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YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

1945

Mayor Gaynor's Letters and Speeches

I sometimes write a letter — just for fun."
Mayor Gaynor
His letters hear his mind."
Shakespeare

Some of _
MAYOR GAYNOR'S
LETTERSAND SPEECHES

New York
GREAVES PUBLISHING COMPANY
Tribune Buildicg

Copyright, 1913, by
Greaves Publishing Co.

Entered at Stationers' Hall
London, England

Cj3£.

Introduction

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS need no intro
duction to the American public. The purpose of
this book is not to make them better known, hut to collect
some of them under one cover.
The letters here given are not one-tenth of the letters
of Mayor Gaynor which should he published. To cull
them out and get them all together would he a great task.
The number of the Mayor's letters is prodigious. His
letters were dictated from day to day. Most of them, of
course, concern the government of the city, but what may
he called "occasional letters," or letters on general topics,
occur constantly.
For directness, penetration, and wisdom, the Letters
of Mayor Gaynor stand alone. Those who have only read
an occasional letter from his pen published — and often
"edited"— 4n some daily newspaper, will be surprised by
the literary merit, range of thought, philosophy, common
sense and incisiveness of these productions.
As to their style the Mayor himself has best described
it in his reply to a question on" the art of letter writing,"
which appeared in " The New York Times." He said:
" What is this you want — just a word about
" the art of letter-writing? I fear you will 'find no
" art in my letters. I only aim to express what I
" have in my mind briefly and in the most express-
" ive words. The most expressive words are short
" words. I always know I am going to have a time
" of it and must be patient when a man with a
" vocabulary comes to talk with me. It is the same
" when such men and women write letters. They
" cause much unnecessary wear and tear in this
" world. " If you want a good vocabulary, read the Bible
" and simple hooks. But in the end good sense is the

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
" foundation of good language. The trouble with
" most writers and speakers is that they are all the
" time ' trying.' Don't try — just write or say what
" you mean. Naturally you may ornament it a
" little with nice words and phrases here and there,
" hut do not try to. If you do you spoil it. Let
" your mind be unambitious and content, and then
" you will better express yourself. What is the
" best way to write things, you ask? Often the best
" way is not to write them. But if you do the
" simple way is the best."
Mayor Gaynor discusses a wide range of topics — pass
ing, with nimble thought, " from grave to gay, from lively
to severe." There is much similarity between the writings
of Mayor Gaynor and those of Benjamin Franklin, whom
he so much admires.
The Mayor's letters are, on the whole, genial; or, even,
as he says in one of them, jovial. Mostly, he says just
what he likes; indulging in a luxury few can afford in
these diplomatic days. Some of his Literary Letters —
notably that to Dr. Morrison on the Birthplace of the Poet
Burns, the one to Mr. R. A.C. Smith on Don Quixote and
that to Rev. Robert W. McLaughlin on Washington and
Lincoln, deserve a permanent place in literature; as, in
deed, do many others.
Mayor Gaynor's speeches— a few of which are here
printed — dealing with political, economic and social prob
lems, deserve serious consideration. W. B. Northrop.

Biographical Sketch
(From The Evening Sun, New York, June 26, 1911.)
WILLIAM J. GAYNOR was born and brought up
on a farm near Oriskany, in Oneida County, New
York. He is of mixed Irish and English ancestry.
The neighborhood in which he lived was called
" Skeeterboro." His was the usual life of a boy on a farm
in a poor country. He worked in the fields and woods
and did the chores. He went to the little district school
each winter for a few weeks. He afterward went to the
village school and the seminary and afterward taught
school, and finally achieved a good education.
He settled in Brooklyn, N. Y., in 1875, at the age of
about 24. He did newspajaer work. Then he practiced law.
His rise in his profession was steady. He was a student
and was careful in his practice. He settled all the cases he
could, but when he had to fight in court he was a formidable
antagonist. Cleans Up Flatbush
He early began to take an interest in public affairs,
but not as a partisan. He at first lived in the town of
Flatbush, adjoining Brooklyn. Its population was about
10,000. Its government was dependent on two political
bosses and was thoroughly bad. There was much waste
and peculation. All sorts of favoritism existed. There
.were forty saloons, only one with a hcense. There was a
colony of road houses frequented by drivers to Coney
Island and the beaches. Gaynor was then a silent young
fellow. But he had tried several law cases at the town
hall with great ability. He said one day that the govern
ment of the town was a disgrace and the people should not

