USA > New York > History of the state of New York, political and governmental, Vol. IV 1896-1920 > Part 9
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33
Having almost won the Mayoralty, Hearst now aspired to become Governor. He organized and financed the Independence League, which in every county of the State gathered together many honest enthusiasts, as well as discarded political workers, from both the old parties. The Armstrong committee's showing of the relations of corporations to both parties aided him, and he capitalized his grievance over the
10New York Times and Tribune, September 24, 25, 26, 27, 1906.
11The ticket was: Governor, Charles E. Hughes, New York; Lieutenant- Governor, M. Linn Bruce, New York; Secretary of State, John F. O'Brien, Clinton ; Comptroller, Merton E. Lewis, Monroe; Treasurer, John G. Wal- lenmeier, Jr., Erie; Attorney-General, Julius M. Mayer, New York; State Engineer, Henry A. Van Alstyne, Columbia.
EDGAR MONTGOMERY CULLEN
Edgar Montgomery Cullen, judge; born in Brooklyn, N. Y., December 4, 1843; graduated from Columbia college, 1860; second lieutenant, United States infantry, March 4, 1862; first lieutenant, September 29, 1863; colonel, 96th New York in- fantry, December 26, 1863; honorably mustered out of volun- teer service, March 21, 1865; resigned from United States army, April 9, 1865; admitted to the bar, 1867; assistant dis- trict attorney of Kings county, 1872-1875; engineer in chief with the rank of brigadier general on the staff of Governor Tilden, 1875; justice of the supreme court, second judicial dis- trict, 1880-1900; associate judge of the court of appeals, 1900- 1904; chief judge on nomination of both parties, 1904-1913; died at Brooklyn, N. Y., April 27, 1922.
JAMES WOLCOTT WADSWORTH, SR.
James Wolcott Wadsworth, Sr. was born at Philadelphia, Pa. August 12, 1846; was preparing to enter Yale when the war broke out but joined the army and served on the staff of General Warren until the close of the civil war; super- visor of the town of Geneseo, 1875-1877; member of assembly, 1878-1879; state comptroller, 1880-1881; elected to the 47th congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of El- bridge G. Lapham and served from December 5, 1881 to March 3, 1885; again elected to congress in 1890 and repeatedly re- elected and served from March 4, 1891 to March 3, 1907; defeated for re-election to the 60th congress; president of the board of managers of the national home for disabled veterans, 1906-1914; father of U. S. Senator James W. Wadsworth, Jr.
129
TAMMANY FOLLOWS HEARST
1906]
alleged fraudulent counting in of McClellan and the failure of Attorney-General Mayer to bring quo war- ranto proceedings in his behalf. Moreover, his great vote for Mayor had surprised Tammany and disposed Murphy to come to terms with a dangerous rival. After his reelection for four years, McClellan determined to pursue an independent policy and soon came to an open break with the Tammany leader, which was carried into the primaries, where Murphy was overwhelmingly successful. In his papers Hearst had attacked Murphy as a thief and in cartoons pictured him in prison stripes.12 But Murphy cared more for victory than to cherish old resentments, and, as he had taken up Grout, who had declared Tammany hopelessly corrupt, so he now determined to annex the Hearst movement. In this task William J. Conners of the Buffalo Courier and, for a time, Norman E. Mack, the New York member of the national committee, aided him.
The conservative elements of the party were indig- nant. For his part Hearst still protested, "I am against all bosses," and declared that it was "amusing" to hear that Murphy was for him.13 Jerome came forward as a candidate, and a meeting of his friends was held in Albany on September 5, in which Thomas M. Osborne, Edward M. Shepard, and John N. Carlisle partici- pated. It denounced the threatened sale of the Democracy to Hearst and prepared to carry the fight
12New York Evening Journal, November 10, 1905.
13New York Times, August 29, 1906.
130
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1906
into the State convention.14 Meanwhile the Independ- ence League held a convention at Carnegie Hall, New York City, on September 11, with Willard A. Glen of Syracuse as temporary and Samuel Seabury of New York as permanent chairman. Seabury made a speech attacking both parties. Hearst's enthusiastic followers threatened to get away from him and to make impos- sible any fusion with the Democrats. Hearst wanted merely to name himself for Governor and John Ford for Attorney-General, but the radicals forced him to name a full ticket.15 Only by clever manipulation and with great difficulty were resolutions put through that, while promising unswerving devotion to independence, left a door open to fusion and the remaking of the ticket to suit the Democrats.16
A platform was adopted declaring for independence in everything, an honest count of ballots, the stripping of the Attorney-General of discretion in quo warranto proceedings, a housecleaning of the Insurance depart- ment, and banking reforms. It announced belief in the public ownership of public utilities that were naturally monopolies, but declared that the application of that doctrine to telephone, lighting, and transportation systems was a local issue.
