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A Stripe of Tammany's Tiger

Name: A Stripe of Tammany's Tiger
Author: Louis Eisenstein, Elliot Rosenberg

Louis Eisenstein, Elliot Rosenberg

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eBook - ePub

A Stripe of Tammany's Tiger

Louis Eisenstein, Elliot Rosenberg

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"This book is a highly personal glimpse into the world of precinct, district, and county politics. It deals with several stripes of the Tammany Tiger and brings into close focus some of the most forceful background figures in New York City's political framework. Primarily, it is a forty-year panorama of Tammany practices and personalities."—from A Stripe of Tammany's Tiger In this fascinating book, first published in 1966, Louis Eisenstein, a Tammany precinct captain from Manhattan's Lower East Side, sets out with his coauthor Elliot Rosenberg to chronicle the evolution—or rather devolution—of New York City politics through the first seven decades of the twentieth century. Eisenstein imbues his lively narrative with an overarching theme: that personal interactions and good faith between those at all levels of power are of paramount importance both for sustained political success and for competent municipal administration.

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Information

Publisher

Fall Creek Books

Year

2013

ISBN

9780801468353

Topic

Storia

Subtopic

Storia nordamericana

IV

Ahearn the Younger: Not by Breadbaskets Alone

Throughout the 1920s, nostrums, not normalcy, prevailed in New York City politics. While Warren G. Harding presided over the dissolution of Washington’s integrity during the early part of the decade, James Walker awaited his turn up in the wings at Albany. His turn came in 1925, when he danced onto the City Hall stage.

By that time, the rest of the nation had already cooled off with Coolidge. So Jimmy had the spotlight to himself. He certainly made the most of it. I sometimes wonder, though, whether the hanky-panky under our town’s Beau Brummell would have smelled so badly under the shadow of Teapot Dome. Republican sins had been quickly forgotten. Democratic wrongdoing never seems to fade away.

The physique of Tammany Hall, more than the rest of the body politic, suffered near-fatal wounds during those chaotic years. As the ever-witty Walker put it, the Hall’s “brains” were buried in Calvary Cemetery after Charles F. Murphy’s death in 1924.

Party factionalism, fractionalism and feudalism followed “Boss” Murphy’s passing. By the end of the decade, the Democratic organizations in other boroughs would no longer be Tammany fiefs. Even within the island of Manhattan itself, district chiefs would form protective clusters and issue virtual Declarations of Independence from the county leadership.

By 1929, a group centered around our own Edward J. Ahearn would gather strength—but not quite enough—to take control of the Hall. Less than two votes in Tammany’s Executive Committee, whose membership consisted of district leaders from throughout the borough, would separate us from victory. Instead, power was destined to pass into the hands of a small, starchy old-timer of narrow gauge mind, who, in the next five years, would lead the party to the wreckage heap.

Eddy Ahearn’s political career was meteoric. In 1921, he was just a wiry, sandy-haired, youthful looking thirty-year-old. Yet, within the fourteen years of life left him, he would inherit his father’s district leadership, cement his control of the Lower East Side, mold it into the core of Tammany’s strongest sub-group, take part in a bitter intra-party scuffle for power, lose it by a hair’s breadth, find his club shorn of patronage, hang on, recover, see his opponents tottering over the brink of their own corrupt ineptness, and snatch at almost certain victory just as the shroud of death veiled his eyes.

Like his father, Eddy grew up on the Lower East Side, lived politics and considered the district leadership post as one of awesome responsibility rather than one of grand opportunity. His one private ambition, he never managed to accomplish—that of vindicating his father’s memory by election to the Borough Presidency.

Born June 15, 1891, he attended Public School 147 across the street from his home and the clubhouse. He went on to high school, then began his political education. Perhaps more than his father, Eddy enjoyed the give and take of politics.

“It’s a game,” he said. “It has its rules. Ever since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, I have been familiar with politics. I was associated with dad and learned the ropes from him…You see, it’s heredity. I’ve had the help of the boys who went to school and grew up with me. They pitched in and helped.

“There’s a lot to politics. It’s a science. But it was dad who built up the organization and we’re just carrying on.”

The fact that Eddy quietly received the scepter and crown of the John F. Ahearn Association with ease was the result of more than heredity. There could have been a bitter squabble for control. Other districts went through such transitions with spasms of malice and long-lasting wounds. This did not happen here, and much credit belongs to Barney Downing, State Senator, confidant of Eddy’s father and the man who wielded authority while the elder Ahearn lay dying. The Senator could have made a contest for the district’s leadership. But he chose not to, for the sake of the club’s unity.