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
suffer it. People thought of the two opposing bosses and
smiled, for whichever was in power the result was the
same. And many even said that they had an understand
ing and worked together. The next thing was that every
one received a printed circular from Mr. Gaynor inviting
him to a public meeting in the town hall to select candi
dates for the approaching election. The hall was packed.
Both bosses were there. The chairman was a tool of theirs.
His Early Political Creed
A motion was put naming candidates. Young Gaynor
quietly handed up a resolution as a substitute, naming a
new set of men from top to bottom. The chairman refused
to submit it to a vote. Mr. Gaynor got up on a bench in
full view, and the whole town learned that he was not as
quiet as he looked. He reviewed the condition of things
in the crispest words. He demanded that the chairman
put the substitute to a vote, and told him that if he did
not do so it would not be at all difficult to put him out of
the window and put another in his place. The whole meet
ing broke out in cheers. The chairman lost his nerve and
put the substitute. It was overwhelmingly carried. Two
days later the two opposing bosses combined on a ticket,
but were beaten three to one at the polls. Gaynor had
been asked to run for the Legislature but refused. He said
he wanted no office. The newspaper accounts of that time
show that in his speech he declared, as he often has since,
that " ours is a Government of laws and not of men." He
even read that famous passage to that effect from the
Massachusetts Bill of Rights.
As A Police Officer
When the government was organized the town board
insisted on appointing Mr. Gaynor Police Commissioner,
and he was prevailed on to serve. He went quietly and
systematically to work. And everything was done in a
strictly lawful manner. No lawless poUce raids were
made, but in a few months the colony of evil places was

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
empty and every hotel and saloon had a license. The
town was " cleaned up." In a year Mr. Gaynor resigned
his office. His work was done. He made the police force
respect the law, and not do as they liked. He has tried to
teach the same lesson to the 10,000 pohcemen of the City
of New York. They are not permitted to do any unlawful
violence. He has taught them and the community that
" the way to enforce the law is the way prescribed by the
law itself," as he has so often declared. When a distin
guished citizen once said to him that that way would not
detect and punish crime he answered dryly, " Then don't,"
Soon afterward Mr. Gaynor moved into Brooklyn.
The politicians distrusted him. He did not court them,
but went his way. The ring quietly bought up a private
water company which supplied a part of the city. They
paid about $200,000 for it. Soon after they made a con
tract with the Mayor and Comptroller and Auditor, sell
ing it to the city for $1,500,000. By this time Mr. Gaynor
had accvmiulated some money in his profession and could
spend some. He brought a taxpayer's suit to prevent the
carrying out of the contract. He gave all the facts, show-
¦ ing it to be, as he said, " a spoliation of the funds of the
city." The court contest aroused the public to the highest
interest. Mr. Gaynor won through all the courts. It was
a year of hard work, with every powerful political and
financial interest against him. First they laughed at his
suit. But he only grew more silent and grim and worked
harder and harder. The fraud was killed, and he paid all
the expense, $14,000. He next took proceedings and com
pelled the city officials to collect the milKons of arrears of
taxes from the elevated railroads. The members of the
ring had large holdings in them, given for their influence,
and protected them. He took similar proceedings to ex
pose the so-called Columbian frauds and prevented the
fraudulent bills from being paid. He did other similar
things. His activity was marvellous. The common saying
was that he heard every pin fall in the city and that nothing
escaped his attention.

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Refuses Mayoralty Nomination
A Mayoralty election was now coming on in Brook
lyn. Everyone turned toward Mr. Gaynor. Honest peo
ple wanted him for Mayor. The politicians sneered and
said, " That is it; that is what he has been after all along;
we will now see him as a self-seeker." A great meeting
was held in the Academy of Music which named him for
Mayor. But he would not run. He said no one would
ever be able to say that the public services he had rendered
were with a view to get into office. He was even touchy
about it. And that characteristic has manifested itself
ever since in the many times he has been asked to be a
candidate for Governor and Mayor. Another was nom
inated instead. Later he was nominated for Justice of
the Supreme Court. He wrote dechning. But leading
citizens induced him to run to help the city ticket, the city
being part of the ten counties making up the judicial dis
trict. There was a majority the other way of about 30,000
in the district and the ring majority in the city was about
20,000 by past elections. But Mr. Gaynor was elected
by a majority of over 30,000, and the ring was as badly
beaten in the city.
This campaign led to the destruction of the celebrated
boss of Coney Island, John Y. McKane. He was chief
of police, and held several other offices in the town of
Gravesend, now a part of the borough of Brooklyn. Al
though there were only 10,000 inhabitants in the town he
had a padded voting list of several thousand. He had
been swinging this vote in a mass from one party to the
other for several years. He gave it to Cleveland for
President one year and the next time to Harrison. He
also used this vote in local and county elections as he saw
fit. The votes were cast by a gang of followers whom he
used as repeaters. At this election he concealed the poll
lists until Election Day, so that nobody could see them
and cause them to be revised or purged. Mr. Gaynor de
clared publicly that if McKane conducted a fraudulent
election that year he would have him sent to state's prison.
10

