His Honor's Honor

STATES & CITIES

Mr. Mayor, would you be good enough to take the stand?

Responding to this long-awaited invitation in the New York County Court House last week, the slick incumbent of "the third biggest job in the U. S." glanced alertly about him to orient friend & foe, shot his broad, lopsided campaign smile, sat down jauntily to defend himself against gravest suspicions of his official conduct. As he looked around him in the packed, hot chamber, Mayor James John ("Jimmy") Walker could see friends aplenty: Lawyer Dudley Field Malone, Police Commissioner Edward P. Mulrooney's wife, a host of rowdy Tammanyites and the hard-headed Democratic minority of the Legislative investigation committee which was about to wave at him. His friends proved a loyal group, wildly cheering his cheapest sallies, hissing & booing his inquisitor. Outside was an admiring multitude who really would not care if it were proved that "Jimmy" had stolen the Brooklyn Bridge.

Mayor Walker did not have to look far to discover his chief foe. Leaning casually against the rail of the Press box was the committee's counsel, grey-haired Samuel Seabury, pontifical, bland, courteous, smiling, maddening. For this moment Inquisitor Seabury had patiently labored for 14 months, relentlessly cutting his way through the city's political jungle, confident that he would come at last to its heart--the Mayor's office in City Hall. At stake were not only His Honor's honor, but His Honor's job and perhaps his liberty as well.

Inquisitor Seabury, following up testimony he had previously wrung from the Mayor's associates, conducted his inquiry along four major channels:

Buses. Why did the Mayor in 1926-27 sponsor a franchise for Equitable Coach Co., later declared "a financial paralytic" by the State Transit Commission in ordering the franchise inoperative, when a company competing for the franchise had promised to operate more buses at a lower fare and posted a substantial guarantee? Why did the Mayor buy securities in Interstate Trust Co., later used in an abortive attempt to finance Equitable? How did it happen that one J. Allan Smith, Eqidtable's New York agent, bought Mayor Walker a $10,000 letter of credit (later extended by $3,000) when the Mayor went abroad in 1927, having just signed the franchise?

His Honor evaded any direct answer to the first question, jocularly wisecracking that the best offer the city ever had for a bus line came from a Long Island hay & feed firm (Laughter).

To the second question the Mayor said: "I never owned a share, I never sold one, I never profited one penny off any share of that stock, I never saw a copy, or even a photostatic copy, before in all my life of any share in that company. ... I never knew who owned it." Mr. Seabury knew that in Wall Street one of the chief selling points urged by vendors of Interstate and

Equitable securities was that blocks of them had been "put aside for the City Hall boys." After the Mayor left the stand, Park Commissioner Walter R. Herrick "remembered distinctly" buying 300 shares of Interstate stock on the Mayor's behalf.

Inquisitor--Did the Mayor pay for his stock, the 300 shares?

Park Commissioner--The money came to me from City Hall, Judge.

Inquisitor--Well, did you understand it was money sent you by the Mayor?

Park Commissioner--By the Mayor or by Mr. Stanton [his secretary].

As to the letter of credit, His Honor testified that he "never heard Smith's name connected with it." He paid his part of the European trip's expenses with $3,000 in cash. The junket's finances, he understood, were handled by Rodman Wanamaker (dead) and State Senator Bernard L. Downing (dead). The Mayor was even unaware, he said, that J. Allan Smith had paid for the $3,000 overdraft.

J. Allan Smith's was not the only name the Mayor failed to recall. He remembered Frank R. Fageol, the Kent, Ohio bus builder who was a potent Equitable backer. But he did not remember Mr. Fageol's Vice President Charles B. Rose (now president of America-La France & Foam-ite Corp.) or President William O'Neil of General Tire & Rubber Co., both of whom contributed heavily to Equitable's $282,000 promotion fund. Two weeks before, Mr. O'Neil had testified that he and most of the Equitable promoters had joined the dapper Mayor at a merry "old clothes" party the night after Equitable's franchise was gaveled through by the Mayor.

