Buoyed by Democratic gains across the nation, about 500 state and local party leaders gathered at San Francisco's Delancey Street Foundation, dancing to gospel music and cheering on Brown, who appeared with reelected Senator Dianne Feinstein and current attorney general Bill Lockyer, who was elected state treasurer.

What remains to be seen, however, is how Brown will redefine the post Lockyer has held since 1999, according to political scientists. As the state’s top law-enforcement official, Lockyer acted as a watchdog for the public’s interests.

During his two terms, the attorney general’s office has prosecuted the energy companies that price-gouged Californians in 2000 and 2001, expanded the state’s civil rights enforcement, and blocked the Bush administration’s efforts to expand logging of the state’s old-growth forests.

“Bill Lockyer will ultimately be regarded as one of the state’s best attorney generals,” said Tim Hodson, executive director of the Sacramento State Center for California Studies. “He recognized that the position is more than crime fighting. He certainly beefed up environmental protection. He also beefed up the units that deal with corporate enforcement. It's a much more holistic Department of Justice than it used to be."

Yet for all his innovation, Lockyer’s terms as attorney general failed to ignite his political career. While his New York counterpart, two-term Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, is poised to take the reins as governor of New York, Lockyer is in effect taking a demotion, running what looks to be a successful campaign for state treasurer.

Lockyer was a candidate for governor until last year, when he abruptly dropped out of the race and announced his candidacy for state treasurer. Critics observed that Lockyer’s shot at higher office was damaged in 2003, when he announced that he voted for Arnold Schwarzenegger during the recall of Governor Gray Davis.

“He's doing a good job, but no one is confusing him with Elliot Spitzer,” said Laurie Levenson, a professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. “He's riding the tide of more aggressive attorney generals.”

The attorney general is widely considered the second-most powerful position in state government, and its office has the resources to act on a vast scale, with a Department of Justice that includes 1,100 lawyers covering both civil and criminal law, and 500 law enforcement officers. "The office is a very large operation with fingers in a lot of pies," said Gerald Uelmen, a professor at the Santa Clara University of Law.

One of Lockyer’s first moves after taking office in 1999 was to establish within the Department of Justice a new Civil Rights Enforcement Section. It has pursued civil rights violations and sought to have them prosecuted by the Attorney General’s office.

In his most famous move as Attorney General, Lockyer went after energy companies, including Enron, after they price-gouged Californians during 2000 and 2001. Lockyer’s office said to date he has secured $5 billion in compensation for Californians.

“Lockyer has also implemented better statewide databases for cops to use, including DNA databases,” said Robert Weisberg, a professor of criminal law at Stanford University. Under Lockyer the State DNA Lab saw a radical upgrade, and produced real results. In the fifteen years before Lockyer was attorney general the office used DNA to solve just 12 crimes. Under Lockyer, that number surged to 1,783, according to Lockyer’s campaign.

“Lockyer was the toughest cop on the block, but he was also concerned about the environment,” Hodson said. In 2005, Lockyer blocked President Bush’s attempt to expand logging in 11.5 million acres of the Sierra Nevada National Forest, a move applauded by environmental groups.

More recent suits filed by Lockyer, however, have been met with skepticism.

On October 4, Lockyer filed charges against former Hewlett-Packard chairwoman Patricia Dunn for her role in the scandal that has shaken up management at the Silicon Valley technology company. While the case was within the Attorney General’s purview, legal experts doubt that the office will see the case through to prosecution and instead expect it to be fought in smaller criminal courts.

In September, Lockyer filed suit against the six largest U.S. and Japanese automakers, alleging that they have caused millions of dollars in environmental damage by producing greenhouse gasses. Some legal critics have regarded the case as a political stunt with little legal merit.

Despite the office’s inherently diverse responsibilities, the candidates to replace Lockyer have shied away from talking about the varied issues they may face as attorney general. Both Brown and his Republican opponent, state Senator Chuck Poochigian of Fresno, have focused on tough-on-crime talk.

“I think ironically Jerry Brown will do much better with the collateral issues than with the crime,” Levensen said. “He has much more general policy experience than law enforcement experience.”

Stanford’s Weisberg disagreed, however.

“Lockyer was a pretty good policy wonk,” Weisberg said. “My guess is that Jerry Brown will not get down and dirty into the details of economic policy and corporate malfeasance.”