Various realignments of New Jersey's colleges and universities have been proposed over the last decade, but the merger of Rutgers-Camden into Rowan has prompted protests from faculty, students and alumni at the Camden campus, and to some degree, within the larger Rutgers system.

Christie has remained adamant that the proposal, drawn up by a governor's task force led by biotech executive Sol J. Barer, go forward by July 1.

Lautenberg's public correspondence Monday specifically questioned whether the merger is being proposed to benefit Cooper University Hospital, of which George Norcross is chairman. Cooper and Rowan have partnered to open a medical school in the fall.

The governor's office dismissed Lautenberg's allegations.

"The intention of the merger plan is to create medical and research centers of excellence," spokesman Michael Drewniak wrote in an e-mail. "Sen. Lautenberg has apparently chosen not to be a positive participant . . . and instead is engaging in over-the-top correspondence like this full of unsupported innuendo and political vindictiveness."

Lautenberg, 88, who is serving his fifth Senate term, has been at odds with both George Norcross and Christie for years.

In 2010, Christie told New York Magazine, "I don't really care what Frank Lautenberg has to say about much of anything," after the senator criticized his decision to kill a $8.7 billion railroad tunnel project connecting North Jersey and New York City.

And in 2008, Lautenberg was enraged when George Norcross supported U.S. Rep. Robert Andrews (D., Camden) in an unsuccessful campaign to unseat the senator, who has been in office since the early 1980s.

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Federal review sought of Rutgers-Rowan merger