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
McKane only laughed at this and went right ahead, Mr,
Gaynor had watchers appointed, and obtained an injunc
tion from the Supreme Court to protect them. On Elec
tion Day McKane surrounded the polhng place with his
policemen, and no one was allowed to go into the polling
place unless he had a card issued by McKane, When the
watchers presented themselves with the injunction Mc
Kane exclaimed, " Injunctions don't go here," He set his
thugs on the watchers and beat them unmercifully so that
they had to run for their lives. The entire vote was cast
in opposition to the Gaynor ticket. A good many said
now that Mr. Gaynor was elected he probably would for
get his threat to send McKane to State's prison. But
he did not. He wrote to the Governor demanding that
the Attorney General intervene as the District Attorney
was on the side of McKane. After some difficulty the
Governor appointed two special deputy attorney generals,
Mr, Gaynor furnished them with all the evidence, and
directed and advised all of the proceedings. The result
was that McKane and 18 of his men were indicted and all
of them were convicted and sent to prison, McKane died
a few years after his seven-year term expired. The work
done in this matter was an object lesson to the whole
country, and attracted attention from all parts. The
memory of it still lives among many men. And the work
was done quietly and in order. There was no clamor and
no false statements were given out by press agents. Mr,
Gaynor worked at it quietly and unostentatiously until the
whole thing was done. Many of the younger generation
think that Mr. Gaynor's part was to try McKane as a
Judge, but that is not so. He was the citizen who attacked
McKane, gathered the evidence against him, and caused
him to be prosecuted and convicted.
Notable Career as Judge
The career of Mr. Gaynor as a judge is well known.
He was an immense worker and set a new pace. The
number of cases he tried each year was beyond anything
11

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
theretofore known. The legislative committee on the law's
delays reported all this several years ago. His opinions on
the rights of the individual, on immunity from unlawful
arrests and police interference, and on hbel, and other
kindred things became read and known all over this coun
try, and some of them are legal classics. It was not
thought he would remain long on the bench. But he
refused to resign to run for Governor, for Mayor of
Brooklyn and twice for Mayor of Greater New York.
At the end of his term he did not seek renomination or say
a word on the subject. But all of the parties without an
exception renominated him. He served only two years of
that term. The last four years as a judge he served as a
member of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court
of the State. Only Winner On His Ticket
But in 1909 he was induced to resign to run for Mayor
of New York City. Every one on his ticket was beaten
except himself. He had a majority of 73,000.
His career as Mayor is knovni to the whole country.
He made no promises or alliances to get the office. He
selected men to head all the twenty-eight departments of
the city to suit himself. The knowledge and insight which
he manifested in the workings of the city government was
an object lesson to everyone. Nothing escaped his atten
tion and he knew the way to do everything. He cut off
millions of expenses. He abohshed boards and bm-eaus
that every Mayor before him had supposed to be legal
fixtures. The story has been so often wiitten and told
that it need not be repeated. He has made the government
of the city an object lesson and pattern for the whole
country. He draws the eyes of Europe even upon the
city. They know him and talk of him over there almost as
much as we do here. But he has kept right on. The
departments have been raised to the highest efficiency.
This Is particularly true of the Police Department, al
though grafters weye found in it and it has been bitterly
12

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
assailed. The men are kept within the law and made to do
their duty. The Mayor has caused all appointments and
promotions to be made in numerical order from a competi
tive list. No money or influence is permitted to interfere
vidth this. No one is able to make any charges of fraud,
ring rule or political favoritism in the government of the
city. Under this man they have simply vanished. Of
course a man hke this has enemies, who growl and abuse
him. But the Mayor goes right on. The people say, " We
love him all the more for the enemies he has made," But
he quarrels vsdth no one and is unjust to no one.
Mayor as Philosopher
The philosophical turn of the Mayor's mind has en
deared him to the country. He displayed it throughout
his whole career, but it became more apparent in his
wider field as Mayor. He is called upon to make extem
poraneous addresses all the time and has made more than
any Mayor, if not more than all the Mayors who preceded
him, and on all sorts of subjects. And he always has some
thing thoughtful and often witty to say. The same is true
of the many letters he writes. He seems to have no desire
to conceal his thoughts or opinions, as is the case with
many politicians. Soon after he became Mayor the public
was attracted to one of the first of his long series of public
letters. A minister of the Gospel wrote to him for a license
to preach to the Jews in the most congested Jewish quar
ter in order to convert them. His answer is in this volume
(page 21).
Perhaps this letter also displays the Mayor's own
profound belief in God, which seems to be his whole creed.
His U3e of pure Anglo-Saxon in his oral and written
speech is remarkable. Attempt to Kill Him
In August, 1910, a discharged city employee tried to
assassinate Mayor Gaynor. He came up behind the Mayor
on the deck of an ocean steamer, where the Mayor stood
13

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
talking with friends who had come aboard to see him off
to Europe, and placing a pistol close to the back of the
Mayor's head fired. The powder marks will always
remain. The bullet entered back bf the right ear, and
changing its course two or three times passed through his
throat. It was never extracted. At first it was thought
that the Mayor's voice was permanently gone. But it
came back by degrees, and during the last year he has made
many public speeches and now his voice is nearly normal.
This assault on the Mayor revealed a new phase in his
character, a most unusual physical as well as mental cour
age. The concussion rendered him unconscious momen
tarily, but he struggled to his feet, and kept perfectly cool
although bleeding from mouth and nose. He did not
manifest the slightest fear of death, although he and every
one thought he was dying. He never speaks of the matter.
Wouldn't Run for Governor
Three years ago the unanimous voice of the Democratic
partjr of the State called on the Mayor to run for Gov
ernor. He carefully considered everything, and then sent
a letter to the waiting convention saying that as a matter
of duty to the people of New York City he could not re
sign as Mayor to accept another office. Everyone had sup
posed he was going to run for Governor, for his election
was beyond even a shadow of a doubt. He has since often
said the office of Mayor was larger than that of Governor,
and second only to the Presidency. Considering the im
mense powers vested in the Mayor of New York this is
true. The Mayor has all along taken a deep interest in
national politics, and nothing in that field escapes him.
His speech on the tariff when Cleveland first ran for Presi
dent was widely circulated — it was one of the best. He is
a close student of national questions. For years he spoke
of favoritism in freight rates as the grossest wrong of the
age. His recent speech at Yale University (see p. 243)
and other recent utterances have been widely read.
14

