off their accomplishments to visitors in the office he eventually shared with them and found grounding in family routines, whether trips to Monmouth Park, barbed jokes on the golf course, or late nights counting votes at firehouses and senior centers.

In the days after his death, tributes poured in from across New Jersey, not only from public officials, but also from teachers, nurses, union members, and people who said a single encounter with “The Gov” stayed with them for years. They spoke less about bills and budgets than about small kindnesses: a returned call, a quiet favor, a check slipped into an envelope, a joke that arrived exactly when it was needed.

Codey is survived by his wife, Mary Jo; his sons, Kevin and his wife, Danielle, and Christopher; his grandchildren, Brooke, Patrick and Paige; his siblings, Robert, Sister Patricia and Colleen; and extended family, former staffers, players, and countless former constituents who considered themselves part of his wider circle.

In lieu of flowers, donations in his memory may be sent to the Codey Fund for Mental Health, 307 Bloomfield Ave., Suite 303, Caldwell, N.J. 07006.