The Battleship USS New Jersey has survived a lot.  Commissioned in 1943, she fought in World War II, the Korean Conflict, the Vietnam War and supported U.S. operations during the Lebanese Civil War in 1983. Despite her success in combat, recent years have been difficult.  Since 2004 she has been a museum ship in Camden, New Jersey on the Delaware River.   Camden suffers from high crime and political corruption and the Battleship New Jersey Museum has had difficulty attracting visors in numbers sufficient to support operations. Now New Jersey’s Governor Christie has used his line item veto power to cut $1.7 million, roughly 40% of the museum’s operating budget.  The museum staff, which in 2006 numbered 52, is now down to 5.   The USS New Jersey, never defeated in combat, may yet be sunk by a governor’s pen.

Battleship New Jersey, historical museums face cuts in N.J. Gov. Christie’s budget

Christie’s budget eliminates five line-item grants: $1.7 million for the Battleship New Jersey in Camden; $250,000 for the Morven Museum in Princeton; $375,000 for the Old Barracks Museum in Trenton; $405,000 for Save Ellis Island; and $75,000 for the New Jersey Council for the Humanities.

“It’s a major inequity,” Linda Caldwell Epps, president and CEO of the New Jersey Historical Society, said of the current system. “It’s not fair to anyone.”

The Battleship New Jersey in Camden is a “national treasure” that relies state aid to cover its $2.6 million budget. A “hub for veterans affairs,” the battleship is the most decorated in the history, said its president and CEO, Jim Schuck. “We’re not a South Jersey museum. We’re a national museum.”