Mayor Gaynor's Letters and Speeches

PART I— LETTERS

His First Letter as Mayor January 10, 1910.
Sir: Please let steps be taken for the immediate re
sumption of the running of the stages on Riverside Drive,
from Seventy-second street to the viaduct, unless there
be a sufficient reason to report to the contrary. That fine
drive was made by the City for all, and not for a few.
Charles B. Stover, Esq.,
Commissioner of Parks,
New York City.

An Act of Justice January 12, 1910.
Sir: Please take measures to reinstate Clinton H,
Smith in his office of secretary, unless there is something
that should be reported to me to the contrary, and his
case can, later on, be calmly dealt with. That done in
heat or haste is as a rule ill done. We must not only deal
with people with justice, but also with the appearances of
15

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
justice, the latter sometimes being as essential as the
former,
Charles B. Stover, Esq.,
Park Commissioner, etc.
Drivers Might Freeze January 19, 1910,
Sir: As I walked down Flatbush avenue, Brooklyn,
on my way over this morning, I noticed that aU of the
drivers of a long line of snow wagons which were being
filled by the shovellers were standing about doing nothing
or sitting on their wagons, I called one of them to me
and asked him if the drivers did not help to load the
M'agons. He answered: " No, not when the City removes
the snow, but when contractors remove it, then we do."
How about this, please? Should they not take a shovel
and help ? They may freeze to death.
W. H. Edwards, Esq.,
Commissioner. Walking January 21, 1910.
To the Mayor of Los Angeles : This will introduce to
you my long time friend, Edward Payson Weston, who
intends to walk from your city to this city, and if you give
him a good send-off we will give him a good greeting when
he arrives here. By teaching by his example the taking of
outdoor physical exercise he is a benefactor to the human
race and should be treated as such.
Simplified Spelling February 11, 1910.
Dear Mr. Carnegie: Your letter is one of the many
coming to me about the matter of abolishing the general
16

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
personal tax. They are all in favor of doing it. But
yours is the only one expressed in the new simplified spell
ing. " I feel compeld " to compliment you in that respect.
But what about the fate of Roosevelt when he tried it,
or rather tried to make other people try it, yea or nay?
I note your expression of earnest hope that I do not
postpone applying to the Legislature until next year. Of
course I have no wish to advocate anything contrary to the
intelligent will of the community. If it calls for the re
peal law now I will have it prepared and sent to Albany.
Or may be a law giving us local option in the matter
would be more prudent? I note the newspaper editorial
approvals which you quote. It is a great thing to have
intelligent, able and fair newspapers, which most of ours
are. The less said about the other few the better.
Andrew Carnegie, Esq.

Waste in Condemning Lands
February 17, 1910.
Sir : I have concluded that the street opening bureau
needs to be reorganized, and also the method of acquiring
lands for City use and the making of awards therefor. The
said bureau is in even worse condition than I had sup
posed. The work there is protracted and made expensive
beyond endurance. Commissioners of appraisal and
award invariably take months and years to do what could
be well done in hours, days or weeks. In that way they
run up expensive bills for their own fees and expenses
which the landowners have to pay, and also postpone
necessary improvements. I have cases before me where
from 4 to 10 years were taken in proceedings to open short
streets, or a few blocks. In addition to this, grossly ex
cessive awards are made. In the acquiring of land for
city use, excessive awards are habitual, and the same un
necessary time is taken. The awards range from 2 to 6
17

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
times the fair value. I am glad to inform you that, as
might be expected, the Judges who appoint commissioners
are anxious to put an end to these abuses. It seems to
me the waj'' is for the Corporation Counsel to have each set
of commissioners charged by the Judge appointing them
in respect of the law governing them, and also as to the
time within which they should complete their work, and in
the case of dilatory commissioners the Corporation Coun
sel should move the court for their removal without com
pensation. It may be necessary for you to remove all of
the appraisers and employ new ones for the future in each
particular proceeding. The collusion between permanent
appraisers and unscrupulous attorneys for owTiers of lands
being taken is easy and has already been exposed, as you
know. The cost of commissioners in condemnation and
street opening proceedings was recently greater than that
of the entire judicial estabhshment within the city limit.
I look to you to make a complete reform in these mat
ters. Millions in money will thereby be saved annually to
the City. Remember always that yours is a great ad
ministrative department and not one of mere litigation,
technicalities and delays. I shall be glad to help you so
much as I can, and I am assured that the Judges will co
operate with you. For instance, we are about to acquire a
block of land in Brooklyn for a new court house. It
depends on the Judge who appoints the condemnation
commissioners whether the land shall be taken at its fair
actual value, or whether the commissioners shall be unfit,
and also turned loose to make excessive and fictitious
awards, and to remain on the job for years when two or
three months would be ample time. If the tax commis
sioners do their duty in valuing land for taxation, it can
not well happen that a commission should make an award
for land which is more than 10 to 15 per cent, higher than
such tax valuation.
A. R. Watson, Esq.,
Corporation Counsel. 18

