USA > New York > History of the state of New York, political and governmental, Vol. IV 1896-1920 > Part 17
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18New York Times, August 16, 1914; Letter to Duell, New York Times, July 17, 1914.
19 New York Times, August 18, 1914.
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sives and forced Roosevelt to yield to the advocates of a straight ticket and publicly withdraw his support from Hinman.20 At the same time it deprived Hinman's candidacy of all the strength it possessed as the possible bridge for union of the Republicans with the Progres- sives in the campaign.
Hedges made a personal campaign, which gained attention chiefly from his ridicule of Whitman's preten- sions to the Governorship on the strength of convicting Becker and his suggestion that the electric chair should in that case be substituted for the eagle as the Repub- lican ballot emblem. He also attacked the Barnes organization for attempting in Whitman's interest to dominate a primary devised to ascertain the untram- meled will of the people. But he could make no head- way. Barnes threw the organization vote to Whitman, less because he wanted Whitman, or expected anything from him, than because Whitman had the strongest popular following and because he saw in the election of Whitman, whom of all the candidates Roosevelt most disliked, a blow to his bitterest enemy. Whit- man's reputation for fearless prosecutions had gone over the whole State, and the general feeling that he could poll more votes than any other candidate made the organization triumph certain. In the primary he received 120,073, Hinman 61,952, and Hedges 43,012 votes. Barnes was equally successful in pushing James W. Wadsworth, Jr., for Senator. His chief opponent was Congressman William M. Calder of Brooklyn, who carried on an active but at the same time good-natured
20New York Times, August 22, 1914.
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campaign with an evident eye to the friendship of Wadsworth's supporters if he were unsuccessful and should wish to try for the other Senate seat two years later. George W. Aldridge, not caring to ally himself with the Barnes-Wadsworth interests, brought forward as a third candidate David Jayne Hill, but his support was little more than complimentary. In the primary Wadsworth received 89,960 votes, Calder 82,895, and Hill 37,102.21
Having turned away from Hinman, the Progres- sive leaders selected Frederick M. Davenport for Governor, but Sulzer entered the field as a candidate for both the Progressive and Prohibition nominations and seriously threatened to run away with the Progres- sives. Two days before the primaries, Davenport bitterly assailed Sulzer as a political and moral bank- rupt. 22 Nevertheless Sulzer polled 14,366 votes in the Progressive primary, to 18,643 for Davenport.23 Sul- zer won the Prohibition nomination and also was on the ballot as the candidate of a so-called American
21The ticket was: Governor, Charles S. Whitman, New York; Lieutenant- Governor, Edward Schoeneck, Onondaga; Secretary of State, Francis M. Hugo, Jefferson; Comptroller, Eugene M. Travis, Kings; Treasurer, James L. Wells, Bronx; Attorney-General, Egbert E. Woodbury, Chautauqua; State Engineer, Frank M. Williams, Orange; Judge of the Court of Appeals, Emory A. Chase, Greene; United States Senator, James W. Wadsworth, Jr., Livingston.
22New York Times, September 27, 1914.
23The ticket was: Governor, Frederick M. Davenport, Oneida; Lieuten- ant-Governor, Chauncey J. Hamlin, Erie; Secretary of State, Sidney W. Stern, New York; Comptroller, John B. Burnham, Essex; Treasurer, Homer D. Call, Onondaga; Attorney-General, Robert H. Elder, Kings; State Engi- neer, Lloyd Collis, New York; Judge of the Court of Appeals, Samuel Sea- bury, New York; United States Senator, Bainbridge Colby, New York.
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party, and in another column by petition without party designation.
The Republicans held a conference or unofficial State convention at Saratoga on August 19, which in its plat- form attacked the Wilson administration as "incom- petent and injurious to the interests of the American people," described its policies as "deliberately sec- tional" in their hostility to the great industrial com- munities and particularly to the State of New York, and pronounced the currency legislation and the income tax as intended to injure New York and dictated by "hostile and sectional intent." Turning to State issues, the platform dwelt on highway and other scandals, criticised the Election law, favored the return to State conventions, and declared for the principle of the short ballot. It rejected a suggestion that the Governor be permitted to attend the Legislature and explain his propositions therein. The Democrats on August 27 put forward a platform indorsing Wilson, condemning the recall of Judges, and favoring biennial sessions of the Legislature and the short ballot, with the proviso that the Attorney-General and Comptroller be retained as elective officers.
