Pinchot Lippmann The New Tammany.pdf

7/29/2019 Pinchot Lippmann The New Tammany.pdf

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36 The Nation [Vol. 137,No. 3549

Walter Lippmann11. The New Tammany

By AMOS PINCHOT

I 1927, whenAlfred E. Smith loomed as a candidatefor the Democratic nomination, Walter L ippmann hadcharge of the editorial page of the New Y ork vorld,the principal Democratic newspaper in the East. Three bar-riels, each seemingly more fatal to his chances than the other,stoodbetween Mr. Smith and the Presidency-his Catholi-cism, his opposition to prohibition, and the fact that he hadfor many years been an ntegral part of the T ammany or-ganization.Now, since Mr. Smith and Tammany were as insepa-rable n the public mind as Siamese twins, it became evidentthat the only way to remove the Tammany curse from theGovernorwas o ransform he-Wigwam ntosomethingwhich, politically speaking, would pass for an asset instead ofa liabili ty. This thaumaturgical feat M r. L ippmann under-took to perform n a series of editori als n which he tracedTammanys history from the days of its admittedly question-able past down to1927,when, according toMr. L ippmann, itunderwent a miraculous change under the leadership of suchmen as John R. Voorhis, George W. Ol vany, and J ames J.Walker.A fter touching franklyon the era when T ammany wonand deserved a bad reputation, fi rst with Tweed and thenwi th Croker n the saddle, M r. L ippmann wri tes in his edi-torial of December 11, 1927:

T he Tarnmany Society, John R. Voorhis, GrandSachem, and the Tarnmany Hall, George W. Olvany,leader, which have just parted with their common home onFourteenth Street and are about to move uptown, belongto the third period of the organization. Fol lowing Croker,after a brief triumvirate, Charles F. M urphy was at firstas hard-boiled a politician as Tammany leaders had beenwont to be, but toward the end of his long rule he acceptedand cooperated with the New Tammany which was growingup under such leaders as Governor Smith, Senator Wagner,M ayor Walker, and the present legislative leaders of theparty. It is a Tammany suited to the more general spreadof popular education, a thing unknown in 1789 and mainlyconfined to the rudiments of the hree Rs in 1871, whenNew Y ork had no public high school. It is a Tammany be-ginning to be more highly regarded in the country at large.I ts move uptown after sixty years in Fourteenth Street maybe taken as appropriate to itsaltered viewpoint, as repre-senting a great national party in our greatest city, and tothe altered bearing of the country toward its own activities.Tammany moves not only uptown but up.

T hus, whi le our M erli n of J ournali sm beams from hismagiccasement in the Pul itzer Buil ding, ntoning editorialincantations, the Wor ld readers see the grisly tiger shed itsstripes and become the faithful St. Bernard dog of the Sun-day-school books-little kegandall.Theywatch heoldT ammany become the New Tammany. A nd even CharlieM urphy stands n awe, while, consonant wi th the spiri t ofeducation, the Tammany braves move their Wi gwam threeblocks uptown.

On what evidence Mr. L ippmann bases this transforma-tion, I do not know. I should ike very much to ask him. 1should ike to have him tell, even if in a general way, whatfacts he had in mind when he drew this comforting picture,at the very moment when, quite as plunderous as in the daysof T weed and Croker, Tammany was wrecking the citysfinances in fresh bursts of graft and extravagance. Tammanyhas movedup, announces M r.L ippmann.W hat does hemean by that? or he ecord shows that if T ammanymoved at alI, itwascertainlynotupward. WithOlvanypresiding.at the Wigwam, wi th Curry s man Walker in theCity Iall , wi th Smith quiescent and,seemingly out of tunewith the organization, and wi th Wagner, never a real partof it, away nWashington, Mr. L ippmanns enlightenedTammany was malting what wi ll long stand as a record forsheer administrative obscenity.But what bliss, what resounding aughter n the Wig-wam, which for all ts uptown quarters stil l stank with itsold downtown smell! T he liberal editor of the New Y orkWorld licking the tigers sores and giving him a clean bill ofhealth, whi le the braves applaud n the background !By 1927 M r. L ippmann should have been a competentnewspaperman. H e had worked with Steffens in his investi-gation of city corruption. H e had been secretary to a radi-calmayorn Schenectady. H e had been on the staff ofE oerybodyiM agazine in hemuckraking days. H e hadserved on the N ew Y ork Wor ld for six years, under a truly great editor, the late Frank Cobb, and had een in charge ofthe editorial page for our. It was strange hatheshouldnot know the truth about Tammany. For it was known toevery seasoned newspaperman n town.Nevertheless, whatever ammany may ormay otbe, M r. Lipprnanns candidate or he Presidency is Mr.Smith. onsequently, Mr. L ippmann continues his lus-tralandpurifying rites, to heend hat hesomewhatun-savory albatross that dangled from the Governors eck mightbe changed by his enchantments nto a li ving bird of para-dise. so on goes the New Tammany saga, whi ch reachesits height about a month before the Presidential election in1928. O n September 10 of that year Mr. L ippmann edi-torially brands as demagogic, grossly unjust, and demonstra-bly untrue a statement by the ederalA ssistantA ttorneyGeneral hatT ammany is anorganization hat or un-derworld connections andpolitical efficiency is matched noplace else in America. He contends hatM ayorWalkerhas an indisputable right to resent such a statement. Hepraises the city government as in effect commission govern-ment. I n the vein of abooster lauding his home town ata chamber-of-commerce luncheon, he insists that under T am-many N ew Y ork is a good city to visit and a good city tolive in.On September 24, 1928, he continues his celebration ofthe Wigwams rebirth, and charges with hypocrisy all parti-san persons who use the word Tammany as an epithet:


