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WHAT'S  THE  MATTER 
WITH  NEW  YORK 

NORMAN  THOMAS 

AND 
PAUL  BLANSHARD 


From  the  collection  of  the 


m 


v    JJibrary 
t        P 


San  Francisco,  California 
2006 


WHAT'S  THE  MATTER 
WITH  NEW  YORK 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  TOBK   .   BOSTON   .  CHICAGO   .  DALLAS 
ATLANTA   .  BAN  FBANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON    .BOMBAY    .   CALCmTA 

MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 
OF  CANADA,  LIMITED 

TORONTO 


Reproduced  by  permission  of 
Rollin  Kirby  and  the  New  York  World-Telegram. 

DESIGN  FOR  A  MUNICIPAL  FOUNTAIN 


WHAT'S 

THE  MATTER  WITH 
NEW  YORK 

A    NATIONAL   PROBLEM 


NORMAN  THOMAS 

AND 

PAUL    BLANSHARD 


NEW  YORK 
THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

1932 


COPYRIGHT,  1932, 
NORMAN  THOMAS  AND  PAUL  BLANSHARD. 

All  rights  reserved — no  part  of  this  book  may  be 
reproduced  in  any  form  without  permission  in  writing 
from  the  publisher,  except  by  a  reviewer  who  wishes 
to  quote  brief  passages  in  connection  with  a  review 
written  for  inclusion  in  magazine  or  newspaper. 

Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  October,  1932. 


SET   UP   BY   BROWN    BROTHERS   LINOTYPERS 

PRINTED   IN    THE   UNITED   STATES   OF   AMERICA 

BY   THE   FERRIS   PRINTING   COMPANY 


To 

SEVEN  FUTURE  CITIZENS  OF  NEW  YORK 
W.  T.,  M.  T.,  F.T.,  R.  T.,  E.  T.,  P.  B.,  JR.,  AND  R.  B. 

in  the  hope  that  they  will  live  to  be  proud 
of  their  city 


PREFACE 

MORE  years  ago  than  he  likes  to  remember  one  of  the 
authors  of  this  book — it  doesn't  matter  which — returned 
for  a  brief  visit  to  his  native  town  with  all  the  weight  of 
a  very  recent  college  degree  upon  him  plus  the  sophisti 
cation  acquired  from  twelve  whole  months  in  the  metrop 
olis.  To  this  youth  a  shrewd  old  judge  imparted  infor 
mation  that  has  stuck,  although  much  else  has  been  for 
gotten.  "Boy,"  said  he,  "don't  tell  me  that  Tammany 
could  teach  us  many  tricks.  Our  small  town  politicians 
know  them  all.  But  the  paving  supply  men  do  tell  me  our 
town  has  an  honest  council.  When  one  of  our  Council- 
men  contracts  to  deliver  his  vote  he  stays  bought  even  if 
some  late  comer  offers  to  raise  him." 

The  obvious  moral  of  this  tale  is  that  we  are  not  hold 
ing  up  New  York  City  in  this  book  as  a  sinner  above  all 
other  American  communities.  Indeed,  we  suspect  that 
the  point  of  our  story  is  that  in  essence  it  is  typical.  Ad 
mitting  with  proper  humility  that  "New  York  isn't  the 
United  States,"  acknowledging  that  its  sheer  size  alone 
gives  it  certain  peculiar  problems,  accepting  at  its  full  value 
the  good  old  American  horror-not-unmixed  with  fascina 
tion  at  the  very  name  of  Tammany,  we  still  affirm  that 
there  are  dozens  of  cities,  towns,  and  rural  counties  that  do 
not  need  to  go  to  school  in  the  Wigwam  in  order  to  learn 

ix 


x  PREFACE 

how  to  make  politics  pay  politicians — at  what  terrible  cost 
to  the  community  our  chapters  illustrate. 

But  we  do  not,  in  this  book,  indulge  in  any  detailed 
comparisons,  odious  or  otherwise.  That  is  one  of  many 
things  that  do  not  lie  in  the  field  we  have  marked  out  for 
ourselves.  We  indulge  ourselves  in  a  last  chapter  on  the 
City  of  the  Future,  but  we  do  not  go  at  length  into  the 
question  of  the  future  of  cities  in  the  light  of  our  progress 
in  communication,  transportation,  and  the  distribution  of 
electrical  energy.  We  summarize  the  findings  of  the  Sea- 
bury  investigation,  but  we  are  not  its  official  recorders,  nor 
do  we  confine  ourselves  to  its  revelations  and  recommen 
dations.  We  discuss  the  place  of  structural  changes  in 
government  in  any  program  for  a  nobler  city,  but  we  do 
not  seek  to  write  a  new  charter  for  New  York.  We  are 
Socialists,  eager  to  make  New  York  an  example  of  effec 
tive  municipal  socialism,  but  we  are  not  laying  down  a 
platform  for  a  party.  What  we  do  is  to  try  to  give  facts 
about  the  past  and  present  of  New  York  City  government, 
and  then  to  interpret  those  facts  and  to  suggest  what  can 
be  done  about  them.  We  cannot  in  every  chapter  remind 
the  hoped-for  reader  what  we  beg  him  never  to  forget; 
namely,  that  behind  the  politics  of  New  York  lies  the 
economics,  the  politics,  the  ethics  of  a  sick  acquisitive  soci 
ety,  drawing  inexorably  near  to  the  end  of  its  epoch. 

Yet,  even  in  this  day  when  not  only  cities  but  a  whole 
social  order  groan  and  travail  in  pain,  it  seems  to  us  well 
that  we  should  understand  the  meaning  and  possibilities 


PREFACE  xi 

for  good  or  evil  of  the  government  which  touches  so  inti 
mately  the  lives  of  the  seven  million  people  of  many  na 
tions  and  races,  gathered  from  the  North,  the  East,  the 
South,  and  the  West,  who  call  New  York  home. 

How  critical  we  are  and  why  of  government  in  New 
York,  of  its  political  machines,  of  its  privileged  classes, 
and  its  unprivileged  masses  the  book  must  speak  for 
itself. 

We  criticize,  not  because  we  despair  but  because  we 
hope.  We  who  are  not  native  New  Yorkers  would  be  less 
than  honest  and  less  than  grateful  if  we  did  not  acknowl 
edge  the  spell  New  York  has  laid  upon  us,  the  sense  of 
living  vitality  which  she  imparts,  and  the  good  comrade 
ship  which  we  have  found  within  her  borders.  It  is  a  city 
worth  saving  from  the  shame  of  economic  exploitation 
and  political  corruption.  It  is  a  city,  great  masses  of  whose 
workers  with  hand  and  brain,  for  all  their  seeming  apathy 
or  cynicism  or  despair,  deserve  a  government  which  will 
be  theirs,  rather  than  their  exploiters.  They  will  take  a 
long  step  toward  it  when  they  begin  to  see  the  contrast 
between  the  shame  that  is  our  city's  and  the  splendor  that 
might  be  the  crown  of  glory  to  all  its  sons  and  daughters. 

In  a  sense  this  book  is  a  cooperative  effort  with  several 
of  our  associates.  We  wish  especially  to  express  our  deep 
indebtedness  to  two  of  those  associates,  Henry  J.  Rosner 
and  E.  Michael  White,  whose  research  underlies  many  of 
the  most  important  chapters  and  whose  critical  comments 
have  been  invaluable.  Our  thanks  are  due  also  to  H.  Eliot 


xii  PREFACE 

Kaplan  for  facts  concerning  the  city's  civil  service  and  to 
Beatrice  Mayer  for  patient  and  cheerful  work  upon  the 
manuscript  and  index. 

Before  we  were  halfway  through  the  book  it  became 
evident  that  we  could  not  record  all  of  the  important  and 
exciting  developments  in  New  York's  recent  civic  scandals 
without  stretching  the  discussion  to  impossible  lengths, 
and  yet  we  were  loath  to  omit  any  important  events  be 
cause  we  wanted  to  make  this  a  reference  book  for  writers 
and  civic  workers  as  well  as  a  critical  discussion  for  the 
general  reader.  We  have  made  what  seems  to  be  a  logi 
cal  compromise  by  discussing  the  major  scandals  in  detail 
and  adding  as  Appendix  I  a  "Calendar  of  Scandals  during 
the  Walker  Administration"  which  lists  without  too  great 
solemnity  the  major  events  in  the  reign  of  Jimmy  the  First 
will  it  be  Jimmy  the  Last? 

N.  T. 
P.  B. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PREFACE  vii 

1 
CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES  1 

2 
HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS  16 

3 
NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE        44 

4 
MORE  TIN  BOXES  63 

J5 
GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  79 

6 
JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  92 

7 
THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  111 

8 
THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  129 

9 

MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  155 

xiii 


XIV 


CONTENTS 


10 
ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY 

11 
TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL 

12 
CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN 

13 
RACKETEERING  IN  LAND 

14 
HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS 

15 
THE  CONSUMER  PAYS 

16 
THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY 

17 
THE  CITY  MANAGER  AND  PROPORTIONAL 

REPRESENTATION  302 

18 
THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  314 

REFERENCES  327 

APPENDICES 

I.   A  CALENDAR  OF  SCANDALS  DURING  THE 

WALKER  ADMINISTRATION  331 

II.   THE  SEABURY  CHARGES  AGAINST  MAYOR 

WALKER  350 

INDEX  357 


WHAT'S  THE  MATTER 
WITH  NEW  YORK 


1 

CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES 

WHEN  James  J.  Walker  resigned  as  mayor  of  New 
York  on  September  1,  1932,  the  event  was  important  not 
only  to  the  seven  million  people  of  the  metropolis  but 
to  the  seventy  million  people  of  America  whose  lives 
are  now  controlled  by  the  governments  of  cities.  New 
York  presents  in  an  exaggerated  degree  problems  that 
are  universal  in  a  machine-age  democracy.  It  is  important 
in  its  own  right  because  it  contains  in  Wall  Street  the 
financial  capital  of  America  and  because  millions  of  Ameri 
cans  are  more  or  less  culturally  dependent  on  its  news 
papers,  magazines,  and  publishing  houses.  It  is  equally 
important  as  a  large-scale  model  of  the  thing  we  call  a 
city,  a  city  with  bosses,  political  machines,  rackets,  gang 
murders,  franchises,  aldermen,  realtors  and  reformers. 

How  desperately  necessary  it  is  to  control  these  things 
we  call  cities  is  worthy  of  some  consideration  before  we 
turn  to  New  York's  troubled  affairs.  The  notion  that  that 
government  is  best  which  governs  least  was  born  in  the 
country  in  an  age  of  simple  agriculture  and  handicraft 
arts.  It  can  have  no  meaning  in  a  modern  city.  However 
bad  our  city  government  is,  it  is  indispensable  to  masses 
of  workers  who  do  not  grow  their  own  food  or  make  their 

1 


2          WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

own  cloth  but  live  housed  in  tenements,  are  fed  by  com 
plex  processes  under  which  the  city  is  never  far  removed 
from  hunger,  who  would  die  of  thirst  but  for  a  city  water 
system,  and  who  are  herded  back  and  forth  in  city  sub 
ways.  Our  health,  certainly  our  protection  from  epidemic 
disease,  depends  far  more  on  the  city  board  of  health 
than  upon  the  best  family  doctor.  The  education  of  our 
children  is  in  the  main  a  city  function.  So  is  our  protec 
tion  from  fire  and  theft.  The  courts  of  the  people  are  city 
courts,  with  little  chance  of  appeal  to  the  august  tribunals 
in  Albany  and  Washington.  And  in  these  bitter  years  of 
depression  hundreds  of  thousands  of  American  workers 
have  learned  that  if  they  are  to  escape  from  the  starvation 
of  unemployment  it  is  primarily  the  city  upon  which  they 
must  depend.  Few  of  us  can  do  for  ourselves  what  the 
city  government  does  for  us  collectively. 

New  York  has  a  peculiar  need  of  a  strong  and  efficient 
government  because  it  is  so  artificial  a  creature  of  the 
machine  age.  Its  economic  as  well  as  its  political  life 
depend  upon  collective  control,  and  in  many  cases  that 
control  is  national.  It  is  an  overhead  city  feeding  upon 
the  hinterland.  The  centripetal  forces  that  hold  it  to 
gether  are  felt  in  San  Diego,  Key  West,  Seattle,  and 
Bangor.  Its  political  boundary  lines  are  little  more  than 
signposts  past  which  the  automobiles  whiz.  A  great  part 
of  its  population  pours  out  of  the  skyscrapers  at  night  to 
sleep  in  neighboring  states  and  completely  ignore  the  civic 
problems  of  the  metropolis.  Incidentally,  it  can  be  said 
that  so  artificial  a  city  may  not  have  a  stable  future.  What 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES       3 

the  machine  has  created  the  machine  may  destroy.  The 
necessity  for  concentration  which  created  the  great  city 
in  the  first  place  is  now  being  destroyed  by  the  telephone, 
the  telegraph,  the  radio,  the  motor  bus,  and  the  airplane. 
Prophets  like  Frank  Lloyd  Wright  think  that  the  city  is 
doomed.  Stuart  Chase  warns  us  that  modern  science  has 
made  the  great  city  a  place  of  danger  in  time  of  peace  and 
war  because  of  the  peril  of  broken  gas  mains  and  aerial 
attacks. 

Whatever  the  machine  age  may  do  to  the  city  its  im 
portance  in  national  life  is  bound  to  grow  because  of 
another  factor.  It  has  become  the  frontier  of  the  struggle 
between  organized  capital  and  the  forces  of  social  change. 
In  Russia  under  the  leadership  of  a  remarkable  group  of 
intellectuals,  the  city  proletariat  has  not  only  overthrown 
the  old  order  in  the  city  but  has  carried  to  a  bewildered 
and  often  reluctant  countryside  a  coercive  gospel  of  social 
ist  salvation.  So  the  city  which  to  the  shepherd  and  peas 
ant  has  always  been  the  symbol  and  home  of  a  predatory 
culture  appears  in  a  new  role  as  the  pioneer  of  a  system 
that  challenges  old  acquisitive  standards. 

In  America  we  have  not  come  yet  to  anything  resem 
bling  the  revolutionary  organization  of  the  city  proletariat 
of  Europe,  but  it  would  be  foolish  to  disregard  the  possi 
bility.  New  York  is  worth  studying  not  only  as  a  sample 
of  civic  failure  but  as  a  possible  cradle  of  economic  revolt. 
As  yet  its  working  class  is  unbelievably  docile,  but  the 
fourth  successive  winter  of  unemployment  may  not  leave 
it  so. 


4         WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

At  present  neither  proletariat  nor  intelligentsia  is  much 
interested  in  city  government.  Forty  per  cent  of  the  Amer 
ican  voters  do  not  bother  to  go  to  the  polls  at  all.  When 
Walker  resigned  as  mayor  of  New  York  the  one  organi 
zation  that  defended  him  most  warmly  was  the  Central 
Trades  and  Labor  Council  of  the  American  Federation  of 
Labor  through  its  president,  Joseph  P.  Ryan!  Among  the 
intelligentsia  it  is  smart  to  be  cynical  concerning  all  forms 
of  democracy  and  especially  local  democracy.  A  man  who 
discusses  intelligently  the  color  line  in  South  Africa  and 
the  freedom  of  India  will  consider  a  street-car  franchise 
in  Brooklyn  beneath  his  mental  range,  and  he  will  be  posi 
tively  disgraced  if  any  one  asks  him  to  run  for  alderman. 
His  attitude  toward  city  investigations  is  that  they  are 
amusing  and  worthless  exhibitions  of  human  ignorance. 

Well,  are  investigations  worthless?  We  believe  they 
are  not,  and  we  think  that  it  will  be  worth  while  to  look 
back  a  moment  at  some  of  New  York's  great  investiga 
tions. 

George  Washington  Plunkitt,  a  famous  old  Tammany 
district  leader  who  operated  a  bootblack  stand  in  front  of 
the  New  York  County  Court  House  about  1900,  once  said: 
"There's  an  honest  graft,  and  I'm  an  example  of  how  it 
works.  I  might  sum  up  the  whole  thing  by  sayin':  I  seen 
my  opportunities  and  I  took  'em."  1 

Never  did  one  slogan  express  better  the  history  of  New 
York  political  machines  since  the  year  1789  when  Tam 
many  was  founded.  An  old  Tammany  song  quoted  by 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES       5 

M.  R.  Werner  in  his  Tammany  Hall  summed  it  up 
phonetically: 

Tammany,  Tammany 
Swamp  'em,  swamp  'em 
Get  the  wampum 
Taammanee!  2 

Of  late  years,  particularly  while  Al  Smith  was  running 
for  president,  an  effort  has  been  made  to  throw  a  cloak 
of  gentility  about  the  early  activities  of  Tammany.  An 
egregious  paper-bound  history  of  the  society  has  been  put 
out  which  omits  or  distorts  everything  that  a  history 
should  tell.  The  truth  is  that  Tammany  always  has  been 
a  center  of  corruption  and  it  has  never  reformed.  It  has 
on  occasion  modified  its  methods  in  the  face  of  public 
indignation  but  as  soon  as  the  public  indignation  has 
cooled  down  it  has  gone  as  far  as  the  law  would  permit. 
(Strictly  speaking,  Tammany  is  confined  to  Manhattan,  but 
we  shall  frequently  use  the  word  in  its  popular  sense  to 
describe  the  Democratic  organizations  in  Greater  New 
York.) 

The  founder  of  Tammany,  an  upholsterer  named  Wil 
liam  Mooney,  who  had  been  charged  with  deserting  the 
American  army  and  joining  the  British  during  the  Revo 
lutionary  War,  spent  nearly  $4,000  of  city  money  in  addi 
tion  to  his  salary  on  his  family  and  himself  in  the  year 
1809,  and  was  removed  from  office.  Like  Sheriff  Tom 
Farley  in  1932,  his  standing  with  Tammany  was  not 
affected  by  his  removal  for  he  was  later  chosen  a  Grand 


6          WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Sachem  of  the  society  for  several  terms.  From  that  day  to 
this  Tammany  has  fought  every  investigation  by  legisla 
ture  or  grand  jury,  and  has  welcomed  back  into  its  ranks 
the  discharged  convicts  and  the  dismissed  officers.  Aaron 
Burr  was  the  first  real  leader  of  Tammany,  and  did  much 
to  shape  its  permanent  policies. 

Looking  back  on  the  story  of  New  York's  great  scandals 
one  can  understand  why  Lord  Bryce  once  remarked  that 
city  government  is  the  great  failure  of  American  democ 
racy,  and  why  H.  G.  Wells,  when  he  visited  Chicago  many 
years  ago,  said:  "I  would  as  soon  go  to  live  in  a  pen  in 
a  stockyard  as  into  American  politics."  Yet  the  story  in 
retrospect  is  not  one  of  despair.  Waves  of  reform  have 
been  followed  by  waves  of  reaction,  but  each  reform 
movement  has  wrought  some  permanent  improvement  in 
the  life  of  the  city.  We  may  take,  for  example,  the  last 
five  investigations  or  drives  against  New  York  corruption, 
the  fight  of  The  Times  against  Tweed  in  1870,  the  fight 
of  Dr.  Charles  H.  Parkhurst  and  the  Lexow  Committee 
against  police  corruption  in  1894,  the  exposure  of  Croker 
by  the  Mazet  Committee  in  1899,  the  Meyer  investigation 
in  Hylan's  administration,  and  the  Seabury  investigation 
in  Walker's.  Only  one  of  these  investigations,  the  Meyer 
inquiry,  failed  to  produce  appreciable  results  in  improving 
the  city's  life.  Every  one  of  them  would  have  succeeded 
more  completely  except  for  the  fact  that  the  organized  and 
bitter  opposition  of  Tammany  was  supported  by  wealthy 
business  interests. 

The  fight  against  William  Marcy  Tweed  was  led  by 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES       7 

George  Jones,  editor  of  The  Times,  with  the  able  assist 
ance  of  Harper's  Weekly  and  the  famous  cartoonist, 
Thomas  Nast.  Jones  was  bitterly  attacked  by  the  Tweed 
newspapers  as  an  Englishman  and  the  husband  of  an 
actress,  and  all  of  Harper's  books  were  barred  from  the 
public  schools.  While  he  was  stealing  about  a  million 
dollars  a  month  from  the  city,  six  of  the  wealthiest  men  in 
New  York,  headed  by  John  Jacob  Astor,  gave  Tweed  a 
certificate  of  character  for  which  it  is  alleged  that  their 
taxes  were  reduced.3  Jay  Gould  advanced  a  million 
dollars  as  bail  to  free  Tweed  from  jail,  whereupon 
Tammany  renominated  and  reflected  him  to  the  State 
Senate. 

But  in  spite  of  his  wealthy  friends  Tweed  died  in  Lud- 
low  Street  jail  and  his  dapper  boy-friend,  Mayor  A.  Oakey 
Hall,  the  1870  counterpart  of  Jimmy  Walker,  was  thor 
oughly  disgraced.  It  is  true  that  only  one  man,  Tweed 
himself,  was  convicted  as  a  result  of  the  great  scandal,  but 
the  Tweed  Ring  was  broken  up,  two  of  the  Tweed  Ring 
judges,  Albert  Cardozo  and  George  Barnard,  resigned  or 
were  removed,  and  reformers  learned  how  to  expose  some 
of  Tammany's  favorite  devices  for  theft.  After  Tweed's 
death  some  of  the  crudest  forms  of  looting  the  public 
treasury  were  abandoned,  and  Tammany  thereafter  cen 
tered  its  attention  on  exploiting  private  citizens  for  city 
service  and  protection. 

Such  exploitation  in  the  underworld  reached  its  climax 
in  the  nineties  during  the  great  depression  of  Cleveland's 
second  administration.  (Perhaps  there  is  a  connection  be- 


8          WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

tween  civic  conscience  and  financial  failure.)  Prostitution 
in  those  days  was  open  and  widespread  in  New  York, 
especially  on  the  lower  East  Side,  and  the  Rev.  Charles  H. 
Parkhurst,  pastor  of  the  Madison  Avenue  Presbyterian 
Church,  who  was  also  president  of  the  Society  for  the  Pre 
vention  of  Crime,  discovered  that  an  organized  system  of 
bribery  existed  under  which  the  police  collected  millions 
in  tribute  for  failure  to  enforce  the  law.  Parkhurst  began 
thundering  from  his  pulpit  in  1892,  at  a  time  when  Croker 
was  in  temporary  retirement  in  Ireland,  and  he  kept  thun 
dering  until  the  business  men  became  disturbed  and  the 
Chamber  of  Commerce  persuaded  the  legislature  to  ap 
point  the  Lexow  investigating  committee. 

Parkhurst,  who  is  still  alive,  has  been  described  so  often 
as  a  mere  vice  crusader  that  his  non-Puritan  aspects  have 
been  almost  forgotten.  He  could  swear  most  effectively  in 
ecclesiastical  language — "the  polluted  harpies  that  under 
the  pretense  of  governing  this  city,  are  feeding  day  and 
night  on  its  quivering  vitals.  They  are  a  lying,  perjured, 
rum-soaked  and  libidinous  lot"  * — but  Lincoln  Steffens  has 
pointed  out  that  he  was  a  shrewd  leader,  "wise"  to  politics 
in  the  suggestive  sense  of  that  word.  Certainly  he  knew 
how  to  dramatize  his  fight.  He  put  on  a  pair  of  checked 
black  and  white  trousers,  hired  a  detective  for  six  dollars 
a  day  and  expenses,  and  went  out  to  see  the  underworld 
for  himself.  His  stories,  told  from  the  pulpit,  forced  the 
Lexow  inquiry  which,  on  the  basis  of  three  million  words 
of  testimony,  disclosed  a  regular  system  of  police  inter 
ference  at  the  polls  and  police  payments  from  disorderly 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES       9 

houses.  The  facts  played  an  important  part  in  destroying 
organized  prostitution  in  New  York  and  ultimately  in 
bringing  the  voting  machine. 

It  remained  for  the  Mazet  inquiry  of  1899  to  lay  before 
the  public  the  spoils  system  of  Tammany.  Republican  Boss 
Platt  forced  the  inquiry.  Croker  was  the  star  of  that 
inquiry.  His  answers  on  the  witness  stand  set  a  record 
in  frankness,  and  accordingly  in  the  education  of  the  pub 
lic.  The  audience  at  that  inquiry  when  Croker  testified 
behaved  very  much  like  the  cheering  Tammany  henchmen 
who  applauded  Mayor  Walker  when  he  testified  before 
Seabury,  but  the  reaction  of  the  newspaper-reading  public 
was  sharply  hostile.  Croker  for  the  first  time  laid  bare 
the  modified  methods  of  Tammany  in  winning  "honest 
graft."  "If  you  can  show  me,"  he  shouted  at  Counsel 
Frank  Moss,  "where  I  have  taken  a  dollar  from  this  city 
you  can  cut  that  right  arm  off." 

Moss  could  not  show  how  Croker  had  taken  city  funds 
directly,  but  he  proceeded  to  show  how  Croker  as  an  auc 
tioneer  and  contractor  made  money  by  getting  contracts 
which  his  puppet  city  officers  had  the  power  to  grant.  One 
passage  from  Croker's  testimony  has  become  classic  as  the 
Tammany  credo: 

Q.  Let  us  see  if  my  deductions  are  correct.  The  judges 
appointed  by  Tammany  Hall  appoint  referees,  who,  in  line 
with  their  party  obligations,  appoint  auctioneers.  .  .  .  And 
it  is  the  duty  of  those  auctioneers 

A.  That  referee  is  appointed  by  the  judge,  and  he  ap 
points  whatever  auctioneer  he  pleases. 

Q.  But  if  that  referee  is  a  good  Tammany  man,  he  should 


10        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

appoint  an  auctioneer  who  is  in  line  with  the  party,  should 
he  not,  as  a  part  of  the  patronage? 

A.  It  all  depends  on  the  kind  of  a  Tammany  man  he  is. 

Q.  If  he  appoints  your  firm  he  does  a  good  party  act,  does 
he  not? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Why?  If  he  appoints  your  firm  he  does  a  good  party 
act,  you  say.  Now,  I  ask  you  why  does  he  do  a  good  party 
act  when  he  appoints  your  firm? 

A.  Well,  all  things  being  equal,  he  has  a  right  to  do  it. 
He  is  a  Democrat  himself  and  he  ought  to  appoint  Demo 
crats. 

Q.  And  he  ought  to  do  that  thing  which  puts  into  your 
pocket  money,  because  you  are  a  Democrat  too? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  .  .  . 

Q.  Then  you  are  working  for  your  own  pocket,  are  you 
not? 

A.  All  the  time;  the  same  as  you.6 

The  big  corporations  of  Croker's  day  did  business  with 
him  as  the  big  corporations  of  to-day  do  business  with  our 
present  Tammany  officials.  The  Manhattan  Elevated  Rail 
road  Co.  gave  his  trucking  company  favors  just  as  the 
North  German  Lloyd  gave  $50,000  to  a  Tammany  lawyer 
in  1930  for  a  pier  lease — because  it  was  cheaper  to  do  that 
than  to  fight. 

After  the  Mazet  inquiry  the  City  Club  issued  a  pamphlet 
in  which  it  said  mournfully:  "Ground  is  not  wanting  for 
the  belief  that  the  power  of  Mr.  Croker  is  sustained, 
directly  and  indirectly  by  'respectable  and  prominent  citi 
zens'  who  believe  that  it  is  better  to  uphold  the  bosses 
than  to  'imperil  the  interests,  perhaps  those  of  widows  and 
orphans,  committed  to  their  charge.'  In  other  words  the 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES     11 

theory  is  that  a  citizen  is  justified,  when  acting  as  a  direc 
tor,  or  as  the  manager  of  a  company  in  'doing  business* 
with  a  political  machine,  however  corrupt  and  however 
dangerous  to  the  state."  We  shall  encounter  that  same 
theory  again  and  again  in  the  evidence  of  business  men 
before  Judge  Seabury  in  1932. 

Although  the  Seabury  inquiry  has  not  yet  been  com 
pleted  as  this  book  goes  to  press,  its  accomplishments  have 
already  been  substantial.  It  has  not  only  destroyed  an 
organized  vice  ring  that  had  developed  a  new  form  of 
extortion,  and  brought  about  the  removal  or  resignation  of 
many  magistrates,  police  officers,  and  a  mayor,  but  it  has 
so  aroused  public  opinion  that  a  reconstruction  of  the  city 
charter  giving  representation  to  minority  parties  may  be 
the  final  outcome. 

As  we  look  back  over  the  history  of  New  York  City 
investigations  we  cannot  help  but  conclude  that  investiga 
tions  do  get  results.  The  Tweed  prosecutions  stopped  the 
worst  forms  of  direct  robbery  of  city  funds;  the  Lexow 
investigation  did  much  to  destroy  organized  prostitution; 
the  Mazet  inquiry  made  elections  more  honest  and  ex 
posed  the  Tammany  machine  to  public  gaze;  the  Seabury 
investigation  may  yet  give  us  proportional  representation, 
and  it  has  accomplished  many  minor  changes  which  we 
shall  discuss  in  later  chapters. 

The  greatest  weakness  of  all  New  York's  investigations 
has  been  their  short-lived  effect.  "These  reform  move 
ments  are  like  queen  hornets,"  said  an  East  Side  gangster 
whom  Werner  quotes.  "They  sting  you  once  and  then 


12        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

they  die."  Even  when  "they  sting  you  once,"  the  sting  is 
fatal  to  only  a  few  victims.  Of  all  the  big  men  of  Tam 
many  exposed  by  Judge  Seabury  only  Sheriff  Farley  and 
Mayor  Walker  were  forced  out  of  office.  Tammany  has 
not  only  succeeded  in  protecting  most  of  its  own  but  it  has 
quickly  come  back  to  power  after  every  exposure.  It  was 
defeated  at  the  polls  in  1871  after  the  Tweed  scandals 
and  then  came  back  into  power  three  years  later.  William 
L.  Strong,  the  reform  mayor  elected  after  the  Lexow  in 
quiry,  lasted  two  years  and  then  gave  place  to  one  of 
Tammany's  worst  tools,  Robert  A.  Van  Wyck.  Seth  Low, 
president  of  Columbia,  served  one  term  as  mayor  after  the 
Mazet  inquiry  and  then  yielded  to  Tammany's  choice, 
George  B.  McClellan. 

The  cynic  may  say  that  these  spasms  of  reform  were 
useless,  but  the  fact  remains  that  the  quality  of  municipal 
service  in  New  York  has  immensely  improved  since  the 
days  of  Tweed  and  the  constant  fight  for  reform  has 
played  a  real  part  in  that  improvement.  The  failure  to 
defeat  Tammany  permanently  has  been  due  not  so  much 
to  the  failure  of  investigations  as  to  a  particular  weakness 
of  reform  groups.  They  are  unwilling  to  face  the  fact 
that  only  a  party  machine  can  defeat  a  party  machine. 
They  either  vote  the  Republican  ticket  or  put  a  "fusion" 
liberal  mayor  in  place  of  a  Tammany  scoundrel  and  then 
walk  away  and  leave  him,  convinced  that  their  victory  is 
proof  of  the  wisdom  of  non-partisanship  in  elections. 
Three  or  four  years  later  the  Tammany  machine  is  back 
in  power  again. 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES     13 

One  striking  example  of  the  naivete  of  most  civic  re 
formers  was  the  acclaim  given  to  Joseph  V.  McKee  when 
he  succeeded  Walker  as  mayor  in  September,  1932.  Be 
cause  McKee  immediately  made  some  drastic  cuts  in  city 
waste  he  was  hailed  as  a  city  savior.  The  Seabury  inquiry 
had  just  revealed  that  the  real  trouble  with  New  York 
was  its  control  by  a  corrupt  Democratic  machine.  McKee 
had  been  a  faithful  member  of  that  machine,  and  had 
voted  for  the  Equitable  bus  franchise  and  the  salary 
grabs.  He  said  after  assuming  office:  "I  am  an  organiza 
tion  Democrat,  always  have  been,  and  always  will  be." 
Yet  this  was  the  man  hailed  by  many  newspapers  and 
realty  groups  as  the  coming  redeemer  of  the  city. 

One  mistake  of  the  reformers  is  their  willingness  to 
believe  that  the  Republican  machine  wants  reform  any 
more  than  Tammany  does.  Boss  Platt  was  willing  to  use 
a  reformer  to  beat  Croker,  but  one  term  of  reform  was 
enough  for  him.  He  declared  that  for  the  doctrine  of 
non-partisanship  in  local  elections  he  had  "the  sincerest 
and  profoundest  contempt."  He  knifed  Seth  Low  in  the 
mayoralty  fight  of  1897  and  threw  the  election  to  Tam 
many's  Van  Wyck.  The  same  thing  will  happen  over 
again  if  reformers  trust  to  the  Republican  Party  to  give 
them  any  permanent  relief  from  the  abuses  of  corrupt 
machine  rule.  And  there  is  a  certain  justification  for  this 
contempt  of  non-partisan  groups.  Their  results  are  never 
permanent. 

Theoretically — perhaps — we  might  imagine  a  city  of 
seven  million  people  voting  wisely  regardless  of  party. 


14        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

In  practical  life  the  picture  is  impossible.  A  little  reflec 
tion  compels  us  to  expect  what  the  history  of  modern  times 
in  every  country  confirms ;  that  politics  is  and  must  be  an 
occupation  requiring  time,  an  exacting  avocation  if  not  a 
full-time  profession.  The  more  complex  a  community  is 
the  greater  is  the  need  of  the  unifying  influence  of  a  politi 
cal  party.  And  a  political  machine  is  not  necessarily 
evil.  What  makes  New  York's  political  machine  evil  is 
the  purpose  it  serves  and  the  way  it  serves  it. 

Democracy,  in  brief,  requires  government  by  parties 
because  the  citizens  are  too  numerous,  too  ill-informed 
and  too  preoccupied  to  come  together  spontaneously  to 
choose  the  policies  and  leaders  they  wish  to  prevail.  Polit 
ical  machinery  has  to  be  worked.  The  parties  work  it.  Or, 
slightly  to  change  the  figure,  political  government,  espe 
cially  in  modern  times,  is  an  engine  which  cannot  be  kept 
going  by  volunteer  stokers  and  late  October  bonfires. 
Your  professional  politicians  are  the  stokers.  Nor  need 
the  term  "politician"  be  one  of  opprobrium.  A  man  who 
organizes  other  men  in  a  political  group  for  a  high  social 
purpose  may  be  one  of  the  nation's  most  useful  citizens. 
This  is  not,  of  course,  to  disparage  non-partisan  action  by 
civic  groups  to  win  the  support  of  all  parties  for  intelli 
gent  measures  of  reconstruction.  One  of  the  chief  sources 
of  strength  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  is  that  it  stands 
for  no  party  or  candidate,  but  for  measures  that  any 
progressive  party  or  candidate  should  support. 

One  more  defect  is  outstanding  in  all  the  investigations 
of  New  York.  They  do  not  plumb  deep  enough  into  the 


CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES     15 

underlying  economic  base  of  Tammany's  power.  The 
power  of  every  urban  democratic  machine  in  this  country 
could  be  traced  back  to  an  urban  plutocracy  if  the  inves 
tigators  had  the  will  and  the  understanding  to  do  it. 
Tammany  is  an  organization  for  private  profit  existing  in 
a  business  system  operated  for  private  profit  and  the  two 
cannot  be  separated.  If  Tammany  did  not  exist  some 
other  machine  would  rise  to  take  its  place,  since  the  own 
ing  class  in  this  country  needs  political  brokers  to  carry 
out  its  will. 

The  proof  of  this  statement  is  in  the  facts  that  this 
book  sets  forth.  We  hope  that  before  we  are  through  the 
reader  will  agree  with  us  that  the  roots  of  civic  corruption 
in  American  life  lie  deep  in  a  predatory  economic  system 
and  that  the  fight  for  clean  government  is  only  one  battle 
in  the  larger  struggle  for  a  just  social  order. 


2 
HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS 

A  TEACHER  in  a  school  in  an  outlying  region  in  New 
York  reports  that  he  has  a  bright  class.  He  asked  the  boys 
how  they  would  go  about  getting  a  new  sewer  laid — an 
important  question  in  that  district.  At  once  they  told  him: 
"We'd  get  a  petition  signed  by  the  property  holders  and 
then  we'd  go  to  see  the  district  leader."  Surely  a  much 
more  realistic  answer  than  they  could  have  made  by 
memorizing  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  and 
familiarizing  themselves  with  that  strange  jumble  of  laws 
which  the  charter  of  New  York  City  has  become.  Almost 
any  textbook  will  anatomize  for  you  the  legal  skeleton  of 
the  body  politic;  very  few  will  tell  you  what  breathes  into 
it  the  breath  of  life  and  sets  it  moving.  Some  textbooks, 
the  ones  used  in  New  York  public  schools  for  instance, 
purport  to  describe  city  government  without  even  men 
tioning  Tammany  Hall. 

The  fundamentals  of  New  York's  legal  structure  are 
simple.  New  York,  like  all  American  cities,  is  a  creature 
of  the  state.  Its  powers  are  derived  from  the  legislature, 
not  the  sovereign  people.  Despite  the  growing  sentiment 
for  home  rule  and  an  alleged  home  rule  act,  the  state  can 
and  does  interfere  with  the  city  by  means  of  all  sorts  of 

16 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       17 

mandatory  laws.  Very  few  of  the  items  of  a  program  of 
municipal  socialism  for  New  York  could  be  carried  out 
without  running  to  Albany.  A  legislature  in  which  up 
state  rural  counties  are  disproportionately  represented 
could,  if  it  so  desired,  rip  up  the  whole  city  government. 
A  governor  of  New  York  can  on  charges  remove  the 
mayor  and  the  borough  presidents  although  the  mayor 
nominally  administers  a  budget  almost  three  times  the 
size  of  the  state  budget  and  usually  exercises  far  more  sig 
nificant  power  over  the  life  and  well-being  of  its  people 
than  any  governor. 

This  rule  of  New  York  City  by  New  York  State  is  one 
of  those  anachronisms  which  survive  in  America  because 
we  treat  historical  accidents  as  sacred.  The  boundary  lines 
of  the  state,  running  northward  as  they  do  near  the  Hud 
son  River,  and  stopping  at  the  southern  tip  of  Manhattan 
Island,  cut  off  New  York  City  from  the  Jersey,  Pennsyl 
vania  and  Connecticut  hinterland  of  which  it  is  a  natural 
part.  The  tying  of  New  York  City  with  its  distinctive 
urban  problems  to  the  vast  and  conservative  rural  area  of 
up-state  New  York  permits  the  conservative  Republicans 
to  play  the  countryside  against  the  city.  If  the  arrange 
ment  worked  for  intelligent  and  progressive  legislation 
and  the  destruction  of  Tammany,  it  might  be  excusable, 
but  in  practice  the  Republicans  at  Albany  are  more  re 
actionary  on  questions  of  social  legislation  than  the  Demo 
crats.  They  thwart  every  forward  movement  toward  un 
employment  insurance,  municipal  housing  and  the  better 
regulation  of  power  companies. 


18        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

As  everybody  knows,  the  present  City  of  New  York  was 
created  in  the  year  1897  by  uniting  the  great  cities  of  New 
York  and  Brooklyn  and  the  scattered  villages  of  Staten 
Island  (Richmond  County)  and  Queens  County,  Long 
Island.  The  new  city  took  in  four  counties.  These  were 
not  consolidated.  On  the  contrary,  a  fifth  county,  Bronx, 
was  created.  Bronx  was  a  separate  borough  from  the  be 
ginning  of  Greater  New  York;  the  other  boroughs  were 
coterminous  with  the  counties.  Of  course  the  counties 
have  the  full — or  more  than  the  full — complement  of 
courts,  sheriffs,  recorders,  and  the  like,  all  of  them  sup 
ported  by  the  city  budget  but  none  of  them  legally  sub 
ject  to  city  control.  Aside  from  the  function  of  giving 
jobs  to  faithful  friends  of  the  political  machine,  the 
counties  have  lost  all  meaning.  They  survive  because  of 
institutional  inertia  and  Tammany  obstruction  to  reform. 

The  official  government  of  New  York  can  be  seen  on 
almost  any  Friday  in  the  winter  time  by  visiting  the  cham 
ber  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  in  that  little  gem  of  architec 
ture  nestled  in  the  shadow  of  the  Woolworth  Building, 
the  City  Hall.  The  name  of  the  official  government  is  the 
Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment.  The  visitor  who 
arrived  there  about  11  o'clock  on  a  Friday  morning  during 
the  Walker  administration  and  waited  until  12  would  see 
seven  men  stroll  in  behind  the  dapper  mayor  and  take 
their  seats  behind  a  large  semi-circular  desk  on  a  plat 
form.  The  mayor  without  any  apology  for  being  an  hour 
late  would  begin  proceedings  by  saying  through  his  loud 
speaker:  "Call  the  roll."  The  clerk  would  call  "Mayor, 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       19 

Controller,  President  of  the  Board  of  Aldermen,  President 
of  the  Borough  of  Manhattan,  Bronx,  Brooklyn,  Queens 
and  Richmond."  These  are  the  men  who  are  elected  every 
four  years  to  govern  the  city.  Three  of  them,  the  Mayor, 
the  Controller,  and  the  President  of  the  Board  of  Alder 
men,  are  elected  at  large  by  the  whole  city,  and  they  each 
have  three  of  the  board's  16  votes.  The  borough  presi 
dents  are  elected  by  each  borough  and  their  votes  vary, 
the  Manhattan  and  Brooklyn  presidents  having  two  votes 
each,  and  the  others  one. 

At  most  meetings  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  the  borough 
presidents  are  mere  figureheads.  Often  they  send  substi 
tutes  to  represent  them  except  when  a  borough  crisis 
arises.  Otherwise  they  sit  sleepily  waiting  for  the  clock 
to  creep  to  1:30  when  they  can  go  out  to  a  two-hour  lunch 
and  transact  their  important  political  business.  We  do  not 
recall  in  our  experience  at  Board  of  Estimate  meetings  a 
single  instance  of  a  comment  on  any  problem  by  a  borough 
president  which  showed  any  careful  study  of  a  city-wide 
situation.  The  borough  presidents  sit  on  the  board 
frankly  for  logrolling  purposes  to  get  all  available  appro 
priations  and  patronage  for  their  boroughs. 

Yet  this  semicircle  of  sleepy-eyed  politicians  with  a 
weary  showman  in  the  middle  is  one  of  the  most  pow 
erful  governments  in  the  world,  reckoned  in  the  dollars 
which  it  spends  and  the  citizens  it  controls.  It  affects 
the  life  of  the  average  New  Yorker  much  more  than  the 
Congress  at  Washington  or  the  Assembly  of  the  League 
of  Nations — and  one  reason  why  it  is  such  a  tragic  failure 


20        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

is  that  the  average  New  Yorker  never  stops  to  realize  this 
fact.  It  is  the  only  legislative  body  in  New  York  City 
with  any  real  power.  Nominally  it  shares  its  power  with 
the  Board  of  Aldermen,  a  body  of  65  local  politicians 
chosen  by  Tammany  and  affiliated  bodies,  but  actually 
this  Board  of  Aldermen  has  little  power  and  uses  less. 
It  meets  once  a  week  for  an  hour  in  cool  weather  and 
rushes  through  an  approval  of  the  actions  of  the  Board  of 
Estimate.  It  can  and  does  change  the  names  of  streets.  It 
can  help  to  pay  itself  good  salaries.  Each  alderman  for 
his  hour  a  week  receives  $5,000  a  year  and  is  aided  in  his 
deliberations  by  the  protective  care  of  eleven  sergeants-at- 
arms  who  receive  $26,520  a  year.  The  Board  of  Aldermen 
is  one  house  of  the  Municipal  Assembly  and  the  Board 
of  Estimate  is  the  other,  but  only  the  Board  of  Estimate 
can  initiate  the  budget  and  the  Board  of  Aldermen  cannot 
increase  it. 

One  reason  why  the  Board  of  Aldermen  is  so  inept  is 
that  there  is  almost  no  opposition  in  it  to  Tammany  rule. 
It  includes  64  rubber-stamp  Democrats  and  one  voluble 
Republican.  It  has  amounted  to  less  than  nothing  since 
the  period  several  years  ago  when  a  delegation  of  Socialist 
aldermen  made  it  a  platform  for  some  penetrating  com 
ments  on  New  York  City  government. 

The  same  statement  could  be  made  concerning  the 
ineptness  of  the  Board  of  Estimate.  Tammany  has  no 
political  opposition  in  the  board.  Borough  President 
Harvey  of  Queens,  nominally  Republican,  is  as  docile  as 
a  kitten.  Controller  Berry  fights  Mayor  Walker  because 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       21 

he  has  political  ambitions  and  because  he  represents  the 
Smith  wing  of  the  party,  but  he  too  must  pull  his  punches 
in  a  crisis,  for  Tammany  has  the  power  to  destroy  him. 
The  only  colorful  fighter  on  the  Board  of  Estimate  in 
recent  years  has  been  Berry's  substitute,  Deputy  Controller 
Frank  J.  Prial,  and  he  has  caused  Mayor  Walker  sufficient 
trouble  to  make  the  public  appreciate  what  one  deter 
mined  critic  in  the  inner  circles  may  mean  to  the  tax 
payers. 

The  mayor  who  presides  over  the  Board  of  Estimate  is 
a  person  of  vast  powers.  He  appoints  the  executive  heads 
of  the  city  departments,  the  masters  of  police,  fire,  correc 
tion,  charity,  health,  hospitals,  sanitation,  docks,  tenement 
houses,  parks  and  playgrounds.  He  appoints  also  the 
magistrates  and  the  judges  of  the  Court  of  Special  Ses 
sions,  and  the  judges  of  the  Children's  Courts,  and  the 
members  of  the  Board  of  Education,  and  the  majority  of 
the  members  of  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals — 
although  he  cannot  remove  magistrates.  If  he  is  a  Tam 
many  man  (and  he  usually  is)  then  the  Tammany  brand  is 
on  every  department  and  loyalty  to  Tammany  is  the  con 
dition  of  appointment. 

The  controller  is  the  next  most  powerful  city  officer  to 
the  mayor.  He  is  the  city's  chief  financial  officer  although 
he  does  not  draw  up  the  budget — that  is  left  nominally 
to  the  Director  of  the  Budget,  Charles  L.  Kohler,  an  old- 
time  Tammany  district  leader.  The  borough  presidents 
have  as  their  chief  prerogative  the  control  of  roads,  sewers 
and  building  permits  in  their  own  boroughs,  a  rich  source 


22        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

of  patronage.  The  wisdom  of  this  borough  form  of  gov 
ernment  we  shall  discuss  later.  Here  we  may  point  out  the 
anomaly  of  having  five  sewer  departments  in  five  different 
boroughs  and  one  water  department  for  the  whole  city; 
five  building  bureaus  and  one  Tenement  House  Depart 
ment;  five  highway  departments  and  one  Board  of  Sanita 
tion  to  keep  the  streets  clean. 

Such  in  outline  is  the  structure  of  New  York's  official 
government.  It  does  immense  business.  Its  budget  for  the 
fiscal  year  1931  was  $621,000,000.  It  carries  142,650  per 
sons  on  its  payrolls.  It  has  developed  an  elaborate  civil 
service  and  has  in  some  of  its  departments  experts,  almost 
unknown  to  the  general  public,  who  would  be  an  orna 
ment  to  any  community. 

But  the  real  government  of  New  York  does  not  func 
tion  at  City  Hall.  It  functions  at  many  district  clubhouses 
throughout  the  city,  and  at  the  county  Democratic  head 
quarters. 

The  four  most  powerful  rulers  of  New  York  govern 
ment  are  the  four  Democratic  bosses  of  the  four  large 
boroughs,  John  F.  Curry  in  Manhattan,  John  H.  McCooey 
in  Brooklyn,  John  Theofel  in  Queens,  and  Edward  J. 
Flynn  in  Bronx.  When,  in  September,  1932,  it  became 
necessary  to  decide  whether  Mayor  Walker  should  run 
again  for  mayor,  the  press  and  the  whole  city  recognized 
that  the  real  decision  lay  in  the  hands  of  these  four  men. 
Here  was  a  city  of  seven  million  people  choosing  its  chief 
magistrate  through  four  men,  not  one  of  whom  has  ever 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       23 

shown  any  great  intellectual  or  business  distinction,  not 
one  of  whom  would  be  chosen  by  any  great  corporation, 
school,  or  newspaper  to  direct  its  destinies. 

The  reason  for  this  singular  spectacle — at  least  it  would 
appear  singular  if  we  had  not  become  so  utterly  accus 
tomed  to  it — is  that  New  York  is  ruled  by  a  closely  knit 
predatory  machine  whose  methods  are  quite  familiar 
in  every  large  city  in  America.  The  machine  is  based 
solidly  upon  the  common  man's  self-interest  plus  the  con 
trol  of  the  powers  that  will  satisfy  that  interest. 

Murray  Seasongood,  formerly  Mayor  of  Cincinnati  and 
now  president  of  the  National  Municipal  League,  sums  up 
the  matter  thus:  "It  is  assumed  that  every  one  wants  some 
thing.  Even  the  strictly  honorable  want  honors.  In  the 
list  of  illegitimate  favors  are  to  be  counted;  unconscion 
able  grants  to  public  utilities;  undeserved  deposits  to 
friendly  banks;  low  valuation  for  taxation  to  large  cor 
porations  and  individuals  with  a  pull;  a  complaisant 
building  inspector;  delinquent  taxes  allowed  to  remain 
delinquent;  appropriation  for  public  purposes  of  property 
no  longer  desired  by  the  owner  at  a  price  far  in  excess  of 
actual  value.  For  the  less  powerful,  there  are  grants  of 
market  or  parking  privileges,  poor  relief,  indigent  soldier 
burials,  taking  care  of  traffic  citations,  lending  dogs  from 
the  dog  pound,  and  so  on  down  to  the  right  of  unmolested 
profitable  street-begging."  * 

To  which  we  may  add  that  in  our  experience  we  have 
never  seen  any  pushcart  peddler  essentially  more  obse- 


24        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

quious  to  Tammany  in  the  height  of  Jimmy  Walker's 
power  than  representatives  of  some  of  the  great  Mer 
chant's  Associations  which  wanted  something. 

Under  the  Tammany  system  the  place  where  men  go 
when  they  want  something  is  the  district  clubhouse  pre 
sided  over  by  the  district  leader.  Behind  a  desk  in  this 
clubhouse  the  leader  sits  for  several  hours  almost  every 
night  in  the  year  while  petitioning  citizens  interview  him. 
They  want  city  jobs  or  excuses  from  jury  duty,  or  peddlers' 
licenses,  or  mercy  from  a  local  magistrate.  The  district 
leader  hears  their  stories  and  reaches  a  decision.  If  he 
agrees  to  do  something,  the  arrangement  is  colloquially 
called  a  "contract."  It  is  not  necessarily  based  on  any 
direct  payment  to  the  leader  or  even  a  pledge  to  vote  the 
Democratic  ticket.  The  leader  takes  it  for  granted  that 
when  he  gives  favors  to  people  they  will  support  him 
politically.  He  is  always  on  the  lookout  to  secure  young 
followers  to  work  for  the  machine  on  promise  of  promo 
tion  to  a  good  job  if  they  are  faithful.  "Better  join  my 
club,"  said  a  district  leader  recently  to  one  of  our  young 
Socialist  friends.  "I  can  give  a  bright  future  to  a  young 
man  like  you  and  I  need  somebody  who  can  read  and 
write." 

The  leader's  income  is  derived  partly  from  the  dues  of 
his  club  and  partly  from  a  city  salary  for  some  sinecure, 
but  mostly  from  the  kind  of  commissions  and  direct  graft 
which  we  shall  describe  in  the  next  two  chapters.  Before 
the  Seabury  inquiry  began  Professor  Joseph  McGoldrick 
of  Columbia,  who  is  an  authority  on  New  York's  govern- 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       25 

ment,  said  that  "a  gross  return  of  $100,000  a  year  is 
probably  fairly  common"  for  the  Tammany  district  leader, 
and  the  inquiry  proved  that  his  estimate  was  modest.2 

Roughly  speaking,  a  political  district  corresponds  to  an 
assembly  or  aldermanic  district. 

The  Republicans  and  Democrats  usually  maintain  at 
least  one  clubhouse  in  each  district,  although  the  Repub 
lican  clubs  have  been  going  bankrupt  in  the  lean  years  of 
the  depression  at  an  alarming  rate.  Each  district  has  its 
Democratic  and  its  Republican  leader,  who  are  usually 
friends,  except  at  election  time,  and  even  then  ready  to 
unite  against  the  Socialists.  The  Republican  and  Demo 
cratic  leaders  need  each  other.  Powerful  as  the  Demo 
cratic  leader  is,  one  of  his  constituents  or  clients  may  have 
some  trouble  about  a  passport  or  the  admission  of  a  rela 
tive  at  Ellis  Island  or  bootlegging  or  an  income  tax  case 
which  the  Republican  leader  presumably  is  in  better  posi 
tion  to  care  for  when  the  Republican  party  is  in  control  at 
Washington.  What  is  simpler  than  for  the  leaders  to 
meet  and  exchange  "contracts"!  The  Republican  leaders, 
however,  are  greatly  handicapped  by  the  rule  that  a  Fed 
eral  employee  cannot  actively  take  part  in  politics.  Main 
taining  a  Republican  machine  on  a  strictly  amateur  basis 
is  a  difficult  task  in  opposition  to  a  Tammany  machine 
which  may  directly  or  indirectly  affect  the  choice  of  600 
job-holders  in  each  political  district. 

The  district  leaders  are  the  governing  oligarchy  in  each 
county  and  they  choose  the  Currys,  McCooeys,  Theofels 
and  Flynns.  Curry,  boss  of  Manhattan,  was  elected  by  the 


26        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

district  leaders  by  a  very  close  vote,  and  he  acts  accord 
ingly.  The  cherubic-faced  McCooey  of  Brooklyn  has  a 
grand  machine  and  is  able  to  do  marvelously  well  for  all 
his  relatives,  but  he  has  to  respect  his  district  leaders  and 
his  fellow  county  bosses,  notably  Curry  of  Tammany,  and 
he  does  not  forget  it.  There  is  no  one  boss  to-day  in 
New  York  of  the  dimensions  of  Croker  or  even  Murphy. 
Each  county  boss  is  only  primus  inter  pares,  and  he  knows 
it. 

There  is  not  even,  technically  speaking,  a  city-wide 
political  machine,  Democratic  or  Republican.  The  county 
is  the  unit  and  technically,  Tammany  is  confined  to  Man 
hattan.  Its  commanding  position  in  the  alliance  of  five 
Democratic  machines  is  due  to  its  age  and  prestige,  and  its 
control  of  the  borough  which,  though  no  longer  the  most 
populous,  is  still  the  center  of  wealth  and  civic  activity. 
Tammany  proved  its  power,  when  with  the  all-important 
help  of  Al  Smith — who  later  regretted  his  choice — it  sup 
planted  Hylan  of  Brooklyn  with  Walker  of  Broadway  in 
1925.  Since  then  Walker's  fortunes  and  Tammany's  have 
been  closely  intertwined. 

But  it  should  not  be  supposed  that  because  Tammany  is 
dominant  in  the  Democratic  organization  to-day  it  will 
always  remain  so.  Flynn  of  the  Bronx  has  been  backing 
Roosevelt  consistently,  and  McKee  is  Flynn's  protege.  If 
McCooey  should  join  forces  with  Flynn  New  York  might 
see  a  real  war  in  the  Democratic  Party.  It  would  be  a  war 
without  principles,  solely  for  personal  advantage. 

The  district-leader  government  maintains  a  nominally 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       27 

democratic  form.  The  party  members  in  each  county 
choose  a  county  committee — an  immense  affair  which  in 
Manhattan  numbers  over  5,000  people — and  this  county 
committee  chooses  a  County  Executive  Committee  of 
about  30  district  leaders  who  really  run  the  government  of 
the  borough.  The  County  Executive  Committee  has  two 
very  important  subcommittees  which  are  inner  circles  of 
wisdom  and  power,  the  Steering  Committee  and  the  Law 
Committee,  referred  to  in  popular  parlance  as  the  War 
Board.  The  county  leaders  like  Curry  and  McCooey  are 
chosen  by  the  district  leaders  of  the  executive  com 
mittee. 

Above  this  official  party  hierarchy  is  the  window-dress 
ing  of  the  Tammany  Society  itself,  which  is  a  fraternal 
order  having  13  sachems — and  an  annual  celebration  on 
the  4th  of  July.  Nominally,  Tammany  Hall,  the  popular 
name  for  the  Democratic  organization  in  Manhattan,  is 
separate  from  the  Tammany  Society.  Actually  the  separa 
tion  is  a  legal  fiction  and  both  are  controlled  by  the  same 
group.  When  a  crisis  occurs,  the  big  official  limousines 
with  city-paid  chauffeurs  roll  up  of  an  evening  to  Tam 
many  Hall  on  17th  Street  and  Union  Square  and  the  dis 
trict  leaders,  and  sometimes  the  sachems,  put  their  heads 
together  in  the  inner  sanctum  where  the  dour-faced  Curry 
sits  beside  a  desk  with  a  silver-framed  portrait  of  Alfred 
E.  Smith  upon  it.  Here  mayors,  judges  and  governors  are 
made  and  unmade. 

The  one  thing  that  a  district  leader  must  always  do  is 
to  control  the  primaries  in  his  district.  This  depends  not 


28        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

only  on  his  skill  in  dispensing  all  sorts  of  favors  but  on 
his  success  in  holding  his  precinct  leaders  in  line.  These 
precinct  leaders  get  out  the  vote  at  elections,  and  what  is 
more  important  for  the  machine,  at  primaries.  It  doesn't 
take  many  votes  in  a  precinct  to  win  the  ordinary  primary. 
The  precinct  captain  can  always  count  on  his  own  old 
guard,  the  600  officeholders  in  each  district,  the  grateful 
recipients  of  favors,  personal  friends  and  relatives.  Before 
the  non-partisan  reformer  is  aware  of  what  has  happened, 
the  nominations  of  both  old  parties  are  completed  and  he 
is  left  to  protest  in  futility,  especially  if  the  Socialist  Party 
is  too  "radical"  for  him  and  he  shrinks  from  the  party 
label.  Only  in  the  rare  event  of  a  well-organized  attack 
by  a  rival  aspirant  to  power  in  the  organization,  or  the 
still  rarer  event  of  a  popular  uprising  does  the  district 
leader  need  to  worry.  Political  death  comes  with  failure 
to  carry  a  precinct  or  a  district  in  the  primary.  To  lose 
your  district  in  an  election  may  be  forgiven — Mr.  Curry,  at 
least  once,  has  openly  and  successfully  supported  an  oppo 
nent  of  a  leader  who  failed  to  carry  his  district — but  to 
lose  your  district  in  a  primary  is  political  suicide. 

We  have  said  that  the  power  of  the  political  machine 
rests  upon  its  ability  to  give  all  sorts  of  people  something. 
That  something  has  almost  infinite  variety.  It  shades  from 
legitimate  and  kindly  service  to  men  and  women,  bewil 
dered  by  the  complexity  of  the  city,  to  highly  illegitimate 
service  to  some  favored  contractor,  landowner,  or  criminal 
with  a  pull  whose  case  must  be  fixed.  Government  even 
in  its  more  serviceable  aspects  is  still  a  fearsome  thing  to 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       29 

the  average  man  and  he  looks  around  as  from  time  im 
memorial  for  a  friend  and  protector.  This  the  district 
leader  or  one  of  his  lieutenants  is.  Nor  is  he  usually  anx 
ious  to  tell  his  constituent  that  he  does  not  always  need 
his  intervention  with  the  lower  courts  and  the  various  city 
boards.  Your  typical  politician  is  always  ready  to  claim 
credit  for  unnecessary  services. 

Much  is  sometimes  said  of  the  political  machine — espe 
cially  Tammany — as  a  great  benevolent  organization. 
Actually  it  is  generous  with  other  people's  money.  It  does 
not  forget  its  own  coffers.  A  typical  district  leader 
never  gives  away  anything  of  his  own,  unless  it  is  his  time, 
and  even  for  that  he  is  well  repaid.  The  main  reliance 
of  a  district  leader  is  the  favors  he  can  get  from  the  city 
administration  which  he  helped  to  put  and  keep  in  office. 
His  own  largesse,  such  as  the  spectacular  gifts  of  the  old 
Sullivan  clan  at  the  holiday  season,  or  the  outings  of  a 
Tom  Farley  association,  are  secondary.  Even  they  are  paid 
for  out  of  the  pickings  of  the  leader  which  he  derives  as 
perquisites  of  his  power. 

Religious  and  national  fellowship  also  tends  to 
strengthen  Tammany,  which  is  led  by  Irish  Catholics,  who 
cleverly  play  for  the  cooperation  of  conservative  Jewish 
voters  and  usually  get  it.  The  radical  Jewish  voters  are 
the  most  intelligent  and  hopeful  group  in  the  city  but 
they  by  no  means  constitute  a  majority  of  Jewish  citizens. 
Tammany's  methods  of  religious  allottment  we  shall  dis 
cuss  later.  Suffice  it  to  say  here  that  Tammany  is  very 
wise  in  its  appeals  to  religious  and  racial  feeling.  "Po- 


30        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

litical  leaders  of  each  faith,"  says  Prof.  Joseph  McGold- 
rick,  "attend  the  functions  of  all.  Goldfogle  marches  in 
the  St.  Patrick's  Day  parade.  Walker  and  McCooey  at 
tend  the  Purim  ball.  Smith  issues  a  message  of  greeting 
at  Rosh  Hoshannah.  The  P.  V.  McCarren  Club  last  year 
distributed  $2,000  worth  of  matzoths." 

The  Protestants  are  not  so  effective  in  New  York  poli 
tics  because  they  are  divided  and  because  there  are  not  so 
many  of  them  as  Catholics  or  Jews.  The  Catholics  and 
Jews  combined  outnumber  the  Protestants  six  to  one. 
Greater  New  York  has  1,734,000  Catholics  and  1,765,000 
Jews,  but  only  a  little  more  than  half  a  million  Protestants. 
Of  course,  these  statistics  are  for  church  membership  only. 
Almost  half  of  the  people  of  New  York  do  not  belong 
to  any  church. 

The  faithful  servants  of  a  district  leader  are  promoted 
on  a  systematic  basis.  At  least  twenty  members  of  the 
average  district  club  have  good  paying  city  jobs.  The 
humble  but  all-important  precinct  leaders  are  given  minor 
clerkships  or  those  famous  sinecures,  the  corporation  in 
spectorships,  which  entail  no  work  and  may  bring  pay 
from  both  the  city  and  the  corporations  "inspected."  The 
youngest  and  most  unimportant  lawyers  are  sent  to  the 
State  Assembly  where  the  pay  is  low,  only  $1,500,  and  the 
frequent  absences  from  the  city  inconvenient.  The  next 
highest  office  for  the  faithful  is  that  of  alderman  which 
pays  $5,000  a  year  but  which  is  usually  reserved  for  the 
docile  and  the  stupid  as  a  position  in  which  any  brilliance 
would  be  an  embarrassment  to  the  party.  Above  these 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       31 

lower  orders  come  the  big  commissionerships  and  chief 
clerkships  with  salaries  above  $5,000,  which  the  district 
leaders  themselves  take  as  side  lines.  Above  these  come 
the  judgeships  and  the  borough  presidencies,  all  con 
trolled  by  the  same  bosses.  The  ownership  of  the  mayor 
is  the  condition  for  control  of  most  of  these  appointments, 
which  is  the  main  reason  why  Tammany  is  always  so  much 
more  interested  in  that  office  than  in  any  other. 

Eighty-five  Republican  and  Democratic  district  leaders 
on  the  city  payroll  have  an  average  salary  of  $7,300.  Of 
course,  they  occupy  positions  at  the  top  of  various  depart 
ments  where  they  are  exempt  from  civil  service  examina 
tions.  The  Civil  Service  Reform  Association  in  May,  1932, 
published  a  list  of  106  Democratic  and  Republican  dis 
trict  leaders  and  their  relatives  on  the  payroll  who  drew 
$715,000  a  year  from  the  city  without  taking  civil  service 
examinations.8  In  many  cases  the  leaders  secure  official 
jobs  for  several  members  of  their  families  and  reap  a 
personal  harvest  through  such  side  lines  as  insurance  and 
real  estate.  A  woman  Tammany  leader  (each  district  has 
a  woman  co-leader  for  decorative  purposes)  is  usually 
satisfied  if  a  husband  or  son  is  given  a  city  job.  Some  of 
the  leaders  and  their  salaries,  with  their  relatives  indicated 
by  brackets,  include: 

Daniel  E.  Finn  New  York  County  Clerk,  $15,000. 
(Daniel  E.  Finn,  Jr.,  secretary  to  Supreme  Court  Justice, 

$6,500.) 
(Mrs.    Mary   A.    Finn,    Deputy   Clerk,    Municipal   Court, 

$4,000.) 


32        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Mrs.  Mary  E.  Dunne,  no  position. 

(Joseph  J.  Dunne,  Third  Deputy  Commissioner,  Tenement 

House  Department,  $6,000.) 
Christopher  D.  Sullivan,  Member  of  Congress. 
(Christopher  D.   Sullivan,  Jr.,   attendant  to  judge,  Court 

General  Sessions,  $3,000.) 
Harry  C.  Perry  (former  leader),  Chief  Clerk,  City  Court, 

$12,000. 
William  L.  Kavanagh,  Deputy  Commissioner  Water  Sup 


ply,  G.  &  E.,  $8,500. 
:le: 


Charles  W.  Culkin,  former  actuary  auditor,  Finance  De 
partment,  $8,000. 
(Thomas  J.  Culkin,  secretary  to  commissioner,  Department 

Water  Supply,  G.  &  E.,  $5,000.) 
(Gerald    P.    Culkin,    clerk    to    justice,    Municipal    Court, 

$3,000.) 

William  J.  Ahearn,  no  position. 
(Edward  J.  Ahearn,  law  assistant,  Surrogate's  office,  New 

York  County,  $8,000.) 
Mrs.  Mary  E.  O'Connell,  no  position. 
(Maurice    O'Connell,    clerk   to    justice,    Municipal    Court, 

$3,240.) 
Solomon    Goldenkranz,    First    Deputy    Commissioner    of 

Docks,  $8,000. 
Terence   F.    McKeever,   Member   of   Board   of  Assessors, 

$8,000. 
Walter  T.  Fitzsimons,  Deputy  Commissioner  of  Records, 

Surrogate's  Court,  New  York  County,   $9,000. 
Charles  L.  Kohler,  Director  of  Budget,  $17,500. 
Martin  G.   McCue,   Clerk,   Surrogate's  Court,  New  York 

County,  $11,000. 
(Martin  G.  McCue,  Jr.,  clerk  to  justice,  Municipal  Court, 

$3,240.) 

Andrew  B.  Keating,  Deputy  Controller,  $10,000. 
Thomas   M.    Farley,    former   Sheriff,   New   York   County, 

$15,000 — now  removed. 

(Terence  V.  Farley,  Clerk,  Municipal  Court,  $4,500.) 
John  E.  Sheehy,  Sheriff,  New  York  County,  $15,000. 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       33- 

H.    Warren    Hubbard,    Commissioner    of   Public    Works, 

$12,000. 

Mrs.  Katherine  D.  Codding,  no  position. 
(Arthur  H.   Codding,   Secretary  to  Commissioner,   Board 

of  Transportation,  $4,800.) 
Mrs.  Clara  Gompers,  no  position. 

(Louis  Gompers,  secretary  to  justice,  City  Court,  $4,500.) 
James  J.  Sexton,  President  Department  Taxes  and  Assess 
ments,  $15,000. 

William  J.  Heffernan,  Commissioner  of  Elections,  $8,000. 
Henry  Hasenflug,  Under-Sheriff,  Kings  County,  $6,500. 
(Henry  Hasenflug,  Jr.,  Clerk  Board  of  Elections,  Queens,, 

$2,820.) 
(August   Hasenflug,    confidential    clerk   to   justice,    Kings 

County  Court,  $5,750.) 
(John    Hasenflug,     clerk    to    justice,    Municipal    Court, 

$3,240.) 
Hyman    Schorenstein,    Commissioner    of    Records,    Kings 

County,  $7,500. 
John   Theofel,   clerk,    Surrogate's   Court,    Queens   County,. 

chairman  executive  committee,  $8,000. 
John    A.    Lynch,    county    leader,    President    Borough    of 

Richmond,  $20,000. 
David  S.  Rendt,  Commissioner  Public  Works,  Richmond, 

$12,000. 
Philip  F.  Donohue,  treasurer  of  Tammany  Hall,  member 

Board  Water  Supply,  $12,000. 
James  F.  Egan,  former  secretary  of  Tammany  Hall,  Public 

Administrator,  New  York  County,  $10,000. 
Valentine  J.  Hahn,  Commissioner  of  Elections,  $8,000. 
John  J.  Knewitz,  Commissioner  of  Records,  Bronx,  $9,000. 
John  R.  Crews,  Commissioner  of  Taxes  and  Assessments, 

$12,000. 
Jacob  A.  Livingston,  Commissioner  of  Elections,  $8,000. 

The  last  four  of  these  gentlemen  are  Republican  district 
leaders,  a  fact  which  should  surprise  no  one  because  Tarn- 


34       WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

many  believes  in  purchasing  the  docility  of  the  Repub 
licans  by  such  appointments.  When  James  J.  Walker 
represented  New  York  at  the  Philadelphia  Sesquicenten- 
nial  he  summed  up  Tammany's  magnanimous  attitude 
toward  the  Republicans  in  this  speech:  "If  Bill  Vare,  Fred 
Kendrick  and  Charley  Hall  lived  in  New  York,  they'd  be 
Tammany  leaders,  and  if  John  McCooey,  Judge  Olvany 
and  Jim  Egan  lived  in  Philadelphia,  they'd  be  making  up 
the  Republican  slate.  We're  all  God's  children  and  I  don't 
believe  in  taking  party  politics  too  seriously." 

The  Civil  Service  Reform  Association  estimates  that 
half  of  all  the  employees  on  the  city  payroll  who  are 
exempt  from  civil  service  examinations  could  be  elimi 
nated  without  loss  and  thus  save  New  York  City  $25,000,- 
000  a  year.  That  $25,000,000  helps  to  keep  the  Tammany 
machine  in  power.  Ostensibly,  of  course,  it  is  payment  for 
service,  and  no  one  can  prove  how  much  is  graft  until  an 
independent  efficiency  commission  is  permitted  to  make  a 
real  survey  of  all  city  jobs  and  to  eliminate  the  chair- 
warmers.  While  the  political  deadheads  sit  comfortably 
upon  the  city  payroll,  the  mayor  and  other  leaders  divert 
attention  by  delivering  solemn  speeches  on  economy.  The 
various  Tammany  department  heads  "economize"  while 
they  are  traveling  about  the  city  in  unlabeled  automo 
biles  driven  by  chauffeurs  on  the  public  payroll.  They 
cruise  in  71  Cadillacs,  12  Lincolns,  24  Packards,  10  Pierce 
Arrows  and  a  Duesenberg.  When  McKee  succeeded 
Walker  in  September,  1932,  he  reduced  this  automobile 
extravagance,  but  we  doubt  that  the  reduction  will  be 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       35 

permanent.  The  Tammany  government  leaders  have  in 
corporated  city  limousines  into  their  family  standards  of 
living,  and  to  return  to  subway  riding  would  be  just  too 
painful. 

In  Mayor  Walker's  administration  the  Tammany  office 
holders  threw  all  caution  to  the  winds  in  rewarding 
themselves.  The  Mayor  boosted  his  salary  in  1929  to 
$40,000,  almost  three  times  the  salary  of  a  member  of  the 
President's  cabinet.  The  salary  of  Charles  Kerrigan,  the 
Mayor's  assistant,  was  raised  to  $17,500,  of  the  controller 
to  $35,000  and  of  the  president  of  the  board  of  aldermen 
to  $25,000. 

The  question  may  arise  why  we  permit  such  favoritism 
to  political  leaders.  Don't  the  civil  service  laws  protect 
us?  Yes  and  no — mostly  no.  Tammany  has  developed  a 
smooth-working  system  for  evading  the  purpose  of  the 
civil  service  laws  in  the  selection  of  the  city's  employees. 
It  is  aided  in  this  maneuvering  by  a  politically  controlled 
Municipal  Civil  Service  Commission.  The  state  constitu 
tion  says  that  "appointments  and  promotions  in  the  civil 
service  of  the  state,  and  of  all  the  civil  divisions  thereof, 
including  cities  and  villages,  shall  be  made  according  to 
merit  and  fitness,  to  be  ascertained  as  far  as  practicable 
by  examinations  which,  so  far  as  practicable,  shall  be 
competitive."  A  splendid  law,  but  what  is  "practicable"? 

Practicable,  says  Tammany,  means  if  it  can't  be  done 
any  other  way.  Tammany's  interpretation  of  the  law  has 
accomplished  the  following  results  with  the  city's  142,650 
employees.  (This  number  includes  3,500  county  em- 


36        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

ployees.)  At  the  top  of  the  government  and  the  payroll 
come  the  mayor  and  other  elected  officials,  and  the  heads 
of  departments,  244  in  all,  who  never  need  to  pass  any 
examination  except  that  administered  by  the  district 
leaders.  They  get  $3,000,000  a  year,  an  average  of  more 
than  $12,000  each.  They  are  called  the  unclassified  officers 
and  they  include  the  district  leaders  we  have  just  listed 
and  other  favorites  of  the  machine.  Next  under  them  on 
the  payroll  come  about  900  employees  of  the  "exempt 
class"  such  as  secretaries  and  deputies.  They  receive 
$6,700,000  or  more  than  $7,400  each.  They  are  exempt 
supposedly  because  of  their  intimate  personal  relationship 
to  the  heads  of  the  government  but  actually  because  of  the 
opportunity  which  this  classification  affords  to  pay  large 
salaries  to  political  henchmen. 

Next  beneath  these  exempt  favorites  come  a  non-com 
petitive  class  of  11,250  employees  who  do  the  cheaper 
forms  of  work  in  hospitals  and  public  institutions.  They  in 
clude  orderlies  and  untrained  nurses  and  scrubwomen.  The 
assumption  is  that  the  qualities  of  such  workers  can  be 
discovered  only  by  experiment  and  not  by  examination. 
They  must  submit  some  kind  of  a  record  of  their  experi 
ence  but  it  is  usually  only  a  formality.  The  city  pays  them 
about  $10,000,000  a  year,  or  $17  a  week  each — some  work 
only  part  time.  In  practice  they  are  almost  as  dependent 
upon  political  favoritism  as  their  overlords.  They  fawn 
upon  the  district  leaders  and  work  for  the  organization 
ticket  with  the  desperate  earnestness  of  men  whose  bread 
is  at  stake. 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       37 

Next  to  them  in  the  scale  come  the  54,600  city  work 
ers  who  actually  pass  competitive  examinations  and  draw 
$148,000,000  from  the  taxpayers,  and  the  44,500  school 
teachers.  These  two  groups  are  the  backbone  of  the  civil 
service.  Beneath  them  in  the  scale  come  about  27,250 
laborers  whose  only  examination  is  a  physical  examination 
and  who  are  allegedly  employed  by  the  city  in  the  'order 
of  their  application.  In  practice  these  "laborers"  some 
times  include  typists  and  clerks  squeezed  in  by  their  politi 
cal  friends  after  failure  to  pass  examinations  in  their 
rightful  classes. 

Officially  this  is  the  picture  of  New  York's  government 
by  civil  service.  The  system  has  one  outstanding  merit ;  the 
departments  controlled  by  the  mayor  including  police,  fire, 
health  and  docks,  have  a  flat  rule  that  employees  must  be 
chosen  in  numerical  order  as  they  pass  the  civil  service 
examinations.  But  the  courts,  the  borough  presidents' 
offices,  and  the  Finance  Department  are  not  controlled  by 
these  rules.  And,  what  is  much  more  important,  virtually 
every  civil  service  department  is  ruled  by  a  political  chief 
whose  recommendations  for  promotion  may  be  based  on 
partisan  bias.  Many  of  the  departments  where  competi 
tive  examinations  are  supposed  to  rule  are  rotten  with 
favoritism. 

Last  year,  for  example,  the  City  Court  chose  seven 
clerks  supposedly  by  civil  service  examinations.  The  jus 
tices,  of  course,  had  almost  nothing  to  do  with  their  selec 
tion.  The  orders  came  from  Tammany  Hall  that,  what 
ever  the  result  of  the  examination  might  be,  three  men 


38        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

were  to  be  squeezed  in  somehow.  We  will  call  them  Her 
man  Cohen,  James  Callahan  and  Louis  Cravello  and  we 
will  simplify  the  situation  for  purposes  of  brevity.  When 
the  examination  was  held  these  men  came  out  llth,  12th 
and  15th  as  follows  (names  fictitious): 

1.  John  Gordon 

2.  Richard   Hoyt 

3.  Karl  Miller 

4.  David  Bowman 

5.  Patrick  Malone 

6.  George  Merrick 

7.  William  Dietrich 

8.  Ernest  Babcock 

9.  Jan  Capek 

10.  Isidore  Lash 

11.  Herman  Cohen 

12.  James  Callahan 

13.  Mark  Van  Norden 

14.  Peter  Turner 

15.  Louis  Cravello 

The  Tammany  arithmetic  experts  puzzled  a  long  time 
over  this  list  before  they  worked  out  a  method  of  elimi 
nating  enough  men  to  put  Cohen,  Callahan  and  Cravello 
in  office.  This  is  how  they  finally  accomplished  the  trick. 

The  famous  1  in  3  civil  service  law  says  that  when  an 
opening  is  to  be  filled  by  civil  service  examination,  the 
department  needing  a  new  employee  must  take  one  of  the 
first  three  men  on  the  list  of  successful  candidates.  The 
acceptance  is  recorded  by  a  process  called  certification. 
The  Civil  Service  Commission  in  this  case  certified  the 
three  highest  men,  John  Gordon,  Richard  Hoyt  and  Karl 
Miller  to  the  City  Court.  The  department  passed  over  the 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       39 

first  two  on  the  list  in  choosing  the  first  clerk  and  certified 
Karl  Miller  because  he  was  a  local  district  worker.  Then 
the  Civil  Service  Commission  certified  the  first  three  re 
maining  names  and  sent  back  the  list  for  the  appointment 
of  the  next  clerk  with  Miller  eliminated  and  David  Bow 
man  as  No.  3.  The  department  chose  Bowman  for  the 
same  reason  it  had  chosen  Miller.  Then  a  Tammany  in 
sider  brought  pressure  to  bear  upon  Patrick  Malone  (No. 
5)  and  persuaded  him  on  a  plea  of  "harmony"  to  waive 
appointment,  so  the  third  certification  of  the  three  highest 
names  placed  George  Merrick  at  No.  3  under  Gordon  and 
Hoyt.  The  department  thereupon  chose  Merrick  (No.  6). 

Now,  a  trick  in  the  law  helped  Tammany  to  reach  its 
favorites.  The  law  says  that  when  a  man  who  has  passed 
a  civil  service  examination  has  his  name  certified  three 
times  to  a  department  by  the  Municipal  Civil  Service  Com 
mission  and  each  time  his  name  is  passed  over  for  some 
one  else,  then  his  name  is  dropped  from  among  the  appli 
cants  for  that  particular  job.  So  after  three  trials,  the  first 
two  men  on  this  list,  John  Gordon  and  Richard  Hoyt,  were 
dropped,  and  when  the  list  was  returned  to  the  department 
for  the  selection  of  the  fourth  clerk  Dietrich,  Babcock  and 
Capek  who  had  originally  been  seventh,  eighth  and  ninth 
were  now  first,  second  and  third.  Capek  was  chosen,  and 
Dietrich,  Babcock  and  Lash  were  certified  as  the  three 
highest  for  the  selection  of  the  fifth  clerk. 

At  this  point  the  Tammany  manipulators  saw  that  they 
could  not  squeeze  in  Cohen,  Callahan  and  Cravello  even 
by  this  trickery  of  elimination  unless  one  remaining  appli 
cant  was  forced  out.  Four  clerks  had  been  already  chosen 


40        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

and  there  were  only  three  berths  left.  So  they  forced  out 
Lash  by  a  series  of  threats  which  finally  persuaded  him 
that  his  life  would  not  be  worth  living  if  he  should  secure 
the  position.  That  made  Cohen,  the  first  of  their  favorites, 
No.  3  on  the  fifth  list,  and  they  chose  him  for  the  fifth 
clerk.  Then  Dietrich,  Babcock  and  Callahan  were  certified 
for  the  sixth  list  and  the  department  chose  Callahan.  Here 
the  rule  of  three  rejections  entered  in  again  and  Dietrich 
and  Babcock,  each  of  whom  had  been  passed  over  three 
times,  were  eliminated. 

So,  on  the  final  list  of  three  for  the  selection  of  the 
seventh  clerk,  Louis  Cravello,  whose  appointment  had 
been  the  chief  aim  of  Tammany  from  the  beginning,  was 
certified  as  No.  3,  and  was  chosen.  This  is  what  the  order 
of  *  'merit  and  fitness"  looked  like  when  Tammany  was 
through: 

1.  John  Gordon   (eliminated  by  jugglery) 

2.  Richard  Hoyt  (eliminated  by  jugglery) 

3.  Karl  Miller  (chosen) 

4.  David  Bowman   (chosen) 

5.  Patrick  Malone  (persuaded  to  withdraw) 

6.  George  Merrick  (chosen) 

7.  William  Dietrich   (eliminated  by  jugglery) 

8.  Ernest  Babcock   (eliminated  by  jugglery) 

9.  Jan  Capek   (chosen) 

10.  Isidore  Lash  (forced  out) 

11.  Herman  Cohen    (chosen) 

12.  James  Callahan  (chosen) 

13.  Mark  Van  Norden  (left  at  the  post) 

14.  Peter  Turner  (left  at  the  post) 

15.  Louis  Cravello  (chosen  at  last) 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       41 

It  is  not  surprising  in  these  circumstances  that  almost 
every  man  who  wants  a  civil  service  job  in  New  York  feels 
impelled  to  make  a  contact  with  a  district  leader  in  addi 
tion  to  preparing  for  his  examination.  The  examinations 
themselves  are  probably  administered  honestly  enough  but 
the  rule  of  1  in  3  and  other  tricks  of  the  trade  may  nullify 
the  highest  standing.  An  applicant  who  is  not  wanted  by 
the  politicians  may  be  called  in  and  told  plainly  that  he 
is  not  wanted,  or  he  may  have  the  situation  and  its  possi 
bilities  entirely  misrepresented  to  him.  Sometimes  a  favo 
rite  receives  a  tip  to  underbid  his  competitors  for  a  job 
and,  after  he  has  been  working  a  short  time,  his  salary  is 
raised. 

Special  tricks  are  permissible  in  the  making  of  contracts 
with  "experts."  The  Board  of  Education  hired  the  fa 
mous  Dr.  William  H.  Walker,  brother  of  the  Mayor,  as  a 
medical  examiner  and  consultant  without  examination  be 
cause  the  civil  service  law  permits  the  city  to  hire  scientific 
or  professional  service  of  an  "expert  nature"  on  a  part- 
time  basis.5  Dr.  Walker's  right  to  hold  such  a  job  with 
out  examination  is  now  being  contested  in  the  courts  by 
the  Civil  Service  Reform  Association. 

The  fight  for  civil  service  standards  in  New  York  dur 
ing  the  last  ten  years  has  been,  on  the  whole,  a  losing 
fight.  Tammany  has  increased  the  exempt  positions  30 
per  cent  since  1920  and  its  war  of  attrition  constantly 
goes  on.  The  State  Civil  Service  Commission  has  thus  far 
been  the  chief  bulwark  of  the  merit  system  and,  fortu 
nately  for  New  York  City  taxpayers,  no  new  exemptions 


42        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

may  be  granted  without  state  sanction.  The  state  commis 
sion  is  constantly  attacked  by  the  city  civil  service  commis 
sion  to  open  the  political  floodgates  to  Tammany  patron 
age,  but  in  80  per  cent  of  the  cases  in  the  last  five  years 
the  state  commission  has  refused. 

In  this  outline  sketch  of  the  political  engine  which  runs 
the  somewhat  complicated  machinery  of  Greater  New 
York  it  remains  to  add  only  a  few  words  about  the  func 
tion  of  women  as  voters  since  the  adoption  of  the  nine 
teenth  amendment.  Despite  the  intelligent  activities  of 
such  groups  as  the  League  of  Women  Voters  and  the 
Women's  City  Club,  women  in  general  have  fitted  very 
docilely  into  the  Tammany  scheme  of  things.  The  per 
centage  of  women  who  vote  at  all  is  even  lower  than  the 
percentage  of  men.  The  masses  of  women,  being  pecul 
iarly  responsible  for  spending  the  family  income  and 
peculiarly  charged  with  the  duty  of  seeing  that  their  chil 
dren  are  fed,  are  peculiarly  susceptible  to  the  fears  and 
favors  doled  out  by  district  leaders.  Few  women,  even 
among  those  who  are  dependable  Democratic  or  Republi 
can  voters,  are  very  active  in  party  affairs  along  their  own 
lines. 

