Last Act

After its Manhattan triumph, the Kefauver committee, virtually ignored in its earlier home-town appearances, played to standing room only in Washington, and to millions of television sets in other cities across the nation.

For the occasion, the Senators brought forth an Interesting Character--none other than "Greasy Thumb" Guzik, once Scarface Al Capone's chancellor of exchequer, and now one of the monarchs of the Chicago underworld.

Greasy Thumb was a card--a short (5 ft. 2 in.), shabby-looking, aging (63) gaffer with dark glasses and a straggle of white hair, who ambled into the crowded room like some ancient and anxious raccoon being ushered into a kennelful of police dogs. He sat on the edge of his chair, feet dangling, conceded that he was Jacob Guzik, and then announced that he would refuse to "answer any questions whatever on the grounds of incrimination."

He refused to give his age. He refused to talk about his income. Greasy Thumb clammed up. Once, peering over his shoulder at the throngs who were eying him, he muttered in protest: "For Christ sake!" Would he talk about anything at all? He wouldn't answer that, either. "It may incriminate me." Where did he get this phrase about incrimination he was using all the time? Said Greasy Thumb with dignity: "I heard it on the television."

Maryland's Senator Herbert O'Conor tried a bit of oil. "May I ask just one question?" he said, with a mortician's delicacy of tone. "I don't want to pursue it. This is as to Mr. Ragen [a Chicago race-wire owner who, according to the committee, was murdered just before Greasy Thumb & Co. took over his service]. Would you answer whether you knew Mr. James Ragen?" Said Greasy Thumb hopefully: "If I answer that question, would you stop?"

Greasy Thumb finally said he did know Ragen, but did not know who killed him. Then he got lockjaw again, and was duly taken away, under arrest for contempt of Congress.

St. Louis' Millionaire Bookie James J. Carroll, a dignified and severely dressed man who had refused to talk before (on the ground that he, like Frank Costello, wanted no part of television), also provided a few refreshing moments. He seemed nervous at first and complained about the lights. Said he: "You have injected the fright factor."

"You are in fright at the moment?" solicitously asked Committee Counsel John Burling. Said Carroll: "That is right. I don't know if I can answer when I am frightened. I have the phenomenon of mike fright."

But when he relaxed he spoke philosophically. "I think gambling is a biological necessity for certain types of people," he said at one point. "It gives substance to their daydreams." Did he think churches were right in condemning gambling as a blight on this country? Said Big Bookie Carroll coldly: "No."

That just about wound up the show, except for a few forthright and patriotic remarks from J. Edgar Hoover. The Kefauver committee had spent eleven months on the trail of the U.S. underworld, and left behind three sheriffs fired, at least a dozen police officials demoted or indicted, scores of damaged reputations. Its methods had created misgivings, as all congressional investigations do: in effect, trying witnesses who are not formally charged with any crime, using loose rules of evidence and few of the protective procedures of a judicial body. And it had raised a new problem: the propriety of doing all this in front of TV's unwinking eye and the radio mike's sensitive ear.

The Kefauver committee's most impressive achievement was its forthright stand against the shoulder-shrugging theory that big crime is an inevitable part of U.S. life. It left many a citizen asking himself: If dozens of hoodlums and sleazy politicians could be hauled into the full view of millions to sing their sorry songs, why couldn't prosecutors have sent them off to the jails where so many of them obviously belong?

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.