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uly 12,19331 The Nation 371

T he epithet Tammany in this campaign is employedbv two sorts of people. By those who do not know thefacts of Governor Smiths career and by those who do knowthem.Those who do not know the facts are also of two sorts.These are the persons who honestly believe that Tammanytoday is the Tammany of Tweed and Croker. They believei t liveschiefly by collecting graft rom prostitution. Theyare exactly as well informed as the backwoods Republicanswho still believe that the Democracy is the party of J effer-sonDavis and that the Republicans are the party of GeneralSherman and the carpet-baggers. . .M uch more importantare the deliberate falsifiers. We mean those NewY orkRepublicans who know the acts about Tammany] andcontinue to misrepresent them.

Except n Mr. L ippmanns imagination, Tammany hadin the slightest degree; it never does change. I n928 just as in T weeds and Croker s times, T ammany oper-as i t does now, on a simple principle, fromwhich tates by a hairs breadth. It performs services, at afor the needy rich-who require favors, privi leges, andmmunities which neither the aw nor public decency allowsdwho herefore olerateTammany.Andwith a part, asmall part, of the proceeds of such transactions, and ofhe profits from ts own peculi ar grafts, it buys the politicalegiance of the needy poor. I n a sense, i t functions asa busi-ss rather than a poli tical institution, since its political activi-ies are incidental to its larger purpose of raking in cash foreIf and its friends. T hat is Tammany; that always wil l beammany, unless some profound upheaval tears it up by theroots, whichare argegraftand elativelysmallcharity.nd yet Mr. L ippmann, apparently with conviction, and cer-y wi th a solemnityalmost J ohnsonian, informs his de-d readers that only the gnorant are unaware of its ref-A t this point et me make it clear that I do not chargethat n writing this drivel-for despite its air of authority

and sweet reasonableness, i t is nothing but drivel-M r. L ipp-ann is trying to deceive his readers. T hat is not the point.T he point is that when he wri tes he is not loolcing at thefacts, but at what he believes to be the requirements of histhesis. And so it is that, when he deals wi th Tammany, orbig business, or the banks, or the trusts, or the oreign-debtquestion, he is never an objective wri ter. H e is, on the con-trary, an exceedingly prejudiced writer, whose special plead-ing is hidden under an il lusion of objectivity conveyed by aWithoutdoubthewritesrly, or at east gives the impression of clarity. But doese hinkclearly?When a writer dodges or ncontinentlylees from such facts as mightwreckhis theories, there isI imagine, an ntellectualdisturbance hat is farrom conducive to clear thought.For the politicalpurposes of the Smith campaign M r.L ippmann requires a regenerate Tammany. There being nosuch thing, he proceeds to create one out of the ribs of Mur -hy, W alker, and Olvany. This, fortunately, is no new taskfor Mr. L ippmann.For, as wehave seen, he has alreadyperformed a similar one in D ri ft and MasteTy, and againin A Preface to M orals, when, in order to prove his thesisof a regenerate big business, he peopled his W al l Street Edenith disinterested bankers and trust magnates who spurn theprofit motive.Whatever may have been the poli?ical influence of the