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Slow Growth February 25, 1910.
My Dear Mr. Scott : I thank you very much for yom*
letter of February 17. I should not have delayed so
long in answering. I assure you that you do not have to
argue one moment with me to get me in sympathy with
j^our ideas of simplified spelling. Our spelling has been
changing for centuries and will continue to change. It
will not change suddenly, however. It seems to be con
trary to the rules of Providence that even good things
should be done suddenly. How long He sat patiently
brooding over this earth before it was fit? How slowly
our bodies mature, and the trees, and the grain of wheat,
and everything about us in the material world. The same
holds good in the intellectual world. All good growth is
slow growth, and even the simplification of spelling must
have its slow growth.
Charles P. G. Scott, Esq.,
Manhattan. A Learned Ratcatcher March 20, 1910.
Dear Mr. Frey : Your letter of March 15 is at hand, de
scribing how your calhng of ratcatcher is being constantly
interrupted by your being summoned to serve as a juror.
Sooner than have the citj'- overrun with rats and every
thing eaten up by them I would have you relieved of jury
duty. Do you not think we had better have a bill intro
duced in the Legislature to exempt ratcatchers from jury
service? The difficulty is, however, that so many exemptions
have already been passed by the Legislature that there
seems to be only the ratcatchers and a few other people
left to serve on juries. That might possibly impede the
progress of your bill if sent to Albany. '
I will have to carefully consider the matter, and some
day when you are do^vn this way come in and Ave will talk
19

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
it over, and also about rats, I see that you are a classical
scholar, judging by the motto at the head of your letter.
My experience is that learned men are to be found every
where. As we read in Don Quixote : " The moun
tains breed learned men and philosophers are found in the
huts of shepherds."
Charles M. Frey, Esq. Good Friday March 25, 1910.
Dear Dr. Morrison : Your rules of living, which you
have been so good as to send me, are so sensible and so easy
to carry out, that I have a strong notion to publish them.
I am going to read them occasionally and see if I can even
measurably follow them, for, as you know, I have never
been very careful of myself. I suppose that before long
I shall begin to feel the effects of it, and tire out from work.
This has always been the one day in the year which
fills me with awe. It is the day of the world's greatest
tragedy. I see Him all day long hanging from the Cross
on the hill called Golgotha. How bad they treated him,
and how the whole world deplores it. I have never been
able to understand those who have no feeling about Good
Friday.
Rev. William Morrison,
Brooklyn, N. Y.
Patrolman's Kind Act April 5, 1910.
[Note: The Mayor received a letter from jNIr. George B.
Dickerson, of Westfield, N. J., telling how his two little boys had
been to the Hippodrome in New York with their teacher and
others, and got separated from them and lost, and how a police
man found them in the street and directed them how to get home,
and gave them a dollar to pay their fare, and how they arrived
home safely. On inquiry the Mayor ascertained that the police
man was Patrolman Thomas Sheahan, of the 29th Precinct, and
he thereupon mailed to him the letter of Mr. Dickerson and asked
20

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the policeman to explain the occurrence. The Mayor received a
reply from Patrolman Thomas Sheahan, telling in a modest way
how he found the boys and directed them how to get home and
gave them the dollar. The Mayor answered Patrolman Sheahan
by the following letter :]
Dear Mr. Sheahan : I am very glad indeed to receive
your letter of April 4, explaining, in answer to my re
quest, how you sent the two little boys home. It was very
kind of you indeed, and I am certain they will send back
the dollar which you gave them, I have long known from
personal observation that the patrolmen do many kind
things, and I am in a position now to hear of many of them
every day, I shall always be glad to hear from you, and
also to do anything for you which I can legally and
properly do. Converting the Jews April 21, 1910,
Reverend and Dear Sir : It seems to me that this work
of proselyting from other religions and sects is very often
carried too far. Do you not think the Jews have a good
religion? Have not the Christians appropriated the entire
Jewish sacred scriptures? Was not the New Testament
also written entirely by Jews? Was not Jesus also born
of the Jewish race, if I may speak of it with due rever
ence? Did not we Christians get much or the most of
what we have from the Jews? Why should any one work
so hard to proselytize the Jew? His pure belief in the one
true living God comes down to us even from the twilight
of fable, and is the one great unbroken lineage and tradi
tion of the world. I do not think I should give you a
license to preach for the conversion of the Jews in the
streets of the thickly settled Jewish neighborhoods which
you designate. Would you not annoy them and do more
harm than good? How many Jews have you converted
so far?
Rev, Thomas M. Chalmers,
Brooklyn, N. Y. 21