Inquisitor--You never heard of any of them? . . .

Mayor--That's correct, but what's that got to do with it? ...

Chairman--Now, Mr. Mayor, please--Mayor (truculently)--Well, who's on trial here, you or counsel?

Inquisitor--Apparently you are just making a speech, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor--Well, they're not so bad. Did you ever listen to any of them? (Laughter, gavel.)

Taxis. Why did the Mayor accept $26,535 worth of bonds from Broker Joseph A. Sisto, whose firm was interested in Parmelee Transportation (Checker Cab) securities, in 1929? Was it chance that, after Broker Sisto spoke to His Honor about the necessity for curbing low-rate "taxicab racketeers," the Mayor legislated into being the Board of Taxicab Control?

Broker Sisto had said that he invested in Cosden Oil stock for the Mayor but without his knowledge, after meeting him for the first time in Atlantic City. He did not give Mayor Walker the total $88,000 in profits from the transaction since he was hard up for cash, but sent him $26,535 m bonds through a henchman named McKeon, who testified he passed them to His Honor while riding home in the Mayoral limousine.

Mayor Walker admitted that he had "many kind friends" who did him unsolicited favors, but denied Broker Sisto had kept him in ignorance of the investment. He said that had the Cosden Oil pool lost money he would have borne his part of the loss. He did not receive the bonds in his car but in his home while dressing for dinner. The gift had no connection with the establishment of the Board of Taxicab Control. He suggested that had he really wished to graft from the Parmelee Company he could have gotten much more than $26,535 by failing to veto a proposal for higher cab fares, passed by the Board of Aldermen, which would have profited the organization $1.000.000 per year.

Fugitive. Why had one Russell T. Sherwood, a financial agent of the Mayor's, fled the city ten months ago when subpenaed by the Committee? How had he managed to bank $700,000 in five years on a salary which had never exceeded $10,000? Why did he share a lock box with Mayor Walker?

His Honor was at a loss to explain Fugitive Sherwood's disappearance. He said he had tried to get him back so he ''wouldn't have to go through these two days." If the $700,000 was inferred to belong partly to him, Mayor Walker said he "hoped [the Inquisitor] proves it is mine. I'd try and collect it" (Laughter). The lock box, he explained, had been shared when Mayor Walker was in the State Senate and practiced law in a firm for which Sherwood was accountant. It had been used by the Mayor as a repository for papers relating to one law case. To him Fugitive Sherwood was simply an unpaid secretary who took money (between $800 and $1,000 a month) to Mayor Walker's widowed sister, paid the expenses of plump Mrs. Walker's yacht (the Mary W.), tended financial odd jobs.

Two days prior, Inquisitor Seabury had questioned an old client of the Mayor's, one Abraham Schwartz, showman and realtor. Showman Schwartz reconstructed the scene of the Mayor's introducing him to Fugitive Sherwood: " 'Abe,' he says, 'I am the Mayor of the City of New York now, and all transactions of business--take it up with Sherwood, whatever he does, it suits me.' "

Block Aid. How did it happen that Mayor Walker shared a joint stock-trading account with Newspaper Publisher Paul Block from which, in 1927-29, the Mayor withdrew profits of $246,692 without having invested a cent?

The Inquisitor tossed this question into the proceedings during the last of the Mayor's two sessions on the stand. Publisher Block, according to testimony brought out at an earlier hearing, had been interested in a Brooklyn concern which planned to sell tile to the city subways. The Mayor affirmed the revelation of his amazing generosity with a shrug of his shoulders, called it a "beneficence," said that he always took his gains home in cash and put them in a safe--"not a vault, not a tin box." Publisher Block's gift, instead of damaging the Mayor, appeared to place a trump in his hand. Having begun to receive Block money several months before his trip to Europe in 1927, why, he asked, need he have looked elsewhere (i. e. to the Equitable bus people) for traveling expenses? Nevertheless, Inquisitor Seabury wanted an explanation for the Block aid. It was forthcoming when the quixotic publisher, who has often been seen at ringside and banquet table with the Mayor and whose Port Chester summer home is named "Friendship," took the stand.