NewTammanyeditorials, hey seem tohavehad no dis-illusioning effect on Mr. L ippmanns readers. T o the con-gregation of aspiring philistines forwhom Mr. L ippmannwas fast becoming the Fortieth A rticle of the faith, thinkingfor ones self is, at best, a dubious pastime. SO they swal-lowed the New T ammany with its repentant sinners just asthey had swallowed the new W al l Street with ts disinter-ested saints.L et us turn he clock forward oOctober, 1931. Alocal campaign is progressing in New Y ork City, and a na-tional Presidential convention is nine months distant. T am-manys so often probed sores are being reopened by M r. Sea-bury, and are showing precisely the same state of putri factionwhich eachprevious inquiryhas revealed. Mr. L ippmann,the New Y ork World having become extinct, is now the col-umnist of the Herald Tribune, in which capacity he is vi rtu-ously denouncing Frankl in D. Roosevelt, who has succeededM r. Smithboth as Governorand as leadingcandidate fortheDemocraticPresidentialnomination.Butwhat s hereproach hat M r. L ippmannhurlsagainst heGovernor?Why, n Mr. L ippmanns eyes, is Franklin Roosevelt sotragically unfi tted or the Presidency? ncredible as i t mayseem, i t is that he is temporizing with Tammany, instead ofdefying and breaking with it. A nd now we find that Tam-many is no longer the New Tammany whichMr. L ippmannconstructed or he purpose of theSmith campaign. It isthe old, sordid, wicked Tammany,withwhichhonestmencan have no truck at all. So that this sad lament is wrungfrom the breast of the columnist:

T he political campaign now being conducted in NewY ork is proceeding in an atmosphere of listless degradation.. . . Governor Roosevelt pursues his carefully calculatedcourse of doing just precisely as much as he has to, and notone bit more than he has to, toward facilitating the exposureof corruption in New Y ork. . .. n the ast ten years therehas been generally in the United States a remarkable indif-ference to the maintenance of public standards,a dyingdown of the old popular fervor in attacking corruption.

M r. L ippmannsown popular ervor, however, risesnobly tohe occasion. A nd he accuses theGovernor ofalmost every poli tical iniquity. H e is carryingwater onboth houlders. H e is placatingwarring elements in heDemocraticParty by two-facedplatitudesand privateassurances. H e has lost his moral freedom. H e is soheavily mortgaged to T ammany that he must prove his inde-pendence of it. . . .T i e trouble with Franklin D. Rooseveltisthat his mind is not very clear, his purposes are not simple,and his methods are not direct.A nd as Roosevelt orgesahead in the race, his allegedconnection with Tammany becomes more scandalous n thesight of Walter L ippmann, and the city government, dis-creditedromhe top down, increasingly disreputable.W hat has become of theNewTammany, he moved-upT ammany of yesteryear?A las, i t is no more. A nd nignorantandpredatory politicalmachine which is guil tyof a brazen exploitation of the gull ibil ity of the people hastaken ts place.However, et us not udge Mr. L ippmannunkindly.L et us concede that these moral morsels come straight fromthe bottom of his heart, and that, ordinarily a mild man, hehas turnedSavonarolaonly n he highcause of stoppingRoosevelt. But et us not concede too fast. Foranother


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38 The Nation [Vol. 137,No. 3549transformation is taking place. A nd on October 7 hean-nounces with quiet dignity: I shall vote cheerfully for Gov-ernor Roosevelt.Sowhatever we may or may not have n Mr. L ippmann,