Both  parties  have  women  as  co-leaders  in  the  districts; 
none  of  these  co-leaders  has  developed  great  power  in  her 
own  right.  Tammany  has  no  women  sachems  and  no 
women  on  its  important  committees.  In  a  great  many  dis 
tricts  women  do  the  bulk  of  the  clerical  work  as  election 
inspectors,  and  Socialists  know  from  experience  that  they 
can  be  at  least  as  adept  as  the  men  in  vote  stealing.  In 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS       43 

short,  until  now  the  coming  of  woman  suffrage  has  made 
no  perceptible  difference  in  city  affairs  except  that  on  the 
whole  women,  for  ecclesiastical  and  other  reasons,  are  a 
little  more  inclined  to  be  suspicious  of  such  things  as 
Socialism.  Sex  has  little  to  do  with  civics  of  either  the 
theoretical  or  the  practical  brand.  City  politics,  we  con 
clude,  are  better  explained  in  terms  of  Marxism  than 
Freudianism! 


THE  NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX 
BRIGADE 

THE  new  Tammany  is  the  old  Tammany  with  the  wis 
dom  of  age  and  experience  added.  Its  guile  and  aplomb 
have  increased  until  to-day  it  has  a  legal  device  for  every 
possible  type  of  looting  and  a  moral  explanation  for  every 
bribe.  As  the  years  have  gone  on  a  noticeable  shift  in 
tactics  has  occurred.  The  votes  of  aldermen  and  other  city 
officials  are  almost  never  sold  directly  and  the  city  treasury 
itself  is  relatively  safe  from  theft.  The  real  fortunes 
of  the  new  Tammany  are  gathered  through  brokerage 
services. 

Look,  for  example,  at  the  Tin  Box  Brigade,  who  crossed 
the  witness  stand  before  Judge  Seabury.  Farley  was  inter 
ested  in  gambling  rights,  Culkin  in  building  permits, 
Doyle  and  Olvany  in  zoning  privileges,  Maier  in  pier 
leases,  Dr.  Walker  in  compensation  fees,  and  McCormick 
in  marriage  licenses.  A  large  part  of  the  activities  of  these 
gentlemen  was  and  is  strictly  legal,  and  it  is  to  be  noted 
that  no  one  of  them,  even  the  notorious  Dr.  Doyle,  was 
convicted  of  any  crime  as  a  result  of  the  Hofstadter  legisla 
tive  investigation.  That  is  the  characteristic  of  the  new 
legal  graft  of  Tammany  Hall.  For  every  type  of  exploita- 

44 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE    45 

tion  it  has  developed  a  technique  for  coming  within  the 
limits  of  the  law.  And  if  occasionally  some  undisciplined 
or  crude  member  of  the  brotherhood  does  step  over  the 
edges  of  legal  propriety,  what  a  host  of  legal  luminaries 
spring  forward  to  defend  his  constitutional  rights  before 
Tammany  appointed  judges! 

Sometimes  the  exploitation  of  the  public  by  Tammany 
brokers  takes  place  entirely  outside  of  official  activities. 
Boss  Curry  and  Boss  McCooey  sell  insurance — and  what 
ambitious  young  contractor  doing  business  with  the  city 
could  fail  to  see  the  advantages  of  such  useful  contacts? 
Theofel  sold  automobiles  whose  streamlines  appealed  to 
the  esthetic  sense  of  an  astounding  number  of  Queens 
officials.  We  shall  describe  his  methods  later. 

The  patriots  of  the  Tin  Box  Brigade  can  be  under 
stood  only  if  they  are  regarded  as  members  of  a  genial 
brokerage  brotherhood.  They  did  not  regard  themselves 
as  particularly  guilty.  Not  one  of  them  in  testifying  before 
Seabury  broke  down  and  told  the  whole  story.  If  they 
had  been  able  to  express  their  defense  in  general  socio 
logical  terms  they  would  probably  have  said  that  they 
were  applying  the  methods  of  the  business  system  to  poli 
tics  a  bit  too  successfully.  Other  men  got  jealous,  chiefly 
Republicans,  and  forced  an  investigation  to  get  in  on  the 
loot. 

Farley  became  the  most  famous  of  the  brigade  chiefly 
through  accidental  circumstances.  Probably  he  was  no 
worse  than  his  associates ;  he  simply  captured  the  spotlight 
first  and  was  unlucky  enough  to  arrive  on  the  scene  at  a 


46        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

time  when  Franklin  D.  Roosevelt  could  politically  afford 
to  demonstrate  a  high  moral  courage.  Genial,  popular 
Thomas  M.  Farley  was  Sheriff  of  the  County  of  New 
York  and  leader  of  the  14th  district  of  Manhattan.  He 
had  been  successively  alderman,  deputy  county  clerk  and 
county  clerk — a  quite  typical  career  for  a  popular  servant 
of  the  people  who  was  faithful  to  Tammany.  Then  Sea- 
bury  got  him.  He  was  arraigned  before  a  packed  house 
at  a  time  when  New  York  was  ready  to  listen.  Seabury 
asked  him  to  explain  bank  deposits  of  $360,000  in  seven 
years.  He  stuttered  and  stammered.  His  total  salary  and 
other  explainable  income  during  those  seven  years  had 
not  been  more  than  $90,000.  Where  did  the  other  $270,- 
000  come  from?  Farley  finally  confessed  that  he  kept  at 
home  a  "wonderful  tin  box"  and  that  he  drew  out  from 
time  to  time  the  moneys  which  swelled  his  bank  accounts. 

"Now,  in  1930,"  Seabury  asked,  "it  appears  that  you 
deposited  in  cash  in  the  Chatham  and  Phenix  and  in  the 
Harriman  and  in  the  Emigrant  over  $13,000  in  cash. 
Where  did  that  cash  come  from,  Sheriff?  A.  Well,  that 
is — my  salary  check  is  in  there. 

"Q.  No,  Sheriff;  your  salary  checks  aggregated  $12,- 
876.09,  which  is  exclusive  of  the  cash  deposits  which  dur 
ing  that  year  you  deposited  in  those  three  banks.  A.  Well, 
that  came  from  the  good  box. 

Q.  Kind  of  a  magic  box?  A.  It  was  a  wonderful  box." 

New  York  rocked  with  laughter.  The  first  big  act  of 
the  Seabury  show  had  scored  heavily. 

Judge  Seabury  filed  with  Governor  Roosevelt  charges 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE    47 

against  Sheriff  Farley,  saying:  "That  he  has  demonstrated 
his  incompetence  to  hold  the  said  office  of  Sheriff,  by 
reason  of  his  ignorance  of  the  duties  of  his  office  and  the 
laws  of  this  State  pertaining  to  the  same,  and  by  reason 
of  the  appointment  to  and  retention  in  office  under  him 
of  incompetent  and  unworthy  persons;  that  he  has  sworn 
falsely  under  oath  at  public  hearings  before  the  Joint  Leg 
islative  Committee;  that  he  has  failed  to  account  for  or 
to  explain  the  receipt  and  possession  of  large  sums  of 
money  in  excess  of  his  salary  as  a  public  officer  or  income 
received  from  any  admitted  occupation  or  from  invest 
ments,  upon  all  of  which  grounds  and  by  reason  of  any 
and  all  the  charges  hereinabove  enumerated,  it  is  respect 
fully  submitted  that  said  Thomas  M.  Farley  should  cease 
to  be  an  incumbent  of  the  office  of  Sheriff  of  New  York 
County." 

Farley  was  removed  from  office  but  not  from  his  posi 
tion  as  a  leader  of  the  Tammany  organization.  After  his 
amazing  testimony  three  great  banquets  were  given  at  one 
of  New  York's  leading  hotels,  supposedly  at  $40  a  plate, 
at  which  he  was  the  guest  of  honor.  Many  of  New  York's 
leading  business  men  and  several  prominent  churchmen 
were  present  at  those  dinners. 

Along  with  his  charges  against  Farley,  Seabury  had 
submitted  facts  against  two  of  Farley's  under  sheriffs, 
Peter  J.  Curran  and  Joseph  Flaherty,  which  were  startling 
enough  to  provide  a  sensation  in  ordinary  times  but  which 
Governor  Roosevelt  blandly  ignored.  About  Curran,  Sea- 
bury  said:  "Between  1925  and  1931  he  deposited  $662,331 


48        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

exclusive  of  the  proceeds  of  notes  discounted,  sales  of 
securities  and  interest,  practically  none  of  which  is  credibly 
explained."  That  was  almost  twice  the  deposits  of  Farley, 
but  Mr.  Curran  remained  in  office  under  Roosevelt's  ap 
pointee,  Sheehy,  after  his  chief,  Farley,  was  removed, 
and  the  City  Affairs  Committee  squandered  a  few  postage 
stamps  in  trying  to  get  him  removed. 

Farley  was  only  the  first  of  a  series  of  tin  box  sensations. 
The  other  brokers  had  other  sources  of  revenue — pre 
sumably  Farley's  sources  were  largely  in  the  underworld. 
James  J.  McCormick,  leader  of  the  22nd  district,  Man 
hattan,  believed  in  love  and  marriage  fees,  and  as  deputy 
city  clerk  he  pocketed  at  least  $150,000  in  such  fees  in  six 
years.2  During  those  six  years  he  put  $384,788  away  for 
a  rainy  day.  He  was  indicted  but  acquitted. 

Much  more  important  than  these  district  leaders  were 
the  two  great  zoning  racketeers,  Dr.  William  F.  Doyle  and 
Judge  George  W.  Olvany,  the  former  leader  of  Tammany 
Hall.  (For  the  chronological  order  of  these  scandals  and 
the  official  details  we  refer  the  reader  to  the  Calendar  of 
Scandals  in  Appendix  I.)  Doyle  held  the  spotlight  for 
many  months  because  of  his  persistent  silence  and  the 
elaborate  maneuvers  of  the  Tammany  legal  hierarchy  in 
protecting  him.  He  was  a  former  veterinarian  who  had 
acquired  magic  power  over  the  zoning  regulations  of  the 
city  and  incidentally  banked  more  than  a  million  dollars  in 
the  process.8 

In  a  city  like  New  York  the  right  to  change  the  zoning 
laws  may  make  or  break  a  man's  fortune.  The  city  has 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE    49 

adopted  very  strict  and,  on  the  whole,  intelligent  regula 
tions  to  exclude  factories  from  residence  districts,  to  con 
trol  the  location  of  gasoline  stations,  and  to  determine  the 
setback  of  high  buildings.  Since  all  laws  should  accom 
modate  themselves  to  changing  conditions  the  city  has 
given  to  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  the  necessary 
power  to  make  modifications  in  the  zoning  laws  upon 
application.  The  application  is  usually  presented  to  this 
board  of  five  people,  all  of  them  political  appointees,  by 
some  professional  representative  or  sponsor.  Naturally, 
the  citizen  whose  land  may  be  raised  in  value  from 
$10,000  to  $50,000  by  a  special  ruling  is  anxious  to  em 
ploy  the  representative  before  this  board  who  will  produce 
the  best  results. 

From  1925  to  1931  apparently  every  one  in  the  city 
except  Mayor  Walker  who  knew  anything  about  city  gov 
ernment,  knew  that  Doyle  was  the  man  to  see  about  zon 
ing  regulations.  Although  he  was  never  admitted  to  the 
bar,  he  won  for  his  clients  between  June  22,  1922,  and 
Dec.  31,  1929,  244  permits  for  garages  in  districts  other 
wise  restricted  against  them  and  after  permit  applications 
had  been  turned  down  by  the  building  superintendents  in 
the  various  boroughs;  52  permits  for  gasoline  stations 
which  had  previously  been  turned  down  by  the  building 
superintendents  of  the  Fire  Prevention  Bureau;  187  modi 
fications  of  departmental  orders  either  under  the  State 
Labor  Law,  the  Fire  Prevention  Rules,  or  the  Building  and 
Tenement  House  Department  Rules ;  7  permits  to  vary  the 
height  of  buildings  curtailed  by  the  zoning  law;  and  6  per- 


50        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

mits  for  wet  wash  laundries  in  restricted  districts,  after  the 
permits  had  previously  been  refused  by  the  building  super 
intendents.* 

Most  significant  of  all,  during  1928  and  1929,  Doyle 
persuaded  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  to  reverse 
itself  in  forty-nine  cases  after  he  had  taken  these  cases  on 
appeal  when  other  lawyers  had  failed. 

These  amazing  decisions  were  almost  all  concurred  in 
by  the  three  present  members  of  the  Board,  Guilfoyle, 
Connell  and  Holland,  whose  vote  is  necessary  in  order  to 
make  any  modification  in  the  zoning  law. 

Next  in  fame  to  the  practice  of  Dr.  Doyle  before  the 
Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  had  been  the  practice  of 
the  firm  of  McCooey  and  Conroy,  headed  by  John 
McCooey,  Jr.,  son  of  the  successful  Brooklyn  philanthro 
pist,  and  now  promoted  to  the  Supreme  Court. 

The  case  of  the  application  of  McCooey  and  Conroy 
on  behalf  of  Joseph  Zorn  for  a  gasoline  station  permit  at 
2576 — 86th  Street,  Brooklyn,  will  serve  to  illustrate  the 
kind  of  case  in  which  favored  practitioners  got  concessions 
from  the  Board. 

The  decision  in  that  case,  handed  down  on  June  9, 
1931,  is  nothing  less  than  astounding.  The  applicant 
obtained  a  permit  for  a  gasoline  station  in  1928.  This 
permit  was  obtained  by  fraud  and  after  the  fire  commis 
sioner,  superintendent  of  buildings,  and  the  Board  of 
Standards  and  Appeals  refused  to  set  the  permit  aside, 
it  was  declared  illegal  on  July  7,  1930,  by  Mr.  Justice 
Cropsey  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Brooklyn,  whose  deci- 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE     51 

sion  was  sustained  by  the  Appellate  Division  and  the 
Court  of  Appeals.  On  the  basis  of  that  decision  the  Board 
of  Standards  and  Appeals  revoked  the  permit  on  the 
ground  that  it  had  been  fraudulently  obtained 

Mr.  Zorn  pleaded  guilty  on  April  19,  1929,  in  the 
Magistrate's  Court  to  a  charge  of  violating  the  building 
zone  resolution  in  attempting  to  install  a  gas  tank  without 
any  authorization.  Despite  the  decision  of  the  Supreme 
Court,  the  Appellate  Division  and  the  Court  of  Appeals, 
despite  the  action  of  the  Board  itself  in  revoking  this  per 
mit,  and  despite  the  record  of  the  applicant's  guilt  in  the 
Magistrate's  Court,  when  an  application  was  made  to  the 
Board  in  1931  by  the  same  Mr.  Zorn,  by  McCooey  and 
Conroy,  for  a  permit  to  operate  this  very  same  gasoline 
station,  and  a  variation  of  the  zoning  law  on  the  ground 
of  hardship,  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  granted 
the  application  and  refused  to  pass  upon  the  question  of 
fraud,  thereby  flouting  its  own  decision  and  the  decision 
of  the  Supreme  Court. 

In  the  end  Seabury  was  completely  baffled  by  Doyle. 
In  order  to  force  him  to  talk  a  special  session  of  the  legis 
lature  passed  special  immunity  laws,  and  then  all  that 
Doyle  would  say  was  that  he  never  had  given  a  bribe  to 
a  public  official.  Then  why  had  he  declined  to  answer  a 
perfectly  plain  question  in  the  first  place  and  why  had  he 
argued  that  an  answer  might  tend  to  incriminate  him? 
He  had  admitted  splitting  fees  but  he  steadfastly  denied 
giving  any  fees  to  city  officials.  To  whom  did  he  pay 
them?  Directly  to  the  Tammany  overlords?  Certainly 


52        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Tammany  supported  him  more  anxiously  than  any  other 
man  involved  in  the  inquiry.  John  F.  Curry  personally 
fought  the  battle  in  the  courts  to  keep  him  out  of  jail  for 
contempt. 

During  all  this  agitation  Mayor  Walker  preserved  an 
attitude  of  aloofness.  His  close  friend,  William  E.  Walsh, 
chairman  of  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals,  resigned 
under  fire,  was  indicted  and,  as  usual  under  Tammany 
prosecution,  acquitted.  The  mayor  finally  appointed  a 
"citizens'  committee"  to  look  into  the  board's  practice. 
The  committee  reported  that  the  entire  board  should  be 
reorganized,  whereupon  Walker  thanked  the  learned  col 
laborators,  put  the  report  in  a  pigeonhole  and  did  noth 
ing.  The  men  who  gave  Dr.  Doyle  and  John  McCooey 
such  astounding  favors  are  still  running  the  Board  of 
Standards  and  Appeals. 

The  theory  that  there  was  a  direct  and  corrupt  connec 
tion  between  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  and 
Tammany  gains  some  plausibility  when  the  case  of  George 
W.  Olvany  is  studied.  Olvany  sold  his  political  influence 
with  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  in  several 
famous  zoning  cases  and  then  concealed  his  interest  in 
the  cases  by  having  another  lawyer  serve  as  the  attorney 
of  record.  Olvany  received  his  fees  for  such  practice  while 
he  was  leader  of  Tammany  Hall  and  concealed  the  receipt 
by  taking  his  firm's  share  in  cash  instead  of  checks.  How 
the  racket  operated  was  revealed  in  the  case  of  the  builder, 
Fred  F.  French,  and  his  construction  of  a  building  at 
551  Fifth  Avenue.6 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE     53 

Mr.  French  wanted  to  build  a  certain  wall  in  his  new 
building  somewhat  higher  than  the  height  limit  prescribed 
by  the  setback  provisions  of  the  zoning  law,  so  he  ap 
proached  Olvany's  law  firm  to  get  help  from  the  Board 
of  Standards  and  Appeals.  He  was  referred  to  a  lawyer 
whom  he  knew  named  John  N.  Boyle  and  was  told  to 
deposit  $35,000  with  Boyle  to  get  the  permit  in  sixty 
days,  the  money  to  be  held  in  escrow  and  returned  if  the 
Board  did  not  give  him  what  he  asked.  The  Board  did, 
whereupon  Boyle  at  the  request  of  a  member  of  Olvany's 
firm  gave  $25,000  in  cash  to  a  firm  member,  took  $5,000 
as  his  own  fee,  and  returned  the  rest  to  French.  Where 
did  the  $25,000  go?  Judge  Olvany  took  a  high  position 
in  the  whole  matter  and  declined  to  allow  Seabury  to 
examine  his  firm's  books. 

But  Judge  Seabury  gave  the  city  a  fairly  convincing 
picture  of  the  income-producing  habits  of  a  Tammany 
leader  before  he  was  through  with  Olvany.  He  showed 
that  the  same  kind  of  farming-out  process  in  zoning  cases 
that  had  occurred  in  the  French  Fifth  Avenue  building 
case  had  occurred  also  in  the  cases  of  No.  1  Wall  Street, 
the  Irving  Trust  Building,  and  a  block  of  residences  in 
the  Murray  Hill  district,  which  had  been  rezoned  in  spite 
of  strong  local  protest.  Olvany  would  assign  the  work 
to  some  other  lawyer  of  record  and  take  the  prodigious 
fee  himself.  Perhaps  that  is  one  reason  he  lost  his  position 
as  head  of  Tammany  Hall — he  was  reputed  to  be  grasping 
and  ungenerous  with  his  spoils.  But  there  can  be  no  doubt 
of  his  success.  His  firm  deposited  $5,283,000  in  the  bank 


54        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

from  1925  to  1931.  In  one  instance  Fred  F.  French  after 
paying  $75,000  not  only  got  the  Board  of  Standards  and 
Appeals  to  change  a  zoning  regulation  in  Tudor  City  but 
he  even  persuaded  the  Board  of  Estimate  to  amend  the 
building  zone  resolution  affecting  that  area  over  the  oppo 
sition  of  the  board's  own  engineers.  Olvany's  firm  re 
ceived  $71,000  of  the  $75,000  fee  for  its  strenuous  labors 
in  this  case  without  appearing  in  the  record. 

After  Seabury  had  demonstrated  how  to  get  a  change 
in  the  zoning  laws  he  proceeded  to  demonstrate  how  to 
get  a  pier  lease  and  a  bus  franchise.  Bus  franchises  are 
granted  by  the  Board  of  Estimate  after  public  hearings 
and  each  franchise  is  supposed  to  be  granted  to  that 
responsible  bus  company  which  will  give  the  city  and  pas 
sengers  the  best  contract.  As  we  shall  show  in  a  later 
chapter,  the  franchises  are  not  usually  granted  on  an 
impartial  basis.  Some  companies  appear  with  loaded  dice 
and  their  unfortunate  competitors  find  themselves  under 
attack  on  the  most  trivial  grounds.  In  the  case  of  John  A. 
Lynch,  borough  president  of  Richmond,  a  franchise  for 
the  Tompkins  Bus  Corporation  was  granted  on  July  28, 
1927,  to  operate  buses  on  Staten  Island,  although  this  com 
pany's  record  was  full  of  irresponsible  and  illegal  acts. 
Lynch  recommended  the  Tompkins  company,  and,  since 
he  was  borough  president  of  the  area  where  the  buses  were 
to  operate  and  since  he  had  just  dutifully  voted  for  Mayor 
Walker's  notorious  Equitable  bus  deal,  his  recommenda 
tion  was  followed. 

Why  did  Lynch  vote  for  such  a  company  when  it  made 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE     55 

an  inferior  offer  to  the  people  of  his  borough?  The  Sea- 
bury  probers  asked  and  answered.  They  found  out  that 
Lynch  had  unloaded  a  losing  newspaper  in  which  he  was 
heavily  interested  on  Gordon,  head  of  the  Tompkins  bus 
concern,  during  the  week  before  the  granting  of  the  fran 
chise.  Lynch  was  to  shake  off  all  his  liabilities  and  receive 
a  substantial  sum  in  addition.  Said  Judge  Seabury:  6  "An 
unbiased  consideration  of  the  testimony  makes  it  perfectly 
apparent,  in  my  opinion,  that  there  was  an  understanding 
between  Borough  President  Lynch  and  Gordon,  by  which 
Gordon  relieved  Lynch  of  an  incubus  in  return  for  which 
Lynch  agreed  to,  and  did,  use  his  influence  in  causing  a 
franchise  to  be  delivered  to  Gordon's  company."  Lynch 
is  still  borough  president  of  Richmond  and  will  vote  on 
the  next  bus  franchise  which  comes  before  the  Board  of 
Estimate. 

The  process  of  getting  a  pier  lease  is  somewhat  more 
complex  but  equally  common  in  New  York's  history.  The 
graft  is  usually  thinly  disguised  as  a  legal  fee  so  that 
prosecution  is  difficult,  particularly  since  there  are  several 
steps  in  the  process  at  which  a  pseudo-lawyer  may  inter 
vene.  The  Tammany  technique  was  revealed  in  the  case 
of  Judge  W.  Bernard  Vause. 

Federal  Attorney  Charles  H.  Tuttle  was  investigating  a 
wildcat  concern  called  the  Columbia  Finance  Corporation 
in  1929 — in  those  days  there  appeared  to  be  a  distinct 
line  between  wildcat  and  legitimate  finance  corporations 
— when  he  chanced  to  examine  the  bank  records  of  W. 
Bernard  Vause,  Brooklyn  county  judge.  He  was  aston- 


56        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

ished  to  find  a  series  of  checks  from  the  United  American 
Lines,  Inc.,  some  of  them  as  high  as  $25,000.  He  probed 
deeper  and  discovered  that  Vause  had  participated  in  a 
$250,000  deal  for  three  pier  leases,  having  been  "retained" 
by  several  shipping  companies  to  get  pier  leases  from  the 
Sinking  Fund  Commission,  a  New  York  City  department. 
He  convicted  Vause  for  using  the  mails  to  defraud  and 
sent  him  to  a  federal  prison  under  a  six-year  sentence,  but 
the  mystery  of  those  pier  leases  has  never  been  explained. 
Vause  was  not  the  attorney  of  record  in  the  pier  cases  and 
he  never  appeared  before  the  Sinking  Fund  Commission 
which  granted  the  pier  leases.  But  he  received  $60,000 
in  fees  after  the  leases  were  granted.  Tuttle  could  not 
probe  the  Sinking  Fund  Commission  and  the  Dock  De 
partment  because  he  had  no  power  to  do  so  as  a  federal 
attorney.  He  could  only  refer  the  whole  question  of  the 
$250,000  "slush  fund"  to  the  aged  and  worried  Tammany 
prosecutor,  Thomas  C.  T.  Crain. 

Crain,  who  is  a  pastmaster  at  futile  gestures,  launched 
his  "investigation"  by  writing  Judge  Vause  a  letter  de 
manding  an  accounting  of  his  fees,  which  letter  went  into 
the  wastebasket  unanswered.  Mayor  Walker  solemnly 
announced  that  his  Commissioner  of  Accounts,  James  A. 
Higgins,  would  make  an  investigation  of  the  Vause  pier- 
lease  deal.  If  the  investigation  was  ever  made  the  public 
has  not  heard  the  results.  This  man  Vause,  incidentally, 
had  made  a  speech  to  a  Brooklyn  grand  jury  in  December, 
1926,  urging  it  not  to  show  any  Yuletide  leniency  to 
criminals. 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE     57 

This  Vause  pier-lease  scandal  was  one  of  the  most  per 
fect  illustrations  of  the  Tammany  method  of  sidetracking 
an  investigation.  Because  the  mayor  is  the  mayor  he  is 
given  a  newspaper  headline  every  time  he  announces  that 
an  "investigation"  will  be  made  of  some  scandal  in  his 
administration.  The  public  indignation  dies  down  pending 
the  outcome  of  the  investigation,  and  months  later  every 
one  has  forgotten  that  no  result  of  the  investigation  was 
ever  announced. 

Pier  leases  in  New  York  have  been  a  scandal  for  a 
generation.  It  is  universally  believed  in  shipping  circles 
that  fortunes  must  be  sunk  in  political  fees  to  get  a  favor 
able  lease  for  ocean-going  steamships  on  the  New  York 
waterfront,  and  during  the  Seabury  investigation  this 
belief  was  confirmed.  No  less  a  personage  than  Charles  F. 
Murphy  himself  saw  the  possibilities  in  dock  leasing  as  a 
middleman.  The  New  York  World  of  October  1,  1905, 
described  the  budding  pier  lease  racket  of  those  days: 

The  complete  inside  history  of  the  New  York  Dock 
Department  under  Tammany  Hall  ...  is  a  record  which 
out-Tweeds  Tweed  ...  the  dock  privilege  allotted  to  Tam 
many  Hall  and  the  tools  of  Tammany  Hall,  if  rented  out 
at  their  true  value,  would  pay  interest  on  the  bonds  and 
the  allotment  toward  the  sinking  fund  twice  over. 

This  astounding  system  in  dock  contracts  was  organized 
by  Charles  F.  Murphy,  the  present  leader  of  Tammany  Hall. 
.  .  .  The  present  graft  system  may  be  said  to  have  begun 
under  the  supervision  of  Murphy  himself  when  Dock  Com 
missioner  under  Mayor  Van  Wyck.  .  .  . 

During  Mr.  Murphy's  short  career  as  leader  of  Tam 
many  Hall  his  contracting  firm  has  acquired,  mainly  through 


58       WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

manipulation  of  the  Dock  Department,  contracts  aggregat 
ing  $30,000,000.  .  .  . 

It  is  not  at  all  peculiar  that  the  largest  contracts  awarded 
to  the  Murphy  firm  are  companies  which  have  too  much  at 
stake  to  risk  a  clash  with  Tammany  Hall.  .  .  .  Any  work 
they  might  contemplate  could  be  hampered  in  numberless 
ways.  Permits  could  be  refused  or  delayed,  or  issued  with 
costly  restrictions.  .  .  .  The  contractors,  if  not  of  Tammany 
Hall,  could  be  harried  by  the  Building  Department  and  the 
Bureau  of  Encumbrances  and  a  dozen  petty  Tammany 
officials.  .  .  .7 

Denis  Tilden  Lynch  in  an  article  in  the  Herald 
Tribune  has  pointed  out  that  even  during  the  war  the 
political  dummies  who  acted  as  lessees  of  city  piers  under 
the  Tammany  system  charged  the  steamship  companies 
from  two  to  five  times  as  much  as  they  paid  the  city  for 
them.  General  William  Black,  Chief  of  Engineers  of  the 
U.  S.  Army  in  1920,  gave  certain  startling  illustrations  of 
the  profits  in  this  pier  racket  as  follows: 

Price  Per  Day  Price  Per  Day 

Paid  to  the  City  Charged  by  Lessee 

by  Lessee  to  Steamship  Company 


$66.67  $250 

53.90  350 

57.47  250 

34.45  225 

53.47  500 

Now,  all  this  material  was  available  as  a  background 
for  a  real  investigation  of  pier  leases  in  1930  when  Charles 
H.  Tuttle  asked  District  Attorney  Crain  to  probe  the  situa 
tion.  Mr.  Crain  found  nothing  worthy  of  comment 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE     59 

although  the  same  information  was  accessible  to  him  that 
was  later  unearthed  by  Judge  Seabury.  When  the  City 
Affairs  Committee  used  this  negligence  as  an  argument 
against  Mayor  Walker  in  its  charges  before  Governor 
Roosevelt  in  1931,  the  mayor  brushed  the  argument  aside 
by  saying  that  even  Republican  Tuttle  had  failed  to  find 
evidence  against  any  member  of  the  Dock  Department! 
Precisely!  Tuttle  was  a  federal  attorney  and  could  not 
investigate  the  Dock  Department.  He  could  only  prose 
cute  individuals  for  violation  of  federal  law  such  as  for 
using  the  mails  to  defraud  or  evading  the  income  tax. 

The  charter  says  that  applicants  for  a  pier  lease  must 
apply  first  to  the  dock  commissioner  and  then  to  the  com 
missioners  of  the  Sinking  Fund.  These  are  all  political 
personages,  outside  of  the  civil  service,  and  usually  the 
dock  commissioner  is  a  district  leader  and  member  of  the 
inner  ring  of  Tammany  Hall.  In  recent  years  the  law  in 
granting  pier  leases  has  been  carelessly  disregarded  and 
the  real  control  over  leases  exercised  by  the  mayor.  The 
North  German  Lloyd  Steamship  Company  discovered  how 
difficult  it  was  to  penetrate  the  Tammany  breastworks  in 
the  fight  to  secure  a  pier  lease.  This  lease  was  of  immense 
importance  to  the  company  because  it  had  been  compelled 
to  dock  its  great  passenger  liners  in  New  Jersey  and  Brook 
lyn.  The  company's  officials  mournfully  remarked  on  the 
witness  stand  before  Seabury  that  in  no  other  part  of  the 
world  where  they  did  business  was  it  necessary  to  use  cir 
cumlocutions  and  influence  in  the  perfectly  simple  business 
of  getting  a  place  to  dock  a  boat.  In  New  York  it 


60        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

was  different.  New  York  was  unique  in  a  number  of 
ways. 

The  company,  being  told  that  direct  approach  was  a 
waste  of  time,  approached  David  Maier,  ex-convict  and 
friend  of  Mayor  Walker,  to  get  a  lease  on  a  new  pier  not 
yet  completed.  Maier  told  the  officials  at  first  that  it 
would  cost  them  perhaps  $3,000  to  get  a  lease,  and  later 
he  said  perhaps  $10,000.  Then  the  suggested  price  was 
shoved  up  to  $25,000,  and  Maier  said  the  one  way  to  get 
the  lease  was  to  hire  an  eminent  Tammany  lawyer,  Wil 
liam  H.  Hickin,  who  has  since  been  elected  president  of 
the  National  Democratic  Club.  Hickin  was  hired,  and 
after  years  of  jockeying  and  manipulation,  he  was  paid 
a  "fee"  of  $50,000  with  the  understanding  that  all  except 
$20,000  was  to  be  passed  on  to  others.  Hickin  refused  to 
waive  immunity  before  Judge  Seabury.  He  refused  to  give 
the  names  of  the  persons  to  whom  he  passed  on  his  win 
nings.  The  bank  records,  however,  show  that  he  drew  out 
$45,000  of  the  $50,000  in  cash  a  few  days  after  he  re 
ceived  the  North  German  Lloyd  check,  and  that  shortly 
afterwards  he  was  without  any  substantial  funds. 

How  Tammany  Hall  operates  in  these  pier-lease  cases 
was  indicated  by  one  letter  from  the  Lloyd  lawyer  to  his 
home  office.  David  Maier,  he  said,  "gave  these  assurances 
in  the  most  positive  manner,  saying  this  is  a  reward  due 
and  promised  him  for  thirty  years  of  service,  and  that 
nobody  can  take  it  from  him.  He  states  that  his  position 
with  the  new  leader  is  very  good."  This  Maier  is  the 
gentleman  whose  presence  on  the  boat  with  Mayor  Walker 


NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE    61 

on  a  trip  to  Europe  caused  so  much  stir.  When  the  com 
pany  finally  got  the  lease,  it  wrote  Mayor  Walker  a  warm 
letter  of  thanks,  but  a  slight  mistake  was  made  in  sending 
this  letter.  It  was  mailed  about  two  months  before  the 
commissioners  of  the  Sinking  Fund  actually  granted  the 
lease. 

This  pier  that  the  North  German  Lloyd  Line  finally 
leased  proved  to  be  a  great  source  of  riches  for  both  Tam 
many  and  some  Republicans.  Olvany  was  aware  of  it  and 
so  was  Colonel  Edward  C.  Carrington,  the  Republican  can 
didate  for  borough  president  of  Manhattan  in  1931.  In 
fact  Carrington' s  company,  the  Hudson  River  Navigation 
Corporation,  owned  the  pier  site  on  which  the  new  pier 
was  built  and  he  hired  Olvany 's  law  firm  to  get  as  high  a 
price  as  possible  for  it  from  the  city.  He  asked  the  city 
to  pay  him  $3,177,000  for  a  pier  and  site  assessed  at 
$633,000.  The  city  finally  paid  two  millions.  Just  why 
he  asked  such  a  large  amount  became  apparent  when  it 
was  revealed  that  heavy  demands  were  made  upon  him. 
He  had  to  pay  Olvany,  and  he  was  asked  to  pay  Dock 
Commissioner  Cosgrove  for  the  commissioner's  approval 
of  the  purchase.  Two  good  things  came  out  of  this  scan 
dal  almost  immediately.  Colonel  Carrington  as  a  candi 
date  for  public  office  was  thoroughly  discredited,  and  the 
city  got  the  pier  site  for  half  a  million  dollars  less  than 
the  price  set  by  the  dock  commissioner  in  the  reign  of 
Olvany. 

At  one  moment  in  his  inquiry  Judge  Seabury  seemed  to 
be  just  on  the  point  of  disclosing  the  real  inside  story  of 


62        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

New  York's  pier  racket.  F.  Traugott  Keller,  chief  engi 
neer  of  the  Dock  Department,  admitted  splitting  fees  in  a 
private  hearing  after  it  was  disclosed  that  he  had  large, 
unexplained  bank  accounts.  He  was  to  come  back  the  next 
day  for  further  examination.  He  died  that  day  in  front 
of  a  subway  train.  No  one  would  testify  that  he  was  mur 
dered.  Perhaps  he  was  not. 


4 
MORE  TIN  BOXES 

THE  high  points  of  comedy  in  the  examination  of  the 
Tin  Box  Brigade  by  Judge  Seabury  came  with  the  appear 
ance  of  James  A.  McQuade,  now  sheriff  of  Kings  County, 
and  Dr.  William  H.  Walker,  brother  of  the  mayor.  The 
testimony  of  these  men  both  brought  to  mind  that  remark 
of  E.  L.  Godkin,  which  is  quoted  by  M.  R.  Werner  in  his 
Tammany  Hall:  "The  three  things  a  Tammany  leader 
most  dreaded  were  in  the  ascending  order  of  repulsiveness, 
the  penitentiary,  honest  industry,  and  biography." 

McQuade  deposited  $520,000  in  the  bank  in  six  years 
although  his  salary  during  that  period  totaled  less  than 
$50,000,  and  he  could  not  remember  any  other  gainful 
occupation  except  his  political  job  as  register  of  Kings 
County.  His  testimony  is  worthy  of  transmission  to  future 
generations : 

Q.  Now  it  appears,  Mr.  Register,  that  in  the  year  1925, 
you  deposited  in  the  Kings  County  Trust  Company  your 
salary  checks  for  the  amount  of  $9,365.40.  That  is  in  accord 
with  your  recollection? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  It  also  appears  in  that  year  you  deposited  in  cash,  not 
other  checks,  there  were  other  checks,  too,  but  deposited  in 
cash  $55,833.07;  that  you  deposited  other  checks  in  addition 

63 


64        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

to  your  salary  checks  for  fourteen  odd  thousand  dollars,  and 
that  your  total  deposits  for  that  year  in  the  Kings  County 
Trust  Company  amounted  to  $80,058.41.  Now  bearing  in 
mind  what  you  have  told  us  about  not  having  any  other 
gainful  pursuits  than  your  public  office,  will  you  be  good 
enough  to  tell  me  where  you  got  the  seventy  odd  thousand 
dollars  in  1925,  which  you  deposited,  $55,000  of  which  was 
in  cash? 

A.  Money  that  I  borrowed.  If  you  want  me  to  get  to  the 
start  of  it,  I  will  have  to  take  and  go  over  the  family  in  its 
entirety,  without  feeling  that  I  am  humiliated  in  the  least 
or  am  not  humiliating  the  other  33  McQuades.  If  this  Com 
mittee  can  take  the  time,  it  can  take  the  time  to  listen,  and 
you  can,  and  the  public  in  general,  I  will  go  over  it  from 
the  start. 

I  unfortunately  went  into  politics.   I  say  that  cautiously. 

Q.  You  don't  base  that  on  that  deposit,  do  you? 

A.  I  am  going  to  get  to  that  deposit,  if  you  will  let  me. 
If  you  will  let  me.  I  bailed  a  man  out  who  stole  off 
McQuade  Brothers  $260,000,  which  necessitated  the  fold 
ing  up  of  the  McQuade  Bros,  firm,  selling  eight  seats  they 
had  in  the  Exchange  for  $6,000  a  piece,  that  afterwards 
brought  $225,000.  After  they  liquidated,  the  34  McQuades 
were  placed  on  my  back,  I  being  the  only  breadwinner,  so  to 
speak,  and  after  that  it  was  necessary  to  keep  life  in  their 
body,  sustenance,  to  go  out  and  borrow  money. 

After  they  paid  up  all  they  could,  I  took  over  their  respon 
sibilities.  It  was  not  necessary;  I  felt  it  my  duty,  being  that 
they  were  my  flesh  and  blood,  part  and  parcel  of  me,  to 
help  them.  I  am  getting  along  in  fairly  good  shape,  when 
my  mother,  Lord  have  mercy  on  her,  in  1925  dropped  dead. 
I  am  going  along  nicely,  when  my  brother,  Lord  have  mercy 
on  him,  in  1926  or  1927  dropped  dead.  But  doing  nicely 
when  I  have  two  other  brothers,  and  when  my  brother  died 
he  willed  me  his  family,  which  I  am  still  taking  care  of, 
thank  God.  Two  other  brothers,  who  have  been  very  sick, 
and  are  sick,  so  much  so  that  when  your  Committee  notified 
me,  I  was  waiting  for  one  of  them  to  die. 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  65 

They  have  24  children  that  I  am  trying  to  keep  fed, 
clothed  and  educated,  which  means  that  I  must  borrow 
money.  The  extra  money  that  you  see  in  this  year  or  any 
year  from  that  year  on  has  been  money  that  I  borrowed, — 
not  ashamed  of  it — 

Q.  Now,  Mr.  Register, — 

A.  If  the  Lord  lets  me  live,  I  intend  to  pay  it  all.  And  I 
borrowed  more  in  1926,  1927,  1928  and  1929,  and  in  the 
last  month  alone,  I  think,  I  borrowed  $10,000  to  keep  the 
roof  over  their  homes. 

Q.  Well,  now,  Mr.  Register,  will  you  be  good  enough  to- 
indicate  from  whom  you  borrowed  this  money? 

A.  Oh,  Judge,  offhand  I  could  not.  I  borrowed,  which 
you  ought  to  remember.  I  was  introduced  to  you,  Judge,  in 
the  Pennsylvania  Railroad  depot  by  the  late  Judge  McCall, 
who  said  to  you  at  that  time,  "This  is  my  friend,  Jim 
McQuade,  Judge  Seabury,  and  he  is  in  need,  and  I  am  going; 
to  help  him."  I  don't  know  whether  you  remember  or  not. 

Q.  I  am  sorry;  I  don't  recall  it,  Mr.  Register. 

A.  I  was  standing  right  beside  you,  and  the  Judge  asked 
me  if  I  would  ride  down  with  him,  and  I  told  him  I 
couldn't.  The  next  day  he  gave  me  $5,000.  That  was  the 
start  of  my  trying  to  keep  the  McQuade  family  together. 

Q.  Well,  now,  Mr.  McQuade,  you  understand,  I  take  it, 
that  you  were  accorded  a  full  opportunity  to  make  any  state- 
ment  that  you  wanted  to  make  in  private,  and  that  you  de 
clined.  You  understand  that,  don't  you? 

A.  Yes.  I  haven't  the  faintest  idea  what  it  was.  I  am  not 
ashamed  of  anything  that  I  am  testifying  here. 

Q.  Now,  you  have  told  us  this  story,  which  from  your 
version  of  it,  shows  the  great  charity  and  benevolence  that 
actuated  you  in  reference  to  the  members  of  the  McQuade 
family,  to  whom  you  have  made  reference.  That  all  relates, 
as  I  understand  it,  to  money  that  you  paid  out  from  time 
to  time? 

A.  That  is  right. 

Q.  Doesn't  it? 

A.  You  see,  in  these  deposits,  Judge — 


66        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Q.  Doesn't  it  relate  to  money  that  you  paid  out? 

A.  From  time  to  time  for  them. 

Q.  Well  now,  my  question,  Mr.  Register,  I  wasn't  inter 
ested  at  all  in  what  you  did  with  the  money.  I  am  quite 
ready  to  assume  that  you  made  charitable  and  benevolent 
dispositions  of  the  money.  Let  us  assume  that,  for  the  sake 
of  argument.  My  question  is:  How,  in  the  year  1925,  with 
your  salary  of  $9,365.40,  you  deposited  $80,000-odd? 

A.  I  would,  for  instance,  borrow  $1,000  off  John  Brown. 
In  two  weeks'  time  John  wanted  that  $1,000,  and  I  would 
borrow  $1,000  off  John  Jones.  Another,  maybe  two  weeks 
or  less,  he  would  want  that.  I  would  get  it  off  John  Smith, 
where  in  reality  there  would  be  possibly  $10,000  deposited 
for  the  $1,000  that  was  actually  working. 

Q.  I  see — just  over  and  over  again  using  the  same  $1,000? 

A.  That  is  it,  trying  to  keep  my — 

Q.  Can  you  give  the  names  of  the  persons  from  whom 
you  borrowed  this  money  that  brought  your  total  deposits 
of  that  year  up  to  $80,000? 

A.  I  can't,  offhand,  Judge,  remember  that  far  back.  I  had 
troubles  enough  to — 

Q.  Have  you  any  data  or  writing  that  will  enable  you  to 
designate  the  persons  from  whom  you  borrowed  these  sums? 

A.  As  the  money  was  paid,  it  was  off  my  mind,  and  I 
thanked  God  for  it  and  destroyed  anything  that  I  might  have. 

Q.  Destroyed  everything  you  might  have? 

A.  After  I  paid  it,  it  was  no  good  to  me. 

Q.  Why  do  you  give  thanks  to  Divine  Providence? 

A.  I  give  thanks  to  Divine  Providence  for  permitting  me 
to  pay  those  people  who  were  kind  enough  to  loan  me  the 
money.1 

After  this  colloquy  an  enterprising  reporter  from  the 
Sun  got  on  a  street  car  and  went  out  into  the  farther 
reaches  of  Brooklyn  to  discover  how  well  McQuade  was 
feeding  his  33  destitute  relatives-  He  found  a  number  of 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  67 

them  on  the  city  payroll,  being  very  comfortably  taken 
care  of  by  the  taxpayers.  He  found  among  the  33  rela 
tives  rotund  and  prosperous  real  estate  owners  in  Queens 
who  seemed  quite  superior  to  the  good  sheriff's  kindness. 
But  all  of  this  did  not  threaten  Mr.  McQuade's  chances 
for  election  as  sheriff  of  Kings  County,  since  he  had 
already  been  designated  for  the  office  by  McCooey  before 
he  testified  and  nothing  less  than  an  earthquake  could 
defeat  a  McCooey  choice  in  McCooeyville. 

The  case  of  Dr.  William  H.  Walker,  the  mayor's 
brother,  is  almost  as  striking.  Dr.  Walker  is  a  pudgy, 
rather  forlorn-looking  person  whom  it  is  hard  to  associate 
with  his  dashing,  voluble  brother.  He  is  not  a  member  of 
the  American  Medical  Association  or  the  New  York  Acad 
emy  of  Medicine.  When  he  was  first  made  medical  exam 
iner  of  the  Board  of  Education,  the  Civil  Service  Reform 
Asociation  contested  his  choice  in  the  courts  on  the  ground 
that  he  had  not  passed  a  required  examination  for  the 
place.  He  was  finally  allowed  to  stay  because  of  a  tech 
nicality  and  he  draws  from  this  position  $6,500  a  year.  He 
is  also  a  member  of  the  Board  of  Retirement  for  city 
pensions  from  which  he  receives  $25  per  meeting,  and  an 
examiner  of  pugilists  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the  State 
Boxing  Commission,  for  which  he  receives  $50  a  per 
formance,  perhaps  50  times  a  year. 

Dr.  Walker's  main  source  of  income,  however,  is  not 
official.  It  consists  chiefly  of  fees  split  with  four  doctors 
who  treat  city  employees  for  injuries.  To  understand  the 
proceeding  it  will  be  necessary  to  explain  just  how  the 


63        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

compensation  racket  works  in  the  practice  of  medicine  in 
New  York. 

When  a  worker  is  injured  in  the  performance  of  duty 
the  State  Workmen's  Compensation  Law  makes  the  em 
ployer  responsible  for  medical  care  but  it  gives  the  em 
ployer  the  right  to  designate  the  doctor.  This  gives  an 
opportunity  for  collusion  between  crooked  doctors  and 
employers  in  exploiting  the  insurance  companies  who  must 
pay  the  bills.  Racketeering  doctors  may  render  fake  bills 
with  the  consent  of  the  employer  and  they  may  compen 
sate  the  employer  for  his  cooperation  by  incorporating  in 
their  bills  names  of  employees  who  never  existed  and  so 
make  it  possible  for  the  employer  to  be  paid  for  medical 
attention  to  a  ghost.  More  commonly  inferior  clinics  are 
run  in  connection  with  insurance  companies  which  are 
interested  in  minimizing  illness  and  giving  cheap  treat 
ment  to  injured  workers. 

In  the  case  of  the  city  the  system  gives  Tammany  a 
chance  to  send  the  city's  injured  employees  to  doctors  who 
will  split  fees  with  the  political  ring.  Judge  Seabury  dis 
covered  that  four  doctors  had  almost  a  monopoly  of  com 
pensation  cases  of  city  employees  and  that  during  37 
months,  from  January  1,  1929,  to  January  31,  1932,  they 
received  $216,000.  Direct  evidence  was  introduced  to 
show  that  in  scores  of  cases  these  fees  were  split  with 
Dr.  Walker  on  a  50-50  basis  to  the  odd  penny.  No  check 
was  made  by  the  corporation  counsel  who  appointed  these 
doctors  to  see  whether  the  services  which  the  city  paid  for 
were  actually  rendered,  or  if  the  treatments  given  were 
necessary  and  reasonable.2 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  69 

When  Dr.  Walker  appeared  on  the  witness  stand  before 
Seabury  he  was  frightened  and  nervous.  He  gave  the  most 
pathetic  exhibition  of  "truth  telling"  in  the  entire  inquiry. 
His  combined  bank  accounts  with  the  four  doctors,  it 
appeared  had  totaled  $431,000  from  1928  to  1932,  an 
astonishing  harvest  for  a  man  wholly  unknown  in  the 
upper  world  of  medicine.3  His  explanations  of  checks  he 
had  received  from  Dr.  Thomas  J.  O'Mara,  one  of  the  four 
city  compensation  doctors,  was  still  more  astonishing. 

He  admitted  receiving  about  $10,000  to  $12,000  a  year 
from  Dr.  T.  J.  O'Mara  in  split  fees  but  he  denied  that  these 
split  fees  came  from  city  compensation  cases.  He  argued 
that  they  came  from  other  compensation  cases  which  he 
shared  with  Dr.  O'Mara  and  he  swore  that  he  himself  had 
never  done  any  work  on  city  compensation  cases.  This 
was  important  because  if  he  had  done  any  paid  service 
directly  for  a  city  patient  the  doctor  who  split  city  fees 
with  him  could  be  charged  with  misappropriating  public 
funds.  To  save  both  himself  and  Dr.  O'Mara  he  had  to- 
pretend  that  the  money  received  from  Dr.  O'Mara  had 
nothing  to  do  with  city  funds,  and  at  the  same  time  he  had 
to  concoct  an  elaborate  yarn  about  the  extensive  coopera 
tion  between  himself  and  O'Mara  to  explain  these  mys 
terious  checks.  How  he  faced  the  music  is  revealed  by 
the  testimony: 

Q.  Now,  are  you  willing  to  swear  that  these  fees  that  for 
the  last  five  years  of  Dr.  O'Mara's  that  he  has  split  with  you 
were  not,  any  of  them,  in  relation  to  city  compensation 
cases? 

A.  They  were  not. 


70        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Q.  You  are  willing  to  say  that  they  were  not? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  Doctor,  I  show  you  a  check  or  warrant  from  the  city 
payable  to  the  order  of  Thomas  J.  O'Mara.  That  is  the 
Dr.  O'Mara  with  whom  you  have  split  some  fees? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  Here  is  a  warrant  or  check  for  $233.20  and  here  is 
another  one  for  $1,269.  Will  you  be  good  enough  to  look 
at  them  and  note  their  date  is  on  March  3,  1931?  March 
3  and  4,  1931? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  That  is  right,  isn't  it? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  Now,  will  you  be  good  enough  to  look  at  this  check 
that  I  hand  you  and  tell  me  whether  it  bears  Dr.  O'Mara's 
signature? 

A.  It  does. 

Q.  And  whether  it  is  made  payable  to  your  own  order? 

A.  It  is.  ... 

Q.  You  observe  that  that  is  just  one-half,  isn't  it,  of  the 
amount  of  the  warrants  paid  to  Dr.  O'Mara  in  those  city 
compensation  cases? 

A.  I  presume  so.  I  haven't  added  it  up.  I  take  your  word 
for  it. 

Q.  Doesn't  the  date  of  the  check  serve  to  refresh  your 
recollection  that  when  Dr.  O'Mara  got  those  checks  for  city 
compensation  cases  he  deposited  them  in  his  bank  and  drew 
a  check  to  your  order  for  one-half  of  the  amount?  Doesn't 
it  refresh  your  recollection,  Doctor? 

A.  I  haven't  any  recollection  of  it,  but  the  check  speaks 
for  itself,  that  I  received  it.  ... 

Q.  Now,  you  see,  Dr.  O'Mara  got  $1,502.20  and  on  the 
next  day  I  think  O'Mara  sends  you  a  check  for  $751.10, 
just  one-half  of  that  amount.  Now  does  not  that,  Doctor, 
serve  to  refresh  your  recollection  that  at  least  in  cases  repre 
sented  by  these  two  checks  from  the  city  to  Dr.  O'Mara 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  71 

under  date  of  March  3  and  4  for  city  compensation  cases 
that  Dr.  O'Mara  did  split  his  fee  50-50  with  you? 

A.  I  never  knew  anything  about  the  doctor  receiving  those 
other  checks. 

Q.  Can  you  tell  me  any  other  reason  why  Dr.  O'Mara 
should  have  sent  you  exactly  one-half  of  the  amount  that  he 
received  in  compensation  cases  one  day  after  he  received  the 
checks  from  the  city? 

A.  No,  I  don't. 

Q.  What  was  it  for,  Doctor,  if  it  was  not  a  division  and 
split  of  this  commission? 

A.  It  was  for  medical  work  that  I  performed  for  him. 

Q.  But  not  medical  work  in  reference  to  compensation 
cases? 

A.  Not  city  compensation  cases. 

Q.  You  still  stick  to  that? 

A.  Yes.  .  .  . 

Q.  Now,  Doctor,  you  say  this  check  for  $751.10  was  for 
some  medical  services  that  you  rendered? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Did  you  ever  send  any  bill  to  anybody  for  those  serv 
ices  you  say  you  rendered? 

A.  No,  I  depend  upon  Dr.  O'Mara's  records  entirely. 

Q.  You  still  say  it  was  not  a  split  on  city  cases? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  .  .  . 

Q.  Now,  I  show  you  another  check  to  Dr.  O'Mara  from 
the  city  for  $436.45  under  date  of  June  27,  1931,  services 
compensation  law.  Do  you  notice  that? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  Did  Dr.  O'Mara  give  you  half  of  that  payment  to 
him? 

A.  I  haven't  any  recollection  of  it.  I  never  knew  Dr. 
O'Mara  received  that  check. 

Q.  What  date  did  he  receive  that  check? 

A.  The  check  is  dated  June  27,  1931. 

Q.  Now  I  show  you  a  check  by  him  to  your  order  on 


72        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

July  1,  1931,  for  $218.23,  and  tell  me  whether  that  serves 
to  refresh  your  recollection  that  Dr.  O'Mara  did  split  that 
fee  with  you  even  to  the  extent  of  giving  you  that  half  cent, 
you  will  observe? 

A.  I  haven't  any  recollection  of  it. 

Q.  Well,  if  it  wasn't  a  split  of  Dr.  O'Mara's  fee,  what 
was  it,  Dr.  Walker? 

A.  It  was  the  same  as  the  other,  the  same  as  the  other 
check. 

Q.  You  couldn't  give  me  any  explanation  for  the  other 
except  to  say  it  was  medical  services? 

A.  Well,  I  will  say  the  same  thing  again. 

Q.  Did  you  render  any  bill  for  these  services? 

A.  No. 

Q.  Don't  you  think  that,  perhaps,  Doctor,  you  may  be 
in  error  and  that  really  you  did  split  these  city  compensation 
fees  with  Dr.  O'Mara? 

A.  No,  sir.  .  .  . 

Q.  Now,  Doctor,  will  you  please  look  at  this  next  check 
I  hand  you,  under  date  of  August  5,  1931,  for  services 
rendered  by  Dr.  O'Mara,  and  paid  for  by  the  city  under  the 
compensation  law,  for  $407.30.  .  .  . 

Q.  And  this  check,  under  date  of  August  6,  1931,  for 
$162.40  to  O'Mara,  in  a  compensation  case.  Do  you  note  it? 

A.  I  do. 

Q.  And  this  check  of  August  6,  1931,  for  $181.75  to 
Dr.  O'Mara  in  a  compensation  case — you  note  it? 

A.  I  note  it. 

Q.  This  one  under  date  of  August  6,  1931,  to  Dr.  O'Mara 
in  a  compensation  case  for  $196.80. 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  And  this  one  under  date  of  August  6,  1931,  to  Dr. 
O'Mara  from  the  city  in  a  compensation  case  for  $194.15? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  You  observe  those  checks — seven  of  them,  are  there 
not? 

A.  Yes. 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  73 

Q.  Doctor,  I  show  you  another  check  under  date  of 
August  6,  1931,  to  Dr.  O'Mara  from  the  city  in  a  compen 
sation  case  for  $237.20. 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  You  note  that,  do  you  not? 

A.  Yes.  .  .  . 

Q.  All  right;  so  that  we  have  seven  checks  between  those 
dates  to  Dr.  O'Mara  in  city  compensation  cases,  aggregating 
$1,382.62.  On  August  12th,  didn't  you  receive  a  check  that 
I  hand  you  from  Dr.  O'Mara  for  $691.30? 

A.  I  presume  I  did — the  check  is  cashed. 

Q.  That  doesn't  rest  on  presumption,  does  it?  That  rests 
on  the  firm  foundation  of  knowledge? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  Wasn't  that  half  of  those  seven  checks  that  Dr.  O'Mara 
got  from  the  city  in  compensation  cases? 

A.  I  will  take  your  figures  for  that. 

Q.  I  don't  mean,  isn't  it  half  of  that  amount;  I  mean  to 
ask  whether  that  $691.30  wasn't  the  split  that  Dr.  O'Mara 
made  with  you  in  the  cases  referred  to  on  those  checks  of 
warrants  from  the  city? 

A.  He  gave  that  check  for  services  I  rendered. 

Q.  Services  in  reference  to  these  cases? 

A.  These  cases  I  didn't  know  anything  about. 

Q.  What  cases  did  you  render  services  for,  for  which  you 
got  this  check? 

A.  Any  cases  he  asked  me  to  look  at. 

Q.  Have  you  got  any  record  to  show  what  those  cases 
were? 

A.  I  haven't  now. 

Q.  Did  you  ever  have  any? 

A.  At  the  time  he  was  giving  me — 

Q.  Didn't  you  keep  any  record  yourself? 

A.  No,  he  kept  track. 

Q.  You  didn't  keep  any  record? 

A.  No. 

Q.   (Continued)  of  the  amount  he  owed  you? 


74        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

A.  No. 

Q.  He  paid  you  thousands  of  dollars  altogether,  didn't  he? 
A.  Yes. 

Q.  You  kept  no  record  of  the  cases  in  reference  to  which 
that  money  was  paid? 
A.  No. 


Q.  .  .  .  doesn't  it  seem  strange  to  you  that  in  these  par 
ticular  city  compensation  cases  you  received  exactly  one-half, 
even  to  the  odd  number  of  dollars  and  the  odd  number  of 
cents — doesn't  that  seem  very  strange? 

A.  I  didn't  even  know  it  was  so  until  now. 

Q.  Now  that  you  do  know  it  is  so,  doesn't  it  seem  very 
strange  to  you? 

A.  It  is  evidently  a  coincidence. 

Q.  It's  a  coincidence.  And  doesn't  it  seem  very  strange, 
too,  that  the  coincidence  happened  in  so  many  separate  series 
of  cases? 

A.  Yes.8 

When  the  City  Affairs  Committee  took  the  evidence 
produced  before  the  Hof stadter  committee  and  made  it  the 
basis  of  charges  against  Dr.  William  H.  Walker  and  his 
four  associates,  before  the  Grievance  Committee  of  the 
State  Department  of  Education,  the  learned  but  cautious 
doctors  who  make  up  that  body  announced  that  fee-split 
ting  was  unethical  but  that  they  could  do  nothing  against 
it  unless  fraud  and  deceit  had  been  revealed.  The  com 
plainant  in  the  case  (one  of  the  authors)  declared  that 
he  did  not  wish  to  "make  a  solitary  victim  of  Dr.  Walker. 
He  is  a  symptom  and  a  sample  of  a  great  medical  racket. 
It  would  be  as  silly  to  remove  him  without  getting  at  the 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  75 

racket  as  it  would  be  to  sew  up  a  wound  with  proud  flesh 
underneath." 

So  the  case  rests  as  this  book  goes  to  press.  The  Tam 
many  forces  are  using  all  their  power  to  protect  Dr. 
Walker  and  to  prevent  a  thorough  investigation.  The 
chances  of  revoking  the  licenses  of  these  fee-splitting  doc 
tors  is  remote  because  Tammany  has  powerful  friends 
among  the  doctors  and  powerful  pleaders  to  present  a  dis 
torted  interpretation  of  the  law  to  machine-made  courts. 
Morally  the  case  against  Dr.  Walker  is  complete — he  took 
what  an  honest  citizen  would  call  graft.  But  if  one  mem 
ber  of  the  Grievance  Committee  of  the  Board  of  Regents 
is  under  Tammany  control  Dr.  Walker's  license  will  never 
be  revoked.  The  revocation  of  a  doctor's  license  by  the 
Grievance  Committee  requires  a  unanimous  vote. 

Dr.  Walker  is  still  in  the  employ  of  the  Board  of  Edu 
cation  to-day.  Which  leads  us  to  discuss  for  a  moment 
how  politics  takes  the  tin  boxes  even  into  our  school  sys 
tem.  The  schools  have  at  their  head  over  one  hundred 
superintendents,  principals  and  directors  of  special 
branches  who  receive  about  $10,000  a  year  and  who  take 
either  a  perfunctory  examination  or  none  at  all.  The  open 
sesame  to  all  of  these  positions  is  the  recommendation  of 
a  major  political  leader. 

It  is  easy  to  imagine  the  effect  of  such  a  system  upon 
the  morale  of  the  pupils,  teachers  and  officials  of  New 
York's  schools.  Dr.  Henry  R.  Linville  of  the  Teachers 
Union  has  summed  up  the  results. 

In  the  first  place  only  those  teachers  who  are  able  to 


76        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

command  political  influence  are  regarded  by  their  fellows 
as  being  in  line  for  appointment  to  the  prize  positions.  In 
the  second  place,  the  necessity  of  having  political  connec 
tions  for  educational  advancement  leads  teachers  to  join 
Democratic  clubs,  and  even  to  give  up  old  religious  affilia 
tions  for  others  of  more  practical  value.  This  tendency  is 
obviously  demoralizing  to  the  integrity  of  character  of 
ambitious  teachers  and  to  the  profession  as  a  whole.  In 
the  third  place,  education  itself  becomes  bound  hand  and 
foot  to  the  system  of  politico-economic  racketeering  that 
is  characteristic  of  practical  government  and  business  in 
New  York  City. 

Public  education  in  New  York  City  is  an  enormously 
expensive  institution.  But  even  so,  it  is  conceivable  that 
much  greater  expenditures  than  the  $150,000,000  required 
to  conduct  the  schools  of  New  York  each  year  would  be 
made  available  willingly  by  the  people  if  the  school  sys 
tem  contributed  substantial  results  in  improved  civic  and 
social  leadership,  or  in  a  recognizable  improvement  in  the 
intelligence  and  social  good  will  of  the  young  people  who 
graduate  from  the  schools.  In  spite  of  the  good  intentions 
of  many  teachers  to  create  a  better  citizenship  through 
education,  it  is  known  by  all  young  people  that  Tammany 
Hall  stands  for  real  and  immediate  success,  and  will  help 
any  smart  young  fellow  to  get  what  he  wants.  The  result 
is  that  an  attitude  of  cynicism  toward  the  teachings  of 
good  teachers  or  good  schools  is  one  of  the  commonest  of 
attitudes  among  the  adolescent  school  children  of  New 
York. 


MORE  TIN  BOXES  77 

By  virtue  of  the  situation  the  officials  of  the  New  York 
public  school  system  are  in  no  position  even  now  to  con 
demn,  or  to  refer  in  a  deprecatory  manner,  to  the  conduct 
of  ex-Mayor  Walker  while  he  was  in  office.  The  present 
superintendent  of  schools  is  fond  of  telling  how  much  he 
owes  to  the  friendly  interest  of  "Johnny"  Ahearn  but  the 
record  shows  that  some  twenty  years  ago  Ahearn  was  re 
moved  by  Governor  Hughes  from  the  office  of  president 
of  the  Borough  of  Manhattan  for  incompetence  and  for 
failure  to  protect  the  interests  of  the  people. 

Quite  as  shocking  as  any  revelations  of  the  Tin  Box 
Brigade  made  by  Judge  Seabury  was  the  self-revelation  of 
Tammany  by  the  Democratic  members  of  the  Hofstadter 
committee.  Assemblyman  Louis  Cuvillier,  looking  like  an 
aged  gargoyle,  sat  to  the  left  of  Chairman  Hofstadter 
during  the  entire  inquiry  and  fought  Judge  Seabury  like  a 
counsel  for  the  defense.  No  interjection  was  too  irrelevant 
or  stupid  for  him  to  make.  On  many  occasions  he  sought 
to  put  such  fantastic  explanations  and  excuses  into  the 
mouths  of  witnesses  that  they  recoiled  and  asked  the  privi 
lege  of  making  their  own  excuses. 

Judge  Seabury  was  wholly  justified  in  saying  at  the  end 
of  his  Intermediate  Report: 

From  the  start  Tammany  Hall  has  done  everything  within 
its  power  to  obstruct  and  interfere  with  the  exposure  of  the 
conditions  brought  out  in  the  testimony.  There  can  be  no 
question  about  the  participation  of  Tammany  Hall  in  the 
legal  proceedings  which  have  been  taken  in  the  attempt  of 
some  of  the  witnesses  to  avoid  interrogation.  Curry's  action 


78        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

in  springing  to  the  defense  of  Dr.  Doyle,  as  well  as  his  sub 
sequent  testimony,  establish  it.  Not  a  single  one  of  the  mis 
creants  has  been  repudiated  by  Tammany  Hall,  or  even 
criticized  by  it,  for  the  official  wrong-doing  which  has  been 
shown;  on  the  contrary,  Tammany  Hall  has  taken  these 
wrong-doers  to  its  bosom,  has  lent  them  all  the  aid  and  com 
fort  that  it  could  and  has  acted  as  their  protector  and  advisor 
throughout. 

It  is  perfectly  apparent  that  what  these  men  did  is  part  of 
the  system  upon  which  Tammany  Hall  exists  and  expands; 
that  Tammany  Hall  approves  it  and  is  ready  to  extend  its 
arm  to  the  utmost  to  protect  and  perpetuate  its  sordid  traffic 
in  political  influence. 


5 
GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS 

IN  a  democracy  the  mandate  of  a  government  is  derived 
from  voters  at  duly  constituted  elections.  New  York  never 
has  an  approximately  honest  election.  The  degrees  of  dis 
honesty  vary  from  year  to  year  with  varying  circumstances. 
These  circumstances  include  such  matters  as  Tammany's 
desire  to  roll  up  an  impressive  vote  and  the  Republican 
desire  to  make  a  real  fight.  However,  Tammany  always 
keeps  its  hand  in  at  a  little  cheating  even  when  it  is  wholly 
unnecessary  for  victory,  and  Republican  desire  for  victory 
is  never  so  strong  that  the  party  can  or  will  prevent  collu 
sion  between  nominally  Republican  and  Democratic  elec 
tion  inspectors  in  certain  assembly  districts.  Such  collusion 
is,  of  course,  the  chief  root  of  fraud. 

This  matter  of  elections  in  New  York — and  we  do  not 
believe  that  New  York  is  a  sinner  above  all  other  cities — 
is  worth  some  consideration.  It  was  one  of  the  gravest 
weaknesses  of  the  Seabury  investigation  of  1931-1932  that 
it  wholly  ignored  the  question  despite  the  fact  that  specific 
and  detailed  grievances  were  laid  before  it.  In  conse 
quence  Judge  Seabury  was  in  the  position  of  investigating 
the  dishonesty  of  a  Tammany  administration  whose  man- 

79 


80        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

date  is  habitually  vitiated  by  fraud  in  the  elections,  which 
fraud  he  and  his  associates  did  not  even  consider. 

One  member  of  the  Hof  stadter  Committee,  Assembly 
man  Hamilton  Potter  of  Suffolk  County,  was  genuinely 
concerned  over  the  situation,  and  at  one  time  contemplated 
definite  action  by  the  legislature.  Almost  nothing  came 
of  this,  presumably  because  of  the  old  familiar  fear  of 
up-state  Republican  legislators  that  they  live  in  houses  of 
quite  too  brittle  glass  for  them  to  start  throwing  stones. 
A  legislative  committee  did  make  hurried  inquiry  into  the 
laws  recently  and  spent  two  days  on  hearings  in  New  York 
which  were  neglected  by  all  but  Socialists. 

The  trouble  with  New  York  elections  would  not  seem 
to  one  reading  the  election  laws  to  rest  with  the  laws 
themselves.  On  the  surface  they  seem  ample  and  adequate, 
but  their  interpretation  by  the  courts  has  left  them  full 
of  loopholes  especially  in  the  matter  of  possible  coloniza 
tion.  So,  too,  do  the  voting  machines,  now  in  general  use 
throughout  the  city,  seem  well  designed  to  reduce  the 
chance  of  accidental  or  deliberate  error  in  the  count.  The 
merits  of  voting  machines  were  impressed  on  reformers 
by  Tammany's  long  opposition  to  their  use.  It  is  true  that 
since  their  adoption  the  all-night  counts  with  their  chance 
for  honest  error  and  for  all  sorts  of  dishonest  tricks, 
including  violence,  have  been  eliminated.  Nevertheless, 
Tammany  has  proved  that  man  is  mightier  than  any  im 
personal  machine. 

The  chief  weakness  of  the  voting  machine  from  a 
mechanical  point  of  view  is  the  fact  that  in  its  present 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  81 

legal  form  it  does  not,  like  a  cash  register,  print  its  totals. 
They  appear  on  the  back  of  the  machine  in  rather  small- 
sized  figures.  While  the  law  provides  that  the  machine 
must  be  opened  and  so  turned  that  the  face  on  which 
totals  are  recorded  is  plainly  visible  to  all  election  inspec 
tors  and  properly  certified  watchers  of  all  political  parties, 
it  is  an  easy  law  to  ignore  or  evade.  Watchers,  even  of  the 
Republican  party  in  New  York  City,  are  often  inexpert, 
easily  brow-beaten,  and  in  many  districts  they  either  fear 
or  actually  experience  physical  violence  if  they  protest. 
Besides  there  are  rarely  enough  watchers  for  every  pre 
cinct.  That  leaves  only  the  Republican  inspectors  for 
Tammany  to  take  care  of.  And  that  is  easy.  We  have 
seen  precinct  after  precinct  where  there  have  been  more 
Republican  officials  than  Republican  votes.  We  have  seen 
more  precincts  where  the  Socialist  vote  as  reported  was 
zero,  one,  two  or  three,  although  we  have  been  able  in 
those  same  precincts  to  get  small  mountains  of  affidavits 
of  Socialists  who  swore  that  in  those  precincts  they  voted 
the  ticket. 

What  happened?  The  Republican  or  allegedly  Repub 
lican  inspectors  obligingly  looked  the  other  way  while  a 
Democratic  chairman  read  off  the  minority  party  vote  and 
a  Democratic  secretary  recorded  it  with  a  substantial  sub 
traction.  In  1927  when  all  Tammany's  bag  of  tricks  was 
used  in  a  certain  district  to  prevent  the  reelection  of  the 
popular  Socialist,  Jacob  Panken,  judge  of  the  municipal 
court,  in  one  precinct  where  there  was  prima  fade  evi 
dence  of  irregularity  the  voting  machine  on  court  order 


82       WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

was  reopened.  It  showed  35  votes  for  Judge  Panken; 
other  testimony  showed  that  the  chairman  had  called  out 
eleven  and  the  secretary  had  written  down  nine,  not  on 
the  regular  form,  but  on  a  slip  of  paper  from  which  later 
he  had  expected  to  transcribe  it  to  the  regular  form  oblig 
ingly  signed  in  blank  by  "Republican"  election  inspectors 
who  then  cleaned  out  altogether! 

Incidentally  that  good  Tammany  war  horse,  Magistrate 
Simpson,  who  later  resigned  under  fire,  refused  even  to 
hold  the  alleged  Republicans  for  the  Grand  Jury.  That 
same  year  in  that  same  district  a  Republican  candidate  for 
municipal  court  judge  openly  mourned  in  Socialist  district 
headquarters  that  he  "hadn't  money  enough  to  keep  the 
boys  in  line."  The  "boys"  were  nominally  Republican  in 
spectors  and  watchers  who  according  to  general  belief 
were  conveniently  blind  and  deaf  for  the  sum  of  twenty- 
five  good  Tammany  dollars.  (The  rate  varies  according 
to  urgency.) 

Against  this  deliberate  misreading  of  the  machine 
through  collusion  between  the  old  parties  court  orders  for 
reopening  the  machines  are  no  real  protection.  To  obtain 
such  orders  is  expensive,  cumbersome  and  requires  an 
amount  of  prima  -fade  evidence  of  fraud  not  worth  the 
cost  and  trouble  of  collecting. 

But  where,  you  may  ask,  are  the  police?  Hand  in  glove 
with  the  Tammany-Republican  machine.  Even  a  decent 
cop  regards  it  as  a  mortal  danger  to  his  job  to  interfere 
on  his  own  initiative,  or  even  at  the  request  of  a  minor 
party  watcher,  with  any  irregularity  at  the  polls  short  of 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  83 

murder.  With  rare  exceptions  the  New  York  cop  at  an 
election  precinct  takes  the  monkeys  of  Nikko  as  his  exam 
ple.  He  hears,  sees,  speaks  no  evil.  No,  not  quite.  We 
have  known  some  specimens  who  if  an  honest,  non- 
Tammany  man  is  attacked  at  the  polls  will  always  see  him 
in  the  role  of  aggressor  and  grab  him,  intimidate  him,  or 
actually  arrest  him.  Meanwhile  the  gangster  escapes. 

But  we  are  getting  a  little  ahead  of  our  argument.  The 
point  about  the  voting  machine  is  this:  if  it  were  so  con 
trived  that  it  printed  in  duplicate  or  triplicate  the  final 
result  and  these  copies  were  properly  filed  it  would  at  least 
be  much  harder  than  it  now  is  to  misread,  misreport  or 
doctor  the  record.  That  is  what  reformers  never  thought 
of  when  the  machine  was  introduced. 

Another  serious  point  about  the  machine  is  its  adapta 
bility  or  lack  of  adaptability  to  proportional  representa 
tion.  At  any  rate  the  history  of  voting  by  a  mechanical 
process  is  one  more  proof  that  we  cannot  be  saved  by  law 
or  machinery  if  we  lack  the  will  or  power  to  organize  for 
our  own  protection.  Some  weary  hours,  some  two  A.M. 
battles,  knavery  and  physical  violence,  some  ballot  fixing, 
the  machine  prevents.  With  the  addition  of  automatic 
printing  of  results  the  area  of  its  protection  might  be 
extended.  More  cannot  be  said  for  it. 

Tammany's  best  means  of  gathering  in  votes  at  the 
expense  of  its  political  opponents  is  not  misreading  the 
voting  machines  but  sheer  intimidation  on  election  day. 
In  this  process  of  intimidation  gangsters,  racketeers,  judges 
and  avowed  political  workers  make  common  cause.  Yes, 


84        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

and  school  teachers.  In  one  experience  one  of  the  most 
persistent  violators  of  the  law  against  lobbying  near  the 
polls  was  a  Tammany  school  teacher  who  used  her  ac 
quaintance  and  influence  with  parents  openly  and  success 
fully  all  day  long  in  the  polling  places  in  the  basement 
of  the  school  where  she  taught.  We  have  seen  in  a 
big  school  basement  a  crowd  of  lingering  visitors  or 
hangers-on,  including  in  the  same  group  a  judge,  a  district 
leader,  an  assemblyman  and  a  well-known  local  gangster, 
all  united  in  bonds  of  amity,  each  in  his  way  impressing 
the  voters  with  the  manysided  might  of  Tammany  and 
the  wisdom  of  doing  its  bidding.  We  have  been  gra 
ciously  offered  personal  immunity  as  a  favor  by  a  typical 
Tammany  alderman  in  a  polling  place,  in  which  the  same 
alderman  had  been  inciting  some  of  his  followers  to  vio 
lence  against  a  Socialist  watcher.  The  crowd  in  that 
polling  place  could  have  had  its  composite  picture  taken 
for  the  kind  of  men  who  loot  cities.  The  worst  of  them 
proudly  wore  party  badges.  Ordinary  citizens,  as  a 
passer-by  explained,  believed  "an  honest  man  hasn't  a 
chance.  Dutch  Schultz's  men  are  operating  in  this  district 
to-day."  (Schultz  is  a  notorious  beer  runner  and  racketeer. ) 
There  is  a  certain  degree  of  respect  for  persons  in  the 
administration  of  physical  violence.  In  such  assembly  dis 
tricts  as  the  2nd,  4th,  17th  in  Manhattan — to  name  only 
three — a  Socialist  candidate  for  high  office  is  relatively 
secure  from  personal  attack  if  he  visits  the  polling  places ; 
the  ordinary  watcher  is  far  less  safe.  There  have  even 
been  instances  where  prominent  Republicans  have  suffered 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  85 

the  indignity  of  the  "bum's  rush"  out  of  a  polling  place. 
And  one  of  the  authors  of  this  book  can  testify  that  such 
immunity  as  he  has  enjoyed  has  not  extended  to  his  com 
panions  or  to  the  tires  of  his  car. 

We  suspect  that  the  fighting  Congressman  La  Guardia 
will  agree  with  Socialists  that  the  one  thing  Tammany 
fears  is  a  counter  organization,  known  to  include  a  num 
ber  of  well-set-up  young  men,  residents  in  the  same  neigh 
borhood  as  the  election  inspectors.  Short  of  that,  well- 
trained  watchers  can  do  much.  So,  too,  can  temporary 
deputies  to  the  attorney  general  appointed  by  him  to  watch 
the  polls — that  is,  if  the  attorney  general  is  Republican. 
In  1931  the  Democratic  attorney  general  appointed  depu 
ties  whose  purposed  or  ignorant  blindness  and  misinter 
pretation  of  law  greatly  assisted  Tammany  in  piling  up 
the  majority  it  needed  to  "vindicate"  the  Walker  admin 
istration. 

These  conditions,  we  repeat,  do  not  prevail  merely  in  a 
very  few  isolated  precincts;  they  are  habitual  in  district 
after  district  in  the  greater  city.  Well-informed  news 
paper  reporters  are  cynically  aware  of  them,  but  editors, 
like  other  respectable  citizens,  usually  vote  in  districts  or 
at  hours  when  nothing  out  of  the  way  happens.  Or  else 
they  are  so  calloused  to  sensation  that  nothing  matters 
short  of  open  riot.  Hence  the  standing  headline:  "All 
quiet  at  the  polls."  And  for  this — and  possibly  less  cred 
itable  reasons — it  is  next  to  impossible  to  get  the  average 
New  York  newspaper  genuinely  interested  in  an  honest 
vote. 


86       WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

How  does  this  intimidation  work?  You  live,  let  us  say, 
in  a  Democratic  district  where  there  are  reasons  for  the 
leader  to  make  a  big  showing.  You  are  one  of  the  group 
not  definitely  lined  up  already  by  fear  or  favor  on  the 
boss's  side.  Your  name  is  checked  to  show  that  fact.  If 
English  is  your  native  language  and  you  have  reasonable 
self-assurance  and  a  job  out  of  the  boss's  reach,  you  can 
usually  vote  your  own  way,  even  if  that  way  is  Socialist 
or  Communist,  unless  some  one  has  thoughtfully  voted 
for  you  first — which  sometimes  happens.  But  if  your  Eng 
lish  is  poor,  you  seem  bewildered,  or  financially  insecure, 
what  then?  Assuming  that  you  have  given  the  Tammany 
canvasser  no  assurances,  you  run  a  hostile  gauntlet  as  you 
stand  in  line  at  the  polls  even  though  that  hostility  may 
not  result  in  immediate  violence.  When  you  come  to  the 
machine  you  may  be  offered  "assistance"  or  even  have  it 
forced  upon  you.  Assistance  is  the  polite  term  for  the 
intrusion  of  a  Tammany  inspector  with  you  into  the  actual 
voting  place  where  he  pulls  the  levers  for  you.  In  a  great 
many  cases,  of  course,  it  is  accepted  or  welcomed  by  bewil 
dered  voters  or  those  desirous  of  some  favor  from  the  boss. 

Legally,  assistance  can  be  given  only  to  those  who  at 
the  time  of  registration  ask  for  it  and  then  only  on  the 
ground  of  certain  physical  disabilities  like  blindness.  Two 
inspectors  of  different  parties  must  then  accompany  the 
voter  to  the  machine.  In  precinct  after  precinct  the  law 
is  contemptuously  ignored.  Reliable  Socialist  watchers, 
after  vainly  protesting,  have  seen  the  majority  of  the  voters 
of  a  precinct  accompanied  to  the  machine  by  a  good 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  87 

Democratic  relative  or  an  inspector  or  both.  Often  not 
even  the  bluff  of  a  proper  entry  is  made  on  the  election 
books.  We  have  been  jovially  assured  in  some  precincts 
that  "the  people  here  are  too  dumb  to  vote  any  other 
way."  The  miserably  exploited  Porto  Rican  colony  in  Har 
lem,  mostly  Spanish-speaking  but  entitled  to  vote,  is  at 
present  the  group  for  whom  "assistance"  is  the  rule  rather 
than  the  exception.  Thus  in  1931  in  one  precinct  of  the 
17th  Assembly  district  136  voters  were  marked  for  "assist 
ance" — 75  for  bad  eyes!  38  were  previous  voters  whose 
need  for  assistance  was  not  set  forth  according  to  law. 
For  this  and  other  offenses  one  group  of  election  inspec 
tors  in  Harlem  on  Socialist  complaint,  was  mildly  disci 
plined  by  the  Board  of  Elections  after  the  1931  election 
and  the  chairman  of  the  inspectors  faces  a  criminal  indict 
ment  in  proceedings  forced  by  Socialists  in  spite  of  an 
apathetic  district  attorney's  office.  But  such  action,  taken 
at  considerable  expense  of  time  and  energy  in  one  precinct 
only,  except  for  its  possible  exemplary  effect,  seems  a  little 
like  bailing  out  the  Hudson  with  a  bucket. 

Moreover  there  is  a  uniform  record  of  laxity  in  the 
courts  in  enforcing  election  laws.  Thus  a  woman  election 
inspector,  caught  red-handed  voting  the  third  time,  was 
discharged  by  a  Tammany  magistrate  on  the  ground  that 
she  was  voting  for  absent  loved  ones  and  meant  no  harm! 
Even  the  higher  courts  for  reasons  best  known  to  them 
selves  have  rendered  decisions  which  hamper  the  war 
against  colonization  or  the  use  of  floaters  by  permitting 
men  to  have  voting  residences  which  are  not  where  they 


88        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

really  live.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  colonization  or  its 
equivalent  in  New  York  City.  It  is  a  favorite  Democratic 
jest  that  up-state  Republicans  vote  the  tombstones.  We 
have  actually  known  one  definite  case  where  some  one 
registered  and  voted  on  the  name  of  a  man  dead  for  at 
least  a  year.  No  one  was  punished. 

Other  election  tricks  include  wholesale  ringing  up  of 
votes  near  the  end  of  the  day  on  the  names  of  voters  who 
have  not  appeared  to  vote  for  themselves.  More  common 
is  spying  on  the  voter  through  holes  and  cracks,  especially 
if  he  rejects  assistance.  Out  of  many  instances  of  this  sort 
we  recall  the  case  of  a  pushcart  peddler  who  was  followed 
out  on  the  street  and  warned  by  a  Tammany  captain  that 
he  could  not  ply  his  trade  in  that  district  since  he  had 
voted  for  one  Socialist. 

Stories  like  this,  magnified  by  men's  fears  in  a  great, 
cruel  city,  have  an  immense  effect  in  cowing  the  electorate. 
Few  there  are  who  will  go  to  court  to  swear  to  irregulari 
ties.  They  or  their  friends,  they  think,  are  sure  to  be  hurt. 
They  complain,  they  cry  for  justice,  but  it  must  come  to 
them  from  on  high.  Repeatedly  we  have  been  asked  to 
work  the  miracle  of  making  an  effective  complaint  al 
though  the  men  and  women  who  ask  it  are  utterly  unwill 
ing  even  to  make  affidavits.  Before  you,  critical  reader, 
become  too  scornful  of  such  weakness,  consider  just  how 
much  of  a  price  in  time,  delay,  possible  insult  you  would 
pay  for  carrying  through  a  fight  under  our  endlessly  slow 
and  wearisome  judicial  system  in  which  the  prosecuting 
authorities  are  all  on  the  side  of  those  who  should  be 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  89 

prosecuted.  And  if  to  this  difficulty  you  must  add  possible 
risk  to  your  job  or  to  your  cousin  who  works  in  the  Hos 
pital  Department,  just  how  far  would  you  carry  your 
complaint? 

To  sum  this  matter  up:  the  Tammany  technique  of  fear 
and  favor  for  controlling  the  electorate  emphatically  ex 
tends  to  actual  voting  on  election  day,  and  of  course,  on 
primary  day  if  opposition  makes  it  necessary.  The  methods 
of  fraud  and  intimidation  include  shipping  in  alleged 
voters  from  another  district  or  city,  physical  or  psycho 
logical  intimidation  at  the  polling  places,  actual  voting 
for  those  voters  whose  English  is  imperfect,  and  delib 
erate  misreading  of  the  voting  machine  totals.  Republican 
candidates  are  the  victims  of  such  tactics  almost  as  much 
as  minor  party  candidates,  yet  this  large  scale  fraud  is 
only  possible  because  of  the  habitual  collusion  of  the 
Republican  county  organizations — such  as  they  are — with 
their  Democratic  big  brothers.  Rarely  does  the  Republican 
leadership  in  any  county  bother  to  fight  for  the  whole 
ticket.  It  bargains  for  special  candidates,  and  it  could  not 
control  all  its  nominal  inspectors  even  if  it  so  desired. 
Its  rewards  are  what  the  Democrats  give  them:  some  cash 
and  favors,  and  here  and  there  a  judgeship.  Why  else  was 
Morris  Koenig  elected  judge  in  New  York  after  a  noto 
rious  deal  with  Murphy  except  that  his  brother  Sam,  the 
Republican  leader,  was  so  obliging  an  ally  to  Tammany? 