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Stops All Arrests Without Warrant for Accidents
May 6, 1910.
Sir: Complaint has been made to me that on April
21st Joseph F. Mullen, a locomotive engineer of the New
York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company, was
arrested without a warrant and locked up by two pohcemen
over night; that he was taken to the police court next
morning and held in $1,000 bail for examination on the
charge of assault; that he offered Mr. H, B. Dwyer as
his bondsman; that the Magistrate rejected Mr, Dwyer
for the reason that he had once practiced law (which was
no reason at all in criminal practice) , and sent the prisoner
back to jail; that thereupon a Justice of the Supreme
Court accepted Mr, Dwyer as bondsman and discharged
the prisoner on bail; that on the examination day the
officers who made the arrest could furnish no evidence
against the prisoner; that an adjournment was had, and
on the adjourned day they could furnish no evidence; that
subsequently the Coroner called up the 37th Street PoMce
Station house and had the prisoner arrested again without
a warrant; and that he was afterwards discharged again
for lack of any evidence.
All this was done because a brakeman on the cars at
tached to the said Mullen's engine was hurt while he was
standing on the running board of the tender of the engine
in the yard of the New York Central and Hudson River
Railroad Company, There was nothing to show that the
engineer assaulted him. It appears to have been an acci
dent. We have all observed that policemen very often
make similar arrests of motormen and others simply be
cause an accident happened. I Avrite this to you not merely
to redress the wrong which was committed to this man,
but also to have you do away with such occurrences in the
future. The members of the force seem to be under the
erroneous notion that it is their duty to make arrests in
all such cases. They should not do so imless there be some
evidence after careful examination that a felony was com-

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mitted, and even then they should await the issuing of a
warrant unless the case be reasonably clear, and the de
fendant may run away. The way is to first make an exam
ination and see whether the person has committed a felony
and whether anybody can testify against him. To arrest
an engineer or motorman for assault or manslaughter
simply because an accident happened, and without any
evidence against him, is an oppression forbidden by law.
William F. Baker, Esq.,
Police Commissioner. Big and Little Policemen May 9, 1910.
Sir: This wiU introduce to you Mr. Joseph Hocker,
who wants to be a policeman. He says he has under
gone the physical examination, and passed, but fears your
mental test. He is certainly a physical giant, 6 feet 5
inches tall, and I trust he is an intellectual giant also, be
cause we are in need of the latter kind on the police force.
He is too big for the detective force ; he could not go any
where without being seen. Is there no way to get a few
little men, even hunchbacks and " singed cats," on the
poHce force, so that we can make detectives of them? We
do npt need giants for detectives. We are more in need of
little fellows who can go through keyholes and knotholes,
and if they have eyes in the back of their heads also aU the
better. To: the Chairman,
Civil Service Commission.

A Government of Laws, Not of Men
(From The Outlook, June 18, 1910.)
The people of the City of New York do well to wel
come Mr. Roosevelt home. He is of them — bone of their
bone, flesh of their flesh — and they have " a soft side " for
23

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
him. Through a long ancestry he is native and to the
manner born here. And the people of the whole country
will join in the welcome. They have witnessed with
pleasure the honor done to Mr. Roosevelt in Europe,
Twice within two generations have they now seen the like
in the case of two of their former Presidents. General
Grant had not only been President twice, hke Mr. Roose
velt, but had one of the great military careers of the world
back of him. No doubt some of the extraordinary curi
osity displayed in Europe to see him and do him honor
arose from this latter fact. But the chief reason was the
same as in the case of Mr. Roosevelt, namely, that, having
been twice President of the United States, and become
again a private citizen, docile to just authority, he per
sonified in the European mind the idea of a government of
laws as distinguished from a government of men. It is
that idea, first vitalized on this continent, and afterwards
followed as an example in Europe, by slow degrees and by
one nation after another, which shall always make one who
has been in chief rulership over this country an object of
profound interest and reverence to the rest of the world.
In one form and another we expressed it in the beginning
in its threefold division of power in all of our fundamental
instruments of government, the loftiness of the conception
being sometimes expressed in equally lofty and fehcitous
language, as, for instance, in the Massachusetts Bill of
Rights : " In the government of this commonwealth, the
Legislative department shall never exercise the
executive and judicial powers, or either of them;
the Executive shall never exercise the legislative
and judicial powers, or either of them; the Judicial
shall never exercise the legislative and executive
poAvers, or either of them; to the end it may be a
government of laws and not of men."
Great problems now confront us for solution, the ac
cumulation of more than Iavo generations of men more
24

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
bent on their individual success, if not greed, than on the
public weal. No few, but all of us, are to blame for it,
either by actual commission or by indifference and neglect.
With that era now drawing toward its close, let us get our
standpoint anew in this great conception of government, to
the end that we may lose all fear, as we most certainly
shall, of a resort to force to right whatever has grown up
among us that suiteth not a commonwealth, and has in it
the canker of death to government of equal opportunity to
all and favoritism or priAalege to none.

