Wyoming does it right

I somehow missed it when Sen. Thomas (R-WY) passed away earlier this month. My mom lived in Worland, WY for a few years, so I took some interest. I read this in the NYT story:

Under the state’s laws, the state’s Republican party is to submit three names as a successor to the Democratic governor of Wyoming, Dave Freudenthal, so the replacement process does not affect the Democratic-Republican split in the Senate.

A while back when Jan and I were discussing a situation (I forget which state) where the governor was able to change the party of a seat in Congress by appointing the replacement when someone died and I said that seemed really cheap and a governor should pick someone of the same party. Jan (being European) said it should obviously be the party that gets to decide the replacement and that would solve the problem. Well, it looks like Wyoming takes a semi-European approach to the problem, seems much better than what most states do. Far better than AK where the Governor could just decide to appoint his daughter...