Florio's entire 1990 tax increases; he lost that election by fewer than 400 votes to incumbent Assemblyman Arthur R. Albohn (then-Assemblyman Rodney Frelinghuysen received the most votes in the primary). When Albohn retired in 1995, Carroll and Anthony Bucco, who was appointed to the Assembly after Frelinghuysen's election to Congress, prevailed in a Republican primary against Rick Merkt, Chris Christie, and two others, going onto victory in the fall. Upon his election to the Assembly, Carroll served on the Judiciary and State Government Committees. Over the course of the next nine terms, he also served on the Health, Regulatory Oversight, Human Services, Law and Public Safety, Housing and Local Government, and Higher Education Committees. At present, he sits on the Judiciary Committee and the State and Local Government Committee. He served as Republican Parliamentarian from 2002 to 2005, and again from 2012 to the present. He also served of the State Human Relations Commission, the Sentencing Review Commission, the New Jersey Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, and as the Assembly Republican Liaison to the State Historical Commission. For the 2018-19 session, Carroll has been assigned to serve on the Higher Education Committee, the Judiciary Committee and the State and Local Government Committee. During the term of Governor Christine Todd Whitman, Carroll became one of her most consistent Republican critics, voting against all but one of her budgets. He and fellow conservatives, including Marion Crecco, Scott Garrett, Guy R. Gregg, Rick Merkt, and Guy Talarico formed a loose-knit coalition dubbed by the press "The Mountain Men" for their conservative stances. Carroll was among only a handful of Assembly Members Legislators to vote against Governor Whitman's "Pension Bond" proposal. He and fellow conservatives were early opponents of Governor Whitman's proposal to raise the gasoline tax and they have, ever since, taken credit for killing that initiative. Along with Rick Merkt and others, Carroll was an early proponent of ending defined benefit pension plans and warned against the looming crisis of unfunded liabilities in the 1990s. Carroll was also among the earliest opponents of HOV lanes along Interstate 287 and Interstate 80 (created as a result of an initiative by Senator Frank Lautenberg). When they were finally abolished, local media proclaimed him one of the "heroes" in the fight against those lanes. While serving with the Republican majority, Carroll secured passage of a bill which exempted the first $500,000 of profit from the sale of