Publisher--I will tell you, although it sounds a little silly or sentimental to me. The Mayor telephoned me one day and asked me if I would take a drive with him. It was on a Sunday. I said, "I have promised my youngster--who was only about ten--that I would take a walk with him." He said, "Why don't you have Billy drive with us?" I said, "Well, that is fine." I knew that would please Billy. . . . My youngster and I went downstairs . . . and we walked up and down in front of the house, and naturally our minds were on the Mayor, and the youngster said, "How much salary does the Mayor get?" And I told him $25,000 which was his salary at that time.

"Does the city give him a home?" And I said, "No, they don't." Well, this youngster said, "Can he live on what he gets?" And I said, "Well, I suppose he can but it probably is a difficult problem." And, Judge, I want you to believe me that it entered my mind then that I was going to try and make a little money for him (Laughter, gavel).

Inquisitor--Well, did you tell your boy that that idea had registered in your mind and that you meant to carry it out?

Publisher--No, I never discussed it with the boy.

So What? The evening following His Honor's ordeal he shadowboxed down the aisle at Madison Square Garden and the steel beams rang with a fight crowd's ovation. The city's fancy, as well as Tammany's, appeared well suited by the Mayor's sassy defense.

During the inquiry one cantankerous Tammanyite, State Senator Dunnigan, committee minority leader, had contributed to the general melee by shouting: "If there is any removal from the office of the Mayor, the people of this city will re-elect him by the greatest vote he ever got!" Quickly checking his ardor, he added to His Honor: "There has been no case made against you. Don't worry!"

But for the Mayor there was ample cause for worry. If Inquisitor Seabury had failed to make the Mayor hang himself on the witness stand, he had certainly brought out the suspicious nature of the Mayor's business affairs, and he had put on record a number of sworn statements by the Mayor which could be checked up on. "I am either guilty of perjury or not," said His Honor. "If I am I would expect to be prosecuted for it." Whether or not it was His Honor, someone had lied on-the stand. At various points the Walker testimony flatly contradicted that given by nine of the Committee's witnesses: Broker Sisto, Park Commissioner Herrick, State Senator Hastings, Busman O'Neil, Morris Markin (taxicab manufacturer). City Comptroller Charles W. Berry, J. H. Pardee of J. G. White Management Co., President William H. Woodin of American Car & Foundry Co., Chairman Charles E. Mitchell of National City Bank.

Missing Brother. Next move of Inquisitor Seabury was to try to find Mayor Walker's missing Brother W'illiam, a doctor, who received a $6,000 check from a man who received a $10,000 commission on the sale of street sweepers to the city. There would be further investigations, the Inquisitor indicated, before his findings reached their ultimate destination, the Governor's desk at Albany.

In February, when Governor Roosevelt ousted Sheriff Thomas M. Farley of New York County for failing to explain satisfactorily the sources of his fat income, the Governor issued a precedent-making announcement: "It is time, I believe, that the standard of the conduct of public officers be put on a plane of personal as well as official honesty and that, therefore, there is a positive duty on the part of the public official to explain matters which arise on an inquiry which involves the expenditure or the depositing of large sums of money. . . . One of their deep obligations is to recognize this, not reluctantly or with resistance, but freely."

What would Governor Roosevelt do if he found Mayor Walker's explanations unsatisfactory? That question was inevitably, inextricably bound up with the Governor's presidential ambition. Already Tammany was cold to him. And every day he needed more badly Tammany's support for the nomination. On the other hand, if the Governor were nominated, dismissing Mayor Walker might be just the act that would get the country to elect another President Roosevelt. Two late developments last week gave political pundits fresh food for speculation: 1) It was indicated that there could be no action at Albany on the Walker case until after the Democratic national convention; 2) Candidate Roosevelt's friends began talking about Tammany's Senator Wagner as the man to invite to place the Governor in nomination.

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