Exhibition of Prize Fight Pictures In Theatres
July 7, 1910.
Dear Sir: I thank you for your favor of July 6.
If it lay in my power to say Avhether the pictures should
be exhibited it would not take me long to decide it. I do
not see how it can do any one any good to look at them.
But will 5^ou be so good as to remember that ours is a gov
ernment of laws and not of men. Will you please get
that well into your head. I am not able to do as I like
as Mayor. I must take the law just as it is, and you may
be absolutely certain that I shall not take the law into my
own hands. You say you are glad to see that the mayors
of many cities have " ordered " that these pictures shall
not be exhibited. Indeed? Who set them up as autocrats ?
If there be some vahd law giving any mayor such power
then he can exercise it ; otherwise not. The growing exer
cise of arbitrary power in this country by those put in
office would be far more dangerous and is far more to be
dreaded than certain other vices that we all wish to mini
mize or be rid of. People little know what they are doing
when they try to encourage officials to resort to arbitrary
power.
Rev. O. R. Miller,
Brooklyn, N. Y. 25

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
In the Presence of Death
St. James, L. I.,
Sept. 3, 1910.
My dear Sister: Your letter encouraged me very
much. I was so glad to get it, for I was feeling depressed,
although coming from the hospital home had braced me up
for the time being. I felt shaky and doubtful of myself,
until Tuesday, the first day I walked out, but now my
strength is returning fast. The barking neuralgia in all
the side of my head and my ear has subsided. The wound
healed without trouble. You remember hoAV quickly the
two bad cuts I got when a boy healed, one from an axe
and the other from a scythe. The doctors looked at the
scars in the hospital.
I still find it difficult to talk, but my voice comes back
a little every day. But I shall not inflict my ills and aches
on you. I am sorry for the worry I have caused you all.
You remember my dog " Spot," when we were children.
He got hurt once, and crawled under a pile of logs and
lay there for more than a week before he came out. Well,
when any trouble happens to me, I feel just hke poor
" Spot " — I would like to crawl under the log pile and
stay there.
I have not read any newspaper since I was hurt, nor
have I been told how the thing happened, except that
Commissioner Thompson told me on the deck that I had
been shot by a former employee of the Dock Department,
I do not remember the name he gave. It is my intention
never to read a line of what has been published in the
newspapers about the matter or me since I was hurt. It
might warp my mind about myself. What I am I am,
with all my shortcomings, and I am content with that.
My OAvn knowledge of the occurrence is of course very
limited and may be inaccurate, I think I shall tell it to
you now, so that there may be some family record of it,
and in a year or two I wish you to turn this letter over
to Rufus to keep. I was taking him with me for com-
26

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
pany. As you know, he and I have travelled much to
gether. He was on the other side of the ship and did not
see me shot.
I was standing on the deck talking with Commis
sioners Thompson, Lederle, Edwards, Corporation Coun
sel Watson, my secretary, Mr, Robert Adamson, and
several friends who had come aboard to see me off, Mr,
Montt, President of Chih, and Mrs. Montt had just
passed by, and I had spoken a few words with them. Mr,
Adamson pointed out that the ship was dressed with flags
for me, but I said I did not think it could be for me. My
next consciousness was of a terrible metallic roar in my
head. It filled my head, which seemed as though it would
bm-st open. It swelled to the highest pitch, and then fell,
and then rose again, and so alternated until it subsided
into a continuous buzz. It was sickening, but my stomach
did not give way. I was meanwhile entirely sightless.
I do not think I feU, for when I became conscious I
was on my feet. I suppose they saved me from falling,
and they were supporting me. My sight gradually re
turned, so that after a while I could see the deck and the
outhnes of the crowd around me. I became conscious
that I Avas choking. Blood was coming from my mouth
and nose and I tried all I could to swallow it so those
around me would not see it. But I found I could not
swallow and then knew my throat was hurt. It seemed
as though it were dislocated. I struggled to breathe
through my mouth, but could not, and thought I was dying
of strangulation. I kept thinking all the time the best
thing to do.
I was not a bit afraid to die if that was God's will of
me. I said to myself just as Avell now as a few years from
now. No one who contemplates the immensity of
Almighty God, and of His universe and His works, and
reahzes what an atom he is in it all, can fear to die in this
flesh, yea, even though it were true that he is to be dis
solved forever into the infinity of matter and mind from
which he came.

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
In some way I happened to close my mouth tight and
found I breathed perfectly through my nose. I then be-
heved I could keep from smothering. But I kept choking
and my mouth kept opening to cast out the blood. But
much of it went doAvn into my stomach. That night in
the hospital I had five hard chills in succession, and got
deathly sick and vomited up this blood all over the bed.
The poor sister who was watching me called the doctors,
but they said it was a good thing. I felt much better after
that, but grew very weak. The trouble was to get nour
ishment as I could not swallow.
But I shall not speak of the hospital, but only of my
recollection (or impressions) of things on the ship. They
wanted me to lie down on the deck, but I said no, I would
walk to my stateroom. I could now see faces, and I
wanted to get away from the crowd. I could not bear to
have them looking at me in the plight I was in, especially
the crowd of newspaper men, and especially those with
cameras. Two of them rushed up from the line where
they all stood and put their cameras right in my face and
snapped them. I finally put my hand up and I think I
said " don't." I hope these pictures Avere not published.
The other newspaper men acted decently, as they
always do.
We were on the opposite side of the ship, and I was
supported through the gangway down a few steps, and
then up the same number, and my stateroom was there.
As Ave were crossing I said to Commissioner Thompson
on my right hand to send for two of the best surgeons of
the city, and be sure and tell them not to discourage me.
I had difficulty to make him understand me, but he finally
did. Finding that my wound Avas not immediately mor
tal, I had determined to make a fight for it, and did not
want any one to come near me who would discourage me.
I Nothing annoys me more than to have persons come about
land express doubts when I have set my mind upon doing
a thing. They lifted me into bed, but had to prop me up on
28