TheRecoveryBy MAURITZ

I Washington, J une 27T has now been almost a fortnight since the NationalRecovery Administration formally opened for business.T hi s newest branch of thegovernment,withGeneralHugh S. Johnson at its head, is to exercise in the name ofthePresident hevastpowerover ndustryand abor con-ferred upon him in heNational ndustrial RecoveryAct.Everything seems in readiness for the titanic task of puttingbusiness back on an even keel-to use aphrase much in voguein the early days of the crisis. T he recovery administrationhas akenover a section of themammothDepartment ofCommerce building. A publicity division has been organ-ized, one of the largest of its kind in the government service.work. Experts of all sorts, college professors, business execu-tives, labor economists, union officials, and others have beenbrought ogether o help in he task. Advisoryboards #rep-resenting-by Presidential decre-the workers, the consum-ers, and ndustry itself have been namedandhave akentheir proper places in the organization. Y et the machine hasbeen woefull y slow n getting started.When President Roosevelt signed the recovery bil l onJune 16,he said i t was his hope that the ten major indus-trieswhichcontrol he bulk of industrial employmentcansubmit their simple basic codes at once and that the countrycan ook forward to the month of J uly as the beginning ofourgreatnationalmovement back to work. Unti l nowonly one group, the cotton-textile industry, has submitted itscode, or set of rules by which t hopes to govern itself andthus achieve stabil ity, and as was to have been expected, thisfirst code was not n acceptable orm. It is now beingsub-jected to publichearings. A fterwards twill go to he ex-pertsandperhaps back to thecotton-textile ndustry itselffor revision. And then t must go to the White House orthe Presidents approval. A long and tedious process.But if M r. Roosevelts hope tKat the arger ndustrieswould take speedy action has not been reali zed, the publicitygiven the recovery bill and the glowing statements attendingits passage havehadotherandmore positive esults. A narmy of financiers, big-business executives, smallmanufac-turers, retail merchants, lawyers, publicity agents, and othershave descended upon Washington. Du Pont, American Tele-phone and elegraph,heUnion Pacific Rail road,heEndicott- ohnson Corporation, the Bankers T rust Companyof N ew Yolk, nternational Harvester, L ambert Pharmacal,Remington Rand, M issouri Pacific, General M otors, K enne-cott Copper, General Electric, United States Steel, StandardOi l of N ew Jersey, Cali forniaFruitGrowers, heFirstNationalBank ofChicago, Goldman Sachs, theWeyer-hauser umber interests, Reynolds Tobacco, and Sears, Roe-buck, among many others, have sent their chairmen or presi-

General J ohnson and his corps of personalssistants are t

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we mustat least admit that he s one of the most entertainingmen of his time.[The hirdarticle i n M r . Pinchotsseries on WalterL ippmann wil l appear in next weeks issue.]

achine StartsA . .HALLGREN

dentso this city. Others haveigh-priced corporationlawyersepresenting them.esser interestsave hiredWashington attorneys t o advise them how to proceed.A ny number of lawyers here are openly soliciting suchbusiness. At the same ime severalinformation agencieshave been organized by persons anxious to prof it financiallyfrom the confusion attending the preliminary administrationof the recovery law. M ost of these agencies are fly-by-nightaffairs hat no one need take seriously. In quiteanothercategory is theNational ndustrialAdvisoryCorporation,formed by thenotoriousShermanCorporation. It calls it-self a private corporation organized to assist in promotingthe principles of theNational ndustrial RecoveryAct.New rade associations hastily organizedundersuch aus-pices wi ll bear close watching, as at least a few of GeneralJohnsons assistantsealize. M ore mportant is theaborangle. T he recovery l aw has as one, of its avowed purposesthe protection of the workers against the sharp practices ofunscrupulous employers. It is worth recall ing that the Sher-manCorporation has in hepastdirected ts energies pri-marily owardbreaking upunions andhiringout strike-breakersand abor spies. It has specialized insettingupwelfare associations, employee-representationlans, andother devices to preventworkers nmany ndustries romestablishing andmaintaining heir own organizations,

Whi le many ndustries and trades have been discussingthe code problem among themselves, they have had no clear-cut principles or policies by which they mightguide hem-selves. Every code of fair competition must be approvedby the President before t can be put into effect, but neitherfrom heWhiteHousenor. rom heNational RecoveryAdministration has come any statement exactly defining whatwillandwhatwillnot be acceptable. T hi s was probablyinevitable, for the Roosevelt experiment is being undertakenin an uncharted field; but it has nevertheless put a brake onthe recovery machines operations. T he economists and otherexperts called n tohelpwith heexperiment havehad todevote most of their time to receiving endless delegations ofsmall manufacturers, retailers, and spokesmen for the weak-er,, ndustries,and oanswering housands of queries frombusiness men hat come in by mailand elegraph.But hebusiness men have not been interested so much n knowingwhat the aw says as they have been in trying to determinewhat the President will onsider afair code of competition.They have been invariably told, after being advised as to thelimitations of the law, tosubmit heirown ideas on thispointand o leave it o he experts, theseveral advisory-boards, and the President to say whether or not their sug-gested codes are acceptable.Thereareother reasons why a strongand aggressivepolicy has notyet been adopted. Forone hing,General


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Pinchot Lippmann The New Tammany.pdf