The Democrats entered the campaign with high hopes, counting on the popularity of President Wilson and the feeling against the Barnes domination of the Republican party. This continued to handicap Whit- man, and especially Wadsworth, despite the retirement of Barnes from the State chairmanship. Through Whitman's influence Frederick C. Tanner was chosen chairman over Ogden L. Mills, the favorite of the
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Progressive Republicans of the metropolis. The Demo- crats also hoped for much from the Progressives, as Roosevelt, without any expectation of electing Daven- port, gave them material aid by attacking Whitman as a tool of the Barnes machine and criticising his conduct in running the year before for District Attorney on the Tammany ticket and thus depriving himself of the opportunity to take an active part with Mitchel and McAneny in the anti-Tammany fight.24 But they
entirely misread popular opinion. The drift back to the Republican party of the rank and file of the voters who followed Roosevelt in the Progressive revolt was far. more rapid than that of their leaders, who still
dreamed of perpetuating the Progressive party.
The
State, moreover, had been alienated by the administra- tion of Dix and the episode of Sulzer. The Repub- licans carried the State overwhelmingly, electing Whit- man by 145,432 plurality and Wadsworth by 67,693. The vote for Governor was: Whitman, 686,701; Glynn, 541,269; Sulzer, 126,270; Davenport, 45,586; Gustav A. Strebel (Socialist), 37,793; James T. Hunter (Socialist Labor), 2,350. The vote for Senator was: Wadsworth, 639,112; Gerard, 571,419 (includ- ing 409 Independent Labor votes) ; Colby, 61,977; Charles E. Russell (Socialist), 55,266; F. E. Baldwin (Prohibition), 27,813; Edwin A. Archer (Socialist Labor), 3,064. The Republicans elected the rest of the executive officers by large pluralities, but the com- bination of the Democrats and Progressives on Seabury elected him Judge of the Court of Appeals over Chase
24Speech at Poughkeepsie, October 5, 1914.
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by 56,054 plurality. The Congress delegation stood : Republicans, 21; Democrats, 20; Socialist, 1; Progres- sive, 1. The Republicans carried both houses of the Legislature. The Senate consisted of 33 Republicans, 17 Democrats, and 1 Republican-Progressive; and the Assembly of 99 Republicans, 49 Democrats, and 2 Progressives. The Republicans also elected all the delegates-at-large to the Constitutional convention and an overwhelming majority of the district delegates.
Commenting on the result, the New York World, which with many independent warnings and admoni- tions had supported Glynn, said: "The Governor's political defeat is the inevitable result of trying to be friendly enough to Tammany to gain its support and independent enough of Tammany to win the support of the anti-Murphy Democracy. The thing the Governor tried to do cannot be done. The ticket that he ran on was loaded down with Murphy candidates from Bensel and Sohmer to Hopper and Ahearn. It reeked of Tammany corruption."25
25 New York World, November 4, 1914.
CHAPTER XV REPUBLICANS AND PROGRESSIVES JOIN FOR HUGHES
1915-1916
W ITH the inauguration of Governor Whit- man the Republicans turned industriously to reorganizing the departments created under Dix, Sulzer, and Glynn and to displacing hold-over Democratic officers. This effort was inspired in part by desire for improved administration and conviction of public policy. But the appetite for spoils was strong and was whetted by the feeling that many of the reorganizations of the previous administrations had been made largely to legislate Republicans out of office. This was notably true with regard to the Court of Claims, which was at once restored. The Legislature, with Sweet continuing as Speaker and Brown as Presi- dent pro tem. of the Senate, reorganized the State Tax department, displacing Louis F. Haffen, whom Hughes had removed for malfeasance from the Borough Presi- dency of the Bronx, and Whitman made Martin Saxe president of the new board. The three-headed Con- servation commission was superseded by a single Commissioner and the Governor, going outside of polit- ical circles, appointed George D. Pratt to the office.
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The Labor department, the Fire Marshal's office, the Industrial board, and the Workmen's Compensation commission were consolidated into an Industrial com- mission of five members, of which John Mitchell, who had been appointed by Glynn a member of the Work- men's Compensation commission, became chairman.