The  question  is  often  raised  whether  fraud,  intimida 
tion  or  theft  of  votes  really  changes  the  result  of  the  elec 
tion.  Probably  not  often  in  the  principal  elections,  but 


90        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

there  is  no  way  of  knowing.  In  the  old  days  of  paper 
ballots,  William  Randolph  Hearst  was  probably  counted 
out  in  his  race  against  McClellan  and  then  enough  ballot 
boxes  were  conveniently  lost  to  make  a  recount  ineffectual. 
Socialists  in  assembly  and  aldermanic  districts  have  fre 
quently  been  counted  out.  Sometimes  they  have  won  on 
recount  proceedings.  August  Claessens  in  a  Harlem  as 
sembly  district  in  1921  was  counted  out  and  later  seated 
on  recount  by  a  comfortable  margin.  There  is  no  reason 
to  think  conditions  have  changed  for  the  better. 

But  Tammany  knows  that  aside  from  a  mere  vulgar 
necessity  for  winning,  its  demonstrations  of  power  on 
election  day  are  immensely  significant  in  keeping  its 
dominion  of  fear  over  the  electorate.  Election  fraud  and 
intimidation  help  in  the  process  of  keeping  whole  dis 
tricts  cowed,  apathetic,  docile,  even  grateful  as  slaves  are 
grateful  for  small  favors.  There  is  no  public  opinion  of 
any  great  weight  against  these  election  frauds  so  long  as 
they  stop  short  of  riot  and  murder.  Taking  the  state  as  a 
whole  Republicans  gain  as  much  as  Democrats  by  fraud. 
Why  interfere  with  each  other,  especially  when  unpopular 
and  scarcely  respectable  minor  parties  are  the  chief  suf 
ferers?  Hence  a  situation  in  which  even  the  Seabury  inves 
tigation  ignored  election  methods  altogether.  Investiga 
tion  into  them  would  not  particularly  have  furthered  the 
man-hunt  against  Walker  into  which  politics  and  popular 
psychology  virtually  forced  the  inquiry. 

Unquestionably  the  election  code  could  be  strengthened. 
The  machines  could  be  improved  so  that  they  could  print 


GANG  RULE  AT  ELECTIONS  91 

the  results.  Something  might  be  gained  if  election  inspec 
tors  were  civil  service  appointees.  They  would  at  least 
be  more  literate  and  efficient  and  possibly — though  not 
certainly — they  would  be  less  amenable  to  political  orders. 
A  few  typical  criminal  prosecutions  might  have  an  exem 
plary  effect.  More  and  better  watchers  is  a  good  slogan 
for  every  minor  party.  But  until  new  faith  in  political 
action,  new  understanding  of  its  importance  and  effective 
organization  arouse  the  working  masses  out  of  their  apa 
thy,  elections  will  remain  approximately  as  dishonest  as 
they  now  are. 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW 

WHEN  Mayor  Walker  began  his  first  term  in  1926  the 
rumblings  of  a  great  judicial  scandal  had  already  begun. 
Hylan's  appointments  to  the  Magistrate's  Court  had  been 
notoriously  bad.  Walker  proceeded  blithely  to  carry  on 
the  tradition  by  appointing  all  the  political  henchmen  who 
were  thrust  upon  him  by  the  district  leaders  without 
apology  and  without  the  pretense  of  consulting  the  bar 
associations.  This  obedience  to  the  district  leaders  was 
not  painful  for  the  mayor.  It  fitted  in  quite  admirably 
with  the  pledge  that  he  had  given  at  the  beginning  of  his 
administration  that  he  was  and  would  remain  an  "organi- 
2ation"  mayor. 

As  his  administration  proceeded  and  the  worst  judicial 
scandals  of  New  York's  history  were  unfolded  in  the 
newspapers,  the  mayor's  loyalty  and  aplomb  were  un 
ruffled.  We  do  not  remember  a  single  occasion  during  his 
two  administrations  when  he  specifically  denounced  any 
judicial  crooks  or  assisted  in  their  exposure.  The  entire 
movement  for  exposure  and  reform  was  forced  upon  the 
city  against  Tammany  opposition  by  the  Socialists  and 
reformers,  by  the  Republican  federal  attorney,  Charles  H. 
Tuttle,  by  Fiorello  La  Guardia,  and  by  the  newspapers. 

92 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  93 

In  the  face  of  growing  scandals  the  prosecuting  machinery 
obviously  broke  down.  Feeble  "investigations"  were 
started  by  the  feeble  District  Attorney  Grain.  The  grand 
jury  which  inquired  into  the  Magistrate's  Court  in  1930 
reported  generalities,  and  concrete  "leads"  were  not  fol 
lowed  up. 

In  allowing  these  judicial  scandals  to  develop  without 
more  serious  efforts  at  reform,  Tammany  made  a  grave 
mistake.  Concerning  the  courts  we  Americans  still  pre 
serve  a  peculiar  kind  of  sensitiveness.  We  take  our  con 
gressmen  and  our  senators  with  something  less  than  seri 
ousness  but  we  preserve  the  fiction  that  the  moment  a 
man  is  elevated  to  the  bench  he  somehow  rises  above  his 
political  past  and  acquires  a  new  insight  and  impartiality. 
Tammany  has  profoundly  shocked  even  hard-boiled  New 
York  by  creating  a  court  system  that  has  gone  beyond  all 
the  limits  of  ordinary  political  manipulation. 

One  reason  for  the  shock  has  been  the  unrealistic  edu 
cation  in  civics  of  New  York  public  school  children,  to 
which  we  have  already  referred.  The  school  textbooks 
omit  all  reference  to  machine  control  of  the  courts.  In 
deed,  a  pupil  in  the  public  schools  would  imagine,  if  he 
did  not  read  the  newspapers,  that  our  magistrates  were 
wise  and  benign  citizens  chosen  for  their  knowledge  and 
impartiality,  that  the  people  actually  nominate  and  elect 
their  judges,  and  that  the  judges  are  removed  if  they  show 
favoritism. 

The  truth  is,  of  course,  that  almost  every  judge  in  New 
York  City  holds  his  position  by  virtue  of  an  initial  loyalty 


94        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

to  the  Democratic  or  Republican  machine.  He  may  have 
become  an  honest  and  scrupulously  fair  judge  in  the 
process  of  his  development — many  of  the  worst  machine 
judges  acquire  new  stature  when  their  debts  have  once 
been  paid — but  his  honesty  and  fairness  seldom  have  any 
thing  to  do  with  his  appointment.  The  sine  qua  non  of 
both  appointment  and  election  is  party  loyalty  and  service. 
The  magistrates  are  nominally  chosen  by  the  mayor  but 
actually  by  the  Democratic  leaders  of  the  districts  in  which 
vacancies  occur.  The  Supreme  Court  judges  are  chosen  by 
the  county  political  leaders. 

Nominally,  the  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court,  the  Court 
of  General  Sessions  and  the  City  Court  are  elected  by  the 
people.  Judicial  conventions  are  called  which  go  through 
democratic  forms,  but  these  conventions  blindly  approve 
any  slate  prepared  by  the  leaders.  The  system  occasionally 
permits  a  man  of  outstanding  ability  to  become  a  judge 
if  he  is  reasonably  loyal  to  his  party,  but  the  tendency  is 
to  exclude  all  men  of  independence  and  courage.  Bril 
liance  in  a  New  York  City  judge  is  accidental ;  conformity, 
at  least  at  the  beginning  of  his  career,  is  essential. 

No  finer  illustration  of  the  working  of  the  system  in 
the  higher  courts  could  be  found  than  the  notorious  judi 
cial  deal  in  the  Second  Judicial  District  (Brooklyn, 
Queens,  etc.)  in  1931  by  which  seven  Democratic  and  five 
Republican  Supreme  Court  judgeships  were  bargained  for 
over  the  political  counter  like  so  many  sacks  of  wheat. 
New  judges  were  needed  in  this  district  but  the  new  posi 
tions  could  not  be  provided  for  without  the  support  of  the 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  95 

Republican  legislature.  The  district  was  Democratic,  so 
the  Republicans  refused  to  create  the  new  positions  unless 
they  were  promised  some  of  the  judgeships.  The  deal 
whereby  the  leaders  named  the  12  judges  was  so  realisti 
cally  described  before  Judge  Seabury  by  John  Theofel, 
Democratic  boss  of  Queens,  that  we  shall  quote  from  his 
testimony  at  some  length: 

Q.  Now,  Mr.  Theofel,  you  know  that  during  the  last 
session  of  the  Legislature  a  law  was  enacted  increasing  the 
number  of  Justices  of  the  Supreme  Court  in  the  Second 
Judicial  District? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Also  increasing  the  number  of  County  Court  Judges, 
was  it  not? 

A.  One  judge. 

Q.  In  your  county? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  And  increasing  the  number  of  City  Court  Judges? 

A.  Two. 

Q.  Two.  And  how  about  Municipal  Court? 

A.  Two.  .   .   . 

Q.  All  right.  Now,  you  understood  that  some  of  those 
were  to  go  to  one  county,  others  to  another,  didn't  you? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  there  was  nothing  in  the  law  about  what  county 
the  Justices  should  come  from,  was  there? 

A.  No,  sir. 

Q.  If  that  was  to  be  determined  in  advance,  then  it  had 
to  be  a  determination  arrived  at  by  the  leaders,  didn't  it? 

A.  I  should  imagine  so. 

Q.  Well,  now,  before  this  law  was  enacted,  do  you  re 
member  a  meeting  in  the  spring  in  Brooklyn? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  When  was  it  that  you  held  that  meeting — in  the  early 
spring? 


96       WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

A.  I  think  it  was,  Judge. 

Q.  And  before  the  bill  was  enacted  into  law? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  who  was  present  at  that  meeting? 

A.  Mr.  McCooey,  Mr.  Rendt,  Mr.  Krug,  Mr.  Rasquin  and 
myself.  [County  leaders]  .  .  . 

Q.  And  where  was  that  conference  held? 

A.  Mr.  McCooey' s  office. 

Q.  Was  it  a  private  office  or  a  public  office? 

A.  Political  office. 

Q.  Political? 

A.  It  is  the  building  owned  by  the  organization. 

Q.  By  what  organization? 

A.  The  Democratic  Organization  of  Kings  County. 

Q.  And  who  called  the  conference? 

A.  Why,  I  was  telephoned  and  invited  down. 

Q.  That  was  a  conference  of  all  the  Democratic  leaders 
in  the  Second  Judicial  District? 

A.  Yes,  sir.   .    .    . 

Q.  Now,  taking  into  account  [the]  grave  perils  that  re 
sulted  from  the  law's  delay,  did  those  who  were  assembled 
there  arrive  at  any  conclusion  as  to  the  method  by  which 
they  could  remedy  these  grave  abuses? 

A.  The  only  way  to  remedy  it  was  to  get  more  Judges. 

Q.  Well,  how  could  those  who  were  assembled  there, 
every  one  of  them  Democrats,  get  more  Judges? 

A.  I  don't  know. 

Q.  They  couldn't,  could  they? 

A.  Not  without  the  assistance  of  somebody.  .   .   . 

Q.  And  then  did  anyone  suggest  how  many  more  Judges 
might  be  provided  for? 

A.  Well,  they  said,  somebody  said,  or  they  discussed  the 
matter  that  it  couldn't,  that  we  couldn't  get  more  Judges 
unless  the  Republicans  put  them  through. 

Q.  That  is,  in  the  Legislature? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  .  .   . 

Q.  Well,  now,  Mr.  Theofel,  didn't  somebody  say  that  the 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  97 

Republicans  wouldn't  put  it  through  and  create  more  Judge- 
ships,  because  if  they  did,  the  Democrats  would  elect  them 
all? 

A.  I  wish  they  had  of  put  them  through,  Judge. 

Q.  Well,  they  wouldn't,  would  they? 

A.  They  didn't. 

Q.  And  didn't  someone  say  the  reason  why  they  wouldn't 
was  because  the  Democrats  would  elect  them  all? 

A.  I  think  the  Democrats  would  have  elected  the  whole 
twelve. 

Q.  The  whole  twelve? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  No  matter  who  they  put  up  or  on  the  ticket? 

A.  I  think  so.  That  is  only  my  opinion.   I  may  be  wrong. 

Q.  At  any  rate,  you  statesmen  who  were  there  assembled 
(laughter — gavel).  .  .  . 

A.  Thank  you. 

Q.  Recognizing  the  difficulties,  were  there  to  devise  a 
method  for  relief  for  the  Supreme  Court  calendar,  weren't 
you? 

A.  Well,  we  were  looking  to  get  more  Judges;  also  to 
help  the  calendar. 

Q.  And  was  the  net  result  of  that  conference  that  it  was 
agreed  that  the  gentlemen  who  were  assembled  there  repre 
senting  the  Democratic  leaders  in  the  Second  District,  should 
enter  into  a  deal  with  the  Republican  leaders,  if  they  could 
get  a  bill  through  creating  more  Judges?  Was  that  the 
understanding  in  words  and  effect? 

A.  Well,  I  don't  know  whether  they  should  enter  in  or 
the  Republican  enter  in  with  us.  I  don't  know  which  it 
was.  .  .  . 

Q.  Wasn't  that,  in  substance  and  effect,  the  result  of  this 
conference  of  Democratic  leaders? 

A.  Along  those  lines. 

Q.  You  wouldn't  say  that  my  statement  of  it  was  inaccu 
rate  in  any  substantial  respect,  would  you? 

A.  No. 


98        WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Q.  Was  the  manner  in  which  those  places  should  be 
allocated  to  counties  after  the  bill  became  a  law,  discussed? 

A.  Well,  they  talked  about  so  many  for  Brooklyn  and  so 
many  for  Queens.  I  was  trying  to  get  as  many  as  I  could  for 
Queens. 

Q.  You,  as  a  loyal  Queens  leader,  wanted  as  many  as  you 
could? 

A.  I  would  like  to  have  gotten  the  whole  12  if  I  could. 

Q.  You  would  have  taken  the  whole  12  (laughter — 
gavel).  You  could  have  used  them  there,  couldn't  you? 

A.  I  believe  so.  ... 

Q.  How  many  did  they  cut  you  down  to? 

A.  Three.   . 

Q.  That  is,  they  cut  your  county  down  to  three? 

A.  Yes. 

Q.  You  had  to  make  provision  for  the  Republicans  in 
that  three,  didn't  you? 

A.  Well,  it  is  up  to  me  to  get  away  with  three  Demo 
crats,  if  I  could. 

Q.  If  you  could.  Well,  now,  you  never  expected,  if  three 
were  to  be  allocated  to  Queens  County,  that  you  would  be 
able  to  get  away  with  the  whole  three? 

A.  I  tried  hard  enough,  Judge,  but  the  Republicans 
wouldn't  let  me. 

Q.  You  had  to  give  up  one,  didn't  you? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  how  many  did  Mr.  McCooey  want  allocated  to 
him? 

A.  Well,  I  guess  he  got  five. 

Q.  Five.  Whatever  you  could  get  in  Queens  County,  you 
were  to  name,  and  whatever  he  could  get  in  Kings  County, 
he  was  to  name? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  he  got  five  in  this  conference,  didn't  he? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Well,  now,  how  much  did  Rendt  get  from  Richmond? 

A.  He  got  one  Judge. 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  99 

Q.  One.  How  was  he  going  to  meet  his  Republican  sit 
uation?  (laughter — gavel).  With  only  one  Judge. 

A.  That  was  a  tough  job. 

Q.  It  was  a  tough  job.  Well,  why  didn't  they  make  it 
thirteen  judges  and  give  two  to  Richmond? 

A.  I  don't  know.  .  .  . 

Q.  Well,  now,  all  this  apportionment  was  determined 
upon,  as  I  understand  it,  in  the  spring  of  this  year,  before 
the  bill  was  enacted  into  law? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  was  anything  said  as  to  how  many  of  the  twelve 
they  would  have  to  give  the  Republicans  for  passing  the 
legislation? 

A.  I  don't  know.  I  believe  it  was  up  to  you  to  get  away 
with  as  many  as  you  could. 

Q.  It  was  up  to  them  to  get  away  with  as  many  as  they 
could? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  If  I  could  have  got  away  with  the  three,  I 
would  have  grabbed  the  three  for  Queens,  but  as  I  said,  my 
Republican  leader  would  not  stand  for  it. 

Q.  No.  Well,  it  was  tentatively  understood,  was  it  not, 
that  with  reasonable  skill  the  Democrats  ought  to  be  able 
to  hold  seven  out  of  the  12? 

A.  Well,  that  was  the  general  opinion. 

Q.  General  opinion.  It  was  not  thought  fair  that  they 
should  give  the  Republicans  more  than  five  just  for  passing 
the  bill? 

A.  Well,  it  was  a  Democratic  district,  Judge. 

Q.  Exactly. 

A.  And  the  vote  would  show  that  if  the  Republicans 
passed  the  legislation  without  doing  business  with  the  Demo 
crats,  that  the  Democrats  could  go  out  and  nominate  12 
Democrats  and  elect  12. 

Q.  Therefore  there  had  to  be  some  kind  of  a  gentleman's 
agreement,  didn't  there? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  That  if  the  Republicans  would  create  the  judgeships 


100      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

the  Democrats  would  not  grab  them  all  but  would  give  five 
to  the  Republicans  and  take  seven  to  themselves? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  that  is  the  way,  in  the  ordinary  course  of  human 
events,  the  thing  finally  worked  out,  wasn't  it? 

A.  About  the  way,  yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  then  it  came  down  to  selecting  the  number  that 
had  been  allocated  to  Queens? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  You  didn't  assume  to  dictate  to  Mr.  McCooey  whom 
he  should  select  in  Kings,  did  you? 

A.  No,  sir. 

Q.  And  Mr.  McCooey  did  not  assume  to  dictate  to  you 
whom  you  should  take  in  Queens? 

A.  Well,  he  didn't  dictate. 

Q.  Well,  did  he  suggest? 

A.  No. 

Q.  That  was  a  matter  for  you  to  fight  out  with  your 
Republican  colleague,  wasn't  it? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  who  was  the  Republican  partner  in  Queens? 

A.  Mr.  Ashmead. 

Q.  Mr.  Ashmead.  He  represented  the  Republicans? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  you  represented  the  Democrats? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Well,  did  you  gentlemen  confer  on  how  many  you 
should  get  and  how  many  Mr.  Ashmead  should  get  and 
whether  or  not  Mr.  Ashmead  would  endorse  your  two  and 
whether  or  not  you  would  endorse  his  one? 

A.  Yes,  we  did.  .    .    . 

Q.  And  as  the  result  of  the  conference  between  you  and 
Mr.  Ashmead  it  was  understood  between  you  and  Mr. 
Ashmead,  was  it  not,  that  you  should  name  two  Judges  in 
Queens  and  that  he  should  name  one? 

A.  Yes,  but  Mr.  Ashmead  would  have  taken  the  two  if 
I  would  have  let  him  get  away  with  it. 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  101 

Q.  He  was  perfectly  willing  to  take  the  two  and  give 
you  one? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  You  wouldn't  let  him  get  away  with  that? 

A.  Not  if  I  could  help  it.   I  tried  to  get  the  three. 

Q.  You  tried  to  get  the  three  but  he  wouldn't  let  you  get 
away  with  that,  would  he? 

A.  No,  sir. 

Q.  So  that  as  the  result  of  these  meetings  between  you 
and  Mr.  Ashmead  it  was  finally  agreed  that  you  should 
have  two  and  that  he  should  have  one? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  .   .   . 

Q.  You  have  told  us  very  clearly  the  arrangement  in 
reference  to  the  Supreme  Court  Justices.  Now,  was  there 
any  arrangement  as  to  the  City  Court  Justices? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  you  were  to  get  in  Queens  County  how  many  City 
Court  Justices? 

A.  Two. 

Q.  And  you  were  to  have  one  and  Ashmead  one? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  was  that  also  the  subject  matter  of  your  conversa 
tions  with  Ashmead? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  Were  there  any  County  Judges  created? 

A.  One. 

Q.  Who  was  to  get  the  County  Judge? 

A.  I  had  one  of  our  Assemblymen  introduce  that  bill, 
Judge. 

Q.  You  had  one  of  your  Assemblymen  introduce  that 
bill? 

A.  Yes,  sir.   There  was  only  one  County  Judge. 

Q.  Wasn't  that  the  subject  of  negotiations  with  Mr.  Ash 
mead? 

A.  Well,  I  believe  Mr.  Ashmead  was  to  help  us  get  the 
legislation  through  on  it. 

Q.  Well,  the  legislation  did  go  through  and  there  was 


102      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

one  County  Judge  additional  for  Queens  created,  wasn't 
there? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  who  was  to  nominate  him? 

A.  We  were,  the  Democrats. 

Q.  The  Democrats.   And  was  Ashmead  to  support  it? 

A.  Yes,  sir,  he  agreed  to  support. 

Q.  He  agreed  to.  And  how  many  Municipal  Court 
Judges? 

A.  Two. 

Q.  And  how  many  of  those  two  Municipal  Court  Judges 
were  you  to  get? 

A.  One. 

Q.  And  how  many  was  Ashmead  to  get? 

A.  There  was  only  one  more. 

Q.  He  was  to  get  the  other? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  when  you  got  them  all  together,  why,  you  were 
both  to  endorse  that  ticket,  weren't  you? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  And  that  is  what  you  have  done,  isn't  it? 

A.  Yes,  sir.  .   .   .* 

It  was  not  a  surprise  after  this  testimony  when  one  of 
the  prospective  candidates  for  the  Supreme  Court  justice 
ship  allotted  to  the  Republicans  in  Queens  testified  that 
the  Republican  judge  selected  was  supposed  to  contribute 
$5,000  to  the  county  committee's  treasury.  It  is  certain, 
however,  that  one  of  the  judges  involved  was  not  required 
to  pay  a  cent  for  his  post.  He  was  young  John  McCooey, 
Jr.,  31  years  old,  relatively  inexperienced  and  unknown 
except  in  his  amazing  successes  before  the  Board  of  Stand 
ards  and  Appeals  which  we  have  already  described.  He 
and  his  father  had  reason  to  feel  deeply  grateful  to  Frank- 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  103 

lin  D.  Roosevelt  who  had  made  the  judicial  deal  possible 
by  signing  the  bill  which  created  the  twelve  new  judge- 
ships  after  he  had  been  repeatedly  warned  by  civic  leaders 
that  a  corrupt  bargain  was  in  the  making. 

For  the  common  man  the  justice  meted  out  in  the  lower 
courts  is  much  more  important  than  that  meted  out  in  the 
Supreme  Court.  If  we  include  the  traffic  cases  over  half  a 
million  New  Yorkers  are  arraigned  in  the  Magistrate's 
Court  in  a  single  year,  and  for  most  of  them  this  arraign 
ment  is  their  sole  contact  with  the  judicial  machinery  of 
their  city.  If  they  are  to  develop  "faith  in  American  insti 
tutions"  this  is  the  place  to  acquire  it.  If  the  misfits  of  a 
great  city  are  to  be  redeemed  by  intelligent  social  service, 
this  is  the  social  worker's  opportunity. 

New  York  has  a  confusing  network  of  lower  courts  for 
criminal  and  civil  cases.  Ordinary  criminal  cases  are  cov 
ered  in  an  ascending  order  of  seriousness  by  the  Magis 
trate's  Court,  the  Court  of  Special  Sessions  and  the  Court 
of  General  Sessions.  The  Magistrate's  Court  takes  care  of 
cases  of  drunkenness,  vagrancy  and  disorderly  conduct  di 
rectly,  and  its  three  branches,  the  Children's  Court,  the 
Traffic  Court,  and  the  Family  Court,  take  care  of  the  minor 
offenses  in  these  specialized  fields.  The  Court  of  Special 
Sessions  also  handles  certain  misdemeanor  cases  which 
have  passed  through  the  Magistrate's  Court.  Felonies  such 
as  murder  and  arson  go  to  the  Court  of  General  Sessions. 
Outside  of  Manhattan  the  county  courts  function  in  place 
of  the  General  Sessions  Court.  Civil  cases  involving  less 


104      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

than  $1,000  may  go  to  the  Municipal  Court,  and  $1,000 
to  $3,000  to  the  City  Court.  In  the  State  Supreme  Court 
suits  for  any  amount  may  be  brought.  Estates  are  cared 
for  by  the  Surrogate's  Court,  which  is  a  county  institution. 

The  quality  of  the  judges  tends  to  improve  in  propor 
tion  to  the  square  of  the  distance  from  a  local  Tammany 
leader.  The  magistrates  are  at  the  bottom,  the  regular 
Supreme  Court  justices  a  little  better,  the  Appellate  Divi 
sion  slightly  tainted,  and  the  Court  of  Appeals  subservient 
only  to  the  congealed  traditions  of  American  capitalism. 
The  magistrates  and  Special  Sessions  judges  are  chosen  by 
the  mayor,  the  Appellate  Division  chosen  by  the  governor 
from  the  elected  justices  of  the  State  Supreme  Court,  and 
the  other  judges  elected.  The  Court  of  Appeals  is  the 
highest  state  court  and  to  it  come  the  important  cases  after 
they  have  been  appealed  from  a  Supreme  Court  judge  to 
the  Appellate  Division  of  a  given  district. 

In  all  of  these  courts  the  pay  is  good  and  the  term  of 
office  is  long,  sufficiently  good  and  sufficiently  long  so  that 
every  judicial  appointment  or  nomination  is  fought  for 
vigorously,  and,  it  is  said,  paid  for  handsomely  in  service 
or  campaign  contributions.  A  State  Supreme  Court  justice 
receives  $25,000  a  year,  $5,000  more  than  a  justice  of  the 
United  States  Supreme  Court,  and  his  term  is  fourteen 
years.  A  magistrate  receives  $12,000  a  year  for  ten  years. 
The  chief  judge  of  the  Children's  Court  receives  $18,000 
a  year,  $3,000  more  than  the  Vice  President  of  the  United 
States.  There  is  no  need  of  his  being  a  specialist  in  child 
welfare  and  his  duties  take  only  a  few  hours  a  day.  No 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  105 

further  comment  is  needed  as  to  the  quality  of  these  Chil 
dren's  Court  judges  than  to  point  out  that  ex-Mayor 
Hylan  was  appointed  a  Children's  Court  judge  when  he 
threatened  to  become  politically  embarrassing  by  cutting 
in  on  the  Tammany  vote  after  Tammany  had  decided  to 
discard  him.  When  Hylan  was  appointed,  a  New  York 
columnist  wrote  that  the  children  of  Queens  would  now 
be  tried  by  their  peer! 

The  thing  which  makes  the  Magistrate's  Court  so  im 
portant  is  not  only  the  half  million  cases  which  come  up 
before  the  fifty  magistrates  each  year  but  the  fact  that  this 
court  is  in  many  cases  the  portal  to  higher  courts  where 
serious  offenses  are  tried.  In  1929  there  were  17,000  pris 
oners  arraigned  before  the  magistrates  on  charges  of  fel 
onies.  A  magistrate  under  political  pressure  may  dismiss 
an  important  prisoner  after  a  perfunctory  hearing,  or  he 
may  ruin  the  career  of  a  poor  man  who  refuses  to  bow  to 
the  local  district  leader.  If  the  magistrate  exercises  reason 
able  caution  in  following  the  orders  of  a  district  leader,  it 
is  almost  impossible  to  prove  malfeasance  in  office. 

One  magistrate  during  the  height  of  the  1930  scandals, 
was  quoted  as  saying:  "If  I  were  a  political  leader  called 
into  court  to  help  out  a  constituent,  I  would  not  feel  that  I 
was  using  my  political  authority  to  defeat  the  ends  of  jus 
tice.  I  would  feel  as  though  I  were  in  the  position  of  a 
military  judge  advocate  in  the  army,  sworn  to  see  that 
every  person  brought  to  court,  no  matter  how  incapable  of 
self-help,  should  have  all  his  deserts  whether  they  were 
comfortable  or  uncomfortable  for  him." 


106      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Of  course,  the  district  leader  does  not  come  into  court 
as  a  judge  advocate  but  as  a  political  fixer  and  overlord 
who  is  more  powerful  than  the  magistrate  himself.  Gro 
tesquely  enough,  the  leader  is  quite  commonly  a  clerk  or 
other  official  in  the  magistrate's  or  in  some  higher  court, 
so  that  citizens  who  want  justice  may  go  directly  to  the 
real  seat  of  authority.  Rotund,  heavy-footed  John  Theo- 
fel,  whose  testimony  we  have  just  quoted,  is  chief  clerk 
in  the  court  of  Surrogate  Hetherington,  who  was  put  in 
office  by  Theofel  and  who  returned  the  compliment  by 
promptly  whitewashing  Theofel  after  charges  were 
brought  against  him  by  the  City  Affairs  Committee. 

The  scandal  of  the  magistrates'  courts  of  New  York  is 
not  new;  like  prosperity  under  capitalism  it  is  cyclical. 
In  1908  the  Page  Commission,  appointed  by  the  legisla 
ture,  investigated  the  inferior  criminal  courts  of  New 
York  and  found  many  of  the  abuses  which  still  persisted 
when  Judge  Seabury  made  his  investigation  22  years 
later.  The  Page  Commission  said:  "The  ordinary  scene  in 
the  magistrate's  court  is  one  of  confusion  and  utter  lack  of 
dignity.  .  .  ."  It  denounced  what  would  have  been 
called  the  bail  bond  racket,  if  the  word  racket  had  then 
been  popularized.  Frank  Moss,  former  police  commis 
sioner  and  president  of  the  Society  for  the  Prevention  of 
Crime,  said  before  the  Page  Commission:  "I  think  there 
are  more  anarchists  bred  in  those  places  (lower  criminal 
courts  of  New  York  City)  than  are  made  in  the  meetings 
of  the  anarchistic  clubs.  I  think  that  many  a  man  who 
in  his  heart  is  innocent  and  who  is  brought  up  by  the 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  107 

police  unfairly  before  a  court  which  handles  him  unfairly, 
whatever  may  be  the  reason,  goes  out  with  a  feeling  of 
hatred  toward  the  institutions  which  we  desire  to  sus 


tain."  2 


The  present  wave  of  court  scandals  centered  originally 
about  Magistrates  Vitale  and  Ewald,  and  grew  with  the 
disappearance  of  Justice  Crater.  Vitale  was  a  magistrate 
who  had  the  bad  fortune  to  eat  a  dinner  one  night  in  his 
honor  in  the  midst  of  a  hold-up  in  which  it  developed  that 
half  a  dozen  of  his  fellow  diners  were  rather  famous  gun 
men.  Famous  but  not  so  quick  on  the  draw  as  the  gun 
men  who  robbed  them  that  night.  The  incident  aroused 
much  comment.  La  Guardia  and  a  Socialist  leader  de 
manded  Vitale' s  removal.  The  Association  of  the  Bar  of 
the  City  of  New  York  recommended  Vi tale's  removal 
after  they  had  discovered  that  the  magistrate  had  accepted 
a  $19,940  "loan"  from  the  enterprising  gambler,  Arnold 
Rothstein,  and  that  his  bank  deposits  contained  a  mysteri 
ous  $100,000.  Vitale  was  removed  as  judge  but  not  dis 
barred  as  a  lawyer,  and  to-day  he  is  practicing  law  merrily. 
Like  many  of  his  associates  he  has  not  been  disqualified 
as  a  lawyer  because  he  was  an  unfit  judge. 

The  case  of  Magistrate  George  F.  Ewald  attracted  even 
wider  attention.  Ewald  was  caught  originally  in  the  stout 
income  tax  net  of  Charles  H.  Tuttle.  It  was  discovered 
that  he  or  his  wife  had  paid  out  $10,000  about  the  time 
that  he  became  a  magistrate,  and  the  discovery  created 
enough  of  a  sensation  to  cause  a  special  grand  jury  in 
vestigation  on  order  of  Governor  Roosevelt,  with  Hiram 


108      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

C.  Todd  as  special  prosecutor.  Ewald  was  indicted  for 
bribery  shortly  after  he  had  resigned  from  office  and 
Martin  J.  Healy,  his  district  leader  who  was  also  first 
deputy  commissioner  of  Plant  and  Structures,  was  charged 
with  accepting  the  bribe.  Why  should  Mrs.  Ewald  pay 
$10,000  to  Mr.  Healy  at  such  an  appropriate  moment? 
Mrs.  Ewald  at  first  refused  to  answer  on  the  ground  that 
it  might  incriminate  her,  but  she  finally  came  forward  with 
the  fantastic  story  that  she  lent  $10,000  to  Healy  to  buy  a 
house  on  Long  Island  without  keeping  any  receipt  or  de 
manding  any  security.  Mrs.  Ewald  was  relatively  poor  and 
Mr.  Healy  was  rich.  Mrs.  Ewald  was  not  a  friend  of 
Healy's,  but  out  of  the  generosity  of  a  warm  heart  she 
advanced  the  $10,000  and  ergo  her  husband  became  a 
magistrate!  Two  American  juries  looked  that  evidence 
squarely  in  the  face  and  disagreed!  The  Ewalds  and  Healy 
were  finally  freed. 

A  conclusion  like  this  prompts  us  to  speak  very  harshly 
of  the  state  of  public  mind  that  allows  such  "explana 
tions"  as  those  advanced  by  Mrs.  Ewald  to  establish  a  rea 
sonable  doubt  in  a  jury's  mind.  It  also  constitutes  an  in 
dictment  of  the  laws  of  evidence  as  developed  in  our  court 
system.  Why  should  not  a  jury  be  allowed  to  take  into 
account  the  fact  that  a  person  accused  of  crime  refuses  to 
waive  immunity  when  first  arraigned?  In  actual  life  the 
ability  to  tell  a  straight  story  concerning  one's  conduct 
when  first  charged  with  crime  is  an  important  indication 
of  innocence,  and  any  delay  which  permits  the  building 
up  of  a  cooperative  set  of  lies  should  be  taken  into  ac- 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW  109 

count  as  an  indication  of  guilt.  In  the  courts,  however, 
full  time  is  allowed  to  build  up  elaborate  evasions  and 
defendants  may  refuse  to  testify  without  prejudice  to  their 
case.  We  see  no  reason  why  anyone  charged  with  any 
crime  should  be  allowed  to  refuse  to  testify,  least  of  all  a 
public  official  or  any  citizen  charged  with  committing  a 
crime  in  connection  with  public  life. 

The  Ewald  case  was  not  only  a  revelation  of  the  break 
down  of  our  jury  system  in  producing  convictions,  but  it 
brought  into  the  open  a  whole  set  of  Tammany  lawyers 
who  play  with  the  machine  on  occasion  and  yet  try  to 
maintain  their  professional  respectability.  The  special 
grand  jury  investigating  Ewald  set  out  to  discover  just 
how  common  the  practice  was  of  paying  $10,000  for  a 
judgeship,  and  who  commonly  received  the  money.  Natu 
rally  it  summoned  first  the  real  ruler  of  political  Manhat 
tan,  John  F.  Curry,  but  when  Mr.  Curry  was  asked  on 
September  24,  1930,  to  waive  immunity  before  this  grand 
jury,  he  stamped  furiously  from  the  room  and  told  the 
host  of  expectant  reporters  that  he  had  been  "insulted." 
Whereupon  seventeen  Tammany  district  leaders  followed 
their  chief  and  refused  to  waive  immunity. 

The  nature  of  the  insult  to  Mr.  Curry  is  rather  difficult 
to  understand  in  view  of  the  known  situation  in  New 
York  courts.  Since  the  magistrates  are  chosen  by  district 
leaders  and  it  is  almost  universally  believed  that  they  pay 
* 'campaign  contributions"  to  these  leaders  in  return  for 
their  appointments,  the  question  naturally  arises:  How  are 
the  contributions  distributed?  Does  Mr.  Curry  receive  anjr 


110      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

of  them?  What  does  Mr.  Curry  consider  a  fair  contribu 
tion? 

Miss  Annie  Mathews,  noted  Tammany  worker  and  co- 
leader  in  the  19th  district  with  Martin  J.  Healy,  who  was 
charged  with  accepting  the  bribe  from  Ewald,  gave  away 
the  Tammany  case  in  a  charmingly  nai've  speech  before 
the  League  of  Women  Voters.  Wouldn't  a  judge  be  a 
"rotter,"  she  asked,  if  he  got  an  appointment  for  the 
Supreme  Court  bench  from  a  district  leader  for  14  years 
at  a  salary  of  $25,000  a  year  and  then  just  said  "Thank 
you"? 

When  Mr.  Curry  could  not  appreciate  the  relevance  of 
the  grand  jury's  very  pertinent  questions  about  buying 
judgeships,  the  heavy  artillery  of  Tammany's  legal  brigade 
came  to  his  rescue  the  next  day  with  an  open  letter. 
Eleven  of  the  city's  most  powerful  lawyers,  knowing  full 
well  that  their  endorsement  would  be  used  to  £ght  any 
thorough  investigation  of  New  York  corruption,  wrote 
Mr.  Curry  that  "your  attitude  and  position  reflected  in  a 
high  degree  what  was  becoming  to  any  citizen  of  dignity 
and  self-respect  in  the  community.  .  .  .You  should  be 
commended  for  defending  a  right  of  inestimable  value  to 
every  citizen."  The  eleven  lawyers  were  George  Gordon 
Battle,  Daniel  F.  Cohalan,  Edward  S.  Dore,  Philip  J. 
Dunn,  Terence  J.  McManus,  Jeremiah  T.  Mahoney,  James 
A.  O'Gorman,  Max  D.  Steuer,  Leslie  J.  Tompkins,  Samuel 

Untermyer  and  Frank  P.  Walsh. 

arrnnioqqfi  ti 

? 


7 
THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS 

AFTER  the  Vitale  and  Ewald  cases  the  public  was  ready 
for  anything.  Seabury  in  his  investigation  of  the  Magis 
trates'  Courts  did  not  disappoint  it.  He  proved  point  by 
point  the  thesis  that  the  rottenness  of  New  York's  lower 
criminal  courts  was  part  of  an  organized  spoils  system. 
The  one  big  disappointment  about  his  investigation  was 
its  restriction  to  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx.  That  destroyed 
half  its  usefulness.  When  the  investigation  finally  came, 
it  included  only  magistrates'  courts  although  other  sec 
tions  of  the  New  York  city  courts  were  just  as  obviously 
a  part  of  the  Tammany  system.  It  left  Brooklyn  and 
Queens  magistrates'  courts  out  of  the  picture  although  the 
manipulations  of  Boss  McCooey  in  Brooklyn  and  Boss 
Theofel  in  Queens  had  been  quite  as  notorious  as  the  ex 
ploits  of  Boss  Curry  in  Manhattan  and  Boss  Flynn  in  the 
Bronx.  This  restriction  of  the  inquiry  was  maneuvered  by 
Governor  Roosevelt,  evidently  acting  under  great  pressure 
from  his  party  machine.  He  did  the  least  that  he  could  do 
under  the  circumstances;  asked  the  Appellate  Division  in 
a  letter  on  August  21,  1930,  to  investigate  the  Magis 
trates'  Courts  of  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx.  We  shall  dis 
cuss  Roosevelt's  part  in  this  situation  later. 

Ill 


112      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Considering  these  limitations  and  the  obstacles  thrown 
in  his  way  by  Tammany,  Judge  Seabury's  report  on  the 
Magistrates'  Court  was  an  outstanding  document,  more 
remarkable  than  his  later  reports  in  the  general  city 
investigation. 

His  investigation  proved  three  things  concerning  the 
magistrates'  courts,  (1)  that  they  were  part  of  a  corrupt 
spoils  system,  (2)  that  certain  individual  magistrates 
were  sufficiently  corrupt  or  incompetent  to  be  removed, 
and  (3)  that  a  mechanical  rearrangement  of  the  lower 
criminal  courts  would  make  them  more  efficient. 

There  was  nothing  new  or  startling  about  these  conclu 
sions  since  they  had  been  matters  of  common  knowledge 
for  years  among  civic  workers,  but  Judge  Seabury  made 
them  known  to  the  average  New  Yorker  by  skillful  dram 
atization.  As  a  result  of  his  inquiry  Magistrates  Jean  Nor- 
ris  and  Jesse  Silbermann  were  removed  from  office  by  the 
Appellate  Division,  Magistrates  Francis  McQuade, 
George  W.  Simpson  and  Henry  M.  R.  Goodman  resigned 
under  fire,  6  police  officers  were  convicted  of  crime,  and 
13  resigned  or  were  suspended  from  the  force.  Judge  Sea 
bury's  one  important  failure  in  this  investigation  was  the 
failure  to  convict  any  magistrate  of  actually  paying  cash 
for  his  office.  He  was  unlucky  enough  to  find  not  a  single 
dying  or  disappointed  judge  who  was  ready  to  shrive  his 
soul  by  telling  the  final  truth  about  his  life. 

In  the  absence  of  such  a  star  stool  pigeon  some  of  the 
magistrates  provided  effective  entertainment  by  describing 
the  manner  of  their  appointment.  Magistrate  August 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  113 

Dreyer  found  that  his  law  business  was  failing,  so  he  won 
promotion  in  the  following  manner: 

I  was  a  Democrat,  and  I  belonged  to  the  organization 
about  eighteen  years.  This  theatrical  practice  was  going 
downhill  fast,  upon  the  ground  that  the  National  Vaude 
ville  Artists  started,  which  was  taking  care  of  all  differ 
ences,  which  were  settled  by  arbitration  by  the  National 
Vaudeville  Artists.  The  Equity  was  started  with  Mr.  Paul 
Turner  there,  and  they  took  care  of  all  their  differences,  so 
that  really  what  was  left  in  the  theatrical  business  was 
nothing  but  to  take  a  divorce  suit,  and  I  felt  that  I  did  not 
want  to  take  any  divorce  suits.  I  simply  went  around  to  my 
organization  at  the  time,  which  was  the  25th,  and  I  spoke  to 
George  Donnellan,  who  was  leader  at  the  time;  he  is  a 
General  Sessions  Court  judge.  I  said:  "Listen" — he  was  not 
a  judge  at  the  time — I  said:  "Listen,  George,  for  eighteen 
years  I  never  knew  what  a  reference  or  receivership  or  guar 
dianship  was,  never  got  a  5 -cent  piece,  never  held  a  political 
office.  Here  is  my  position,  my  practice  absolutely  gone, 
the  National  Vaudeville  Artists  settle  their  differences  with 
the  Actors'  Equity,  who  settle  their  differences  through  Paul 
Turner,  what  am  I  going  to  do?  I  think  I  am  entitled  to 
get  a  judgeship  for  all  I  have  done  for  eighteen  years,  spent 
my  time  three  times  a  week,  never  asked  for  anything,  never 
bothered  about  references,"  I  said,  "I  think  I  am  entitled  to 
some  recognition."  Well,  he  says:  "I  will  be  honest  with 
you,  you  are  entitled  to  some  recognition.  You  never  an 
noyed  me  or  bothered  me,  other  lawyers  were  after  me  to 
see  what  I  could  get  for  them."  I  said:  "I  think  I  am  en 
titled  to  it."  x 

P.S.  He  got  the  job. 

Although  the  Inferior  Criminal  Courts  Act  specifically 
forbids  a  magistrate  from  engaging  in  other  profession  or 
occupation  while  he  is  on  the  bench,  Magistrate  McQuade 


114      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

regarded  the  act  so  lightly  that  he  served  openly  in  the 
management  of  the  New  York  Giants  and  even  sued  the 
club  to  reinstate  him  as  treasurer.  When  about  to  be  con 
fronted  with  these  facts,  he  resigned,  but  not  before  he 
had  contributed  this  classic  of  political  frankness: 

Q.  Now,  in  your  own  words,  Judge,  will  you  state  to  the 
Court,  just  how  you  came  to  be  appointed  Magistrate? 

A.  Well,  I  was  active  around  in  politics,  and  so  on,  and 
I  had  the  endorsement  of  Mr.  Hyde,  who  was  City  Cham 
berlain  at  the  time,  and  Senator  Sullivan  interested  himself 
in  me. 

Q.  Senator  who? 

A.  Sullivan. 

Q.  Tim  Sullivan? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 


Q.  Just  how  did  you  manage  to  get  this  new  appoint 
ment? 

A.  Why,  I  asked  Mr.  Murphy,  who  was  the  head  of 
Tammany  Hall,  if  he  saw  fit  to  give  me  the  long  term.  Of 
course,  I  asked  him  to  speak  to  the  Mayor,  if  he  would,  at 
that  time  Hylan,  and  he  did,  and  Hylan  gave  me  the  long 
term.2 

Magistrate  Maurice  Gottlieb  told  of  his  appointment 
as  follows: 

Q.  Now,  will  you  tell  us  a  little  more  about  the  circum 
stances  of  your  appointment  to  the  bench,  Judge?  Was  the 
appointment  made  upon  the  recommendation  of  Judge 
Mahoney  or  was  it  merely  that  he  sponsored  you  through 
your  district  leader  and  through  organization  circles? 

A.  Well,  I  can  explain  that.  I  have  been  a  member  of 
Tammany  Hall  over  40  years.  I  have  lived  in  Yorkville  for 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  115 

30  odd  years.  My  folks  lived  in  Yorkville  for  50  years.  I 
am  a  member  of  the  Osceola  Club  for  over  20  years.  Judge 
Mahoney — I  was  very  active  with  Judge  Mahoney  in  help 
ing  to  elect  him  leader,  that  must  be  12  or  15  years  ago,  and 
I  might  say  that  when  he  became  leader  I  was  fairly  well 
known  as  his  right-hand  bower.  I  took  care  of  things  politi 
cally.  I  helped  get  the  house  that  our  clubhouse  is  in.  I  have 
done  things  to  help  build  up  our  organization  in  our  dis 
trict.  .  .  .  Judge  Rittenberg,  my  predecessor,  was  very  sick. 
I  had  known  Moe  Rittenberg  for  probably  30  or  35  years. 
A  call  came  for  a  man  to  fill  his  place,  as  temporary  magis 
trate.  I  spoke  to  Briarly.  There  seemed  to  be  no  logical 
man  for  the  position  but  myself.  After  all,  I  had  spent 
money,  time  and  help  to  build  up  the  organization. 

In  appointing  magistrates  and  in  nominating  other  offi 
cials  Tammany  observes  an  unwritten  law  of  religious  and 
national  allotments.  While  the  leading  figures  in  the 
Democratic  machine  are  Irish  Catholics,  the  Jews  and 
Protestants  must  be  appeased.  Senator  Royal  S.  Copeland 
is  a  leading  Methodist;  District  Attorney  Crain  is  an 
Episcopalian  (Tammany  has  a  fondness  for  Protestant 
district  attorneys)  ;  Controller  Berry  is  a  Presbyterian; 
Borough  President  Samuel  Levy  of  Manhattan  is  a  Jew; 
Joseph  V.  McKee,  president  of  the  Board  of  Aldermen,  is 
Catholic,  as  are  Mayor  Walker  and  a  host  of  other  lead 
ers.  A  rough  balance  of  religious  and  national  allotments 
is  maintained  in  the  courts  and  the  other  city  offices  by 
assigning  a  Jew  to  succeed  a  Jew,  a  German  to  succeed  a 
German  and  so  on.  When  Julius  Miller,  borough  presi 
dent  of  Manhattan,  was  made  a  Supreme  Court  judge  it 
was  taken  for  granted  that  this  Jewish  leader  should  have 


116      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

a  Jewish  successor  if  a  reasonably  able  one  could  be  found. 
Accordingly  Samuel  Levy,  a  leading  politician  in  Jewish 
fraternal  orders,  took  his  place  and  promptly  demon 
strated  his  party  loyalty  by  allowing  a  subordinate  to  dis 
tribute  the  employment  cards  from  a  public  city  employ 
ment  office  through  Tammany  clubhouses  just  before  elec 
tion  day.  After  this  event  he  was  elected  President  of  the 
National  Jewish  Orthodox  Congregations  of  the  United 
States  and  Canada. 

When  Francis  X.  Mancuso  resigned  under  fire  as  a 
judge  of  the  Court  of  General  Sessions  because  he  was 
caught  as  a  director  in  the  $5,000,000  failure  of  the  City 
Trust  Co.,  it  was  taken  for  granted  that  another  Italian 
should  get  his  position,  so  Governor  Roosevelt  appointed 
Amadeo  A.  Bertini  who  resembled  his  successor  so  strik 
ingly  that  he  refused  to  waive  immunity  before  a  grand 
jury.  When  Magistrate  Jesse  Silbermann  was  being  ques 
tioned  by  Judge  Seabury  in  the  Magistrates'  Court  investi 
gation,  he  calmly  admitted  that  he  had  been  chosen  by 
Mayor  Walker  because  the  mayor  had  "decided  to  appoint 
a  Hebrew  from  the  Bronx." 

The  power  of  the  Democratic  organization  in  New 
York  remains  as  it  has  for  so  long  remained  in  the  hands 
of  Irish  Catholic  leaders.  Curry,  McCooey,  and  Flynn  of 
Bronx — the  big  three  bosses  of  New  York  political  life, 
are  all  Irish  Catholic.  Their  important  district  leaders  are 
Irish  Catholic.  Half  of  the  sachems  of  Tammany  Hall 
are  Irish  Catholic — and  not  one  Jewish.  That  is  one  rea 
son  no  doubt,  why  the  Catholic  Church  in  New  York  has 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  117 

been  so  far  behind  the  Protestant  churches  and  synagogues 
in  denouncing  civic  corruption  and  why  no  newspaper  in 
New  York  ventures  to  mention  this  fact  editorially  for 
fear  of  being  accused  of  religious  prejudice.  We  know 
many  good  Catholics  in  New  York  who  resent  this  civic 
inertia  of  their  own  church  very  keenly. 

The  Rev.  Edward  Lodge  Curran,  editor  of  the  official 
organ  of  the  International  Catholic  Truth  Society  in  a 
recent  pamphlet  on  "Graft"  said:  "Tammany  is  once 
again  under  fire  and  once  again  the  testimony  of  its  op 
erations,  wrested  from  its  unwilling  witnesses  only 
through  fear  of  perjury,  reveals  the  prevalence  of  the  same 
plundering  and  personally  profiting  attitude  toward  the 
administration  of  city  government  that  has  characterized 
its  history  since  its  association  with  Aaron  Burr.  .  .  .  The 
leopard  does  not  change  his  spots.  The  excuses  of  the 
older  grafter  were  blunt.  The  excuses  of  the  newer  grafter 
are  naive.  The  testimony  of  the  older  grafter  reads  like  a 
melodrama.  The  testimony  of  the  newer  grafter  reads 
like  a  fairy  tale." 

About  the  creedal  and  racial  allotment  of  Tammany  in 
the  magistrates'  courts  Judge  Seabury  was  caustic  in  his 
final  report.  He  said: 

Ability  and  fitness  for  the  office,  where  they  exist,  are 
as  a  rule,  purely  accidental.  The  selection  is  made  primarily 
to  strengthen  the  power  of  the  party.  This  explains  the 
principle  by  which  appointments  are  parcelled  out  to  meet 
the  alleged  claims  of  particular  political  districts;  it  also  ex 
plains  the  even  more  vicious  principle  by  which  race,  nation 
ality  and  creed  often  dictate  the  selection  of  Magistrates.3 


118      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

In  his  more  general  comment  on  the  root  of  the  prob 
lem  in  the  Magistrates'  Court,  Seabury  summed  up  his 
findings  in  a  striking  passage: 

The  reason  why  we  are  no  better  off  today  under  the  In 
ferior  Criminal  Courts  Act  than  we  were  prior  to  its  enact 
ment  is  that  the  Inferior  Criminal  Courts  Act  left  unim 
paired  and  free  to  flourish  the  basic  vice  in  the  Magistrates' 
Courts,  i.e.,  their  administration  as  a  part  of  the  political 
spoils  system.  It  left  the  Magistrates  to  be  appointed  by  a 
political  agency,  the  Mayor,  upon  the  recommendation  of 
the  district  leaders  within  his -political  party — and  these  men, 
as  we  know,  have  regarded  the  places  to  be  filled  as  plums 
to  be  distributed  as  rewards  for  services  rendered  by  faith 
ful  party  workers.  The  Courts  are  directed  by  these  Magis 
trates  in  cooperation  with  the  Court  clerks,  who  are  not  Civil 
Service  employees  and  who  are  appointed  without  the  slight 
est  regard  to  fitness  or  qualification,  but  solely  through  poli 
tical  agencies  and  because  of  political  influences.  The  assist 
ant  clerks  and  attendants,  though  nominally  taken  from  the 
Civil  Service  List,  are  still,  in  almost  all  instances,  faithful 
party  workers  who,  despite  Civil  Service  provisions,  have 
secured  their  places  through  political  influence  as  a  recom 
pense  for  services  performed  for  the  party.  The  insidious 
auspices  under  which  the  Magistrates,  the  clerks,  the  assist 
ant  clerks  and  the  attendants  are  appointed  are  bad  enough; 
the  conditions  under  which  they  retain  their  appointments 
are  infinitely  worse,  because  they  involve  the  subserviency 
in  office  to  district  leaders  and  other  politicians.  It  is  a  by 
word  in  the  corridors  of  the  Magistrates'  Courts  of  the  City 
of  New  York  that  the  intervention  of  a  friend  in  the  district 
political  club  is  much  more  potent  in  the  disposition  of  cases 
than  the  merits  of  the  cause  or  the  services  of  the  best  lawyer 
and,  unfortunately,  the  truth  of  the  statement  alone  prevents 
it  from  being  a  slander  upon  the  good  name  of  the  City. 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  119 

To  which  may  be  added  this  further  indictment,  that 
behind  the  Tammany  system  of  appointing  judges  on  the 
basis  of  political  favoritism  lies  the  economic  system 
which  makes  the  profession  of  law  parasitic.  In  a  profit 
economy  where  the  great  fortunes  are  paid  to  manipu 
lators  and  owners  the  lawyer  who  wishes  to  make  money 
gravitates  toward  the  upper  reaches  of  big  business.  He 
becomes  a  servant  of  a  great  corporation  and  spends  most 
of  his  time  and  energy  defending  one  property  interest 
against  another  property  interest.  If  he  enters  the  field  of 
criminal  law  he  soon  adopts  the  principle  that  he  will 
charge  his  customers  all  that  the  traffic  will  bear.  That  is 
the  principle  of  the  business  system  in  which  we  live,  so 
why  should  the  lawyer  be  expected  to  rise  above  it?  The 
lawyer  serves  the  rich  client  if  possible  and  the  poor  client 
only  if  the  rich  one  is  unavailable.  A  constant  stream  of 
poor  people  visit  our  offices  in  search  of  legal  aid  which 
they  need  but  cannot  afford. 

The  result  of  the  pecuniary  competition  in  the  legal 
profession  is  that  the  whole  field  of  legal  aid  for  the  poor 
in  both  civil  and  criminal  cases  is  abandoned  to  second- 
rate  lawyers  and  tenth-rate  magistrates.  The  lawyer  who 
concerns  himself  with  the  agonizing  struggles  of  the  un 
employed  tenant  and  the  wife  of  the  drunk  is  looked  upon 
by  his  own  profession  as  a  man  who  has  failed  to  make 
good.  The  "big  lawyers"  rarely  take  such  cases  except 
when  they  are  so  well  established  as  financial  advisors  and 
corporate  manipulators  that  they  can  afford  to  stoop  gra- 


120      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

ciously  and  render  conspicuous  aid  in  the  presence  of  the 
press. 

The  one  bright  spot  in  the  situation  for  the  poor  litigant 
is  the  excellent  work  of  the  Legal  Aid  Society.  In  1931 
the  society  gave  advice  or  cooperation  in  40,200  civil  and 
criminal  cases,  charging  a  fifty-cent  fee  in  most  civil  cases 
and  nothing  at  all  in  criminal  cases.  The  Voluntary  De 
fenders  Committee  of  the  Legal  Aid  Society  works  for  the 
most  part  in  the  Court  of  General  Sessions  where  prison 
ers  are  prosecuted  on  felony  charges.  Without  the  aid  of 
this  committee  the  poverty-stricken  prisoner  charged  with 
burglary  or  arson,  for  instance,  would  be  in  a  helpless 
position.  The  law  says  that  the  judge  in  such  cases  may 
assign  counsel  to  the  prisoner  but  no  provision  is  made  for 
paying  the  counsel.  The  young,  salaried  lawyers  of  the 
Voluntary  Defenders  Committee  who  handle  such  cases 
at  an  average  cost  of  $28  a  case  get  many  contributions 
for  their  work  from  the  great  corporation  law  factories, 
where  the  "big"  lawyers  of  New  York  spend  their  time 
fighting  over  property  rights. 

The  poor  prisoners  in  the  Magistrates'  Court  do  not 
have  any  free  lawyers  to  defend  them  because  the  Legal 
Aid  Society  does  not  have  enough  money  to  provide  law 
yers  for  these  courts.  The  society  can  afford  to  defend 
only  the  felony  cases  in  the  Court  of  General  Sessions.  A 
poor  man  who  is  arraigned  in  a  Magistrate's  Court  is 
asked  by  the  judge:  "Do  you  wish  to  have  counsel?"  If 
he  replies  that  he  has  no  money,  it  means  that  he  can  have 
no  counsel.  Even  if  he  is  charged  with  a  serious  crime  he 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  121 

must  go  through  these  preliminary  stages  without  the  help 
of  a  lawyer.  If  he  tries  desperately  to  raise  money  for  a 
lawyer,  he  is  more  than  likely  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  the 
bail-bond  racketeer  who  works  in  partnership  with  a 
shyster  lawyer. 

Most  New  York  lawyers  are  so  frantically  busy  trying 
to  extract  an  income  from  business  quarrels  that  they  are 
not  interested  in  reform  of  the  courts.  No  better  illustra 
tion  of  this  charge  could  be  found  than  the  continued 
failure  of  the  bar  to  overcome  legal  delays.  When  the 
City  Affairs  Committee  made  its  attack  upon  the  three- 
month  vacations  of  New  York  Supreme  Court  judges  in 
the  summer  of  1931,  the  Supreme  Court  of  Brooklyn  was 
three  and  one-half  years  behind  its  calendar  and  the  Su 
preme  Court  of  Manhattan  one  and  one-half  years  behind. 

In  spite  of  this  fact  many  judges  had  been  stretching 
their  inexcusably  long  summer  vacations  (July,  August 
and  September)  to  include  several  weeks  of  June  and 
many  extra  days  at  the  Christmas  and  Easter  seasons.  In 
June,  1930,  nine  judges  sitting  in  the  Brooklyn  Supreme 
Court  averaged  fifteen  days  out  of  a  possible  twenty- 
three;  in  June,  1931,  eight  judges  in  this  same  court  av 
eraged  seventeen  days  out  of  a  possible  twenty-three.  In 
December,  1930,  these  same  Brooklyn  Supreme  Court 
judges  lost  twelve  trial  days  in  addition  to  Christmas 
vacations. 

When  there  is  such  obvious  neglect  of  duty  in  the 
higher  courts,  it  is  natural  that  the  Magistrate's  Court 
should  emulate  the  standard.  The  magistrates  come  in  late 


122      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

and  leave  early.  In  1928  the  enterprising  members  of 
the  Women's  City  Club  decided  to  check  up  on  the  magis 
trates  of  Manhattan  to  discover  what  time  they  arrived  in 
the  morning  and  left  in  the  afternoon.  The  ladies  discov 
ered  that  on  the  basis  of  a  six-day  week  the  average  court 
session  lasted  only  three  hours  and  eleven  minutes  a  day. 
These  magistrates,  it  should  be  remembered,  do  not  have 
any  weighty  documents  to  examine  in  off -court  hours  as 
appellate  judges  have.  Their  duties  can  almost  all  be  per 
formed  during  the  court  session. 

Judge  Seabury  commented  on  the  Magistrate's  Court 
incompetence  by  saying: 

"In  the  Magistrates'  Courts  of  the  City  of  New  York, 
the  business  of  the  court  is  generally  concluded  very  early 
in  the  afternoon,  and  even  while  the  court  is  in  session 
many  of  the  employees  are  not  kept  continuously  engaged 
in  the  performance  of  any  duties.  In  the  Children's  Court 
the  justices  sit  but  a  few  hours  each  day.  An  examination 
of  the  Report  of  the  Court  of  Special  Sessions  for  the 
year  1931  discloses  on  its  face  that  this  court  does  not 
transact  sufficient  business  to  keep  its  judicial  and  clerical 
staff  busy  more  than  a  part  of  each  working  day. 

"There  is,  in  my  opinion,  no  doubt  that  the  number  of 
employees  in  our  inferior  criminal  courts  could  be  sub 
stantially  cut  down,  at  a  great  saving  to  the  public,  if  the 
personnel  were  limited  to  competent,  efficient  and  indus 
trious  employees." 

And  again  he  said: 

"In  the  Borough  of  Manhattan  which  has  a  population 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  123 

of  about  1,900,000  we  have  27  judges  in  the  inferior 
criminal  courts  and  9  judges  in  the  Court  of  General  Ses 
sions,  making  a  total  of  36.  Detroit  with  a  population  of 
about  1,550,000,  has  but  ten  judges  in  the  whole  of  its 
criminal  courts." 

Incidentally  the  cost  of  New  York's  elaborate  and  over 
manned  system  of  Magistrate's,  Children's  and  Special 
Sessions  Courts,  comprising  seventy-four  justices  and  a 
whole  army  of  underlings,  is  $3,271,000  a  year. 

Judge  Seabury  might  have  added  that  the  real  burden 
of  responsibility  for  making  the  courts  of  New  York  effi 
cient  rests  upon  the  lawyers  and  that  thus  far  they  have 
been  timid  to  the  point  of  cowardice  in  criticizing  incom 
petent  judges  and  correcting  inefficient  practice.  When 
the  City  Affairs  Committee  made  the  very  modest  sugges 
tion  that  the  summer  vacations  of  Supreme  Court  judges 
be  cut  to  two  months  instead  of  three,  not  a  bar  associa 
tion  in  the  city  went  on  record  in  favor  of  the  plan  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  it  had  wide  newspaper  support. 

Incidentally,  it  should  be  said  that  the  Municipal  Court 
of  New  York  is  probably  just  as  corrupt  as  the  Magis 
trate's  Court.  One  of  us  can  testify  that  when  he  began  a 
campaign  for  court  reform  in  1927  he  was  flooded  with  as 
many  complaints  against  the  Municipal  Court  as  any 
other.  This  court  has  thus  far  escaped  an  investigation. 

As  we  write  this  book  six  months  after  Judge  Seabury 's 
final  report  on  the  Magistrate's  Court  not  a  single  magis 
trate  who  was  removed  from  office  or  resigned  has  been 
disbarred  from  the  practise  of  law,  and  not  a  bar  associa- 


124      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

tion  in  the  city  has  moved  to  discipline  those  notorious 
officials  as  lawyers.  If  a  man  is  morally  unfit  to  be  a  judge 
he  is  morally  unfit  to  be  a  lawyer.  Yet  the  bar  associations 
permit  the  unfit  ex-magistrates  to  continue  their  large 
and  lucrative  law  practises. 

The  timidity  of  the  bar  associations  was  never  better 
illustrated  than  in  the  famous  telephone  call  of  John  F. 
Curry  to  Justice  Henry  L.  Sherman  of  the  Appellate  Divi 
sion  to  ask  for  a  stay  keeping  Dr.  William  F.  Doyle  out 
of  jail.  Justice  William  Harmon  Black  had  found  the 
veterinarian  guilty  of  contempt  of  court  and  sentenced 
him  to  thirty  days  in  jail  for  refusing  to  testify  before 
Judge  Seabury.  Doyle's  lawyers  led  by  Samuel  Falk,  son- 
in-law  of  the  Republican  count  boss,  Samuel  S.  Koenig, 
asked  for  a  chance  to  get  a  stay  in  execution  of  the  jail 
sentence,  and  Judge  Black  agreed  on  condition  that  Judge 
Seabury  was  to  be  notified  in  time  to  appear  and  fight  the 
request  for  a  stay.  Instead  of  appealing  to  an  appellate 
justice  in  New  York,  where  Seabury  could  appear,  Tam 
many  took  the  case  to  Justice  Sherman  in  Lake  Placid. 
Boss  Curry  telephoned  to  Lake  Placid  from  his  own  apart 
ment  and  arranged  to  have  Doyle's  lawyers  apply  for  a 
stay  there  at  11  o'clock  the  next  morning.  At  10:35  that 
morning  Judge  Seabury  in  New  York  was  notified  that  the 
application  for  the  stay  was  being  made  before  Justice 
Sherman  at  Lake  Placid,  three  hundred  miles  away.  Jus 
tice  Sherman  granted  the  stay.  Seabury  had  been  tricked 
and  judicial  canons  violated. 

The  Association  of  the  Bar  of  the  City  of  New  York 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  125 

never  even  rebuked  Justice  Sherman  for  this  action.  It 
made  an  "investigation"  and  issued  a  mournful  report 
regretting  the  "unfortunate"  intervention  of  Mr.  Curry 
and  exonerating  Justice  Sherman. 

Occasionally  some  lawyer  says  what  he  thinks  about 
Supreme  Court  judges.  Meier  Steinbrink  in  1924  said: 

"The  majority  of  Supreme  Court  judges  do  not  really 
work.  Some  of  them  are  lazy.  Of  course  there  are  a  few 
who  really  work,  but  as  for  many  of  them,  I  would  not 
give  them  $1700  a  year  as  law  clerks  not  to  mention  the 
$17,500  they  receive.  They  and  equally  lazy  lawyers  are 
the  primary  cause  of  the  congestion  in  our  courts."  *  Now 
Mr.  Steinbrink  is  himself  a  Supreme  Court  judge,  and  the 
salaries  of  Supreme  Court  judges  have  been  raised  to 
$25,000  instead  of  $17,500.  He  gained  his  new  dignity  as 
part  of  the  judicial  deal  which  we  described  in  the  last 
chapter. 

Judge  Seabury's  plan  for  reforming  the  Magistrate's 
Court  is  deserving  of  respect  largely  because  it  recognizes 
its  limitations.  He  admits  that  no  plan  of  reorganization 
can  amount  to  anything  of  permanent  value  unless  the 
courts  are  freed  from  the  control  of  the  present  dominant 
political  machine.  To  that  end  he  suggests  that  magis 
trates  should  be  chosen  by  the  Appellate  Division  of  the 
Supreme  Court  rather  than  the  mayor,  and  for  the  sake  of 
economy  and  efficiency  he  recommends  that  the  present 
minor  criminal  courts  of  New  York  City  should  all  be 
consolidated  in  a  new  Court  of  Special  Sessions  whose 
branches  would  all  operate  in  a  few  central  buildings. 


126      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

The  best  argument  for  the  appointment  of  magistrates  by 
the  justices  of  the  Appellate  Division  is  that  these  justices 
are  more  independent  of  their  party  machines  than  a 
mayor.  They  have  been  appointed  for  ten-year  terms  and 
their  line  of  promotion  often  leads  away  from  the  local 
machine  toward  Albany  and  Washington.  Some  of  them 
are  old  enough  so  that  a  ten-year  term  marks  the  end  of 
their  political  life  and  they  have  nothing  more  to  ask  of 
the  machine. 

Probably  nothing  will  come  of  Judge  Seabury's  sugges 
tions  for  a  new  method  of  appointing  magistrates  pre 
cisely  because  the  suggestions  would  take  away  from  both 
Republican  and  Democratic  machines  an  important  part 
of  their  patronage.  A  constitutional  amendment  would  be 
necessary  to  bring  about  the  change,  and  at  Albany  such 
an  amendment  would  encounter  the  united  opposition  of 
the  old  party  bosses.  This  hopelessness  of  getting  real 
legislative  remedies  in  Albany  underscores  our  belief  that 
a  city  government  can  rarely  be  redeemed  independently 
from  national  or  state  politics.  What  New  York  City 
needs  is  not  only  a  program  of  reform  but  a  state-wide 
party  to  put  it  into  effect.  Without  such  a  party  even 
Judge  Seabury's  program  of  reform  could  be  adopted  and 
jettisoned  as  so  many  structural  reforms  have  been  nulli 
fied  in  the  past.  The  mayor  is  now  the  tool  of  the  Demo 
cratic  machine  in  appointing  magistrates;  transfer  his  ap 
pointive  power  to  the  Apellate  Division  and  after  the  first 
wave  of  public  indignation  had  subsided,  a  machine  gov- 


THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS  127 

ernor  might  be  discovered  appointing  an  Appellate  Divi 
sion  pledged  in  advance  to  choose  local  magistrates  recom 
mended  by  district  leaders.  Such  things  have  been  known 
to  happen  in  the  past.  For  this  reason  we  emphatically 
oppose  the  transfer  of  the  power  to  appoint  magistrates 
to  the  Appellate  Division  as  a  futile  gesture. 

A  City  Club  committee  which  studied  Seabury's  sugges 
tions  for  reform  of  the  Magistrate's  Court  apparently  had 
the  same  fear  of  pollution  of  the  Appellate  Division.  It 
said:  "The  committee  is  of  the  opinion  that  such  a  change 
(appointment  of  magistrates  by  the  Appellate  Division) 
would  not  accomplish  its  purpose,  but  rather  its  tendency 
would  be  to  put  the  Appellate  Division  into  politics." 

All  suggestions  for  the  reform  of  the  lower  courts  boil 
down  to  this,  that  hardly  any  mechanical  change,  no  mat 
ter  how  good  in  itself,  will  be  worth  making  unless  the 
"contract"  system  in  use  by  the  Tammany  district  leaders 
is  abolished.  Under  that  system  the  district  leader,  sitting 
at  his  desk  in  the  clubhouse  each  night  tells  Jim  Jones  or 
Tom  Smith:  "I'll  fix  that  with  the  judge."  And  he  does 
fix  it  with  the  judge  because  the  judge  is  his  creature. 

Some  reformers  have  suggested  that  magistrates  should 
be  elected  instead  of  being  appointed  by  the  mayor.  The 
suggestion  seems  futile  to  us  because  the  same  men  would 
be  chosen  by  appointment  or  election  as  long  as  Tammany 
controlled  the  judicial  conventions.  Nor  does  the  jury 
system  in  the  Magistrate's  Court  offer  a  very  intelligent 
way  out.  Juries  are  expensive  and  slow  moving. 


128      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

That  part  of  Judge  Seabury's  suggestions  for  the  Magis 
trate's  Court  which  has  the  best  chance  of  adoption  is  his 
program  concerning  lawyers  and  bail-bond  racketeers  who 
now  exploit  the  poor  in  the  most  pitiless  manner.  We 
shall  discuss  these  things  when  we  treat  of  the  police  in 
the  next  chapter.  Of  one  thing  we  feel  certain,  that  the 
establishment  of  an  office  of  Public  Defender  for  those 
unable  to  hire  a  lawyer  would  be  a  great  forward  step  in 
all  the  criminal  courts.  Justice  will  be  a  mockery  for  the 
poor  as  long  as  they  must  depend  upon  the  vagaries  of 
private  charity  for  legal  defense.  A  Public  Defender  with 
assistants  for  every  branch  of  every  criminal  court  would 
go  far  to  eliminate  the  worst  types  of  injustice. 


8 
THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW 

THE  poison  of  favoritism  and  incompetence  seeps  down 
from  the  courts  to  the  police,  the  shyster  lawyers  and  the 
court  clerks.  The  system  cannot  be  rotten  at  the  top  and 
pure  at  the  bottom.  Bribery,  illegal  detention,  fee-splitting, 
and  the  third  degree  have  become  established  parts  of  the 
New  York  City  police  system  because  the  political  ma 
chine  that  governs  New  York  does  not  sincerely  desire  an 
impartial  or  fair  enforcement  of  the  law.  Says  the  Wicker- 
sham  Commission  in  summarizing  its  findings  on  law 
lessness  in  New  York  City: 

"The  investigators  were  repeatedly  told — not  by  sen 
sation  mongers  but  by  observers  of  high  position  and  abil 
ity,  long  experience  and  unquestioned  disinterestedness — 
that  the  courts  know  that  some  of  the  prosecutors  are 
crooked  and  the  prosecutors  know  that  some  of  the  courts 
are  crooked,  and  both  know  that  some  of  the  police  are 
crooked,  and  the  police  are  equally  well  informed  as  to 
them.  If  a  policeman  or  detective  who  has  worked  hard 
and  effectively  to  land  a  bad  criminal  in  jail  sees  him  get 
off  through  improper  influences,  he  will  tend  to  be  less 
zealous  in  the  next  prosecution.  He  will  be  inclined  to 

129 


130      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

take  the  easiest  course  and  merely  try  to  get  a  confession 
without  a  too  nice  regard  for  the  means  employed." 

And,  the  commission  adds:  "The  third  degree  is  widely 
and  brutally  employed  in  New  York  City.  .  .  .  Third- 
degree  methods,  authoritatively  reported  to  us  as  recently 
employed  include:  Punching  in  the  face,  especially  a  hard 
slap  on  the  jaw;  hitting  with  a  billy;  whipping  with  a 
rubber  hose;  kicking  in  the  abdomen;  tightening  the  neck 
tie  almost  up  to  the  choking  point;  squeezing  the  testicles. 
Methods  are  favored  which  do  not  leave  visible  marks, 
because  these  attract  the  attention  of  the  courts  and  some 
times  lead  district  attorneys  not  to  use  the  confession. 
There  is  said  to  be  a  practice  that  the  arresting  officer 
does  not  commonly  do  the  beating ;  another  man  will  do  it, 
so  that  when  the  arresting  officer  takes  the  stand  it  cannot 
be  charged  that  he  used  force." 

We  do  not  pretend  that  New  York  police  are  unique 
in  their  use  of  the  third  degree.  Practically  every  large 
police  station  in  the  country  has  a  room  apart  from  the 
others  where  prisoners  are  questioned,  and  it  is  common 
knowledge  that  these  rooms  are  used  for  practices  which 
could  never  stand  the  light  of  publicity.  In  New  York  the 
third  degree  has  long  been  a  matter  of  public  record,  ac 
cepted  with  more  or  less  complacency  by  people  who  can 
not  think  of  themselves  in  the  role  of  the  persecuted  vic 
tim.  When  in  July,  1932,  twenty-year-old  Hyman  Stark 
was  so  badly  beaten  by  Mineola  police  that  his  Adam's 
apple  was  broken  and  he  died  of  strangulation,  a  burst  of 
protest  came  from  the  press  and  there  were  quick  indict- 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  131 

ments  of  13  policemen.  But  many  prominent  citizens  im 
mediately  rushed  to  their  defense,  and  a  jury  finally  ac 
quitted  them. 

"The  Police  Defense  Committee,"  said  the  New  York 
Sun,  "organized  by  George  W.  Loft,  the  former  head  of  a 
chain  of  candy  stores  and  now  president  of  the  South  Shore 
Trust  Company;  William  Welden,  Jr.,  Nassau  County  man 
ager  of  the  Greater  New  York  and  Suffolk  Title  and  Guar 
antee  Company;  Dr.  Theron  W.  Kilmer  and  Edward  Sykes, 
was  formed  to  raise  money  and  to  bring  public  opinion  to 
the  point  of  approving  the  act  of  the  police  in  beating 
Hyman  Stark  to  death,  crushing  his  throat  and  allowing  him 
to  strangle  on  blood,  even  though  they  had  plenty  of  evi 
dence  against  him  and  his  companions  to  convict  them  of 
the  robbery  and  beating  of  the  aged  mother  of  a  detective, 
and  had  no  need  to  torture  the  prisoners  to  extort  confes 
sions. 

'  'If  you  let  down  the  bars,  kiss  the  gangsters  on  each 
cheek  and  offer  them  pink  tea,  our  women  and  children  will 
not  be  safe,  and  they  must  be  safeguarded  against  these 
crooks  at  all  costs,'  the  former  candy  maker  said. 

"  'Nassau  County  has  been  reasonably  safe  as  a  result  of 
the  methods  used  by  our  policemen.  It  may  be  true  that  they 
went  a  little  too  far  in  this  case,  but  who  is  the  man  who 
hasn't  made  a  mistake  in  his  life?  Do  not  forget  the  won 
derful  service  these  men  have  rendered  in  the  past  for  the 
citizens  of  Nassau  County. 

'  'In  the  words  of  big  Chief  Devery,  "There  is  more  law 
in  the  end  of  a  nightstick  than  there  is  in  all  the  courts  of  the 
land." 

The  blow  that  killed  Hyman  Stark  was  probably  no 
harder  than  other  blows  that  have  disfigured  New  York 
prisoners  without  killing  them.  M.  Fiaschetti,  former  head 
of  the  Italian  squad  of  detectives,  does  not  stop  with 


132      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

fists.  He  uses  a  baseball  bat.  In  his  book,  You  Gotta  Be 
Rough,  he  says:  "I  went  to  the  Tombs  and  got  myself  a 
sawed-off  baseball  bat  and  walked  in  on  all  those  dogs. 
Yes;  they  came  through  with  everything  they  knew." 

Sometimes  they  "come  through"  with  things  that  they 
do  not  know  just  to  avoid  one  more  skull-crushing  swing 
of  the  baseball  bat;  and  then  the  "confession"  is  repudi 
ated  in  the  courts  while  a  baffled  jury  tries  to  solve  the 
riddle  of  which  side  is  lying.  In  the  long  run  the  violence 
of  the  police  defeats  its  own  ends  for  every  confession  is 
distrusted  if  the  prisoner  chooses  to  repudiate  it,  and, 
when  the  public  is  aroused  over  some  particularly  fla 
grant  example  of  the  third  degree,  no  judge  dares  to  accept 
a  confession  at  its  face  value  if  it  is  repudiated.  Three 
days  after  the  killing  of  Hyman  Stark  by  the  police  of 
Mineola,  there  appeared  this  significant  story  in  the 
World-Telegram : 

In  County  Court,  Brooklyn,  H.  Abramowitz,  19,  of  71 
Herzl  Street,  Brooklyn,  charged  with  first  degree  robbery, 
repudiated  a  confession  which  Assistant  District  Attorney 
Charles  N.  Cohen  sought  to  introduce. 

Abramowitz  told  Judge  Franklin  Taylor  that  police  got 
him  out  of  bed,  refused  to  tell  him  what  he  was  being  ar 
rested  for  until  they  got  him  to  Miller  Ave.  station,  Brook 
lyn,  and  when  he  denied  knowledge  of  the  robbery,  twisted 
his  arm  until  he  screamed  in  pain. 

"To  save  it  from  getting  broke,"  he  said,  "I  was  ready 
to  say  I  did  anything  they  wanted  me  to." 

Judge  Taylor  directed  a  jury  to  acquit  Abramowitz  when 
his  counsel,  Harry  B.  Siegel,  pointed  out  that  on  three  prev 
ious  times  when  the  case  was  called  the  State  produced 
no  witnesses.  It  had  none  today. 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  133 

The  Wickersham  committee  found  that  assault  and 
battery  of  prisoners  by  New  York  police  had  been  popular 
for  a  long  time.  It  quoted  a  former  New  York  dis 
trict  attorney,  R.  H.  Elder,  who  said:  "The  third  degree 
has  now  become  established  and  recognized  practice  in 
the  police  department  of  the  City  of  New  York.  Every 
police  station  in  the  city  is  equipped  with  the  instruments 
to  administer  the  torture  incident  to  that  process."  Mr. 
Elder's  opinion  is  not  unique.  The  Association  of  the 
Bar  of  the  City  of  New  York  appointed  a  committee  in 
1927  to  report  on  lawless  practices  of  the  police  and  the 
committee  which  included  three  former  district  attorneys 
of  New  York  County  and  three  former  United  States 
attorneys  for  the  southern  district  of  New  York,  among 
whom  were  Emory  Buckner,  William  Travers  Jerome  and 
Charles  S.  Whitman,  said:  "From  our  aggregate  experi 
ence  and  from  such  information  as  we  have  been  able  to 
acquire  in  our  study  of  present  conditions,  we  are  of  the 
opinion  that  these  accusations  (of  brutal  and  violent  as 
saults  to  extort  confessions)  are  well  founded."  * 

The  records  of  the  Voluntary  Defenders  Committee  of 
the  Legal  Aid  Society  bear  out  Mr.  Elder's  statement.  The 
lawyers  of  this  committee  who  interview  prisoners  in 
jail  have  found  violence  against  prisoners  so  common  that 
the  prisoners  do  not  even  bother  to  report  it  on  most 
occasions — they  assume  that  it  is  a  matter  of  police  rou 
tine.  Of  1,235  prisoners  helped  by  the  Legal  Aid  Society 
in  1930,  289  said  they  were  beaten  by  the  police,  and 
the  lawyers  of  the  society  believed  their  stories  were  suf- 


134      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

ficiently  credible  to  record  the  method  of  extra-legal  pun 
ishment.  The  records  of  punishment  of  the  men  who  were 
listed  in  the  society's  statistical  table  read:  "Night  stick; 
Kicked  in  stomach;  Hit  in  jaw;  Beaten;  Knocked  out 
teeth;  Rubber  hose;  Fists,  rubber  hose;  Blackjacked; 
Clubbed  on  ear;  Struck  with  shovel;  Broke  wrists; 
Dragged  by  hair  all  day;  and  so  on  and  on.  Of  these 
289  victims  of  police  violence  166  were  given  the  violent 
treatment  as  part  of  the  third  degree. 

Contrary  to  the  usual  belief,  the  police  of  New  York 
do  not  confine  their  third-degree  methods  to  hardened 
offenders.  Of  the  166  third-degree  victims  listed  by  the 
Legal  Aid  Society  in  1930  nearly  half  were  first  offenders, 
and  only  17.5  per  cent  had  felony  records.  One  boy  of 
15  was  beaten  with  fists;  twelve  boys  of  16  were  beaten 
with  nightsticks,  blackjacks,  rubber  hose  and  fists;  sixteen 
boys  of  17  included  one  kicked  in  the  testicles.  And 


so  on.6 


Many  of  these  boys  had  come  through  the  New  York 
public  school  system  where,  in  the  civics  textbook,  they 
had  seen  a  picture  of  the  New  York  County  Court  House 
bearing  this  inscription:  "The  True  Administration  of  Jus 
tice  is  the  Firmest  Pillar  of  Good  Government." 

The  physical  result  of  such  treatment  was  made  public 
in  the  famous  Barbato  case  in  which  the  prisoner  "con 
fessed"  the  murder  of  Julia  Museo  Quintieri  after  a  ter 
rific  beating,  was  sent  to  the  death  house,  and  later 
released  when  the  method  by  which  the  confession  had 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  135 

been  extracted  was  made  public.  Dr.  Radin  who  examined 
Barbato  testified:  6 

Q.  Now,  doctor,  will  you  tell  this  jury  what  your  exami 
nation  disclosed? 

A.  I  found  echymoses,  that  means  black  and  blue  marks, 
over  the  right  arm,  with  some  swelling  of  the  arm,  with  a 
hemetoma  over  the  middle  of  the  arm.  A  hemetoma  is  a 
little  collection  or  tumor  of  the  blood.  There  were  several 
abrasions  over  the  right  elbow  and  right  forearm.  Abrasions 
are  superficial  scratches.  There  are  livid  stripes  over  the 
right  forearm  and  back  of  the  right  hand.  There  are  echy 
moses,  black  and  blue  marks,  over  the  left  arm,  also  over 
both  eyelids  on  the  left  eye;  over  the  left  malar  bone,  that 
means  cheek  bone  here  (indicating);  there  were  some  abra 
sions  in  the  right  temporal  region,  that  is,  up  here  (indi 
cating) — 

The  Court.  Witness  indicates  by  placing  his  hand  on  the 
left  temple. 

A.  (Continuing.)  There  were  a  few  echymoses  over  the 
back  of  the  neck,  and  he  complained  of  pain  on  manipula 
tion  of  the  head.  There  are  some  echymoses  over  the  right 
scapula;  that  is,  the  shoulder  blade.  There  were  echymoses 
over  both  sides  of  the  back  and  in  the  left  lumbar  region; 
that  is,  the  left  loin,  in  the  left  lower  axillary  region — the 
axillary  region  is  the  side  of  the  chest,  and  the  left  lower 
axillary  region  would  be  the  lower  part  of  the  side  of  the 
chest — there  were  echymoses  over  the  right  buttock  and  over 
the  front  of  the  right  thigh  and  over  the  front  of  the  left 
thigh  and  over  the  back  of  both  thighs;  there  were  some 
abrasions  of  the  right  leg." 