On the eve of the Democratic State convention Mack
14New York Tribune, September 6, 1906.
15The ticket was: Governor, William R. Hearst, New York; Lieutenant- Governor, Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler, Dutchess; Secretary of State, John S. Whalen, Monroe; Comptroller, Charles H. Auel, Erie; Treasurer, George A. Fuller, Jefferson; Attorney-General, John Ford, New York; State Engi- neer, Frank L. Getman, Tompkins.
16New York Tribune and Times, September 9, 10, 11, 12, 1906.
131
TAMMANY FOLLOWS HEARST
1906]
wrote to Mayor J. N.Adam of Buffalo that he could not support Hearst if he was a candidate of any other party.17 Conservatives still talked of Jerome, Osborne,
Adam, or Shepard, but it was a forlorn hope. The Democrats met at Buffalo on September 25 and made Lewis Nixon chairman. The New York Times said that Hearst had barely 100 delegates out of 450,18 but that Murphy was using Hearst as a club to destroy McClellan. He proceeded to wield it through Grady in the committee on credentials, where anti-Hearst delegates from 21 districts were thrown out and 63 Hearst delegates seated.19 This with the Tammany vote gave the Hearst-Murphy combination complete control. Jerome's friends planned to send him on the floor of the convention to try to break up the deal, but, as he was not a delegate, he declined and the anti- Hearst men contented themselves by going on record for other candidates. William V. Cooke of Albany placed Hearst in nomination. George Raines put forward William Sulzer in a speech denouncing social- ism and charging that the surrender to Hearst was a deal to stop separate tickets in New York City. Osborne presented the name of John Alden Dix of Washington county. Hearst received 309 votes to 124 for Sulzer and 17 for Dix. Most of the Sulzer support came from Kings, where McCarren threw him 69 votes. Nine votes from New York went to him, while Murphy gave 96 votes from that county to Hearst. The
17New York Times, September 20, 1906.
18New York Times, September 26, 1906.
19 New York Times, September 27, 1906.
132
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1906
Democrats accepted Chanler and Whalen from the Independence League ticket, but for the rest nominated candidates of their own, on whose behalf the Independ- ence Leaguers retired.20
Bourke Cockran presented the platform. It included a plank denouncing failures to prosecute big corpora- tion criminals of influence and social position, which was generally interpreted as an attack on Jerome. The platform was not entirely in harmony with that of the Independence League. It declared against any interference by the government in the field of private industry, professed the strongest disapproval of social- ism, but held that the whole field of public service was included in the domain of the government's legitimate authority.21 When the new State committee organized, William J. Conners became its chairman.
A campaign of bitter personalities followed. Hearst attacked Hughes as a corporation lawyer and accused him of failure of duty in the insurance investigation, although at its conclusion his papers had lauded the investigator. Hughes replied by charging that Hearst in the conduct of his newspapers employed the corpora- tion methods that he denounced. Many Democrats refused to support Hearst. McClellan announced that he would vote for the ticket in general, but not for Hearst. The Tribune declared that Hughes had the
20The ticket was: Governor, William R. Hearst, New York; Lieutenant- Governor, Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler, Dutchess; Secretary of State, John S. Whalen, Monroe; Comptroller, Martin H. Glynn, Albany; Treasurer, Julius Hauser, Suffolk; Attorney-General, William S. Jackson, Erie; State Engi- neer, Frederick Skene, Queens.
21New York Tribune and Times, September 25, 26, 27, 1906.
133
TAMMANY FOLLOWS HEARST
1906]
support of every man who was not "ready to see the Empire State sold to a reckless adventurer by the very politicians whom he has repeatedly denounced as thieves and blackmailers, fit only for prison stripes."22 The Republicans reproduced Hearst's cartoons of Murphy in prison stripes, and Elihu Root, the Secretary of State, on the platform recalled his cartoons and paragraphs attacking McKinley, some of which went close to sug- gesting violence.23 On November 1, at Utica, Root said : "In President Roosevelt's first message to Congress, in speaking of the assassin of McKinley, he spoke of him as inflamed 'by the reckless utterances of those who, on the stump and in the public press, appeal to the dark and evil spirits of malice and greed, envy and sullen hatred. The wind is sowed by the men who preach such doctrines, and they cannot escape their share of the responsibility for the whirlwind that is reaped.' I say, by the President's authority, that in penning those words, with the horror of President
22New York Tribune, September 27, 1906.
