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Former Republican Lt. Gov. Jim Gardner had a little fun with his former political rival Jim Hunt as he played emcee at Saturday's inauguration.

"Is this not a great day in North Carolina," he asked toward the end of the ceremony. "And I'm even up here clapping for Jim Hunt," he added to laughter.

Hunt, the former four-term Democratic governor, did not attend the ceremony. But Bishop George Battle Jr, of African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, countered for him.

Saying he had something in common with Gardner, he said, "I used to serve you at the country club. So let's be careful about what you say about my governor Jim Hunt."

Sharon Day, the co-chairman of the Republican National Committee, will be stumping in North Carolina Tuesday, helping turn out the vote. She is attending a get-out the vote events in Cornelius and Concord this morning and Asheboro at 2:30 this afternoon, and in Salisbury at 4:30 p.m. All the events are local victory offices.

Meanwhile, Tuesday evening at 6 p.m., Jim Gardner, the former lieutenant governor and former congressman, will hopen open a GOP victory office in Rocky Mount at 1616 Sunset Ave.

Pat McCrory will be blessed by the Tar Heel Republican establishment next week at a Greensboro fund raiser attended by the “Four Jims” of GOP politics.

Laying on of the hands will be Jim Broyhill, a former congressman and former senator; Jim Gardner, a former lieutenant governor, congressman and three-time gubernatorial candidate; Jim Holshouser, a former governor, and Jim Martin, a former governor and former congressman.

They, of course, hope that McCrory will be next Republican governor.

The fund raiser is being hosted by Don, Jim and Joe Brady of Brady Energy Services. But helping put it together is Phil Kirk, who served as chief of staff for Broyhill, Holshouser and Martin.

“I think they accepted our invitation to participate because they were afraid of what I might say about them in their absence,” Kirk quipped.

The cost of admission to the the event ranges from $250 to $2,000.

Wake County commissioner Tony Gurley has picked up the endorsement of former Lt. Gov. Jim Gardner in his bid to win the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor.

Gardner, a Rocky Mount businessman, said he was making a rare entry into Republican primary politics, but said he liked the idea that Gurley, a pharmacy owner, had a background in business.

"Frankly, I can't think of anyone more prepared to serve as North Carolina's lieutenant governor,” Gardner writes in a fund raising letter. “Tony Gurley has a unique blend of experience in government and business. We cannot afford another four years of liberal Democrats killing jobs. And Republicans  can't afford to nominate a candidate who needs on the job training.”

Gurley faces Dan Forest, a Raleigh architect.  The winner will face Democratic incumbent Walter Dalton.

Gardner, a former congressman and former state party chairman, is a three-time candidate for governor. He was an early leader in building the Republican Party in North Carolina in the 1960s and the 1970s.

What would Robert Pittenger do as lieutenant governor?

In 1988, Republican Jim Gardner was elected to gavel sessions led by a Democratic controlled legislature. They responded by stripping away much of the job's power, leading to the rise of Senate president pro tem Marc Basnight.

At a debate tonight on WUNC, Pittenger promised that he would help ensure GOP ideas were discussed in the Senate if he was elected. But with Basnight and Senate Majority Leader Tony Rand holding the parliamentary conch, that could prove tricky.

After the debate, Pittenger told Dome how he would operate.

He said that he would recognize more Republican legislators to speak on the floor, allowing them to make amendments. (Currently, some never get that chance.) To prevent those bills from being voted on, Rand would be forced to rule them out of order.

"Is he going to do that 20 times a day, four days a week?" he asked. "There is going to be a time when the iron-fisted control of the Senate is going to be so obvious. He's not going to have the coordinated effort of a lieutenant governor who's working on his behalf."

Pittenger said as a state senator he'd seen Democratic Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue stop debate to "get her marching orders" directly from Rand.

Francis DeLuca says the Queen City Curse is not the only one.

Although much has been made of the failed attempts of Charlotte mayors to win statewide office, the executive director of the Civitas Institute points out that a number of lieutenant governors have lost their bids for governor.

1976 - Lt. Gov. Jim Hunt won the general election for governor
1984 - Lt. Gov. Jimmy Green lost the Democratic Primary
1988 - Lt. Gov. Bob Jordan lost the general election
1992 - Lt. Gov. Jim Gardner lost the general election
2000 - Lt. Gov. Dennis Wicker lost the Democratic Primary
2008 - Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue won the Democratic Primary but is in a close general election

He also notes that while none of the Charlotte politicians won a statewide election, every lieutenant governor won at least won general election.

"Looking at the inability of seasoned statewide politicians to move up to the Governor's mansion leads me to only one conclusion — there is a curse on Lieutenant Governors who try and become governor," he writes.

So much for the garage band.

Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory has hired the Keith Richards of the North Carolina Republican Party.

Jack Hawke, a veteran GOP strategist, has signed on as the lead consultant for McCrory.

When McCrory entered the race last month, he declared he was going to run a garage band campaign. But after some early stumbles he has had second thoughts.

Hawke, a 66-year old Zebulon resident, managed the last successful Republican camapign for governor—Jim Martin in 1984.

He also was chief strategist for Jim Gardner’s successful 1988 camapign for lieutenant governor, helped Virginia Foxx get elected to Congess in 2004, and was state GOP party chairman for eight years, the longest of anybody in history.

He was also one of several consultants for Richard Vinroot's unsuccessful 2000 campaign for governor.

More after the jump.

Jim Gardner says that the lieutenant governor should have security.

The former lieutenant governor, who served from 1989 to 1992, said that he did not have security when he came into office, but he was assigned a Highway Patrol detail by Gov. Jim Martin sometime during the Gulf War.

His successors, Dennis Wicker and Beverly Perdue, have also received security.

In a report today, the state auditor's office noted that there are no "statutes, rules or regulations" to provide security, which is at the discretion of the governor. It also noted that Perdue had used state security while going to campaign events, for which she has reimbursed the patrol.

Gardner said he doesn't see the need for a distinction.

"I don't think the governor's ever made any distinction between when they were campaigning and when they were going to public events," he said.  

Primary runoff elections are a Southern institution.

In a 1997 column, veteran N&O political observer Rob Christensen wrote that primary runoffs have been a "political fact of life" in North Carolina since 1915, leading to defeats for Luther Hodges Jr., Frank Porter Graham and Jim Gardner, among others.

At the time, the legislature was considering abolishing them.

Christensen interviewed Charles Bullock, a University of Georgia professor who studied 1,222 primary runoffs between 1970 and 1986. Bullock, the nation's leading expert on primary runoffs, argued they are the least-understood aspect of American elections.

Bullock argued that primary runoffs: 1) Were not created to disenfranchise black voters. 2) Do not necessarily hurt black candidates. 3) Keep Democratic- and Republican-controlled districts competitive. 4) Do not necessarily hurt the eventual nominee. 5) Do not always go to the underdog. 6) Are not chosen by a handful of voters.

After the jump, the full text of the column.