The  worst  forms  of  police  brutality  usually  come  in  a 
"drive"  that  is  staged  after  some  sensational  crime.  Then 
the  police  must  do  something,  anything,  to  appease  public 


136      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

anger.  Grover  Whalen,  as  commissioner  of  police,  had  as 
the  slogan  for  his  drives:  "There's  plenty  of  law  at  the 
end  of  a  nightstick."  It  should  have  read:  There  is  plenty 
of  lawlessness  at  the  end  of  a  nightstick.  Whalen  an 
nounced  in  a  public  attack  upon  the  Communists  that 
"these  enemies  of  society  were  to  be  driven  out  of  New 
York  regardless  of  their  constitutional  rights."  Fortu 
nately  for  the  Communists  and  the  Constitution,  Whalen' s 
nightsticks  were  wielded  in  so  bloody  and  public  an  en 
counter  that  even  New  York's  complacency  was  disturbed. 
It  was  perceived  that  nightsticks  under  certain  circum 
stances  might  make  Communists  more  rapidly  than  Marx 
ian  speeches,  and  Mr.  Whalen  retired  from  his  original 
position  with  his  gardenia  and  his  reputation  badly  wilted. 
When  children  were  shot  by  gangsters  in  the  streets  of 
New  York  in  the  summer  of  1931  Commissioner  Mul- 
rooney  ordered  a  great  "drive"  of  indiscriminate  arrests 
in  which  the  first  night's  haul  of  105  persons  contained 
not  a  single  victim  chargeable  with  a  definite  crime.  The 
New  York  police  department  does  not  bother  to  observe 
the  law  that  requires  the  prompt  arraignment  of  a 
prisoner  before  a  court,  and  in  this  negligence  lies  one 
explanation  for  the  frequency  of  the  third  degree.  The 
law  itself  contains  a  loophole.  Section  165  of  the  Code  of 
Criminal  Procedure  says:  "The  defendant  must  in  all  cases 
be  taken  before  the  magistrate  without  unnecessary  delay, 
and  he  may  give  bail  at  any  hour  of  the  day  or  night." 
He  may  give  bail  at  any  hour  of  the  day  and  night — not 
must.  It  is  a  misdemeanor  for  a  police  officer  to  violate 


Reproduced  by  permission  of 
Rollin  Kirby  and  the  New  York  World-Telegram. 

'AW,  IT'S  ONLY  A  KID!" 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  139 

this  law;  but  what  does  it  mean?  What  is  "unnecessary 
delay"?  The  New  York  City  Charter  makes  a  most  lenient 
interpretation  of  this  law.  In  section  338  it  provides  that 
the  policeman  immediately  after  he  has  made  an  arrest 
must  convey  "in  person  the  offender"  to  the  nearest  sitting 
magistrate,  but  that  if  this  magistrate  is  not  sitting  the 
prisoner  may  be  kept  in  the  station  house  until  the  next 
regular  sitting  of  the  magistrate.  So  a  man  may  be  ar 
rested  in  the  late  afternoon,  beaten  to  a  pulp  at  various 
intervals  during  the  night,  and  washed  up  carefully  in 
the  morning  after  his  confession  has  been  extracted.  Or 
he  may  be  taken  from  police  station  to  police  station  while 
his  relatives  are  sent  to  the  station  he  has  just  left.  Or  he 
may  be  "detained"  in  a  police  station  without  being  ar 
rested  so  that  the  police  officers  can  truthfully  say  later 
that  he  was  arraigned  immediately  after  arrest. 

It  is  the  poor,  of  course,  and  not  the  rich  who  are  sub 
jected  to  illegal  violence  by  the  police.  We  have  never 
heard  of  an  officer  of  the  Bank  of  United  States  or  a  Wall 
Street  speculator  being  put  through  the  third  degree.  Even 
middle-class  murderers  like  Judd  Gray  and  Ruth  Snyder 
are  subjected  only  to  the  ordeal  of  long  questioning.  If 
some  of  our  wealthy  traffic-law  violators  experienced  the 
police  handling  given  to  Socialist  strikers  they  would  be 
somewhat  more  concerned  with  police  lawlessness. 

We  approach  the  proposed  remedies  for  this  situation 
with  a  sense  of  despair.  We  do  not  believe  that  the  ordi 
nary  policeman  on  the  beat  is  to  blame  for  illegal  deten 
tion  and  the  third  degree.  These  practices  are  part  of  a 


140      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

system  that  has  been  allowed  to  grow  up  largely  because 
of  public  inertia  and  the  survival  of  savage  traits.  Most 
New  York  policemen  are  courteous,  hard-working  serv 
ants  of  the  law,  probably  tainted  by  liquor  graft  but  other 
wise  self-respecting  citizens.  Their  pay  is  not  high — even 
the  first-class  policemen  average  less  than  $60  a  week — 
and  their  physical  risks  in  gang-ridden  New  York  are  con 
siderable.  Their  conduct  is  determined  not  so  much  by 
themselves  as  by  police  tradition.  In  London  the  police 
tradition  is  against  violence  and  the  third  degree  is  un 
known.  In  New  York  it  is  an  accepted  part  of  police 
practice  because  New  York  is  part  of  the  United  States 
and  almost  every  city  in  the  United  States  suffers  from 
the  same  affliction. 

No  official  exposures  or  programs  for  reform  seem  to 
have  any  effect  upon  police  conduct.  The  Page  Com 
mission  in  1908  said  almost  precisely  the  same  thing  about 
illegal  detention  of  prisoners  in  station  houses  that  Judge 
Seabury  said  in  1932.  The  Page  Commission  said  con 
cerning  the  detention  of  prisoners  in  station  houses  ille 
gally:  "The  plain  provisions  of  the  Greater  New  York 
charter  .  .  .  have  been  repeatedly  violated  by  the  police." 
Judge  Seabury  in  his  magistrates'  report  said:  "One  of 
the  most  insidious  influences  in  the  administration  of  jus 
tice  is  the  atmosphere  and  relationships  that  exist  in  and 
around  police  stations.  These  stations  scattered  through 
out  the  city  are  isolated  outposts,  little  controlled  by  pub 
lic  opinion  because  the  operations  that  go  on  there  are  so 
mysterious  that  little  can  be  known  of  them  by  outsiders. 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  141 

In  almost  every  case  of  framing  that  came  out  during  the 
investigation,  the  police  station  was  the  place  where  the 
dirty  work  of  bribery  and  fixing  was  carried  on.  ... 

"If  we  add  to  this  sinister  process  the  fact  that  the 
third  degree,  when  it  is  practised,  is  generally  done  in  the 
police  station,  we  have  an  overwhelming  argument  for  a 
complete  reform  of  the  station  house,  which  as  a  practi 
cal  matter,  cannot  be  accomplished,  or  else  a  method  by 
which  the  prisoner  shall  be  taken  into  court  without  an 
intermediary  trip  to  the  station  house.  Legislation  should 
be  enacted  providing  that  all  persons  on  arrest,  regardless 
of  the  offense  charged,  should  be  taken  directly  before  a 
magistrate,  the  charge  read  to  them,  the  statement  of  the 
arresting  officer  taken  upon  the  record  and  an  opportunity 
given  to  the  prisoners,  after  first  advising  them  of  their 
rights,  to  make  a  statement  of  their  own.  ...  At  least 
one  term  of  the  court  should  be  in  session  at  all  hours  of 
the  day  and  night,  to  which  arrested  persons  could  be 
brought." 

This  last  suggestion  of  a  twenty-four-hour  magistrate's 
court  for  the  prompt  arraignment  of  all  prisoners  is  the 
most  practical  device  to  avoid  the  fixing  of  cases  by  both 
the  police  and  criminals.  The  danger  hours  in  any  crim 
inal  case  are  the  hours  between  arrest  and  arraignment. 
During  those  hours  the  shyster  lawyer,  the  district  leader, 
the  bail  racketeer,  and  the  over-ambitious  policeman  all 
may  have  their  chance  to  exploit  the  prisoner  or  distort 
the  truth.  Professor  Raymond  Moley  suggests  that  the 
present  system  can  be  revised  without  any  change  in  the 


142      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

law.  The  present  deputy  assistant  district  attorneys  who 
are  supposed  to  function  in  the  Magistrate's  Court  are  use 
less.  Professor  Moley  would  have  them  dismissed  and 
lawyers  hired  by  the  Police  Department  to  examine  every 
prisoner  arrested  in  the  presence  of  a  magistrate  immedi 
ately  after  his  arrest.7 

Certainly  a  city  of  the  size  of  New  York  could  afford 
to  have  at  least  one  emergency  magistrate  sitting  in  each 
borough  all  night  to  prevent  the  police  from  forcing  a 
"confession"  upon  any  prisoner  before  he  has  had  a  chance 
to  say  guilty  or  not  guilty  before  a  magistrate.  But  no 
law  revising  the  practice  of  handling  criminals  will  be 
effective  in  the  long  run  unless  public  opinion  forces  its 
observance  by  the  police.  Good,  sound  laws  against  un 
necessary  detention  in  police  stations  have  been  on  the 
statute  books  of  almost  every  state  in  the  union  for  many 
years,  but  the  police  of  nearly  all  our  larger  cities  have 
ignored  them.  The  police  are  so  powerful  that  they  can 
make  their  own  law  if  their  superior  officers  do  not  inter 
fere. 

In  the  case  of  the  liquor  racket  in  New  York,  it  is  a 
matter  of  universal  knowledge  that  a  system  of  speak 
easy  protection  exists  with  payments  to  police  and  pro 
hibition  enforcement  officers.  One  speakeasy  proprietor, 
writing  a  public  confessional  recently,  said  that  each 
speakeasy  paid  about  25  per  cent  of  its  gross  receipts  for 
protection.  The  testimony  before  the  Hofstadter  com 
mittee  indicated  that  small  speakeasies  pay  their  tribute  to 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  143 

the  ordinary  plainclothes  patrolmen,  but  that,  to  use  Judge 
Seabury's  words,  "the  larger  operators,  who  could  and 
were  willing  to  pay  well  for  protection,  were  reserved  for 
the  higher-ups.  This  does  not  mean  that  the  lower  police 
officers  were  not  left  with  plenty  of  opportunities  for 
graft.  One  of  them  who  was  shown  to  have  deposited 
$99,000  in  ten  years,  stated  that  'the  cop,'  such  as  himself, 
got  only  'the  crumbs  from  the  table/  ' 

The  real  feast  of  liquor  and  gambling  graft  in  New 
York  is  spread  for  the  higher-ups,  and  it  is  a  feast  so 
tempting  that  it  would  corrupt  any  set  of  human  beings 
below  angelic  standards.  Grover  Whalen  estimated  that 
there  were  32,000  speakeasies  in  Greater  New  York 
when  he  was  police  commissioner;  more  impartial  author 
ities  have  placed  the  estimate  at  twice  that  number.  The 
scale  of  prices  for  protection  was  indicated  in  the  case  of 
Police  Inspector  Mullarkey  of  Queens,  who  asked  $500  a 
week  for  himself  and  $100  a  week  for  an  assistant  for 
the  right  to  run  an  alcohol  manufacturing  plant  in  Queens, 
but  finally  settled  for  $200  a  week.  He  disappeared  dur 
ing  the  Seabury  hearings. 

The  situation  in  regard  to  liquor  racketeering  in  New 
York  to-day  is  so  abnormal  that  we  have  purposely 
avoided  any  extended  discussion  of  it.  The  liquor  traffic 
has  always  been  a  source  of  trouble  for  the  government 
of  New  York,  but  since  the  adoption  of  the  Eighteenth 
Amendment  it  has  been  peculiarly  troublesome  because  of 
the  amendment's  unpopularity.  Since  the  great  majority  of 
the  people  of  the  city  do  not  want  prohibition,  they  do  not 


144      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

hesitate  to  cooperate  with  bootleggers  and  police  in  flout 
ing  the  law.  In  these  circumstances,  there  is  bound  to  be 
a  system  of  protection  for  an  industry  which  the  majority 
of  New  Yorkers  consider  justified. 

If  we  are  going  to  have  a  liquor  trade — and  it  now 
seems  inevitable  that  we  must  have — the  Socialist  solu 
tion  of  government  ownership  and  operation  of  the  in 
dustry  seems  the  most  logical  one.  Take  profit  out  of 
liquor  and  half  the  gangs  in  America  would  have  nothing 
to  live  on.  Sell  liquor  at  cost  under  the  most  careful 
regulation  and  the  bootlegger  would  soon  lose  his  cus 
tomers. 

In  the  exposure  of  the  framing  of  innocent  women  by 
the  vice  squad,  it  was  discovered  that  even  the  experi 
enced  reformers  of  the  Committee  of  Fourteen,  an  anti- 
vice  committee,  had  been  completely  hoodwinked  for 
years  by  a  secret  alliance  of  policemen,  magistrates,  law 
yers  and  bondsmen.  Outraged  women  had  been  report 
ing  these  frame-ups  for  years,  but  the  position  of  the 
police  is  so  powerful  that  no  one  believed  the  women's 
stories  until  Judge  Seabury's  aides  discovered  one  police 
stool-pigeon,  Chile  Acuna,  who  exposed  the  whole  con 
spiracy.  Acuna,  once  a  well-to-do  immigrant  from  South 
America,  died  not  long  after  the  exposure  while  suffer 
ing  from  a  brain  tumor  in  a  Brooklyn  hospital.  If  he 
had  been  a  gangster  and  turned  upon  his  gang,  his 
life  would  have  been  snuffed  out  in  a  few  hours.  As 
it  was,  the  police,  whom  he  had  betrayed,  did  not  dare 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  145 

to  kill  him  because  they  knew  that  his  death,  like  the 
death  of  gambler  Rosenthal  on  the  orders  of  Police 
Lieutenant  Becker  in  1912,  would  have  brought  down 
upon  them  the  vengeance  of  an  aroused  public. 

We  cannot  believe  that  Mayor  Walker  and  the  leaders 
of  Tammany  Hall  actually  knew  the  full  horror  of  the 
exploitation  of  innocent  women  by  the  vice  squad,  but 
it  is  fair  to  say  that  the  conditions  which  grew  up  in 
the  vice  squad  were  a  direct  result  of  their  negligence 
and  misgovernment.  When  groveling  politicians  buy 
their  way  to  the  bench  with  money  or  political  service 
they  do  not  change  their  character  over  night.  When 
Tammany  puts  an  aged  and  feeble  judge  into  the  most 
difficult  legal  post  in  the  United  States,  the  office  of  Dis 
trict  Attorney  of  New  York  County,  it  means  that  Tam 
many  wants  certain  crimes  overlooked.  In  the  case  of  the 
vice  squad  (since  abolished)  the  whole  system  of  exploita 
tion  would  have  been  impossible  if  the  District  Attorney 
had  paid  any  attention  to  the  Women's  Court. 

New  York,  considering  its  size  and  wealth  and  the 
large  population  of  visitors  in  search  of  amusement,  does 
not  have  a  great  amount  of  organized  prostitution.  Opin 
ions  differ  as  to  the  amount  of  street-walking,  but  it  is 
probable  that  the  proportion  ir  less  than  in  Chicago, 
Detroit,  and  other  large  American  cities.  Tammany  can 
not  be  accused  of  fostering  vice  on  a  large  scale  for  its 
own  profit. 

Those  cases  of  prostitution  which  come  to  the  atten 
tion  of  the  police  are  brought  into  a  section  of  the  Magis- 


146      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

trace's  Court,  where  they  are  tried  by  a  magistrate  with 
the  help  of  a  representative  of  the  District  Attorney's 
office.  This  representative  should  be  a  man  of  integrity 
and  of  sound  training  in  social  service  work.  Under  Tam 
many  he  is  not.  For  seven  years  the  post  was  filled  by 
John  C.  Weston,  a  former  Tammany  process  server  who 
did  not  even  bother  to  submit  reports  to  the  District 
Attorney's  office.  He  united  with  the  vice  squad  in  de 
veloping  a  vice  ring  which  extorted  hundreds  of  thou 
sands  of  dollars  from  innocent  women  by  having  them 
arrested  falsely,  bailed  out  at  extortionate  rates  by  a 
bondsman  in  the  ring,  and  then  bled  by  a  racketeering 
lawyer  who  split  with  the  police.  The  story  is  the  most 
hideous  thing  in  the  whole  history  of  New  York.  It 
was  concealed  for  many  years  because  the  innocent  women 
who  were  the  victims  did  not  dare  to  risk  the  ruin  of  their 
reputations. 

The  ring  worked  through  stool-pigeons  hired  by  the 
police  department.  The  stool-pigeon  would  select  his  vic 
tim,  arrange  to  give  a  signal  to  a  vice-squad  patrolman 
in  plain  clothes,  enter  the  woman's  room  on  some  pre 
text,  give  her  some  marked  money  or  place  it  on  a  table, 
perhaps  strip  off  his  coat,  and  then  signal  the  policeman. 
The  officer  would  come  bursting  into  the  room,  arrest  the 
woman  for  prostitution,  and  take  her  to  jail.  He  would 
appear  to  be  entirely  innocent  of  any  desire  to  frame  the 
woman,  and  the  stool-pigeon  would  conveniently  dis 
appear.  The  officer  would  inform  the  victim  that  she 
could  get  out  on  bail  immediately  if  she  went  to  a  cer- 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  147 

tain  bondsman  who  was  in  the  ring.  The  bondsman 
would  adjust  his  charge  for  bail  according  to  the  amount 
the  victim  could  pay,  usually  getting  an  attachment 
against  her  bank  book  and  charging  her  ten  per  cent  for 
bail,  although  the  legal  rate  is  three  per  cent.  Then  she 
would  be  told  that  she  could  have  her  case  fixed  if  she 
would  hire  a  certain  lawyer,  also  a  member  of  the  ring. 
Each  vulture  in  the  ring  would  extract  his  toll,  and 
when  the  case  finally  came  before  the  magistrate  it 
would  be  dismissed  on  recommendation  of  the  District 
Attorney. 

Weston,  the  assistant  to  the  District  Attorney,  for  rec 
ommending  dismissal,  would  get  $25  to  $150.  Alto 
gether  he  helped  in  the  dismissal  of  600  cases  and  orig 
inally  claimed  a  profit  of  $20,000.  The  policeman's 
"split"  would  depend  entirely  on  the  amount  extracted 
by  the  bondsman  and  lawyer — the  totals  over  a  period 
of  years  might  amount  to  a  substantial  fortune.  Officer 
Quinlivan  of  the  vice  squad,  said  his  wife  banked  $88,000 
in  five  years,  of  which  $61,000  was  in  cash.  Officer  Mor 
ris  acquired  about  $50,000,  of  which  $10,000  came  from 
"gambling,"  and  $40,000  from  his  "Uncle  George,"  who 
died  conveniently  after  giving  him  $40,000  in  one-thou 
sand  dollar  bills  while  they  were  going  to  Coney  Island !  8 
Quinlivan  went  to  prison  and  Morris  was  dismissed  from 
the  force.  Altogether  there  were  six  policemen  convicted 
of  crime  and  13  resigned  or  suspended  from  the  force; 
the  lawyers  escaped  more  easily.  Two  lawyers  were 
disbarred  and  one  reprimanded  as  a  result  of  Judge  Sea- 


148      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

bury's  exposure  of  the  ring.  The  vice  squad  itself  was 
abolished. 

No  summary  of  the  methods  of  the  police  in  the  vice 
frame-ups  can  do  justice  to  their  cruelty.  Let  the  Seabury 
record  in  the  Potocki  case  tell  the  story  of  one  woman's 
suffering: 

Mrs.  Potocki,  for  two  years  before  her  arrest,  had  been 
supporting  her  two  little  girls.  From  8  P.M.  to  4  A.M.  she 
worked  as  a  charwoman.  When  she  returned  home  she  could 
sleep  only  an  hour  or  so  before  giving  her  two  children 
breakfast  and  sending  them  off  to  school.  Then  she  went 
downstairs  to  work  in  a  restaurant  until  3:30  P.M.  She  had, 
in  addition,  been  selling  liquor  to  friends  to  add  five  or  ten 
dollars  a  week  to  her  income. 

At  5:30  P.M.,  September  23rd,  1930,  she  was  entertain 
ing  two  friends,  Marie  Barry  and  Jack  Keeve,  when  she 
heard  a  knock  at  the  door.  Two  plain  clothes  men,  Lewis 
and  McFarland  of  the  Vice  Squad,  stood  outside  and  said 
they  had  been  sent  by  a  friend  to  get  a  drink.  When  they 
had  persuaded  her  that  they  were  "all  right,"  she  let  them 
in.  Drinks  were  poured  and  $15  placed  on  a  table.  Mrs. 
Potocki' s  two  friends  left  at  approximately  7  P.M.  She  then 
told  the  officers  that  they  must  go.  Just  as  she  began  to 
remove  the  bottles  from  the  table,  Lewis  struck  her  on  one 
side  of  the  jaw  and  then  on  the  other.  She  screamed  as  she 
fell;  Lewis  stood  over  her  and  demanded  $500.  Lewis  then 
fell  upon  her  and  ripped  off  her  clothing. 

At  that  moment,  Mrs.  Barry,  who  had  returned  to  get  a 
package  which  she  left,  knocked  at  the  door.  McFarland 
opened  the  door  for  her  and  struck  her  on  the  jaw  with  such 
terrific  force  that  the  blood  spurted  from  her  mouth.  Mean 
while,  Lewis  was  still  wrestling  on  the  floor  with  Mrs. 
Potocki.  In  his  effort  to  overcome  her  resistance  he  hit  sev 
eral  times,  and  beat  her  severely.  McFarland  at  the  same 
time  was  holding  Mrs.  Barry  by  the  hair  and  dashing  her 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  149 

against  the  wall.  Finally  Lewis  dragged  Mrs.  Potocki  to 
the  telephone  and  called  for  the  patrol  wagon. 

At  9  P.M.  the  two  battered  women  were  taken  to  the  Old 
Slip  Station.  Mrs.  Potocki,  who  is  corroborated  by  Mrs. 
Barry,  testified  that  she  called  for  a  doctor  all  night,  but  no 
one  paid  the  slightest  attention  to  her  cries. 

The  trial  took  place  before  Magistrate  Earl  Smith,  who 
was  so  shocked  by  the  evidence  of  police  brutality  that  he 
not  only  discharged  the  woman  but  sent  the  minutes  to 
Chief  Magistrate  Corrigan. 

Dr.  Louis  Goldblatt  of  the  Beekman  Street  Hospital  testi 
fied  before  me  that  he  examined  Mrs.  Potocki  on  September 
26th,  at  which  time  he  made  the  following  findings:  Con 
tusions  below  the  left  eye — on  the  right  and  left  arms  and 
upper  sternum — "marks  above  the  right  breast,  which  re 
sembled  teeth  marks" — contusions  on  both  breasts — the 
abdomen  and  upper  thighs,  on  both  inside  and  outside  sur 
faces,  and  tenderness  over  the  ribs  in  front,  so  that  it  hurt 
her  to  breathe.9 

Officers  Lewis  and  McFarland  are  now  in  Sing  Sing. 

Now  that  the  vice  squad  has  been  abolished,  the  two 
most  important  next  steps  in  a  thorough  clean-up  of  the 
Magistrate's  Court  are  the  public  ownership  and  opera 
tion  of  a  central  bond  office  for  bailing  out  all  prisoners 
and  the  elimination  of  scores  of  surplus  court  clerks  and 
attendants  who  act  as  fixers  for  shyster  lawyers.  The  eli 
mination  of  the  surplus  court  attendants  will  not  come 
while  Tammany  is  in  power  because  these  attendants  are 
an  important  factor  in  the  Tammany  machine,  but  a  pub 
lic  bond  monopoly  would  be  quite  possible  in  spite  of 
Tammany  if  a  centralized  Magistrate's  Court  is  adopted. 
Possibly  Tammany  would  not  oppose  such  a  reform  be- 


150      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

cause  the  bail-bond  racketeers  are  only  scavengers  on 
the  edge  of  the  system.  Their  elimination  would  affect  the 
power  of  the  district  leader  only  slightly. 

The  bail-bond  racket,  as  it  now  operates,  has  developed 
partly  because  New  York  is  so  large  and  impersonal. 
Originally  the  theory  of  bail  was  that  a  prisoner  who  had 
responsible  friends  could  gain  his  liberty  if  those  friends 
trusted  him  so  much  that  they  were  willing  to  risk  their 
property  in  his  defense.  Such  property  usually  consisted 
of  a  house  or  land — and  still  does  in  our  smaller  towns. 
But  in  New  York  only  a  small  minority  of  the  people  own 
any  property  that  can  be  used  for  bail.  The  average  poor 
man  has  no  friends  who  could  bail  him  out  even  if  they 
wanted  to.  The  result  is  that  when  he  is  arrested  he 
must  fall  back  upon  a  bonding  company  or  an  individual 
bondsman  to  whom  he  has  been  referred  by  the  police 
man  or  the  court  attendant.  Usually  these  bondsmen 
have  little  offices  near  each  Magistrate's  Court  with  a 
runner  to  stay  in  the  court  room  and  get  tips  from  the 
police  and  court  attendants  and  an  office  man  to  make 
out  papers. 

These  companies  and  individual  bondsmen  operate  in 
New  York  Magistrate's  Courts  without  any  careful  regu 
lation  or  inspection.  They  are  extortionists  pure  and  sim 
ple — or,  more  accurately,  vile  and  sophisticated.  They 
charge  their  victims  three  or  four  times  the  legal  bail- 
bond  rate  of  three  per  cent;  they  may  use  the  same  piece 
of  property  over  and  over  again  in  various  courts  as 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  151 

security  so  that  if  a  number  of  prisoners  jumped  bail 
simultaneously,  the  city  could  not  recover;  and  they  hire 
"chiselers"  to  get  trade  whose  salaries  become  an  over 
head  charge  upon  the  poor  who  are  arrested.  One  bail- 
bond  racketeer  named  Steiner  who  was  exposed  by  Judge 
Seabury  and  sent  to  the  penitentiary,  extorted  from  Miss 
Anna  Johnson,  a  doctor's  nurse,  on  a  vice  frame-up,  her 
entire  savings  of  $600. 10 

The  establishment  of  one  publicly  owned  bail  office 
which  would  have  a  monopoly  of  the  bail-bond  busi 
ness  and  which  would  not  be  operated  for  profit,  would 
permanently  destroy  the  bail-bond  racket  because  it  would 
take  away  the  pool  of  profits  on  which  the  racketeers 
thrive.  The  State  Insurance  Fund  for  workmen's  com 
pensation  has  set  an  admirable  precedent  for  such  a  ven 
ture.  A  public  bail  office  would  have  no  salesman's  over 
head  in  its  expenses  and  it  would  have  no  motive  to  force 
high  bail  for  trivial  offenses.  Judge  Seabury' s  recom 
mendations  for  destroying  the  bail-bond  racket  tend  in 
this  direction,  but  they  do  not,  in  our  judgment,  go  quite 
far  enough.  He  recommends  low  bail  in  minor  cases 
and  points  out  that  in  England,  where  low  bail  (a  pound 
or  two)  is  accepted  in  most  offenses,  there  are  practically 
no  professional  bondsmen.  A  standard  of  $25  bail  instead 
of  $500  for  most  minor  offenses  would  be  a  distinct  gain 
for  the  poorer  prisoners,  but  as  long  as  some  private 
profit  existed  in  the  bond  business  the  vultures  would 
circle  about  the  Magistrate's  Court,  preying  upon  their 


152      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

victims.  A  publicly  owned  bail  office  operated  by  the 
State  Insurance  Fund  would  put  these  vultures  out  of 
business  permanently. 

Judge  Seabury  found  that  the  bail  racket  was  very 
closely  tied  up  with  the  incompetence  of  the  Probation 
Department.  Long  before  his  investigation  it  had  become 
evident  that  both  the  probation  and  parole  systems  in 
the  city  are  a  grim  and  expensive  joke.  Again  and  again 
ex-prisoners  from  Welfare  Island  have  come  to  our  offices 
and  told  of  a  system  of  payments  for  parole  which  they 
say  is  still  in  vogue.  We  cannot  prove  their  stories  be 
cause  we  have  no  power  of  subpoena  and  because  the 
ex-prisoners  themselves  are  so  afraid  of  "the  system" 
that  they  will  not  take  the  witness  stand. 

The  quality  of  men  who  care  for  the  moral  welfare 
of  discharged  prisoners  under  the  Tammany  regime  was 
disclosed  in  1930,  when  Edwin  J.  Cooley,  head  of  the 
Probation  Department  of  the  Court  of  General  Sessions, 
resigned  under  fire  after  it  was  discovered  that  he  had 
authorized  the  controller  to  make  payments  to  his  sister 
for  seven  months  in  1929,  during  part  of  which  time  she 
was  employed  in  Buffalo.  He  was  acquitted  by  a  jury 
after  a  trial  in  which  he  was  prosecuted  by  an  inexperi 
enced  young  assistant  district  attorney  and  defended  by 
one  of  the  ablest  lawyers  in  New  York. 

In  the  Probation  Department  of  the  Magistrate's  Court 
the  care  of  prisoners  on  probation  is  slipshod,  incom 
plete  and  irresponsible,  particularly  so  in  the  Women's 
Court,  where  the  supervision  of  young  girls  is  especially 


THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW  153 

important.  Young  girls  with  venereal  disease  planning 
to  start  their  life  over  again  after  medical  treatment  and 
discharge  have  found  that  the  probation  department  has 
sent  letters  to  their  distant  parents,  saying  that  their 
'  'daughter  is  in  the  hospital  with  an  infectious  disease" 
and  is  being  held  in  the  Women's  Court.  Judge  Seabury 
and  his  staff  showed  that  such  stupidity  was  typical  of 
the  department.  Almost  no  check-up  was  made  upon 
the  stories  of  delinquent  girls  on  probation — they  might 
have  continued  as  prostitutes  and  no  one  would  have  been 
the  wiser.  Very  few  of  the  girls  were  visited  once  a 
month,  as  the  law  required,  and  the  most  flimsy  and  un 
verified  "reports"  were  accepted  without  further  investi 
gation.  "Dear  Miss  McCauley,"  one  girl  wrote,  "I  am 
well.  Hoping  you  are  the  same.  Oblige."  This  was  the 
kind  of  "report"  which  was  accepted  for  a  whole  year 
as  "supervision."  One  "report"  on  the  case  of  a  male 
probationer  deserves  to  stand  with  this.  "The  defendant 
is  of  good  character  and  habits,  with  the  exception  that 
he  stays  out  late  at  night,  associates  with  undesirable 
companions,  refuses  to  work,  and  will  not  obey  the  rea 
sonable  dictates  of  his  parents." 

Many  of  the  magistrates  have  chosen  to  dismiss  their 
prisoners  rather  than  place  them  in  charge  of  such  para 
gons  of  stupidity — which  paragons,  by  the  way,  cost  the 
city  $250,000  a  year.  Even  when  a  prisoner  has  a  long 
police  record  the  magistrate  often  dismisses  his  case  with 
out  placing  him  on  probation.  Judge  Seabury  discovered 
196  such  cases  in  the  Magistrate's  Court  in  1930  alone. 


154      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

He  strongly  condemned  the  chief  probation  officer  of 
the  Magistrate's  Court  for  incompetence  and  negligence, 
and  recommended  the  junking  of  the  present  probation 
system  and  the  creation  of  a  central  probation  bureau 
with  specialized  branches  and  a  health  clinic  for  all  the 
criminal  courts  of  Greater  New  York.  Nothing  has  been 
done  about  Judge  Seabury's  recommendations.  Nothing 
will  be  done  until  Tammany  control  of  the  courts  is 
shaken  off. 

That  is  the  conclusion  that  we  must  come  to  after  sev 
eral  years  of  observation  of  New  York  justice.  The  most 
perfect  forms  of  social  service  are  nothing  but  flashy  deco 
rations  unless  the  political  group  in  control  at  City  Hall 
has  a  sincere  desire  for  honest  and  efficient  government. 


9 

MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR 

THE  two  greatest  wonders  of  American  city  politics 
have  been  William  Hale  Thompson  and  James  Joseph 
Walker.  Although  Thompson  in  his  day  was  the  greatest 
political  clown  in  the  United  States  he  never  attained  the 
personal  popularity  of  our  Jimmy.  Jimmy  did  not  need  to 
"bust  King  George  on  the  snoot"  or  carry  around  a  cage 
full  of  rats  bearing  his  opponents'  names.  He  was  his 
own  show.  He  was  one  of  the  most  adroit  and  charming 
campaigners  that  this  country  has  ever  produced.  His 
popularity  in  New  York  was  based  upon  the  solid  founda 
tion  of  good  public  speaking,  quick  wit,  and  a  real  per 
sonal  warmth.  Given  that  combination  even  his  weak 
nesses  were  an  asset — until  he  resigned.  Once  the  glamour 
of  power  had  been  taken  from  him  people  began  to  won 
der  just  what  qualifications  he  had  to  direct  one  of  the 
greatest  corporations  of  history. 

Early  in  his  first  term  he  set  out  to  be  a  tabloid  mayor. 
He  exhibited  his  cleverness  at  innumerable  dinners;  he 
did  the  graceful  and  appropriate  thing  at  all  sorts  of 
sporting  events;  he  welcomed  everybody  from  channel 
swimmers  to  cardinals.  And  in  all  of  these  arduous  labors 

155 


156      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

he  had  the  movie  cameras  grinding  at  his  elbow  and  the 
reporters  frantically  scribbling  notes. 

We  have  called  Walker  at  the  head  of  this  chapter  a 
machine-made  mayor  and  the  description  is  quite  accurate 
because  without  the  support  of  the  Tammany  machine  he 
would  have  been  destroyed  by  his  own  weaknesses  far 
sooner  than  he  was.  But  almost  equally  he  was  a  press- 
made  mayor.  He  was  "good  copy  for  the  boys."  There 
were  thousands  of  stories  about  him  in  the  newspapers  dur 
ing  the  seven  years  after  his  election,  and  of  course,  most 
of  these  stories  created  a  favorable  impression  upon  the 
reader  because  in  them  Walker  was  presented  as  saying 
or  doing  something  important  or  interesting.  Shrewd  men 
know  that  the  sheer  weight  of  publicity  is  the  important 
initial  factor  in  creating  a  political  hero  in  America,  and 
Walker  knew  how  to  use  his  commanding  position  as 
mayor  to  win  that  publicity. 

The  reporters  liked  him  because  he  was  easy  and  warm 
hearted  and  lent  them  money  and  thought  of  something 
to  say  that  would  fill  an  assignment.  They  swallowed  his 
every  utterance,  for  the  most  part  uncritically,  and  gave 
him  front-page  headlines.  This  was  especially  true  of  the 
regular  reporters  who  covered  the  City  Hall  beat.  On  this 
beat  in  recent  years  the  great  New  York  dailies  have  had 
routinists  rather  than  crusaders.  Perhaps  their  point  of 
view  has  been  affected  by  the  knowledge  that  hostile  criti 
cism  usually  makes  it  harder  to  get  the  next  day's  story 
from  incensed  officials.  At  any  rate,  when  an  important 
fact  concerning  unemployment  relief,  bad  city  manage- 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  157 

ment,  or  constructive  social  reform  was  brought  before 
the  Board  of  Estimate  by  a  protesting  civic  group  or  party, 
the  fact  was  nearly  always  subordinated  in  the  next  day's 
news  story  to  some  blatant  and  empty  promise  of  action 
by  the  mayor.  The  average  New  Yorker,  reading  only 
headlines  in  the  newspaper,  judged  Walker  by  those  head 
lines.  The  newspaper  editorial  writers  might  try  to  undo 
the  work  of  the  headlines  by  commenting  soberly  on  civic 
problems  but  the  subway  strap-hanger  did  not  read  the 
average  editorial. 

Moreover,  until  the  World-Telegram  entered  the  field 
Walker  was  not  faced  with  the  kind  of  blistering  day-to 
day  exposure  that  was  necessary  to  destroy  his  popularity 
with  the  common  voter.  The  old  World  and  the  new 
Herald-Tribune  were  intelligently  hostile  but  the  Times, 
New  York's  most  influential  paper,  did  not  take  the  ini 
tiative  against  Walker.  It  waited  until  some  one  else 
did  the  exposing.  And,  as  always,  Hearst  was  incalculably 
crafty,  preaching  high  civic  morality  while  backing 
Walker  and  his  gang  by  every  journalistic  artifice.  Hearst's 
hand  was  apparently  the  guiding  one  in  Walker's  final 
resignation,  for  it  was  Hearst  who  made  him  believe  that 
his  vindication  at  the  polls  would  be  overwhelming. 
Then,  when  Walker  had  resigned,  Mr.  Hearst  slapped  him 
on  the  wrist. 

Walker's  prestige  was  increased  by  the  mediocrity  of 
the  men  around  him.  We  have  already  pointed  out  that 
the  borough  presidents  who  sat  on  the  board  with  him 
were  colorless  and  obedient,  voting  like  automatons  for 


158      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

the  administration  measures  after  the  usual  logrolling  for 
their  district  interests.  Probably  the  most  colorless  and 
obedient  of  all  was  the  nominal  Republican,  George  U. 
Harvey  of  Queens,  who  worked  hand  in  glove  with 
Walker  on  almost  every  Tammany  measure  and  even  in 
troduced  the  resolution  which  raised  Walker's  salary  from 
$25,000  to  $40,000  a  year. 

Joseph  V.  McKee,  who  succeeded  Walker  as  mayor  of 
New  York,  sat  at  the  right  of  Mayor  Walker  for  almost 
seven  years  on  the  Board  of  Estimate  with  a  pained  ex 
pression  on  his  face  looking  like  a  "bored  Prince  of 
Wales."  He  is  a  much  quieter  and  more  dignified  person 
than  his  predecessor  and  Walker's  clowning  made  him 
wince.  He  accepted  it  because  he  was  forced  to  accept  it 
as  a  member  of  the  machine.  Toward  the  end  of  Walker's 
reign  when  it  seemed  that  the  desertion  of  a  sinking  ship 
might  be  good  politics,  he  sometimes  rebelled  against  his 
chief,  but  in  nearly  every  important  vote  he  stood  with  the 
mayor. 

Walker  handled  his  powers  as  mayor  with  the  utmost 
recklessness.  On  all  the  occasions  when  we  visited  the 
Board  of  Estimate  during  his  administration  he  was  never 
once  on  time.  Quite  commonly  he  was  an  hour  late  for  the 
opening  of  the  session,  although  his  presiding  over  this 
board  was  the  most  important  duty  of  his  office  and  often 
the  most  pressing  legislative  matters  had  to  be  held  up 
until  his  arrival.  Likewise  in  our  experience  we  have 
never  known  him  to  take  less  than  an  hour  and  a  half  for 
luncheon,  even  while  sweating  crowds  were  standing  up 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  159 

in  the  board  chambers  waiting  for  his  return.  When  he 
did  arrive  he  often  scolded  a  citizen  who  was  protesting 
against  some  measure  for  taking  one  minute  over  his 
allotted  five  minutes.  His  tact  and  charm  were  not  always 
evident  in  the  legislative  chamber.  Often  he  appeared  so 
tired  and  cross  from  his  labors  of  the  previous  day,  or 
night,  that  he  hardly  seemed  to  know  what  was  going  on. 
He  was  savage  and  coarse  in  shouting  down  (through  his 
loud  speaker)  many  a  luckless  citizen  who  aroused  his 
anger. 

James  Joseph  Walker  came  to  the  mayoralty  through 
steady  promotion  at  the  hands  of  his  Tammany  colleagues. 
Born  in  1881  on  Leroy  Street  in  old  Greenwich  Village, 
he  came  from  an  Irish  family  steeped  in  Tammany  poli 
tics.  His  father  had  been  a  Tammany  alderman,  assem 
blyman  and  leader  of  the  old  Ninth  Ward.  In  his  youth 
he  wanted  to  be  an  actor  and  this  aspiration  explains  a 
large  part  of  his  conduct  as  an  adult.  He  did  become  a 
passable  pianist  and  vaudeville  gag  man,  making  $10,000 
on  one  song,  "Will  You  Love  Me  in  December  as  You 
Do  in  May."  He  met  his  wife  while  he  was  a  gag  man 
in  a  musical  comedy  and  she  was  in  the  chorus.  He  de 
cided  to  become  a  lawyer  and  work  for  "the  organiza 
tion,"  so,  after  graduating  from  the  New  York  University 
Law  School,  he  was  sent  to  the  assembly  and  later  to  the 
senate  as  one  of  the  young  "slaveys"  of  Charles  F. 
Murphy. 

At  Albany,  where  he  served  for  fifteen  years,  Jimmy 
Walker  revealed  two  qualities  necessary  for  political  sue- 


160      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

cess.  He  always  voted  with  the  machine  and  he  made  a 
host  of  warm  personal  friends.  In  personality  and  con 
duct  he  was  the  antithesis  of  the  dullness  and  routine  of 
legislative  life  at  Albany.  He  dressed  boldly,  drank  gaily, 
and  fought  for  the  freedom  of  sports.  He  gradually  be 
came  known  as  a  warm-hearted  "regular  fellow."  His 
party  finally  chose  him  as  its  leader  in  the  Senate,  a  post 
usually  occupied  by  a  rising  young  subordinate  of  the  ma 
chine  who  can  be  trusted  to  have  no  mind  of  his  own  in 
serious  matters.  It  was  from  this  post  that  Tammany 
promoted  him  to  City  Hall,  with  the  potent  help  of  Alfred 
E.  Smith. 

After  the  stupidities  of  the  Hylan  administration  the 
city  and  Tammany  Hall  gave  a  sigh  of  relief  when  a  per 
sonable  and  plausible  mayor  moved  into  City  Hall.  Hylan, 
who  had  been  forced  on  the  Democratic  organization  by 
Hearst  as  his  price  for  supporting  the  party  ticket,  had 
neither  intelligence  nor  charm,  and  he  was  one  of  the  most 
erratic  mayors  New  York  ever  had.  The  Tammany  lead 
ers  were  relieved  when  Walker  took  office  because  they 
again  had  a  man  at  City  Hall  who  would  obey  orders,  and 
the  people  were  relieved  because  they  were  rid  of  a  color 
less  bore.  Walker  not  only  obeyed  orders  with  alacrity 
but  he  boasted  before  and  after  election  that  he  was  and 
would  be  a  Tammany  mayor. 

He  promptly  appointed  as  heads  of  various  departments 
a  whole  string  of  Tammany  district  leaders  whose  quali 
fications  for  the  offices  consisted  of  loyalty  to  the  machine 
and  personal  friendship  for  Jimmy.  His  judicial  appoint- 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  161 

merits,  also,  were  machine  appointments  made  without 
heed  to  the  recommendations  of  bar  associations.  The 
degraded  character  of  his  administration  was  partly  con 
cealed  by  a  brilliant  publicity  stunt,  the  appointment  of  a 
gigantic  committee  on  plan  and  survey  for  the  city,  com 
posed  of  472  more  or  less  distinguished  members.  The 
various  activities  of  this  gigantic  committee  distracted  pub 
lic  attention  for  months.  Sub-committees  were  appointed 
and  books  were  written  and  reports  filed  away;  and  if 
Walker  ever  read  the  reports  there  is  no  evidence  of  it. 

There  was,  for  example,  the  report  of  the  mayor's  com 
mittee  on  budget  and  finance,  commonly  known  as  the 
Lehman  report.  It  went  in  great  detail  into  the  clumsy 
and  inefficient  method  of  making  the  city  budget  and 
recommended  a  complete  change  in  procedure.  It  recom 
mended  that  each  year's  budget  should  contain  a  capital 
outlay  program  so  that  the  taxpayers  would  know  what 
public  improvements  were  contemplated — the  present 
budget  does  not  contain  these  items.  It  recommended  a 
change  in  the  fiscal  year  so  that  there  could  be  a  more  in 
telligent  consideration  of  the  budget.  None  of  these 
reforms  was  adopted.  Each  year  the  budget  comes  up 
before  the  Board  of  Estimate  in  such  an  obscure  and  in 
complete  form  that  the  civic  organizations  are  almost 
helpless  in  criticizing  it.  The  citizen  who  wants  to  know 
what  the  city  is  getting  for  its  expenditures  cannot  find 
out  from  the  budget  because  these  things  are  not  itemized. 

Fortunately  for  Walker  he  entered  City  Hall  at  a  mo 
ment  when  America  faced  its  greatest  wave  of  investors' 


162      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

prosperity.  Land  values  soared,  business  expanded  hysteri 
cally,  and  millionaires  were  made  over  night  in  Wall 
Street.  The  extravagance  and  mismanagement  of  the  ad 
ministration  were  forgotten  in  the  national  exuberance. 
Walker  laid  corner  stones  and  cut  ribbons,  and  opened 
bridges,  and  claimed  the  credit  for  himself  and  for  his 
administration  of  spending  the  new  excess  wealth. 

He  was  fortunate,  also,  in  having  a  good  watch-dog 
over  his  treasury  in  the  person  of  Controller  Berry.  Berry's 
department  had  a  number  of  surprising  blind  spots — es 
pecially  a  blind  spot  concerning  unemployment  relief 
needs — but  it  undoubtedly  saved  the  city  from  the  worst 
forms  of  drunken  spending.  In  fact,  as  we  write  these 
lines,  the  City  of  New  York  is  not  in  bad  financial  condi 
tion,  considering  the  national  situation,  and  it  has  not  been 
in  bad  financial  condition  during  the  Walker  administra 
tion.  The  looting  of  funds  during  the  Walker  regime  has 
consisted  for  the  most  part  of  a  levy  upon  private  business 
by  political  brokers  who  had  2oning  laws,  franchises,  or 
permits  to  sell.  It  is  probable  that  only  in  the  payment  of 
high  salaries  to  Tammany  chair-warmers  has  there  been 
any  extensive  misappropriation  of  public  funds,  although 
some  evidence  exists  that  public  works  are  built  below 
contract  specifications.  We  would  not  condone  any  of 
this  petty  graft;  it  is  serious  enough.  But  it  is  trivial  com 
pared  to  the  large  profit-taking  of  private  business  at  the 
expense  of  consumers  and  workers. 

The  record  of  the  Walker  administration  can  be  quite 
naturally  discussed  under  the  two  heads  which  we  have 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  163 

already  suggested,  brokers'  loot  and  personal  loot.  Walker 
from  the  beginning  of  his  administration  used  his  power 
to  give  to  the  Tammany  machine  the  personal  loot  of 
highly  paid,  decorative  positions.  The  non-competitive 
jobs  at  the  top  of  the  city's  administration  gave  him  the 
chance  to  bestow  rewards  on  almost  all  the  leading  serv 
ants  of  the  machine.  In  several  cases  he  appointed  power 
ful  district  leaders  who  were  notoriously  unfit.  There 
were  for  example  the  cases  of  James  F.  Geraghty  of  the 
Bronx  and  Charles  L.  Kohler. 

The  City  Affairs  Committee  in  its  charges  against 
Walker  in  March,  1931,  cited  the  appointment  of  James 
F.  Geraghty  as  commissioner  of  licenses  and  Charles  L. 
Kohler  as  director  of  the  budget.  During  Walker's  first 
administration  the  regulation  of  private  employment  agen 
cies  had  become  such  a  scandal  that  the  State  Industrial 
Survey  Commission  had  recommended  that  the  regulation 
be  put  in  state  hands.  Walker's  answer  was  to  place  in 
the  office  of  commissioner  of  licenses  in  charge  of  em 
ployment  bureaus  a  Bronx  district  leader,  Geraghty,  who 
had  been  officially  condemned  for  incompetence  by  the 
Meyer  Legislative  Investigating  Committee  when  he  was 
in  charge  of  the  Division  of  Licensed  Vehicles.  The 
Meyer  Committee  disclosed  that  "the  administration  of 
the  Division  of  Licensed  Vehicles  of  the  License  Depart 
ment  under  Deputy  Commissioner  Geraghty  not  only 
made  it  a  hot-bed  of  petty  graft  but  that  the  safety  of  the 
public  had  been  seriously  menaced  by  the  large  number  of 
licenses  as  taxicab  drivers  issued  to  ex-convicts." 


164      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Geraghty  is  still  in  office.  Kohler  was  made  Budget 
Director  by  Walker  after  serving  as  secretary  of  the 
Health  Department  during  some  of  its  most  serious  scan 
dals,  scandals  concerning  which  Judge  Charles  H.  Kelby 
in  his  report  on  August  10,  1927,  had  said  that  "it  is  hard 
to  believe  that  the  executive  heads  of  the  department  were 
not  cognizant  of  conditions." 

We  cite  the  cases  of  Geraghty  and  Kohler  because  they 
are  instances  of  the  way  in  which  Walker  was  allowed  by 
Governor  Roosevelt  to  whitewash  his  administration  in 
answering  the  charges  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  in 
1931.  Walker  misrepresented  his  record  and  his  misrepre 
sentations  were  accepted  by  the  public  as  a  vindication 
because  Roosevelt  refused  the  committee  the  privilege  of  a 
rebuttal.  In  the  case  of  Geraghty,  Walker  dismissed  the 
charges  against  him  by  describing  the  Meyer  Committee 
findings  as  "merely  the  reflection  of  a  disappointed  inves 
tigator,"  and  by  saying  that  "Mr.  Geraghty's  resignation 
from  the  License  Department  had  no  relation  to  the  inves 
tigation,  nor  was  it  caused  by  anything  adduced  before 
the  committee." 

The  truth  is  that  the  Meyer  Committee  thoroughly  ex 
posed  and  condemned  Geraghty  in  the  most  specific  words : 

With  the  advent  of  the  present  administration,  the  Chief 
of  the  Division  of  Licensed  Vehicles  was  shorn  of  power. 
An  official  subordinate  was  made  his  actual  superior  in 
charge  of  the  issue  of  licenses  and  one  of  the  Deputy  Com 
missioners,  James  F.  Geraghty,  a  district  leader  in  the  Bronx, 
was  placed  in  direct  charge  of  the  Division.  From  time  to 
time  the  complicity  of  taxicab  chauffeurs  in  crimes  of  vio- 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  165 

lence,  often  committed  in  broad  daylight,  roused  public  con 
cern.  While  this  branch  of  the  inquiry  was  under  way, 
Geraghty's  resignation  was  invited  and  submitted.  .  .  . 

Geraghty's  tolerance  is  not  difficult  to  understand  in  view 
of  his  own  standards  of  conduct  in  public  office.  For  in 
stance,  when  his  political  club  held  an  "outing"  twenty-seven 
taxicabs  were  furnished  him  gratis  by  an  association  of  taxi- 
drivers,  which  itself  paid  the  men  who  owned  the  cabs. 
When  his  club  gave  an  affair  this  same  organization  was 
requested  to  and  did  buy  $100  worth  of  tickets.  When  the 
bill  for  the  transfer  of  jurisdiction  over  the  licensing  of  cabs 
and  drivers  was  pending,  employees  of  the  division  professed 
to  fear  for  their  positions  and  raised  a  fund  for  expenses 
in  working  up  opposition  by  the  sale  of  raffle  tickets  among 
the  persons  licensed  by  the  departments.  In  a  word  the  divi 
sion  has  been  completely  demoralized. 

As  Walker  blandly  ignored  the  real  record  of  Geraghty 
so  he  ignored  the  ominous  Dr.  William  F.  Doyle  and  his 
astonishing  practice  before  the  Board  of  Standards  and 
Appeals.  In  his  reply  to  the  City  Affairs  Committee 
charges  he  did  not  even  mention  Doyle.  The  facts  about 
Doyle  were  a  public  scandal  during  the  mayor's  entire 
administration,  having  been  spread  on  the  records  of  the 
Board  of  Aldermen  by  George  U.  Harvey  on  May  26, 
1925,  seven  months  before  Walker  took  office.  The  Har 
vey  resolution  demanded  a  special  investigation  "to  in 
form  the  people  of  the  city  how  a  veterinarian  could  come 
before  city  boards  as  an  architect  and  amass  a  fortune  of 
$2,000,000  in  three  years."  Walker  not  only  had  the 
power  to  remove  the  members  of  the  Board  of  Standards 
and  Appeals  who  made  Doyle's  success  possible,  but  he 
had  a  whole  corps  of  investigators  already  on  the  city 


166     WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

payroll  waiting  to  be  used  in  just  such  a  scandal.  The 
1931  budget  of  the  city  showed  that  the  mayor's  commis 
sioner  of  accounts,  who  is  really  his  chief  investigator,  had 
under  him  two  deputies,  eighteen  examiners,  sixty-two 
accountants  and  six  examination  inspectors  ready  for  a 
clean-up. 

It  is  indicative  of  the  public  attitude  toward  politics  that 
Walker's  failure  to  be  a  good  mayor  was  not  considered 
half  so  serious  as  any  personal  dishonesty  that  might  be 
charged  against  him.  The  City  Affairs  Committee's 
charges  against  Walker  in  1931  set  forth  certain  convinc 
ing  reasons  why  Walker  should  be  considered  an  incom 
petent  and  irresponsible  mayor  of  a  great  city;  the  Sea- 
bury  charges  of  1932  set  forth  equally  convincing  reasons 
why  the  mayor  was  personally  unreliable.  Of  the  two  sets 
of  charges  those  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  were  more 
serious  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  average  citizen's 
welfare  because  they  showed  the  actual  breakdown  of 
government  under  Walker's  reckless  rule. 

But  a  large  part  of  the  New  York  press  attacked  the 
committee's  charges  as  too  general  simply  because  they 
did  not  produce  sworn  testimony  concerning  the  commis 
sion  of  a  crime.  Few  stopped  to  ask  how  a  voluntary  civic 
body  could  produce  sworn  testimony  without  the  power 
of  subpoena.  The  charges  which  had  been  intended  only 
as  the  starting  point  for  an  official  probe,  were  attacked 
as  incomplete,  and  under  cover  of  the  attack  Governor 
Roosevelt  was  given  the  chance  to  dismiss  them  without 
loss  of  prestige.  If  he  had  immediately  called  for  a  public 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  167 

trial  and  appointed  competent  prosecutors,  the  mayor's 
unfitness  for  office  would  have  been  established  in  a  week. 

After  this  experience  it  became  evident  that  Walker,  no 
matter  how  unfit,  could  not  be  removed  unless  he  was 
convicted  of  a  crime,  either  morally  or  legally.  The  line 
of  the  attack  of  Seabury  upon  Walker  was  marked  out  for 
him  by  circumstance.  He  had  to  prove  that  the  mayor 
either  accepted  a  bribe  or  came  so  close  to  it  that  the  dis 
tinction  was  not  a  difference.  He  was  compelled  by  the 
nature  of  the  electorate  to  make  his  investigation  a  man 
hunt.  He  avoided  the  worst  pitfalls  of  such  a  man-hunt 
by  showing  the  inter-relations  of  corruption,  but  it  is  to  be 
regretted  that  he  did  not  make  a  methodical  survey  of  the 
government,  department  by  department,  to  show  the  ex 
tent  of  its  demoralization. 

The  most  obvious  material  ready  for  Seabury' s  use  was 
the  Equitable  Coach  scandal.  The  Citizens'  Union  had 
underscored  it  and  the  Socialist  candidate  for  mayor  in 
1929  had  made  it  a  major  point  of  attack  upon  Walker. 
It  was  peculiarly  a  personal  scandal  because  the  whole  city 
knew  that  the  mayor  himself  had  personally  jammed 
through  the  Equitable  franchise  against  all  opposition. 

As  we  look  back  upon  the  Equitable  scandal  now  it 
seems  strange  that  no  one  took  the  trouble  to  go  to  the 
heart  of  the  complex  situation  and  point  out  the  financial 
meaning  of  the  deal.  A  great  new  industry  was  develop 
ing  which  was  destined  to  supplant  street  cars,  and  the 
company  which  secured  a  monopoly  franchise  of  this  in 
dustry  for  greater  New  York  would  be  in  a  position  to 


168      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

reap  a  prodigious  harvest.  Probably  the  promoters  of  the 
Equitable  Coach  Company  were  modest  in  estimating  their 
profits  at  $19,000,000  in  ten  years.  The  streets  of  New 
York  were  worth  that  much  to  any  bus  monopoly  and 
they  knew  it. 

It  was  not  surprising  that  a  group  of  financial  adven 
turers  began  working  on  the  new  mayor  from  the  begin 
ning  of  his  first  administration,  using  as  contact  man  the 
mayor's  loud-mouthed  salesman  friend,  Senator  John  A. 
Hastings.  As  soon  as  Hastings'  intimacy  with  the  mayor 
became  known  he  became  a  "bus  expert,"  a  "taxicab 
expert,"  and  what  have  you. 

What  happened  then  is  too  well  known  to  need  any 
complete  description  here.  Hastings  had  organized  a 
bus  syndicate  composed  of  Frank  R.  Fageol  and  Charles 
B.  Rose,  bus  manufacturers,  and  William  O'Neil,  a  tire 
manufacturer.  Two  weeks  after  Mayor  Walker  was 
elected  in  1925  they  incorporated  the  Equitable  Coach 
Company  and  filed  an  application  for  a  city- wide  bus  fran 
chise.  Hastings  was  put  on  the  new  company's  payroll 
at  $1,000  a  month  and  expenses.  The  corporation  was 
apparently  set  up  in  such  a  way  that  Hastings  and  his 
associates  would  have  made  $19,000,000  in  ten  years  with 
out  investing  a  nickel.  The  initial  capital  was  to  come 
out  of  the  dear  public,  who  would  presumably  rush 
to  buy  stock  when  the  franchise  was  awarded  and  leave 
the  insiders  with  their  promotion  stock  paid  for. 

The  Equitable  Coach  Company  was  not  apparently 
worse  than  many  other  companies  which  exploit  streets, 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  169 

gold  mines,  and  consumers.  True,  it  had  practically  no 
financial  backing  and  almost  no  experience  in  running 
buses.  Chairman  Delaney  of  the  Board  of  Transporta 
tion  must  have  blushed  a  little  when  he  concocted  a  report 
that  gave  a  clean  bill  of  health  to  the  company,  but  he 
swallowed  his  doubts  and  did  his  duty  like  a  faithful  son 
of  Tammany.  The  reason  why  the  Equitable  Coach  Co. 
was  exposed  was  that  it  had  to  secure  a  contract  with 
New  York  City  after  public  hearings,  and  its  franchise 
would  not  stand  the  glare  of  publicity.  In  jamming 
through  the  franchise,  Mayor  Walker  and  his  associates 
clearly  violated  section  74  of  the  city  charter  which  com 
pels  the  city  to  make  an  investigation  of  the  money  value 
of  a  franchise  before  granting  it — a  fact  which  strangely 
enough  was  not  brought  out  at  the  Seabury  hearings.  The 
thing  which  finally  killed  the  franchise  was  that  reputable 
bankers  would  not  back  it.  They  pretended  that  the 
Equitable' s  prospects  were  not  bright.  We  believe  that 
this  was  only  a  pretext,  that  the  franchise  would  have 
made  millions  for  its  backers,  and  that  the  bankers  shied 
away  because  they  saw  that  the  franchise  was  so  tainted 
that  it  threatened  to  become  a  public  scandal. 

Walker  jammed  through  the  Equitable  franchise  by 
bargaining  with  the  Bronx  and  Richmond  leaders  to  give 
them  their  own  franchises  separately,  signed  the  contract 
on  August  9,  1927,  and  sailed  for  Europe  on  August  10th 
with  a  $10,000  letter  of  credit  bought  for  the  mayor  in 
cash  by  J.  Allan  Smith,  the  Equitable's  New  York  repre 
sentative.  He  says  that  the  two  events  had  no  connection! 


170      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

He  produced  friendly  witnesses  at  his  trial  before  Gov 
ernor  Roosevelt  in  August,  1932,  to  show  that  all  of  the 
$10,000  not  contributed  by  himself  came  from  other  peo 
ple.  But  the  coincidence  of  that  letter  of  credit  being 
taken  out  at  that  particular  moment  for  Mayor  Walker 
by  the  chief  promoter  of  the  Equitable  was  a  little  too 
plain  to  ignore.  The  "explanation"  was  reminiscent  of 
McQuade  and  his  relatives,  and  Dr.  Walker  and  his  split 
fees. 

Meanwhile  such  a  storm  had  been  raised  by  the  award 
ing  of  this  franchise  to  an  irresponsible  fly-by-night  cor 
poration  that  the  mayor  and  the  Equitable  promoters  had 
to  start  the  fight  all  over  again  when  Walker  returned 
from  Europe.  Some  of  Walker's  superiors  in  Tammany 
were  obviously  worried  by  the  scandal.  J.  Allan  Smith 
wired  to  Fageol  two  messages  which  deserve  to  be  classics 
in  local  political  literature  because  they  show  how  Tam 
many  appeals  to  its  financial  masters.  "No  answer  yet 
your  suggested  financing  stop  He  (Hastings)  advises 
War  Board  (Tammany  Hall)  notified  boy  friend  (Mayor 
Walker)  time  limit  (for  commencement  of  operation  of 
buses  under  Equitable  franchise)  was  April  15th  stop 
Have  made  progress  upstairs  (General  Electric  Com 
pany)  and  arranged  meeting  late  yesterday  between  Judge 
(Charles  W.  Appleton)  and  boy  friend  (Mayor  Walker) 
before  he  (Mayor  Walker)  left  for  Florida  stop  Judge 
(Appleton)  reported  favorable  progress  and  expected  to 
see  his  boss  (Owen  D.  Young)  today  and  advise  me 
Monday  stop  His  boss  (Young)  poor  health  ordered 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  171 

away  for  months  but  if  he  (Young)  says  yes  we  can  get 
extension   Will  keep  you  advised." 

"John  (Hastings)  made  mistake  as  his  boy  friend 
(Mayor  Walker)  did  not  want  further  negotiations  with 
Philadelphia  banker  (Albert  M.  Greenfield)  but  says  go 
ahead  with  Brooklyn  party  (Brooklyn-Manhattan  Transit 
Corporation)  Chairman  Board  (Gerhard  M.  Dahl)  agree 
able  and  like(s)  you  Things  look  bright." 

(The  words  in  brackets  were  not  in  the  original  tele 
grams,  but  since  we  personally  heard  the  testimony  in  this 
case  and  Judge  Seabury  embodied  substantially  these  in 
terpretations  in  his  rebuttal  to  Mayor  Walker  without 
protest  by  the  mayor,  we  feel  warranted  in  including 
them.) 

The  second  of  these  two  telegrams  suggests  what  cer 
tain  political  insiders  have  believed  for  a  long  time  that 
the  Equitable  Coach  deal  was  part  of  a  great  transit  plan 
in  which  the  Brooklyn-Manhattan  Transit  Corporation 
and  Gerhard  M.  Dahl,  its  head,  had  bargained  success 
fully  with  Tammany  Hall  for  transit  monopoly  of  the 
city.  The  B.  M.  T.,  which  had  originally  been  bitterly 
opposed  to  the  Equitable's  bus  franchise  was  suddenly 
converted  to  it  and  offered  to  cooperate.  The  borough 
president  of  Brooklyn  was  also  converted  to  the  Equitable 
franchise,  and  the  McCooey  machine  later  helped  to  put 
through  the  award  of  a  bus  franchise  in  Brooklyn  to  the 
B.  M.  T.  for  $2,000,000  when  it  was  worth  more  than 
$14,000,000.  Gerhard  M.  Dahl  was  receiving  about  the 


172      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

time  of  the  Equitable  discussion  an  annual  bonus  of 
$75,000  a  year,  in  addition  to  a  salary  of  $100,000,  chiefly 
for  "improving  relations  with  the  public" — a  fact  which 
we  shall  discuss  later.  Mayor  Walker  became  exceedingly 
friendly  both  with  Dahl  and  with  the  promoters  of  the 
Equitable.  When  the  Equitable  franchise  was  finally  ve 
toed  by  the  Transit  Commission  (a  State  body)  because 
the  company  could  not  show  any  financial  backing,  Dahl 
and  the  B.  M.  T.  gave  Fageol,  the  Equitable's  promoter, 
a  handsome  order  for  new  buses  in  spite  of  the  fact  that 
another  bus  manufacturer  had  made  a  lower  competitive 
offer. 

The  thing  which  gave  the  whole  Equitable  deal  an  ugly 
look  was  not  only  Mayor  Walker's  letter  of  credit  bought 
by  J.  Allan  Smith  but  the  fact  that  nearly  all  of  the 
Equitable  promoters  except  Hastings  refused  to  waive 
immunity  when  they  came  before  Judge  Seabury.  The 
public  could  not  believe  after  that  that  their  transaction 
was  innocent. 

It  would  be  strange  indeed  if  the  capitalist  politicians 
and  the  franchise  promoters  of  New  York  did  not  coop 
erate  to  give  each  other  unearned  profit.  The  conception 
of  both  the  Democratic  and  Republican  parties  is  that  the 
streets,  piers,  markets,  wires,  and  land  of  the  community 
are  raw  materials  for  private  exploitation.  If  these  basic 
factors  of  wealth  production  were  socialized,  the  blessed 
private  initiative  of  the  Hastings,  Fageols,  and  Dahls 
would  be  diluted  and  the  city  would  languish.  We  shall 
discuss  the  meaning  of  such  initiative  more  fully  in  the 
chapters  on  buses  and  public  utilities. 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  173 

Walker  finally  fell  not  because  he  sold  out  the  city  to 
private  traction  interests  but  because  he  was  too  reckless 
in  receiving  money  from  friends  whose  generosity  had 
developed  after  he  became  mayor.  Paul  Block,  for  exam 
ple,  might  have  been  more  plausible  in  explaining  his 
$246,000  beneficence  to  the  mayor  if  his  generosity  had 
dated  back  to  Walker's  pre-mayoralty  days.  As  it  was, 
the  story  of  how  Block  opened  a  stock  account  for  the 
mayor  on  the  inspiration  of  his  warm-hearted  ten-year-old 
son,  who  wondered  how  such  a  well-dressed  mayor  could 
live  graciously  on  $25,000  a  year  brought  loud  laughter 
from  the  city.  Probably  those  laughs  hurt  the  mayor  more 
than  many  of  Seabury's  factual  thunderbolts. 

Both  the  Block  incident  and  the  Sisto  incident  showed 
how  difficult  it  is  to  convict  a  modern  public  official  of 
receiving  a  bribe.  A  stock  account  may  be  used  with  per 
fect  safety  to  pay  almost  any  ill-gotten  gain  while  the 
stock  market  is  going  up.  Graft  during  a  depression  is 
more  difficult  to  conceal. 

In  the  Sisto  case,  as  in  the  Block  case,  the  mayor  re 
ceived  stock  profits  without  any  written  commitment  on 
his  part  to  pay  for  any  stock  or  to  pay  losses  on  any  stock. 
His  friends  simply  "let  him  in."  In  one  case  he  received 
$246,000,  in  the  other  $26,000.  The  $26,000  from  J.  A. 
Sisto  had  definite  signs  of  taint.  Sisto  was  heavily  inter 
ested  in  taxicabs  and  the  mayor,  shortly  after  he  received 
the  Sisto  bonds,  fought  for  legislation  that  would  have 
greatly  benefited  the  big  taxi  companies.  That  the  mayor 
finally  failed  to  win  as  favorable  a  measure  for  the  taxi- 
cab  owners  as  he  had  originally  planned  is  beside  the 


174      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

point.  He  obviously  intended  to  impose  upon  the  industry 
the  kind  of  regulation  that  in  the  end  would  have  meant 
great  gain  to  such  a  holding  company  as  Sisto  represented. 
Sisto's  sworn  testimony  concerning  the  $26,000  gift  flatly 
contradicted  the  mayor's.  Sisto  said  that  the  money  was  a 
gratuity  and  that  he  had  paid  an  income  tax  on  the  entire 
amount.  (See  Appendix  III  for  Seabury  charges  against 
Walker.) 

Walker  floundered  pathetically  in  explaining  these  gifts 
from  Sisto  and  Block.  He  said  that  they  were  not  gifts  but 
profits  on  investments  and  that  he  would  have  borne  the 
losses  if  there  had  been  any.  If  they  were  profits,  then 
why  did  he  not  pay  income  taxes  upon  them?  The  law 
does  not  permit  one  member  of  a  partnership  to  pay  the 
income  tax  for  another.  We  believe  that  if  Walker's  own 
story  of  Sisto's  $26,000  and  Block's  $246,000  is  accepted, 
the  ex-mayor  is  clearly  guilty  of  violating  both  the  State 
and  Federal  income  tax  laws.  Probably  he  could  not  be 
prosecuted  because  in  these  cases  the  testimony  of  Sisto 
and  Block  that  their  contributions  were  gifts  rather  than 
dividends  would  be  accepted  at  face  value  by  the  Federal 
government,  and  during  the  years  when  those  gifts  were 
made  there  was  no  Federal  gift  tax. 

Seabury' s  weakest  point  against  Walker  was  his  charge 
that  the  mayor  had  violated  the  law  by  owning  some 
bonds  of  the  Reliance  Bronze  and  Steel  Corporation  when 
it  was  supplying  the  city  with  traffic-light  standards.  The 
charge  should  never  have  been  made  because  Walker  had 
obviously  done  nothing  wrong  in  owning  these  bonds. 


MACHINE-MADE  MAYOR  175 

Probably  the  unexplained  millions  of  Walker's  personal 
business  agent,  Russell  T.  Sherwood,  did  more  than  any 
one  thing  to  force  him  out  of  office.  Here  was  a  man 
running  away  after  giving  about  $75,000  of  somebody's 
money  to  an  unnamed  person  who  was  a  friend  of  some 
body.  The  tabloid  readers  could  understand  that.  The 
unnamed  person  became  the  most  named  unnamed  person 
in  the  history  of  the  planet.  Somebody  suggested  building 
a  monument  and  laying  a  wreath  upon  the  tomb  of  the 
unnamed  person.  Sherwood  forfeited  all  his  property  in 
New  York  rather  than  return  to  face  Seabury,  and  an 
income  tax  levy  of  almost  $50,000  was  made  against  him. 

The  public  could  not  think  of  any  reason  for  Sher 
wood's  disappearance  except  his  connection  with  the 
mayor.  He  had  been  a  $3,000-a-year  assistant  in  Walker's 
former  law  office  and  suddenly,  when  Walker  became 
mayor,  his  bank  deposits  jumped  to  $98,000  in  Walker's 
first  year  and  totaled  $961,000  during  the  first  five  years 
and  eight  months  of  Walker's  rule.  And,  significantly 
enough,  almost  $750,000  was  in  cash.  Sherwood  paid 
many  of  the  mayor's  and  Mrs.  Walker's  bills  out  of  his 
bank  account  and  then,  when  asked  to  explain  where  it 
all  came  from,  disappeared. 

To  the  end  Walker  kept  up  his  amazing  front.  He 
screamed  that  he  was  being  persecuted  by  Republicans  for 
political  advantage;  he  forgot  that  long  before  the  Repub 
licans  had  forced  an  investigation  the  Socialists  and  non- 
partisan  civic  groups  had  disclosed  ample  grounds  for  his 
removal.  He  saw  that  his  defense  had  failed  and  that  he 


176     WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

was  about  to  be  removed;  so  he  resigned  with  the  final 
flourish  of  a  vaudeville  star.  Slinking  off  the  stage  as  if 
already  a  fugitive  from  justice  he  would  not  deny  himself 
that  final  curtain. 

And  to  the  end  Walker  was  backed  by  the  machine 
which  he  had  served  so  faithfully.  The  Tammany  leaders 
did  everything  in  their  power  to  save  him.  They  obstructed 
the  Seabury  hearings  until  those  hearings  became  at  times 
almost  a  riot.  They  packed  the  hearing  room  on  the  days 
of  Walker's  appearance  by  sending  a  gang  of  district  ruf 
fians  through  an  unguarded  back  door  to  cheer  him.  They 
sent  filibustering  lawyers  to  Albany  for  the  mayor's  trial 
before  Roosevelt  to  raise  every  fantastic  objection  possible 
to  a  straight-forward  discussion  of  the  facts.  They  kept 
their  machine  intact  after  Walker's  downfall,  and  it  still 
rules  New  York.  It  rules  New  York  so  completely  that, 
if  the  present  form  of  voting  is  continued,  they  can  prob 
ably  put  James  Joseph  Walker  back  in  the  City  Hall  at 
any  time  that  they  wish. 


10 
ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY 

BY  a  queer  twist  of  fate  the  public  hero  of  the  drama 
of  Walker's  resignation  was  Franklin  D.  Roosevelt.  He 
it  was  whom  the  Western  and  Southern  papers  described 
as  the  stern  yet  fair  arbiter  who  sat  in  judgment  over  the 
Tammany  mayor.  The  legend  of  his  strength  and  courage 
spread  through  the  land.  Had  he  not  defied  the  corrupt 
overlords  of  his  own  party?  Had  they  not  sought  to  de 
stroy  him  at  Chicago?  What  better  proof  could  one  want 
that  Franklin  Roosevelt  was  the  White  Knight  who  led 
the  forces  of  civic  virtue? 

Whereupon  we  who  have  lived  in  New  York  and  for 
lo  these  many  years  have  fought  the  steadily  losing  fight 
against  the  Tammany  machine  added  a  third  volume  to 
our  Library  of  Presidential  Fairy  Tales.  It  was  called 
How  Roosevelt  Slew  the  Tammany  Dragon,  and  it  sat  on 
the  shelf  beside  How  Coolidge  Crushed  the  Boston  Police 
Strike,  and  How  the  Great  Engineer  Brought  Efficiency  to 
Washington. 

Lest  we  seem  a  trifle  bitter  about  Franklin  Roosevelt 
let  us  add  that  he  is  a  nice  person  who  once  graduated 
from  Harvard,  has  a  good  radio  voice,  and  is  as  sin 
cere  as  old  party  politics  will  permit.  But  as  to  his 

177 


178      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

relationship  to  Tammany  and  New  York  City  cor 
ruption,  which  is  the  sole  interest  of  this  chapter,  it  is 
the  record  of  a  weak  man  who  has  been  incredibly  lucky. 
To  use  the  words  of  Walter  Lippmann:  "It  is  well  known 
in  New  York,  though  apparently  not  in  the  West,  that 
Governor  Roosevelt  had  to  be  forced  into  assisting  the 
exposure  of  corruption  in  New  York  City.  It  is  well 
known  in  New  York  that,  through  his  patronage,  he  has 
supported  the  present  powers  in  Tammany  Hall.  It  is 
well  known  that  his  policy  has  been  to  offend  Tammany 
just  as  little  as  he  dared  in  the  face  of  the  fact  that  an 
investigation  of  Tammany  had  finally  to  be  under 
taken.  .  .  . 

"I  do  not  say  that  Mr.  Roosevelt  might  not  at  some  time 
in  the  next  few  months  fight  Tammany.  I  do  say  that  on 
his  record  these  last  three  years  he  will  fight  Tammany 
only  if  and  when  he  decides  it  is  safe  and  profitable  to  do 
so.  For  Franklin  D.  Roosevelt  is  no  crusader.  He  is  no 
tribune  of  the  people.  He  is  no  enemy  of  entrenched  privi 
lege.  He  is  a  pleasant  man  who,  without  any  important 
qualifications  for  the  office,  would  very  much  like  to  be 
President."  x 

The  illusion  of  Mr.  Roosevelt's  courage  is  an  inheritance 
from  his  youth  when,  for  a  few  weeks  in  1911  as  a  young 
State  Senator  from  Dutchess  County  he  fought  William 
F.  Sheehan,  who  was  Charles  Murphy's  choice  for  the 
United  States  Senate,  and,  after  winning  his  fight,  voted 
for  the  Tammany  candidate  ultimately.  After  that  one 
rebel  yell  he  was  amiable,  regular.  He  played  with  the 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  179 

machine,  attended  its  banquets  and  mass  meetings,  and 
became  known  in  the  district  clubhouses  as  a  "good  fel 
low."  He  was  made  governor  by  Alfred  E.  Smith  who 
needed  a  popular  Protestant  with  the  right  name  as  a  state 
running  mate  on  the  presidential  ticket  to  offset  the  preju 
dice  against  an  Irish  Catholic  son  of  Tammany. 

When  Roosevelt  ran  for  governor  in  1928  Walker  had 
already  been  in  office  for  nearly  two  years,  and  the  char 
acter  of  the  man  was  quite  evident.  Roosevelt  did  noth 
ing  to  offend  or  criticize  the  machine  which  put  both 
him  and  Walker  into  office.  When  the  notorious  Olvany, 
whose  real  estate  manipulations  we  have  already  de 
scribed,  resigned  as  Tammany  leader  in  1929,  Roosevelt 
issued  a  statement  praising  him.  He  continued  to  do 
business  amiably  with  John  F.  Curry.  His  wife  joined 
the  committee  of  leading  citizens  to  ask  James  J.  Walker 
to  be  a  candidate  for  reelection  in  1929.8 

During  his  second  year  as  governor  (1930)  his  position 
of  innocent  aloofness  was  challenged  by  Fiorello  La 
Guardia,  Charles  H.  Tuttle  and  the  Socialist  Party.  The 
scandals  in  New  York  City  government  came  thick  and 
fast.  Rothstein  had  been  killed  and  Magistrate  Vitale  had 
been  removed  by  the  Apellate  Division  for  accepting  a 
loan  from  the  gambler.  General  Sessions  Judge  Mancuso 
had  been  forced  out  after  the  failure  of  the  City  Trust 
Company.  Roosevelt,  instead  of  scouring  the  city  for  a 
successor  to  Mancuso  who  would  command  universal  re 
spect,  accepted  the  Tammany  designee  for  the  post,  a  man 
who  was  condemned  as  unfit  for  his  place  by  the  New 


180      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

York  County  Lawyers'  Association  and  who  later  refused 
to  waive  immunity  before  the  Todd  grand  jury.  He  re 
fused  to  make  public  his  files  relating  to  Bertini's  ap 
pointment  after  a  demand  for  such  publicity  by  Louis 
Waldman. 

Then  in  March,  1930,  the  Republicans  in  Albany  tried 
to  get  Roosevelt  to  investigate  New  York  City  on  his  own 
authority  and  the  governor  vetoed  the  bill.  The  Socialist 
Party,  after  the  Vause  pier  lease  scandal,  asked  Roose 
velt  in  June,  1930,  to  initiate  a  Moreland  Act  investigation 
of  the  New  York  City  situation  and  the  Republicans 
offered  to  support  a  special  session  of  the  legislature  to 
give  the  governor  adequate  powers  for  such  an  investiga 
tion.  Roosevelt  declined  in  a  letter  that  was  scholarly  and 
evasive.  He  treated  the  phenomena  of  corruption  in  New 
York  not  as  connected  parts  of  a  pattern  of  political  con 
duct  but  as  isolated  incidents  to  be  referred  to  the  Tam 
many  prosecutors  and  their  aides.  He  would  intervene  in 
New  York  City,  he  said,  only  when  there  was  "a  failure 
on  the  part  of  local  inquisitorial  bodies."  In  practice  that 
meant  the  reference  of  Tammany  crimes  to  the  aged 
Curry  henchman,  T.  C.  T.  Crain. 

Roosevelt  was  shrewd  enough  in  all  of  his  moves  never 
to  appear  as  the  agent  of  obstruction.  He  fell  back  adroitly 
on  good  constitutional  alibis.  When  he  turned  down  the 
Republican  and  Socialist  request  for  a  Moreland  Act  inves 
tigation  of  New  York  City  he  volunteered  heartily  to  have 
plenty  of  investigations  by  grand  juries  and  the  Appellate 
Division.  These  investigations,  of  course,  would  be  lim- 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  181 

ited  to  specific  areas  and  grievances  and  would  not  expose 
the  whole  picture  of  the  corrupt  rule  of  the  city  by  his 
party,  This  is  precisely  the  strategy  that  he  finally  used 
when  the  scandals  in  the  city  became  so  great  that  it  was 
bad  politics  to  ignore  them  further. 

When  Charles  H.  Tuttle  disclosed  the  Ewald  scandal 
and  Grain  failed  to  get  an  indictment  Roosevelt  not  only 
initiated  a  grand  jury  investigation  of  the  particular  case 
but  he  asked  the  Appellate  Division  to  investigate  the 
Magistrates'  Courts  in  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx.  The 
public  uproar  was  so  great  that  he  could  do  nothing  less, 
but  his  move  for  these  restricted  inquiries  saved  Tammany 
from  the  much  more  serious  revelations  that  seemed  to  lie 
behind  Vause's  expensive  pier  leases  and  Doyle's  adjust 
able  zoning  laws. 

Charles  H.  Tuttle  was  perfectly  justified  when,  in  run 
ning  for  governor  against  Roosevelt  in  1930  he  said:  "In 
the  face  of  this  record  the  Governor  has  been  as  blind, 
deaf  and  dumb  as  Tammany  Hall  could  wish  him  to  be. 
He  has  pretended  to  regard  each  scandal  as  mere  distinct, 
unrelated  and  isolated  cases  to  be  taken  up  separately  each 
apart  from  the  other,  until  the  evidence  in  each  became 
too  strong  to  ignore.  He  declined  to  see  what  even  the 
unanimous  Democratic  press  sees — namely,  a  common 
bond  and  a  common  significance." 

To  which  Roosevelt  replied  in  his  closing  campaign 
speech:  "Without  further  evidence  I  am  not  convinced 
that  the  seven  million  people  of  New  York  City  cannot 
handle  their  own  affairs  and  unless  by  such  evidence  I  am 


182      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

so  convinced  I  will  not  interfere  with  their  affairs.  With 
out  sufficient  evidence  I  have  refused  to  believe  that  all 
judges  in  New  York  City  are  corrupt.  Without  sufficient 
evidence  I  have  refused  to  believe  that  all  officeholders  in 
New  York  City  are  dishonest." 

So  the  bold  progressive  was  reflected  governor  and 
Tammany  was  "vindicated."  As  each  new  scandal  arose 
Roosevelt  demonstrated  just  the  right  proportion  of  cau 
tion  and  concern.  When  in  the  grand  jury  investigation 
of  the  Ewald  case  Prosecutor  Hiram  Todd  called  John  F. 
Curry  and  other  Tammany  leaders  to  the  witness  stand, 
they  all  refused  to  waive  immunity.  Todd  refused  to  lis 
ten  to  their  evidence  unless  they  did  waive  immunity. 
Roosevelt,  faced  with  a  virtual  admission  of  guilt  by  his 
own  party  chiefs,  was  obliged  to  do  something  to  save 
their  faces  or  dissociate  himself  from  such  company.  He 
evolved  a  neat  formula  for  doing  both  at  once. 

He  wrote  a  solemn  public  letter  to  Mayor  Walker  de 
claring  that  no  man  should  hold  public  office  and  refuse 
to  waive  immunity  in  regard  to  his  public  acts.  Walker 
and  the  Tammany  leaders  took  the  cue.  The  leaders 
declared  their  willingness  to  testify  as  to  their  public  acts 
but  not  as  to  their  private  acts.  The  buying  of  judgeships 
which  Todd  was  probing  into  was,  of  course,  a  private 
act.  Todd  rightly  refused  to  listen  to  the  Tammany  leaders 
unless  they  agreed  to  testify  before  him  without  condition. 
They  refused  to  waive  immunity  completely,  and  in  the 
end,  they  escaped  examination.  Roosevelt  acquiesced  in 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  183 

this  evasion  and  never  added  a  word  of  rebuke  to  his 
pious  public  utterance. 

But  still  the  scandals  in  New  York  City  grew  and  the 
Republicans  in  Albany  finally  decided  to  force  a  legislative 
investigation.  They  forced  it  through  a  joint  resolution 
which  Roosevelt  never  signed  because  he  did  not  need  to 
sign  it.  They  and  not  Roosevelt  chose  Seabury  as  the  coun 
sel  for  that  investigation.  When  it  was  all  done  Roosevelt 
could  not  refuse  to  sign  the  appropriation  bill  for  the 
investigation  without  committing  political  suicide. 

While  the  public  demand  for  an  investigation  of  New 
York  City  was  growing,  the  City  Affairs  Committee, 
through  its  chairman  and  vice-chairman,  John  Haynes 
Holmes  and  Rabbi  Stephen  S.  Wise,  brought  charges 
against  Mayor  Walker;  and  the  City  Club  filed  charges 
against  District  Attorney  Thomas  C.  T.  Crain.  Both  sets 
of  charges  were  intended  to  be  only  indictments  calling 
for  investigation  and  public  hearings.  Both  charges  served 
their  purpose  admirably  because  they  focussed  the  wide 
spread  discontent  against  the  Walker  administration  on 
definite  points  of  infection  and  probably  played  a  deter 
mining  part  in  inducing  the  legislature  to  vote  a  complete 
investigation.  The  details  of  the  charges  against  Walker 
we  have  discussed  elsewhere;  here  we  are  concerned  with 
the  role  that  Roosevelt  played  in  relation  to  those  charges, 
a  role  which  the  public  has  never  thoroughly  appreciated. 

The  City  Affairs  Committee's  charges  against  Mayor 
Walker  were  detailed  and  broad  in  their  scope.  They  were 


184      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

so  serious  in  their  nature  that  no  fair  judge  could  possibly 
have  discovered  their  truth  or  falsehood  without  some 
first-hand  investigation  of  the  departments  of  New  York 
City's  government.  Governor  Roosevelt  never  made  any 
move  to  make  such  an  investigation  and,  what  is  more 
damning,  he  never  even  referred  the  charges  to  the  legis 
lative  committee  which  had  been  created  for  the  express 
purpose  of  making  an  investigation  of  Walker's  adminis 
tration.  The  legislative  committee  to  investigate  New 
York  City  had  been  created  while  the  charges  of  the  City 
Affairs  Committee  against  Mayor  Walker  were  still  pend 
ing  and,  as  soon  as  the  committee  was  created,  Mr.  Holmes 
and  Dr.  Wise  hastened  to  assure  Governor  Roosevelt  that 
they  would  be  delighted  to  have  their  charges  referred  to 
this  committee. 