23From among Hearst's articles the opposition press frequently reprinted the following, and contrasted them with his warm tribute to Mckinley after his death :
"Mckinley, bar one girthy Princeton person [Cleveland], who came to be no more or less than a living breathing crime in breeches, is therefore the most despised and hated creature in the hemisphere, his name is hooted, his figure is burned in effigy."-New York Journal, August 29, 1899.
"He is an abject, weak, futile, incompetent poltroon."
"Did not the murder of Lincoln, uniting in sympathy the north and south, hasten the era of American good feeling?"
"Institutions, like men, will last until they die; and if bad institutions and bad men can be got rid of only by killing, then the killing must be done."- New York Journal, April 10, 1901.
134
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1906
McKinley's murder fresh before him, he had Mr. Hearst specially in his mind."24
The current of dissatisfaction growing out of the insurance revelations ran strongly in Hearst's favor. Nothing but the personal standing of Hughes and the popular distrust of his opponent defeated Hearst; for the Democrats elected all the other State officers. Hughes won by 57,897 plurality. The vote was: Hughes : 749,002; Hearst, 673,268 on the Democratic ticket and 17,837 on the Independence League ticket ; John C. Chase (Socialist), 21,751; Henry M. Randall (Prohibition), 15,985; Thomas H. Jackson (Socialist Labor), 4,624. Bruce, who came nearest of the other Republicans to election, lost by 5,574 votes, while the plurality adverse to Mayer ran up to 11,560. The Republicans held the Legislature, electing 33 of the 51 Senators, and the Assembly stood: Republicans, 98; Democrats, 49; Independents, 2; Independence League, 1. The Republicans elected 25 of the 37 Congressmen. ,
Governor Higgins was so ill at the close of his term that his friends urged him to remain at his home in Olean, but he said that he owed a duty of courtesy to his successor and he would attend the inauguration and welcome Governor Hughes if it killed him. After he had extended his welcome in cordial terms from the platform of the Assembly chamber, he turned to his secretary, Frank S. Perley, saying: "Frank, did I get through it all right?" and, when answered in the affir- mative, added that he was so ill that he could not see a
24New York Tribune, November 2, 1906.
135
TAMMANY FOLLOWS HEARST
1906]
word of his manuscript.25 He returned immediately after the inauguration to Olean and died on February 12. In his message to the Legislature announcing the death, Governor Hughes said: "No soldier on the battlefield ever exhibited greater heroism than was his when, at the peril of his life, he made his last public appearance to discharge what he conceived to be his public duty on the occasion of his successor's inaugura- tion. 26 The effect of this tribute was the more emphatic because some of the most ardent newspaper supporters of the new Governor had been representing Higgins as sulking and discourteous, when his physical condition had compelled him to be inactive.27 He was not a man of original force, nor was he fitted for political leadership in a time of transition. Owing to his failing health his mind worked slowly and he shrank from public appearance. By political instinct and training he avoided the spectacular and had little capacity for turning waves of popular sentiment to political use. But he devoted himself with industry and conscience to the task of giving the people honest and efficient service. He was a good Governor and left a record of highly successful business administration.
25Statement of Mr. Perley to the writer in 1907.
26Lincoln, Messages from the Governors, X, 962.
27New York Evening Post, December 31, 1906.
CHAPTER X HUGHES THE UNCOMPROMISING
1907-1908
P OPULAR expectation that Hughes would administer his office without regard to the interests of political leaders was not disap-
pointed. Both Roosevelt and Higgins, while maintaining their independence, worked through the organization and made political concessions to gain their ends. Hughes made no compromises. His appointments and recommendations were made without regard to the wishes or views of political leaders. He proposed measures and left the party to deal with them in the light of public opinion. In his first message he advocated a reorganization of methods for controlling public utilities by the abolition of the Railroad and Gas commissions and the Rapid Transit commission of New York City, and the creation of two Public Service commissions, one with metropolitan jurisdiction and the other with authority over the rest of the State. He favored the Massachusetts ballot and a permissive trial of the direct primary system, and he proposed a law under which either Hearst or McClellan might open any ballot-boxes and secure a recount of the Mayoralty vote.1
1New York Tribune, January 3, 1907.