The Governor sought in his appointments to bring about him men of high character and ability. For Superintendent of Public Works he chose General William W. Wotherspoon, who had been chief of staff of the United States army. Edwin Duffey became Superintendent of Highways and Samuel H. Ordway, a leading student of civil service reform problems, chair- man of the Civil Service commission. Republicans looked with dissatisfaction on the administration of the Public Service Commissioners, and early in the session a Senate committee, headed by George F. Thompson, began an investigation, which resulted in charges against four of the First district commission. But these were dismissed by the Governor on May 27. The next December, however, on evidence subsequently obtained by the committee, he removed Edward E. McCall, who had transferred to his wife stock in corporations subject to the Public Service commission's supervision by what the Governor held to be "a mere subterfuge and clumsy effort to evade the statute." Whitman then appointed Oscar S. Straus chairman of the commission. George V. S. Williams, another Commissioner, resigned and Robert Colgate Wood also resigned under charges of having sought a bribe from the Union Switch and Signal Company. He was indicted, but the
JAMES WOLCOTT WADSWORTH, JR.
James Wolcott Wadsworth, Jr., U. S. senator; born at Geneseo, N. Y., August 12, 1877; graduated from Yale, 1898; engaged in stock raising and general farming at Mt. Morris, Livingston county; served in Spanish American war, 1898; assembly 1905-1910; speaker from 1906 to 1910; delegate to republican national conventions of 1908, 1912, 1916, 1920; elected United States senator in 1914 and 1920.
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trial was delayed and in March, 1917, the Dis- trict Attorney, whose earlier motion to dismiss the indictment had been overruled, announced that the wit- nesses necessary for a trial were out of the State.1 Dur- ing his first year and a half in office Whitman, through removals, resignations, and expirations of term, was enabled to name the entire commission for the First district. He made no removals in the Second district, but reappointed Commissioner Frank Irvine.
The Court of Appeals having in February upheld a law prohibiting the employment of aliens on public work, the Legislature at once modified the act so far as it applied to the New York City subways, which were found to be dependent on alien labor. It also passed a Widowed Mothers Pension bill and repassed for sub- mission to the people in November a constitutional amendment giving the suffrage to women. The Assembly, by a vote of 54 to 49, killed a prohibition referendum.
The Governor early in the year roused a storm in New York City by proclaiming the necessity of a direct tax of at least $18,000,000 to provide for canal work, to meet accrued obligations and institutional needs, which, he charged, the Glynn administration had neglected, and to furnish a working balance to the treasury. The city officials challenged this necessity, but after investi- gation Comptroller Prendergast declared that it could not be avoided, though Mayor Mitchel and President McAneny of the Board of Aldermen persisted in their
1New York Times, December 28, 1916, March 22, 1917; Myers, History of Tammany Hall, p. 392 et seq.
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criticism and ex-Governor Glynn supported them. McAneny urged the cutting off of appropriations that the Governor thought essential, and proposed con- tinuing the canal work by expedients to anticipate the expected vote for a bond issue at the fall election, which the Republican leaders considered illegal.2 The Legislature passed and the Governor signed a bill imposing a tax of $19,500,000. The Bureau of Munic- ipal Research subsequently reported that not only this sum, but almost $10,000,000 more, was needed to place the State on a proper pay-as-you-go basis, owing to the failure of previous administrations to provide revenues adequate to each year's appropriations.3
While the less implacable and perhaps less logical Republican leaders were seeking to heal the breach between their party and the Progressives, William Barnes was intent on widening it. He believed in "a policy of thorough." Roosevelt in his writings had bitterly attacked him and charged that he was in poli- tical alliance with Murphy and that he was part of a corrupt alliance between crooked business and crooked politics. Barnes made this charge the basis of a suit for libel. He wanted a personal vindication. It would strengthen his leadership and help him to hold the party firm for conservatism in the coming Presi- dential campaign. But beyond that, he apparently thought that he could reveal Roosevelt's inconsistencies, traverse his career of association with Platt and his
2Governor Whitman's Report to the Voters, September 7, 1916; New York Times, April 9, 10, 16, 25, May 2, 1915.
3New York Times, October 26, 1915.