Governor  Roosevelt  declined  to  refer  them.  He  had 
received  a  warning  from  Tammany  that  it  would  consider 
the  reference  of  these  charges  to  the  Hofstadter  committee 
an  unfriendly  act.  He  did  an  amazing  thing.  He  referred 
the  very  brief  complaint  of  the  City  Club  against  District 
Attorney  Crain  to  Judge  Seabury  for  a  thorough  investiga 
tion  with  hearings ;  he  sent  the  long  and  detailed  charges 
against  Mayor  Walker  to  the  mayor  for  a  reply,  then 
refused  the  City  Affairs  Committee  the  opportunity  to 
refute  the  insolent  and  evasive  reply  of  the  mayor,  and 
finally  dismissed  the  committee's  charges  against  Walker 
as  "too  general."  He  did  not  have  the  courage  to  say 
that  they  were  false — he  had  never  investigated  a  single 
city  department  to  discover  whether  they  were  false  or 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  185 

true — and  he  feared  the  effect  of  the  smashing  rebuttal  that 
the  City  Affairs  Committee  could  have  made.  He  chose 
rather  to  pick  upon  the  aged  and  feeble  Crain,  submit  him 
to  public  torture  upon  charges  which  contained  not  a 
single  detail,  and  dismiss  the  15-page  detailed  charges 
against  Tammany's  powerful  mayor  as  "too  general" — 
without  denying  a  single  one  of  them. 

Roosevelt  escaped  a  barrage  of  public  condemnation  by 
lucky  circumstance.  The  average  New  Yorker  had  begun 
to  think  of  the  Seabury  inquiry  as  the  hope  of  the  city 
long  before  Roosevelt  had  reached  a  decision  on  the  City 
Affairs  Committee's  charges  against  Walker.  In  the  ex 
citement  of  the  new  inquiry  the  dropping  of  the  charges 
was  not  considered  serious.  Seabury,  the  public  reasoned, 
would  get  at  the  facts  more  thoroughly  than  any  unofficial 
committee  could. 

Seabury  discovered  enough  official  and  unofficial  cor 
ruption  to  shock  a  continent  but  it  was  not  enough  to  pro 
duce  a  tremor  at  the  executive  mansion  in  Albany.  During 
all  the  tin-box  revelations  which  we  have  outlined  in  pre 
vious  chapters  not  one  word  of  condemnation  or  one  sug 
gestion  of  reform  came  from  Governor  Roosevelt.  Many 
of  the  officials  exposed  were  directly  responsible  to  the 
governor  for  their  conduct  and  removable  by  him.  The 
complete  evidence  against  them  was  published  in  full  day 
by  day  in  the  great  New  York  dailies  where  Governor 
Roosevelt  could  not  have  failed  to  see  it.  Still  silence 
from  Albany.  Sheriff  Farley,  the  most  notorious  of  the 
Tin  Box  Brigade,  testified  before  Seabury  on  October  6th 


186      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

and  his  complete  testimony  was  published  October  7th. 
Silence  from  Albany  for  eighty-five  days!  Then  Seabury 
decided  to  officially  call  the  attention  of  the  governor  to 
the  evidence  against  Sheriff  Farley.  He  transmitted  that 
evidence  to  Governor  Roosevelt  on  December  30th,  al 
though  Roosevelt  had  had  the  opportunity  to  read  all  the 
important  features  of  it  in  the  newspapers  weeks  before. 
Then  Seabury  waited.  The  Committee  of  One  Thousand 
and  the  City  Affairs  Committee  put  the  case  against  Farley 
in  the  form  of  definite  charges  on  January  18th.  Roosevelt 
did  not  even  have  the  courtesy  to  make  Seabury's  statement 
about  Farley  public  until  the  City  Affairs  Committee  had 
wired  him  asking  for  an  explanation  of  his  neglect.  Sea- 
bury  waited  until  January  24th,  one  hundred  and  ten  days 
after  Farley  had  testified,  before  Roosevelt  finally  decided 
to  give  Farley  a  public  hearing. 

By  this  time  the  newspapers  were  clamoring  so  loudly 
that  further  inaction  had  ceased  to  be  good  politics.  Far 
ley  was  summoned  to  Albany  where  he  floundered  in  his 
tin  box  explanations  even  more  pathetically  than  he  had 
on  the  witness  stand  in  New  York.  Roosevelt  removed 
him — gently,  without  one  word  of  anger,  and  without  any 
suggestion  that  his  transgressions,  as  Seabury  had  proved, 
were  not  individual  sins  but  samples  of  a  definite  system 
of  plunder  by  a  political  machine  of  Governor  Roosevelt's 
own  party. 

In  removing  Farley,  Roosevelt  made  a  statement  which 
will  remain  the  outstanding  mystery  of  his  political  career. 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  187 

It  was  a  ringing  statement  of  high  moral  principle  such 
as  a  man  might  make  who  had  decided  to  burn  all  old- 
party  bridges  behind  him  and  fight  for  a  genuine  political 
reconstruction.  He  said:  "As  a  matter  of  general  sound 
public  policy,  I  am  very  certain  that  there  is  a  requirement 
that  where  a  public  official  is  under  inquiry  or  investiga 
tion,  especially  an  elected  official,  and  it  appears  that  his 
scale  of  living  or  the  total  of  his  bank  deposits  far  exceeds 
the  public  salary  which  he  is  known  to  receive,  he,  the 
elected  public  official,  owes  a  positive  public  duty  to  the 
community  to  give  a  reasonable  or  credible  explanation 
of  the  sources  of  the  deposits,  or  the  source  which  enables 
him  to  maintain  a  scale  of  living  beyond  the  amount  of 
his  salary." 

There,  for  once,  spoke  a  man  and  not  a  politician ! 

Roosevelt  must  have  known  when  he  made  this  state 
ment  that  if  he  followed  it  through  the  entire  Tammany 
machine  would  be  wrecked.  Unwittingly  or  sagaciously 
he  had  given  the  reformers  and  Judge  Seabury  the  very 
handle  they  had  been  looking  for.  He  had  proposed  a 
moral  rather  than  a  legal  test  for  fitness  to  hold  office  in 
New  York.  He  had  lightened  the  burden  of  proof  placed 
upon  Seabury  in  his  arraignment  of  Walker.  Before  the 
Farley  statement  Seabury  was  beholden  to  prove  that 
Walker  had  actually  accepted  a  bribe  or  misappropriated 
city  funds;  now  he  only  had  to  produce  unexplained  bank 
accounts.  Roosevelt's  position  was  made  even  more  sig 
nificant  by  the  fact  that  on  January  25,  1932,  Seabury 


188      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

issued  his  intermediate  report  summarizing  the  evidence 
against  a  whole  group  of  Tammany  chieftains  and  show 
ing  that  Farley  was  no  worse  than  the  rest. 

The  City  Affairs  Committee  promptly  jumped  into  the 
fray  again  with  a  test  for  Roosevelt's  new  formula.  Was 
the  governor  talking  political  rhetoric  or  really  changing 
his  attitude  toward  Tammany?  John  Haynes  Holmes  and 
Stephen  S.  Wise  signed  charges  against  Sheriff  James  A. 
McQuade  of  Kings  County  and  sent  them  to  Roosevelt; 
and  they  also  sent  to  Roosevelt  a  copy  of  their  charges 
against  John  Theofel,  Democratic  boss  of  Queens  and 
Chief  Clerk  of  the  Surrogate's  Court  of  that  county,  whose 
removal  they  asked  by  Surrogate  Hetherington.  Both  these 
men  had  been  convicted  out  of  their  own  mouths  of  hav 
ing  large  bank  deposits  for  which  they  could  give  no 
credible  explanation.  Both  these  men  had  been  denounced 
by  Judge  Seabury  in  language  as  definite  as  his  denun 
ciation  of  Farley. 

Roosevelt  met  the  new  attack  by  the  City  Affairs  Com 
mittee  in  language  so  violent  and  with  anger  so  un 
affected  that  his  real  attitude  toward  the  whole  Tammany 
machine  was  revealed  as  by  a  flash  of  lightning.  It  be 
came  apparent  that  his  statement  of  high  political  morality 
in  removing  Farley  was  the  utterance  of  an  aspirant  to  the 
Presidency.  He  had  no  intention  of  following  it  up.  He 
showed  more  anger  in  one  burst  of  resentment  against 
Mr.  Holmes  and  Dr.  Wise  than  he  had  revealed  in  the 
whole  course  of  the  investigation  of  New  York  corrup 
tion.  He  not  only  refused  to  remove  McQuade  or  rec- 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  189 

ommend  an  investigation  into  the  conduct  of  Theofel, 
but  he  utterly  ignored  the  other  Tammany  officials  who 
remained  in  office  with  huge  bank  accounts  unexplained, 
two  of  them,  Flaherty  and  Curran,  assistants  to  Farley. 
He  consulted  with  John  F.  Curry  as  to  Farley's  successor. 
Then  he  appointed  Curry's  choice,  John  E.  Sheehy,  who 
calmly  proceeded  to  leave  in  office  the  subordinates  of 
Farley  who  were  guilty  of  the  same  offense  for  which 
Farley  had  been  removed. 

Fortunately  for  the  honor  of  the  New  York  press,  not 
a  newspaper  in  the  city  except  The  Times  took  Roose 
velt's  refusal  to  remove  McQuade  and  Theofel  as  an  act 
of  political  courage.  Roosevelt  in  his  reply  had  attacked 
the  leaders  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  personally,  say 
ing:  "If  you  would  exert  yourselves  patiently  and  con 
sistently  in  pointing  out  to  the  electorate  of  New  York 
City  that  an  active  insistence  on  their  part  would  result  in 
better  qualified  and  more  honest  and  more  efficient  public 
servants,  you  would  be  rendering  a  service  to  your  com 
munity  which  at  the  present  time  you  are  not  performing." 

He  refused  to  remove  McQuade  on  the  ground  that  the 
voters  of  Kings  County  had  elected  him  sheriff  after  read 
ing  of  his  testimony  before  Judge  Seabury  and  that  there 
fore  he  was  legally  purged.  "If  our  system  of  government 
were  changed,"  he  said,  "so  as  to  give  to  the  Governor  the 
duty  of  overriding  and  nullifying  a  definite  elective  choice 
by  removing  an  elected  official  for  acts  committed  prior 
to  his  election,  with  full  public  knowledge  thereof,  such 
change  would  create  in  Albany  a  power  so  dangerous  in 


190      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

the  hands  of  an  unscrupulous  Governor  that  the  will  of 
the  electorate  could  be  wholly  destroyed."  In  refusing  to 
take  any  action  against  Boss  Theofel  he  accused  the  City 
Affairs  Committee  of  grave  impropriety  in  asking  him  to 
exert  pressure  upon  a  "high  judicial  officer." 

The  reply  of  the  committee,  sent  by  Mr.  Holmes  and 
Dr.  Wise,  probably  did  more  than  any  one  thing  to  destroy 
the  confidence  of  liberals  in  Roosevelt  because  it  summed 
up  in  its  conclusion  many  important  facts  concerning 
Roosevelt's  negligence.  It  said: 

You  purport  to  be  indignant  over  our  "grave  im 
propriety"  in  urging  "that  you  use  your  utmost  interest 
and  influence  to  secure  the  removal  from  office  of  the 
clerk  of  the  Surrogate's  Court."  You  are  shocked  that 
any  one  should  suggest  that  you  "exert  pressure"  upon 
"a  high  judicial  officer."  This,  sir,  is  the  sheerest 
quibbling!  You  know  perfectly  well*  what  we  meant 
in  our  appeal.  We  meant  and  we  mean  that,  had  you 
been  worthy  of  your  high  office,  as  alert  to  the  peoples' 
interest  as  to  your  own  political  advancement,  you 
would  months  ago  have  summoned  the  surrogate  of 
Queens  County  into  your  presence  and  demanded  that 
he  act  on  the  facts  brought  to  light  by  the  counsel  for 
the  Hofstadter  Committee.  So  far  as  the  public  records 
show,  you  have  done  nothing  to  bring  the  conduct  of 
his  clerk  to  the  attention  of  the  surrogate,  who  is  by 
law,  responsible  to  you.  This  in  spite  of  the  fact  that 
the  surrogate,  taking  example  and  advantage  of  your 
neglect,  did  nothing  for  five  months  after  the  facts 
concerning  Mr.  Theofel  had  been  made  public.  The 
surrogate's  present  action  is  only  the  result  of  our  prod 
ding.  Had  you  moved  with  the  promptness  and  vigor 
which  the  moral  aspects  of  the  case  demand,  there 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  191 

would  have  been  no  need  to  ask  you  to  use  your  influ 
ence  to  secure  the  removal  of  Mr.  Theofel.  Your  own 
culpable  inaction  was  at  once  the  cause  and  occasion  of 
our  plea. 

You  pretend  that  Surrogate  Hetherington  is  a  high 
and  independent  judicial  official.  You  know  that  the 
surrogate  and  scores  of  other  officials  in  Queens  County 
are  the  creatures  of  John  Theofel,  the  Democratic 
leader  of  Queens,  put  in  office  by  his  power,  and  kept 
in  office  for  his  advantage.  Mr.  Theofel  himself  has 
publicly  admitted  that  he  put  the  surrogate  in  his  pres 
ent  position.  If  you  do  not  command  or  force  action 
against  Mr.  Theofel,  how  can  you  expect  his  political 
underling  to  do  so? 

Your  objection  to  our  appeal  for  help  in  the  removal 
of  Mr.  Theofel  is  outdone  by  your  peremptory  rejec 
tion  of  our  charges  against  Sheriff  McQuade,  of  Kings 
County,  on  the  ground  that  he  was  elected  to  his  pres 
ent  office  after  the  public  revelation  of  his  incredible 
bank  accounts.  You  contend  that  the  legislative  system 
"allows  to  the  registered  voters  full  opportunity  to 
select  any  citizen  no  matter  what  you  and  I  may  think 
of  the  qualification  of  that  citizen  for  the  office."  Dare 
you  say,  sir,  that  the  citizens  of  Brooklyn  had  a  fair 
chance  to  weigh  the  guilt  or  innocence  of  Mr.  McQuade 
at  the  last  election?  Let  us  remind  you  that  the  dis 
closures  before  the  Hofstadter  Committee  concerning 
Mr.  McQuade' s  unexplained  bank  accpunts  were  not 
made  until  October  7,  which  was  two  full  months  after 
he  had  been  designated  for  his  present  office  by  the 
Democratic  party  convention.  He  was  named  at  this 
convention  on  August  7,  confirmed  in  the  primaries 
on  September  15,  and  did  not  testify  before  the  Hof 
stadter  Committee  until  October  7.  His  nomination  on 
the  Democratic  ticket  in  Brooklyn,  as  you  well  know, 
was  equivalent  to  election. 

Furthermore,  at  the  election  of  last  November,  the 


192      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

voters  of  Brooklyn  were  not  presented  a  clear-cut  issue. 
They  had  read  sketchy  newspaper  accounts  of  a  public 
hearing  and  of  vigorous  protestations  of  innocence  by 
Mr.  McQuade.  No  charges  were  then  made  against 
Mr.  McQuade  by  any  civic  committee  or  any  prosecut 
ing  attorney.  You  now  tell  us  that  you  would  not  have 
voted  for  Mr.  McQuade  had  you  "been  a  resident  of 
Kings  County  last  autumn."  Why  did  you  not  state 
this  before  the  election?  How  could  you  expect  the 
voters  to  reject  Mr.  McQuade  in  the  absence  of  such 
courage  of  leadership  as  it  was  your  opportunity  to 
offer?  Why  did  you  not  summon  Mr.  McQuade  before 
you  while  he  was  running  for  his  new  office  and  de 
mand  the  truth  about  the  allegations  that  had  been 
made  against  him?  At  that  time  the  voters  did  not 
have  before  them  any  such  ruling  as  you  laid  down  in 
the  Farley  case,  to  the  effect  that  an  official  who  could 
not  explain  his  bank  accounts  should  be  removed  from 
public  office.  .  .  . 

You  purport  to  be  profoundly  shocked  at  our  request 
for  the  removal  of  a  public  official  for  offenses  com 
mitted  before  his  reelection.  Your  statement  on  this 
question  is  a  patent  evasion  of  the  issue.  It  has  support 
neither  in  law  nor  in  morals.  Mr.  McQuade  committed 
an  offense  for  which  he  has  indicated  no  repentance 
and,  as  far  as  we  can  judge,  he  has  not  turned  over  a 
new  leaf  nor  broken  with  his  past.  His  associations 
remain  what  they  were  in  1930,  and  perhaps  he  is  still 
"supporting"  the  thirty-three  relatives  to  whom  he  re 
ferred  in  his  testimony  before  the  Hofstadter  Commit 
tee.  You  know,  sir,  that  Mr.  McQuade  was  guilty  of 
exactly  the  same  offense  for  which  you  removed  Sheriff 
Farley  and  that  he  had  the  same  unfitness  for  office  on 
November  4  that  he  had  on  November  2,  1931.  In 
the  case  of  an  offending  official,  your  task  as  Governor 
is  to  judge  him,  not  on  the  basis  of  legal  technicalities, 
but  on  the  grounds  of  moral  fitness.  The  law  in  grant- 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY  193 

ing  you  the  power  of  removal  exempts  you  from  those 
judicial  limitations  and  circumscriptions  which  too  often 
tend  to  obstruct  justice  in  the  courts. 

We  recognize  that  the  power  to  remove  an  official 
for  past  offenses  after  his  reelection  is  open  to  abuse, 
but  that  danger  of  abuse  is  no  excuse  for  failure  to 
act  when  the  moral  issue  is  clear. 

We  insist  that  the  very  power  of  removal  was  given 
you  by  the  Constitution  of  this  state  in  order  that  you, 
as  an  executive  and  not  a  judge,  might  be  free  to  oust 
an  unfit  public  servant  even  when  he  had  not  com 
mitted  an  offense  reviewable  in  a  court  of  law  or  clear 
cut  enough  to  be  adjudged  at  the  polls.  .  .  . 

You  say  that  you  are  "becoming  convinced"  that 
"corruption  in  public  office  and  that  unfit  servants  in 
public  office"  are  even  more  abhorrent  to  you  than  to 
us.  Your  record  belies  this  boast.  The  Tammany  brand 
is  as  clear  on  that  record  as  the  stripes  of  a  tiger.  You 
removed  Sheriff  Farley  for  his  unexplained  bank  ac 
counts  only  when  Judge  Seabury  forced  you  to  this 
action,  and  then  you  replaced  the  Tammany  leader  of 
the  14th  District  with  the  Tammany  leader  of  the  15th 
District.  The  new  sheriff  whom  you  appointed  still  is 
retaining  in  office  at  this  date  two  deputies,  Curran 
and  Flaherty,  who  are  guilty  of  the  same  offense  that 
caused  you  to  remove  their  chief. 

You  have  shown  more  indignation  in  attacking  us 
than  you  have  demonstrated  against  all  the  corruption 
revealed  in  New  York  City  in  recent  months.  When 
Judge  Mancuso  retired  under  fire  you  appointed  Judge 
Amedeo  Bertini  in  his  place,  although  the  New  York 
County  Lawyers'  Association  declared  that  Bertini  was 
not  fitted  for  the  position  of  judge  of  the  Court  of 
General  Sessions.  You  appointed  Bertini  on  recom 
mendation  of  Tammany  leader  Charles  L.  Kohler  and 
Bertini  promptly  revealed  his  caliber  by  refusing  to 
waive  immunity  before  a  grand  jury  that  was  investi- 


194      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

gating  a  $100,000  transaction  that  followed  his  ap 
pointment.  At  the  beginning  of  the  special  grand  jury- 
investigation  into  magistrates'  courts  you  allowed  six 
high  officers  in  the  Walker  administration  to  refuse  to 
waive  immunity  in  regard  to  their  unofficial  acts  with 
out  rebuke  from  you,  although  you  must  know  that  the 
sale  of  judgeships  is  unofficial  and  that  the  only  legal 
ground  for  refusing  to  waive  immunity  is  that  testify 
ing  might  lead  to  conviction  of  a  crime.  You  adroitly 
evaded  the  responsibility  for  these  officials'  acts  by  re 
buking  them  for  refusing  to  waive  immunity  concern 
ing  their  public  acts,  but  you  gave  them  a  convenient 
loophole  by  permitting  them  to  remain  silent  concerning 
unofficial  acts.  You  pursued  the  same  tactics  recently 
in  the  Farley  case  when  you  aided  and  abetted  the 
Tammany  leaders  who  are  fighting  Judge  Seabury  by 
hinting  that  they  are  not  obliged  to  testify  in  private 
hearings.  Hastings  and  Walker  immediately  took  your 
cue  and  announced  that  they  refuse  to  testify  at  private 
hearings.  .  .  . 

Never  once,  during  all  the  months  in  which  disclo 
sure  has  been  piled  on  disclosure  of  the  unspeakable 
corruption  of  government  in  New  York,  have  you  vol 
untarily  denounced  those  Tammany  leaders  who  hold 
power  in  your  party  and  office  in  this  community.  On 
the  contrary,  you  constantly  consort  and  consult  with 
those,  your  Tammany  masters  and  managers,  and  use 
shameful  ingenuity  in  trafficking  for  their  good  will  as 
revealed  in  your  communication  to  us.  This  catalog 
of  your  actions  in  relation  to  the  Tammany  machine 
in  New  York  is  not  pleasant  to  read  and  is  its  own 
refutation  of  your  claim  to  leadership  in  the  work  of 
public  reform.* 

To  which  any  postscript  would  be  superfluous. 
Governor  Roosevelt's  reply  to  the  City  Affairs  Commit- 


ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY 

tee  was  cryptic.  He  said:  "If  they  (Holmes  and  Wise) 
would  serve  their  God  as  they  seek  to  serve  themselves,, 
the  people  of  the  city  of  New  York  would  be  the  gainers." 
The  governor  was  playing  for  Tammany's  support  at 
Chicago  so  he  postponed  Walker's  day  of  retribution  ta 
the  last  possible  moment.  He  could  have  forced  the  mayor 
to  face  the  music  late  in  May,  as  soon  as  Walker  had 
testified  before  Seabury,  which  would  have  allowed  ample 
time  to  remove  the  mayor  before  the  Democratic  conven 
tion.  Instead  he  dawdled  and  dodged  and  finally  per 
mitted  His  Honor  to  postpone  his  answer  until  July  29, 
two  months  after  his  public  testimony.  Then,  when  the 
nomination  had  already  been  secured,  the  White  Knight 
of  Albany  took  his  civic  conscience  out  of  mothballs  and 
sat  in  judgment  over  Walker.  He  became,  as  we  pointed 
out  at  the  beginning  of  this  chapter,  the  public  hero  of 
the  last  act  in  the  Walker  drama. 


11 

TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL 

THE  fiction  that  Roosevelt  is  a  bold  enemy  of  Tammany 
has  a  companion  myth.  It  is  that  the  Republican  Party  in 
New  York  City  is  a  bold  enemy  of  Tammany  and  that  it 
stands  for  clean  government.  The  Republican  Party  has 
nominally  controlled  the  Borough  of  Queens  for  three 
years  under  the  "reform"  administration  of  George  U. 
Harvey,  and  the  borough's  government  during  those  years 
has  been  as  full  of  scandal  and  incompetence  as  if  it  had 
been  ruled  directly  by  Jimmy  himself.  It  is  well  to  remem 
ber  this  when  we  are  inclined  to  blame  all  the  political 
ills  of  New  York  upon  the  Democratic  organization. 

The  announcement  in  1932  that  the  center  of  popula 
tion  of  New  York  City  was  in  a  cemetery  in  Queens  was 
greeted  by  the  public  with  both  amazement  and  amuse 
ment.  Not  many  people  had  realized  to  what  extent  the 
city  had  been  moving  to  Long  Island  in  recent  years ;  they 
had  learned  to  think  of  New  York  as  centered  in  Man 
hattan  and  its  skyscrapers.  Brooklyn,  it  should  be  remem 
bered,  is  now  larger  than  Manhattan  in  population,  and 
Queens  is  the  fastest  growing  part  of  the  city. 

One  of  the  great  disappointments  of  the  Seabury  in 
quiry  was  the  failure  to  expose  thoroughly  the  govern- 

196 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  197 

ment  of  Queens.  For  this  failure  we  cannot  too  harshly 
blame  Judge  Seabury  because  his  time  and  his  appropria 
tion  were  sharply  limited.  It  was  necessary  to  show  defi 
nite  results  in  Manhattan  in  order  to  maintain  public 
interest  in  the  inquiry.  He  did  pillory  the  Democratic 
boss  of  Queens,  John  Theofel,  most  effectively  only  to 
have  Governor  Roosevelt  dodge  the  issue  of  forcing  Theo- 
fel's  removal  from  office  by  pretending  that  the  boss's 
underling,  Surrogate  Hetherington,  must  take  entire 
responsibility. 

Queens  has  been  victimized  by  realtors  and  political 
parasites  until  its  people  are  ripe  for  both  political  and 
economic  rebellion.  Its  people  are  largely  small  home 
owners  who  bought  houses  from  the  makers  of  subdivi 
sions  at  boom  prices  and  then,  when  the  depression  ar 
rived,  found  themselves  in  possession  of  little  else  but 
mortgages.  Queens  could  yet  be  the  most  beautiful  and 
well-planned  section  of  New  York  if  it  had  intelligent  di 
rection  because  it  still  has  room  to  grow.  At  present  it 
might  be  called  typically  American.  It  sprawls  unevenly 
over  a  vast  territory  with  alternate  stretches  of  ugliness 
and  beauty,  and  no  central  concept  of  development  any 
where.  Incidentally  it  is  one  of  the  finest  illustrations 
extant  of  the  social  cost  of  our  burial  customs.  If  New 
York  practiced  cremation  the  people  of  Queens  to-day 
could  have  as  parks  for  the  living  many  acres  of  land  now 
consecrated  to  the  dead. 

The  record  of  political  corruption  and  incompetence 
in  Queens  would  be  hard  to  equal  anywhere  in  the  United 


198      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

States.  If  we  ignore  the  interim  term  of  President  Patten, 
five  of  the  last  six  borough  presidents  of  Queens  have 
been  under  fire  of  official  charges,  removed  from  office, 
resigned,  or  ended  up  in  prison.  Maurice  E.  Connolly, 
the  Democratic  borough  president  in  the  first  part  of 
Walker's  reign,  cost  the  taxpayers  of  his  borough  many 
millions  of  dollars  by  conspiring  with  a  sewer  ring  to  pay 
extortionate  prices  for  defective  pipes.  He  was  convicted 
in  1928  and  sent  to  prison  after  the  most  desperate  efforts 
were  made  to  save  him.  W.  L.  D'Olier,  head  of  a  sani 
tary  corporation,  who  was  regarded  as  an  important  wit 
ness  against  the  sewer  ring,  was  shot  to  death  shortly 
before  the  trial,  and  the  grand  jury  returned  a  murder 
verdict.  J.  M.  Phillips,  head  of  the  ring,  died  under 
strange  circumstances  two  months  before  the  trial. 

Connolly,  of  course,  was  a  friend  and  associate  of  Tam 
many  and  the  failure  to  discover  his  sewer  graft  was  a 
distinct  source  of  embarrassment  to  Walker  and  Berry. 
The  sewer  contracts  with  their  exorbitant  prices  for  pipe 
had  been  registered  in  the  controller's  office  and  it  was 
difficult  to  explain  why  some  examination  of  them  had  not 
been  made.  Certainly,  the  fraud  would  have  been  imme 
diately  revealed  if  some  one  in  the  Finance  Department 
had  been  willing  to  give  the  matter  a  little  attention. 

When  Connolly  was  finally  exposed,  one  of  those  pecu 
liar  accidents  of  journalism  occurred  which  sometimes 
bring  fame  to  dullards  and  oblivion  to  heroes.  The  pub 
lic  thought  that  the  then  Republican  alderman,  George  U. 
Harvey,  had  been  responsible  for  Connolly's  downfall. 
The  truth  is  that  Harvey  only  entered  the  scene  to  exploit 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  199 

the  sewer  scandal  after  Attorney  Henry  Klein  had  forced 
it  before  the  public.  Klein  did  not  even  know  Harvey 
when  the  Connolly  exposure  began.  Harvey  took  Klein's 
material  and  used  it  for  charges  against  Connolly  before 
Governor  Smith.  The  history  of  Harvey's  reputation  is  as 
curious  a  story  of  manufactured  public  opinion  as  the  tale 
of  Calvin  Coolidge  and  the  Boston  police  strike. 

Harvey  is  a  little  man  with  a  light  voice  who  on  occa 
sion  wears  the  uniform  of  a  colonel.  He  has  richly  earned 
the  title  of  Tammany's  Little  Colonel  for  he  has  been  as 
faithful  to  the  machine  in  all  major  policies  as  one  of  its 
own  district  leaders.  He  defended  Mayor  Walker  warmly 
when  the  latter  was  under  charges  before  the  governor, 
and  made  the  first  move  for  the  mayor's  salary  increase 
and  the  mayor's  notorious  bus  program  for  Queens  (see 
the  next  chapter) .  He  was  accused  of  being  a  member  of 
an  organization  affiliated  with  the  Ku  Klux  Klan,  and  the 
evidence  seemed  to  us  convincing.  He  became  borough 
president  after  the  sewer  scandals,  when  the  Democrats 
of  the  borough  were  divided,  with  the  support  of  a  non 
descript  group  called  Independent  Democrats  who  were 
led  by  Martin  Mager,  John  J.  Halleran  and  Irving  Klein. 

Martin  Mager,  the  official  leader  of  the  Independent 
Democrats,  was  convicted  in  December,  1929,  of  bartering 
political  jobs  for  pay  but  he  escaped  with  a  $500  fine 
because  of  his  health.  He  continued  to  act  as  unofficial 
leader  of  the  group  for  a  long  time  after  his  conviction, 
apparently  with  the  friendly  support  of  Mr.  Harvey.  In 
deed,  he  was  indicted  again  in  1931,  this  time  for  having 
conspired  with  Klein.  Irving  Klein,  vice  president  of  the 


200      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Independent  Democrats,  under  Mager,  who  was  made 
superintendent  of  highways  by  Mr.  Harvey,  finally  ended 
his  political  career  in  1932  when  he  was  convicted  of 
defrauding  the  city  in  the  Rosati  road-oil  case.  John  J. 
Halleran,  chairman  of  the  Board  of  Directors  of  the 
Queens  Independent  Democrats  while  Mager  was  presi 
dent  and  Klein  vice  president,  is  still  Mr.  Harvey's  Com 
missioner  of  Public  Works  although  he  was  directly  in 
volved  in  the  Mager  case  by  the  testimony  of  Corporation 
Inspector  Michael  J.  Lyons,  and  in  the  Rosati  oil  case  by 
his  admission  that  he  had  no  system  of  checking  up  on 
the  Rosati  contract. 

Halleran  was  toastmaster  at  a  banquet  of  the  Independ 
ent  Democratic  Organization  of  Queens  on  March  22, 
1930,  at  which  Martin  Mager  was  guest  of  honor  three 
months  after  Mager 's  conviction  for  job  selling.  The  pro 
gram  of  that  banquet  contained  two  poems  worthy  of  quo 
tation,  each  printed  on  a  separate  page  under  the  portrait 
of  its  subject.  Under  the  portrait  of  Martin  Mager  the 
poem  read: 

OUR  LEADER 

Our  fondest  respect  and  deep  admiration, 
Undying  loyalty,  is  our  obligation. 
Respect,  for  the  honest  methods  he  uses. 
Love,  for  the  confidence  he  never  abuses. 
Efficient,  honest,  staunch,  true  to  the  end, 
An  honor  to  have  him  call  you  a  friend. 
Democratic,  unassuming,  personality  that  beams, 
Enveloped  in  the  hearts  of  the  people  of  Queens. 
Restoring  Democracy  to  its  proper  metre. 
Is  MARTIN  MAGER,  OUR  DEMOCRATIC  LEADER. 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  201 

The  poem  under  the  picture  of  John  J.  Halleran  read: 

OUR  EXECUTIVE  CHAIRMAN 

Kindly  listen  voters,  and  a  story  I  will  tell 
About  a  man  that  did  his  job,  and  did  it  very  well, 
When  called  upon  to  do  a  job,  in  nineteen  twenty  nine, 
A  task,  I'm  sure,  which  many  men,  would  readily  decline, 
Because   the   sewers    and   street   cleaning   departments   of 

Queens 
Were  in  the  most  deplorable  condition,  that  we  have  ever 

seen. 
As  head  of  these  departments,   Commissioner  of  Public 

Works, 

He  went  right  at  it  with  a  will,  no  duties  did  he  shirk, 
He's  been  there  little  more  than  a  year,  what  else  is  there  to 

say! 
Just  look   at  the  improvements,   those   departments  have 

made  today. 
And  is  he  content,  to  take  a  rest,  with  the  good  work  he  has 

done? 
He  said,  "Do  you  think  those  things  are  good?   Well  my 

work  has  just  begun." 

He  organized  democracy,  for  Independence,  truth  and  fair 
ness, 
Of  which,  he's  executive  chairman,  with  belief  in  right  and 

squareness. 

We  take  our  hats  off  to  you,  John,  we're  with  you  to  a  man, 
Our  efficient  Commissioner  of  Public  Works, 
THE  HON.  JOHN  J.  HALLERAN. 

Mr.  Halleran  is  a  strapping  big  realtor  who  may  or  may 
not  be  more  dishonest  than  most  realtors.  He  is  interested 
in  the  expansion  of  Queens  and  has  a  considerable  stake 
in  that  expansion.  His  brother  and  partner,  Laurence  B. 
Halleran,  made  a  profit  of  $10,000  by  selling  some  land 


202      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

for  the  use  of  the  New  York  Air  Terminals,  Inc.,  in  con 
nection  with  the  closing  of  Old  Bowery  Bay  Road  in 
Queens.  Supreme  Court  Justice  MacCrate  in  handing 
down  a  decision  against  this  corporation  for  taking  the 
road  said:  "I  find  that  the  defendant  without  permit  stole 
part  of  Old  Bowery  Bay  Road,  a  public  highway,  with  the 
knowledge  and  assistance  of  the  Queens  Borough  offi 
cials."  The  acting  borough  president  referred  to  in  Jus 
tice  MacCrate's  decision  was  John  J.  Halleran. 

Halleran  and  his  technical  superior,  Mr.  Harvey,  stoutly 
defended  their  friend  Klein  through  many  scandals  and 
only  threw  him  overboard  on  May  27,  1931,  when  he  had 
been  indicted  and  when  it  became  evident  that  their  own 
political  lives  were  at  stake. 

In  the  John  Doe  inquiry  into  Queens  corruption  in  1929 
Justice  Tompkins,  in  announcing  his  findings  on  June  27 
of  that  year,  said:  "There  would  seem  to  be  in  this  case 
some  very  sharp  practice  on  the  part  of  Commissioner 
Klein  and  his  attorney  Fred  Leder.  There  is  really  no  ex 
planation — or  not  a  sufficient  one — as  to  why  he  (Klein) 
so  suddenly  revoked  Leary's  permit  (for  dumping)  and 
then  issued  it  again  to  his  own  attorney  Leder,  who  is 
engaged  in  the  practice  of  law  and  not  in  filling  in  pri 
vate  property.  .  .  ."  When  County  Judge  Adel  sentenced 
Martin  Mager  for  job  selling  on  December  20,  1929,  he 
publicly  rebuked  Klein  as  a  falsifier  by  saying  in  open 
court  that  he  did  not  believe  a  word  of  his  testimony. 

In  October,  1930,  Deputy  Controller  Frank  J.  Prial, 
after  hearings,  found  Klein  guilty  of  placing  many  dead- 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  203 

heads  on  the  payroll  of  his  department.  In  October,  1929, 
Klein  was  charged  in  a  magistrate's  court  with  accepting 
a  bribe  from  a  contractor.  He  admitted  that  he  had  re 
ceived  $4,000  as  a  "loan"  in  the  form  of  $1,000  and  $500 
bills  from  a  contractor  whom  he  had  never  met  before  with 
out  giving  any  physical  security  although  the  contractor 
knew  that  Klein  held  $100,000  worth  of  property.  This 
bribery  charge  was  dismissed  in  a  most  extraordinary  de 
cision  by  Magistrate  Simpson  who  later  resigned  under 
fire  when  Judge  Seabury  made  an  investigation  of  his  con 
duct.  In  the  face  of  all  these  scandals  George  U.  Harvey 
and  John  J.  Halleran  sat  unperturbed,  continuing  to 
express  confidence  in  their  friend  Klein. 

Mr.  Harvey's  great  mistake  had  been  in  admitting  to  his 
administration  an  honest  man  who  later  exposed  him. 
Fritz  Brieger  was  appointed  superintendent  of  street  clean 
ing  at  the  beginning  of  the  Harvey  administration  but 
when  he  became  familiar  with  the  methods  by  which 
Martin  Mager  mulcted  city  workers  out  of  a  portion  of 
their  pay  each  week  as  a  reward  for  giving  them  jobs  he 
presented  to  Harvey  charges  against  Mager,  Klein,  and 
Halleran,  and  declared  that  he  would  not  continue  in 
office  with  them.  Finally  he  resigned,  and  opened  up  a 
fight  that  came  to  a  climax  in  charges  against  Harvey 
before  Roosevelt  in  May,  1931. 

To  anyone  who  studies  the  case  against  Harvey  impar 
tially,  it  will  appear  that  his  record  in  many  ways  paral 
lels  that  of  Walker.  Neither  of  the  two  men  violated  the 
law  in  such  a  way  that  the  violation  could  be  proved,  but 


204      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

both  men  used  their  official  position  in  the  most  reckless 
manner. 

Harvey  became  a  director  of  the  New  York  City  Air 
port,  Inc.,  a  creation  of  his  aforementioned  commissioner 
of  public  works,  John  J.  Halleran,  and  the  commission 
er's  brother  Laurence  B.  Halleran.  The  corporation  used 
his  name  widely  in  its  prospectus  and  published  a  letter  of 
his  on  official  borough  stationery,  saying  that  "this  enter 
prise  should  receive  support  because  of  its  sound  business 
principles."  For  this  service  he  received  500  shares  of 
stock  in  the  corporation  which  had  a  par  value  of  $2,500. 
Actually  the  stock  became  worthless  because  the  state  at 
torney  general  on  complaint  of  the  City  Affairs  Commit 
tee  held  a  series  of  sensational  public  hearings  in  which  it 
was  demonstrated  that  the  corporation  was  one  of  the 
wildest  dreams  of  a  wild  era.  The  Hallerans  admitted  on 
the  witness  stand  that  the  prospectus  of  the  corporation 
was  misleading  and  that  Commissioner  Halleran  had 
"appraised"  at  $3,000,000  in  1929  the  identical  land 
which  his  brother  in  1930  told  the  tax  department  was  not 
worth  $300,000.  The  land  had  been  assessed  in  1929  for 
about  $69,000. 

Concerning  this  land  the  company's  prospectus  said: 

The  founders  of  the  company,  all  of  whom  are  members 
of  the  Board  of  Directors,  are  turning  over  to  the  Airport 
real  estate  ground  values  appraised  at  $3,000,000  unim 
proved,  and  $4,500,000  improved,  exclusive  of  structures, 
comprising  administration  building,  swimming  pool,  bar 
gains,  etc.,  which  will  cost  approximately  $700,000. 

The  greatest  amount  of  common  stock  which  can  be  out- 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  205 

standing  is  900,000  shares  of  a  par  value  of  $5  each,  or  a 
total  of  $4,500,000,  which  is  the  exact  price  at  which  the 
ground  value  has  been  appraised.  There  are  no  bonds  or 
preferred  stock. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  purchasers  of  common  stock  at 
par  will,  for  all  intent  and  purpose,  be  buying  an  undivided 
interest  in  a  rare  tract  of  land  at  exact  appraisal  figures. 

The  stockholder  who  believed  this  appeal  and  invested 
his  savings  would  find  that  $2  of  every  $5  went  to  the 
promoter,  and  that  before  his  stock  was  worth  a  penny  it 
had  to  survive  the  assault  of  a  $1,285,000  mortgage  on  a 
bit  of  marshy  meadowland  worth  perhaps  $400,000. 

Public  officials  are  sometimes  beguiled  into  foolish 
business  projects  because  they  are  too  busy  to  investigate, 
but  this  excuse  will  not  suffice  in  the  case  of  Mr.  Harvey 
and  the  New  York  City  Airport.  He  did  not  quit  as  a 
director  when  the  truth  about  the  corporation  was  made 
public  and  he  retained  Mr.  Halleran  as  his  public  works 
commissioner  after  Mr.  Halleran  had  admitted  making 
the  false  appraisal  solely  for  the  purposes  of  promoting 
the  corporation.  He  still  continued  as  a  director  after  it 
had  become  known  that  the  promoter,  William  Paul 
Buchler,  was  to  get  $2  for  every  $5  share  of  stock  sold  and 
the  founders  had  pocketed  250,000  shares  for  themselves 
in  founding  the  company.  They  had  so  rigged  the  finances 
of  the  company  that  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  the  innocent 
lambs  who  bought  stock  could  have  saved  a  penny  of  their 
investment  if  exposure  had  not  come. 

Fortunately  for  the  stockholders  the  vigorous  prosecu 
tion  of  Assistant  Attorney  General  Paul  J.  McCauley 


206      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

threw  the  Hallerans  and  Harvey  into  a  panic.  McCauley 
denounced  them  for  misstatements  in  stock  selling.  They 
offered  to  dissolve  the  airport  corporation  and  return 
every  cent  invested  by  the  stockholders.  The  State  ac 
cepted  the  surrender  and  issued  a  dissolution  certificate. 
The  promoters  agreed  to  a  stock-sale  injunction — and  no 
body  went  to  jail.  The  directors  went  back  instead  to  gov 
ern  a  borough  of  one  million  people. 

But  Mr.  Harvey's  troubles  had  only  begun  with  the 
smashing  of  the  New  York  City  Airport,  Inc.  Fritz 
Brieger  brought  charges  against  him  before  Governor 
Roosevelt,  declaring  that  he  had  obtained  loans  aggregat 
ing  $11,500  for  his  own  corporation  from  a  company 
that  was  then  trying  to  sell  a  snow  remover  to  the  city, 
and  that  Harvey  had  acted  as  a  promoter  of  that  snow 
remover  at  the  time  he  was  receiving  the  loans.  Governor 
Roosevelt  in  censoring  Harvey  for  his  conduct  said: 

The  documents  before  me  set  forth  a  course  of  conduct 
on  the  part  of  the  Borough  President  which  should  be  in 
compatible  with  ideals  of  official  conduct.  It  is  true  that 
criminal  dishonesty  is  not  demonstrated.  But  some  of  the 
items  set  forth  in  the  papers  show,  on  the  part  of  the 
Borough  President,  disregard  for  or  lack  of  understanding 
of  the  type  of  official  and  unofficial  behavior  which  we  look 
for  and  hope  to  find  in  so  important  an  office. 

It  is  clear  that  the  Borough  President  has  borrowed  money 
for  his  own  personally  owned  corporation  from  interests 
which  were  engaged  in  negotiating  business  transactions 
with  the  Borough  of  Queens.  Outside  of  a  few  small  items 
charged  off  for  sounding  out  sentiment  for  Mr.  Harvey  as 
Governor  these  loans  were  repaid.  The  Borough  President 
appears  to  have  made  no  money  on  this  transaction.  .  .  . 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  207 

While  it  was  clearly  bad  taste  to  become  indebted  to  inter 
ests  doing  business  with  the  borough,  there  is  no  demonstra> 
tion  that  there  was  an  actual  use  of  the  official  power  of  the 
office  of  Borough  President  in  order  to  secure  pecuniary 
advantage  to  the  officeholder. 

This  conclusion  follows  with  equal  force  from  a  consid 
eration  of  the  other  major  charge  filed,  to  wit,  the  charge 
concerning  the  Airport  Corporation,  of  which  Mr.  Harvey 
was  a  director  and  stockholder.  It  is  true  that  he  was  willing 
to  lend  his  name  to  a  stock-promotion  scheme  of  a  highly 
suspicious  nature,  to  write  a  letter  of  endorsement  of  the 
venture  and  to  accept  500  shares  of  its  stock  for  nothing, 
still  there  is  no  indication  that  any  borough  action  was  in 
duced  by  him  to  assist  this  airport  corporation  in  such  a  way 
that  he  himself  would  derive  financial  benefit.  .  .  . 

My  conclusion  from  a  study  of  these  documents  is  that  the 
conduct  of  the  Borough  President  is  deserving  of  censure, 
but  that  facts  submitted  do  not  warrant  the  institution  of 
actual  removal  proceedings.  .  .  . 

Lucky  Mr.  Harvey!  He  accepted  $2,500  of  stock  for 
becoming  dummy  director  in  a  parasitic  corporation  and 
then  escaped  removal  apparently  because  Governor  Roose 
velt's  conscience  in  August,  1931,  had  not  yet  reached  the 
sensitivity  that  it  attained  in  the  Farley  and  Walker  cases 
in  1932.  The  governor  let  Mr.  Harvey  off  with  a  rebuke 
because  there  was  "no  indication  that  any  borough  action 
was  induced  by  him  to  assist  this  airport  corporation." 
Strange  that  the  writing  of  a  promotion  letter  on  official 
borough  stationery  and  the  use  of  his  name  and  official 
title  on  promoter's  literature  should  fall  outside  of  the 
category  of  "borough  action"! 

The  truth  is  that  Queens  is  still  blessed  with  Mr.  Har- 


208      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

vey  because  Mr.  Roosevelt  was  placed  in  an  impossible 
position  at  the  time  the  charges  were  brought  against 
the  borough  president.  He  had  only  shortly  before  dis 
missed  the  sweeping  charges  of  the  City  Affairs  Commit 
tee  against  Mayor  Walker  without  even  granting  a  hear 
ing.  If  he  had  dismissed  a  Republican  official  after  that 
without  overwhelming  evidence  of  an  actual  crime  he 
would  have  appeared  partisan — and  no  candidate  for  the 
presidential  nomination  could  afford  that  dreadful  stigma. 
Meanwhile  Queens  will  continue  to  be  the  borough 
which  reforms  without  reforming.  To  change  from  a 
Democratic  to  a  Republican  administration  is — well,  it  is 
like  changing  from  a  Republican  to  a  Democratic  admin 
istration.  If  Queens  voters  become  disgusted  with  Mr. 
Harvey  they  may  fall  back  into  the  arms  of  their  Demo 
cratic  boss,  John  Theofel,  who  still  draws  $8,000  as  chief 
clerk  of  the  Surrogate's  Court.  "I  have  never  seeked  a 
raise  in  salary  in  the  office  since  I  have  been  there,"  said 
Boss  Theofel  at  a  Seabury  hearing.  When  asked  to  de 
scribe  his  onerous  duties  he  could  not  even  remember  the 
names  of  the  departments  that  he  was  supposed  to  super 
vise.  The  testimony  read  in  part: 

Q.  What  different  departments  do  you  understand  they 
have  there? 

A.  I  am  not  a  lawyer,  Judge. 

(Then  he  remembered  the  Guardian's  and  Probate  De 
partments.  ) 

Q.  Well,  now  what  other  departments  have  you  beep 
required  to  supervise?  Speak  a  little  louder  if  you  will. 

A.  We  have  the  Guardianship  Department. 

Q.  And  the  Probate  Department? 


TAMMANY'S  LITTLE  COLONEL  209 

A.  Yes,  sir. 
Q.  Now  what  else? 

A.  I  can't  just  recall  offhand,  Judge,  the  different  depart- 
ments. 

Q.  There  are  other  departments? 

A.  Yes,  sir. 

Q.  But  you  don't  offhand  just  recall  what  they  are? 

A.  No. 

This  is  the  man  who  appoints  the  assistant  district  at 
torneys  and  magistrates  and  surrogates  and  Supreme  Court 
judges  of  Queens.  Also,  this  is  the  man  who  sells  auto 
mobiles.  He  was  the  chief  stockholder  in  Wilson  Bros., 
Inc.,  run  by  his  son-in-law,  which  sold  high-priced  cars, 
sometimes  above  the  market  price,  to  the  eager  customers 
who  held  public  office  in  the  borough.  In  the  words  of 
Seabury's  Intermediate  Report: 

The  County  Clerk  of  Queens  County  bought  his  car  from 
Wilson  Bros.,  Inc.;  the  District  Attorney  of  Queens  County 
bought  his  car  from  Wilson  Bros.,  Inc;  the  Borough  Presi 
dent  of  Queens  bought  his  car  from  Wilson  Bros.,  Inc.; 
Magistrate  Marvin  of  Queens  County  bought  his  car  from 
Wilson  Bros.,  Inc.;  Park  Commissioner  Benninger  of  Queens 
County  bought  his  car  from  Wilson  Bros.,  Inc.;  Assistant 
District  Attorney  Loscalzo  of  Queens  County  bought  his  car 
from  Wilson  Bros.,  Inc.;  and  Sheriff  Burden  of  Queens 
County  bought  his  car  from  Wilson  Bros.,  Inc. 

Theofel's  most  characteristic  gesture  came  in  the  cam 
paign  of  1928  when  he  was  treasurer  of  the  Queens 
County  Campaign  Committee.  When  the  committee  was 
settling  the  bills,  Chairman  Smedley  said:  "John,  take  a 
thousand  for  yourself " 

John  did. 


12 
CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN 

THE  street  battles  of  Tweed  centered  about  street-car 
franchises,  the  street  battles  of  Walker  about  bus  fran 
chises. 

The  streets  of  New  York  are  now  the  center  of  an  in 
tense  and  dramatic  fight  for  $70,000,000,  which  is  the 
stake  involved  in  bus  franchises  in  Manhattan,  Brooklyn, 
and  Queens. 

The  operation  of  buses  in  New  York  is  a  potential  gold 
mine.  A  bus  requires  no  tracks,  no  wires,  no  conductor, 
no  signalman,  yet  it  moves  as  rapidly  as  a  street  car.  Be 
cause  it  does  not  block  traffic  and  because  it  operates 
quietly  the  bus  is  in  universal  demand  to  replace  the 
street  car.  The  story  which  we  tell  here  of  the  bus  fran 
chise  fight  in  New  York  can  probably  be  repeated  in  a 
dozen  American  cities. 

The  future  of  New  York  streets  belongs  to  buses;  there 
can  be  no  doubt  of  that.  The  questions  still  to  be  decided 
are  who  will  own  the  buses*  and  how  much  shall  the  city 
get  for  its  -streets.  Those  were  the  questions  behind  the 
Equitable  scandal,  which  we  have  discussed  elsewhere,  the 
Queens  bus  fight,  and  the  battle  in  Brooklyn  between  the 
City  Affairs  Committee  and  the  B.M.T.  The  Walker 

210 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  211 

administration  tried  to  give  away  the  streets  of  New  York 
for  less  than  half  of  what  they  were  worth.  In  Manhat 
tan  and  Queens  the  uproar  of  opposition  temporarily 
stopped  the  outrageous  deals  proposed;  in  Brooklyn  the 
deal  was  concluded,  but  the  City  Affairs  Committee  chal 
lenged  the  franchise  in  the  courts  and  has  already  won 
two  preliminary  skirmishes  in  the  State  Supreme  Court 
and  the  Appellate  Division. 

The  obvious  solution  to  the  bus  problem  in  New  York 
would  be  municipal  bus  ownership  and  operation.  The 
Socialist  Party  has  been  fighting  for  this  solution  for  a 
generation.  It  has  constantly  pointed  out  that  the  private 
ownership  of  public  utilities  keeps  those  utilities  "in  poli 
tics"  because  it  gives  the  traction  manipulators  a  motive 
for  buying  politicians.  In  the  case  of  bus  operation  the 
argument  for  municipal  ownership  is  especially  strong. 
The  streets  belong  to  the  city  and  the  control  of  municipal 
bus  lines  is  relatively  simple.  The  nickels  and  dimes  that 
passengers  pay  for  fares  can  be  metered  beyond  the  possi 
bility  of  substantial  graft  and  the  price  paid  for  equip 
ment  is  standard  throughout  the  country.  One  bus  com 
pany  official  of  Queens  made  this  perfectly  clear  in  a  hear 
ing  in  the  municipal  building  in  1931  when  he  calmly 
informed  the  public  that  he  would  make  $4,000  a  day  net 
profit  in  Queens  alone  if  the  city  granted  him  a  franchise.1 

The  question  naturally  arose  why  a  city  which  is  com 
plaining  of  high  tax  rates  should  deny  itself  this  $4,000  a 
day.  The  immediate  answer  is  that  the  city  does  not  now 
have  the  power  to  own  and  operate  its  own  buses,  since 


212      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

that  power  has  never  been  granted  to  it  under  the  home 
rule  law  by  the  Republican  reactionaries  at  Albany.  These 
Republicans  have  adopted  the  theory  that  any  excess 
profits  involved  in  a  new  industry  must  be  the  rewards 
of  private  initiative.  The  Tammany  administration  has 
repeatedly  asked  for  the  right  of  the  city  to  operate  its 
own  buses  and  has  repeatedly  been  refused.  In  recent 
years  the  request  has  been  made  so  faint-heartedly  as  to 
arouse  suspicion  of  substitute  compensations  from  the  big 
private  bus  interests  of  New  York. 

When  the  Equitable  bus  franchise  was  finally  defeated 
in  1929,  Walker  set  out  to  grant  separate  bus  franchises 
in  various  boroughs.  While  small  private  bus  lines  in 
various  parts  of  the  city  took  care  of  immediate  traffic 
needs  by  operating  on  temporary  permits,  Walker  dick 
ered  with  certain  favored  companies  for  ten-year  fran 
chises.  His  favorite  in  Brooklyn  was  the  Brooklyn  Bus 
Corporation,  owned  by  the  B.  M.  T.  and  headed  by  Ger 
hard  M.  Dahl,  while  his  favorites  in  Queens  were  two 
local  companies  known  as  the  North  Shore  Bus  Co.  and 
the  Jamaica  Bus  Co.  Neither  one  of  these  Queens  com 
panies  could  produce  any  reasons  why  they  should  be 
favored  above  other  companies.  The  North  Shore  Com 
pany  was  pitifully  weak  financially  and  its  president  made 
mysterious  and  conflicting  financial  statements  to  various 
public  bodies.  The  Jamaica  concern  had  had  almost  no 
experience  in  running  buses.  It  was  controlled  by  Park 
Rowley,  intimate  friend  of  Mayor  Walker,  and  its  treas 
urer  was  Fred  C.  Harris  who  held  a  power  of  attorney 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  213 

giving  him  access  to  the  safe  deposit  box  held  jointly  by 
Mayor  Walker  and  his  fugitive  business  agent,  Russell  T. 
Sherwood. 

Mayor  Walker,  with  the  help  of  Borough  President 
Harvey  of  Queens,  attempted  to  divide  up  Queens  into  two 
sections  and  give  the  exclusive  ten-year  franchise  in  each 
section  to  one  of  these  two  favorites.  Queens  was  in  an 
uproar.  Hundreds  of  citizens  came  to  the  City  Hall  under 
the  leadership  of  vigorous  local  civic  organizations  and 
almost  turned  a  session  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  into  a 
riot.  The  opposition  of  these  civic  bodies  was  chiefly 
based  on  resentment  against  Walker  and  Harvey  for  at 
tempting  to  take  away  the  franchises  from  the  local  pio 
neers  who  had  served  them  faithfully  with  independent 
bus  lines.  The  City  Affairs  Committee  produced  figures 
prepared  by  Henry  J.  Rosner  to  show  that  the  proposed 
Walker-Harvey  franchises  to  the  two  favored  companies 
would  yield  the  city  $535,000  a  year  less  than  the  offer  of 
an  important  competitor,  the  Nevin-Queens  Bus  Corpora 
tion.  The  committee  showed  that  the  favored  companies 
would  make  112  per  cent  a  year  profit  by  the  Walker 
deal.2 

Walker  tore  up  the  committee's  statement  at  a  public 
hearing  and  threw  it  into  the  wastebasket.  He  shouted 
the  word  "faker"  at  the  Socialist  spokesman,  Norman 
Thomas.  But  the  facts  produced  by  the  opposition  were 
sufficiently  impressive  to  defeat  the  franchises.  Controller 
Berry  refused  to  vote  with  the  mayor  and,  finally,  Bor 
ough  President  Harvey,  frightened  by  the  local  fury 


214      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

against  the  deal,  deserted  the  mayor  also  and  pretended 
that  he  had  favored  the  local  bus  operators  from  the 
beginning. 

This  Queens  bus  scandal  was  in  our  opinion  the  clearest 
case  in  the  entire  Walker  administration  of  a  violation  of 
public  trust,  and  it  would  have  been  sufficient  in  itself  to 
force  out  of  public  office  every  man  who  voted  for  the 
Walker  deal.  A  clearly  superior  bid  for  the  use  of  the 
city's*  streets  was' voted  down  with  a  loss  to  the  city  that 
would  have  totaled  $5,000,000.  The  reason  why  the 
scandal  did  not  play  the  leading  part  in  the  Seabury  in 
quiry  was  that  the  deal  was  never  completed.  Walker 
could  not  hold  his  own  associates  in  line.  A  block  north 
from  City  Hall  during  the  winter  of  1931-32  witnesses 
were  appearing  before  Seabury.  All  through  that  winter 
Walker  continued  to  stand  for  his  Queens  bus  favorites 
even  in  the  face  of  an  exhaustive  report  by  Deputy  Con 
troller  Frank  J.  Prial,  which  concluded  that  "the  proposed 
franchises  be  not  entered  into  at  this  time." 

The  deal  was  not  finally  defeated  until  an  uproarious 
session  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  in  May,  1932,  at  which 
both  the  authors  of  this  book  were  called  enemies  of  the 
public.  Joseph  V.  McKee,  president  of  the  Board  of  Alder 
men,  who  had  been  wavering  in  his  decision,  then  decided 
to  desert  Walker  also  and  join  Controller  Berry  and 
Borough  President  Harvey  in  opposition. 

So  the  Walker-Queens  deal  was  defeated  and,  as  we 
write  these  lines,  the  next  Queens  bus  battle  is  about  to 
begin.  The  franchises  in  Queens  are  still  ungr anted.  The 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  215 

Walker  administration,  at  last  thoroughly  frightened,  an 
nounced  that  bus  franchises  in  Queens  would  be  granted 
on  the  basis  of  open  and  fair  competition.  Immediately 
one  of  the  two  companies  which  Walker  had  favored 
offered  the  city  two  and  one-half  times  the  percentage  of 
receipts  which  Walker  had  formerly  accepted  as  adequate. 
It  was  evident  to  everybody  then  that  the  mayor  had  been 
trying  to  give  away  the  city's  streets  for  a  song  and  had 
been  caught  flat-flooted.  Even  after  the  franchises  to 
favorites  had  been  defeated  the  Bureau  of  Franchises  pro 
duced  a  "financial"  report  in  the  summer  of  1932  dis 
qualifying  the  Nevin-Queens  and  several  other  companies 
and  approving  the  favorites,  among  others.  It  showed  the 
most  brazen  favoritism  in  applying  to  various  companies 
the  financial  tests  which  all  bus  companies  are  supposed 
to  meet.  Accordingly  there  is  no  guarantee  that  because 
Walker  was  caught  flat-footed  in  1932  his  associates  will 
not  repeat  the  same  type  of  deal  in  1933.  Walker  did 
not  act  alone  in  the  Queens  bus  scandal.  John  H.  Delaney, 
looking  like  a  Presbyterian  deacon,  acted  with  him,  and 
so  did  Joseph  V.  McKee,  until  he  saw  that  the  course  was 
too  perilous. 

If  these  men  are  still  in  office  when  this  book  is  pub 
lished  they  will  be  called  upon  to  explain  their  action  at 
a  certain  meeting  of  the  Committee  of  the  Whole  of  the 
Board  of  Estimate  which  took  place  on  April  19,  1932. 
Originally  Walker's  two  favorite  bus  companies  in  Queens 
had  not  offered  the  city  any  share  at  all  in  their  profits 
outside  of  the  usual  5  per  cent  of  revenue,  and-  both 


216      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Delaney  and  McKee  had  accepted  the  deal  complacently. 
Then  when  the  Nevin-Queens  Company  offered  50  per 
cent  of  all  profits  above  6  per  cent  in  addition  to  the 
usual  5  per  cent  of  gross,  and  the  public  uproar  had 
blocked  the  original  steal,  Delaney  sought  to  save  the 
mayor's  face  by  coming  forward  with  a  more  reasonable 
deal.  On  April  6,  1932,  he  advocated  a  Queens  franchise 
that  would  give  the  city  half  of  all  profits  above  6  per 
cent  after  the  first  two  years  of  operation.  (The  Nevin- 
Queens  Co.  offered  half  of  all  profits  above  6  per  cent 
from  the  beginning  of  operation.)  He  could  not  get 
Walker's  favorite  companies  to  accept  even  this  compro 
mise,  so  on  April  19  he  presented  a  revised  contract  to  the 
Committee  of  the  Whole  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  which 
would  give  the  city  half  of  all  profits  above  8  per  cent, 
instead  of  6  per  cent,  After  three  years  instead  of  two* 
The  difference  to  the  city  between  the  offer  which  Delaney 
favored  and  the  Nevin-Queens  Co.  offer  was  $2,250,000. 
Mr.  McKee  sided  with  Delaney  in  support  of  the  lesser 
offer.  What  hold  did  these  two  Queens  companies  have 
on  the  administration  to  force  such  a  public  surrender  at 
the  very  height  of  the  Seabury  investigation? 

The  difficulty  of  removing  unfit  officials  from  public 
office  is  illustrated  by  this  Queens  bus  case.  In  private  life 
a  trustee  of  an  estate  who  sells  a  piece  of  property  for 
$1,000  when  he  could  get  $2,000  would  be  promptly 
removed.  In  municipal  affairs  a  subterfuge  can  almost 
always  be  discovered  to  disguise  the  real  character  of  an 
act  of  betrayal. 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  217 

In  the  case  of  the  Brooklyn  bus  franchise  the  Walker 
administration  escaped  a  great  scandal  chiefly  because 
there  was  not  sufficient  local  uproar  to  force  the  situation 
on  to  the  front  pages  of  the  newspapers.  The  franchise 
was  actually  granted  to  the  Brooklyn  Bus  Corporation,  a 
subsidiary  of  the  B.  M.  T.,  on  June  4,  1931,  on  a  basis  that 
would  yield  150  per  cent  profit  while  a  superior  bidder 
was  disputing  the  claim,  and  newspapers  of  New  York 
were  too  busy  with  other  scandals  to  dig  out  the  basic 
story.  The  City  Affairs  Committee,  whose  representative 
was  prevented  from  speaking  at  the.  last  public  hearing 
on  this  franchise,  took  the  case  to  the  courts  where  its 
counsel  Louis  Waldman  produced  some  astonishing  fig 
ures  to*  show  how  the  city  had  been  mulcted.  He  pointed 
out  that  the.  offer  of  a  competing  company  had  been  ig 
nored  although  it  was  $200,000  better  than  the  offer  of 
the  B.  M.  T.  He  produced  a  table  of  profits  under  the 
franchise,  based  largely  on  the  studies  of  the  well-known 
bus  engineer,  A.  Joseph  Hoffman,  which  showed  that  the 
B.  M.  T.  stood  to  win  $14,877,000  in  ten  years  on  a 
maximum  investment  of  $1,325,000. 

The  question  occurred  to  many  citizens  whether  this 
was  the  kind  of  friendship  with  the  public  that  Gerhard 
M.  Dahl,  chairman  of  the  board  of  both  the  B.  M.  T.  and 
the  I.  R.  T.,  had  been  paid  to  maintain.  He  had  been  paid 
handsomely  enough  and  somebody  had  produced  hand 
some  results.  When  he  was  called  to  the  witness  stand  by 
Judge  Seabury  and  asked  how  much  he  had  been  paid  as 
a  bonus  for  "improving  relations  with  the  city,"  the  Re- 


218      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

publican  majority  on  the  committee  balked  Judge  Seabury 
and  blocked  further  questions.  The  truth  finally  came  out 
when  one  of  the  authors  who  owns  one  share  of  B.  M.  T. 
stock  exercised  his  legal  rights  as  a  stockholder  and  dis 
covered  that  Mr.  Dahl  received  during  1928,  1929,  1930 
and  1931  $675,000  in  salary  and  bonuses,  probably  a 
higher  compensation  than  that  received  by  any  railroad 
president  in  the  United  States.  The  stockholders  of  the 
B.  M.  T.  had  apparently  received  no  specific  information 
concerning  this  unusual  generosity  at  their  general  meet 
ings.  They  had  perfunctorily  approved  all  the  actions  of 
their  directors  at  routine  sessions  where  general  resolu 
tions  of  approval  had  been  introduced,  and  there  was 
nothing  in  the  resolutions  of  approval  to  indicate  the 
compensation  received  by  Mr.  Dahl. 

Mr.  Dahl's  huge  income  underscored  the  sorry  failure 
of  public  regulation.  Here  was  a  great  public  utility  fight 
ing  for  the  seven-cent  fare  and  working  many  of  its  em 
ployees  seven  days  a  week  ten  hours  a  day,  yet  able  to  pay 
its  chairman  $100,000  a  year  in  salary  and  a  $75,000 
bonus  even  in  years  of  depression.  And  the  State  Transit 
Commission  which  is  supposed  to  approve  and  regulate 
all  transit  companies  in  New  York,  could  not  touch  a 
nickel  of  Mr.  Dahl's  compensation,  could  not  even  ascer 
tain  that  compensation,  because  Mr.  Dahl  is  hired  by  a 
holding  company  and  the  state  can  regulate  only  operating 
companies.  Mr.  Dahl  does  not  directly  help  to  move  a 
wheel  on  the  traction  lines  which  his  gigantic  holding 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  219 

company,  the  B.  M.  T.,  controls  through  operating  sub 
sidiaries. 

Usually  when  such  holding  companies  milk  the  consum 
ers,  workers,  and  small  stockholders  their  legal  methods 
are  unimpeachable.  Happily  the  B.  M.  T.  has  made  a 
serious  blunder  in  getting  its  virtual  monopoly  of  bus  op 
eration  in  Brooklyn  through  the  franchise  of  the  Brooklyn 
Bus  Corporation.  It  overlooked  section  74  of  the  city 
charter  which  was  written  after  several  great  traction 
scandals  with  the  specific  purpose  of  preventing  the  kind 
of  thing  that  has  happened  in  the  case  of  the  Brooklyn  bus 
franchise.  Section  74  which  is  a  sort  of  consumers'  Magna 
Charta  says:  "The  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment 
shall  make  inquiry  as  to  the  money  value  of  the  franchise 
or  right  proposed  to  be  granted  and  the  adequacy  of  the 
compensation  proposed  therefor,  and  shall  embody  the 
result  of  such  inquiry  in  a  form  of  contract  with  all  the 
terms  and  conditions,  including  the  provisions  as  to  rates, 
fares,  and  charges." 

The  city  has  never  made  an  inquiry  as  to  the  money 
value  of  the  Brooklyn  bus  franchise  and  has  never  pub 
lished  an  estimate  of  that  value.  It  has  put  into  the  fran 
chise  the  required  figures  on  fares  without  ascertaining 
how  much  the  cost  of  operation  or  the  total  profit  would 
be.  So  it  has  sold  a  franchise  worth  over  $14,000,000. 
for  a  little  more  than  $2,000,000.  If  the  City  Affairs  Com 
mittee  wins  its  pending  suit  to  annul  this  franchise  the 
city  could  then  offer  the  franchise  anew  to  the  highest 


220      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

responsible  bidder  and  recapture  for  the  taxpayers  five  to 
ten  millions. 

A  study  of  the  bus  record  of  the  Walker  administration 
shows  clearly  that  its  neglect  of  public  interest  has  been 
deliberate.  It  has  produced  pounds  upon  pounds  of  offi 
cial  reports  on  bus  franchises  and  has  always  managed  to 
avoid  the  one  central  fact  that  would  reveal  its  stake  in 
the  spoils,  namely,  the  money  worth  of  bus  franchises. 
In  1926  Mr.  Delaney  labored  and  brought  forth  the  huge 
Sixth  Report  of  the  Board  of  Transportation  on  Omnibus 
Franchises,  which  was  supposed  to  be  an  economic  guide 
for  the  city  in  its  dealings  with  the  bus  industry.  It  not 
only  neglected  the  all-important  problem  of  franchise 
money-values  but  it  misstated  the  whole  financial  problem 
of  organizing  a  bus  company. 

Starting  a  bus  line  in  New  York  City,  if  the  necessary 
permits  are  secured,  is  a  very  simple  thing  financially. 
The  operator  needs  only  $2,500  for  each  $10,000  bus  and 
$1,000  extra  per  bus  for  working  capital.  All  the  other 
costs  are  eagerly  advanced  by  the  bus  manufacturer  who 
gives  $7,500  credit  on  each  $10,000  bus  and  allows  four 
years  to  pay  it.  The  B.  M.  T.  can  buy  buses  without  any 
down  payment  at  all. 

Mr.  Delaney  in  making  his  "studies"  of  the  bus  industry 
did  not  take  these  facts  into  account  but  reckoned  the 
entire  investment  of  bus  operator  and  bus  manufacturer 
as  necessary  capital  outlay  upon  which  a  bus  company 
could  rightfully  earn  as  much  as  22  per  cent  in  perpetuity. 
Why  a  bus  operator  should  be  allowed  to  earn  any  profit 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  221 

upon  a  bus  manufacturer's  investment  is  more  than  we  can 
understand,  and  why  it  should  be  permissible  to  earn  22 
per  cent  when  courts  are  setting  8  per  cent  as  a  fair  return 
on  a  public  utility  investment  is  a  riddle  that  Mr.  Delaney 
should  be  called  upon  to  solve. 

Delaney,  like  Walker,  has  heard  his  master's  voice  and 
so  has  failed  to  fight  for  a  constructive  city  bus  policy. 
He  could  have  had  a  municipal  bus  system  in  operation 
by  this  time  if  he  had  worked  half  as  earnestly  for  it  as 
he  worked  for  the  Equitable  Coach  Company. 

As  a  holding  company  the  B.  M.  T.  is  an  amateur  com 
pared  to  the  corporate  octopus  which  is  now  seeking  a  bus 
monopoly  of  Manhattan,  the  New  York  Omnibus  Cor 
poration.  This  company  is  the  local  arm  of  the  corporate 
hierarchy  which  is  best  known  in  New  York  as  the  Fifth 
Avenue  Coach  Company.  The  top  of  the  hierarchy  is 
controlled  by  four  Chicago  business  men  whose  removal 
from  the  operating  companies  puts  them  in  a  position  to 
escape  local  regulation  and  at  the  same  time  to  milk  those 
operating  companies  through  parasitic  intermediaries.  The 
story  of  the  success  of  this  bus  combination  is  amazing. 

At  the  top  of  the  combination  is  the  Omnibus  Corpora 
tion  of  Chicago  which  is  controlled  by  a  voting  trust  held 
by  seven  trustees,  four  Chicagoans  and  three  New  York 
ers.  The  Omnibus  Corporation  owns  the  Fifth  Avenue 
Bus  Securities  Corporation,  which  owns  the  New  York 
Transportation  Company,  which  owns  the  Fifth  Avenue 
Coach  Company,  which  owns  the  New  York  Railways 


222      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Corporation.  The  New  York  Railways  Corporation  owns 
a  whole  nest  of  feeble  and  half  bankrupt  street  car  com 
panies  including  the  Bleecker  Street  and  Fulton  Ferry 
Railway  Company,  the  Broadway  and  Seventh  Avenue 
Railway  Company,  the  23rd  Street  Railway  Company,  and 
the  34th  Street  Crosstown  Railway  Company.  As  far  as 
actual  service  is  concerned,  the  New  York  Transportation 
Company,  the  Fifth  Avenue  Bus  Securities  Corporation, 
and  the  Omnibus  Corporation  are  simply  leeches  upon  the 
Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company,  since  the  coach  company 
passes  on  its  earnings  to  the  upper  members  of  the  hier 
archy  without  getting  any  considerable  service  in  return. 
The  New  York  Transportation  Company,  the  Fifth  Ave 
nue  Bus  Securities  Corporation,  and  the  Omnibus  Cor 
poration  are  drones  which  pay  dividends  out  of  the  earn 
ings  of  the  working  bee,  the  Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Com 
pany. 

The  various  corporate  members  of  the  hierarchy  have 
approximately  the  same  boards  of  directors.  The  pathetic 
street  car  companies  at  the  bottom  of  the  hierarchy  are 
paupers,  but  the  upper  members  of  the  hierarchy  are  not 
obliged  to  come  to  their  assistance,  and  continue  to  declare 
enormous  dividends  out  of  the  profits  of  the  Fifth  Avenue 
Coach  Company  while  asking  privileges  from  the  city  for 
the  railway  companies  because  they  are  virtually  bankrupt. 
The  Transit  Commission  has  no  power  to  go  behind  the 
Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company  in  this  hierarchy  because 
it  can  regulate  only  operating  concerns. 

Courts  have  commonly  ruled  that  a  public  utility  is 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  223 

entitled  to  an  8  per  cent  return  on  investment,  but  the 
Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company,  whose  stockholders'  orig 
inal  investment  was  $50,000,  has  received  $3,600,000  in 
dividends  in  the  last  eight  years,  an  average  return  of 
950  per  cent  annually  on  its  original  investment.  The 
company's  officials  have  admitted  that  the  stockholders 
never  put  a  dollar  into  the  company  except  the  original 
$50,000  and  the  earnings  thereon.  In  defense  of  these 
astounding  dividend  figures  it  is  contended  that  the  com 
pany  plowed  back  its  dividends  over  a  long  period  of 
years,  since  no  dividends  were  paid  prior  to  1923,  but 
this  contention  is  nullified  by  the  fact  that  the  company's 
surplus  and  fixed  capital  have  increased  far  in  excess  of 
any  normal  dividends  which  might  have  been  plowed 
back  into  the  company.  If  the  company  had  started  at  the 
beginning  of  its  existence  and  plowed  back  10  per  cent 
dividends  every  year,  paying  dividends  upon  the  plowed- 
back  dividends,  it  still  would  have  been  worth  only  $600,- 
000  in  1923  when  it  started  its  big  dividend  splurge.  Actu 
ally  it  was  worth  approximately  $8,000,000  in  1923. 

The  stockholders  invested  only  $50,000  in  the  company 
and  all  subsequent  additions  to  the  capital  have  come 
from  the  dimes  of  New  York  passengers.  These  dimes 
have  not  only  given  the  stockholders  almost  1,000  per  cent 
dividends  in  recent  years,  but  they  have  piled  up  a  surplus 
which  totaled  $10,780,613  in  1930.  In  1930  the  company 
actually  earned  almost  one  and  one-half  million  dollars, 
since  it  declared  a  dividend  of  $500,000  and  put  $994,000 
into  its  surplus. 


224      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

In  the  lean  years  when  dividends  were  not  being  paid 
the  loss  of  dividends  was  more  than  balanced  by  tremen 
dous  increases  in  fixed  capital.  Even  during  recent  years, 
when  prodigious  dividends  have  been  paid,  the  fabulous 
appreciation  in  the  fixed  capital  of  the  corporation  has 
continued.  During  the  eight  years  past  when  the  company 
has  paid  an  average  dividend  of  950  per  cent  on  its  actual 
investment,  its  capital  value  has  doubled.3 

There  is  one  fly  in  the  ointment  of  the  Fifth  Avenue 
Coach  Company,  however.  Its  legal  claim  to  operate 
buses  on  Manhattan  streets  is  not  at  all  clear  and  the  city 
is  now  at  last  contesting  that  claim  in  the  courts.  Accord 
ing  to  the  reports  of  John  A.  McCollum,  Chief  of  the 
Division  of  Franchises  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  and  the 
1917  report  of  Lamar  Hardy,  the  Fifth  Avenue  Coach 
Company  received  its  franchises  originally  through  a  legal 
blunder,  since  it  applied  for  these  franchises  as  a  business 
corporation  whereas  it  should  have  applied  as  a  railroad 
corporation.  The  legislature  attempted  to  rectify  this  blun 
der  by  a  special  act  but,  according  to  Mr.  McCollum,  the 
act  itself  was  an  unconstitutional  grant  of  a  special  privi 
lege.  If  Mr.  McCollum' s  opinion  is  accurate,  at  the  pres 
ent  time  46  per  cent  of  the  Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Com 
pany's  lines  are  illegally  operating  under  the  legislative 
grant,  16  per  cent  are  operating  by  revocable  consent,  and 
25  per  cent  are  operating  with*  no  consent  or  franchise 
whatsoever.  This  leaves  only  about  13  per  cent  of  the 
present  franchises  held  by  this  company  which  are  not 
questioned  by  the  city. 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  225 

Behind  these  Fifth  Avenue  Coach  franchises  lies  a  net 
work  of  old  street-car  franchises,  some  of  them  perpetual 
and  some  of  them  bought  by  bribery  in  the  days  of  Tweed, 
now  reposing  in  the  hands  of  the  new  bus  hierarchy  by 
virtue  of  its  purchase  of  the  New  York  Railways  Cor 
poration.  A  fascinating  history  of  New  York  capitalism 
could  be  written  about  these  franchises.  Most  of  them  do 
not  have  a  going  value  of  one  penny  but  they  have  been 
bought  up  by  the  bus  hierarchy  at  a  bargain  because  of 
their  nuisance  value.  A  street-car  company  may  be  losing 
money  steadily  and  still  have  a  certain  practical  value  if 
it  possesses  a  perpetual  right  to  New  York  streets.  It  can 
demand  a  good  price  to  get  off  the  streets  and  permit  the 
operation  of  buses,  or  it  can  demand  valuable  bus  fran 
chises  for  itself. 

This  latter  demand  is  now  being  made  upon  the  city 
by  a  collection  of  half-bankrupt  street-car  companies 
which  have  been  gathered  together  by  the  bus  hierarchy. 
These  companies,  subsidiaries  of  the  New  York  Railways 
Corporation,  have  applied  for  the  right  to  motorize  their 
lines  and  get  both  longitudinal  and  crosstown  bus  lines 
under  franchises  which  would  yield  them  145  per  cent 
profit,  about  $2,066,000  annually  on  an  initial  investment 
of  $1,431,500.  One  of  their  claims  to  these  franchises  is 
that  they  have  certain  ancient  and  heavily  moist  street-car 
securities  which  they  may  "sacrifice"  for  eleven  millions 
of  capitalization  in  the  new  bus  monopoly.  The  city  is  in 
an  embarrassing  position  because  some  of  the  street  rail 
way  companies  can  stubbornly  hang  on  to  their  ancient 


226      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

perpetual  franchises  a  long  while  and  still  make  enough 
money  to  pay  operating  expenses. 

We  of  this  generation  are  now  being  asked  to  pay  for 
the  city's  recklessness  in  the  days  of  Tweed  and  before. 
We  are  refused  the  right  to  have  municipal  operation  by 
the  state  law  and  we  are  prevented  from  starting  with  a 
clean  slate  and  granting  the  Manhattan  bus  contracts  to 
the  highest  bidder  because  of  franchises,  many  of  which 
were  purchased  by  bribery  in  the  days  of  Tweed.  If  in  the 
early  days  the  profits  of  the  street-car  lines  had  been  fairly 
distributed,  much  of  the  present  outstanding  stock  would 
never  have  been  issued  and  no  one  would  now  be  attempt 
ing  to  foist  it  upon  the  present  generation.  For  many 
years  the  companies  which  later  united  to  form  the  New 
York  Railways  Corporation  were  milked  by  insiders  who 
controlled  subsidiary  lines  and  holding  companies.  In 
some  cases  the  subsidiary  lines  were  rented  to  holding 
companies  for  more  than  their  total  annual  revenue.  The 
overcapitalization  goes  back  to  Civil  War  days.  In  the 
period  after  the  Civil  War  electric  car  lines  which  should 
have  been  capitalized  at  not  more  than  $40,000  a  mile 
were  forced  up  a  Jacob's  ladder  of  heavenly  finance  until 
they  reached  the  peak  of  $2,000,000  a  mile  in  1903.* 

One  bond  issue  of  $700,000,  a  fraction  of  which  the 
City  of  New  York  is  now  asked  to  validate,  may  be  used 
as  an  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  fake  services  have 
been  saddled  upon  the  city  and  later  investors  as  real 
obligations.  Its  history  has  been  traced  by  E.  Michael 
White.  It  is  the  4%  bond  issued  in  January,  1865,  by  the 


CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN  227 

Bleecker  Street  and  Fulton  Ferry  Line  which  later  became 
and  is  now  part  of  the  New  York  Railways  Corporation 
structure.  That  bond  never  did  represent  more  than 
$268,000  of  real  investment.  The  other  $432,000  of  the 
$700,000  together  with  $900,000  worth  of  capital  stock 
were  distributed  to  insiders  for  the  franchise  of  this 
Bleecker  Street  Line  which  the  city  gave  away  for  nothing. 
That  $700,000  bond  had  paid  $1,828,000  in  interest  on 
an  actual  outlay  of  $268,000  up  to  July  1,  1931,  when  the 
first  default  in  interest  payments  took  place,  although 
part  of  the  line  had  been  abandoned  for  many  years. 

According  to  the  prevailing  ethics  of  capitalism  the  men 
who  are  now  trying  to  get  a  bus  monopoly  in  Manhattan 
are  quite  irreproachable.  Some  of  them  are  capable  ad 
ministrators,  and  here  and  there  among  the  security 
holders  can  be  found  the  usual  widows  and  orphans  in 
whose  name  any  exploitation  of  the  public  is  excused. 
The  genuine  investors  who  made  a  sacrifice  to  purchase 
securities  are  now  inextricably  tangled  up  with  the  pirati 
cal  insiders  who  contributed  nothing.  The  big  financial 
manipulators  at  the  top  of  the  bus  hierarchy  are  no  more 
parasitic  than  most  of  the  owners  of  U.  S.  Steel  or  A.  T, 
and  T. — their  misdeeds  are  simply  better  advertised  be 
cause  they  are  manipulating  a  public  utility  which  must 
make  some  of  its  contracts  in  the  open. 

Fortunately  there  are  three  factors  favorable  to  the  city 
in  the  present  fight  against  a  Manhattan  bus  monopoly  for 
the  Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company.  Both  Controller  Berry 
and  Joseph  McKee  are  opposed;  the  legality  of  the  com- 


228      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

pany's  present  franchises  is  in  dispute;  and  a  formula  for 
municipal  operation  is  possible. 

The  formula  for  municipal  operation  is  this.  The  city 
is  not  allowed  to  inaugurate  a  municipal  bus  system  itself, 
but  under  section  73  of  the  city  charter,  it  may  recapture 
a  bus  line  by  paying  adequate  compensation  and  operate 
it  thereafter.  Thus  far  Tammany  has  made  no  use  of  this 
power.  It  has  stuck  stubbornly  to  definite-term  franchises, 
which  would  block  the  efforts  of  the  city  to  include  the 
buses  in  a  comprehensive  municipal  transit  system.  We 
believe  that  a  unified  municipal  transit  system  is  the  only 
sane  way  out  of  the  present  bus  tangle  and  we  believe 
that  the  logical  next  step  toward  that  end  would  be  the 
granting  of  terminable  franchises  only,  and  then  only  to 
the  highest  bidder,  so  that  the  city  might  take  over  the 
system  at  the  earliest  practical  moment  and  get  the  maxi 
mum  return  for  its  streets.  Such  a  municipal  bus  system 
is  doubly  important  in  view  of  the  pending  move  for  city- 
wide  transit  unification. 


13 
RACKETEERING  IN  LAND 

WE  have  pointed  out  that  the  corruption  of  New  York 
political  life  can  be  traced  back  in  large  part  to  the  prac 
tices  of  our  business  world.  Mayor  Walker,  if  his  own 
story  is  to  be  believed,  gambled  in  Wall  Street  with  Paul 
Block  and  cheerfully  took  $246,000  from  his  friend 
without  a  qualm  because  he  lived  in  an  atmosphere  of 
speculation  where  such  things  were  part  of  traditional 
conduct.  Among  his  friends  no  stigma  was  attached  to 
getting  something  for  nothing  as  long  as  the  larceny 
laws  were  avoided. 

This  wholly  uncritical  attitude  toward  money  made 
by  speculation  in  Wall  Street  is  even  more  evident  in 
the  conservative  politician's  attitude  toward  land  values. 
Everywhere  in  America  local  politicians  acquire  their 
fortunes  quite  largely  by  speculating  in  land,  and  no 
sense  of  guilt  disturbs  their  consciences.  The  realtor  is 
America's  typical  business  hero.  He  creates  almost  noth 
ing.  He  shrewdly  studies  the  changing  currents  of  popu 
lation,  directs  those  currents  on  occasion  by  tremendous 
ballyhoo,  and  steps  in  to  take  for  himself  the  increment 
created  by  the  influx  of  the  crowd. 