136
137
HUGHES THE UNCOMPROMISING
1907]
His Public Service program meant the abolition of important offices and was unwelcome to the organiza- tion. Nevertheless the Legislature, with Wadsworth as Speaker and John Raines as leader of the Senate, promised to cooperate; and Senator Armstrong and the other Monroe representatives gave support to the Governor, although it meant legislating George W. Aldridge out of his office of Railroad Commissioner. Woodruff, Parsons, and Wadsworth, however, were soon at odds with the Governor. Hughes selected for Superintendent of Public Works Frederick C. Stevens, who was just rejoicing in the defeat of the elder Wadsworth for Congress, although Parsons wanted McDougall Hawkes and Aldridge urged the promotion of Winslow M. Mead, the deputy. Hughes disclaimed any antagonism to Wadsworth, and the Speaker showed no dissatisfaction over an appointment that had always been considered in a large measure personal.2 More serious disagreement came over the Superintend- ent of Elections. Higgins had appointed Lewis M. Swazey, a Brooklyn district leader, temporarily to fill a vacancy, and both Woodruff and Parsons urged his retention. Hughes declined to appoint him, and when Woodruff and Parsons, on Friday evening, January 12, urged that he give them time to recommend someone else, he announced that he would nominate William Leary of New York on Monday night.3 Leary had managed Parsons's campaign for Congress, and the latter could have no objection to him, but Hughes's un-
2New York Tribune, January 15, 16, 1907.
3Statement of Mr. Woodruff to the writer in 1907.
138
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1907
willingness to respond to organization suggestions was galling. In these first appointments Hughes acted on the theory that the success of his whole administration depended on his giving both the politicians and the public an initial demonstration of his independence of organization control. He felt that he was new to poli- tics and that if he accepted tutelage in minor matters at the beginning his pledged independence would not be credited in large affairs.
Further estrangement came when the Governor, at the end of January, demanded the resignation of Otto Kelsey from the Insurance department. Kelsey was a follower of Wadsworth and a personal friend of the Higgins group of Senators-Tully, Franchot, White, and Hooker. No one questioned his honesty, but the Governor complained that he had failed to carry out the recommendations of the Armstrong committee and had kept in office subordinates whom it had condemned. Kelsey answered that because of the San Francisco earthquake he had been confronted with an extraor- dinary emergency and had felt compelled to keep trained assistants, though he might distrust them. He refused to resign, on the ground that his reputation would be compromised, and, after a hearing before the Governor in which he was sharply cross-examined to show laxness of administration, Hughes recommended his removal by the Senate. After long hearings the Senate on May 2, by a vote of 27 to 24, refused to remove him. Among the Senators who supported Hughes were Agnew, Armstrong, Hinman, Page, O'Neil, Saxe, Travis, Heacock, and Cobb. Grady and
139
1907]
HUGHES THE UNCOMPROMISING
the Tammany Senators, the McCarren Democrats, Raines, and Allds joined Kelsey's personal friends in his defense.4 Despite these troubles the Legislature accepted the Governor's program, created his Public Service commissions, and confirmed his appointments to them of men selected from both parties without any regard to political availability. William R. Willcox, postmaster of New York City, was made chairman in the First district, and Frank W. Stevens of Jamestown, who had been prominent in the prosecution of Justice Hooker, became chairman in the Second district. The Recount bill was passed, but was declared unconstitu- tional by the Court of Appeals on November 19. The new Attorney-General started quo warranto proceed- ings, but more than a year later, after a long trial, Jus- tice Lambert instructed a jury to render a verdict that McClellan was legally elected.5 On the Governor's recommendation the State accepted William P. Letchworth's gift for a reservation at Portage Falls, despite the opposition of interests whose plans for developing Genesee River power were interfered with by this safguarding of the gorge. Hughes vetoed a two- cent railroad fare bill on the ground that it was arbitrary and not passed after inquiry into the cost and profits of service.6 He also vetoed, as an invasion of home rule, a bill giving the women teachers of the New York schools equal pay with the men, after it had been vetoed by McClellan and repassed. The Reapportion-
4New York Tribune, May 3, 1907.
5New York Times, July 1, 1908.
6C. E. Fitch, Official New York, I, p. 257.
140
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1907
ment act of 1906 having been declared unconstitutional, chiefly on account of inequalities in the representation of Queens county, a new act was passed, which, despite the opposition of the Speaker, again combined Genesee, Allegany and Wyoming to the advantage of Stevens and diminished Wadsworth's political power by making Livingston the subordinate partner in a Senate district with Steuben.