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toleration of political methods that he later denounced, and so discredit him as to rob the Progressive leader- ship of moral force. The case was brought to trial before Justice William S. Andrews in Syracuse in the spring of 1915. John M. Bowers was Roosevelt's chief counsel, while William M. Ivins undertook for Barnes the congenial task of puncturing the Roosevelt reputation. But Roosevelt was more than a match for the lawyer. Days of heckling could not change the belief of the public or the jurors that Roosevelt, while distinctly an opportunist, was unfailingly high-minded and independent. As for the libel, Roosevelt dis- avowed any intention to charge personal corruption, but he stood by his statement as to the character of Barnes's political transactions. Justice Andrews in his charge held that the statement was libelous in two respects: "One, that it charges a political alliance between Mr. Barnes and Mr. Murphy in the govern- ment of the State; the other, that it charges that Mr. Barnes worked through a corrupt alliance between crooked politics and crooked business."4 Unless Roosevelt could prove both of these charges the plain- tiff was entitled to recover. With respect to the first charge Roosevelt's evidence was weak. He alleged an alliance with Murphy to enable him to elect Sheehan to the Senate and to prevent the Republicans from cooperating with the insurgents to choose a more inde- pendent Senator. Barnes denied reports of William Loeb, Jr., quoting conversation with him to that effect, and the other evidence was mostly gossip brought to
4New York Times, May 21, 1915.
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Roosevelt by his friends. Barnes also showed that he had advised the Republicans to join with the insurgents at the critical moment when fear that they would join finally forced Murphy to abandon Sheehan. In sup- port of the second charge, Roosevelt declared that Barnes in a conference with him spoke about contribu- tors to campaign funds whose interests ought to be pro- tected. After long deliberation the jury on May 22 found for Roosevelt. Roosevelt's prestige and his power to impress men with his essential rightness of mind might have warned Barnes against any expecta- tion of a verdict dependent on technical proofs con- cerning charges made in political controversy. Barnes failed to discredit Roosevelt and lost the benefit of Roosevelt's disavowal of any aspersions upon his personal character. He might have accepted that as a vindication, but the temptation to subject Roosevelt to cross-examination by Ivins had been too strong. His defeat was a severe personal disappointment to Ivins, and together with the physical exhaustion resulting from the trial operated to bring about his sudden death shortly afterward. On the train home after the conclu- sion of the trial he is reported to have said to a member of the Constitutional convention: "I am tired to the heart. I could lie down and wish never to get up."
The Constitutional convention met in Albany on April 5. Among the Republican delegates were Elihu Root, Seth Low, James W. Wadsworth, Sr., Herbert Parsons, Louis Marshall, Presidents Jacob Gould Schurman of Cornell and Rush Rhees of the University of Rochester, George W. Wickersham, Henry L. Stim-
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son, Adolph J. Rodenbeck, Meier Steinbrink, William M. K. Olcott, Harold J. Hinman, William Barnes, Jr., Edgar T. Brackett, Martin Saxe, John Lord O'Brian, A. T. Clearwater, Jacob Brenner, P. W. Cullinan, and Ray B. Smith. The Democratic membership included Morgan J. O'Brien, William N. Dykman, Andrew McLean, Alfred E. Smith, John B. Stanchfield, Wil- liam F. Sheehan, Robert F. Wagner, John G. Saxe, Eugene Lamb Richards, Arthur J. Baldwin, and DeLancey Nicoll. By common consent the presidency went to Elihu Root, many of the Democrats voting for him, although some of them cast a complimentary vote for Morgan J. O'Brien. The convention continued its session into September, proceeding for the most part without division on party lines to draft a framework of government with a view to increased administrative efficiency.
Both parties were committed in their platforms to the "short ballot," or reduction in the number of elective officers, and President Wilson had been a conspicuous leader in the movement to secure it. Responding to this demand, the convention made the Secretary of State and the Treasurer appointive; abolished the State Engineer and transferred his duties to the Department of Public Works; systematized the administrative work then distributed among more than 150 different boards or officials into seventeen departments, and provided against the multiplication of commissions by requiring all administrative functions to be apportioned among them. The Attorney-General and Comptroller were left elective. The Education department was left under the
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Regents chosen by the Legislature. The Commissioners of Labor, Public Service, Conservation, and Civil Ser- vice, who were vested with both legislative and admin- istrative functions and had terms extending beyond that of the Governor, were made appointive by the Gover- nor, subject to confirmation by the Senate. The heads of all other departments were made subject to appointment and removal by the Governor alone.