New  York  City  is  the  most  perfect  model  of  the  real- 

229 


230      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

tor's  heaven.  The  little  strip  of  land  called  Manhattan 
Island,  which  was  sold  to  Peter  Minuit  for  $24  three 
hundred  years  ago,  is  now  assessed  at  more  than  five 
billions.  The  land  in  the  whole  five  boroughs  of  Greater 
New  York  was  "worth,"  in  1930,  $8,731,778,851 — that  is 
to  say  it  was  assessed  at  that  amount  and  probably  had  a 
market  value  of  ten  billions.1 

The  people  of  Peter  Minuit' s  little  island  pay  fortunes 
to  the  owners  of  the  island  for  its  use.  Some  of  our  great 
est  New  York  fortunes,  such  as  the  Astor  fortune,  were 
made  largely  by  sitting  tight  (or  cruising  on  yachts)  while 
the  millions  crowding  into  New  York  increased  the  land 
values.  For  a  time  New  York  City  land  increased  in  value 
at  the  rate  of  $600,000,000  a  year.  The  most  conspicu 
ous  unearned  fortunes  have  been  won  by  the  holders  of 
certain  "golden  corners"  in  Manhattan.  The  land  on 
which  the  Stock  Exchange  was  located  was  assessed  at 
$500  a  square  foot — we  speak  in  the  past  tense  because,  as 
we  write  this  book,  a  movement  is  on  foot  to  reduce  assess 
ments  one  to  three  billions.  One  realtor  in  the  boom 
years  claimed  that  the  land  on  the  northeast  corner  of 
Fifth  Avenue  and  Forty-second  Street  was  "worth" 
$36,000  per  front  inch.  Of  course  he  never  persuaded 
any  one  to  agree  with  him.  The  land  on  which  the  Em 
pire  State  Building  is  located,  which  sold  for  less  than 
$10,000  a  hundred  years*  ago,  was  valued  at  seventeen 
millions  before  the  depression  began. 

The  size  of  the  toll  extracted  from  the  productive  work 
ers  of  New  York  by  the*  land-owning  class  can  best  be 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  231 

appreciated  by  imagining  that  the  first  settlers  in  New 
Amsterdam  had  been  Socialists  and  had  imposed  upon  the 
whole  region  a  Socialist  system  of  land  tenure  under  which 
the  users  of  land  leased  their  plots  from  the  government. 
(The  community,  of  course,  has  the  natural  claim  to  land 
since  no  person's  labor  has  created  it.)  If  that  had  been 
the  case,  the  people  who  live  in  New  York  would  have 
had  few  tax  worries,  for  most  of  the  costs  of  government 
would  have  been  covered  by  land  rentals.  Many  of  the 
great  unearned  fortunes  that  form  the  basis  for  cruel 
snobbery  would  never  have  been  created.  The  city  would 
have  been  planned  to  give  the  maximum  of  light,  air  and 
happiness  to  its  inhabitants  rather  than  to  increase  the 
profits  of  downtown  landholders. 

These  imaginative  reflections  are  not,  of  course,  new. 
Henry  George,  when  he  ran  for  mayor  of  New  York,  told 
the  people  what  private  land  speculation  cost  them  and 
advocated  the  single  tax  to  recapture  for  the  community 
the  values  of  the  land  which  the  community  created.  He 
made  a  profound  impression  upon  his  generation,  the 
young  Samuel  Seabury  being  included  among  his  dis 
ciples.  Given  our  system  of  private  ownership  of  land  the 
corruption  of  New  York  politics  by  land  speculation  is 
inevitable.  The  average  American  would  be  disgraced  in 
the  eyes  of  his  fellows  if  he  knew  in  advance  of  a  com 
ing  increase  in  the  value  of  a  certain  plot  of  land  and  did 
not  take  advantage  of  that  knowledge.  The  Tammany 
politicians,  in  harmony  with  American  morals,  have 
worked  out  a  system  of  advance  knowledge  and  under- 


232      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

cover  manipulation  that  deserves  to  be  called  a  land 
racket.  It  was  partially  exposed  in  the  years  1927  to  1930 
by  the  Citizen's  Union,  the  City  Affairs  Committee  and 
Controller  Charles  W.  Berry.  Its  final  exposure  came  in 
the  report  of  Leonard  M.  Wallstein,  as  a  special  corpora 
tion  counsel,  on  land  condemnation  in  January,  1932. 

The  law  says  that  when  the  city  government  wants  a 
certain  piece  of  land  for  a  school  building,  a  court  house, 
or  a  street  it  may  condemn  the  land  for  a  public  use  and 
compel  the  owner  to  sell  it.  The  owner  may  negotiate  for 
the  highest  price  obtainable  with  the  Finance  Department 
or  he  may  refuse  that  price  and  appeal  to  the  State  Su 
preme  Court  to  set  a  price.  The  procedure  sounds  inno 
cent  enough  and  would  be  innocent  enough  if  our  city 
fathers  were  men  who  could  keep  secret  their  plans  for  a 
public  improvement  and  if  the  judges  who  preside  in  our 
Supreme  Court  were  not  land  gamblers  in  their  philosophy 
and  good  friends  of  Tammany  realtors. 

New  York  was  shocked  in  1930  when  the  City  Affairs 
Committee  announced  that  it  had  made  a  study  of  the  cost 
of  land  bought  by  the  city  for  school  sites  from  1925  to 
1928  and  had  discovered  that  the  city  had  paid  3.2  times 
the  assessed  value  of  these  sites,  although  the  assessment 
officers  were  sworn  to  value  each  piece  of  property  to  the 
best  of  their  ability  at  its  true  market  value.  Figuring  the 
excess  expenditure  over  market  value  on  school  sites  as 
typical  waste,  the  committee  estimated  that  New  York 
citizens  were  losing  about  $29,000,000  a  year  on  the  con 
demnation  racket.  They  pointed  to  the  site  of  the  public 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  233 

school  at  115th  Avenue  and  201st  Street,  Queens,  which 
was  sold  to  the  city  for  thirteen  times  its  assessed  value, 
and  to  several  other  school  sites  which  were  sold  at  six, 
seven  and  eight  times  their  assessed  value. 

These  revelations  came  shortly  after  Justice  Dunne  had 
awarded  $12,500,000  to  certain  Rockaway  Beach  property 
owners  for  land  which  was  assessed  at  about  one-tenth  of 
this  price  when  the  project  was  authorized  in  1924s 

Mr.  Wallstein  in  a  long  series  of  hearings  and  in  a 
subsequent  report,  showed  the  public  how  it  is  high 
jacked  out  of  millions  of  dollars  every  year  by  a  ring  of 
real  estate  dealers,  city  land  "experts,"  condemnation 
lawyers,  judges  and  political  bosses.  Through  the  activi 
ties  of  the  ring  the  city  threw  away  during  the  boom  years 
of  1926  to  1930  at  least  $20,000,000  a  year.  The  ring 
was  not  an  illegal  conspiracy  as  the  ring  of  lawyers  and 
bail  bondsmen  in  the  Magistrate's  Court  was.  It  was,  and 
is,  a  group  of  sharp-practicing  lawyers  who  got  advance 
tips  from  insiders  in  city  departments,  solicited  trade  from 
the  land  owners  on  a  percentage  basis,  and  proceeded  to 
win  from  indifferent  judges  and  mildly  protesting  repre 
sentatives  of  the  city  awards  that  were  tantamount  to  a 
raid  upon  the  public  treasury.  The  exposure  of  the  racket 
indicated  how  futile  our  criminal  laws  are  in  the  case  of 
established  exploitation.  A  judge  who  sends  a  thief  to  jail 
for  stealing  an  apple  will  calmly  award  a  lucky  land 
owner  five  times  the  assessed  value  of  his  property  with 
out  any  careful  examination  of  the  owner's  claims,  and 
the  city  may  lose  the  price  of  a  million  apples. 


234      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

In  the  case  of  the  Libby  Hotel  and  the  Chrystie-For- 
sythe  Street  widening,  Justice  Philip  McCook  awarded  the 
owners  $2,850,000,  although  shortly  before  this  event  a 
corporate  mortgage  had  been  foreclosed  on  the  hotel  with 
the  contention  that  the  site  was  valueless,  causing  the 
stockholders  to  be  wiped  out. 

The  city  government  is  involved  in  the  condemnation 
racket  in  three  ways,  through  political  leaders  who  sell 
undesirable  land  to  the  city  at  a  high  profit,  through  city 
officials  who  trade  on  their  inside  knowledge  of  construc 
tion  plans,  and  through  Tammany  realty  experts  who  get 
prodigious  fees  for  overvaluing  land  to  be  purchased. 
Pink-cheeked,  benevolent  Boss  McCooey  of  Brooklyn,  for 
example,  apparently  made  $69,656  profit  on  a  Brooklyn 
school  site  located  across  from  some  gas  tanks,  as  re 
vealed  in  hearings  before  Mr.  Wallstein. 

He  worked  through  a  business  associate  named  Charles 
D.  Cords  who  bought  certain  pieces  of  land  in  Bay  Ridge 
at  5th  Street  for  $57,500  with  the  help  of  a  $15,000  loan 
from  Mr.  McCooey,  whose  name  did  not  appear  as  owner. 
A  committee  of  the  Board  of  Education  was  looking  for 
a  school  site,  and  the  committee,  naturally  enough,  in 
cluded  some  good  friends  of  Mr.  McCooey.  On  its  first 
trip  of  inspection,  however,  it  apparently  did  not  know 
that  Mr.  McCooey  was  interested  in  the  Cords'  property, 
so  it  recorded  a  frank  opinion  in  its  field  notes  about 
another  site  that  was  two  full  blocks  away  from  the  gas 
tanks:  "Too  near  the  gas  tanks — Out."  But  on  a  later 
field  trip  the  committee  included  Miss  Margaret  J. 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  235 

McCooey,  a  sister  of  the  Brooklyn  boss  and  one  of  the 
superintendents  of  our  school  system.  The  report  on  the 
Cords'  land  was  more  favorable.  In  fact,  the  Board  of 
Superintendents  with  Miss  McCooey  present,  finally  con 
cluded  that  the  Cords'  property,  situated  in  the  middle  of 
gas  tanks,  incinerators,  heavy  industrial  traffic,  and  a 
sparsely  populated  neighborhood,  was  "especially  adapt 
able  to  school  purposes." 

But  the  parents  of  the  locality  raised  such  a  furore  that 
the  local  school  board  of  District  36  in  Brooklyn  was 
moved  to  protest  against  the  site  to  the  city  Board  of 
Education.  Mr.  McCooey  was  undismayed.  He  called  in 
the  chairman  of  the  local  school  board  who  was  the  re 
cording  secretary  of  the  Ninth  Assembly  Regular  Demo 
cratic  organization  and  converted  him  on  the  spot  into  an 
enthusiastic  proponent  of  the  gas-tank  land.  He  called 
in  the  secretary  of  the  local  school  board,  a  Miss  May 
Golden,  with  equal  success.  He  was  quite  frank  about  the 
basis  of  this  success.  It  was  not  sex  appeal.  It  was  "friend 
ship."  Mr.  McCooey  had  gotten  her  brother  appointed  a 
magistrate.  "I  would  start  off  with  this  premise,"  he  con 
fided,  "that  inasmuch  as  I  had  a  great  deal  to  do  with  the 
appointment  of  her  brother  as  magistrate,  that  she  natu 
rally  would  be  friendly  to  me  if  I  wanted  her  friendship 
for  this  site."  His  premise  was  correct. 

The  local  school  board  reversed  its  position  and  begged 
the  Board  of  Education  to  use  this  choice  land.  Dr.  Wil 
liam  A.  Boylan,  since  promoted  to  the  presidency  of 
Brooklyn  College,  and  Dr.  William  J.  O'Shea,  the  pliant 


236      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

gentleman  who  now  presides  over  New  York's  public 
schools,  heartily  favored  the  site  and  Dr.  Boylan  pushed 
it  before  the  Board  of  Estimate  with  the  declaration  that 
the  property  had  "a  delightful  outlook."  In  spite  of  some 
unpleasant  remarks  by  the  Controller  the  city  finally  took 
title  and  the  question  of  price  went  to  the  courts. 

The  judge  in  the  case  was  Mitchell  May,  a  regular 
machine  Democrat  and  friend  of  McCooey.  The  city's 
real  estate  expert,  Edward  J.  Gaynor,  who  had  known 
Mr.  McCooey  for  twelve  years  and  had  been  appointed 
an  expert  for  the  city  with  McCooey' s  recommendation, 
valued  the  whole  piece  of  land  at  $264,000,  more  than 
three  times  the  assessed  valuation  and  $120,000  higher 
than  the  valuation  of  the  controller's  office.  Of  course 
the  Cords-McCooey  experts  shot  higher  than  Mr.  Gay 
nor  to  establish  the  well-known  principle  of  balance,  and 
set  their  estimate  at  $353,000.  The  assistant  corporation 
counsel  representing  the  city,  who  had  been  approved  for 
his  appointment  by  Mr.  McCooey,  handled  the  experts 
with  a  perfunctory  gentleness,  forgetting  to  bring  out  the 
fact  that  neighboring  lots  were  selling  for  about  half  of 
what  the  claimants  were  asking.  Justice  May  tolerantly 
split  the  difference  and  set  a  price  of  $303,000.  A  touch 
of  lovely  charm  was  added  to  the  whole  proceeding  by  the 
revelation  that  Mr.  McCooey's  profit  in  the  deal  was  a 
wedding  anniversary  gift  to  his  wife!  3  Incidentally,  the 
land  still  stands  idle,  since  no  one  wants  to  use  it  for 
school  purposes. 

Mr.  Wallstein's  investigation  also  revealed  that  certain 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  237 

positions  in  the  offices  of  the  Board  of  Education  and  the 
Board  of  Estimate  have  been  used  as  listening  posts  for 
acquiring  advance  knowledge  of  city  purchases.  Usually 
the  listening  posts  are  handled  with  such  caution  and  the 
connection  with  the  land  racketeers  is  so  carefully  camou 
flaged  that  no  one  can  be  convicted  of  a  crime.  The 
favorite  device  for  land  manipulation  is  a  small  corpora 
tion  with  an  innocuous  name  created  by  the  inside  poli 
ticians  and  realtors  to  buy  up  land  in  anticipation  of  a 
demand  for  it  by  the  city.  Usually  the  corporation  is  con 
trolled  through  dummies  or  relatives. 

Francis  T.  McEneny  was  removed  as  chief  examiner  to 
the  president  of  the  Board  of  Aldermen  after  it  was  dis 
covered  that  he  and  his  friends  had  engaged  in  "substan 
tial  and  apparently  profitable  transactions  in  connection 
with  school  sites,"  and  his  crony  Morris  Warschauer  was 
transferred  from  his  position  as  secretary  of  the  committee 
on  buildings  and  sites  of  the  Board  of  Education  for  simi 
lar  reasons.  But  Mr.  Warschauer  is  still  assistant  secretary 
of  the  Board  of  Education  after  making  explanations  of 
his  bank  accounts  that  Leonard  M.  Wallstein  called  "fan 
tastic,"  and  Perry  Winston  is  still  assistant  engineer  on 
the  staff  of  the  secretary  of  the  Board  of  Estimate  after 
it  was  disclosed  that  his  friends  had  made  handsome 
profits  by  dabbling  in  school  sites  and  then  thrown  away 
their  check  books  and  canceled  check  vouchers.  Mr.  Win 
ston  gets  advance  knowledge  of  the  plans  of  the  Board 
of  Education  for  all  its  new  buildings.  Just  before  he 
recommended  a  school  site  on  23d  Avenue  in  Brooklyn 


238      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

some  friends  of  his  brother-in-law  organized  the  Ralmac 
Realty  Corporation  which  sold  the  recommended  land  to 
the  city  at  a  profit  of  $13,000  in  ten  months  on  an  invest 
ment  of  $12,000.  At  about  this  time  the  sister  of  Mr. 
Winston's  brother-in-law  (the  women  of  this  family  are 
also  brilliant  business  promoters)  was  making  $20,000 
on  a  cash  investment  of  $4,000  in  the  site  of  the  Abraham 
Lincoln  High  School.  This  high-school  site,  incidentally 
was  assessed  by  the  city's  tax  experts  at  $321,800  but 
when  the  city  attempted  to  buy  it  the  city's  own  real  estate 
expert,  Charles  Schiffman,  valued  it  at  $300,000  higher 
than  the  tax  valuation,  which  explains  in  part  the  aston 
ishing  success  of  the  distant  relatives  of  Mr.  Winston  in 
the  real  estate  business. 

Mr.  Schiffman  received  $4,600  as  an  expert's  fee  for 
his  optimism  in  valuing  this  land  for  the  Abraham  Lincoln 
High  School  and  a  rebuke  from  Mr.  Wallstein  for  im 
proper  business  dealings  because  he  helped  to  get  a  loan 
for  some  of  the  claimants  in  this  very  case  from  an  assist 
ant  corporation  counsel.* 

We  should  not  be  unduly  severe  in  judging  the  Mc- 
Enenys,  Warschauers,  Winstons  and  Schiffmans.  Perhaps 
they  believe  that  there  should  be  more  business  in  govern 
ment.  The  almost  universal  rule  in  big  business  is  for  the 
insiders  to  take  advantage  of  what  is  called  "business 
opportunity,"  which  means  foreknowledge  of  dividend 
statements  and  purchase  needs. 

The  expert  racket  dovetails  into  the  condemnation  law 
yer's  racket.  The  important  condemnation  cases  in  the 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  239 

city  are  handled  by  the  firms  of  Talley  and  Lamb,  and 
Skinner  and  Bermant.  Alfred  J.  Talley,  the  big  gun  in 
condemnation  proceedings  in  New  York,  was  a  close  asso 
ciate  of  Charles  F.  Murphy  and  was  urged  as  a  possible 
successor  to  Murphy  in  the  leadership  of  Tammany  Hall 
in  1924. 

The  condemnation  law  firms  actively  solicit  business 
from  owners  of  prospective  city  land  "like  salesmen  sell 
ing  lead  pencils  and  suspenders,"  as  one  witness  testified 
in  the  hearings  before  Mr.  Wallstein,  although  this  solici 
tation  is  specifically  forbidden  by  a  court  rule  which 
applies  to  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx.  The  rule  says:  "No 
attorney  shall  directly  or  indirectly  solicit  a  retainer  or 
employment  to  present,  settle,  prosecute  or  defend  any 
claim  or  action,  or  employ  or  authorize  any  person  so  to 
solicit  on  his  behalf."  Far  from  observing  this  rule  the 
law  firms  of  the  city  swoop  down  like  vultures  on  the  land 
owners  of  any  neighborhood  where  a  civic  improvement 
is  planned,  sometimes  fifteen  years  in  advance  of  actual 
sale,  and  "sign  them  up"  in  a  house  to  house  canvass 
with  an  agreement  that  the  law  firm  shall  receive  5  per 
cent  of  the  total  award.  That  means,  of  course,  $50,000 
for  a  million  dollar  award  which  can  often  be  secured 
from  friendly  courts  with  very  little  labor. 

The  labor,  in  fact,  is  nearly  all  in  getting  the  clients 
and  holding  them  together.  The  actual  condemnation 
cases  are  perfunctory  affairs.  The  claimants  have  an  ex 
pert  who  has  become  known  as  a  professional  optimist. 
The  city  has  an  expert  who  is  only  slightly  less  optimistic. 


240      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Both  are  paid  handsomely  for  brief  service;  the  city  usu 
ally  pays  its  experts  $100  a  day,  and  in  the  Chrystie  Street 
condemnation  case  their  bills  totaled  $124,065.  In  that 
case  Nicholas  F.  Walsh  received  $40,000,  Samuel  Augen- 
blick,  $40,000,  and  Walter  T.  Murphy  $32,000  as  city 
land  experts.  In  the  Rockaway  Beach  condemnation  case 
Congressman  John  J.  Boylan  who  represents  John  F. 
Curry's  district  at  Washington,  included  in  his  $39,000 
bill  to  the  city  five  days  for  "attendance  at  court"  which, 
according  to  the  Congressional  Record,  he  had  spent  in 
Washington.6  Part  of  his  bill  was  disallowed  but  he  still 
kept  a  nest  egg  of  $200,000  which  he  had  received  as  an 
expert  in  condemnation  cases  between  1924  and  1930. 

The  experts  in  the  past  have  not  been  permitted  to 
bring  in  to  condemnation  proceedings  the  assessed  value 
of  the  property  to  be  bought  although  such  value  is  the 
only  index  which  the  city  can  use  in  deciding  to  purchase 
the  property,  and  they  have  likewise  been  prevented  by 
idiotically  narrow  court  rulings  from  bringing  in  the  most 
pertinent  evidence  of  all,  the  recent  sales  price  of  the 
property  to  be  bought.  In  some  states  assessments  are  bad 
barometers  of  value  but  not  in  New  York  City,  since  the 
state  equalization  tax  tables  show  that  here  the  assessed 
value  of  property  comes  very  close  to  the  market  value. 

The  story  of  the  way  in  which  New  York  Supreme 
Court  judges  have  refused  to  permit  assessed  value  to  be 
noticed  judicially  in  condemnation  cases  is  to  us  one  of 
the  most  startling  proofs  of  the  dry  rot  in  our  legal  pro 
fession.  Because  some  judges  had  misinterpreted  the  law 
on  this  subject,  succeeding  judges  and  succeeding  lawyers 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  241 

fell  in  line  and  duly  quoted  their  predecessors'  foolish 
ness.  The  aim  of  a  condemnation  proceeding,  to  deter 
mine  actual  value,  seems  to  have  been  quite  lost  sight  of. 

When  the  experts  had  finished  their  testimony  in  a 
condemnation  case,  the  judge,  who  may  or  may  not  have 
been  listening  to  the  proceeding,  usually  "split  the  differ 
ence"  between  the  competing  optimists.  Mr.  Wallstein 
just  for  fun  tabulated  164  of  these  split-the-difference 
decisions  on  school  sites  and  found  that  the  judges  in 
making  twenty-five  million  dollars  worth  of  judgment 
came  within  seven  hundredths  of  one  per  cent  of  splitting 
the  melon  exactly  in  half.  To  suspect  collusion  in  such 
cases  would  be  as  irreverent  as  to  question  the  conspicuous 
guilelessness  of  the  average  New  York  divorce  case. 

Mr.  Wallstein  has  suggested  a  number  of  reforms  for 
condemnation  proceedings  and  some  of  them  have  been 
adopted  at  Albany.  Condemnation  proceedings,  as  soon 
as  another  legislature  has  approved  a  pending  constitu 
tional  amendment  and  the  people  have  voted  for  it,  will 
be  taken  out  of  the  hands  of  a  single  Supreme  Court  judge 
and  given  to  a  special  condemnation  tribunal  of  three 
judges  to  be  periodically  assigned  by  the  Apellate  Divi 
sions.  Assessed  valuations  may  be  considered  by  judges 
and  must  be  considered  by  the  Corporation  Counsel  who 
represents  the  city.  More  complete  publicity  is  provided 
for. 

All  these  reforms  are  good  in  themselves  and  Mr.  Wall 
stein  deserves  the  public's  thanks  for  initiating  them,  but 
he  would  probably  be  the  first  to  admit  that  they  will  be 
useless  unless  there  is  some  honest  will  to  serve  the  public 


242      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

interest  in  the  government  that  rules  New  York.  And  in 
this  case  the  reform  legislation  will  be  handicapped  by  one 
of  the  oldest  traditions  of  American  capitalism,  the  allo 
cation  to  private  owners  of  the  increased  value  of  land. 

A  proper  philosophy  and  practice  of  taxing  land  values 
would  solve  all  these  problems.  The  trouble  starts  when 
the  community  allows  a  land  owner  to  keep  the  land  value 
which  it  (the  community)  has  created.  Realtors  will  con 
tinue  to  be  economic  highwaymen  as  long  as  they  are 
honored  in  proportion  to  their  success  in  capturing  these 
values.  Judges  will  consistently  give  the  benefit  of  the 
doubt  to  private  speculators  rather  than  the  government 
in  the  purchase  of  land  until  our  ethics  of  land  ownership 
have  changed.  What  we  need,  if  Mr.  Wallstein's  reforms 
are  to  have  more  than  a  temporary  effect,  is  more  judges 
on  the  bench  who  have  read  Karl  Marx  and  Thorstein 
Veblen  and  Henry  George,  and  taken  them  seriously 
enough  to  understand  that  there  is  a  difference  between 
earned  and  unearned  wealth.  Which  is  to  say  that  we 
need  more  socialist  and  fewer  conservative  judges.  Inci 
dentally,  we  are  not  sure  that  Mr.  Wallstein  himself 
would  make  the  very  best  judge.  He  saved  the  city 
$4,459,000  in  the  Rockaway  Beach  condemnation  case, 
then  took  a  $160,000  fee  for  himself  in  addition  to  heavy 
expenses  for  a  few  months'  work.  His  criticism  of  the 
land  racketeers  lost  some  of  its  force  thereby. 

Meanwhile  New  York's  transit  construction  program 
has  reached  an  impasse  because  the  city  government  did 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  243 

not  undertake  to  pay  for  subway  construction  out  of  the 
unearned  wealth  of  the  land  owners  along  the  subway 
lines.  There  is  no  reason  why  taxpayers  as  a  whole  should 
pay  for  all  subway  costs  when  specific  pieces  of  land  are 
trebled  and  quadrupled  in  value  by  the  subway.  These 
specially  benefited  pieces  of  land  should  be  stripped  of 
their  extra  unearned  increment  added  by  the  construction 
of  the  subway,  especially  since  the  extra  expense  involved 
in  building  subways  rather  than  elevated  railroads  is  in 
curred  chiefly  because  the  elevated  would  injure  land 
values  along  its  course.  At  present  82  per  cent  of  the 
cost  of  new  subways  is  added  to  the  burden  of  the  tax 
payer. 

John  H.  Delaney,  chairman  of  the  Board  of  Transporta 
tion,  originally  favored  special  assessments  to  aid  in  build 
ing  the  new  Eighth  Avenue  subway  but  the  pressure  of 
the  real  estate  interests  was  too  strong  for  him.  The  idea 
of  special  assessments  for  subway  construction  is  sound 
and  practical  if  properly  applied — just  as  sound  and  prac 
tical  as  the  special  assessment  for  park  and  road  construc 
tion.  It  was  heartily  endorsed  by  Mayor  Walker's  own 
committee  on  budget  and  finance  in  1928.  The  committee 
felt  "that  the  location  of  new  subway  lines  and  particu 
larly  the  location  of  stations  result  in  an  entirely  fortuitous 
gain  to  the  owners  of  certain  pieces  of  real  estate.  This 
gain  might  be  recovered  through  the  adoption  of  the  spe 
cial  assessment  method."* 

New  York's  first  subway,  started  in  1904,  might  have 
been  paid  for  entirely  out  of  special  assessments  upon 


244      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

benefited  land  without  any  injustice.  That  subway  which 
cost  $43,000,000  added  $80,000,000  in  value  in  seven 
years  to  one  section  of  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx  in  excess 
of  the  increase  which  was  considered  normal  in  the  city 
as  a  whole.  The  increases  in  the  value  of  land  adjoining 
other  subways  have  not  been  so  consistent,  but  they  have 
been  sufficient  to  underscore  the  need  of  special  assess 
ments.  Certainly  a  large  part  of  the  city's  investment  of 
$386,000,000  in  the  old  subways  could  have  been  cap 
tured  quite  painlessly  by  special  assessments. 

The  City  Affairs  Committee  made  a  study  of  the  in 
crease  in  land  values  along  the  new  Eighth  Avenue  sub 
way  from  1924,  when  it  was  first  announced,  to  1930,  two 
years  before  it  opened.  The  committee's  figures  for  the 
thirty  blocks  from  13th  Street  to  43d  Street  show  that  the 
two  adjoining  blocks  on  each  side  of  the  subway  rose 
$94,000,000  in  value  in  that  time,  an  increase  of  78  per 
cent.  The  general  rise  in  land  value  in  the  rest  of  Man 
hattan  was  64  per  cent  during  those  years.  It  is  very  con 
servative,  therefore,  to  say  that  the  subway  itself  added 
$17,000,000  (the  difference  between  78  per  cent  and  64 
per  cent)  in  excess  value  to  the  Eighth  Avenue  region 
between  13th  Street  and  43d  Street  from  1924  to  1930 — 
very  conservative  because,  while  this  method  of  calcula 
tion  is  not  accurate  in  itself,  the  subway  also  added  mil 
lions  in  value  to  the  blocks  west  of  Ninth  Avenue,  which 
we  are  not  including  in  the  total  increment.  The  subway 
between  13th  Street  and  43d  Street  cost  $21,000,000.  If 
$10,000,000  of  its  cost  had  been  paid  by  special  assess- 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  245 

ment,  the  owners  of  the  adjoining  land  would  still  have 
had  a  handsome  margin  of  excess  increment. 

It  is  not  too  late  to  apply  this  principle  even  now  to  the 
Eighth  Avenue  subway,  and  it  is  certainly  in  order  to 
apply  it  to  the  construction  of  all  new  subways.  We  be 
lieve  that  it  is  the  only  logical  way  to  save  the  five  cent 
fare  on  New  York  transit  lines.  The  objection  commonly 
made  to  special  assessments  for  subway  construction  is 
that  the  increase  in  value  due  to  such  construction  is 
impossible  to  calculate  in  advance,  the  factors  involved 
being  so  complex.  The  logical  way  to  avoid  this  difficulty 
would  be  to  adopt  an  adjustable  special  assessment  which 
can  be  increased  or  decreased  on  each  specific  piece  of 
land  according  to  its  rise  in  value. 

If,  for  example,  the  city  in  building  the  Eighth  Avenue 
subway  between  13th  Street  and  43d  Street,  had  decided 
to  assess  ten  millions  of  the  cost  on  neighboring  land,  it 
could  have  drawn  a  line  about  the  territory  it  considered 
specially  benefited  and  then  based  its  assessment  year  by 
year  on  the  assessed  value  of  1924.  Let  us  say  that  it  took 
$1,000,000  a  year  out  of  this  area.  Each  annual  levy 
would  be  based  on  the  rise  in  value  of  the  land  since  1924. 
All  land  which  had  failed  to  rise  since  1924  would  be 
exempt.  A  piece  which  rose  $10,000  in  1925  might  pay 
$100;  a  piece  which  rose  $20,000  might  pay  $250;  a  piece 
which  rose  $30,000  in  1925  and  went  back  $20,000  in  1926 
might  pay  $375  in  1925  and  $100  in  1926;  and  so  on. 
This  system  of  adjustable  special  assessments  is  applied 
now  to  the  Westchester  County  sewer  system.  It  avoids 


246      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

the  immense  difficulty  of  calculating  in  advance  the  pre 
cise  increment  that  the  subway  will  add  to  any  given  lot.7 

If  this  method  had  been  applied  roughly  to  New  York 
land  many  years  ago  there  would  be  no  difficulty  in  financ 
ing  subways  to-day.  In  the  last  twenty-five  years  two  sec 
tions  of  Manhattan,  the  financial  district  below  Fulton 
Street,  and  the  mid-town  section  around  the  Pennsylvania 
Station  and  the  Grand  Central  Terminal  have  increased  a 
billion  and  a  quarter  dollars  in  value.8  In  both  cases  the 
new  values  have  been  due  very  largely  to  good  subway 
facilities.  These  areas  have  paid  higher  taxes  because  of 
the  higher  values,  but  they  have  not  paid  their  fair  share 
for  subway  construction  in  view  of  the  immense  increase 
in  their  value. 

Next  to  a  special  assessment  on  land  near  subways  the 
most  logical  way  to  finance  new  traction  lines  would  be  a 
land  increment  tax.  The  city  could  consider  the  valuation 
of  each  piece  of  land  at  a  certain  date  as  the  base,  and  tax 
the  owner  two  per  cent  of  the  excess  value  above  that 
amount  each  year.  That  plan  (a  one  per  cent  increment 
tax)  was  recommended  in  1912  by  Mayor  Gaynor's  com 
mittee  on  taxation.  If  it  had  been  put  in  force  then  the 
yield  from  a  two  per  cent  tax  would  have  been  $58,000,- 
000  in  1928  and  $68,000,000  in  1929. 

Behind  these  suggestions  of  ours  for  subway  financing 
lies  a  philosophy  of  taxation  for  all  civic  improvements. 
We  believe  that  all  taxes  in  the  last  analysis  should  be 
based  upon  the  ability  of  the  taxpayer  to  pay — in  short 
upon  income,  but  that  the  income  which  is  unearned 


RACKETEERING  IN  LAND  247 

should  be  taken  by  the  government  first.  No  income  in 
capitalist  society  is  more  fundamentally  unearned  than 
the  income  from  city  land  values,  and  therefore  a  program 
of  increased  taxation  for  civic  improvements  should  begin 
with  those  values  and  end  with  the  public  ownership  of 
land.  One  way  to  bring  about  that  public  ownership 
would  be  to  appropriate  the  rental  value  of  land  apart 
from  its  improvements. 


14 
HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS 

THAT  the  richest  city  in  the  history  of  the  world  should 
have  some  of  the  world's  worst  slums  is  not  a  fact  that 
annoys  or  surprises  the  average  New  Yorker.  Gross  in 
equalities  in  housing  are  such  an  accepted  part  of  our  life 
that,  to  borrow  an  analogy  from  Bernard  Shaw,  we  be 
come  accustomed  to  them  as  we  become  immune  to  the 
taste  of  water  because  it  is  so  constantly  in  contact  with 
our  mucous  membranes  that  we  believe  it  has  no  taste. 
Most  men  who  live  in  New  York  do  not  stop  to  wonder 
why  some  men  live  in  palaces  and  some  in  hovels  because 
they  have  never  even  raised  the  deeper  question  why  some 
are  rich  and  some  are  poor. 

The  poor,  we  say,  are  entitled  to  as  good  water  as  the 
rich  even  if  they  cannot  afford  it,  as  good  public  school 
education,  and  as  good  fire  protection.  This  communistic 
attitude  toward  education,  water,  and  fire  protection  was 
not,  of  course,  an  innate  idea.  It  came  after  long  struggle 
and  agitation  and  the  usual  pronouncements  by  the  rich 
that  these  public  beneficences  would  undermine  the  ster 
ling  independence  and  initiative  of  the  poor. 

To-day  we  are  on  the  threshold  of  an  era  when  we  will 

248 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  249 

recognize  housing,  at  least  in  cities,  as  a  sociai  responsi 
bility  in  the  same  sense  that  education  is.  Hitherto  a 
man's  house  has  been  his  chief  symbol  of  social  success 
or  failure,  almost  as  individualistic  a  thing  in  his  economic 
life  as  food  and  clothes.  But  with  the  building  of  great 
cities  houses  have  become  less  and  less  individualistic.  The 
very  right  to  have  a  home  has  become  a  restricted  privi 
lege  instead  of  a  right.  A  man's  living  quarters  have  come 
to  depend  more  and  more  on  the  accidents  of  work  loca 
tion  and  the  density  of  surrounding  population. 

In  modern  megalopolis  the  very  men  who  make  the 
city,  who  clean  its  streets  and  shovel  its  coal  and  run  its 
subway  trains,  may  be  exiled  from  it  when  they  quit  work 
at  night.  To-day  in  New  York  the  average  worker  simply 
cannot  provide  a  decent  home  for  himself  on  the  average 
wage.  We  have  been  so  victimized  by  the  spirit  of  the 
real  estate  speculator  that  we  have  almost  forgotten  the 
logical  ideal  of  a  city  as  a  pleasant  place  for  common 
people  to  live  together. 

At  the  outset  of  this  discussion  of  housing  let  us  say 
frankly  that  we  see  no  satisfactory  solution  within  the 
limits  of  our  present  economic  system.  So  long  as  the 
distance  between  rich  and  poor  remains  what  it  is,  there 
will  be  palaces  on  some  Park  Avenue  and  slums  on  some 
East  Side.  It  would  require  a  complete  social  revolution 
to  establish  the  perfectly  sound  and  obvious  moral  prin 
ciple  that  in  a  sanely  organized  city  every  human  being 
willing  to  work  is  entitled  to  good  lodging.  And  it  would 
require  just  as  complete  a  social  revolution  to  effect  the 


250      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

planning  of  a  city  without  regard  to  the  private  profit  of 
land  owners. 

But  we  do  not  despair  of  moving  rapidly  in  the  direc 
tion  of  those  ideals  even  within  our  present  economic 
order.  And  in  the  process  we  shall  nurture  a  finer  genera 
tion  to  establish  a  nobler  order.  Housing  in  New  York 
has  become  a  sorry  tragedy  for  both  rich  and  poor  and 
so  at  last  New  York's  intelligentsia  are  beginning  to  talk 
about  it.  On  Park  Avenue  the  unpaid  and  unpayable 
mortgages  lie  as  thick  and  deep  as  the  Persian  rugs.  All 
over  the  city  the  architects  are  hungry  and  the  builders  are 
bankrupt  while  hundreds  of  thousands  of  building  trades 
workers  walk  the  streets.  All  this  in  a  city  which  needs 
cheap  apartments  badly. 

The  basic  difficulty  lies  in  providing  homes  for  the  low 
est  paid  third  of  the  population.  The  rich  and  the  middle 
class  can  always  find  lodging  that  is  adequate  even  if  too 
expensive. 

The  Committee  on  Plan  and  Survey  appointed  by 
Mayor  Walker  said  in  1927:  "A  third  of  the  city's  popu 
lation — over  two  million  people — live  under  unsatisfac 
tory  conditions,  many  under  distressing  conditions,  some 
under  disgraceful  conditions.  For  thousands  home  is  a 
mockery.  It  consists  of  two  or  three  small  rooms  of  which 
but  one  is  adequately  lighted — and  often  even  not  that 
one — and  none  of  which  is  adequately  ventilated;  rooms 
that  in  the  hot  summer  day  become  an  inferno  of  torture 
to  little  children,  the  sick,  and  the  weak. 

"For  the  persons  living  in  these  homes  there  is  little 


Reproduced  by  permission  of 
Rollin  Kirby  and  the  New  York  World-Telegram. 

GETTING  HIS  CUT 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  253 

privacy;  there  are  no  reticences;  they  must  share  the 
process  of  living  with  other  families;  they  must  use  a 
common  water  closet;  they  must  get  all  the  water  they 
use  from  a  common  faucet  in  the  public  hall;  the  fire  peril 
menaces  them  at  all  times.  .  .  . 

"This  is  the  state  of  two  million  people,  over  a  third 
of  the  city's  population,  viz.,  those  who  live  in  the  so- 
called  old-law  tenements  or  those  erected  before  the  tene 
ment  house  law  of  1901  worked  its  beneficent  changes." 

For  these  lower  two  million  of  New  York's  population 
this  tenement  house  law  destroyed  some  of  the  worst  inde 
cencies  of  the  old  slums  but  it  did  not  provide  good  houses 
for  workers  within  the  reach  of  their  incomes.  It  nomi 
nally  prevented  the  construction  of  interior  bedrooms,  it 
compelled  the  landlords  to  provide  a  toilet  for  every  fam 
ily,  and  it  reduced  the  building  coverage  on  each  lot  so 
that  tenements  could  no  longer  occupy  90  and  95  per  cent 
of  the  plot  on  which  they  stood.  But  of  course  it  was  put 
in  force  very  gently,  and  at  the  present  rate  of  demolition 
these  old-law  tenements  will  not  be  cleared  from  New 
York  for  134  years.  Louis  H.  Pink  of  the  State  Housing 
Board  points  out  that  from  1920  to  1925  the  old-law 
suites  decreased  only  2.8  per  cent  and  that  there  were  still 
566,000  of  them  in  the  city  in  1925. *  Years  ago  an  inves 
tigation  proved  that  the  infant  death  rate  and  the  tuber 
culosis  death  rate  in  rear  tenements  were  double  those  in 
regular  tenements  in  the  same  neighborhood,  but  there  are 
still  many  rear  tenements  in  New  York. 

When  the  tenement  house  laws  had  been  passed  the 


254      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

question  arose:  where  can  an  ordinary  worker  live  in  New 
York? 

The  average  industrial  worker  in  New  York  does  not 
receive  more  than  $30  a  week  in  good  times  and  the  aver 
age  family  requires  four  rooms  to  live  decently.  To  allow 
a  minimum  for  food,  clothing,  and  sickness  that  family 
should  never  spend  more  than  one  week's  income  for  one 
month's  rent,  which  means  a  maximum  of  $7.50  per  room 
per  month.  Where  is  such  housing  to  be  found  in  New 
York  to-day?  The  answer  is  that  it  is  not  to  be  found  at 
all  except  in  the  old-law  tenements  of  the  slums  where 
over  1,500,000  people  still  live.  The  New  York  working 
class  family  must  therefore  crowd  too  many  people  into 
each  room  or  spend  more  than  a  proportionate  share  of  its 
income  on  rent.  Usually  that  means  the  psychological  or 
physical  degeneration  of  the  family. 

The  obvious  answer  is  government  housing  at  cost — 
and  possibly  some  subsidization  of  housing  for  the  very 
lowest  of  the  income  groups.  The  chief  reason  for  the 
high  cost  of  housing  to-day,  aside  from  the  antiquated 
methods  of  production  which  we  shall  discuss  later,  is  the 
cost  of  credit.  When  a  private  builder  constructs  a  house 
he  must  pay  9,  10  and  11  per  cent  for  his  money,  and 
when  these  costs  are  passed  on  to  the  tenant  they  mean  a 
rental  too  high  for  the  average  worker.  The  government 
can  borrow  money  at  4  and  5  per  cent,  and  so  reduce  the 
cost  of  housing  at  least  $3  per  room  per  month.  To 
launch  a  government  housing  program,  therefore,  seems 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  255 

the  surest  way  to  provide  fit  housing  for  the  average 
worker. 

The  economic  reasons  for  such  a  program  in  New  York 
are  almost  self-evident.  Private  builders  have  failed  to 
provide  the  houses  that  the  workers  need  within  the  range 
of  the  workers'  income.  Almost  all  the  housing  in  New 
York  in  recent  years  has  been  built  to  rent  at  $15  a  room 
a  month  or  more.  When  presidents'  conferences  and 
building  congresses  meet  to  discuss  housing  they  conceal 
or  ignore  this  simple  fact  and  print  pictures  in  handsome 
booklets  of  model  tenements  renting  at  $5  and  $10  a  room 
a  month  more  than  the  workers  can  afford  to  pay. 

The  most  flagrant  ballyhoo  artist  in  the  field  of  housing 
was  Mayor  Walker.  His  heart  beat  more  noisily  for  the 
slum  dwellers  of  the  East  Side  than  for  any  other  part 
of  the  population.  He  made  enough  speeches  about  hous 
ing  at  election  time  to  float  a  balloon.  For  our  own  amuse 
ment  we  checked  up  the  headlines  that  Mayor  Walker 
received  on  his  imaginary  housing  program  in  the  New 
York  Times,  and  here  are  some  summaries,  mostly  in  the 
words  of  the  Times  Index,  of  the  first  two  years  of  his 
housing  headlines.  The  headlines  began  even  before  he 
was  mayor.  If  we  had  included  the  housing  headlines  of 
his  whole  administration  there  would  have  been  room  for 
nothing  else  in  this  chapter. 

October  27,  1925 — Walker  outlines  housing  program  for 
relief  legislation. 

November  19,  1925 — Walker  says  in  Miami  speech  he 


256      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

studied  development  there  as  aid  in  relieving  New  York 
City  congestion. 

December  11,  1925 — Walker  plans  to  have  commission 
he  appoints  for  survey  of  population  look  into  housing  con 
gestion  also. 

February  5,  1926 — League  of  Mothers  Clubs  of  United 
Neighborhood  Houses  urges  Walker  to  support  program  for 
better  housing  and  cheaper  rents. 

February  9,  1926 — Advisory  housing  commission  formed 
at  meeting  of  representatives  of  50  organizations,  in  response 
to  Walker's  suggestion. 

May  23,  1926 — Walker  pledges  aid  of  city  administration 
to  relieve  housing  shortage,  in  speech  at  opening  of  Sunny- 
side  Gardens. 

June  26,  1926 — Walker  appoints  August  Heckscher  spe 
cial  emissary  to  investigate  European  housing  and  recom 
mend  reconstruction  to  relieve  congestion  in  New  York  City. 

December  2,  1926 — Walker  invites  "old  east  siders"  to 
dinner  in  honor  of  August  Heckscher,  to  enlist  aid  for  re 
building  of  congested  areas  of  New  York  City. 

December  3,  1926 — Walker  appoints  August  Heckscher 
head  of  commission  to  plan  construction  of  model  tenements 
on  New  York  City's  east  side  at  dinner  at  Libby's  Hotel. 

December  5,  1926 — Walker  appoints  August  Heckscher 
chairman  of  Commission  to  start  work  of  rebuilding  East 
Side  with  model  homes. 

March  11,  1927 — Walker  introduces  bill  in  Estimate 
Board  for  20-year  tax  exemption  on  model  tenements  built 
by  limited  dividend  companies  organized  and  existing  under 
state  housing  law. 

May  27,  1927 — Board  of  Estimate  passes  Walker's  hous 
ing  bill  for  tax  exemption.  [This  was  the  one  achievement 
of  his  administration  in  this  field,  and  it  was  entirely  the 
result  of  the  efforts  of  others.] 

June  23,  1927 — Walker  signs  tax  exemption  housing  bill. 

July  8,  1927 — Walker  outlines  plan  for  city  to  take  land 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  257 

in  crowded  districts  by  condemnation  action  and  become 
partner  in  erection  of  model  houses;  conference  with  bankers, 
realtors  and  philanthropists. 

July  28,  1927 — Walker  will  introduce  resolution  into 
Board  of  Estimate  branch  of  municipal  assembly,  calling  for 
popular  referendum  on  amendment  to  city  charter  to  remove 
ill  barriers  to  his  condemnation  plan. 

July  29,  1927 — Board  of  Estimate  votes  favorably  on 
Walker's  resolution  and  proposes  local  law  introduced  by 
lim  to  aid  his  housing  plan. 

August  19,  1927 — Walker  radiophones  message  on  his 
Dill  and  tenement  study  in  Europe  from  London. 

August  23,  1927— Walker  talks  with  J.  V.  McKee  by 
radiophone  on  London  tenements. 

September  11,  1927 — Walker  inspects  Rome's  tenement 
district. 

Not  a  single  brick  was  laid  or  a  single  plan  for  a  house 
:ompleted  as  a  result  of  this  prodigious  volume  of  bally- 
100.  Seven  blocks  of  cleared  land  still  lie  sprawling  in 
:he  heart  of  the  East  Side  where  Walker  dreamed  about 
i  housing  development  at  Chrystie  and  Forsythe  Streets. 
The  city  has  had  the  title  to  this  land  for  years  and  the 
Walker  administration  could  have  developed  a  plan  for 
t  in  a  month. 

To  get  back  to  the  economics  of  housing,  a  room  which 
:ents  for  $12  a  month  when  built  by  a  private  speculative 
xiilder  can  rent  for  about  $9  a  month  when  built  by  a 
imited  dividend  corporation,  and  $7.50  to  $8.00  a  month 
vhen  built  by  the  city.  The  City  Affairs  Committee  took 
he  Brooklyn  Garden  Apartments  as  a  sample  in  1931  and 
produced  figures  to  show  just  how  such  apartments  could 


258      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

be  built  on  $3  land  (per  square  foot)  in  Brooklyn  and 
Queens  to  rent  for  $7.50  to  $8.00. 

The  reason  for  the  cheapness  of  public  housing,  of 
course,  is  the  cheapness  of  government  borrowing  plus 
the  exemption  from  taxation.  The  principle  of  tax  ex 
emption  is  not  new  since  it  was  the  basis  of  the  State 
Housing  Law  of  1926.  That  law  seems  to  us  now  a  most 
feeble  instrument  but  it  did  mark  a  great  forward  step 
in  public  opinion  concerning  housing.  It  allowed  housing 
corporations  which  limited  their  dividends  to  6  per  cent 
to  have  all  their  buildings  exempt  from  taxation  for 
twenty  years  if  they  built  houses  under  the  supervision  of 
the  State  Housing  Board  that  would  rent  for  a  maximum 
of  $12.50  a  room  a  month  in  Manhattan,  $11  in  Brooklyn 
and  the  Bronx,  $10  in  Queens  and  Richmond,  and  $9  else 
where  in  the  state.2 

The  theory  of  this  law  was  excellent  and  the  men  who 
sponsored  it  were  men  of  lofty  purpose,  but  the  benevo 
lent  capitalists  who  were  supposed  to  come  forward  with 
their  wealth  did  not  materialize  in  large  numbers.  All  the 
projects  coming  under  the  law  have  housed  only  about 
6,000  people  while  private  builders  in  the  same  period 
have  built  housing  for  at  least  600,000.  And  even  those 
projects  which  have  been  built  under  this  law  have  con 
sisted  largely  of  cooperative  projects  which  probably 
would  have  been  built  without  the  law  and  several  of 
which  were  planned  before  the  law  was  passed.  The  two 
splendid  housing  projects  of  the  City  Housing  Corpora 
tion  at  Sunnyside,  Long  Island,  and  Radburn,  New  Jersey, 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  259 

do  not  come  under  the  tax  exemption  law  because  they 
are  colonies  of  fairly  high-priced,  privately  owned  homes. 
The  beautiful  and  admirably  managed  cooperative  apart 
ments  of  the  Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers  in  the 
Bronx  and  on  Grand  Street  require  an  investment  of 
$2,000  for  each  four-room  apartment  before  the  tenant 
can  enjoy  the  $ll-a-room  rent.  This  investment  can  be 
paid  in  small  installments  but  it  stands  as  a  barrier  against 
the  workers  who  need  good  housing  most.  Probably  the 
best  example  of  limited-dividend  housing  which  does  not 
require  a  down  payment  by  the  tenant  is  the  Brooklyn 
Garden  Apartments  with  an  average  rental  of  $10.75  a 
room  a  month. 

Probably  we  must  look  to  Brooklyn  and  Queens  for  the 
model  housing  of  the  future,  for  there  good  land  can  still 
be  procured  for  less  than  $3  a  square  foot,  and  large 
enough  plots  are  available  to  develop  regional  projects. 
Slum  clearance  is  a  fine  phrase  to  toy  with  but  with  our 
present  condemnation  procedure  it  will  probably  come 
last  in  a  municipal  housing  program.  The  city  paid 
$16.50  a  square  foot  for  the  land  which  it  captured  on 
Chrystie  and  Forsythe  Streets  in  the  heart  of  the  East  Side 
after  Mayor  Walker  had  decided  that  a  housing  program 
would  be  a  good  campaign  diversion.  It  is  not  the  most 
suitable  land  for  a  model  housing  experiment  but  even 
here  apartments  could  be  built  by  the  city  to  rent  at  $9.50 
to  $10.00  a  room  a  month — and  still  pay  4  per  cent  on 
the  city's  investment. 

We  visualize  the  New  York  of  to-morrow  as  a  city 


260      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

with  relatively  few  private  homes.  The  notion  that  para 
dise  begins  with  personal  home  ownership  is  one  that  has 
been  drummed  into  Americans  for  so  long  by  presidents 
(bank  and  otherwise)  and  realtors  that  it  is  hard  to  dis 
lodge.  Nevertheless  for  the  average  American  industrial 
worker  home  ownership  is  a  chain  that  may  bind  him  to 
a  poor  job  or  no  job,  and  that  may  limit  his  right  to  fight 
against  unjust  conditions.  Moreover,  New  York  in  our 
time  is  not  likely  to  become  a  place  where  any  but  the 
upper  economic  third  of  the  people  can  afford  to  own 
individual  homes  with  open  land,  and  still  have  enough 
money  left  to  travel  to  work.  The  rich  will  continue  to 
crowd  out  the  poor  no  matter  how  valiantly  some  of  the 
technicians  of  the  Regional  Plan  work  for  a  better  spread 
of  the  population. 

It  seems  that  the  only  way  out  for  housing  is  the  con 
struction  by  public  funds  in  the  outlying  boroughs  of 
great  apartment  projects  surrounded  by  open  space.  The 
projects  could  be  self-supporting  so  that  the  money  for 
construction  could  come  either  from  the  Reconstruction 
Finance  Corporation  or  from  a  city  bond  issue.  The  tax 
payers  would  not  lose  a  cent  in  either  case.  The  tenants 
would  pay  the  bill  just  as  the  car-riders  pay  for  the 
Hudson  Tunnel.  Europe  has  demonstrated  that  such 
dreams  are  as  practical  as  public  schools.  Socialist  Vienna 
has  led  the  way. 

In  New  York  Socialists,  also,  have  been  pioneers  in  the 
fight  for  such  a  program.  Now  many  civic  groups  are 
taking  up  the  fight.  Recently  the  Public  Housing  Con- 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  261 

ference  and  the  City  Affairs  Committee  have  proposed 
a  plan  for  realizing  the  ideal  of  municipal  housing  with 
the  least  waste  motion.  They  proposed  a  city  department 
of  housing  for  local  responsibility  and  a  constitutional 
amendment  to  give  the  city  power  to  go  into  the  housing 
business.  They  frankly  recognize  that  housing  must  be  a 
public  utility  if  the  average  worker  of  New  York  is  to 
have  a  decent  apartment  within  the  reach  of  his  income. 
The  plan  will  be  fought  by  the  realty  interests  and  dis 
torted  by  the  politicians,  but  it  is  bound  to  be  tried  some 
day  because  there  is  no  other  way  out  of  the  housing 
muddle. 

Along  with  the  revolution  in  housing  finance  there  is 
likely  to  come  a  revolution  in  housing  construction,  and 
perhaps  the  latter  will  in  the  end  be  the  more  important 
factor  in  bringing  down  prices.  The  building  industry  is 
to-day  almost  the  only  great  industry  that  has  not  adopted 
mass  production  methods.  Perhaps  the  New  York  of  the 
future  will  be  made  up  almost  entirely  of  buildings  that 
have  standard  wall  panels,  and  standard  ceiling  strips,  and 
standard  everything  else,  all  made  on  moving  belts  in 
great  factories. 

H.  G.  Wells  with  his  uncannily  prophetic  imagination 
said  thirty  years  ago:  "I  find  it  incredible  that  there  will 
not  be  a  sweeping  revolution  in  the  methods  of  building 
during  the  next  century.  The  erection  of  a  house  wall, 
come  to  think  of  it,  is  an  astonishingly  tedious  and  com 
plex  business;  the  final  result  exceedingly  unsatisfactory. 
.  .  .  Everything  in  this  was  hand  work,  the  laying  of 


262      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

bricks,  the  dabbling  of  the  plaster,  the  smoothing  of  the 
paper;  it  is  a  house  built  of  hands — and  some  I  saw  were 
bleeding  hands — just  as  in  the  days  of  the  pyramids,  when 
the  only  engines  were  living  men.  .  .  .  Better  walls  than 
this  and  less  life-wasting  ways  of  making  them  are  surely 
possible."  3 

If  better  walls  are  to  be  built  into  better  homes  it  will 
be  necessary  to  have  better  regional  planning  as  New 
York's  population  grows.  Thus  far  the  city  has  not  lacked 
planners  but  they  have  been,  for  the  most  part,  private 
realtors  disguised  as  civic  leaders.  The  Russell  Sage  Foun 
dation  tried  to  supplant  the  hit-and-miss  planning  of  these 
private  realtors  with  a  comprehensive  survey  and  plan 
of  the  whole  New  York  region  including  ten  million  peo 
ple,  5,528  square  miles,  and  436  local  government  authori 
ties.  The  12  volumes  of  the  Regional  Survey  and  Plan 
of  New  York  and  its  Environs  constitute  an  impressive 
piece  of  work  in  almost  every  field  except  housing.  Here 
the  regional  planners  were  cautious  and  noncommittal, 
regretting  the  slums  but  shying  away  from  a  public  hous 
ing  program.  They  propose,  however,  one  useful  reform 
which  the  cities  of  Europe,  particularly  Berlin,  have  found 
of  immense  value,  the  giving  of  the  right  to  the  city  gov 
ernment  to  buy  outlying  land  for  future  development. 
Such  a  right  would  make  possible  the  planning  of  decen 
tralized  public  housing  developments  in  the  suburbs  as 
part  of  a  gigantic  regional  plan. 

As  we  approach  the  third  bitter  winter  of  unemploy 
ment  the  plea  for  a  great  public  housing  program  comes 


HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS  263 

with  treble  force.  Some  day  the  rotting  old-law  tenements 
of  New  York  must  be  cleared  away  and  new  housing 
built.  Why  not  now?  A  housing  program  that  would  give 
new  apartments  to  one  million  of  New  York's  two  million 
unsatisfactorily  housed  inhabitants  would  give  work  to 
30,000  in  the  building  trades  for  five  years.  What  more 
intelligent  way  could  be  thought  of  to  fight  the  depression 
with  constructive  relief? 


15 

THE  CONSUMER  PAYS 

THE  average  New  Yorker  is  almost  wholly  dependent 
for  daily  comfort  on  several  great  corporations  which 
have  monopolies  or  near  monopolies  of  the  things  that  he 
must  have.  He  must  have  milk,  and  the  chances  are  nine 
to  one  that  he  will  buy  from  one  of  the  two  great  dairy 
firms  of  Borden's  or  Sheffield's.  He  must  have  electric 
light  and  gas,  and  in  both  cases  he  is  likely  to  buy  them 
from  one  great  holding  concern,  the  Consolidated  Gas 
Co.  He  must  have  a  telephone,  and  again  he  has  no 
choice.  His  bill  must  be  paid  to  the  New  York  Telephone 
Co.,  which  is  owned  in  entirety  by  the  American  Tele 
phone  &  Telegraph  Company.  If  he  is  an  ordinary  man 
he  must  ride  in  a  subway  or  an  elevated  train,  and  con 
tribute  to  one  central  consolidated  monopoly  of  the 
B.  M.  T.  and  the  Interborough.  He  must  have  water  and 
mail,  but  here  the  private  profit  and  the  private  monopoly 
have  been  destroyed  and  he  shares  in  two  of  the  safest 
and  fastest  distributive  systems  in  the  world  without  the 
annoyance  of  any  scandals  about  inflated  values. 

New  Yorkers  pay  a  price  of  untold  millions  to  the 
great  private  monopolies  every  year — an  excessive  price 
because  these  monopolies  use  their  power  to  defeat  effec- 

264 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  265 

tive  regulation.  Theoretically  the  law  protects  the  con 
sumer  completely.  The  State  Public  Service  Commission 
is  supposed  to  regulate  all  telephones,  gas  and  electric 
light  companies;  the  State  Transit  Commission  is  ordered 
to  do  likewise  in  the  field  of  subways  and  surface  cars. 
In  practice  the  public  is  in  a  state  of  continuous  defeat 
because  the  private  utilities  have  enough  money  and 
power  to  thwart  the  agencies  of  control. 

The  biggest  dragon  of  all  in  the  utility  field  is  the  Con 
solidated  Gas  Company,  which  owns  the  New  York  Edi 
son,  the  Brooklyn  Edison,  the  New  York  and  Queens 
Electric  Light  and  the  United  Electric  Light  and  Power 
corporations.  It  also  owns  most  of  the  gas  companies 
of  New  York  City  and  is  so  wealthy  that  it  can  afford 
to  fight  for  years  in  the  courts  against  any  order  to  reduce 
its  rates.  It  is  so  extensive  and  powerful  that  the  expert 
who  testifies  against  it  rests  under  a  cloud  in  the  pursuit 
of  his  professional  career.  (The  utility  interests  are  fond 
of  saying  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  power  trust,  and 
in  the  national  field  there  is  some  plausibility  in  their 
claim,  but  New  York  has  a  power  trust  in  both  name  and 
fact.)  To-day  in  the  middle  of  the  depression  when  the 
prices  of  every  other  commodity  on  the  market  have  gone 
down,  gas  prices  and  electric  rates  are  only  a  little  below 
the  1920  level. 

The  City  Affairs  Committee  in  a  brief  filed  with  the 
Public  Service  Commission  early  in  1932  showed  how 
ridiculous  the  electrice  rate  schedule  was  in  the  face  of 
falling  costs.  Since  1920  the  cost  of  almost  everything 


266      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

that  the  electric  companies  buy  has  been  reduced.  Coal, 
copper  and  labor  have  come  down.  The  operating  ex 
penses  of  generation  per  kilowatt  hour  dropped,  from 
1920  to  1930,  58  per  cent  for  the  New  York  Edison, 
71  per  cent  for  the  Brooklyn  Edison,  and  50  per  cent 
for  the  United  Electric  Light  and  Power.  The  lower  costs 
of  operation  for  the  New  York,  Brooklyn,  and  Queens 
companies  since  1920  have  resulted  in  a  saving  of 
$13,389,000.  Of  course  there  was  a  most  substantial  fur 
ther  decline  in  prices  during  1931  and  1932. 

When  companies  save  so  much  money  at  the  expense 
of  the  consumer,  it  is  natural  that  they  should  pay  large 
dividends.  Dividends  have  increased  as  operating  econo 
mies  have  been  realized.  Even  during  the  depression,  the 
New  York  Edison,  the  United  Electric  Light  and  Power 
and  the  New  York  and  Queens  Electric  paid  12  per  cent 
for  both  1930  and  1931.  The  Brooklyn  Edison  continued 
its  usual  8  per  cent  dividend,  which  seems  innocent 
enough  in  itself  but  is  not  so  innocent  when  we  note  that 
it  tucked  away  many  unnecessary  millions  in  its  surplus. 

Being  a  holding  company  Consolidated  Gas  is  able  to 
use  certain  familiar  little  tricks  to  step  up  its  profits.  For 
example,  it  sells  money  to  its  subsidiaries  at  a  much 
higher  price  than  it  must  pay,  and  pockets  the  difference. 
This  result  is  accomplished  by  selling  its  own  preferred 
stock  to  the  public  to  yield  5^  per  cent  and  passing  the 
money  on  to  subsidiaries  for  common  stock  which  pays 
the  Consolidated  12  per  cent.  The  differential  of  6y2  per 
cent  goes  to  the  Consolidated  stockholders  and  costs  the 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  267 

consumers  of  New  York  $3,900,000  a  year.  This  capital 
could  just  as  well  be  obtained  directly  from  the  public 
by  the  New  York  Edison  Company,  for  example,  at  5^ 
per  cent  and  so  eliminate  the  extra  profit  to  the  Consoli 
dated.  Or  the  Consolidated  itself  could  raise  this  money 
by  selling  preferred  stock  at  5^  per  cent  and  passing  on 
the  money  so  raised  to  its  subsidiaries  without  a  huge 
brokerage  fee. 

A  holding  company  should  be  a  mechanical  conven 
ience  and  a  genuine  aid  to  economical  management.  In 
the  case  of  the  Consolidated  the  device  has  been  used  for 
parasitism. 

The  Consolidated  reduced  its  rates  in  1931  with  a  great 
fanfare  of  trumpets,  announcing  a  voluntary  cut  of 
$6,000,000.  Upon  examination  the  gift  horse  appeared 
not  so  attractive  as  advance  notices  indicated.  Even  after 
the  reduction,  about  50  per  cent  of  New  York  residential 
users  paid  more  for  their  electricity  than  they  did  in  the 
boom  year  of  1928.  The  new  rates  put  a  disproportion 
ate  burden  upon  the  poorest  users,  taxing  every  customer 
a  one  dollar  monthly  minimum.  These  rates  in  New  York 
are  still  inexcusably  high.  In  Ontario  under  public  owner 
ship  of  the  electric  industry  the  customer's  minimum 
charge  is  33  cents.  For  100  kilowatt  hours  a  month  a 
New  Yorker  pays  $5.55  while  residents  of  Toronto,  even 
after  a  10  per  cent  allowance  is  made  for  the  taxation  of 
a  public  plant,  pay  $1.73.  Let  the  comparative  figures  for 
small  and  large  users  in  various  American  and  Canadian 
cities  speak  for  themselves: 


268      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

COMPARATIVE  MONTHLY  BILLS 

40kwh.     100  kwh.  250  kwh.  500  kwh. 

New  York  City 2.55           5.55           13.05  25.55 

Toronto  (adjusted  10%  to 

allow  for  taxes)    .....    1.13           1.73             3.23  5.73 

Jamestown,  N.  Y 1.40           3.25             6.63  12.25 

Los  Angeles,  Calif 1.92           3.42             6.82  11.82 

Seattle,  Wash 2.20           3.40             6.30  8.80 

Washington,  D.  C 1.88           4.70           11.75  23.50 

(Jamestown,  Los  Angeles  and  Seattle  have  publicly  owned 
plants.) 

Whether  rates  are  reckoned  comparatively  or  by  cost 
analyses  we  pay  too  much  for  electricity  in  New  York 
City.  We  pay  approximately  $19,000,000  a  year  more 
than  we  need  to  in  order  to  give  the  electric  companies 
a  fair  return  for  their  capital.  That  means  an  average 
excess  charge  of  $12  a  year  for  every  domestic  consumer 
in  New  York. 

If  we  judge  New  York's  electric  rates  by  the  standards 
of  public  ownership  rather  than  the  standards  of  conven 
tional  investment  the  overcharge  is  $17  a  year  for  each  of 
the  1,600,000  domestic  consumers  of  New  York  City.  A 
publicly  owned  and  operated  electric  industry  would  not 
need  to  pay  more  than  4  per  cent  interest  to  attract  capi 
tal  in  normal  times,  and  this  reduced  interest  rate  would 
save  New  York  consumers  $26,500,000  a  year. 

Under  the  present  electric  rate  schedule  the  small  light 
users  partially  subsidize  the  large  power  users.  The  argu 
ment  was  formerly  made  that  these  residential  users 
should  bear  the  chief  burden  because  they  were  respon 
sible  for  the  peak  load  (the  largest  amount  of  electricity 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  269 

needed  at  any  one  time)  and  this  peak  load  forced  the 
companies  to  spend  many  millions  for  equipment  adequate 
to  meet  it.  That  argument  does  not  hold  to-day.  The  big 
industrial  users  are  responsible  for  the  peak  load  that 
demands  great  equipment  and  yet  they  are  still  favored  in 
the  rates.  The  residential  consumers  with  their  steady 
demand  are  the  backbone  of  the  trade,  but  they  are  still 
discriminated  against.  It  has  been  charged  that  the  small 
retail  consumer  who  pays  the  maximum  rates  is  actually 
paying  the  entire  cost  of  producing  and  distributing  New 
York's  electrical  energy  and  that  if  the  system  were  run 
on  a  non-profit  basis,  the  current  used  by  the  big  power 
consumers  could  be  given  away.1 

Gas  consumers  are  in  the  same  plight  as  electricity  con 
sumers.  The  Brooklyn  Union  Gas  Co.,  which  serves  680,000 
domestic  consumers,  has  actually  increased  its  rates  for 
small  users  in  the  middle  of  the  depression  (August, 
1931).  It  is  paying  steadily  10  per  cent  dividends  on  a 
stock  capitalization  that  is  forty  per  cent  water. 

Whenever  the  state  Public  Service  Commission  under 
takes  to  reduce  electric,  gas,  or  telephone  rates,  the  Con 
solidated  Gas  or  the  New  York  Telephone  Co.  takes  its 
case  to  the  courts,  presents  an  array  of  experts  to  support 
its  claims,  and  appeals  and  appeals  and  appeals  from  all 
adverse  decisions.  In  March,  1932,  the  commission  prac 
tically  admitted  in  accepting  the  new  electric  rate  schedule 
that  it  did  so  because  of  the  hopelessness  and  expense  of 
fighting  the  Consolidated.  When  the  commission  grap 
pled  with  the  New  York  Telephone  Co.  in  the  last  great 


270      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

rate  case  62,864  pages  of  testimony  were  taken  with 
4,323  exhibits  in  the  first  ten  years. 

The  telephone  monopoly  is  one  of  the  most  respectable 
and  efficient  of  our  utilities.  It  spends  enormous  sums 
in  good-will  advertising  in  the  newspapers  and  magazines. 
While  its  head,  Walter  S.  Gifford,  was  chairman  of  the 
President's  Relief  Organization  it  was  revealed  that  the 
New  York  Telephone  Co.  (owned  entirely  by  the  Ameri 
can  Telephone  and  Telegraph  Co.)  had  given  $233,000 
to  charitable  causes  in  three  years  and  charged  it  to  operat 
ing  expenses,  which  means  that  the  consumer  would  ulti 
mately  be  asked  to  pay  it.  The  company  did  not  take 
cheerfully  the  suggestion  of  one  stockholder  that  all  chari 
table  contributions  should  be  taken  from  the  company's 
surplus,  and  when  the  Public  Service  Commission's  chair 
man  asked  it  to  do  so  the  company  refused.  It  took  the 
case  to  the  courts  where  it  is  still  in  litigation. 

At  the  present  moment  the  telephone  monopoly  is  mak 
ing  itself  extremely  unpopular  by  assessing  all  users  of 
hand-set  telephones  an  extra  charge  of  twenty-five  cents  a 
month  in  perpetuity.  In  Washington,  Baltimore  and  Vir 
ginia  other  branches  of  the  American  Telephone  &  Tele 
graph  Co.  allow  their  customers  to  pay  $4  cash  or  $4.50 
in  twenty-five  cent  monthly  installments  for  a  hand-set 
telephone,  and  then  all  extra  charge  is  discontinued.  The 
difference  between  the  New  York  and  Washington 
methods  of  charging  means  an  extra  payment  of  $8,540,- 
000  in  the  next  five  years  by  New  York's  813,000  users 
of  hand-set  phones.  Even  if  the  company's  own  figures 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  271 

of  the  extra  cost  of  the  new  hand-sets  were  accepted,  the 
cost  of  interest  and  amortization  would  be  only  3  cents 
a  month.  The  telephone  monopoly  is  skimming  almost 
$2,000,000  worth  of  extra  cream  each  year  from  New 
York  consumers  by  its  hand-set  rates.8 

When  the  telephone  company  is  faced  with  facts  like 
these  it  falls  back  for  defense  upon  the  conservative  rul 
ings  of  the  courts.  It  maintains  that  the  courts  have  given 
it  the  legal  right  to  receive  a  fair  return  upon  its  capital. 
What  is  a  fair  return  and  what  is  capital?  The  answers 
to  those  questions  are  so  divergent  that  a  corps  of  lawyers 
and  experts  can  quarrel  over  them  ad  infinitum — for  a 
good  price.  The  common-sense  answer  seems  to  be  that 
investors  in  a  protected  public  monopoly  even  under  the 
ethics  of  capitalism  should  never  be  paid  more  than  a  fair 
dividend  on  prudent  investment.  The  courts,  however, 
have  taken  a  "larger  view"  and  have  permitted  the  com 
panies  to  reckon  the  reproduction  cost  of  their  present 
equipment  as  an  important  factor  in  setting  rates.  Here 
a  whole  world  of  guesses  and  hopes  enters  into  the  cal 
culation  of  value. 

The  New  York  Telephone  Co.  in  1926  asked  for  an 
8  per  cent  return  on  an  intra-state  valuation  of  615  mil 
lions.3  According  to  the  New  York  Public  Service  Com 
mission  that  was  an  overvaluation  of  about  250  millions. 
The  rates  asked  by  the  company  were  24  millions  a  year 
higher  than  those  suggested  by  the  public  body.  The  New 
York  Telephone  Co.  went  to  the  most  ludicrous  extremes 
in  padding  its  valuation  figures.  Its  own  engineers  had 


272      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

estimated  its  fair  value  at  160  millions  above  the  figure 
of  the  Public  Service  Commission,  but  it  was  not  satisfied. 
It  hired  another  group  of  utility  engineers  from  Stone  and 
Webster  who  shoved  the  valuation  up  106  millions  more. 
The  difference  in  telephone  rates  based  on  these  two  esti 
mates  would  be  $7,400,000  a  year  for  the  telephone  cus 
tomers  of  New  York  State.  And  the  cost  of  all  this  statis 
tical  juggling,  which  in  the  case  of  these  two  sets  of 
experts  was  one  million  dollars,  and  which  in  the  case  of 
the  whole  rate  fight  of  the  telephone  company  totaled 
over  six  millions,  was  added  to  the  costs  of  operation  and 
must  in  the  long  run  be  paid  by  the  consumer. 

The  telephone  company  denies  that  it  ever  has  tried  to 
get  a  penny  on  watered  stock  or  inflated  estimates.  The 
Public  Service  Commission  is  relatively  helpless  to  protect 
the  consumers  in  such  a  situation  because  neither  the 
Republican  nor  the  Democratic  Party  is  willing  to  support 
an  aggressive  fight  on  the  utilities,  and  because  the  com 
panies  can  always  appeal  any  adverse  ruling  to  a  reac 
tionary  court.  Moreover  the  Public  Service  Commission  is 
undermanned  and  undersupplied  with  money  so  that  it 
cannot,  even  if  it  would,  take  an  aggressive  attitude 
toward  the  utilities.  Some  of  its  members,  notably  George 
R.  Van  Namee,  who  was  political  manager  for  Alfred  E. 
Smith,  have  taken  an  aggressive  attitude  in  defense  of  the 
utilities  on  almost  every  possible  occasion.  Chairman 
Milo  Maltbie  and  George  R.  Lunn,  the  fairly  progressive 
members  of  the  commission,  often  find  themselves  out 
voted. 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  273 

A  similar  situation  in  more  acute  form  exists  in  the  reg 
ulation  of  transit  lines.  The  city  has  had  to  fight  through 
every  court  in  our  judicial  hierarchy  to  maintain  a  per 
fectly  obvious  provision  in  our  subway  contracts  for  the 
five-cent  fare.  Having  defeated  reactionary  judges  the  city 
must  now  engage  in  another  long  struggle  to  recapture  its 
subway  lines  at  a  fair  price  from  traction  interests  that 
have  the  support  of  a  conservative  regulatory  body,  the 
State  Transit  Commission.  (The  Board  of  Transportation 
appointed  by  the  mayor  builds  subways ;  the  Transit  Com 
mission  appointed  by  the  governor  regulates  them.) 

The  moral  of  all  these  painful  struggles  is  that  when  a 
city  surrenders  its  public  utilities  to  private  monopoly,  its 
troubles  begin.  The  city  and  state  had  sense  enough  when 
the  Holland  Vehicular  Tunnel  and  the  George  Washing 
ton  Bridge  were  built  to  make  them  public  enterprises 
under  the  Port  Authority,  so  that  profiteering  at  the  ex 
pense  of  taxpayers  was  avoided.  Would  that  our  prede 
cessors  had  had  as  much  sense  when  they  started  the 
subways ! 

The  city  after  building  nearly  all  the  subways  and  part 
of  the  elevated  lines  was  foolish  enough  to  turn  over  its 
original  system  to  several  great  corporations  which  are 
now  united  in  one  combination  under  the  chairmanship  of 
the  B.  M.  T.  head,  Gerhard  M.  Dahl.  The  city  put 
$386,000,000  into  the  old  systems  while  the  traction  inter 
ests  put  in  $325,000,000.  In  order  to  raise  the  $325,000,- 
000  from  private  sources  (the  city  was  too  close  to  the 
legal  debt  limit  then  to  borrow  all  the  money  itself) 


274      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Mayor  Gaynor  signed  the  famous  dual  contracts  in  1913 
which  turned  over  the  transit  system  to  the  predecessors 
of  the  present  B.  M.  T.  and  Interborough  on  terms  highly 
favorable  to  the  companies.  The  companies  and  the  city 
were  supposed  to  get  8.7  per  cent  on  their  investment  but 
in  practice  the  profits  went  to  the  companies. 

They  had  prior  claim  to  the  interest  on  all  investments 
in  the  system  except  $2,650,000  annual  interest  on  the  in 
vestment  made  by  the  city  in  the  first  subway.  Aside  from 
this  interest  the  city  never  received  a  nickel  on  its  invest 
ment  until  in  1929  the  Interborough  began  paying  inter 
est.  The  B.  M.  T.  has  never  paid  the  city  a  cent  on  its 
investment  and  it  is  likely  that  the  Interborough,  having 
gone  into  the  hands  of  a  receiver,  will  soon  stop  all  inter 
est  payments  except  the  obligatory  $2,650,000  a  year.  The 
system  is  $223,000,000  behind  in  its  schedule  of  payments 
due  to  the  city  but  only  $5,000,000  behind  in  its  payments 
to  the  private  owners. 

What  a  partnership !  The  city  pays  for  more  than  half 
of  the  subways,  gives  the  companies  prior  claim  to  almost 
all  payments,  takes  almost  nothing  in  return  for  its  invest 
ment,  and  then  is  fought  year  by  year  in  the  courts  by 
company  lawyers  whose  huge  bills  are  charged  to  operat 
ing  expenses.  The  only  thing  that  has  made  the  situation 
tolerable  is  this,  that  New  Yorkers  can  ride  27  miles  for 
a  nickel  in  the  subway  system — if  they  are  not  smothered 
or  crushed  by  their  fellow  strap-hangers  before  the  end  of 
the  journey. 

We  are  paying  the  price  now  for  the  bad  bargaining 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  275 

of  Mayor  Gaynor.  He  did  not  even  force  the  companies 
to  contract  for  an  intelligent  plan  of  recapture  by  the  city. 
It  is  true  that  the  city  can  buy  back  most  of  the  subway 
system  by  serving  notice  on  the  companies  of  its  intention 
to  recapture  and  by  paying  them  their  total  investment 
plus  15  per  cent  minus  an  agreed  annual  deduction.  But 
this  right  of  recapture  is  not  inclusive  of  any  one  major 
system  of  subways.  In  Manhattan  the  city  can  recapture 
either  the  East  Side  subway  or  the  West  Side,  but  not  both 
— at  least  not  until  1963.  It  cannot  recapture  the  elevated 
lines  at  all  for  they  have  long-term  franchises. 

The  incompleteness  of  the  right  of  recapture  gives  the 
companies  the  chance  to  make  an  expensive  nuisance  of 
themselves  by  refusing  to  give  up  the  non-recapturable 
parts  of  the  system  unless  the  city  pays  a  handsome  price 
for  the  whole.  The  city  does  not  want  an  octopus  with 
some  of  its  most  useful  legs  cut  off,  especially  since  in  this 
case  some  of  the  legs  might  come  to  life  independently. 

Now,  at  last,  the  need  of  unifying  all  the  transit  lines 
in  the  city  has  become  acute  because  the  new  municipally 
owned  Eighth  Avenue  line  must  be  coordinated  with  the 
existing  lines.  There  are  three  major  problems  involved: 
how  much  shall  the  private  investors  in  the  B.  M.  T.  and 
Interborough  get  for  their  stock,  how  much  fare  shall  the 
passengers  pay,  and  who  shall  run  the  unified  system.  We 
believe  that  if  the  situation  is  properly  handled  by  the  city 
the  whole  system  can  be  unified  under  city  operation  with 
out  disturbing  the  five-cent  fare.  Thus  far  the  city,  the 
State  Transit  Commission,  and  the  companies  have  been 


276      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

jockeying  for  position.  Walker  was  obviously  favorable 
to  unification  under  the  B.  M.  T.  but  he  dared  not  aban 
don  the  five-cent  fare  voluntarily  because  of  the  tremen 
dous  loss  in  votes  it  would  entail. 

Also  he  had  to  reckon  with  Samuel  Untermyer.  Unter- 
myer,  however  reactionary  his  political  connections  may 
be,  has  been  a  terror  to  the  B.  M.  T.  and  to  the  adminis 
tration  officials  who  are  friendly  to  the  B.  M.  T.  Chair 
man  John  H.  Delaney  of  the  Board  of  Transportation  is 
afraid  of  Untermyer 's  scorching  vocabulary  and  great  per 
sonal  prestige.  "The  line-up  of  Mr.  Delaney  and  the 
B.  M.  T.,"  says  Mr.  Untermyer,  "is  just  another  Equitable 
Bus  experience  on  a  vastly  bigger  scale." 

The  B.  M.  T.  will  not  say  exactly  how  much  it  expects 
for  its  lines  but  at  one  time  it  was  holding  out  for  more 
than  $500,000,000.  Untermyer  sought  to  compromise 
with  the  company  by  suggesting  $489,000,000,  although 
he  admitted  that  the  estimate  was  many  millions  too  high. 
The  company  refused  to  negotiate  on  this  basis  and  finally, 
in  December,  1931,  the  Transit  Commission  by  a  vote  of 
2  to  1  offered  a  plan  that  set  a  net  price  of  $474,500,000.* 
Nobody  has  accepted  the  plan  yet.  Untermyer  declared 
that  the  commission  price  was  really  more  than  $500,000,- 
000  when  all  the  company's  obligations  were  reckoned  in, 
and  he  denounced  the  figure  as  fifty  to  seventy-five  mil 
lions  too  high. 

It  is  easy  to  demonstrate  that  this  $474,500,000  price  is 
too  high,  although  the  traction  companies  are  still  pre 
tending  that  it  is  too  low.  The  City  Affairs  Committee 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  277 

made  a  study  in  March,  1931,  which  set  $420,000,000 
as  a  fair  price.  Since  then  the  decline  in  stock  prices  and 
in  the  number  of  passengers  makes  $400,000,000  an 
ample  price. 

At  the  moment  that  the  Transit  Commission  presented 
its  plan  to  the  public  it  proposed  to  pay  the  traction  com 
bine  $150,000,000  more  than  the  market  value  of  the 
stock.  The  proposal  meant  a  payment  of  $80  a  share  for 
B.  M.  T.  stock  which  in  August,  1932,  was  selling  for 
$25,  of  $100  for  B.  M.  T.  preferred  which  was  selling 
for  $61,  and  of  $50  for  Interborough  stock  which  was 
selling  at  $7.B  Some  of  the  most  ludicrous  exaggerations 
of  value  crept  into  the  estimate.  The  inventory  included 
773  wooden  cars  a  generation  old  at  $7,998  each,  although 
these  cars  probably  cost  about  $9,500  originally,  and  some 
of  them  have  recently  been  sold  for  $100  to  $350.  For 
almost  obsolete  elevated  lines,  some  of  which  are  actually 
losing  money,  the  traction  combine  was  to  receive 
$70,000,000  more  than  cost  less  depreciation.  This  was  a 
high  price  even  if  the  elevated  lines  had  had  a  bright 
future. 

Fortunately  the  recent  scandals  involving  Walker,  the 
Equitable  Coach  Co.  and  the  B.  M.  T.  have  frightened 
some  of  the  Tammany  officials  and  there  is  hope  of  an 
agreement  on  unification  at  a  fair  price.  Speaking  bluntly, 
neither  the  Transit  Commission  nor  the  Board  of  Trans 
portation  as  now  constituted  can  be  trusted  to  drive  a  fair 
bargain  for  the  city  except  through  fear  of  a  scandal  if 
they  do  not.  The  one  good  official  that  the  public  has  had 


278      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

to  watch  its  interests  in  traction  affairs,  Charles  C.  Lock- 
wood  of  the  Transit  Commission,  has  resigned  to  accept 
a  Supreme  Court  judgeship,  sardonically  enough  as  a  part 
of  the  notorious  judicial  deal  for  12  judges  engineered  by 
the  Democratic  and  Republican  bosses.  Lockwood  made 
a  brave  fight  against  the  domination  of  the  Transit  Com 
mission  by  the  B.  M.  T.  but  was  uniformly  outvoted  by 
his  conservative  colleagues  William  G.  Fullen  and  Leon 
Godley. 

In  resigning  Lockwood  wrote  a  stinging  attack  upon  his 
colleagues'  attempt  to  pay  the  B.  M.  T.  half  a  billion 
dollars  for  its  interests.  He  said  that  the  company  had 
already  spent  at  least  a  million  dollars  for  lawyers  and 
engineers  to  puff  up  its  value  for  bargaining  purposes. 
"The  prices  and  values  of  these  properties,"  he  said, 
"seem  to  have  gone  higher  and  higher  since  1929,  while 
the  prices  and  values  of  about  everything  else  in  the  world 
have  gone  lower  and  lower."  He  estimated  that  under  the 
plan  which  Delaney  and  the  conservative  transit  commis 
sioners  were  trying  to  jam  through,  the  city  would  pay 
$37,000,000  each  to  the  Interborough  and  B.  M.  T.  in 
excess  of  the  estimates  of  original  and  reproduction  cost 
by  the  commission's  own  engineers.6 

The  hope  of  getting  municipal  operation  of  a  unified 
subway  system  grows.  Mr.  Delaney  has  already  indicated 
a  partial  surrender  on  that  point.  The  revelation  of  Mr. 
Dahl's  $675,000  bonus  and  salary  in  four  years  has  indi 
cated  to  the  public  where  its  money  goes  under  private 
operation — 13,500,000  passengers  could  ride  on  that  sum. 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  279 

The  new  arrangements  for  the  municipal  operation  of  the 
Eighth  Avenue  subway  are  excellent,  with  experienced 
engineers  in  charge  at  reasonable  salaries,  with  higher 
wages  for  the  workers,  and  with  the  abolition  of  the 
seven-day  week.  It  is  not  likely  that  Tammany  will  dare 
to  risk  a  traction  disaster  by  putting  inexperienced  favor 
ites  in  responsible  positions.  Whatever  petty  favoritism 
may  exist  it  will  be  trivial  compared  to  the  parasitic 
manipulations  that  have  occurred  and  occur  under  B.  M.  T. 
control. 

