Tom Corbett will go down in history as the first Pennsylvania governor to be denied re-election. The reasons are diverse, including his support for major cuts in education spending, his spotty record on taxes and his failure to rally legislative support for rolling back pension benefits.

HARRISBURG — The most notable elements of Gov. Tom Corbett's legacy may have been cemented on Election Day.

His defeat by first-time candidate Tom Wolf saddled Corbett with the distinction of being the first Pennsylvania governor denied re-election in the 40 years that the state's chief executive has been allowed to seek a second consecutive term.

And amid historic Republican gains in state legislatures across the country — including in Pennsylvania — Corbett was the only sitting GOP governor to lose his seat to a Democratic challenger in the Nov. 4 election.

Whether history will be kinder than voters in assessing the governor's track record remains to be seen.

Corbett was elected in 2010 with a reputation as the corruption-fighting state attorney general who prosecuted several leaders of the state House of Representatives. He campaigned as a pro-business fiscal conservative, promising to shrink government, and he took a pledge against raising taxes or fees.

Corbett, 65, did work to curb state spending. He cut education aid and various social services programs, slashed business taxes and balanced a multibillion-dollar deficit without broad-based tax increases. But he also signed various tax and fee increases — including a massive transportation funding bill — while defending himself as living up to his pledge “the best I can.”

He governed at a time when Pennsylvania became the nation's No. 2 natural gas-producing state, thanks to the booming exploration of the Marcellus Shale reservoir, and the state worked its way back from the recession.

His leadership style — he had cool relationships with lawmakers and eschewed deal-making or compromises — did not win him many fans in Harrisburg. Two of his signature agenda items — rolling back public employee pension benefits and ending state control over liquor and wine sales — stalled in the Legislature, even though the GOP controlled both chambers throughout his four-year tenure.

He held the line on state sales and income taxes, even though he struggled with long-delayed annual pension obligation payments and a structural deficit that prompted rating agency downgrades. Corbett's decision to reduce public school aid — reflecting expiring federal funds, he argued — became a persistent lightning rod for criticism by educators and Democratic lawmakers, and a dominant campaign theme for Wolf.

“I promised exactly what I was going to do,” the governor said in a recent Associated Press interview. “I made tough decisions. I wish I hadn't been in the position to have to make them, but they had to be made, and people were upset with them.”

Democrats overwhelmingly opposed his budgets, while Corbett's efforts to advance the fortunes of private, parochial and charter schools frequently brought him into conflict with public school boosters.

Corbett cut hundreds of millions of dollars from social service programs, including the elimination of $200 monthly cash payments to poor adults unable to work and subsidized health insurance for low-income adults.

“He comes across as insensitive and even cruel. That's something that's really hard to shake,” said Randall Miller, a history professor at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia.

Later, Corbett applied for billions of new Medicaid expansion money available under the 2010 federal health care law to extend coverage to hundreds of thousands more working adults despite opposition from conservatives.

Alan Novak, a former longtime state Republican Party chairman, defended Corbett as working within limited budget options.

“I think they did the most with those options that they could,” Novak said.

Meanwhile, Corbett championed the business community. He cut business taxes every year, reducing payments by hundreds of millions of dollars annually, and signed various top-priority bills for business groups. The natural gas industry applauded Corbett for blocking a severance tax sought by many lawmakers, and Corbett often credited his stances as the kernel for Pennsylvania's economic recovery and its growing energy sector. Still, Democrats countered that Corbett's policies had sunk the state's rate of job growth to among the nation's slowest.

Arguably, Corbett's most far-reaching victory was passage of a law that will generate more than $2 billion a year from higher fuel taxes and motorist fees to jump-start work on a huge backlog of highway and bridge reconstruction projects.

Corbett often was forced into politically divisive social issues and sided with conservatives. He signed a law to make Pennsylvania's voter identification law one of the nation's strictest and fought a federal court challenge to the state's ban on recognizing same-sex marriage. He ultimately decided not to appeal court rulings that overturned both laws.

Terry Madonna, who directs the Center for Politics and Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, said Corbett's legacy will become clearer after the dust settles.

“We often need time for perspective,” he said. “Judgments change over time.”

A look at Republican Gov. Tom Corbett's record over his four-year tenure:SPENDINGCorbett inherited a $28.1 billion budget balanced with $4.2 billion in one-time items identified by his office, including $2.6 billion in federal recession aid, when he took office in 2011. He balanced four budgets without raising broad-based taxes. His current $29 billion budget includes $2.5 billion in one-time items.EDUCATIONHe signed bills to limit school boards' authority to raise property taxes and double a tax credit that helps subsidize tuition at private and parochial schools. He also supported budget-balancing reductions in funding to public schools and universities amid the disappearance of federal recession aid.HEALTH CARECorbett eliminated adultBasic, a subsidized health insurance program for about 40,000 low-income adults. He instituted twice-yearly eligibility checks for Medicaid recipients that critics blamed for tens of thousands of people losing Medicaid coverage because of caseworkers' errors. Corbett sought federal approval to make changes in the federal Medicaid expansion authorized by the 2010 health care law, delaying it in Pennsylvania for a year. Coverage is scheduled to expand Jan. 1.TRANSPORTATIONHe signed a landmark transportation funding bill boosting fuel taxes and motorist fees by an estimated $2.3 billion a year to ramp up the state's road and bridge reconstruction spending by about 40 percent.CHILD ABUSECorbett signed a package of bills that expanded the 20-year-old playbook for how caseworkers and investigators can handle reports of child abuse and who must report cases of suspected child abuse. The bills were largely a response to the Jerry Sandusky child molestation scandal.LIQUORCorbett was unable to persuade the House and Senate to agree on a plan to end state control of the wholesale and retail sale of wine and liquor, one of his signature initiatives.PENSIONSCorbett unsuccessfully sought passage of legislation to pare pension benefits for future state and school employees to save money over the long term. Lawmakers also ignored his call to further delay payments into the pension funds in a bid to provide near-term budget relief to school districts.ENERGYCorbett's administration helped negotiate deals to keep three Philadelphia-area refineries from shutting down. He signed legislation adapting Pennsylvania's drilling regulations to the Marcellus Shale exploration, including an impact fee on wells that he initially resisted. Courts later struck down rules he had sought to restrict the ability of municipalities to dictate the location of drilling activity.BUSINESSCorbett's budgets cut business taxes every year, reducing companies' payments by hundreds of millions of dollars annually. He signed legislation limiting the liability of companies sued in civil liability cases. And he signed legislation authorizing one of the state's biggest bond issuances ever to repay billions in unemployment compensation debt at a lower interest rate.VOTER IDCorbett signed legislation to toughen Pennsylvania's voter identification law, making it one of the nation's toughest, but courts blocked it from taking effect and ultimately struck it down as unconstitutional. Corbett did not appeal.GAY MARRIAGECorbett defended Pennsylvania's law banning recognition of same-sex marriage against a federal court challenge. Corbett opposes same-sex marriage, but he decided not to appeal a judge's May 2014 decision striking down the law because Corbett did not believe the state would prevail.GUNSCorbett signed legislation to allow member organizations like the National Rifle Association to sue municipalities over local gun control ordinances that exceed the reach of state firearms laws. He also signed legislation to expand the allowable use of lethal force in self-defense.