Barney Downing was already of voting age when Eddy was born. In many ways, he was the most influential man in the Fourth Assembly District. Like the elder Ahearn, he demanded and deserved respect. Also like the elder Ahearn, he always kept his word. It was his bond. Downing was a hard liver and a hard drinker. But he was an honest and honorable man.

“Barney Downing is the only Irishman who ever curses in front of me and gets away with it,” Father Byrnes, one-time police department chaplain and head of St. Mary’s Church, once complained to me.

“So why don’t you threaten to get him thrown out of the State Senate?” I asked him. “That would teach him a lesson.”

Father Byrnes winked. “Oh, I wouldn’t do a thing like that,” he said. “Barney’s too old to mend his ways. Besides, my Jewish friends would kill me.”

Everyone liked the Senator. Around the neighborhood, he was our “Irish-Jewish legislator”—and Father Byrnes was our “Jewish priest.” Both lived to ripe old ages and were able servants of the Lower East Side.

Downing became known as a humorist in the State Senate. He introduced quaint conservation measures, such as one to protect bullfrogs. But he was also a competent legislator and a close associate of Governor Alfred E. Smith. On more than one occasion, Smith’s chauffeur-driven limousine pulled up in front of the Ahearn club and discharged its sole passenger, the Senator. He climaxed his career in Albany as the Senate’s minority leader, replacing Jimmy Walker when Beau James moved on to City Hall.

Together with Henry S. Schimmel and Aaron J. Levy, Downing formed the triumvirate of professors who prepared Eddy for his political diploma. The younger Ahearn did not need much tutoring. He was a born politician.

Downing usually accompanied Eddy on his trips up to Tammany Hall or down to City Hall. During those early months, the aging “Boss” Murphy still held court at Tammany’s Fourteenth Street citadel. His austere throne room was no place for a youthful, recently-elevated district leader to venture alone.

Downtown, at City Hall, John Francis Hylan still reigned, and occasionally ruled. A dull, plodding official with a flaming red mustache, “Red Mike” fought bankers, transit companies, reformers, his own Board of Estimate and the whole British Empire with equal ferocity. He was a well-meaning man but he found the tasks of the Mayor’s office a bit baffling and drifted aimlessly.

At the Municipal Building, Downing, with Eddy in tow, would march into various departments. Surveying whatever office they were in, the Senator would point to an empty, obviously unused desk and ask, “Who works there?”

“It’s…ah…unoccupied at the moment,” was the usual response by an uneasy official.

“Well,” Downing would announce, “tomorrow I’m sending down a man from my clubhouse. Put him to work.”

Commissioners occasionally winced when they received word that Barney was in the building. They knew he did not come around for social calls. He wanted jobs for his people.

Eddy once told close friends the story of a journey he took with Downing to the inner sanctum of Grover Whalen. Later in his long, flamboyant public career, Whalen would steward the fortunes of the Police Department and milk that semi-military post for all the publicity he could squeeze. In that exalted role, by grace of Jimmy Walker, he would surround himself in a regal aura. His private quarters at 240 Centre Street would be furnished with luxurious mahogany, blue carpet and a bronze equestrian statuette of Napoleon. Pompous glory indeed lay ahead for this splendidly mustached dignitary.

At the moment, however, Whalen was merely Commissioner of Plants and Structures in Hylan’s regime. This was far from an exalted position. But it was one garbed in wreaths of patronage.

Downing stopped before the receptionist’s desk and asked to see the Commissioner. Whalen sent back word he was busy conferring with colleagues. Barney and Eddy therefore cooled their heels in the anteroom. Minutes passed. They heard no voices in the inner office, so they asked the receptionist to remind Whalen of their presence.

“Is the Commissioner still busy?” Downing inquired.

“Yes, he is,” was the reply. “You can’t go in.”

The pair sat down again. More minutes passed. Finally, as the clock ticked away, Barney lost patience. Ignoring the receptionist, who had buried his head in a stack of papers, the Senator barged in unannounced.

There sat Whalen, alone, flower in his lapel, feet on his desk, carefully manicuring his fingernails.

“Why, Barney, it’s good to…” said the startled Commissioner.