The next most important change was the establish- ment of a budget system. The administrative depart- ments were required to prepare estimates and the Governor, after public hearing, to submit to the Legis- lature a complete budget, or plan of proposed expendi- tures and estimated revenues. The Governor and heads of departments might appear before the Legis- lature, and must appear if requested, to discuss the budget. The Legislature might reduce or eliminate any item, but could not increase it. The appropria- tions thus based on the Governor's budget became law without the Governor's approval. The appropriations for the expenses of the Legislature and the judiciary were not based on Executive estimates, but were subject to the veto power. The Legislature could make no other appropriations until it had disposed of the budget. Then it might make such further appropriations as it desired in the usual manner, subject to the veto power, provided they were made in separate bills for each single work or object. The salary of the Governor was raised to $20,000 a year and the salaries of members of the Legislature were increased to $2,500. Safeguards were provided against exemption from taxation, and
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the Legislature was authorized, with the approval of the electors, to establish tax districts as large as a county, in which the assessment should furnish a uni- form and equalized roll for all taxes levied within a district or any part of it, and for the assessment of the property of public service corporations by State authorities. A greatly increased measure of home rule was extended to cities. The existing rules of appor- tionment were continued, but the requirement of a State enumeration was eliminated and future apportionments were to be based on the Federal census.5
No sooner was the work of the convention finished than it was subjected to attack from several sides. Though the Democrats had declared for the "short ballot," they violently opposed the concentration of the appointing power in the Governor's hands. They also saw a threat to liberty in the budget system, although the plenary power of the Legislature over expenditures was preserved, provided only that it acted directly and openly in making appropriations not covered by the budget. Complaint was made that the cities were not allowed sufficient freedom, though their rights were greatly extended, and the Apportionment article was attacked, although the defeat of the new Constitution could not in any way better the conditions complained of. Equally violent was the war made by the Progres- sives upon the instrument. It was represented as the work of the "interests" and of reactionaries dominated by Root, and organized labor was urged to defeat it. The Taxation article awakened distrust in the rural
5 Address to the People adopted by the convention, September 10, 1915.
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sections where the Constitution might otherwise have been popular, for it threatened easy-going tax methods long prevalent outside the cities.
Finally a powerful antagonist appeared in the person of ex-Chief-Judge Cullen,6 who criticised the failure of the convention to adopt a proposed amendment to the bill of rights prohibiting military tribunals from exercising "jurisdiction over a civilian unless engaged in military or naval service while the regularly consti- tuted State courts are open to administer justice." Root7 and others answered that the Constitution already prohibited punishment except after jury trial, unless the defendant was in actual military service. Consequently the proposed amendment weakened the safeguards of the civilian, since by implication it subjected him to military tribunals wherever the civil courts were not open, that is, wherever the administrative authorities saw fit to declare martial law. But Judge Cullen held that the debates of the convention showed that some persons opposed the suggested amendment because they favored the exercise of military jurisdiction in case of riot. He thought this evidence of legislative intent might be used to extend military trials. His fears were sharpened by a recent case in West Virginia (Nance vs. Brown), in which the highest court upheld a mili- tary sentence of a civilian, although the State Constitu- tion forbade the exercise of military jurisdiction over
6New York Sun, October 3, 1915; two pamphlets addressed: To the Electors of the State of New York, by Edgar M. Cullen, Brooklyn Eagle Press.
7New York Times, October 17, 1915.
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a civilian for any offense cognizable by the civil courts. The defenders of the convention's work answered that this decision was clearly contrary to the West Virginia Constitution, that no form of words could guard against such an arbitrary proceeding, appeal from which was prevented by a pardon, and that the provision rejected at Albany would afford no greater protection to civilians in such a situation than that provided by the Constitution as it was. They therefore maintained that there was no need of change in an article that had stood for a century as an efficient bulwark against military despotism. Nevertheless, Judge Cullen's appeal greatly intensified the hostility of labor, already aroused by the cry that it was Root's Constitution.
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