Meanwhile  the  transit  battle  of  the  century  will  not  be 
finished  until  it  is  decided  whether  we  shall  continue  the 
five-cent  fare.7  The  struggle  boils  down  to  this:  if  all  the 
costs  of  construction  are  taken  into  account,  the  New 
York  passenger  who  pays  a  five-cent  fare  does  not  pay 
for  his  ride.  About  three  cents  comes  out  of  the  taxpayer. 
We  believe  that  this  sharing  of  subway  costs  by  the  tax 
payer  is  perfectly  just  because  the  subways  have  added 
billions  of  dollars  of  value  to  New  York  land,  but  in  time 
of  depression  the  question  rises  whether  the  taxpayer 
should  still  bear  this  burden,  especially  since  a  $50,000,- 
000  annual  outlay  is  involved  in  paying  for  the  new 
Eighth  Avenue  subway  in  a  hurry.  Mr.  Delaney  wants  to 
pay  for  the  new  subway  quickly  because  it  is  much  cheaper 
to  pay  for  it  that  way.  It  saves  many  millions  in  interest 
rates  that  the  city  would  otherwise  have  to  pay  on  long- 
term  loans.  The  real  estate  interests  are  fighting  the 
Delaney  plan  bitterly  because  it  means  higher  taxes  now. 
If  they  win,  taxes  will  be  reduced  and  we  will  have  the 


280      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

seven-cent  fare.  If  Mr.  Delaney  wins,  taxes  will  stay  high 
for  a  few  more  years,  but  the  five-cent  fare  may  continue 
forever. 

We  believe  that  the  Delaney  plan  is  far  sounder  than 
the  plan  of  the  real  estate  interests.  These  interests  are 
always  willing  to  skim  for  themselves  the  heavy  cream 
that  comes  from  rising  land  prices  but  when  those  land 
prices  begin  to  fall,  they  seek  to  push  the  burden  of  sub 
way  maintenance  onto  the  strap-hanger.  They  fought  and 
defeated  the  plan  to  pay  for  the  subways  by  special  assess 
ments  on  neighboring  land,  which  plan  would  have  saved 
the  city  from  its  present  financial  embarrassment. 

From  the  strap-hangers'  point  of  view  the  elevated 
trains  are  approximately  as  good  as  subways,  but  the  tran 
sit  system  has  been  submerged  at  tremendous  expense  to 
the  city  so  that  it  would  not  ruin  the  value  of  adjoining 
property.  The  strap-hanger  has  a  right  to  insist  that  a  large 
part  of  this  added  cost  should  come  from  such  adjoining 
property. 

For  thousands  of  working  people  in  New  York,  espe 
cially  in  time  of  unemployment,  a  difference  of  three 
cents  in  transit  fare  is  a  serious  problem.  Often  it  is  the 
difference  between  walking  and  riding.  The  life  of  the 
working  people  has  been  built  on  the  stable  fact  of  the 
five-cent  fare.  If  the  real  estate  interests  have  their  way 
the  extra  three  cents  paid  by  a  passenger  will  go  to 
bankers  and  bondholders  for  increased  interest  on  city 
loans  in  order  to  relieve  the  present  generation  of  tax 
payers. 


THE  CONSUMER  PAYS  281 

Putting  it  mathematically,  the  real  estate  interests  would 
have  us  borrow  money  for  the  subways  on  fifty-year  bonds 
which  means  that  for  each  dollar  we  get  we  must  pay 
$2.53  in  interest  and  amortization.  Mr.  Delaney  wishes 
to  pay  for  the  subways  in  four-year  bonds  so  that  for  each 
dollar  we  spend  we  must  pay  $1.111  in  interest  and  amor 
tization.  The  difference  in  interest  is  the  difference  be 
tween  11  per  cent  and  153  per  cent.  Mr.  Delaney's  scheme 
is  cheaper  in  the  long  run  while  the  business  men's  scheme 
will  be  $38,000,000  a  year  cheaper  in  the  next  few  years. 
If  the  Delaney  plan  is  abandoned  in  favor  of  fifty-year 
bonds  the  five-cent  fare  must  be  abandoned  too  because 
the  State  Legislature  has  decreed  that  the  New  York  sub 
way  system  must  be  self-supporting  and  it  could  not  be 
self-supporting  if  we  paid  $2.53  for  each  dollar  of  sub 
way  construction. 

All  of  which  reinforces  what  we  said  under  the  head  of 
the  land  racket.  If  the  city  had  levied  special  assess 
ments  against  adjacent  land  originally,  the  subways  would 
never  have  been  a  financial  nightmare,  and  the  gentlemen 
who  ride  to  work  in  limousines  would  not  now  be  attack 
ing  the  five-cent  fare  as  uneconomical. 


16 
THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY 

OVER  and  over  during  this  recital  of  the  facts  that  are 
known  about  New  York's  government — to  say  nothing  of 
the  facts  that  are  suspected — the  reader  must  have  been 
tempted  to  cry:  Why  has  New  York  loved  Tammany  so 
long  and  so  well?  Why  did  a  whole  city  take  to  its  heart 
a  playboy  mayor  so  completely  that  he  won  an  overwhelm 
ing  victory  at  the  polls  in  1929  in  spite  of  the  vigorous 
and  well-grounded  attacks  of  his  Republican  and  Socialist 
opponents? 

Whatever  our  final  answer  to  these  questions,  neither 
authors  nor  readers  have  any  right  to  formulate  it  until  we 
have  specifically  considered  some  aspects  of  New  York 
City's  life  to  which  we  have  referred  thus  far  only  in 
passing. 

New  York  City,  physically,  is  a  monument  to  the  might 
of  a  machine  age  and  to  the  crimes  of  capitalism.  Artists 
and  architects  may  quarrel  over  the  New  York  sky  line, 
city  planners  may  well  deplore  the  folly  of  concentrating 
so  great  a  population  on  the  tip  end  of  a  narrow  island, 
but  to  the  average  layman  that  sky  line  is  an  outward  and 
visible  sign  of  the  power  and  glory  of  human  achievement. 
Neither  height  nor  depth  has  deterred  Man  the  Builder. 
He  has  bored  under  great  rivers  on  which  can  float  the 

282 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          283 

commerce  of  the  world;  he  has  spanned  them  with  bridges. 
The  traveler  by  rail  enters  the  city  through  splendid  tem 
ples  such  as  the  ancients  built  for  the  worship  of  the  gods. 
And  yet  if  he  arrives  at  the  Pennsylvania  station  by  night, 
he  has  to  pick  his  way  out  of  some  of  its  underground 
exits  past  sleeping  men  who  have  nowhere  to  lay  their 
heads  except  upon  concrete  steps.  These  men  are  workers, 
some  of  them  perchance  the  very  workers  who  have  built 
the  towers  which  lift  the  traveler's  eye  up  to  the  night 
and  its  stars.  This  is  what  the  richest  city  in  the  world 
has  done  to  its  most  useful  human  beings. 

In  the  dreary,  man-made  deserts  of  most  of  residential 
New  York  men  live  not  from  love  of  noise  and  dirt  and 
ugliness  but  from  necessity.  That  necessity  is  not  the  work, 
primarily,  of  New  York  City's  government  or  of  Tam 
many  Hall.  It  is  born  of  the  capitalist  system  which  turns 
over  land  to  the  landlords  and  great  industries  to  the  profit 
takers.  The  sins  of  Tammany  are  dwarfed  when  com 
pared  to  the  monumental  injustice  of  that  system  with  its 
palaces  and  slums. 

One  despairs  of  giving  halfway  accurate  figures  on 
wealth  and  poverty  in  New  York  in  the  depression  of 
1932.  A  conservative  estimate  of  the  number  of  unem 
ployed,  based  on  figures  of  factory  employment  and  the 
data  of  the  Welfare  Council,  is  one  million.  That  is  one- 
third  of  all  those  gainfully  employed.  The  needle  trades 
which  are  centered  in  New  York  are  almost  idle;  build 
ing  is  at  a  virtual  standstill.  Even  the  luxury  of  great 
Babylon  is  less  apparent  than  a  few  short  years  ago.  But 


284      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Fifth  and  Park  Avenues  still  flaunt  an  opulence  that  one 
would  not  think  could  exist  less  than  half  an  hour  away 
from  the  poverty  of  Harlem  and  the  rookeries  of  Sullivan 
Street  and  Avenue  C. 

We  shall,  however,  go  back  to  the  last  year  of  the 
golden  epoch  of  vaunted  prosperity — 1929.  In  that  year, 
according  to  the  State  Department  of  Labor,  the  average 
wage  paid  to  men  in  city  factories  was  $36.86  weekly.  If 
men  worked  52  weeks  a  year  that  would  mean  an  annual 
wage  of  $1,917.  But  New  York  work,  especially  in  the 
needle  trades,  is  highly  seasonal.  It  is  conservative  to  say 
that  for  such  workers  a  forty-two-week  year  is  a  good  aver 
age.  That  brings  the  annual  average  income  to  $1,547  for 
factory  workers.  Below  them  are  day  laborers  and  semi- 
casual  workers.  The  estimate  of  the  Housing  Commission 
in  1926  was  that  one-third  of  the  families  in  New  York 
had  incomes  less  than  $1,500  annually. 

The  lowest  official  estimate  in  1926  for  the  cost  of 
living  was  that  made  by  the  National  Industrial  Confer 
ence  Board,  the  employers'  organization.  It  was  $1,752 
for  a  family  of  four  supported  by  an  industrial  worker; 
$1,907  for  a  family  of  five.  Compare  these  figures  with 
the  figures  of  income!  Nor  is  this  all.  The  Conference 
Board  figure,  checked  by  figures  of  social  workers,  and  by 
the  actual  budget  studies  of  the  Heller  Committee  for 
Research  and  Social  Economics  in  San  Francisco,  was  far 
below  a  decent  standard  on  rent,  medical  care,  recreation 
and  savings.  A  truer  estimate  of  a  standard  which  would 
allow  for  health,  decency  and  a  high  school  education  for 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          285 

the  children  would,  in  1929,  have  fixed  a  level  of  $2,700 
for  a  family  of  four — $1,200  above  the  average  income  of 
factory  workers. 

Since  1929  the  average  weekly  wage  has  dropped  ap 
proximately  17  per  cent  for  those  still  working.  Living 
costs  have  declined  17  Y2  per  cent.  But  it  is  notorious  that 
the  chief  burden  of  relief  has  fallen  on  the  poor;  that  it 
is  the  generosity  of  the  poor  to  the  poorer  far  more  than 
any  organized  charity  or  public  relief  which  has  averted 
wholesale  starvation.  That  unknown  factor  of  sharing 
which  has  saved  life  has  terribly  reduced  the  standard  of 
living.  The  gains  of  a  decade  in  housing  have  been  lost 
by  the  enforced  doubling  up  of  families.  Such  in  dry  sta 
tistical  terms  is  the  situation  for  workers  in  New  York. 
It  means  that  men  grope  in  garbage  cans  for  extra  food; 
that  babies  swelter  and  die  in  the  summer  heat  of  the 
slum. 

It  is  hard  to  explain  why  New  York  labor  has  been  so 
docile  in  the  face  of  these  conditions  and  why  it  has  been 
so  much  less  effective  in  party  organization  than  European 
labor.  In  England  the  working  class  grew  in  political 
experience  after  1832,  while  an  aristocracy,  which  had 
seen  the  democratic  handwriting  on  the  wall,  gave  the 
government  a  leadership  that  was  competent  even  though 
selfish.  Few  labor  leaders  were  drawn  out  of  their  class 
because  there  were  few  prizes  they  could  win  in  an  upper 
class.  In  America  the  prizes  have  been  more  abundant  and 
the  desertions  to  the  army  of  upper-class  and  lower-class 
racketeering  more  common.  There  has  been  no  disinter- 


286      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

ested  group  to  give  us  clean  or  efficient  government,  and 
no  homogeneous  base  for  our  democracy. 

Our  pioneer  psychology  and  our  scores  of  national 
groups  have  complicated  the  situation  in  New  York. 
Millions  of  immigrants  have  taken  New  York  only  as  a 
place  to  pass  through.  Others  have  seen  their  village 
habits  and  customs  break  up  with  such  bewildering  speed 
that  the  second  generation  has  little  in  common  with  the 
first.  Unfortunately  the  forces  present  in  New  York  life 
have  not  made  for  labor  solidarity.  Peasant  groups  have 
come  from  many  nations  without  labor  background.  By 
the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century  New  York  had  become 
one  of  the  largest  Irish,  Italian,  German,  and  Greek  cities 
in  the  world.  The  religions  and  the  languages  were  bases 
of  division.  The  tug  of  American  bourgeois  psychology 
(what  Hoover  would  call  "individualism")  was  against 
labor  political  solidarity. 

We  record  these  facts  merely  to  show  the  difficulties  in 
building  a  politically-conscious  labor  movement  in  New 
York,  not  to  blame  the  sins  of  Tammany  upon  our  for 
eign  population.  Native-born  Americans  can  play  as  dirty 
politics  as  any  immigrant  group  that  ever  came  to  New 
York.  Philadelphia,  one  of  the  most  corrupt  and  ill-gov 
erned  of  American  cities,  has  always  had  a  comparatively 
low  per  cent  of  foreign  born. 

For  the  owning  class  New  York  City  is  still  not  only  the 
economic  but  the  social  capital,  seat  of  the  enormous  con 
centration  of  wealth  in  Wall  Street  and  of  fashion  on 
Fifth  and  Park  Avenues.  In  1929  New  York  with  five 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          287 

per  cent  of  the  population  had  26  per  cent  of  the  mil 
lionaires.  In  that  same  year  an  inquiry  which  one  of  the 
authors  of  this  book  undertook  to  get  some  idea  of  the 
upper  range  of  rents — the  lower  he  knew — elicited  from 
a  woman  realtor  the  information  that  a  "ducky  apartment" 
could  be  had  for  $75,000.  It  is  fair  to  say  that  $40,000 
pent  houses  and  $20,000  apartments  under  the  roof  were 
more  usual.  To-day,  while  200,000  New  Yorkers  are  liv 
ing  on  a  relief  allowance  of  about  five  cents  a  meal,  the 
restaurants  and  night  clubs  of  the  rich  ask  enough  for  a 
meal  to  maintain  a  starving  family  for  a  week. 

During  the  golden  age  of  Calvin  Coolidge  the  Park 
Avenue  Association  did  some  boasting  which  Stuart  Chase 
put  into  an  illuminating  picture  of  how  the  upper  half 
lives — or  perhaps  we  should  say  the  upper  fortieth.  Along 
the  avenue,  it  appeared,  lived  3,000  to  4,000  millionaires 
whose  money  was  in  many  cases  earned  for  them  by  coffee- 
growers  in  Brazil,  cattle  men  in  Nevada,  and  miners  in 
Africa.  They  spent  perhaps  $280,000,000  a  year.  The 
average  family  income  was  over  $100,000  a  year,  enough 
to  keep  a  worker's  family  alive  on  its  average  wage  for 
66  years.  One  Park  Avenue  apartment  boasted  sixty  mil 
lionaires  under  a  single  roof. 

How  Thorstein  Veblen  would  have  relished  these  illus 
trations  for  a  new  chapter  on  Conspicuous  Waste!  Park 
Avenue  found  that  it  was  extremely  difficult  to  furnish  an 
apartment  at  all  adequately  for  less  than  $100,000.  Stuart 
Chase  tells  of  a  single  bathroom  in  jade  and  gold  costing 
$35,000. 


288      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 


A  TALE  OF  TWO  DINNERS 


HOTEL  PIERRE 

NEW  YORK 

DINER 
Monday,  Sept.  19,  1932 

HORS  D'OEUVRE 
Imported  Caviar  $2.50 

POTAGES 
Green  Turtle  .70 

ROTIS  (to  order) 
Long  Island  Duckling  5.00 

LEGUMES 

New  Peas  .80 

Broccoli  .80 

SALADES 

Calavo  Alligator  Pear  (i/2)      .65 

ENTREMETS 

Stewed  Fresh  Peaches 


.50 


Hotel  Pierre  Special  Coffee 
with  Cream 

Total 


New  York  City's  Official  Food 
Budget  for  a  Family  of  Five 
for  One  Week. 

Milk— 7  bottles  "B"  $  .77 
15  cans  Evaporated    1.00 

Bread — 13  loaves  .91 

Oatmeal— 1  box  .08 

Cornmeal — 2  Ibs.  .10 

Macaroni— 1  Ib.  .08 

Brown  Rice — box  .15 
Wheatsworth  Cereal — box       .13 

Flour— 31/2  lbs-  -10 

Potatoes — 17  lbs.  .25 

Cabbage— small  .10 

Onions — 2  lbs.  .12 

Turnips— iy2  lbs.  .10 

Carrots — 1  Ib.  .05 

Dried  Lima  Beans — 1  Ib.  .10 

Green  Split  Peas — i/2  Ib.  .04 

Tomatoes — 2  cans  .17 

Kidney  Beans — 2  lbs.  .16 

Prunes — 1  Ib.  .05 

Apples— 3  lbs.  .10 

Oranges — 7  .14 

Stewing  Lamb — 2  lbs.  .26 

Cheese— 1/2  Ib.  .11 

Eggs — 1  doz.  .25 

Salmon — 1  can  .12 

Butter — 1  Ib.  .29 

Lard— 2  lbs.  .16 

Salt  Pork— 1/2  Ib.  .05 

Sugar— 5  lbs.  .23 

Coffee— 1  Ib.  .19 

Molasses — 1  can  .14 

Cocoa — 1  box  .10 

Salt— 1  sack  .05 

Matches — 1  box  .04 

Soap — 3  bars  .10 

Scouring  Soap  .06 

Total  $6.85 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          289 

And  how  Park  Avenue  adorned  itself  in  those  golden 
days!  Four  thousand  daughters  of  the  rich  spent  annually 
$21,000  apiece  on  clothes.  Enraptured  with  the  music  of 
the  opera  they  invaded  the  boxes  at  the  Metropolitan, 
exposing  their  expensive  backs.  Outside  of  the  opera  door 
hungry  men  stood  watching.  They  still  stand  watching. 

The  Park  Avenue  Social  Review  advertised  a  sable  coat 
for  $70,000 — absolutely  in  the  mode!  The  gracious  leaders 
of  the  charity  set  appeared  at  Beaux  Arts  balls  in  golden- 
leaved  dresses,  all  for  the  benefit  of  the  poor.  Mrs.  So 
and  So  gave  a  benefit  performance  on  her  Long  Island 
estate  for  vacations  for  the  poor  little  children  of  the  East 
Side.  Mrs.  Graham  Fair  Vanderbilt  spent  a  fortune  in  one 
night  and  displayed  to  her  delighted  guests  the  entire  cast 
of  Earl  Carroll's  Vanities.  It  was  estimated  that  a  good 
coming-out  party  for  a  debutante  of  the  social  register 
cost  at  least  $20,000.  Mrs.  Paul  Dubonnet,  social  arbiter, 
gave  an  interview  to  the  Los  Angeles  Times. 

"On  a  $10,000  a  year  clothes  budget  a  woman  can  easily 
be  nicely  dressed  if  she  buys  no  furs  or  jewels,"  Mrs. 
Dubonnet  said.  "It  costs  a  tremendous  amount  of  money 
to  be  among  the  best-dressed  women  in  the  world.  Most 
of  these  women  spend  at  least  $60,000  a  year.  ...  A 
decent  sable  wrap  costs  $50,000,  and  you  simply  can't  get 
a  mink  coat  that  you  would  wear  under  $12,000." 

It  is  in  this  accepted  contrast  of  wealth  and  poverty 
that  the  real  crimes  and  tragedies  of  New  York  are  rooted. 
What  is  most  wrong  with  New  York  is  capitalism  near  the 
end  of  its  epoch,  not  Tammany  Hall.  Indeed  Tammany 


290      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Hall  can  only  be  understood  as  one  of  the  tools  of  capital 
ism  in  dealing  with  masses  of  workers  who  must  be  man 
aged  because  they  have  votes  and  who  might  use  them  to 
claim  real  power  if  they  were  aroused  by  a  sound  politi 
cal  movement  of  their  own. 

Previous  chapters  have  described  the  nature  of  the  polit 
ical  machine,  the  sort  of  favors  it  renders  and  the  basis  of 
its  appeal  to  masses  to  whom  it  offers  some  sense  of  pro 
tection  and  human  power  in  the  cruel  jungle  we  call  civi 
lization.  The  condition  of  this  appeal  to  the  masses  is,  of 
course,  that  they  should  not  effectively  take  economic 
power  into  their  own  hands.  If  Tammany  is  to  be  what 
former  Ambassador  Gerard  told  the  Harvard  Club  it  was, 
a  bulwark  against  municipal  socialism,  it  must  keep  alive 
the  illusion  of  friendship  for  the  people  and,  at  the  sam< 
time,  cultivate  among  the  workers  an  acceptance  of  the 
inevitability  of  capitalism  and  its  ethics.  It  must  temper 
the  poverty  of  the  city  masses  with  bread  and  circuses  and 
opiates. 

Tammany  does  not  so  much  rob  the  rich  to  give  to  the 
poor  as  rob  both  rich  and  poor.  Yet  from  another  angle 
it  can  hardly  be  said  to  rob  the  rich  at  all.  It  exacts  only 
a  moderate  commission  for  keeping  the  masses  quiet  ai 
confirming  landlords,  bankers,  public  utility  owners  an< 
the  whole  House  of  Have  in  their  favored  position.  That 
is  why  our  repectable  classes  are  so  cautious  and  fearful 
in  their  attacks  on  Tammany.  That  is  why  we  do  not  know 
of  a  single  powerful  millionaire  in  New  York  to-day  who 
is  fighting  Tammany  aggressively. 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          291 

Tammany's  methods  simply  reflect  the  prevailing  busi 
ness  ethics.  The  rule  of  capitalist  business  is  to  capture 
as  much  unearned  wealth  as  possible  regardless  of  social 
welfare.  In  politics  that  may  be  called  graft  but  in  busi 
ness  it  is  called  the  reward  of  sagacity.  Wall  Street  has 
charged  the  people  of  New  York  far  more  than  Tammany 
for  its  sagacity.  Nothing  that  Judge  Seabury  has  uncov 
ered  matches  in  the  way  of  arrogant  corruption  the  South 
American  loans,  the  oil  scandals,  or  the  amazing  case  of 
Kreuger  and  Toll.  No  tin  boxes  have  produced  such  magic 
fortunes  as  the  bonus  Bethlehem  Steel  gave  to  its  presi 
dent,  without  knowledge  of  workers  or  stockholders.  The 
flaunting  luxury  of  New  York  comes  not  from  political 
extortion  but  from  the  legalized  extortion  of  a  profit  sys 
tem  that  gives  huge  rewards  to  absentee  owners  and  suc 
cessful  manipulators  regardless  of  their  service.  The  poli 
ticians  are  weak  imitations  of  the  business  men.  The 
estimable  folk  who  want  to  keep  high  standards  of  public 
service  in  city  government  without  touching  the  basic  eco 
nomic  wrongs  of  our  time  expect  the  unreasonable.  An 
electorate  genuinely  aware  of  the  evil  of  all  unearned 
wealth  would  strike  at  Wall  Street  long  before  it  reached 
Jimmy  Walker. 

So  general  is  the  poison  of  the  racketeering  standard 
in  our  civilization  that  it  is  hard  to  say  how  much  cynicism 
or  consciousness  of  ill-doing  is  possessed  by  the  individual 
politician,  business  man,  lawyer  or  gangster.  Mayor 
Walker,  Sheriff  Farley,  Magistrate  Silbermann,  Al  Capone, 
and  Harry  Sinclair,  when  some  measure  of  justice  over- 


292      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

took  them,  were  probably  sincere  in  thinking  themselves 
abused.  Doubtless  they  felt  that  they  had  done  what 
everybody  else  would  do  in  like  circumstances.  It  is  on 
the  whole  a  cause  for  some  hope  that  there  is  as  much 
of  a  standard  as  there  is  of  "public  office  as  public  trust." 
That  standard  has  been  sorely  battered  by  the  impact  upon 
urban  democracy  of  those  who  want  for  themselves  things 
that  belong  to  society.  Many  a  landlord  seeking  tax  reduc 
tion  and  many  a  public  utility  magnate  seeking  a  franchise 
has  bribed  the  government  whose  venality  he  outwardly 
deplores.  Then  he  has  told  the  world  that  corruption 
would  make  socialism  unworkable! 

It  is  clear  enough,  on  this  view,  that  the  remedy  for 
New  York's  ills  in  government  as  for  the  deeper  ills  of 
mankind  in  these  years  of  crisis  is  a  change  in  system. 
Social  revolution  is  the  ultimate  social  reform,  not  neces 
sarily  a  revolution  of  violence  but  a  thorough  reconstruc 
tion  of  the  control  of  our  lives.  City  government  under 
capitalism  can  be  improved  but  it  cannot  be  wholly  re 
leased  from  that  exploiting  class  which  uses  it  as  a  tool. 
Of  course  no  city  under  our  scheme  of  things  can  change 
a  social  order  by  itself.  We  need  an  international  move 
ment  for  that. 

What  municipal  socialism  can  do  in  New  York  we  shall 
suggest  more  fully  in  our  final  chapter.  Here  we  would 
point  out  the  impotence  of  the  conventional  good  govern 
ment  movement  to  capture  the  imagination  of  the  elector 
ate  or  reach  its  deep-seated  ills.  We  need  a  greater  vision 
and  a  practicable  plan  to  make  exploited  workers  see  that 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          293 

they  can  win  for  themselves  infinitely  more  than  any 
friendly  district  leader  can  give  them. 

We  shall  be  better  able  to  consider  the  task  and  possi 
bilities  of  municipal  socialism  in  this  city  of  riches  and 
poverty  if  we  examine  briefly  two  aspects  of  Tammany's 
relation  to  the  working  masses  which  conclusively  show 
how  it  uses  its  power  to  divert  their  attention  from  funda 
mental  issues. 

First,  let  us  discuss  Tammany  and  organized  labor. 
New  York  city  workers  are  better  organized  than  in  most 
American  cities.  The  building  and  printing  and  needle 
trades  are,  or  were  up  to  the  depression,  sufficiently  organ 
ized  to  exert  a  high  degree  of  power  over  hours,  wages 
and  working  conditions.  The  story  of  the  rise  of  the 
needle  trade  workers  by  organization  out  of  their  most 
wretched  sweat-shop  condition  is  one  of  the  most  heroic 
chapters  in  American  history.  Also  that  story  is  an  illus 
tration  of  the  limitations  of  labor  unionism  in  so  capital 
istic  an  environment  as  ours  where  the  contagion  of  the 
racketeering  spirit  spreads  to  all  sections  of  society. 

Our  concern,  however,  is  with  the  relation  of  Tammany 
and  its  city  government  to  the  workers,  organized  and 
unorganized.  In  a  word,  these  relations  are  eminently 
"practical."  Tammany  in  cosmopolitan  New  York  in 
order  to  survive  has  had  to  acquire  a  capacity  for  racial 
and  national  tolerance  and  inclusiveness.  It  has  always 
had  to  be  at  the  farthest  pole  from  snobbishness  or  the 
high-hat  manner.  Its  voting  strength  is  among  the  masses. 
Hence  Tammany  and  Tammany's  government  have  been  a 


294      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

little  quicker  than  some  other  political  machines  to  yield 
well  before  the  breaking  point  on  certain  measures  of 
social  amelioration.  Tammany  has  seen  the  wisdom  of 
having  a  "liberal"  labor  policy  which  has  become  more 
liberal  in  proportion  to  Socialist  pressure. 

In  public  work  Tammany's  government  has  been  less 
tight-minded  and  sadistic  than  the  government  in  some 
coal,  steel  and  textile  regions.  It  has  been  wise  enough 
not  to  get  an  anti-labor  reputation,  but  always  hard-boiled 
in  suppressing  "the  radicals."  The  strutting  Grover 
Whalen  was  not  led  to  resign  as  police  commissioner  be 
cause  of  his  stupid  and  brutal  handling  of  strikes  and 
Communist  demonstrations,  but  because  he  crowded 
Jimmy  Walker  from  the  spotlight.  His  successor,  Com 
missioner  Mulrooney,  has  done  a  better  job  because  he  is 
a  "practical  cop,"  not  because  of  any  theories  on  civil 
liberties  or  the  rights  of  labor.  Every  great  strike  in  New 
York  sees  plenty  of  jailing  of  peaceful  pickets.  Workers, 
accordingly,  do  not  trust  for  protection  to  the  justice  of 
their  cause  but  to  the  influence  they  can  get  by  "practical" 
means.  Tammany  is  always  ready  for  business,  ready  to 
grant  justice  from  the  police  for  political  support.  The 
justice  is  needed  by  radicals  and  conservatives  alike  and 
there  are  many  ways  of  paying  for  it.  Arnold  Rothstein, 
according  to  indications,  was  probably  a  "fixer"  with 
police  and  magistrates  in  the  Communist-led  fur  and 
cloak  makers'  strikes  of  several  years  ago. 

Tammany's  great  tie,  however,  is  not  with  the  workers 
as  workers  but  with  a  certain  type  of  labor  leader.  So 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          295 

far  has  this  tie-up  gone  that  we  have  heard  a  prominent 
labor  man  declare  privately  in  a  burst  of  candor  that  "the 
Central  Trades  and  Labor  Council  (dominated  by  these 
labor  leaders)  was  Tammany  first  and  labor  afterwards." 
This  council  scarcely  makes  a  pretense  of  nonpartisanship 
in  its  endorsements.  A  Tammany  candidate  would  have 
to  be  caught  red-handed  in  blacklisting  labor  not  to  be 
endorsed.  Joseph  P.  Ryan,  president  of  the  Central  Trades 
and  Labor  Council,  has  been  Mayor  Walker's  stanchest 
defender.  He  was  one  of  the  only  two  citizens  who  ap 
proved  the  salary  grab  which  raised  the  pay  of  members 
of  the  Board  of  Estimate  after  the  depression  began.  He 
publicly  advised  the  mayor  to  ignore  the  socialist  recom 
mendations  for  unemployment  relief  in  1930.  For  this  it 
is  said  that  Mr.  Ryan  has  had  his  reward  in  certain  valu 
able  extra-legal  privileges.  Some  of  his  predecessors  and 
associates  have  got  jobs.  Ex-Sheriff  Farley  got  his  start 
as  business  agent  of  the  Cement  and  Concrete  Workers 
Union.  J.  P.  Holland  was  called  from  the  presidency  of 
the  State  Federation  to  a  well-paid  post  on  the  malodorous 
Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals.  Leadership  in  the  typo 
graphical  union  helped  John  H.  Delaney's  rise  to  the 
chairmanship  of  the  Board  of  Transportation  where  his 
real  ability  and  industry  are  subordinated  to  orders  from 
the  Hall.  Other  leaders  get  less  conspicuous  favors. 

What  the  workers  got  and  get  is  something  very  differ 
ent.  In  1926  Mayor  Walker  used  both  force  and  mislead 
ing  promises  to  help  break  the  exceedingly  well  justified 
strike  of  the  subway  workers  on  the  Interborough.  Then 


296      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

he  approved  a  bill,  or  rather  agreed  to  forego  claims 
against  the  company  on  behalf  of  the  city,  which  included 
$1,600,000  spent  for  strike  breaking  and  anti-union 
activities. 

All  through  his  administration,  as  through  Hylan's,  the 
city  avoided  paying  the  prevailing  rate  of  wages  required 
by  law  to  carpenters,  painters  and  others  on  jobs  done 
for  the  city  under  contract.  It  continued  the  vicious 
padrone  system  of  hiring  help  in  public  schools  and  the 
exploitation  of  firemen  in  city  schools  who  work  10  and 
12  hours  a  day.  It  lifted  not  one  finger  to  help  the  25,000 
subway  and  bus  employees  who  work  seven  days  a  week 
on  jobs  over  which  the  city  has  at  least  some  indirect  con 
trol.  No  provision  against  such  work  on  the  new  8th 
Avenue  subway  or  on  the  bus  routes  was  made  or  even 
suggested  by  Tammany  or  by  the  labor  leaders  themselves 
until  Socialists  and  the  City  Affairs  Committee  had  made 
it  an  issue  before  the  Board  of  Estimate.  Meanwhile 
"fixers"  waxed  fat  on  labor  cases  in  magistrates'  courts. 

Tammany's  record  on  unemployment  is  equally  "prac 
tical."  The  richest  city  in  the  world  has  made  a  pitiful 
showing  on  unemployment  relief.  This  we  say  without 
denying  that  in  a  national  emergency  like  ours  the  federal 
government  with  its  power  of  credit  and  currency  and  its 
power  to  tax  incomes  and  inheritances  over  the  entire 
country  has  a  responsibility  for  providing  means  for  un 
employment  relief  greater  than  the  city's.  The  city  is 
handicapped  by  limitations  on  its  power  to  tax.  But  this 
should  not  free  the  city  government  of  responsibility,  espe- 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          297 

dally  in  a  crisis.  The  whole  policy  of  the  Walker  admin 
istration  toward  unemployment  relief  was  that  of  casual 
and  reluctant  generosity  under  pressure.  The  poor  were 
supposed  to  cry  loudly  and  long,  and  then  perhaps  City 
Hall  would  listen. 

The  first  coherent  and  practicable  program  for  unem 
ployment  relief  for  the  city  was  presented  by  Louis  Wald- 
man  and  Norman  Thomas  in  behalf  of  the  Socialist  Party 
and  a  number  of  labor  unions  in  March,  1930.  It  was 
thrown  out  by  the  mayor  on  the  plea  that  under  state  law 
the  city  could  spend  no  money  for  "outdoor  relief"  except 
for  the  veterans  and  the  blind.  Repeatedly  Socialists  called 
attention  to  the  fact  that  the  city  did  have  such  power 
under  Section  404  of  the  laws  of  1919.  Morris  Hillquit 
supported  this  position  in  a  notable  argument  before  the 
Board  of  Estimate.  It  was  finally  upheld  by  the  Attorney 
General  of  the  State.  But  Mayor  Walker  on  the  basis  of 
an  opinion  of  his  corporation  counsel — an  opinion  that  no 
one  has  ever  been  able  to  find  in  written  form — held  that 
no  such  power  existed  and  finally  acted  on  the  basis  of 
special  legislation  procured  from  the  Legislature.  All  that 
the  city  did  for  the  first  year  and  a  half  of  the  great  depres 
sion  was  to  collect  a  fund  from  its  employees  under  pres 
sure  and  belatedly  open  a  few  municipal  employment 
bureaus  long  after  they  had  been  demanded  by  socialists 
and  civic  reformers. 

Actual  direct  appropriations  for  work  relief  from  the 
city  did  not  begin  until  April,  1931,  and  for  home  relief 
until  January,  1932,  the  third  winter  of  the  depression. 


298      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

From  then  on  even  the  conservative  Welfare  Council 
fought  earnestly  for  more  adequate  appropriations  be 
cause  the  situation  was  getting  out  of  hand.  Private  char 
ity  was  wholly  inadequate  to  meet  the  need.  In  the  fall  of 
1931,  125,000  families  in  America's  capital  of  wealth 
were  in  need  and  could  get  no  relief  from  city  or  private 
charity.  The  mayor's  heart  bled  for  the  unemployed  but 
they  continued  to  starve.  Why  there  were  no  more  riots 
we  do  not  understand.  A  mayor  getting  $40,000  a  year 
was  allowed  to  use  the  poverty  of  the  taxpayers  as  an 
obstacle  to  adequate  relief.  All  taxpayers,  it  appeared, 
were  small  home  owners!  The  enormous  unearned  incre 
ment  of  landlords  in  good  years  was  wholly  forgotten. 

To  make  a  long  and  painful  story  short,  under  pressure 
of  bitter  events,  Communist  demonstrations,  detailed  and 
practicable  socialist  demands  and  pleading  from  the  Wel 
fare  Council  and  other  groups,  the  city  did  increase  its 
gifts.  Somehow  the  unemployed  pulled  through,  although 
the  hospitals  were  overtaxed  with  those  whom  worry  and 
undernourishment  had  laid  low.  But  the  lesson  of  the 
winter  of  1932  did  not  penetrate  Tammany  skulls.  In  the 
worst  months  of  the  whole  depression  up  to  that  time,  the 
spring  of  1932,  the  city  home  relief  stations  stopped  regis 
tering  the  names  of  hungry  people  who  came  to  apply  for 
aid.  At  that  time  new  families  in  distress  had  been  regis 
tering  at  the  rate  of  5,000  a  week,  the  private  agencies 
had  stopped  taking  new  cases,  and  the  city  had  cut  its 
allowance  for  work  relief  from  $15  to  $10  a  week. 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          299 

How  does  a  family  live  in  New  York  on  $10  a  week?  If 
that  question  seems  difficult  it  might  be  well  to  relieve 
the  brain  by  asking:  How  does  a  family  live  in  New  York 
on  nothing  at  all?  For  many  thousand  families  in  New 
York  this  last  year  the  only  answer  has  been  begging  and 
slow  starvation.  The  city's  great  bankers  and  Controller 
Berry  put  a  damper  on  city  aid  by  their  warnings  about 
increasing  the  budget.  The  precaution  was  quite  unnec 
essary  since  the  city  could  have  borrowed  millions  on  good 
terms  if  the  fervor  of  Liberty  loan  campaigns  had  been 
reproduced.  The  plain  truth  was  that  New  York's  upper 
class  never  was  half  so  much  concerned  about  starving 
babies  in  city  tenements  in  1932  as  it  was  about  starving 
babies  in  Belgium  in  1917.  The  notorious  Block-Aid  plan 
created  a  tremendous  ballyhoo  and  a  pretense  that  the 
situation  could  be  met  by  private  charity.  The  Social 
ist  Committee  on  Unemployment  authorized  Norman 
Thomas  to  support  the  plan  in  a  radio  address  largely 
because  it  believed  that  some  money  for  the  starving  was 
better  than  no  money,  but  the  drive  was  almost  futile, 
raising  only  $1,300,000  after  a  campaign  that  obscured 
the  real  picture  of  inadequate  aid. 

Now,  as  we  approach  the  fourth  winter  of  depression 
the  situation  is  more  desperate  than  ever.  Henry  J.  Ros- 
ner  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  sums  up  the  crisis  by 
saying  that  we  must  have  $6,000,000  a  month  for  unem 
ployment  relief  while  the  city  is  appropriating  only 
$3,000,000.  The  50,000  families  receiving  home  relief 


300      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

from  the  city  are  trying  to  live  on  $1  a  day,  and  the 
33,000  families  who  have  work  relief  must  live  on  $1.50 
a  day.  Outside  of  the  pale  there  are  at  least  50,000  fami 
lies  in  desperate  need  who  are  getting  no  relief  at  all. 

As  Mr.  Rosner  points  out,  this  situation  could  be  met 
by  a  perfectly  simple  and  direct  plan.  The  city  could  pro 
vide  the  necessary  $6,000,000  a  month  for  unemployment 
relief  by  selling  five-year  unemployment  bonds  to  its  own 
sinking  fund  at  a  low  interest  rate,  and  the  cost  to  the 
taxpayer  would  not  be  more  than  2  per  cent  of  the  city 
budget  in  1933,  and  4  per  cent  in  1934.  New  York  has 
the  money;  it  is  simply  a  question  whether  the  unem 
ployed  will  get  it  by  riots  or  legislation. 

Meanwhile,  the  record  of  the  last  three  years  has  dem 
onstrated  how  hollow  is  the  claim  of  Tammany  that  it  is 
a  friend  of  the  poor  as  a  class.  It  owes  its  "popularity" 
among  the  poor  to  the  fact  that  it  rewards  certain  chosen 
leaders  of  labor  who  betray  their  class  for  personal  gain. 
It  distributes  food  baskets  and  work  tickets  from  district 
headquarters  in  return  for  votes.  It  is  practical,  always 
practical,  never  disturbing  the  balance  of  power  between 
rich  and  poor,  and  so  winning  support  or  tacit  acceptance 
from  the  rich  because  it  teaches  the  poor  to  stay  in  their 
place.  It  can  always  beat  the  "good  government"  groups 
in  appealing  to  the  poor  because  those  groups  have  no 
economic  vision  of  the  way  government  can  be  used  to 
give  security  to  workers.  In  fact  for  the  workers  the 
average  "good  government"  movement  with  its  anxious 
taxpayers  pleading  for  economy  offers  no  relief  from  star- 


THE  CITY  OF  RICHES  AND  POVERTY          301 

vation.  These  business-men  reformers  do  not  impress  the 
workers  as  being  really  interested  in  their  fate.  Why 
change  from  Tammany  with  its  occasional  food  baskets  to 
budget  commissions  of  realtors?  Why  indeed  bother 
about  civic  reform  when  the  question  is:  When  do  I  eat? 


17 

THE  CITY  MANAGER  AND  PROPORTIONAL 
REPRESENTATION 

ASK  the  average  good  citizen  who  concerns  himself 
with  municipal  affairs  what  he  thinks  is  the  most  con 
structive  thing  to  do  in  the  war  against  Tammany  and 
nine  times  out  of  ten  he  will  tell  you:  "Install  the  city 
manager  plan."  Ask  him  just  what  the  city  manager  plan 
is  and  what  it  may  mean  for  New  York  and  the  chances 
are  that  his  reply  will  be  a  bit  vague,  but  probably  he  will 
tell  you,  correctly  enough,  that  the  city  manager  plan 
means  that  under  it  the  voters  elect  a  council  which  in 
turn  chooses  an  efficient  executive  as  administrative  boss 
of  the  city  government,  leaving  questions  of  policy  for  the 
council  to  determine.  The  mayor,  if  there  is  a  mayor,  is 
only  chief  among  equals  on  the  council,  a  presiding  officer 
who  usually  takes  over  the  ceremonial  side  of  the  work 
of  a  chief  magistrate — the  luncheons,  corner  stone  layings, 
reception  of  more  or  less  distinguished  visitors  and  similar 
activities  which  absorbed  so  many  of  the  Hon.  Jimmy 
Walker's  working  hours  and  which  he  so  adorned.  Mean 
while  the  city  manager,  a  trained  official,  can  attend  to 
business,  relatively  immune  from  politics  and  politicians. 

Theoretically  there  is  much  to  be  said  for  the  plan.  It 

302 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  303 

makes  the  business  of  being  a  city  executive  something  of 
a  career  to  which  earnest  and  ambitious  youth  may  look 
forward  without  the  uncertainty  and  dread  which  attend 
the  vicissitudes  of  modern  politics.  The  city's  chief  execu 
tive  officer  can  attend  to  business  without  the  distractions 
of  campaigning.  Presumably  he  will  have  been  chosen 
for  an  executive  capacity  which  does  not  always  charac 
terize  the  man  who  can  win  the  support  of  the  dominant 
city  organization  and  the  approval  of  a  majority  of  his 
fellow  citizens.  Deeds  will  count  more  than  honeyed 
words  and  performance  more  than  wise  cracks.  This  effi 
ciency,  those  who  still  care  for  democracy  may  argue,  is 
not  purchased  at  the  price  of  democracy.  The  council, 
the  policy  forming  body,  is  democratically  elected.  In 
deed,  it  may  be  claimed  the  city  manager  plan  is  a  happy 
solution  of  the  necessary  marriage  of  trained  ability  in 
administration  to  popular  choice  of  the  policies  under 
which  we  are  to  be  governed,  without  which  political 
democracy  is  doomed.  Nevertheless  emotionally  a  good 
deal  of  the  enthusiasm  for  the  city  manager  plan  in  New 
York  springs  less  from  the  desire  to  make  democracy  effec 
tive  than  from  the  desire  to  obtain  that  efficient  dictator 
for  whom  so  many  sons  and  daughters  of  the  American 
Revolution  now  yearn. 

Practically,  the  city  manager  plan  has  to  its  credit  rea 
sonable  success  in  small  and  medium-sized  American  cities 
some  400  of  which  now  enjoy  its  benefit,  conspicuous 
success  in  the  large  city  of  Cincinnati,  no  success  in  Kan 
sas  City,  and  not  enough  success  in  Cleveland,  the  largest 


304      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

city  in  which  it  has  been  tried,  to  hold  popular  favor.  On 
the  basis  of  all  this  is  the  city  manager  plan  the  way  out 
for  New  York,  or  even  an  important  part  of  the  way  out? 
If  so,  under  what  conditions  is  it  likely  to  be  effective? 

There  is  a  danger  that  Tammany's  almost  certain  oppo 
sition  to  any  city  manager  plan  will  persuade  some  earnest 
souls  that  what  Tammany  hates  or  fears  they  must  love. 
It  by  no  means  follows  that,  because  Tammany  would 
prefer  to  let  well  enough  alone  and  would  regard  the 
change  to  a  city  manager  plan  as  the  kind  of  reform 
which  would  damage  its  prestige,  therefore  the  adoption 
of  the  city  manager  plan  would  be  the  beginning  of  the 
end  of  Tammany.  Very  much  to  the  contrary,  any  form 
of  the  city  manager  plan  under  which  the  council  was  not 
elected  by  proportional  representation  would  in  the  long 
run  be  more  easily  manipulated  by  Tammany  and  its  allied 
organizations  than  the  present  mayor  and  board  of  esti 
mate  form  of  government.  The  easiest  thing  Tammany 
now  does  is  to  keep  the  Board  of  Aldermen  in  the  boss' 
or  bosses'  vest  pocket.  Generally  the  citizens  pay  no  atten 
tion  to  the  qualities  and  records  of  minor  candidates  for 
office.  New  York  has  a  voting  population  of  three  million 
of  whom  about  one-third  stay  away  from  every  election 
and  about  one-half  from  minor  elections. 

To  a  lover  of  New  York  nothing  is  more  discouraging 
than  an  off-year  municipal  election  when  no  mayor  or 
other  important  city- wide  official  is  to  be  chosen.  In  1931, 
for  instance,  not  even  the  Seabury  inquiry  could  shake  off 
the  apathy  of  an  off-year  election,  to  which  newspapers 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  305 

and  public  gave  only  perfunctory  and  routine  attention. 
That  was  the  year  when  in  three  of  the  five  counties 
Supreme  Court  justiceships  were  coolly  bartered  between 
the  Democratic  politicians  and  their  Republican  boy 
friends  without  effective  protest.  Tammany  was  far  less 
put  to  it  that  year  and  educational  discussion  of  the  city's 
needs  was  far  less  heeded  than  in  the  mayoralty  cam 
paign  of  1929  before  there  was  a  Seabury  inquiry.  If  in 
1931  a  mayor  had  been  elected,  no  doubt  Tammany  would 
have  won,  but  not  by  so  wide  a  margin.  Unquestionably 
a  vigorous  candidate  for  mayor,  even  if  defeated,  would 
have  carried  a  few  of  his  supporters  into  minor  offices. 
As  it  was,  Tammany  elected  every  alderman  but  one  and 
made  a  clean  sweep  of  almost  all  other  offices. 

The  plain  truth  is  that  for  better  or  worse  the  American 
electorate  as  a  whole  is  psychologically  attuned  to  the 
presidential,  not  the  parliamentary  form  of  government. 
It  personalizes  issues.  One  man  may  arouse  it;  a  dozen 
or  a  score  in  different  districts  cannot.  If  the  triumph  of 
the  council  and  city  manager  plan  in  so  many  cities  seems 
to  disprove  or  weaken  this  generalization  it  does  not  fol 
low  that  there  would  be  similar  success  in  New  York 
City.  The  immense  size  of  the  city,  its  local  divisions,  its 
well-developed  regionalism,  its  lack  of  homogenity,  make 
it  peculiarly  necessary  that  its  form  of  government  and 
manner  of  election  campaign  should  make  it  easy  to  con 
centrate  the  attention  of  the  electorate  on  a  responsible 
official.  This  would  be  far  harder  to  do  in  New  York  in 
the  election  of  a  council  than  of  the  mayor  and  board  of 


306      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

estimate.  With  election  of  the  council  by  proportional 
representation  the  advantages  of  the  plan  might  make  it 
worth  trying.  Of  this  more  later.  But  the  election  of  a 
council  by  plurality  votes,  whether  by  districts  as  the  alder 
men  are  elected  now,  or  by  city-wide  vote,  would  make  it 
easier,  not  harder,  for  the  political  machines,  once  the 
first  ardor  of  reform  had  passed,  to  perpetuate  their 
power.  Responsibility  in  the  eyes  of  the  average  voter 
would  be  diffused  rather  than  concentrated. 

Nor  is  the  case  for  the  city  manager  plan — any  city 
manager  plan — strengthened  when  one  examines  what  it 
has  accomplished  or  the  particular  weaknesses  of  the  pres 
ent  situation  in  New  York. 

Here  are  two  cities  in  the  same  state:  Cincinnati  and 
Cleveland.  Both  had  city  manager  plans.  In  Cincinnati 
the  plan  has  thus  far  been  very  successful;  in  Cleveland 
its  most  loyal  friends  could  claim  for  it  only  a  modest 
degree  of  success  and  in  1931  the  city  reverted  to  the 
mayor  and  council  form  of  government.  Cincinnati  is 
politically  speaking  far  less  progressive  than  Cleveland  in 
national  politics,  and  Cincinnati  unlike  Cleveland  never 
had  a  Tom  Johnson  interlude  of  intelligent  and  mod 
erately  successful  municipal  radicalism!  On  the  contrary, 
it  was  one  of  the  worst  boss-ridden  cities  in  the  country. 
Perhaps  the  very  shame  of  Cincinnati's  plight  prompted 
its  municipal  awakening!  The  chief  difference,  however, 
between  Cincinnati  and  Cleveland  was  this:  in  Cincinnati 
the  city  manager  plan  was  the  achievement  of  the  so-called 
charter  group  or  party  which  did  not  disband  after  it  had 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  307 

carried  its  new  charter  but  continues  to  this  day  as  an 
active,  well-organized  municipal  party  which  has  been 
fortunate  in  the  quality  of  the  men  and  women  it  has 
attracted  and  peculiarly  wise  and  fortunate  in  the  men  its 
council  has  chosen  as  city  manager — particularly  the  pres 
ent  incumbent,  C.  A.  Dykstra. 

In  Cleveland,  on  the  other  hand,  the  old  party  machines 
had  no  such  organized  opposition.  They  did  business  at 
the  old  stand.  A  city  manager  declared  publicly  that  he 
could  carry  on  only  by  apportioning  patronage  60-40 
between  the  Republican  and  Democratic  organizations. 
Nor  were  the  two  city  managers  in  Cleveland's  experience 
any  outstanding  proof  that  under  this  plan  one  gets  abler 
executives  than  under  popular  elections.  The  home  of 
Tom  Johnson,  yes,  even  of  Newton  D.  Baker,  has  had 
mayors  fully  up  to  the  standard  of  its  city  managers.  Un 
der  these  circumstances  the  failure  of  the  city  to  continue 
the  city  manager  plan  was,  if  not  a  triumph  for  good  gov 
ernment,  at  least  not  a  victory  for  the  powers  of  darkness. 
It  most  certainly  was  a  warning  to  city  manager  zealots 
that  a  plan  without  a  party  to  carry  it  out  is  a  vain 
thing. 

This  conclusion  is  ten  times  strengthened  by  an  exam 
ination  of  New  York's  needs.  New  York  City  does  not 
suffer  primarily  because  of  the  incompetence  of  its  high 
executives.  Take  the  mayors  during  the  20th  century: 
McClellan,  Gaynor,  Mitchell,  Hylan,  Walker.  With  the 
exception  of  Hylan  any  one  of  them  was  able  enough  to 
fill  the  post — quite  as  able  as  the  average  city  manager. 


308      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Even  Walker  had  the  ability  if  he  had  cared  to  use  it.  All 
of  them  in  varying  degree  were  subject  to  political  pres 
sure.  If  they  were  men  of  courage  they  could  stand  out 
against  such  pressure  better  with  an  independent  mandate 
than  could  the  manager  for  a  Tammany  council. 

Let  us  go  a  step  farther:  New  York  does  not  suffer  pri 
marily  from  incompetence  or  even  from  structural  faults 
in  its  governmental  system.  Of  the  latter  there  are  plenty 
but  they  are  minor  faults.  The  charter  should  be  simpli 
fied,  superfluous  officers  should  be  eliminated,  the  counties 
should  be  consolidated  and  so  should  most  of  the  admin 
istrative  functions  of  the  borough  president's  offices.  These 
things  should  be  done  with  or  without  a  city  manager 
plan.  They  are  not  done  or  have  not  heretofore  been  done 
precisely  because  the  present  arrangement  gives  the  poli 
ticians  more  jobs.  They  get  a  good  brokerage  fee  for  dis 
charging  their  primary  function  as  brokers  between  the 
masses  with  a  vote  and  the  classes  with  power  and  privi 
lege.  It  is  from  this  source  that  most  of  our  municipal 
evils  spring. 

On  the  whole  the  structure  of  the  Board  of  Estimate 
and  the  various  departments  is  excellent.  There  is  a  good 
deal  of  routine  competence  in  New  York  City's  govern 
ment.  With  all  its  faults,  its  budget  is  more  honest  and 
more  illuminating  to  its  citizens  than  most  great  corpora 
tion  reports  to  stockholders.  And  by  great  corporations 
we  do  not  refer  merely  to  Dahl  and  the  B.  M.  T.,  the 
Bank  of  United  States,  or  Insull's  house-of -cards  holding 
companies! 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  302 

Where  New  York  goes  wrong  is  in  the  underlying  ar 
rangements:  to  whom  does  the  government  belong,  what 
ends  does  it  serve,  what  is  its  policy?  Its  scandals  arise 
out  of  the  attempt  to  carry  over  the  profit  ethics  of  busi 
ness  into  government.  Behind  every  significant  abuse  un 
covered  by  Judge  Seabury,  and  some  not  uncovered,  is  the 
demand  of  some  organized  special  privilege  for  power  and 
profit.  Sometimes  that  special  privilege  is  illegal,  an  un 
derworld  racket,  but  the  most  costly  rackets  are  in  them 
selves  legalized.  Landlords  want  low  taxes  and  great  con 
demnation  awards,  privately  owned  public  utilities  want 
franchises  that  are  gold  mines,  and  so  it  goes.  New  York 
could  have  efficient  administration  in  the  ordinary  narrow 
sense  of  the  term  without  disturbing  any  of  the  real 
sources  of  exploitation  of  the  toiling  producers  and 
consumers. 

Since  the  great  problem  is  to  capture  the  government 
for  the  service  of  these  workers  with  hand  and  brain  the 
vital  question  becomes  one  of  policy.  Our  aim  should  be 
to  use  government  as  an  instrument  of  economic  service 
and  the  redistribution  of  wealth.  We  should  visualize  the 
city  hall  as  the  center  of  municipal  socialized  ownership 
of  those  public  utilities  that  now  make  some  rich  at  the 
expense  of  workers  and  consumers.  That  means  a  direct 
conflict  with  the  real  estate  and  other  property  interests 
who  conceive  of  government  as  a  nuisance,  a  burden,  or 
an  ally  in  exploitation. 

No  city  manager  worth  his  salt  could  do  a  significant 
piece  of  work  in  New  York  without  challenging  the  pri- 


310      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

vate  utility  and  real  estate  interests.  If  he  tried  to  carry 
out  efficiently  and  honestly  a  policy  concerning  wages  and 
hours  o£  city  workers,  the  right  to  organize,  methods  of 
unemployment  relief  and  taxation,  he  would  find  himself 
blocked  completely  by  both  old  parties.  And  if  he  de 
sired  to  be  what  every  great  executive  must  be,  a  shaper 
of  policy,  he  would  probably  go  farthest  with  a  direct 
mandate  from  the  electorate. 

At  a  conference  on  political  problems  an  outstanding 
American  historian  remarked  that  in  the  small  city  where 
he  lived  there  was  a  fairly  satisfactory  city  manager  plan 
in  operation  but  that  when  all  was  said  and  done  its  chief 
use  was  that  the  real  estate  and  public  utility  interests  got 
almost  what  they  wanted  more  cheaply  than  when  they 
had  to  pay  illegal  graft!  New  York  City  can  hardly  be 
roused  to  so  inglorious  an  achievement  as  that! 

The  real  thing  that  some  cities  have  which  New  York 
needs  is  not  the  city  manager  plan  but  proportional  repre 
sentation.  It  might  be  worth  trying  the  city  manager  plan 
if  by  some  psychological  quirk  or  practical  turn  of  politics 
it  was  tied  up  to  proportional  representation. 

Our  present  single-member  district  plan  of  electing 
aldermen  has  the  practical  effect  of  disfranchising  all 
minorities.  If  the  Democrats  by  using  the  office-holders 
in  each  district  as  a  machine  can  win  a  plurality  of  ten 
votes  in  every  district  in  the  city,  the  Board  of  Aldermen 
is  100  per  cent  Democratic.  In  the  election  of  1931  the 
Democrats  polled  65  per  cent  of  the  votes  and  elected 
98.5  per  cent  of  the  aldermen — 64  out  of  65.  Under 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  311 

proportional  representation  this  is  what  would  have  hap 
pened: 

Aldermen 

elected 

Party  Votes  Cast  under  P.  R. 

Democratic  851,216  (65%+)  42 

Republican  339,020  (25.9%+)  17 

Socialist  110,254  (8.4%  +  )  6 

Others  8,773   (.7%—)  0 

1,309,263 

As  a  matter  of  fact  under  proportional  representation 
the  Socialists  and  Republicans  might  well  have  had  a 
majority  because  hundreds  of  thousands  who  stayed  away 
from  the  polls  would  have  voted  if  they  had  had  any  hope 
of  electing  a  candidate.  Less  than  half  the  eligible  voters 
went  to  the  polls  in  that  election. 

When  we  speak  of  proportional  representation  we  refer 
to  the  Hare  system  of  the  single  transferable  vote.  Under 
this  system  a  voter  who  is  voting  for  five  members  of  a 
city  council,  for  example,  puts  the  figure  1  in  front  of 
his  first  choice,  the  figure  2  in  front  of  his  second  choice, 
and  so  on.  If  there  were  100,000  votes  cast  and  5  were 
to  be  elected,  the  * 'quota"  for  electing  any  one  man  would 
be  20,000.  The  voters  would  vote  by  boroughs  instead 
of  small  districts,  so  if  the  minority  parties  could  con 
centrate  on  one  man  enough  to  get  20,000  votes  for  him 
in  the  whole  borough,  he  would  be  elected. 

This  end  is  accomplished  under  proportional  represen 
tation  by  the  system  of  transferring  votes.  When  a  voter 
votes  for  one  candidate  as  his  first  choice  and  that  candi 
date  is  elected  without  counting  his  vote,  or  hopelessly 


312      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

defeated,  then  the  voter's  second  choice  is  counted.  Under 
proportional  representation  no  primaries  are  held  and  no 
party  labels  are  put  on  the  ballot.  Candidates  are  nomi 
nated  by  a  petition  signed  by  a  certain  number  of  voters. 
The  effect  of  the  voting  according  to  choices  is  to  give 
each  party  or  group  representation  on  the  council  in  pro 
portion  to  its  vote. 

This  system  of  proportional  representation  is  simple  for 
the  voter  but  difficult  and  complex  for  purposes  of  count 
ing.  The  result  of  an  election  in  New  York  would  not  be 
known  for  several  days  after  the  vote.  Hence  the  machine 
politicians  attempt  to  misrepresent  the  idea  as  unwork 
able,  whereas  it  has  been  successful  in  thousands  of  elec 
tions  throughout  the  world  and  it  offers  no  great  difficul 
ties  to  a  set  of  independent  experts  who  could  be  hired  to 
supervise  the  count. 

Under  proportional  representation  minority  parties  could 
nominate  their  strongest  men  and  put  forward  their 
strongest  programs.  There  would  be  genuine,  wholesome 
and  constructive  opposition  in  governmental  bodies.  More 
over  there  could  be  a  certain  sort  of  cooperation  against 
Tammany  which  would  not  require  the  impossible  and 
wholly  undesirable  attempt  to  bring  Socialists  and  other 
radicals  together  with  nondescript  reformers  who  do  not 
accept  the  Socialist  platform. 

On  no  other  terms  is  effective  action  against  Tammany 
possible.  Every  politician  and  political  writer  knows  it, 
but  proportional  representation  cannot  be  realized  for 
New  York  without  legislation  at  Albany  giving  the  city 


THE  CITY  MANAGER  313 

the  chance  to  revise  its  charter  and  install  this  system.  For 
that  right  all  good  citizens  must  fight  if  they  wish  to  throw 
off  the  Tammany  yoke. 

One  thing  more  besides  proportional  representation, 
Cincinnati  also  possesses  which  New  York  needs.  That 
is  a  permanent  party  interested  in  good  government.  But 
New  York  needs — and  we  suspect  that  Cincinnati  will 
soon  find  that  she  needs — a  party  not  confined  to  the  mu 
nicipality  or  to  avowedly  municipal  affairs.  As  we  have 
repeatedly  pointed  out,  no  program  for  using  city  gov 
ernment  as  the  real  servant  of  the  people  can  get  far  with 
out  going  to  the  state  legislature.  Even  if  the  nature  of 
American  constitutional  systems  did  not  make  this  true, 
it  would  be  true  that  there  is  no  logic  or  compelling  power 
in  a  good  government  appeal  to  the  masses  which  does  not 
require  community  control  over  the  private  corporations 
which  now  exploit  them.  That  means  in  the  long  run 
municipal  socialism. 


18 
THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE 

IN  the  first  chapter  of  this  book  we  asked  the  question: 
Are  investigations  worth  while?  We  answered  the  ques 
tion  affirmatively  with  the  tremendous  qualification  that 
in  our  present  society  no  mere  investigation  of  inefficiency 
or  corruption  could  go  to  the  deep  roots  of  misery  in  that 
amazing  jumble  of  splendor  and  squalor,  luxury  and  pov 
erty,  which  is  New  York.  The  city  of  the  future  requires 
more  than  house  cleaning;  it  requires  a  new  house. 

Now,  what  of  that  future?  How  shall  the  house  be 
built? 

Properly  to  answer  the  question,  or  even  to  try  to  answer 
it,  would  require  another  and  different  book  than  this. 
We  should  have  to  consider  the  work  of  the  city  planners, 
the  monumental  report  on  regional  planning  of  the  com 
mittee  which  the  Russell  Sage  Foundation  set  up,  Lewis 
Mumford's  criticisms  of  it,  Frank  Lloyd  Wright's  drastic 
prophecies  of  the  end  of  cities,  and  a  host  of  other 
material,  German,  French  and  English.  Some  things  in 
harmony  with  the  scope  of  this  book  we  shall  point  out. 

The  city  of  the  future,  if  it  makes  use  of  the  skill  now 
available,  can  be  a  city  of  order,  convenience,  and  beauty 
such  as  no  amount  of  individual  wealth  can  buy  for  its 

314 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  315 

possessors  in  our  present  jungle.  Planning  for  such  a  city 
in  physical  terms  is  obviously  a  regional  rather  than  an 
urban  problem.  In  such  planning  for  New  York,  we  are 
handicapped  by  a  governmental  structure  and  a  state  divi 
sion  which  long  antedated  modern  New  York.  A  regional 
plan  for  New  York,  involving  as  it  must  the  three  states 
of  New  York,  New  Jersey  and  Connecticut,  and  436  local 
government  authorities,  will  be  no  easy  matter  to  carry 
out.  Evidently  the  whole  problem  of  effective  govern 
ment  for  such  areas  will  have  to  be  reconsidered  with  an 
eye  to  the  changes  wrought  by  the  machine  age.  If  we 
were  commissioned  by  a  Socialist  government  of  the 
United  States  to  establish  governmental  efficiency  in  the 
New  York  region  we  would  erase  the  state  lines  that  now 
surround  New  York  City  altogether  and  create  a  new 
unit  with  half  of  the  overlapping  machinery  of  govern 
ment  abolished. 

Until  such  obvious  common  sense  overcomes  present 
inertia  such  an  instrument  as  the  Port  Authority  of  New 
York  is  the  best  example  of  regional  administrative  ma 
chinery  that  may  create  cooperation  between  states.  We 
may  soon  come  to  an  official  planning  commission  set  up 
by  agreement  between  New  York,  New  Jersey  and  Con 
necticut  and  guiding  by  expert  advice  the  physical  develop 
ment  of  the  New  York  area.  Certainly  we  cannot  satis 
factorily  trust  to  chance  or  to  purely  selfish  interests  the 
solution  of  the  problems  of  parks,  breathing  spaces,  food 
and  water.  The  water  supply  for  New  York  City  has  al 
ready  been  a  matter  of  controversy  not  only  between  the 


316      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

counties  and  towns  in  New  York  State  but  also  with  Penn 
sylvania. 

More  difficult  even  than  the  physical  problems  of  the 
city  of  the  future  are  the  economic  problems  involved. 
On  the  whole  the  Russell  Sage  Foundation  planners 
evaded  the  landlord  issue.  They  simply  accepted  the  exist 
ing  economic  order,  landlordism  and  all.  How  you  can 
accept  it  and  get  a  city  worthy  of  the  love  and  pride  of 
free  citizens  we  cannot  see.  There  are  things  that  can  be 
done,  for  instance,  about  the  essential  process  of  land  con 
demnation  which  we  have  pointed  out,  but  how  can  we  or 
our  children  afford  to  build  even  such  a  modest  improve 
ment  on  New  York  as  the  Sage  Foundation  planners  de 
sire,  if  the  right  of  absentee  owners  to  rental  values  on 
land  goes  virtually  unchallenged?  Those  rental  values 
were  created  by  society  and  must  be  reclaimed  by  society. 
And  how  can  any  city  by  itself  be  anything  but  an  ameli- 
oriative  agency  in  relieving  a  poverty  that  is  rooted  in  an 
international  order  of  society? 

Our  communist  friends  would  answer  that  question  by 
saying  that  almost  all  attempts  to  build  a  new  city  are 
fruitless  except  through  a  social  revolution.  We  share  the 
communist's  scepticism  concerning  the  adequacy  of  ordi 
nary  civic  reform,  but  does  it  follow  therefore  that  there 
is  no  use  in  doing  anything  until  we  can  do  everything? 
Is  no  minor  change  for  the  better  in  the  quality  and  extent 
of  New  York  City's  service  to  its  people  worth  the  effort? 
We  think  that  it  is.  Properly  to  arouse  New  York  requires 
the  inspiration  of  a  great  challenge  and  a  great  ideal,  but 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  317 

that  ideal  cannot  be  put  on  ice  or  otherwise  conserved  for 
one  great  revolutionary  moment.  A  community  utterly 
incapable  of  moral  indignation  against  the  sort  of  thing 
that  has  been  set  forth  in  this  book  will  not  suddenly  dis 
close  a  capacity  for  effective  action  in  some  great  moment 
of  crisis.  Fathers  and  mothers  taught  to  endure  with 
cynical  complacency  the  kind  of  housing,  the  police  meth 
ods,  and  the  gangs  of  New  York  which  combine  to  invite 
their  children  into  a  life  of  crime  are  very  poor  builders 
of  some  future  cooperative  commonwealth. 

Of  course  preparation  of  even  the  most  tentative  pro 
gram  for  a  future  New  York  brings  home  to  the  authors, 
as  it  must  to  the  readers,  the  limitations  inherent  in  a 
decrepit  and  dying  economic  order.  It  is  hopeless  to  build 
the  city  of  the  future  as  we  would  want  it  within  the  con 
fines  of  the  lunatic  world  that  a  dying  capitalism  gives  us. 
The  city  and  the  social  order  must  be  changed  together. 
The  program  for  the  city  must  be  part  of  a  larger  program 
of  social  change.  And  experience  has  shown  that  this 
municipal  socialism  is  vital  in  itself  and  in  addition  is  an 
excellent  education  for  the  larger  international  task.  In 
Europe  and  in  such  American  cities  as  Milwaukee  and 
Reading  the  workers  have  found  an  admirable  field  for 
experience  and  experiment,  not  to  mention  their  very 
solid  accomplishments  in  civic  reconstruction.  With  all 
the  limitations  on  our  cities,  city  government,  and  espe 
cially  New  York's  city  government  touches  daily  life,  as 
we  have  seen,  more  intimately  than  any  other  govern 
mental  agency.  There  is  no  loss  or  diversion  of  energy, 


318      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

then,  in  formulating  a  plan  and  fighting  for  municipal 
socialism  as  part  of  the  general  campaign  for  a  new  social 
order. 

What  is  more  important  just  now  for  the  city  of  the 
future  than  static  plans  or  blue  prints  of  its  streets  is 
dynamic  power  directed  on  right  lines  to  achieve  it.  We 
need  first  of  all  the  awakening  of  a  vivid  consciousness 
among  the  apathetic  masses  that  there  can  be  a  city  which 
would  do  more  collectively  for  all  the  great  company  of 
workers  of  hand  and  brain  than  any  "boss"  can  do  for 
them  individually.  Next,  we  need  a  general  policy  and  a 
program  for  immediate  advance.  Finally  we  need  definite 
organization  of  a  party  to  carry  it  out. 

A  policy  for  the  New  York  of  the  future  might  be 
stated  thus:  (l)  organize  the  city  governmental  machine 
so  far  as  possible  without  waste,  favoritism,  or  inefficiency; 
(2)  let  the  people  through  their  government  own  and 
operate  the  great  natural  economic  monopolies  without 
private  profit  or  special  privilege;  (3)  let  the  workers  of 
hand  and  brain  share  in  the  control  of  those  monopolies. 

In  practice  such  a  policy  means  first  the  complete  reor 
ganization  of  New  York  City's  government  to  eliminate 
every  chair-warmer  and  political  favorite,  every  superflu 
ous  bureau  and  parasitic  nephew.  Then  it  means  the  im 
mense  expansion  of  the  government  to  include  the  owner 
ship  and  control  of  the  industries  of  electric  power,  gas, 
subways,  telephone,  buses,  and  at  least  some  housing.  No 
man  could  prophesy  the  exact  limits  or  the  exact  sequence 
of  such  a  program.  It  would  depend  largely  on  the  devel- 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  319 

opment  of  a  national  socialist  movement.  It  would  de 
velop  step  by  step  as  the  collective  activities  of  the  city 
have  already  developed — schools,  fire  departments, 
museums,  traffic  police,  ferries,  road  building,  hospitals. 
For  many  of  these  changes  we  have  already  sketched  a 
program  in  the  preceding  chapters.  Let  us  recapitulate  a 
little,  fill  in  some  gaps,  and  comment  as  we  go  along. 

1.  Structural  and  administrative  changes.  County  lines 
should  be  abolished  within  the  city,  some  county  offices 
eliminated  and  others  consolidated.  There  should  be  one 
district  attorney's  office  with  the  necessary  bureaus  and 
district  branches  rather  than  five.  Now  criminals  can 
dodge  around  the  five  counties.  This  device  was  one  of 
several  to  which  men  involved  in  the  milk  scandals  some 
years  ago  resorted  in  order  to  escape  full  justice. 

The  administrative  work  of  the  borough  presidents' 
offices,  notably  the  building  and  highway  bureaus,  should 
also  be  consolidated  into  city  departments.  This  would 
not  automatically  cure  the  inefficiency  and  graft  rampant 
in  them,  but  it  would  permit  centralized  planning  and 
make  more  difficult  the  pressure  of  local  politics. 

There  should  be  a  scientific  study  of  the  entire  city 
administration  looking  to  the  elimination  of  purely  politi 
cal  jobs  and  a  dollar's  worth  of  work  for  a  dollar's  pay. 
On  the  face  of  it  in  such  departments  as  Health  and  Hos 
pitals  the  work  of  experts  is  starved  while  political 
deputies  of  no  technical  or  administrative  competence 
draw  big  salaries. 

The  city  manager  plan  and  our  doubts  concerning  it  we 


320      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

have  already  discussed.  Emphatically  there  should  be  pro 
portional  representation.  To  accomplish  this  and  the  other 
structural  changes  necessary  the  citizens  of  New  York  of 
all  political  faiths  must  unite  to  get  new  power  from  the 
legislature  to  rewrite  their  own  charter.  The  revision  of 
the  home  rule  act  is  the  necessary  first  step. 

2.  Election  machinery.    New  Yorkers  are  entitled  to 
more  information  on  the  conduct  of  their  government. 
During  election  campaigns,  the  city  radio  station  should 
be  open  impartially  at  stated  times  for  a  constructive  state 
ment  of  the  platforms  and  purposes  of  the  different 
parties. 

The  present  general  dishonesty  of  elections  requires 
machinery  that  will  automatically  print  the  totals  on  the 
voting  machines  or  photograph  the  backs  of  them  for  offi 
cial  records.  It  might  also  help  the  situation  to  stiffen  the 
law  on  assistance  to  voters,  and  possibly  to  impose  civil 
service  tests  on  election  officials.  Only  a  strongly  organ 
ized  party,  not  controlled  by  Tammany,  as  the  Republican 
machine  is  controlled,  can  use  the  necessary  pressure  to 
end  election  frauds. 

3.  Police  and  courts.  Here  again  what  is  wrong  lies  too 
deep  for  change  by  law  or  administrative  fiat.  We  do  not 
believe  that  power  over  the  police  should  be  taken  from 
the  mayor  as  some  have  suggested.   The  police  commis 
sioner,  however,  might  well  be  regarded  as  a  permanent 
administrative  official,  to  be  removed  only  by  the  mayor 
for  cause,  which  cause  should  include  a  failure  to  carry 
out  the  program  as  to  police  methods  adopted  by  the  re- 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  321 

sponsible  city  executive.  The  third  degree  might  be 
checked  to  some  extent  by  providing  for  immediate  ex 
amination  of  the  prisoner  before  a  designated  investigat 
ing  magistrate,  as  we  have  already  suggested,  and  a  sys 
tem  of  Public  Defenders  should  be  established  immedi 
ately  for  all  poor  defendants. 

As  to  the  courts,  we  know  of  no  panacea  either  by  elec 
tion  or  appointment  of  judges.  Approval  of  magistrates 
or  municipal  court  judicial  nominations  by  bar  associa 
tions  means  next  to  nothing  as  these  associations  are 
among  the  chief  sinners  in  regard  to  the  low  standard  of 
legal  ethics  and  practise.  Public  ownership  of  the  bail- 
bond  business  would  help  the  poorer  victims  of  shyster 
lawyers  and  the  police. 

4.  Social  services.  New  York's  penal  institutions  and 
her  almshouse  on  the  ironically  misnamed  Welfare  Island 
in  the  East  River  are  a  disgrace.  They  should  be  removed 
to  a  region  not  so  needed  for  a  public  park  and  not  so 
available  to  the  drug  trade  which  seems  according  to 
reports  of  former  inmates  to  flourish  in  the  prisons  under 
high  political  protection  despite  the  vigilance  of  Commis 
sioner  Patterson,  one  of  the  best  of  the  Walker  cabinet. 

The  trouble  with  other  departments  like  Health,  Hos 
pitals  and  Sanitation,  as  we  have  indicated,  is  not  that  we 
do  not  have  in  them  some  expert  and  loyal  servants,  but 
that  they  and  their  service  are  starved  while  political 
office  holders  fatten.  In  these  social  services  the  require 
ment  is  efficient  administration  of  one  branch  of  what 
should  be  a  great  cooperative  community. 


322      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Unemployment  relief  we  have  already  discussed.  The 
principal  initiative  in  large  scale  relief,  public  works,  and 
the  five  day  week  belongs  to  the  federal  and  state  gov 
ernment.  The  city  under  present  conditions  should  in 
crease  its  appropriation,  keep  politics  out  of  the  relief 
picture,  and  push  public  works,  including  a  housing  pro 
gram. 

5.  Public  utilities.  Subway  lines  should  be  unified  under 
public  operation.  The  general  plan  should  include  the 
correlation  of  city  owned  and  operated  bus  lines.  Opera 
tion  should  be  under  boards  which  give  the  users  of  the 
service  the  majority  control,  but  with  representation  also 
for  different  categories  of  workers. 

In  connection  with  providing  power  for  subways  the 
city  should  also  provide  itself  and  its  citizens  with  elec 
tricity  at  cost  to  break  the  strangle  hold  of  the  electric 
and  gas  monopoly  with  its  outrageous  charges,  and  when 
experience  in  public  operation  had  been  gained  the  city 
could  buy  out  the  electric  and  gas  monopolies  at  a  price 
that  included  no  watered  values  and  pay  for  them  with 
municipal  bonds  yielding  a  low  interest. 

Milk  should  be  declared  a  public  utility  and  its  distribu 
tion  should  be  taken  over  by  a  stated  municipal  corpora 
tion  working  in  conjunction  with  bona  fide  farmers'  co 
operatives.  Only  so  can  the  outrageous  spread  between 
farmers  and  transportation  companies  and  the  ultimate 
consumer  be  prevented.  Few  things  cost  the  public  more 
than  the  control  of  the  milk  situation  by  two  great  hold 
ing  companies  whose  competition  rarely  reduces  prices  to 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  323 

consumers  or  raises  them  for  farmers,  but  simply  adds  to 
the  evils  of  private  monopoly  the  costs  of  competing 
agents  and  milk  wagons. 

6.  Housing  and  taxation.   Public  housing,  as  we  have 
already  argued,  is  the  only  answer  to  slums,  tenements  and 
their  evil  consequences.    The  best  plan  in  the  present 
emergency  would  be  to  set  up  a  public  housing  depart 
ment  which  could  borrow  from  the  federal  government 
for  large-scale  housing  operations  at  the  same  rate  that 
the  government  borrows.    Limited  dividend  companies 
which  pay  six  per  cent  on  invested  capital — invested  capi 
tal  under  the  housing  law  must  be  one-third  of  the  total; 
the  other  two-thirds  can  be  raised  by  mortgage — cannot 
and  will  not  provide  homes  for  the  workers  who  need 
them  most.  Housing,  moreover,  must  be  related  to  parks, 
playgrounds,  transportation,  and  above  all  taxation  pol 
icies  of  the  city. 

The  city's  principal  tax  dependence  could  be  a  tax  to 
expropriate  the  rental  value  of  land — not  the  improve 
ments  on  the  land.  Thus  the  city  in  behalf  of  society 
would  become  the  landlord.  Taxation  should  be  shifted 
to  this  basis  within  a  decade.  The  state  may  also  make 
allowances  to  the  city  from  income  and  inheritance  taxes 
for  specific  purposes  during  a  transitional  period. 

7.  Education.  New  York's  public  schools  have  a  cum 
bersome,  bureaucratic  management  which  is  shot  through 
with  all  kinds  of  politics,  not  excluding  ecclesiastical  pol 
itics.   Its  highest  executives  are  usually  mediocrities,  and 
Chamber  of  Commerce  ideals  predominate.    In  spite  of 


324      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

some  devoted  teachers,  the  system  grinds  out  robots  and 
Babbitts.  Again  the  spirit  and  ideals  of  the  system  are 
more  important  than  structural  and  administrative  changes 
in  achieving  the  city  of  the  future.  The  thing  that  is  the 
matter  with  our  schools  is  the  blight  of  Tammany  control 
and  no  perfection  of  educational  machinery  can  overcome 
that  blight. 

We  can  imagine  some  gentle  reader  who  has  just 
scanned  this  program  looking  up  in  surprise  and  asking: 
"But  how  about  graft?  You  have  just  written  a  book  in 
which  you  have  piled  instance  upon  instance  of  ineffi 
ciency  and  corruption  in  New  York's  government,  and 
now  you  propose  to  give  to  that  corrupt  government  more 
and  more  power  over  our  lives."  Yes  and  no.  We  propose 
to  give  more  power  to  city  government  but  not  to  a  Tam 
many  government.  What  is  much  more  important,  we 
propose  to  take  away  from  speculative  business  the  pri 
vate  profit  which  now  causes  corruption  in  city  politics. 

Look  back  over  this  book  and  you  will  see  what  we 
have  repeatedly  emphasized,  that  the  money  which  buys 
politicians  comes  from  private  profiteers  who  have  bus 
franchises  to  buy,  transit  stock  to  manipulate,  and  well- 
located  land  to  sell.  If  the  city  owned  the  franchises,  the 
transit  stock,  and  the  land,  the  pool  of  profits  that  now 
buys  the  politician  would  be  taken  away.  The  socialist 
answer  to  graft  is  not  to  clap  the  grafter  into  jail,  although 
a  socialist  government  would  punish  grafters  ruthlessly, 
but  to  remove  the  spoils  from  private  exploitation. 


THE  CITY  OF  THE  FUTURE  325 

If  there  were  no  Equitable  bus  franchise  to  give  out 
it  would  pay  nobody  to  supply  a  very  generous  letter  of 
credit  to  a  city  official.  If  there  were  no  unearned  profits 
to  be  made  out  of  an  advance  tip  on  land  there  would  not 
be  the  immense  graft  connected  with  condemnation  pro 
ceedings.  Graft  in  connection  with  the  Dock  Department 
arises  not  primarily  from  building  the  docks  but  from  rent 
ing  them.  New  York's  marvelous  publicly  owned  and 
operated  water  system  has  been  far  freer  from  scandal 
than  has  been  the  relation  of  the  city  to  privately  owned 
gas  and  electric  supply. 

This  is  not  to  argue  that  municipal  or  any  other  kind  of 
socialism  will  automatically  end  all  graft.  There  is  no 
political  machinery  which  gluttons,  fools  and  cowards  can 
drive  with  perfect  safety.  But  socialism  by  the  new  point 
of  view  which  it  inculcates  and  its  steady  destruction  of 
opportunities  to  make  immense  unearned  private  profits 
strikes  a  mortal  blow  at  the  racketeering  spirit  which  cor 
rupts  both  government  and  business  to-day. 

All  of  which  makes  it  doubly  clear  that  what  New  York 
needs  is  a  program  for  regeneration  that  is  part  of  a 
national  program.  Few  of  the  major  reforms  we  have 
suggested  could  be  accomplished  against  the  opposition 
of  reactionary  state  and  federal  governments.  It  should 
be  even  more  obvious  that  the  things  that  matter  most  to 
the  workers  cannot  be  attained  by  mere  good  govern 
ment.  No  good  government  program  in  our  memory  has 
ever  gone  to  fundamentals  or  promised  exploited  workers 
anything  to  shake  them  loose  from  their  dependence  of 


326      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

fear  and  favor  on  the  district  leader.  The  Mitchell  fusion 
government  had  certain  administrative  virtues  which  it 
failed  to  capitalize  in  the  minds  of  the  voters.  It  had  no 
program  at  all  to  break  the  grip  of  public  utilities  or  milk 
companies  or  to  conquer  slums.  Is  it  any  wonder  that 
masses  of  workers  were  indifferent  to  it  and  would  not 
have  continued  it  even  if  its  end  had  not  been  compli 
cated  by  the  passions  of  the  World  War? 

The  city  of  the  future,  if  it  is  to  be  a  city  of  beauty  and 
well  being,  will  be  part  of  a  cooperative  commonwealth 
in  which  all  our  great  productive  powers  are  dedicated 
to  the  needs  of  men  rather  than  to  the  profits  of  absentee 
owners.  And  to  dream  that  there  will  be  cities  or  urban 
areas  in  which  man's  collective  power  will  combine  with 
nature  to  give  him  comfort  and  beauty  is  not  Utopian. 
The  collective  control  of  our  cities  is  increasing  year  by 
year.  Our  schools  and  libraries,  our  improved  public 
health  service,  such  cooperative  houses  as  those  that  the 
Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers  have  built,  the  marvel 
ous  park  system  of  Westchester,  the  state  park  board  on 
Long  Island,  especially  at  Jones  Beach,  and  the  work  of 
the  Port  Authority  of  New  York — these  things  are  not 
Utopian.  They  are  joyous  realities.  Other  great  cities  can 
show  other  successful  experiments  in  cooperative  economic 
government.  When  we  have  made  it  generally  possible 
to  expand  this  work  all  along  the  line  in  every  city  in 
America  then  the  social  revolution  will  be  assured.  To 
make  that  possible  is  the  inescapable  debt  we  owe  to 
our  children. 


REFERENCES 
1 

CITY  PROBLEMS  AND  INVESTIGATION  CURES 

1  Plunkitt  of  Tammany  Hall,  by  William  L.  Riordan. 

2  We  are  indebted  to  Werner's  excellent  book  for  much  of  the  mate 
rial  in  this  chapter,  including  the  quotation  from  H.  G.  Wells. 

8  See  Current  History,  November,  1928,  article  by  D.  T.  Lynch. 
*  My  Forty  Years  in  New  York,  by  Charles  H.  Parkhurst. 
5  Werner,  p.  335,  from  Mazet  Investigation,  Vol.  I,  p.  336  ff. 


HOW  NEW  YORK'S  GOVERNMENT  WORKS 

1  Harvard  Graduate's  Magazine,  March,   1930. 

2  Joseph  McGoldrick's  article,  "The  New  Tammany,"  in  the  Ameri 
can  Mercury  of  September,  1928,  is,  in  our  opinion,  the  best  description 
ever  written  of  the  operations  of  Tammany  Hall. 

3  See  the  1932  report  of  the  Executive  Committee  of  the  Civil  Service 
Reform  Association  for  the  full  corrected  list  which  was  largely  reprinted 
in  the  New  York  Times  of  May  18,  1932. 

*  McGoldrick,  supra. 

5  See   paragraph    11,    Section   IX    of   Rule   V    of   the   rules    of   the 
Municipal  Civil  Service  Commission. 


3 

THE  NEW  TAMMANY  AND  THE  TIN  BOX  BRIGADE 

1  Testimony    of    the    Joint    Legislative    Investigating    Committee,    p. 
1034.    Hereafter  this  will  be  referred  to  as  Seabury  Minutes. 