“Senator to you,” interrupted Downing.

“I’m sorry I didn’t know it was you,” apologized Whalen. “What can I do for you? Do you want something?”

“Nothing!” snapped the Senator, spitting in the Commissioner’s face to emphasize his contempt. Downing then turned around and briskly walked out.

Somehow, Whalen never found room to relate this incident in his modestly titled autobiography, Mr. New York.

When a district leader in the ‘twenties made an odyssey to City Hall, his usual intention was neither to fight it nor exercise his right of petition. Rather, it was to insist on his right to munch on a few minor patronage plums.

The really big appointive jobs, of course, were handled by Murphy uptown on Fourteenth Street. So, too, were the nominations for practically all elective offices, especially those crossing the boundaries of two or more assembly districts. The Tammany leader arbitrated the conflicting claims of his district lieutenants to state court judgeships and seats in Congress. Selections for small constituency posts such as State Assemblyman and Alderman (later City Councilman), which usually fell within the jurisdiction of one district, were the prerogative of its leader.

Murphy made it clear, however, that district chiefs would be held responsible for the men they suggested and for their subsequent behavior in office. The same held true for appointed officials. Had Murphy lived another decade, crusader Samuel Seabury might have passed through a quiet, legally productive life in relative obscurity.

Downtown, to the quaint masterpiece of colonial architecture that has been the working address of Mayors for a century and a half, leaders made their frequent pilgrimages. They eagerly sought to snap up little jobs for their home districts—jobs that were too small to concern Murphy. Unfortunately, patronage has all too often been considered a dirty word. It was far from an evil term depicting a sinister device. Patronage was a necessary organ of the political body.

Bear in mind that political activity then was no weekend form of recreation, designed to replace gardening when fall set in. For many captains in our teeming district, it was a daytime, nighttime, full-time chore, exhausting no matter how exhilarating. It demanded body and soul and far more than a forty-hour week. A city payroll job did not mean leisure for these workers. It meant a living could be assured while they did their more important job, one that has since been taken over by bureaucratic agencies at perhaps two or three times the expense—and probably with half the efficiency. In an age when the prevailing attitude of government was “hands off” towards social problems, to whom else could the poor turn besides their Tammany captain?

Logically, the district leaders who produced the greatest turnout on every Election Day should have gotten the most jobs. But infighting was always rough. There were 23 Assembly Districts in the 1920s, and, with splits because of state legislative reapportionments, 35 leaders. After Murphy’s death, court favorites harvested the juicier fruits, no matter what their political merit. Others were left with the stems.

By all that was politically holy, the Fourth Assembly District should have been granted the largest possible slice of patronage. Year after year, it won recognition as Tammany’s “Banner District”. The neighborhood our club served, cluttered with tenements, was probably the most crowded in the Western World. It gave way only to the teeming slums of Asian cities. And it would produce an overwhelming majority for almost any candidate on the Democratic ticket.

Eddy Ahearn worked hard for his captains, just as he expected his captains to work hard for their constituents. Once he got word that a note he had scribbled on behalf of a captain had been torn up right before the man’s eyes by a bureaucrat at the Municipal Building. Eddy was furious. He dropped everything, dashed down to the city’s “capitol”, and stormed into the office of the offending bureau chief.

“If you can’t make good on a contract, that’s one thing,” he said. “If you don’t want to carry out a contract, you may have your reasons and I’ll listen to them. But when you tear up a contract in front of my man’s face, that’s an insult to him and it’s an insult to me!”

On that note, Eddy, who learned well his lesson from Barney Downing, spat at the shaking executive, about-faced and strutted out.

I don’t think Eddy ever weighed more than 120 pounds. But he was no political featherweight. Titles meant nothing to him. He did not stand in awe of nameplates or other symbols of civic authority or prestige. (I know of only one other case, however, when he actually spat in a man’s face. On the receiving end, that time, was Mayor Jimmy Walker, himself. The gesture soured their relations for many years—to the detriment, as we shall see, of both men.)

After his brief apprenticeship under Downing, Schimmel and Levy, Eddy clearly took command. He quickly earned the respect of old-timers despite his youth. He judged all comers on their individual worth and everyone got a fair shake.

Book learning was no royal road to success in Eddy’s domain. Not that he had anything against erudite young lawyers. He just felt they often made poor captains. Too many carried chips on their shoulders. They looked down on the...