By this time many of the organization leaders were arrayed in open hostility to Hughes-not merely hostility to particular measures, but to the Hughes idea of government. The Governor did not follow their rules of politics, and his appointments and policies were decided upon without regard to their effect upon State or local organizations. He used patronage neither to win nor punish them. He was a declared party man, but he treated the party as an aggregation of citizens unself- ishly devoted to certain ideas of public policy and needing the services of no political leaders whose power and influence were dependent upon the distribution of patronage or the shaping of legislation with a view to its effect on their own fortunes. Some of the political leaders at first thought he was merely trying to build up a personal or factional machine. The more clever and thoughtful of them, however, saw the traditional prin- ciples of political leadership involved, and began a steady warfare on the Governor under the inspiration of William Barnes, Jr., the most clear-thinking of them all and the consistent champion of machine politics as it had been practised in the Republican party from the time of his grandfather, Thurlow Weed. Some of
141
HUGHES THE UNCOMPROMISING
1907]
Hughes's own associates failed in this respect to com- prehend him. While the Governor's plans hung fire in the Legislature, Frederick C. Stevens went to Washing- ton and suggested to Roosevelt that the politicians who formerly antagonized him were blocking Hughes. As a result, in April Roosevelt suddenly demanded the resignation of Archie E. Sanders, the Collector of Internal Revenue at Rochester. Sanders was an ally of the Wadsworths and a political enemy of Stevens, whose own political purposes harmonized perfectly with this exercise of Presidential discipline. Ex-Con- gressman Wadsworth charged that the President was persecuting him.7 In indirect reply it was announced from the White House that the President's action was dictated by a desire to support Hughes. The Tribune reported that the President wished to fill the place with a good Hughes man, and added: "It is the President's intention to strengthen Governor Hughes's hand at every opportunity, and this seemed to be a good one."8
This suggestion; however, met with no favorable response from Hughes, who said that he had not been consulted about Sanders.9 He let it be known that he did not care to base his success on the use of Federal patronage. This rejection of his aid greatly annoyed the President, whose friends represented him as com- plaining that he responded to what he supposed was an inspired request of the Governor's political representa- tive, only to be snubbed for interference. Sanders's
7New York Times, April 19, 1907.
8New York Tribune, April 19, 1907; New York Times and World, April 20, 1907.
9New York Times, April 21, 1907.
142
POLITICAL AND GOVERNMENTAL HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK
[1907
resignation, when forwarded, was left unaccepted. He was continued in office for more than a year, and then removed for "pernicious activity" in aiding John A. Merritt to defeat Congressman Porter's renomination by the Republicans.10 Hughes's position was difficult. He had to choose between repulsing Roosevelt's friend- ly offices and making his administration the shadow of Washington and a football in the contest for the Presi- dential succession, which was beginning to shape itself between Roosevelt's friends and opponents. Little as Hughes wished it, out of the Sanders incident sprang a long continued coldness on the part of Roosevelt toward the Governor.
The only State officers to be chosen were two Judges of the Court of Appeals. The Republican State com- mittee on October 4 nominated Edward T. Bartlett, a Republican, to succeed himself, and Willard Bartlett, a Democrat, sitting in the Court by Executive designa- tion, to succeed Judge Denis O'Brien, who was retiring on account of age. Murphy and Conners defeated McCarren's attempt to anticipate this pro- gram. They were willing to renominate E. T. Bartlett, but urged Gaynor to run for the other seat, and when he declined sought an agreement with the Republicans that each committee should pick one candidate. Mean- while the Republicans nominated and Murphy reluctantly followed where McCarren had led.11 Both Judges were elected without significant opposition. The Republicans won 96 Assemblymen and the Demo-
10New York Tribune, August 26, 1908.
11New York Tribune, October 1, 4, 5, 1907.
143
HUGHES THE UNCOMPROMISING
1907]
crats 54. Wadsworth was chosen Speaker for his third term. E. A. Merritt, Jr., succeeded Sherman More- land as majority leader, while George M. Palmer headed the minority. Raines and Grady continued to lead the Senate. Two constitutional amendments were adopted, one freeing cities of the second class from the restriction of the debt limit in providing water supply, and the other making 175,000 instead of 250,000 popu- lation the line of division between cities of the first and second class, so as to include Rochester in the first class. Parsons arranged a fusion with the Independence League on local offices in New York, despite opposition from the Tribune and many leading Republicans, who asserted that even to defeat Tammany, which Parsons considered the supreme object, they could not counte- nance any partnership with Hearst, whom they had recently been denouncing as morally responsible for the spirit of class hatred that had prompted the murder of McKinley.12 The fusion was overwhelmed by Tammany.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.