2  Intermediate  Report  to  Samuel   H.   Hofstadter  of  Samuel   Seabury 
as  counsel  to  the  Joint  Legislative  Investigating  Committee,  dated  Janu 
ary  25,  1932,  p.  127,  hereafter  referred  to  as  Intermediate  Report. 

3  Intermediate  Report,  p.  196  and  Exhibit  B,  15. 

327 


328      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

4  An  open  letter  to  Mayor  Walker  from  the  City  Affairs  Committee 
on  the  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals,  July  19,  1931. 

5  Intermediate  Report,  p.  13  ff. 
•ibid.,  p.  51. 

7  This  and  the  subsequent  quotation  are  from  an  article  by  Dennis 
Tilden  Lynch  in  the  Herald-Tribune,  July  17,  1932. 

8  Intermediate  Report,  p.  94. 


4 

MORE  TIN  BOXES 

1  Seabury  Minutes,  p.  1162ff. 

*  The  Seabury  charges  against  Mayor  Walker,  p.  19. 

8  New  York  Times,  June  2,  1932. 


JUSTICES  AND  THE  LAW 

1  Seabury  Minutes,  p.  2435  ff. 

8  Final  Report  of  the  Page  Commission,  New  York  State  Assembly, 
Document  54,  April  4,  1910. 

3  New  York  Times,  Oct.  6,  1930. 


7 
THE  SHAME  OF  THE  COURTS 

1  Final  report  of  Samuel  Seabury  to  the  Appellate  Division,  First 
Judicial  Department,  March  28,  1932,  p.  31. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  35. 
8  Ibid.,  p.  48. 

*  Quoted  in  the  Brooklyn  Eagle,  May  19,  1925. 


8 
THE  LOWER  WORLD  OF  THE  LAW 

1  Report  on  Lawlessness  and  Law  Enforcement  of  the  National  Com 
mission  on  Law  Observance  and  Enforcement    (Wickersham  Commis 
sion)   No.   11,  p.  86. 

2  New  York  Sun,  July  28,  1932. 


REFERENCES  329 

3  P.  242.    Quoted  in  Wickersham  report,  p.  92. 

*  Association  of  the  Bar  of  the  City  of  New  York,  Annual  Report 
of  the  Committee  on  Criminal  Courts,  Law  and  Procedure  for  1927-28. 

B  See  that  excellent  book  "Our  Lawless  Police,"  by  Ernest  Jerome 
Hopkins. 

6  Wickersham  report,  p.  95. 

7  New  York  Times,  August  28,  1932. 

8  Seabury  Magistrates'  report,  p.  96. 

9  Ibid,  p.  87. 

10  Ibid,  p.  109. 


10 
ROOSEVELT  AND  TAMMANY 

1  New  York  Herald-Tribune,  January  8,  1932. 

2  New  York  Times,  July  15,  1929. 

3  New  York  Times,  November  2,  1930. 

*  New  York  Times,  April  2,  1932. 

12 

CITY  STREETS  AT  A  BARGAIN 

1  Report   of   Controller   Berry  on   the   Proposed   Contracts   for   Bus 
Franchises  in  the  Boroughs  of  Manhattan  and  Queens,  October  9,  1931, 
p.  25. 

2  See  "The  Truth  About  Queens  Bus  Franchises,"  a  pamphlet  pub 
lished  by  the  City  Affairs  Committee. 

8  Poor's  Manual  of  Public  Utilities,  p.  504  jff.,  and  the  original  reports 
of  the  Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company  on  file  with  the  New  York  Transit 
Commission. 

*  The  history  of  the  capitalization  of  the  present  street-car  system  is 
taken  from  a  report  by  Corporation  Counsel  William   P.   Burr,   based 
upon  an  investigation  made  by  the  Board  of  Estimate  in  1919,  approved 
by  the  Board,  and  embodied  in  the  minutes  of  May  20,  1921. 

13 

RACKETEERING  IN  LAND 

1  A  valuable  discussion  of  land  values  in  New  York  with  statistical 
tables  is  contained  in  Land  Values  in  New  York  in  Relation  to  Transit 
Facilities,  by  E.  H.  Spengler,  Columbia  University  Press.  A  general 
discussion  is  contained  in  the  Regional  Plan  of  New  York  and  Its 
Environs. 


330      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

2  New  York  Times,  September  23,  1930. 

8  This  whole  story  is  outlined  in  the  report  of  Leonard  Wallstein 
as  Special  Corporation  Counsel  on  Land  Condemnation,  January,  1932, 
p.  22  ff. 

*lbid.,  p.  24,  26,  27. 

B  New  York  Evening  Post,  October  15,  1930. 

6  The  Finances   and  Financial   Administration   of   New    York   City, 
1928,  p.  Ivi. 

7  This  system  is  permitted  by  Chapter  603   of  the  Laws  of  New 
York  of  1926. 

8  Spengler,  supra,  p.  128. 


14 

HOUSING  HUMAN  BEINGS 

1  Louis  H.  Pink,  The  New  Day  in  Housing. 

a  For  an  excellent  discussion  of  recent  developments  see  Recent 
Trends  in  American  Housing,  by  Edith  Elmer  Wood. 

8  "Anticipations,"  quoted  by  Grosvenor  Atterbury  in  Regional  Survey 
of  New  York,  Vol.  VI. 

15 

THE  CONSUMER  PAYS 

1  Brief  filed  by  the  Community  Councils  with  the  New  York  Public 
Service  Commission  in  Case  6367. 

2  Petition  of  the  City  Affairs  Committee  to  the  New  York  Public 
Service  Commission. 

8  Report  of  New  York  State  on  Revision  of  the  Public  Service  Com 
mission  Law,  1930,  Vol.  I.  These  and  the  following  facts  are  taken  from 
the  minority  report,  p.  265  ff. 

*The  plan  was  outlined  in  The  Times  of  December  21,  1931. 

6  Based  on  Untermyer's   analysis,   The  Times,   September   27,    1931, 
and  stock  market  quotations  of  August  18,  1932. 

*  The  Times,  January  1,  1932. 

7  An  excellent  summary  of  the  whole  transit  unification  problem  was 
written  for  The  Times  of  March  6,  1932,  by  Harold  Phelps  Stokes. 


APPENDIX  I 

A  CALENDAR  OF  SCANDALS  DURING  THE 
WALKER  ADMINISTRATION 

(We  acknowledge  with  gratitude  the  fact  that  this  cal 
endar  is  based  in  fact  and  partially  in  language  upon  that 
invaluable  guide  to  current  events,  The  New  York  Times 
Index.  We  have,  however,  condensed  many  items  from  the 
index  for  purposes  of  brevity,  and  in  a  number  of  places  we 
have  frankly  interpreted  facts  in  our  own  language,  so  The 
Times  should  not  be  held  responsible  for  opinions.  Where 
several  events  in  sequence  are  grouped  together  under  one 
date,  the  date  chosen  is  that  of  the  earliest  event.) 

1925 

October  21:  Walker  praises  Tammany's  records  in  dra 
matic  speech  at  rally  at  Tammany  Hall;  vows  clean  city. 

November  15:  Walker  in  radio  speech  at  Miami  says 
Southern  women  and  children  may  visit  New  York  with 
safety  in  his  administration. 

December  9:  Walker  says  Olvany  will  settle  patronage 
disputes  throughout  city. 

1926 

January  2:  Walker  urges  reorganization  of  city  government 
and  simplification  in  inaugural  speech. 

January  6:  Judge  O.  A.  Rosalsky  says  crooks  will  have  no 
chance  under  Walker  government. 

331 


332      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

January  6:  Patrolman  Brennan  kills  S.  Kranin  in  station 
house  while  intoxicated. 

January  9-  112  arrested  on  gambling  charges;  formation 
of  squad  by  Police  Inspector  Lahey  indicates  means  of  check 
ing  up  action  by  district  inspectors. 

January  11:  Magistrate  Vitale  frees  30  arrested  in  raid  on 
Oriona  Social  Club  on  ground  of  illegal  arrest;  Magistrate 
Glatzmyer  frees  41  of  44  taken  in  pool-room  raids. 

January  13:  Democrats  in  Board  of  Aldermen  defeat 
efforts  to  put  Mrs.  Pratt,  only  Republican,  on  important 
committees. 

January  13:  President  McKee  introduces  custom  of  having 
Board  of  Aldermen  business  session  opened  with  prayer. 

January  13:  Walker  pledges  rule  for  people's  interests, 
with  no  politics. 

January  25:  Courts  free  over  200  taken  in  raids  on  Trilby 
Inn,  Amex  Dist.  Dem.  Club  and  Elmore  Social  Club,  Inc., 
for  lack  of  evidence. 

January  29:  Leonard  Wallstein,  counsel  for  Citizens 
Union,  asks  New  York  State  Supreme  Court  to  block  former 
Commissioner  Enright's  pension  on  charge  that  former 
Mayor  Hylan  granted  it  in  violation  of  home  rule  act.  Pension 
finally  stopped. 

January  31:  Mclaughlin  scores  handling  of  welfare  and 
contingent  fund,  organized  by  Enright  for  emergency  aid  to 
policemen;  investigation  shows  that  badges  for  honorary 
officials,  European  trips  of  officers  to  study  conditions,  ex 
penses  of  sessions  of  international  police  conference,  salary 
of  E.  E.  Hart  as  publicity  man,  fees  of  A.  Honiger  for  teach 
ing  "Eye  Language,"  T.  R.  Gaines  for  teaching  breathing 
and  other  expenses  came  from  fund. 

February  6:  Walker  opposes,  as  against  principle,  pro 
posal  to  transfer  some  authority  of  New  York  City  Standards 
and  Appeals  Board  to  State  Public  Service  Commission. 


APPENDIX  333 

February  25:  Police  Commissioner  Warren  says  city  has 
lost  $500,000  already  in  street  cleaning  graft  and  figure  may 
reach  $2,000,000. 

March  2:  Automobile  Graft — Twenty  summonses  issued 
in  investigation  of  Attorney  J.  I.  Cuff  of  forgery  and  bribery 
in  Brooklyn  Traffic  Court,  involving  two  members  of  motor 
cycle  squad  and  many  motorists;  rubber  stamps  with  fac 
simile  signatures  of  judges  used  and  motorists  paid  from 
$10  to  $30  to  have  cases  dropped. 

March  6:  Citizens  Committee  appears  before  Board  of 
Education  to  ask  restriction  of  size  of  high  schools  to  2,000 
pupils  each;  Pres.  G.  J.  Ryan  says  it  would  be  too  expensive. 

March  16:  Mayor  Walker  describes  bad  condition  of 
Bellevue  psychopathic  ward  to  Committee  of  Whole  of 
Board  of  Estimate;  says  money  for  new  buildings  should  be 
spent  on  it;  will  make  personal  survey  of  city  hospital  con 
ditions.  (The  Bellevue  psychopathic  pavilion  was  not  voted 
until  three  years  later.) 

April  3:  Patrolmen  J.  Feit,  P.  Murray  and  J.  Alutto  placed 
on  trial  in  graft  and  bribery  case  connected  with  snow  re 
moval.  Convicted  of  conspiracy  and  sentenced  to  three 
months  in  workhouse. 

April  14:  Walker  rises  early  to  ride  horse,  Cedar  King, 
in  Central  Park. 

April  27:  Supreme  Court  Justice  Proskauer,  in  Citizens 
Union  suit  against  granting  ex-Mayor  Hylan's  pension,  holds 
pension  void,  rules  home  rule  amendment  grants  city  no 
power  in  matter  of  pensions.  Sustained  by  Court  of  Appeals. 

May  19:  Brutality — New  York  County  Lawyers  Assn. 
complains  to  Commissioner  Mclaughlin  and  District  Attor 
ney  Banton  of  third  degree  methods;  McLaughlin  reported 
to  have  replied,  approving  "strong  arm"  methods  in  such 
cases. 

May  20:  Gambling  and  vice — Police  raid  Tammy  Central 


334      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

Club,  Democratic  organization  of  12th  Assembly  District, 
for  second  time  in  three  days;  35  arrested  but  freed  in  night 
court. 

May  22:  Application  of  American  Civil  Liberties  Union 
for  use  of  Stuyvesant  High  School  for  free  speech  meeting 
denied  by  Board  of  Education.  Denial  approved  by  patriotic 
societies  and  State  Chamber  of  Commerce. 

June  10:  Walker  tells  newspaper  men  he  favors  putting 
buses  on  streets  of  city  as  soon  as  possible. 

June  12:  Controller  Berry  writes  letter  to  Mayor  Walker 
charging  him  with  habitual  tardiness  at  the  Board  of  Estimate 
meetings.  This  was  six  months  after  he  had  taken  office. 

June  14:  Walker  names  472  persons  to  city  planning  and 
survey  committee. 

June  22:  Harris  suspends  three  inspectors  of  the  Food  and 
Truck  Bureau  as  result  of  investigation  into  adulteration  of 
butter. 

August  7:  Mayor  Walker  appoints  Judge  C.  H.  Kelby  to 
head  centralized  investigation  of  milk  graft  covering  five 
boroughs. 

August  31:  Harry  C.  Perry  Democratic  Club,  Tammany 
organization  of  Second  Assembly  District,  raided. 

September  6:  Reports  that  Tammany  is  annoyed  by  raids 
on  district  clubs  by  Commissioner  McLaughlin,  Governor 
Smith's  appointee,  with  resultant  resentment  to  Smith. 

September  18:  Controller  Berry's  report  on  passenger  cars 
used  by  divisions  of  city  government,  exclusive  of  policy, 
fire  and  street  cleaning  vehicles,  puts  expense  in  1926  at 
over  $3,000,000;  calls  it  factor  in  budget  increase. 

October  27:  Freedom  of  thought — Teachers  Union  cites 
records  of  J.  W.  Hughan,  R.  G.  Hardy  and  A.  Lefkowitz  in 
charge  of  discrimination  in  promotion,  due  to  personal  views 
on  public  questions.  Superintendent  O'Shea  says  public 
opinion  backs  refusal  to  promote  three  radical  teachers. 


APPENDIX  335 

October  27:  W.  G.  Krane  urges  high  school  teachers'  asso 
ciation  of  New  York  City  to  "enroll  as  Democrats  but  vote 
as  you  please." 

December  7:  Controller  Berry  refuses  to  authorize  payment 
of  $3,500  for  scrolls,  badges  and  other  items  in  connection 
with  welcomes  to  crown  prince  and  princess  of  Sweden  and 
of  crew  of  President  Roosevelt;  scores  "bad  English"  of 
scrolls. 

December  8:  W.  Bernard  Vause,  Brooklyn  judge,  urges 
grand  jury  to  show  no  Christmas  leniency  toward  criminals. 

1927 

January  6:  Women's  night  court  of  Brooklyn  condemned 
as  unfit  by  New  York  State  Prisons  Commission. 

February  11:  Schieffelin  says  that  Governor  Smith  evades 
duty  in  milk  graft  prosecution  in  deference  to  G.  W. 
Olvany's  wish. 

February  20:  Ex-Mayor  Hylan  bets  E.  F.  Foley  that  Walker 
will  not  pose  for  picture  at  Palm  Beach;  loses. 

March  31:  Commissioner  Harris  declares  millions  of  dol 
lars'  worth  of  bootleg  cream  was  smuggled  into  city  during 
season  of  scarcity. 

May  24:  Walker  in  speech  at  Institutional  Synagogue, 
New  York  City,  says  he  is  "pro- Jewish  Gentile." 

July  1:  Dr.  William  H.  Walker  threatened  with  loss  of 
post  on  medical  board  of  New  York  City  Board  of  education 
for  failing  to  take  required  civil  service  tests. 

July  21:  Conviction  of  T.  J.  Clougher  on  graft  charge 
upheld  in  court  of  appeals. 

July  29:  Bus  franchise  awarded  to  Equitable  Coach  Co.; 
Service  Transportation  Corp.  and  Tompkins  Bus  Corp.  also 
get  franchises;  Walker  signed  contract  August  9  and  sailed 
for  Europe  August  10  with  $10,000  letter  of  credit  arranged 
by  J.  Allen  Smith  of  Equitable. 


336      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

August  10:  Kelby  in  report  to  Mayor  Walker  shows  evi 
dence  of  graft  in  food  inspection  division  of  Health  Depart 
ment  prior  to  present  administration  in  148  criminal  cases 
sent  to  district  attorneys  in  four  counties. 

August  17:  Mrs.  R.  B.  Pratt  demands  ousting  of  C.  L. 
Kohler,  budget  director  and  former  secretary  of  Health  De 
partment,  as  result  of  graft  expose;  Citizens  Union  assails 
his  record,  calls  Kelby  inquiry  a  fiasco.  Kohler  still  in. 

December  16:  Harvey  submits  charges  concerning  Queens 
sewers  to  Governor;  Governor  Smith  appoints  Scudder  head 
of  inquiry.  Max  Steuer  defends  Connolly.  Shearn  later 
succeeds  Scudder. 

1928 

May  6:  W.  J.  Lougheed  voluntarily  offers  affidavits  charg 
ing  huge  graft  in  connection  with  alleged  padding  of  pay 
rolls  of  temporary  employees. 

May  15:  Investigator  for  Commissioner  of  Accounts  Hig- 
gins  uncovers  thefts  in  Manhattan  and  Brooklyn;  Lougheed 
and  three  others  plead  not  guilty.  Lougheed  later  pleads 
guilty. 

May  29:  Assistant  District  Attorney  Ryan  charges  $2,600 
of  $3,390  weekly  went  to  "dummies"  on  street  cleaning 
payroll. 

June  9:  Oswald  found  guilty  of  grand  larceny  in  street 
cleaning  case;  McGee  acquitted. 

June  1 6:  Taylor  dismisses  three  in  snow  graft  case. 

July  4:  J.  M.  Phillips,  alleged  head  of  Queens  ring,  dies 
while  under  indictment  for  graft. 

July  11:  A.  Courtney,  W.  McClutchy,  B.  Barone,  A. 
Casenza  and  E.  Dunnegan  convicted  of  payroll  padding  in 
street  cleaning  scandal. 

July  17:  State  Socialist  Party  asks  Governor  Smith  to  in 
vestigate  administration;  makes  11  charges.  Smith  declines 
to  grant  inquiry. 


APPENDIX  337 

July  22:  Commissioner  of  Health  Harris  resigns  as  result 
of  lack  of  cooperation  from  mayor  in  cleaning  up  health 
evils. 

September  3:  W.  L.  D'Olier,  president  of  Sanitary  Corpo 
ration,  regarded  as  important  witness  in  forthcoming  prose 
cutions,  found  dead  of  shot;  police  uncertain  of  suicide. 

September  28:  Grand  jury  returns  murder  verdict  in 
D'Olier  inquiry. 

October  18:  Connolly  and  Seely  found  guilty;  former 
sentenced. 

October  19:  Connolly  at  Welfare  Island. 

November  6:  Arnold  Rothstein  murdered. 

December  14:  Warren  resigns  as  police  commissioner. 
Grover  Whalen  appointed. 

1929 

February  1:  W.  Schroeder  assumes  office  as  commissioner 
of  hospitals,  and  appoints  Cadley  and  Fay  as  deputies. 

February  4:  Women's  City  Club  report  scores  lateness  in 
opening  magistrates'  courts. 

February  12:  City  Trust  Co.  doors  closed. 

March  14:  Annual  police  parade  revived  by  Commissioner 
Whalen. 

March  16:  G.  W.  Olvany  resigns  as  Tammany  leader. 
Governor  Roosevelt  praises  Olvany 's  service. 

March  28:  F.  Brieger  resigns  from  Harvey  cabinet; 
charges  borough  president  caters  to  politicians. 

March  29:  Whole  official  legislative  program  of  New 
York  City  slaughtered. 

March  29-'  L.  G.  Godley  of  Transit  Commission  rejects 
Equitable  plan  on  funds  and  company  will  lose  franchise. 

April  24:  Curry  elected  Tammany  leader;  defeats  E.  J. 
Ahearn,  in  whose  favor  McCue  resigns;  old  Tammany  idea 
victorious;  Mayor  Walker  becomes  dominating  force;  influ 
ence  of  Smith  and  Foley  regarded  as  destroyed. 


338      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

May  12:  Mrs.  M.  Sullivan,  leader  of  raid  on  Birth  Con 
trol  Clinical  Research  Bureau,  demoted  by  Whalen. 

September  28:  La  Guardia  declares  Magistrate  A.  H. 
Vitale  received  loan  from  Rothstein.  Thomas  scores  Vitale. 

October  4:  Walker  pays  surprise  visit  to  Tammany 
Hall;  reaffirms  fealty;  promises  to  follow  leadership  of  J.  F. 
Curry. 

October  10:  General  Sessions  Judge  Mancuso  resigns  from 
bench  in  City  Trust  Co.  case. 

October  11:  Supreme  Court  Justice  T.  C.  T.  Crain,  Demo 
cratic  nominee  for  district  attorney,  says  powers  of  office 
will  not  lie  dormant  if  he  wins. 

October  12:  Mancuso,  Frederico  Ferrari,  A.  Di  Paola, 
I.  Siegeltuch,  L.  Rose,  S.  Soraci  and  F.  S.  Paterno  indicted 
on  charges  of  violating  penal  law  relating  to  misconduct  of 
directors  of  moneyed  corporations. 

October  16:  Alfred  E.  Smith  appeals  for  reelection  of 
Walker  on  his  record. 

October  18:  Amadeo  A.  Bertini  appointed  to  fill  Judge 
Mancuso' s  place  until  January  1;  later  refused  to  waive 
immunity  before  grand  jury.  Died  March  2,  1931. 

October  19:  Central  Trades  and  Labor  Council  endorses 
T.  M.  Farley,  Democrat,  for  sheriff. 

October  26:  Thomas  makes  public  report  on  school  con 
struction,  prepared  by  Cooperative  and  Constructive  School 
Survey  in  1924;  says  Walker  has  ignored  findings. 

October  30:  J.  P.  Ryan,  president,  Central  Trades  and 
Labor  Council,  says  labor  is  for  Walker;  only  "red"  group 
backs  La  Guardia. 

November  2:  More  than  100  indicted  on  charge  of 
registration  frauds. 

November  6:  Walker  elected  by  497,165  plurality;  hails 
vote  as  vindication. 

November  6:  Jury  finds  Frank  H.  Warder,  former  state 


APPENDIX  339 

bank  superintendent,  guilty  of  accepting  $10,000  bribe  while 
Superintendent  of  Banks  in  City  Trust  case;  sentenced  to  5 
to  10  years  in  Sing  Sing. 

December  6:  Judge  Nott  directs  jury  to  acquit  McManus 
of  the  murder  of  Arnold  Rothstein. 

December  17:  Resolution  fixes  mayor's  salary  at  $40,000, 
controller's  at  $35,000  and  president  of  Board  of  Alder 
men  at  $25,000,  offered  by  Harvey.  Harvey  denies  seeking 
Democratic  favor  by  measure. 

1930 

February  16:  Bar  Association  asks  removal  of  Vitale. 

March  7:  One  hundred  injured  in  riot  of  Communists  in 
Union  Square.  Thomas,  Civil  Liberties  Union,  and  others 
protest  police  brutality.  Thomas  presents  petition  for 
Whalen's  removal  March  17th. 

March  13:  Vitale  continues  testimony,  admitting  he  made 
$165,000  in  4  years  while  on  bench  and  that  he  had  $125,- 
000  when  he  got  loan  from  Rothstein. 

March  14:  Vitale  removed  by  Appellate  Division  on 
account  of  Rothstein  loan. 

April  22:  Governor  Roosevelt  vetoes  bill  to  transfer  cus 
tody  of  registration  books  from  election  inspectors  to  police. 

May  7:  W.  Vause  indicted  on  charge  of  using  mails  to 
defraud.  Also  indicted  for  perjury  by  Federal  grand  jury 
on  testimony  relating  to  fees  for  pier  leases.  Guilty  on  13 
counts,  sentenced  to  6  years  in  Atlanta. 

May  12:  U.  S.  Attorney  Tuttle  subpoenas  income  tax  re 
turns  of  Doyle  and  investigates  bank  accounts;  extensive 
investigation  planned. 

May  14:  Discovered  that  Dock  Commissioner  Cosgrove 
has  filed  no  report  since  1926,  though  annual  accounting  is 
required. 


340      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

May  21:  Whalen  resigns  as  Police  Commissioner.  E.  P. 
Mulrooney  appointed. 

May  22:  Citizens  Union  opposes  appointment  of  J.  F. 
Geraghty  as  commissioner  of  licenses;  cites  criticism  of  de 
partment  during  his  previous  administration.  N.  Thomas 
charges  him  with  leniency  toward  private  employment 
agencies. 

June  10:  Judge  W.  B.  Vause  resigns  from  bench. 

June  11:  Civil  Service  Reform  Association  charges  viola 
tion  of  law  in  paying  salaries  to  Dr.  W.  H.  Walker,  R.  E. 
Walsh  and  8  clerks  in  Brooklyn  Municipal  Court. 

June  21:  Roosevelt  rejects  Socialist  Party's  plea  for 
investigation. 

June  27:  Chairman  Walsh  of  Board  of  Standards  and 
Appeals  indicted  by  New  York  County  grand  jury  on  charge 
of  accepting  gratuity  while  holding  public  office,  and  by 
Federal  grand  jury  for  failure  to  file  income  tax  return  for 
1929.  Resigns  as  chairman.  Acquitted. 

August  5:  Witness  testifies  to  Federal  grand  jury  that 
George  F.  Ewald  paid  $12,000  to  be  a  magistrate. 

August  17:  Association  of  Bar  of  City  of  New  York  asks 
Governor  Roosevelt  to  investigate  charges  of  corruption  in 
appointments  of  magistrates;  S.  S.  Wise  and  Norman 
Thomas  also  appeal. 

August  21:  Doyle  cleared  of  perjury  charge,  jury  dis 
agrees  on  tax  evasion. 

August  23:  Budget  calls  for  10  additional  sergeants-at- 
arms  for  Board  of  Aldermen;  positions  pay  $2,280  a  year 
and  require  services  of  employees  only  1  day  a  week. 

August  24:  Roosevelt  drops  idea  of  city-wide  inquiry. 

August  26:  Appellate  Division  votes  to  investigate  magis 
trate's  court  in  Manhattan  and  Bronx;  Thomas  calls  investi 
gation  ludicrously  inadequate. 

September  18:  Ewald  and  Healy  refuse  to  waive  immunity; 


APPENDIX  341 

grand  jury  examines  their  bank  accounts;  Ewald,  wife  and 
Healy  indicted. 

September  24:  Seabury  and  Kresel  get  wide  powers  to 
investigate  courts. 

September  25:  J.  F.  Curry  and  C.  H.  Kohler  and  other 
Tammany  leaders  refuse  to  waive  immunity;  Mrs.  Healy 
refuses  to  be  sworn. 

September  29:  Governor  Roosevelt  in  letter  to  Mayor 
Walker  asks  that  Tammany  men  testify;  mayor  promises  to 
demand  that  aides  answer  questions. 

October  4:  Seven  Tammany  leaders  to  waive  immunity 
partially;  Special  Prosecutor  H.  C.  Todd  objects  to  limi 
tation  to  official  acts  only  and  rejects  offer  because  office- 
buying  is  excluded. 

October  5:  Roosevelt  acquiesces  in  Tammany  leaders'  de 
cision  and  C.  H.  Tuttle  charges  Roosevelt  with  attempting 
to  bury  investigation  by  limiting  immunity  waivers  to  official 
acts. 

October  6:  Tammany  lawyers  back  J.  F.  Curry's  stand  on 
refusing  to  sign  immunity  waiver. 

October  7:  Roosevelt,  in  letter,  refuses  to  authorize  wide 
investigation  of  courts. 

October  8:  Roosevelt  refuses*  to  make  public  files  relating 
to  appointment  of  Bertini. 

October  13:  City  Affairs  Committee  reports  enormous 
wastes  in  condemnation  of  school  sites. 

October  18:  Board  of  Estimate  votes  $40,000  for  inquiry 
into  past  and  present  condemnation  proceedings,  to  be  con 
ducted  by  Leonard  Wallstein. 

October  28:  Roosevelt  says  allegations  of  wholesale  corrup 
tion  are  made  for  partisan  purposes. 

November  4:  H.  Riegelman  charges  that  35,000  have 
registered  fraudulently  in  New  York  County. 

November  25:  Appellate  Division  opens  public  hearings 


342      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

on  magistrates  court;  J.  C.  Weston,  former  process  server, 
exposes  vice  ring  of  bribery,  graft  and  corruption  in  Women's 
Court. 

November  26:  At  Appellate  Division  hearings  girl  tells 
how  she  was  "framed"  in  Women's  Court  vice  ring;  wit 
nesses  tell  of  Magistrate  Silbermann's  alleged  favoritism  on 
bench;  bail  bond  "racketeering"  revealed. 

December  4:  Acuna  identifies  13  policemen  as  "framers" 
in  vice  cases;  girl  victims  testify  at  Appellate  Division  hear 
ing;  cost  of  "ring"  to  taxpayers  estimated  at  $50,000  to 
$100,000  annually. 

December  10:  Magistrate  McQuade  resigns  as  Seabury 
moves  to  investigate  his  conduct  on  bench. 

December  12:  Bank  of  United  States  closes. 

1931 

January  7:  Magistrate  Goodman  resigns  under  fire;  pleads 
illness. 

January  17:  Magistrate  Simpson  resigns  as  he  faces 
inquiry. 

January  23:  Ewald  case  ends  in  dismissals. 

January  31:  Magistrate  Brodsky  cleared  of  any  wrong 
doing. 

February  8:  Forty  witnesses  in  vice  frame-ups  vanish. 

February  11:  Isidor  Kresel  resigns  as  special  counsel  in 
Appellate  Division  inquiry  because  of  indictment  (later 
acquitted)  as  director  of  Bank  of  United  States. 

February  25:  Levey  tells  of  speakeasy  graft  collected  by 
Quinlivan  and  O'Connor;  got  $40  a  day  as  collector. 

February  26:  Walker's  administration  defended  by  Harvey. 

February  27:  Roosevelt  signs  bill  providing  contingent 
fund  for  investigation. 

February  28:  Appellate  Division  of  Second  Department 


APPENDIX  343 

opposes  extension  of  court  inquiry  to  Brooklyn,  Queens  and 
Richmond. 

February  28:  Jean  Norris  got  $1,000  for  testimonial  ad; 
admits  to  Seabury  it  was  unethical;  admits  convicting  women 
on  unsupported  word  of  policemen. 

March  8:  Governor  Roosevelt,  in  reply  to  charges  by  City 
Club,  says  he  will  order  investigation  of  District  Attorney's 
office;  appoints  Seabury  to  head  investigation. 

March  18:  City  Affairs  Committee  files  formal  charges 
against  Mayor  Walker. 

March  24:  Roosevelt  sends  copy  of  charges  to  Walker  with 
request  for  reply. 

March  24:  Legislature  puts  through  resolution  providing 
for  general  inquiry  into  New  York  City  affairs  with  Seabury 
as  counsel  of  legislative  committee. 

March  26:  Tammany  warns  Roosevelt  that  it  will  con 
sider  it  an  unfriendly  act  if  he  refers  charges  against  Walker 
to  legislative  investigating  committee.  (Roosevelt  did  not.) 

April  12:  Borough  President  Harvey  orders  public  hearing 
on  charges  of  City  Affairs  Committee  against  Klein,  Queens 
superintendent  of  highways. 

April  17:  Mayor's  Committee  recommends  abolition  of 
Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals  and  substitution  of  2  units. 
(Nothing  was  ever  done  about  it.) 

April  20:  City  Affairs  Committee  asks  Roosevelt  for  oppor 
tunity  to  file  rebuttal. 

April  21:  Walker  files  answer  to  City  Affairs  Committee's 
charges. 

April  22:  Holmes  and  Wise  characterize  Walker's  reply  as 
reckless  and  superficial;  ask  governor  to  preside  at  trial  of 
mayor,  or  appoint  commissioner. 

April  22:  District  Attorney  Crain  says  he  was  satisfied  with 
his  own  investigation  of  courts. 


344      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

April  26:  F.  Brieger  files  charges  against  Harvey  in  third 
plea  for  action  by  governor. 

April  29:  Roosevelt  dismisses  City  Affairs  Committee 
charges  against  Walker;  rejects  rebuttal  plea. 

April  29:  Board  of  Estimate  votes  to  grant  franchise  to 
Brooklyn  Bus  Corp.  for  20  lines,  17  Brooklyn  and  3  Queens, 
and  Mayor  Walker  signs  franchise. 

May  2:  Slot  machine  profit  $20,000,000  inquiry  shows; 
witnesses  describe  organized  system. 

May  16:  Supreme  Court  Justice  MacCrate  accuses  Queens 
Borough  officials  of  assisting  New  York  Air  Terminal,  Inc., 
to  close  part  of  Old  Bowery  Road,  public  highway,  for  de 
velopment  of  air  field. 

May  17:  Testimony  suit  in  New  York  Air  Terminal,  Inc., 
reveals  that  L.  Halleran,  brother  of  J.  J.  Halleran,  received 
$10,000  fee  for  airport  deal;  Commissioner  Halleran  ex 
plains  deal. 

May  26:  Irving  Klein  and  F.  H.  Shepheard  indicted  on 
bribery  charges;  Klein  dismissed  from  post  as  superintendent 
of  Queens  Highway  Bureau.  Both  acquitted  but  Klein  later 
convicted  on  separate  indictment. 

May  28:  M.  Mager,  Queens  politician,  indicted  on  charge 
of  having  conspired  with  Klein;  not  convicted. 

June  9:  Attorney  General  Bennett  orders  investigation  of 
stock  selling  methods  of  New  York  Airport,  Inc.  Borough 
President  Harvey  and  Commissioner  J.  J.  Halleran  are 
directors. 

June  9:  As  result  of  fight  against  tentative  awards  in 
Rockaway  Beach  condemnation  case,  city  saves  $4,459,643; 
L.  M.  Wallstein  receives  $160,000  fee  for  service. 

June  16:  Assistant  Attorney  General  P.  J.  McCauley 
alleges  gross  misstatements  in  stock  selling  of  New  York 
City  Airport,  Inc.;  Harvey  resigns  from  board  of  directors 
but  later  withdraws  resignation. 


APPENDIX  345 

June  18:  Prosecutor  shows  letter  from  Harvey,  accepting 
place  on  board  of  New  York  City  Airport,  Inc.,  was  used  as 
basis  for  advertising  promoting  stock  sales. 

June  23:  L.  B.  Halleran  admits  no  board  action  on  sale  to 
New  York  City  Airport,  Inc.,  for  $80,000  of  land  costing 
$22,000;  J.  J.  Halleran  concedes  advantage  was  taken  of 
Harvey. 

June  26:  Magistrate  Jean  Norris  found  guilty  on  5  charges; 
removed  from  office  as  unfit. 

July  3:  Halleran  admits  he  does  not  agree  with  some  of 
promotion  methods  of  New  York  City  Airport,  Inc.;  secre 
tary  of  state  issues  dissolution  certificate  for  corporation. 
State  ends  inquiry. 

July  3:  Magistrate  Silbermann  removed  from  bench  by 
unanimous  vote,  for  giving  political  favors. 

July  11:  Board  of  Estimate  hearing  on  Queens  bus  fran 
chises;  dissension  between  Controller  C.  W.  Berry  and  Mayor 
Walker  over  forms  of  grants  to  North  Shore  Bus  Corp.  and 
Jamaica  Buses,  Inc.;  Walker  attacks  N.  Thomas  and  refuses 
to  allow  P.  Blanshard  to  ask  questions. 

July  20:  City  Affairs  Committee  asks  Mayor  Walker  to 
exclude  Doyle  and  McCooey  and  Conroy  from  further  prac 
tice  before  Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals. 

July  24:  Justice  Sherman  of  Appellate  Division  grants 
stay  to  Doyle;  Seabury  says  stay  was  obtained  by  trickery  and 
deceit. 

July  26:  Seabury  traces  telephone  call  from  J.  F.  Curry 
apartment  to  Lake  Placid,  N.  Y.,  where  Justice  Sherman 
granted  stay  to  Doyle. 

July  28:  Doyle  jailed  as  appeal  is  denied  on  contempt 
charge. 

August  5:  Roosevelt  dismisses  charges  against  Harvey  with 
severe  censure. 

August  15:  Doyle  denies  having  bribed  officials. 


346      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

August  15:  Blanshard,  of  City  Affairs  Committee,  sues  to 
annul  Brooklyn  Bus  Corp.  franchise,  and  asks  writ  to  bar 
service. 

August  18:  N.  Thomas  asks  bar  Association  to  investigate 
action  of  Justice  Sherman  in  granting  stay  to  Doyle. 

August  26:  Governor  Roosevelt,  in  message,  presents  pro 
posed  bill  to  give  Hofstadter  Committee  immunity  power, 
and  proposed  revision  of  penal  code;  immunity  bills  passed 
August  28. 

August  31:  City  Affairs  Committee  attacks  Fifth  Avenue 
Coach  Co.  and  says  4  Chicago  men  "milk"  revenues  through 
system  of  holding  companies. 

September  1:  Seabury,  in  report  on  District  Attorney  Crain, 
recommends  dismissal  of  charges,  but  criticizes  conduct  of 
office;  Governor  Roosevelt  follows  recommendation. 

September  26:  Investigation  reveals  that  out  of  514  per 
sons  arrested  in  gambling  raids  of  1926  and  1927  only  5 
were  held  for  Special  Sessions. 

October  5:  G.  W.  Olvany,  refusing  to  testify  on  fees  in 
cases  before  city  departments,  pleads  confidential  relation 
between  lawyers  and  client. 

October  15:  Supreme  Court  refuses  to  dismiss  Blanshard's 
suit  on  Brooklyn  buses. 

October  16:  Central  Trades  and  Labor  Council  endorses 
almost  all  Democratic  candidates. 

October  17:  Sherwood  in  Mexico  on  honeymoon. 

October  29:  Mayor,  in  campaign  speech,  transforms  revela 
tions  into  vindications  of  administration. 

November  2:  Sherwood  arrives  at  San  Antonio;  disappears. 

November  5:  Promoters  agree  to  stock-sale  injunction  of 
New  York  City  Airport,  Inc. 

November  5:  N.  Thomas  charges  vote  theft  in  2nd,  4th 
and  17th  Assembly  Districts;  sending  complaint  to  Board  of 
Elections. 

November  10:  Olvany's  income  reported  to  have  totaled 


APPENDIX  347 

more  than  $2,000,000  during  4y2  years  of  Tammany  Hall 
leadership. 

November  13:  Tammany  club  leaders  testify  falsely  dated 
relief  cards  were  distributed  during  registration  week. 

November  16:  City  Affairs  Committee  charges  Borough 
President  Levy  with  having  used  unemployment  relief  fund 
to  get  votes. 

December  2:  Chairman  of  23d  district  election  board  re 
moved  as  result  of  N.  Thomas'  charges;  others  censored. 

December  18:  J.  T.  Quinn  admits  that  as  Sheriff  he  re 
ceived  $32,000  from  late  J.  M.  Phillips,  sewer  contractor; 
Deputy  City  Clerk  J.  J.  McCormick  attributes  larger  part  of 
his  income  to  tips  from  bridegrooms. 

1932 

January  13:  Sale  of  fugitive  Russell  Sherwood's  assets 
brings  $310  after  court  seizes  his  property  as  punishment 
for  evading  Seabury. 

January  22:  Mayor  Walker  acclaimed  at  Tammany  victory 
dinner  says  investigations  seek  only  self-glorification. 

January  25:  Seabury  makes  Intermediate  Report. 

February  25:  Sheriff  Farley  removed  by  Roosevelt  after 
hearing. 

February  27:  Seabury  in  speech  indirectly  attacks  Roosevelt 
for  delay  and  deference  to  Tammany. 

March  1:  Roosevelt  appoints  District  Leader  John  Sheehy 
to  succeed  Farley  as  Sheriff  with  approval  of  John  F.  Curry. 

March  3:  H.  C.  Perry,  chief  clerk  of  City  Court,  tried  by 
City  Court  judges  for  falsification  of  bank  accounts  and 
acquitted. 

March  6:  City  Affairs  Committee  files  charge  against  W.  L. 
Kavanagh  of  Department  of  Water  Supply  for  unexplained 
bank  accounts.  Charges  later  dismissed  by  his  superior,  John 
Dietz,  after  whitewash. 


348      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

March  10:  Former  Sheriff  Farley  acquitted  by  jury  of 
taking  interest  on  funds  in  his  care. 

March  1 7:  William  J.  Flynn  of  Bronx  revealed  as  making 
huge  profit  by  building  garage  on  area  he  had  made 
restricted. 

March  18:  City  Affairs  Committee  asks  removal  action 
against  John  Theofel,  boss  of  Queens. 

March  27:  City  Affairs  Committee  asks  Roosevelt  to  re 
move  Sheriff  J.  A.  McQuade  of  Kings  County. 

March  31:  Roosevelt  in  letter  to  Holmes  and  Wise  refuses 
to  remove  McQuade  and  attacks  City  Affairs  Committee 
officers. 

April  1:  R.  C.  Bastress  and  J.  I.  Cohalan  convicted  of 
accepting  bribe  and  get  four-month  terms. 

April  2:  City  Affairs  Committee  through  Holmes  and 
Wise  reply  to  Governor  Roosevelt. 

April  13:  J.  J.  (marriage  license)  McCormick  indicted  for 
evading  taxes.  Never  convicted. 

April  15:  Seabury  shows  that  laxity  in  Bureau  of  Weights 
and  Measures  reported  to  Mayor  Walker  and  Commissioner 
Higgins  was  punished  only  by  scolding. 

April  27:  C.  B.  Rose  testifies  that  Senator  Hastings  de 
manded  contribution  to  Mayor  Walker's  campaign  in  1925 
as  step  toward  obtaining  Equitable  franchise.  Hastings  to 
get  third  of  Equitable' s  stock  without  investing  anything. 

May  5:  Surrogate  Hetherington  dismisses  City  Affairs 
Committee  charges  against  John  Theofel. 

May  5:  Controller  Berry  charges  that  Commissioner  De- 
laney  fixed  reports  on  bus  franchises  to  suit  Mayor  Walker, 
and  mayor  forced  Board  of  Estimate  to  approve  Equitable 
franchise. 

May  7:  Queens  bus  franchises  defeated  in  uproarious 
meeting  of  Board  of  Estimate;  Walker  calls  N.  Thomas  and 
P.  Blanshard  enemies  of  the  public. 


APPENDIX  349 

May  12:  Evidence  about  bonuses  of  Gerhard  M.  Dahl  by 
B.  M.  T.  ruled  out  of  order  by  Hofstadter. 

May  13:  ].  A.  Sisto  admits  giving  $26,000  in  bonds  to 
Walker. 

May  23:  City  Affairs  Committee  asks  Sheriff  John  Sheehy 
why  he  does  not  remove  Deputies  Curran  and  Flaherty  be 
cause  of  unexplained  bank  accounts. 

May  26-27:  Walker  testifies  before  Seabury  and  entire 
testimony  is  published  in  press. 

May  21  to  June  4:  Governor  Roosevelt  is  silent  about 
Walker  testimony. 

June  1:  Seabury  reveals  that  Russell  Sherwood  drew  large 
sums  from  secret  account  before  Mayor  Walker  sailed  for 
Europe. 

June  2:  Dr.  W.  H.  Walker  revealed  as  splitting  fees  with 
physicians  handling  workmen's  compensation  cases. 

June  9:  Seabury  sends  charges  against  Mayor  Walker  to 
Governor  Roosevelt. 

June  18:  Irving  Klein  convicted  of  falsifying  records  in 
Rosati  road  oil  case. 

June  20:  Samuel  Levy,  Tammany  henchman  and  borough 
president  of  Manhattan,  elected  president  of  National  Jewish 
Orthodox  Congregations  of  United  States  and  Canada. 

June  23:  Roosevelt  orders  Walker  to  answer  removal 
charges. 

July  29:  Walker  replies  to  Seabury  charges. 

August  4:  Governor  Roosevelt  orders  Mayor  Walker  to 
answer  Seabury  charges  at  public  hearings  in  Albany. 

August  12:  Walker  hearings  begin. 

August  29:  Supreme  Court  Justice  E.  J.  Staley  rules  that 
Roosevelt  has  power  to  try  and  remove  Walker,  but  severely 
attacks  governor  for  method  of  conducting  hearings. 

September  1:  Mayor  Walker  resigns. 


APPENDIX  II 

THE  SEABURY  CHARGES  AGAINST  MAYOR 
WALKER 

1.  That  he  has   failed  properly  to  execute  the  duties 
which,  as  Mayor  of  the  City  of  New  York,  it  was  incum 
bent  upon  him  to  discharge;  that  he  has  so  acted  in  his 
official  capacity  as  to  prejudice  the  best  interests  of  the  people 
of  the  City  of  New  York;  that,  in  the  course  of  his  official 
conduct,  he  has  been  actuated  by  improper  and  illegal  con 
siderations;  that  he  has  while  holding  the  office  of  Mayor, 
been  guilty  of  gross  improprieties;  and  that  his  explanations 
of  circumstances  seriously  reflecting  upon  the  manner  in 
which,  as  its  chief  executive,  he  has  conducted  the  affairs  of 
the  City  of  New  York,  have  been  either  so  incomplete  or 
so  unworthy  of  credence  as  not  to  constitute  acceptable 
explanations. 

2.  That  the  Mayor  accepted  ten  $1,000  Reliance  Bronze  & 
Steel  Corporation  bonds,  ten  $1,000  Parmelee  Transporta 
tion  Company  bonds,  and  thirteen  $1,000  Hygrade  Food 
Products  Corporation  bonds,  said  thirty-three  bonds  being 
of  the   aggregate  value  of  approximately   $26,000,    from 
J.  A.  Sisto,  who  then  had  a  large  financial  interest  in  bring 
ing  about  a  limitation  of  the  number  of  taxicabs  operating 
in  New  York  City  and  who  was  desirous  of  inducing  the 
Mayor  to  bring  about  such  a  limitation  of  the  number  of 
said  taxicabs;  that  thereafter  the  Mayor  actively  sponsored 
and  caused  to  be  enacted  legislation,  the  passage  of  which 

350 


APPENDIX  351 

was,  to  his  knowledge,  desired  by  the  said  J.  A.  Sisto  and 
by  certain  corporations,  in  the  securities  of  which  the  said 
J.  A.  Sisto  and  Samuel  Ungerleider  &  Company  were  sub 
stantially  interested. 

3.  That  at  a  time  when  Samuel  Ungerleider  &  Company, 
in  association  with  the  aforesaid  J.  A.  Sisto,  was  substan 
tially  interested  in  the  future  of  Parmalee  securities,  the 
value  of  which  would  be  increased  by  a  limitation  of  the 
number  of  taxicabs  operating  in  New  York  City,  Samuel 
Ungerleider  &  Company  paid  Russell   T.   Sherwood,   the 
Mayor's  financial  agent,  $22,000  more  than  the  then  market 
worth  of  shares  of  stock  which  Ungerleider  &  Company 
purported  to  buy  from  Sherwood;  that  thereafter  the  Mayor 
actively  sponsored  and  caused  to  be  enacted  legislation,  the 
passage  of  which  was,  to  his  knowledge,  desired  by  the  said 
J.  A.  S'isto  and  by  certain  corporations,  in  the  securities  of 
which  the  said  J.  A.  Sisto  and  Samuel  Ungerleider  &  Com 
pany  were  substantially  interested. 

4.  That  the  Mayor,  in  violation  of  the  provisions  of  Sec 
tion  1533  of  the  Greater  New  York  Charter,  was  the  owner 
of  ten  $1,000  debenture  bonds  of  Reliance  Bronze  &  Steel 
Corporation,  convertible  into  stock  of  the  corporation  at  the 
election  of  the  holder  thereof,  with  which  corporation  the 
City  of  New  York,  on  or  about  February  3,  1931,  entered 
into  a  contract  for  the  purchase  of  104  traffic  light  standards, 
at  a  purchase  price  of  approximately  $43,000. 

5.  That,  to  the  great  detriment  of  the  City  of  New  York 
and  its  inhabitants,  the  Mayor,   in  violation  of  his  duty, 
advocated  and  used  the  influence  of  his  office  to  procure  an 
award  of  a  bus  franchise  for  the  Boroughs  of  Manhattan, 
Brooklyn  and  Queens  to  Equitable  Coach  Company,  Inc.,  a 
corporation   which   he  knew  was   not  fit   or   qualified   to 
receive  it. 

6.  That  the  Mayor  advocated  and  used  the  influence  of 


352      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

his  office  to  procure  said  award  of  said  bus  franchise  to  the 
Equitable  Coach  Company,  Inc.,  in  furtherance  of  a  plan 
to  benefit  a  group  of  persons  of  whom  his  friend  and  asso 
ciate,  Senator  John  A.  Hastings,  was  one. 

7.  That  the  Mayor  improperly  made  possible  and  facili 
tated  the  purchase  of  300  shares  of  Interstate  Trust  Com 
pany  stock,  which  stock  was  received  by  or  on  behalf  of 
J.  Allan  Smith,  Frank  R.  Fageol  and  John  A.  Hastings, 
promoters  of  the  Equitable  Coach  Company,  Inc.,  and  May 
Arter  Smith,  wife  of  J.  Allan  Smith,  prior  to  the  date  when 
that  company  was  granted  a  bus  franchise  by  the  City  of 
New  York,  but  while  its  application  therefor  was  pending, 
and  that  200  shares  of  this  stock  were  used  to  secure  a  loan 
of  $23,000,  which  sum  was  deposited  in  the  account  of 
J.  Allan  Smith,  Trustee,  the  account  which  was  used  to 
defray  the  expenses  of  procuring  said  franchise. 

8.  That  on  or  about  the  day  prior  to  the  signing  of  the 
Equitable  franchise,  the  Mayor  was  provided  with  a  Letter 
of  Credit,  in  the  amount  of  $10,000,  which  was  paid  for  in 
cash  by  J.  Allan  Smith,  one  of  the  promoters,  and  the  agent 
of  all  of  the  promoters,  of  the  Equitable  Coach  Company, 
Inc.,  and  that  subsequently,  and  after  the  exhaustion  of  the 
said  Letter  of  Credit,  but  while  the  Equitable  Coach  Com 
pany  was  and  continued  unable  to  comply  with  the  require 
ment  of  its  franchise  that  it  commence  operations  thereunder, 
and  during  the  period  when  the  Equitable  Coach  Company 
was,  from  time  to  time,  applying  for  and  receiving  from 
the  Board  of  Estimate  and  Apportionment  extensions  of  the 
time  within  which  to  commence  such  operations,  the  said 
J.  Allan  Smith  paid  a  draft  in  the  amount  of  $3,000,  plus 
interest,  for  the  payment  of  which  the  Mayor  was  liable. 

9.  That  the  Mayor  permitted  himself  to  be  placed  in  a 
position  inconsistent  with  the  position  which  he,  as  a  public 


APPENDIX  353 

officer,  should  at  all  times  have  maintained,  by  accepting 
substantial  gratuities,  which  he  calls  "beneficences,"  from 
persons  who  might  seek  benefits  from  the  municipal  author 
ities.  In  the  case  of  Paul  Block,  such  "beneficences"  were 
accepted  from  a  person  who  subsequently  became  interested 
in  a  corporation  which  sought,  and  procured,  approval  from 
the  Board  of  Transportation  of  a  tile  which  said  Company 
intended  to  manufacture  for  use  in  the  subway. 

10.  That  during  the  period  of  five  years  next  succeeding 
his  entering  the  office,  Mayor  Walker,  for  the  purpose  of 
concealing  his  interest  therein,  caused  his  financial  transac 
tions  to  be  conducted  through,  and  in  the  name  of,  Russell 
T.  Sherwood;  that  this  agent,  during  said  period,  deposited 
in  bank  and  brokerage  accounts  close  to  a  million  dollars, 
of  which  upwards  of  $700,000  was  in  cash,  and  that  the 
Mayor  has  failed  and  refused  satisfactorily  to  explain  the 
sources  of  the  moneys  belonging  to  him  and  deposited  by 
Sherwood  in  said  accounts. 

11.  That  as   soon  as  it  became  known  that  the  Joint 
Legislative  Committee  desired  to  examine  the  said  Russell 
T.  Sherwood  with  respect  to  his  financial  transactions  on 
behalf  of  the  Mayor,  the  said  Sherwood  disappeared,  and 
the  Mayor  has  failed  and  neglected  either  to  cause  his  agent 
to  return,  or  to  cooperate  with  the  Committee  in  its  efforts 
to  locate  him,  thereby  preventing  the  disclosure  of  facts 
essential  to  a  complete  investigation  of  the  conduct  of  his 
office  by  the  Mayor. 

12.  That  on  May  23,  1932,  a  subpoena  duces  tecum  of 
the  Joint  Legislative  Committee  was  served  upon  Mayor 
Walker,  calling  for  the  production,  on  May  25,  1932,  of  all 
records  of  his  personal  financial  transactions   from  Janu 
ary    1,    1926,    to    date.     When    the    Mayor   appeared   on 
May  25,  1932,  for  examination  at  public  hearing,  he  brought 


354      WHAT'S  THE  MATTER  WITH  NEW  YORK 

with   him,    in   response   to   this   subpoena,    the   following 
papers: 

Cancelled  vouchers  of  his  account  with  the  Chatham  & 
Phoenix  Bank  &  Trust  Company  for  one  month  in 
1930  and  3%  months  in  1931; 

Stub  check  books  for  the  same  account  for  one  month 
in  1930  and  eleven  months  in  1931  and  for  1932. 

When  questioned  as  to  his  failure  to  produce  check  books 
or  cancelled  vouchers  for  the  years  1926,  1927,  1928  and 
1929,  he  stated  that  if  any  records  were  in  existence  they 
were  in  the  law  office  with  which  he  was  connected  before 
he  assumed  the  office  of  Mayor,  but  that  he  had  not  per 
sonally  made  inquiry  as  to  whether  or  not  those  records  were 
in  existence. 

He  was  examined  in  public  a  second  time  on  the  day 
following,  but  produced  no  further  documents  or  papers  in 
response  to  the  subpoena. 

On  June  2,  1932,  ten  days  after  the  service  of  said  sub 
poena  upon  him,  and  seven  days  after  the  conclusion  of  his 
examination,  he  produced,  in  further  compliance  with  the 
subpoena,  cancelled  vouchers  of  his  Chatham  &  Phoenix 
Bank  &  Trust  Company  account  for  the  period  January  5, 
1927,  to  June  21,  1927.  At  this  time  he  also  produced 
check  stub  books  on  the  same  account  for  the  period  begin 
ning  June  21,  1927,  and  ending  with  November,  1930. 

That  the  Mayor  has  not  produced  a  single  record  showing 
his  financial  transactions  during  the  year  1926  nor  for  the 
first  five  and  a  half  months  of  1927. 

That  he  has  not  produced  the  cancelled  vouchers  of  his 
Chatham  &  Phoenix  checking  account  for  the  period  from 
January  1,  1926,  to  January,  1927;  for  the  six  months, 
June  21,  1927,  to  December  30,  1927;  for  any  part  of  the 
year  1928;  for  any  part  of  the  year  1929;  for  the  first  eleven 


APPENDIX  355 

months  of  the  year  1930;  for  the  eight  and  a  half  months 
from  April  16  to  December  31,  1931,  nor  for  any  part  of 
the  year  1932,  of  which  nearly  five  months  had  elapsed  at 
the  time  when  the  subpoena  was  served. 

13.  That  Mayor  Walker,  in  his  testimony  before  the  Joint 
Legislative  Committee,  was  neither  frank  nor  truthful,  and 
that  his  purpose  in  being  evasive  and  untruthful  was  to 
hinder  and  obstruct  the  Joint  Legislative  Committee  in  the 
prosecution    of    the    investigation    which    the    Legislature 
directed  it  to  make,  and  to  prevent  an  effective  investigation 
of  his  activities  as  Mayor  of  the  City  of  New  York,  and  a 
complete  disclosure  of  his  conduct  in  such  office. 

14.  That  the  Mayor  neglected  his  official  duty  in  per 
mitting  his  Corporation  Counsel  to  designate,  in  City  com 
pensation  cases,  doctors  who  split  their  fees  with  the  Mayor's 
brother. 

15.  That  in  the  matters  above  referred  to,  and  generally 
since  he  assumed  office,  the  Mayor's  conduct  has  been  char 
acterized  by  such  malfeasance  and  nonfeasance  in  disregard 
of  the  duties  of  his  office  as  Mayor,  and  he  has  conducted 
himself,  to  the  prejudice  of  the  City  of  New  York  and  its 
inhabitants,  in  a  manner  so  far  unbecoming  the  high  office 
which  he  holds,  as  to  render  him  unfit  to  continue  in  the 
office  of  Mayor. 


INDEX 


Abraham  Lincoln  High  School  site, 

238. 
Accomplishments    of    New    York, 

civic  and  private,  326. 
Acuna,  Chile,   144. 
Administration,    changes    proposed 

for,  319. 

Aldermen,  see  Board  of. 
Amalgamated    Clothing    Workers' 

apartments,  259. 
American  Telephone  and  Telegraph 

Co.,  270. 

Apartments,  cooperative,  259. 
Association  of  the  Bar,  107,  125; 

report  on  third  degree,  133. 
Astor,  John  Jacob,  and  Tweed,  7; 

family  fortune,  230. 
Augenblick,  Samuel,  appraisal  fees, 

240. 
Automobiles,  city-owned,  34. 

Bail-bond  racket,  150-152. 
Barbato  case,  134-135. 
Barnard,  Judge  George,  7. 
Battle,  George  Gordon,  110. 
Berry,  Controller  Charles  W.,  20, 

115;  administrative  record,  162; 

on  Queens   bus   franchise,    214; 

exposure  of  land  racket,  232. 
Bertini,     Amadeo     A.,     116;     ap 
pointed  by  Roosevelt,  179. 
Black,    General   William,    on   pier 

leases,  58. 

Black,  Justice  William  H.,  124. 
Block,  Paul,  beneficence  to  Walker 

173. 

Block-Aid  Plan,  299. 
Board  of  Aldermen,  20. 
Borough  Presidents,  powers  of,  21- 

22. 
Board  of  Education,  hiring  of  Dr. 


Walker,  41 ;  purchase  of  land  for 
schools,  234-238. 

Board  of  Estimate,  18-20;  a  source 
of  information  on  city  purchases, 
237;  structure  of,  308. 

Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals, 
49;  decisions  of,  50;  investiga 
tion  of,  52. 

Boylan,  John  J.,  fees  for  land 
appraisals,  240. 

Boylan,  Dr.  William  A.,  235. 

Boyle,  John  N.,  53. 

Brieger,  Fritz,  fight  against  Harvey, 
203,  206. 

Brooklyn  Bus  Corporation,  212, 
217-219. 

Brooklyn  bus  franchise,  211,  217- 
220. 

Brooklyn  Edison  Company,  265. 

Brooklyn  Garden  Apartments,  257. 

Brooklyn-Manhattan  Transit  Corpo 
ration,  171-172;  owner  of  Brook 
lyn  Bus  Corporation,  212;  sub 
way,  274. 

Bryce,  Lord,  on  city  government,  6. 

Buchler,  William  Paul,  205. 

Budget,  see  Kohler,  Charles  L. 

Building  permits,  secured  by  Doyle, 
49-50. 

Burr,  Aaron,  leader  of  Tammany, 
6. 

Bus  franchises,  13,  54-55,  167-174, 
210-228;  business  and  Tammany, 
11. 

Cardozo,  Judge  Albert,  7. 
Carrington,  Edward  C.,  61. 
Catholic  Church,   116-117. 
Catholics  in  politics,  29-30. 
Chamber   of   Commerce,    share   in 
Lexow  investigation,  8. 


357 


358 


INDEX 


Chase,  Stuart,  3,  287. 

Chrystie-Forsythe  Street  widening, 
234. 

Cincinnati,  government  in,  313. 

Citizen's  Union,  in  Equitable  Coach 
scandal,  167;  exposure  of  land 
racket,  232. 

City  Affairs  Committee,  strength 
of,  14;  charges  against  Curran, 
48;  charges  against  Walker,  59, 
163,  166,  183-185;  charges 
against  Dr.  Walker  and  asso 
ciates,  74;  charges  against  Theo- 
fel,  106,  188;  attack  on  judges' 
vacations,  121,  123;  charges 
against  Farley,  186;  charges 
against  McQuade,  188;  reply  to 
Roosevelt,  190-194;  fight  on 
Brooklyn  bus  franchise,  211,  217, 
219;  in  Queens  bus  franchise, 
213;  exposure  of  land  racket, 
232;  study  of  increased  land 
values,  244;  on  housing,  257- 
258,  261;  on  subway  recapture 
price,  277;  against  seven-day 
week,  296;  in  unemployment  re 
lief,  299. 

City  Club,  pamphlet  on  Croker, 
10;  report  on  court  reform,  127; 
charges  against  Grain,  183. 

City  manager  plan,  302-304. 

Civil  Service  Commission,  Munici 
pal,  35. 

Civil  Service  Laws,  evasion  of,  37- 
40. 

Civil  Service  Reform  Association, 
34,  41. 

Claessens,  August,  elected  on  re 
count,  90. 

Cohalan,  Daniel  F.,  110. 

Columbia  Finance  Corporation,  55. 

Committee  of  Fourteen,  hoodwink 
ing  of,  144. 

Committee  of  One  Thousand, 
charges  against  Farley,  186. 

Committee  on  Plan  and  Survey, 
quoted,  250-251. 

Condemnation  proceedings,  reforms 
for,  241. 

Connolly,  Maurice  E.,  198-199. 

Controller,  powers  of,  21. 


Consolidated  Gas  Company,  265- 
269. 

Cooley,  Edwin  J.,  resignation  of, 
152. 

Copeland,  Royal  S.,  115. 

Cords,  Charles  D.,  234. 

Cosgrove,  Dock  Commissioner,  61. 

Courts,  laxity  in  enforcing  election 
laws,  87;  cases  covered  by,  103- 
104;  importance  of  Magistrate's, 
105. 

Crain,  Thomas  C.  T.,  investigation 
of  pier  leases,  56;  investigations 
of  magistrates,  93,  115,  180; 
charges  against  by  City  Club, 
183. 

Crime,  Society  for  the  Prevention 
of,  8. 

Croker,  Richard,  exposure  of,  6; 
testimony  of,  9-11. 

Cropsey,  Justice,  50. 

Culkin,  and  building  permits,  44. 

Curran,  Peter  J.,  in  Seabury  investi 
gation,  47-48;  no  action  against 
by  Roosevelt,  189. 

Curran,  Rev.  Edward  Lodge, 
quoted,  117. 

Curry,  John  F.,  22;  at  Tammany 
Hall,  27;  support  of  district 
leaders,  28;  private  activities, 
45;  support  of  Doyle,  52;  in 
sulted,  109;  intervention  for 
Doyle,  124-125;  refusal  to  waive 
immunity,  182;  consultation  with 
Roosevelt,  189. 

Cuvillier,  Louis,  conduct  in  Sea- 
bury  investigation,  77. 

Dahl,  Gerhard  M.,  171,  212;  sal 
ary,  217-218,  273. 

Delaney,  John  H.,  report  on  Equi 
table  Coach  Co.,  169;  in  Queens 
bus  franchise,  215-216;  report 
on  bus  franchises,  220;  on  spe 
cial  assessments,  243;  fear  of 
Untermyer,  276;  from  typo 
graphical  union,  295. 

District-leader  government,  income 
of  leader,  24;  County  Executive 
Committee,  27;  selection  of 
county  leaders,  27;  centering  in 


INDEX 


359 


Tammany  Hall,  27;  promotion 
in,  30-31;  salaries  of,  31-34. 

D'Olier,  W.  L.,  198. 

Dore,  Edward  S.,  110. 

Doyle,  Dr.  William  F.,  and  zoning 
privileges,  44;  building  permits, 
48-50,  51-52;  stay  of  sentence, 
124;  Harvey's  charges  against, 
165. 

Dreyer,  August,  testimony  before 
Seabury,  113. 

Dubonnet,  Mrs.  Paul,  on  clothes 
budget,  289. 

Dunn,  Philip  J.,  110. 

Dunne,  Justice,  233. 

Education,  changes  suggested  for, 
323-324. 

Elder,  R.  H.,  on  third  degree, 
quoted,  133. 

Elections,  district  leader's  role  in, 
27-28;  abuse  of  voting  machines 
at,  80-83;  lobbying  at,  83-84; 
violence  at,  84-85;  illegal  prac 
tices  at,  86-87;  colonization  in, 
88 ;  Tammany  technique  at,  89 ; 
off-year,  304;  changes  proposed 
for,  320. 

Electric  rates,  265-269. 

Elevated  lines,  recapture  price  offer, 
277. 

Employment  agency  scandal,  163. 

Equitable  bus  franchise,  13,  167- 
174. 

Ethics,  291-292. 

Ewald,  Magistrate  George  F.,  resig 
nation  of,  107-110. 

Fageol,  Frank  R.,  168-172. 

Falk,  Samuel,  124. 

Farley,  Sheriff  Tom,  5;  charges 
against  by  Committee  of  One 
Thousand,  186;  gambling  rights, 
44;  and  tin  box,  45-47;  investi 
gation  of,  185-186;  started  in 
Union,  295. 

Fiaschetti,  M.,  You  Gotta  Be 
Rough,  132. 

Fifth  Avenue  Coach  Company,  222- 
227. 

Five-cent  fare,  279-280. 


Flaherty,  Joseph,  in  Seabury  in 
vestigation,  47,  189. 

Flynn,  Edward  J.,  22. 

French,  Fred  F.,  testimony  before 
Seabury,  53-54. 

Fullen,  William  G.,  278. 

Future,  policy  for,  318-324. 

Gas  rates,  269. 

Gaynor,  Edward  J.,  236. 

George,  Henry,  campaign  for 
mayor,  231. 

George  Washington  Bridge,  273. 

Geraghty,  James  F.,  exposure  of, 
163-165. 

Gifford,  Walter  S.,  270. 

Godkin,  E.  L.,  quoted,  63. 

Godley,  Leon,  278. 

Golden,  Miss  May,  235. 

Goodman,  Henry  M.  R.,  resigna 
tion  of,  112. 

Gottlieb,  Maurice,  testimony  before 
Seabury,  114-115. 

Gould,  Jay,  and  Tweed,  7. 

Government,  general  impotence  of, 
292 ;  fundamental  soundness  of 
city,  308;  present  weaknesses  in, 
309. 

Hall,  A.  Oakey,  7. 

Halleran,  John  J.,  199-205. 

Halleran,  Laurence  B.,  204-206. 

Hare  system  of  voting,  311-312. 

Harper's  Weekly,  7. 

Harris,  Fred  C,  212. 

Harvey,  George  U.,  on  Board  of 
Estimate,  158;  charges  against 
Doyle,  165;  friend  to  Tammany, 
199-207;  in  Queens  bus  fran 
chise,  213-216. 

Hastings,  Senator  John  A.,  in  Equi 
table  Coach  scandal,  168-172. 

Healy,  Martin  J.,  in  Ewald  case, 
108-110. 

Hearst,  W.  R.,  in  campaign  against 
McClellan,  90;  attitude  toward 
Walker,  157. 

Herald  Tribune,  58;  attitude  toward 
Walker,  157. 

Hetherington,  Surrogate,  106,  188. 

Hickin,  William  H.,  60. 


360 


INDEX 


Higgins,  James  A.,  investigation  of 
pier  leases,  56. 

Hillquit,  Morris,  support  of  "out 
door  relief,"  297. 

Hoffman,  A.  Joseph,  217. 

Holland,  J.  P.,  295. 

Holland  Vehicular  Tunnel,  273. 

Holmes,  John  Haynes,  183,  188. 

Housing  problem,  solution  for,  254- 
255,  323. 

Hudson  River  Navigation  Corpora 
tion,  61. 

Hylan,  administration  of,  6;  ap 
pointed  judge,  105;  as  mayor, 
160. 

Income  of  families,  284. 
Interbprough  subway,  274. 
Investigations,  effects  summarized, 

12-15. 
Irving  Trust  Building,  53. 

Jamaica  Bus  Co.,  212. 

Jews  in  politics,  29,  30,  115,  116. 

Jones,  George,  fight  against  Tweed, 

7. 
Judges,    reason    for   appointments, 

94;  quality  of,   104;  salary  and 

tenure,    104. 

Kelby,  Judge  Charles  H.,  quoted, 

164. 

Keller,  F.  Traugott,  62. 
Klein,  Henry,  199. 
Klein,  Irving,  199-203. 
Koenig,  Morris,  elected  judge,  89. 
Kohler,  Charles  L.,  Director  of  the 

Budget,   21;   exposure  of,    163- 

164. 

Labor,  American  Federation  of,  4. 

Labor,  docility  of,  285;  and  Tam 
many,  293-296. 

La  Guardia,  Fiorello,  in  investiga 
tion  of  magistrates,  92 ;  demands 
for  removal  of  Vitale,  107;  at 
tack  on  Roosevelt,  179. 

Land,  values,  230;  condemnation 
racket,  232-242;  appraisal  fees, 
239-240;  values  increased  by  sub 
ways,  243-245. 


League  of  Women  Voters,  42,  110. 
Legal  Aid  Society,  120-121;  report 

on  third  degree,  133-134. 
Legislature,  in  judgeship  deal,  94- 

95. 

Levy,  Samuel,  116. 
Lehman  report,  161. 
Lexow  Committee,  6-9. 
Libby  Hotel,  damages,  234. 
Linville,  Dr.  Henry  R.,  75. 
Lippmann,  Walter,   on   Roosevelt, 

178. 

Living  expenses,  284. 
Lockwood,  Charles  C,  278. 
Low,  Seth,  mayor,  12,  13. 
Lunn,  George  R.,  272. 
Lynch,  Dennis  Tilden,  58. 
Lynch,  John  A.,  and  bus  franchises, 

54-55. 

McCauley,  Paul  J.,  205. 

McClellan,  George  B.,  Tammany 
mayor,  12;  elected  over  Hearst, 
90. 

McCooey,  John  H.,  22 ;  private  ac 
tivities,  45;  profit  on  land  deals, 
234-236. 

McCooey,  John,  Jr.,  and  zoning 
laws,  50;  in  judgeship  deal,  102. 

McCooey,  Miss  Margaret  J.,  235. 

McCook,  Judge  Philip,  234. 

McCormick,  and  marriage  licenses, 
44;  indictment  and  acquittal,  48. 

MacCrate,  Justice,  decision  quoted, 
202. 

McEneny,  Francis  T.,  237. 

McGoldrick,  Professor  Joseph, 
quoted,  25,  30. 

McKee,  Joseph  V.,  as  mayor,  13; 
reduction  of  city  automobiles, 
34;  on  Board  of  Estimate,  158; 
on  Queens  bus  franchise,  214- 
216. 

McManus,  Terence  J.,  110. 

McQuade,  James  A.,  testimony  be 
fore  Seabury,  63-67. 

McQuade,  Francis,  resignation  of, 
112;  testimony  before  Seabury, 
114;  charges  against,  188. 

Machine,  city-wide  political,  26. 

Mager,  Martin,  199-203. 


INDEX 


361 


Magistrate's  Court,  importance  of, 

105. 

Mahoney,  Jeremiah  T.,  110. 
Maier,  David,  in  pier  lease  deals, 

44,  60-61. 

Maltbie,  Milo,  272. 
Mancuso,  Francis  X.,  116. 
Manhattan,  bus  franchises  in,  221- 

228;  street  railways,  222. 
Manhattan  Elevated  Railroad  Co., 

favors  to  Croker,  10. 
Mathews,  Miss  Annie,  110. 
Mayor,  powers  of,  21. 
May,  Mitchell,  236. 
Mazet  Committee,  6,  9-11. 
Meyer      Legislative      Investigating 

Committee,  6,   163-165. 
Miller,  Julius,  115. 
Milwaukee,  government  of,  317. 
Moley,    Professor    Raymond,    141- 

142. 

Mooney,  William,  founder  of  Tam 
many,  5. 

Morris,  vice  squad  profits  of,  147. 
Moss,  Frank,  quoted,  106-107. 
Mulrooney,  Commissioner,  294. 
Mumford,  Lewis,  314. 
Murphy,  Charles  F.,  57. 
Murphy,  Walter  T.,  appraisal  fees, 

240. 

Nast,  Thomas,  fight  against  Tweed, 
7. 

National  Industrial  Conference 
Board,  284. 

Nevin-Queens  Bus  Corporation, 
213-216. 

Newspapers,  and  elections,  85;  on 
Roosevelt's  refusal  to  remove 
McQuade,  189. 

New  York  Air  Terminals,  Inc., 
202. 

New  York  and  Queens  Electric 
Light  Co.,  265. 

New  York  City,  results  of  investi 
gations  of  government,  11-12; 
improvement  in  government,  12; 
state  supervision  of,  16-18; 
budget,  22;  persons  on  payroll, 
22;  real  government  of,  22;  re 
muneration  of  employees,  35-37; 


annual  loss  in  land  condemna 
tions,  232. 
New  York  City  Airport,  Inc.,  204- 

206. 

New  York  Edison  Company,  265. 
New  York  Omnibus  Corporation, 

221-228. 
New   York   Telephone   Co.,    270- 

272. 
Norris,  Jean,  removal  from  office, 

112. 
North   German  Lloyd,  pier  lease, 

10,  59-61. 

North  Shore  Bus  Co.,  212. 
No.  1  Wall  Street,  53. 

Olvany,  Judge  George  W.,  and 
zoning  privileges,  44 ;  and  build 
ing  permits,  48,  52-54;  praised 
by  Roosevelt,  179. 

Omnibus  Corporation  of  Chicago, 
221. 

O'Mara,  Dr.  T.  J.,  fee  splitting  of, 
69-74. 

O'Neil,  William,  168. 

O'Gorman,  James  A.,  110. 

O'Shea,  Dr.  William  J.,  235. 

Page  Commission,  report  quoted, 
106-107;  on  detention  of  pris 
oners,  140. 

Panken,  Jacob,  campaign  for  re 
election,  81. 

Park  Avenue  Association,  287. 

Parkhurst,  Dr.  Charles  H.,  6,  8. 

Phillips,  J.  M.,  198. 

Pier  leases,  44,  55-62. 

Pink,  Louis  H.,  253. 

Platt,  Republican  boss,  9,  13. 

Plunkitt,  George  Washington,  4. 

Police,  interference  at  polls,  8 ;  and 
disorderly  houses,  8 ;  use  of  third 
degree,  130;  brutality  of,  135- 
136;  character  of,  139-140;  and 
speakeasy  protection,  142-144; 
vice  squad,  147;  Mulrooney, 
Commissioner  of,  294. 

Politics,  organized,  necessity  of,  14. 

Port  Authority  of  New  York,  315. 

Potter,  Hamilton,  80. 

Potocki  case,  148-149. 


362 


INDEX 


Prial,  Deputy  Controller,  Frank  J., 
21,  202;  report  on  Queens  bus 
franchise,  214. 

Probation  Department,  incompe 
tence  of,  152-154. 

Proportional  representation,  306- 
313. 

Prostitution,  8. 

Protestants  in  politics,  30,  115. 

Public  Housing  Conference,  261. 

Public  utilities,  265-281. 

Queens,    situation    in,     197;    bus 

franchise  in,  213-216. 
Quinlivan,  vice  squad  profits,  147. 

Ralmac  Realty  Corporation,  238. 

Reading,  government  of,  317. 

Realtor,  the,  a  business  hero,  229. 

Regional  Plan,   315. 

Reliance  Bronze  and  Steel  Corpora 
tion,  174. 

Religion,  deference  to,  in  appoint 
ments,  115-116. 

Republican  party,  and  reform,  1 3 ; 
in  judgeship  deal,  102;  request 
for  investigation,  180;  acts  to 
force  investigation,  183;  coop 
eration  with  Tammany,  196. 

Roosevelt,  Franklin  D.,  and  Farley, 
46-47;  and  charges  against  Cur- 
ran,  47;  and  judgeship  deal, 
103;  investigation  of  Ewald  case, 
107;  authorization  of  investi 
gation  of  courts,  111;  dismissal 
of  City  Affairs  Committee's 
charges,  166;  attack  on  by  La 
Guardia,  179;  attitude  toward 
Tammany,  178-195;  rebuke  to 
Harvey,  206-207. 

Rose,  Charles  B.,  168. 

Rosner,  Henry  J.,  213;  on  unem 
ployment  relief,  299. 

Rothstein,  Arnold,  loan  to  Vitale, 
107;  "fixer,"  294. 

Rowley,  Park,  212. 

Russell  Sage  Foundation  Regional 
Plan,  262,  314-315. 

Ryan,  Joseph  P.,  4,  295. 

Schiffman,  Charles,  238. 

School  system,  politics  in,  75-77. 


Seabury,  Judge  Samuel,  44;  and 
Farley,  46;  on  bus  franchises, 
55;  cross-examination  of  Mc- 
Quade,  63-66;  and  Dr.  W.  H. 
Walker,  68-74;  Intermediate  Re 
port  quoted,  77-78;  cross-exami 
nation  of  Theofel,  95-102,  208- 
209;  investigation  of  Magis 
trates'  Courts,  111-112;  final  re 
port,  quoted,  117-118;  report  on 
Magistrates'  Courts,  quoted,  122- 
123;  plan  for  reforming  courts, 
125-128;  on  third  degree,  quoted, 
140-141 ;  Potocki  case  record, 
148-149;  exposure  of  bail  bond 
racketeering,  151;  weakest  charge 
against  Walker,  174;  investiga 
tion  of  Farley,  185-186;  investi 
gation  of  Queens,  196-197;  ex 
amination  of  Dahl,  217. 

Seasongood,  Murray,  quoted,  23. 

Sheehan,  William  F.,  178. 

Sheehy,  appointed  by  Roosevelt, 
189. 

Sherman,  Justice  Henry  L.,  124. 

Sherwood,  Russell  T.,  175. 

Silbermann,  Jesse,  removal,  112; 
appointment,  116. 

Simpson,  George  W.,  resignation 
of,  112,  203. 

Sinking  Fund  Commission,  56. 

Sisto,  J.  A.,  gift  to  Walker,  175- 
176. 

Smith,  J.  Allan,  169;  telegrams  to 
Fageol,  170-171 ;  letter  of  credit 
for  Walker,  172. 

Smith,  Alfred  E.,  5;  support  of 
Roosevelt,  179. 

Socialists,  in  elections,  81,  82,  84, 
88,  90 ;  in  investigation  of  magis 
trates,  92 ;  solution  of  liquor 
problem,  144;  attack  on  Roose 
velt,  179;  request  for  investiga 
tion,  180;  program  for  unem 
ployment  relief,  297;  Committee 
on  Unemployment,  299. 

Social  service,  improvements  sug 
gested  for,  321-322. 

Speakeasy,  protection,  142-144. 

Stark,  Hyman,  case  of,  130-131. 

State  Housing  Law,  258. 

Steffens,  Lincoln,  on  Parkhurst,  8. 


INDEX 


363 


Steinbrink,  Meier,  on  judges, 
quoted,  125. 

Steuer,  Max  D.,  110. 

Stool-pigeons,  146-147. 

Street  railways,  222. 

Strikes,  294. 

Strong,  William  L.,  reform  mayor, 
12. 

Subway,  costs  of  building,  243; 
method  of  financing,  243-246; 
problems  of  recapture,  273-275; 
recapture  price,  277;  hope  for 
municipal  operation,  278 ;  five- 
cent  fare,  279-280;  financing  of, 
281. 

Supreme  Court,  in  condemnation 
cases,  240-241. 

Talley,  Alfred  J.,  239- 

Tammany,  investigations  of,  4-15; 
spoils  system,  9-11;  and  busi 
ness,  1 1 ;  comeback  after  investi 
gations,  12;  underlying  economic 
base,  1 5 ;  dominance  of,  26 ; 
Curry  at,  27;  district  leaders  of, 
28;  evasion  of  civil  service  laws, 
35-42;  legal  graft  of,  44;  sup 
port  of  Doyle,  52;  importance 
of  elections  to,  90;  mistake 
in  judicial  scandals,  93;  consid 
eration  of  religion  in  appoint 
ments  and  nominations,  115-117; 
influence  on  practice  of  law,  119- 
121;  support  of  Walker,  176; 
hold  on  the  people,  290 ;  attitude 
toward  labor,  293-296;  ties  with 
labor  unions,  295;  record  on  un 
employment,  296. 

Tammany  Hall,  see  Werner,  M.  R. 

Tammany  Society,  27. 

Taxation,  plan  for,  323. 

Teachers  Union,  75. 

Telephones,  270-272. 

Tenements,  253. 

Theofel,  John,  22 ;  private  activities, 
45 ;  testimony  on  judgeship  deal, 
95-102;  acquitted  of  charges, 
106;  charges  against,  188;  testi 
mony  before  Seabury,  208-209; 
sale  of  automobiles,  209. 

Third  degree,  130-141. 

Thompson,  William  Hale,  155. 


Times,  The  New  York,  against 
Tweed,  6;  attitude  toward 
Walker,  157;  attitude  toward 
Roosevelt,  189. 

Tin  Box  Brigade,  44. 

Todd,  Hiram  C,  108,  182. 

Tompkins  Bus  Corporation  fran 
chise,  54-55. 

Tompkins,  Leslie  J.,  110. 

Tompkins,  Justice  A.  S.,  quoted, 
202. 

Trades  and  Labor  Council,  Central, 
4,  295. 

Transit  Commission,  offer  on  sub 
ways,  276. 

Trusts,  265. 

Tuttle,  Charles  H.,  55-56;  in  in 
vestigation  of  magistrates,  92; 
charges  against  Ewald,  107;  at 
tack  on  Roosevelt,  179;  dis 
closure  of  Ewald  scandal,  181. 

Tweed,  fight  against,  6-7. 

Unemployment,  283,  296-300. 

United  American  Lines,  payments 
to  Vause,  56. 

United  Electric  Light  and  Power 
Co.,  265. 

Untermyer,  Samuel,  110;  and  sub 
ways,  276. 

Utilities,  public,  plan  for  operating, 
322. 

Van  Namee,  George  R.,  272. 
Van  Wyck,  Robert  A.,   Tammany 

mayor,  12,  13. 

Vause,  Judge  W.  Bernard,  55-57. 
Veblen,  Thorstein,  287. 
Vice,  145. 

Vitale,  Magistrate,  removal  of,  107. 
Voting  machines,  drawbacks  of,  80- 

83 ;  misreading  totals  of,  89. 

Waldman,  Louis,  217;  program  for 
unemployment  relief,  297. 

Walker,  James  J.,  resignation  of, 
1,  4;  administration  of,  6;  on 
party  politics,  34;  salary  raises, 
35;  action  on  investigation  of 
Board  of  Standards  and  Appeals, 
52 ;  appointment  of  magistrates, 
92;  appointments  of,  160-161; 


364 


INDEX 


political  background,  1 59- 1 60 ; 
machine-made  mayor,  156;  aided 
by  publicity,  156-157;  Seabury 
charges  against,  166;  City  Affairs 
Committee's  charges  against,  166; 
in  Equitable  Coach  scandal,  168- 
172;  gifts  from  friends,  173- 
174;  attitude  on  bus  franchises, 
211;  in  Queens  bus  franchise, 
213-216;  on  housing,  255-257; 
in  subway  strike,  295. 

Walker,  Dr.  William  H.,  employ 
ment  of,  41 ;  compensation  fees, 
44;  fee  splitting,  67-75. 

Wallstein,  Leonard  M.,  exposure  of 
land  racket,  232-233,  238. 

Walsh,  Frank  P.,  110. 

Walsh,  Nicholas  F.,  appraisal  fees, 
240. 

Walsh,  William  E.,  indictment  and 
acquittal,  52. 

Warschauer,  Morris,  237. 

Wealth  in  New  York,  287-289. 

Welfare  Council,  on  unemployed, 
283,  298. 

Wells,  H.  G.,  on  American  politics, 
6 ;  on  housing  and  building,  261- 
262. 


Werner,  M.  R.,  Tammany  Hall,  5, 
11,  63. 

Weston,  John  C,  146;  profits  from 
vice  racket,  147. 

Wickersham  Commission,  quoted, 
129-130. 

Winston,  Perry,  237. 

Wise,  Rabbi  Stephen  S.,  183,  188. 

Whalen,  Grover,  on  nightsticks, 
136;  on  speakeasies,  143;  resig 
nation  of,  294. 

White,  E.  Michael,  226. 

Women,  in  New  York  politics,  42- 
43;  framing  of,  144-149. 

Women's  City  Club,  42,  122. 

Worker,  housing  requirements, 
254. 

World,  New  York,  quoted,  57-58; 
attitude  toward  Walker,  157. 

World-Telegram,  quoted,  132;  atti 
tude  toward  Walker,  157. 

Wright,   Frank  Lloyd,   3,   314. 

Zoning  laws,  48-49 ;  evasion  of,  49- 
54,  see  also  Doyle,  Dr.  William 

Zorn,  Joseph,  gasoline  station  per 
mit,  50-51.