TRENTON – Phil Murphy made no secret of his desire to legalize pot in New Jersey when he ran for governor in 2017 and won overwhelmingly.

Sure, there were many other issues, but you have to figure that if there was strong opposition to allowing responsible adults to use recreational marijuana, there would have been some voter backlash. There didn’t seem to be any.

In the ensuing 16 months or so, more than one poll has shown that more than 60 percent of state residents back making pot legal.

So Monday’s inability of the Senate to endorse a legal weed bill must be considered a colossal failure for the governor and Senate Leader Steve Sweeney. The votes were said to be there in the Assembly; the upper house was the problem.

There was drama at the beginning of the day with multiple TV news trucks parked on West State Street and a horde of press assembled outside the Senate Majority conference room as senators caucused. It had all the makings of a long day, but then it didn’t. A press release a few minutes before 1 p.m. said there would be no vote on the issue.

An hour or so later, Sweeney met reporters to detail what went wrong. He uttered some cliches about learning some lessons and the fact significant legislation is hard, not easy. And then he oddly praised the governor for his leadership. Really?

If Murphy had shown the “real leadership” of which Sweeney spoke, the bill would have passed. After all, Democrats control the Senate by a healthy margin.

Raw political leadership aside, you have to wonder what prompts this Puritanical view of marijuana among Democrats, a party that is supposed to be the progressive or liberal one.

The national trend leaves no ambiguity of where we are headed on this issue.

Recreational marijuana is now legal in 10 states plus Washington D.C. Most of these jurisdictions achieved that through voter referendum, which is a path New Jersey lawmakers oddly do not seem like pursuing. Sweeney noted that only Vermont legalized marijuana through the legislative process.

The different ways marijuana laws are now enforced is undeniable, which is why the governor liked calling this a “social justice” issue, which sounds a bit better to some than legalizing another way for folks to get high.

But one should not too quickly ignore the social justice aspect of things. Data – along with common sense – suggests inner-city black and Hispanic individuals are most likely to get busted for pot use. One reason could be because they often indulge in parks or on the street, as opposed to their suburban counterparts who can get stoned by sitting on their back deck. Anyone who thinks many suburbanites of all ages and political persuasions do not use weed is in denial, pure and simple.

Money is another issue. The yield from pot would not have been great relative to a budget of more than $37 billion, but whenever government can realize a chunk of money that doesn’t come from a broad-based tax that is a good thing.

What seems clear here is that some lawmakers are just afraid – afraid to do something that some may see as irresponsible. One is reminded of how years ago, state lawmakers refused to back marriage equality when it was being approved in many other states. The issues are different, but what is the same is the failure to challenge what some may see as the traditional norms of society. Marriage equality didn’t make it to New Jersey until it was “legislated” by the courts.

Sweeney tried to put a most positive spin on things, contending that the pot bill didn’t fail.  His point was that it was held, not defeated.

This led to a prediction by the Senate President.

“This is an issue that is not going away. The legalization of marijuana will be passed in New Jersey one way or another,” he said.

So there.

One must also wonder about Republicans, most of whom seem reflexively opposed to pot legalization. What ever became of the Libertarian wing of the GOP?  You know, the group that believes adults should be free to live the life they want with the least amount of government interference as possible. That seems to have been replaced by a rigid, authoritative point of view dating back to the “Just say no” movement,

But here’s the problem. Rightly or wrongly, many New Jerseyans are saying “yes” to using marijuana.

You would think that’s something legislators would know.