The People's Friend

After 28 years of protecting Jersey City from the consequences of low taxes, up-to-date schools, free speech, the C.I.O., and modern sewers, Mayor Frank Hague faced another election. As the campaign went into its last fortnight, profane, puritanical-looking Boss Hague was able to contemplate the works of his opponents with heavy-lidded equanimity.

By odd coincidence Attorney General Walter D. Van Riper, who had come in to clean out Hague's bailiwick, was being tried last week in Federal Court on embarrassing charges--dealing in black-market gasoline. And Hague's opposition, the "Liberation ticket," had split in mid-campaign. Four of its members were accusing a fifth of selling out to the Boss.

But 69-year-old Frank Hague wasted no time in gloating. With his old-fashioned starched collar tight above a chaste pearl stickpin, he went out to remind the people of his years of toil in their behalf. With revival-meeting fervor the Boss told his followers that he was still pure at heart: "Let them point to one blemish on my record as mayor of Jersey City!" Liberation Candidate Paul E. Dougherty almost blew a gasket. Cried he: "... On a salary of never more than $8,000 he can own a summer home worth $125,000, a home in Miami ... an apartment ... a suite in New York! . . . Perhaps the mayor does not consider it a blemish that children attend antiquated schools . . . that garbage disposal is 50 years behind the times . . . that 56,000 property owners seek reductions in property assessments. . . ."

Unperturbed. Boss Hague disregarded such criticism for broader subjects less susceptible of factual proof. There was sin abroad. (Hague is against sin: he allows no prostitutes, burlesque shows or nightclubs in Jersey City.) There was the city's youth. Brassily the mayor intoned: "I have never developed into a reformer, but I have always tried to set an example for the younger folk."

There was the mayor's well-run Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital, at which Jersey City mothers get the finest treatment at low rates. Recalled Hague: "A kitchen table in a dingy tenement was my delivery room. My mother carried me about on a pillow for three months. . . ."

The mayor's claque applauded, and sang When Irish Eyes Are Smiling. The mayor had a word for his Polish constituents: "I will stay in the fight until you get your relief, a free Poland with the same borders as before the war." He had a convincing backer--Wisconsin's Congressman Alvin O'Konski who stumped beside him.

To a meeting of Italians he pledged himself to do "everything possible to rebuild Italy," added that he was "interested" in the San Francisco conference.

But Boss Hague, whose registered voters have a way of remaining registered voters even after they are buried, spoke with a certain irritation about one trick perpetrated by his enemy Republican Governor Walter Edge: this year, for the first time, all Jersey City must use voting machines.

"Edge and the railroad lobby are behind it!" shouted the mayor. "But don't be frightened . . . just pull the first five levers. Then they'll drag those damned machines out of here."

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