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
i
account of the choking. I told the poor captain who bent
over me that I Avas sorry for the trouble and delay I was
causing. The ship's doctor and the ambulance doctor who
soon arrived washed my face and beard and bandaged my
wound. They carried me in a litter and put me in the
ambulance. As it started I Avas filled Avith joy to see
my dear Rufe spring up on the rear seat. I knew then
that I was not to be alone. How relative happiness is in
this world. He had been encouraging me by words all
along and kept on doing so, but broke down completely
in the hospital when mamma arrived, as I afterwards
learned. The excitement being over,' I began to grow weak,
and was quite weak when I was wheeled into the operating
room. I forgot to tell you that as I stood or was sup
ported on the deck I heard some one crying out, " Kill
him," and others saying, " No, do not kill him." They had
seized the assassin. I heard no struggle, nor did I hear
any shots fired, but I concluded that I had been shot in
the head by an assassin. I did not hear or feel the shot
that hit me. There was an interval at the first when I
seem to have been unconscious.
Though the thing had not entered my head that morn
ing, I was not surprised when I realized that I was shot. I
had had a feeling for some weeks that I might be assaulted
on account of the anonymous threats I was getting by
mail. I had not received so many since I was opposing
the ring corruptions and the McKane conditions in Brook
lyn and Gravesend when I was a young man. I had
ceased walking over the Brooklyn Bridge.
The matter of the pictures of the Reno prize-fight had
come up. I had no way as Mayor to stop the theatres
from showing them. By the city charter their licenses
were revokable by the judges of the Supreme Court, not
by the Mayor, and the district attorney and corporation
counsel decided that there was no law forbidding such pic
tures. They had been shoAvn for years without objection.
But the Hearst newspapers kept on denouncing me for
29

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
not stopping them. I suppose you know the way they
had behed me ever since I became Mayor. Finally, one
day they printed in large type that an officer of the Chris
tian Endeavor Society named Lowande had called on
me at the Mayor's office and asked me on behalf of that
society to stop the pictures, and that I told him he " was
a fool and was sent by fools."
I had never said such a thing, as you may well know.
It was made up. I learned that Lowande was a process
server for laAvyers. The officers of the Christian Endeavor
Society put forth a statement of their own motion that
it was untrue that they had sent Lowande or any one
else to me, and that he did not represent them. But it
made no difference. These newspapers went on repeating
the falsehood, and even tried to get up a pubhc meeting
to denounce me.
Meanwhile, people of wicked or disordered minds, of
whom there are a large number in New York city, woidd
cut these articles out and send them to me with abuse
and threats written on the margin, or else with anonymous
letters threatening me. Some of them said I would be
killed. Probably they cared nothing about the pictures,
but the particular disorder of their minds was inflamed
by reading how bad a man I was. Finally they printed
that terrible cartoon of me entitled " The Barker." I was
dressed up as a ruffian and standing outside of a prize
fight ring twirling a cane and barking for people to go
in and see the sport. Two men slugging each other, one
of them down and bleeding, were exposed in the ring.
Think of one who has been more of a library student
than an5rthing else all his life, and who never even saAv a
boxing match, being pictured like that. But the ignorant
and disordered minds believed it, and I suppose many
others who read no other newspaper did, and were nat
urally inflamed against such a ruffian being Mayor. That
was the object these newspapers had in view, although
they printed all the pictures of the fight in the most re
volting form, as they had been doing for years with all
so

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
such fights. Even some sensational ministers wrote to me
as though they believed it. It Avas during this time that
it first entered my head that I might be in danger, espe
cially in walking over the Bridge, although earher in the
year I had received a few similar threats when these same
newspapers published that we were discharging small em
ployees but taking on expensive ones.
Such journahsm is, of course, in absolute defiance of
the criminal law, and it did not enter my mind to publicly
call on the grand juries and the district attorney to pro
tect me from it, but I was weak and feared people would
say I was thin skinned. But the time is at hand when
these journahstic scoundrels have got to stop or get out,
and I am ready now to do my share to that end. They
are absolutely without souls. If decent people would re
fuse to look at such newspapers the thing would right
itself at once. The journalism of New York city has
been dragged to the lowest depth of degradation. The
gi'ossest railleries and libels, instead of honest statements
and fair discussion, have gone on unchecked. One cannot
help sympathizing with the decent newspapers.
But I will Aveary you with all this. Tom saw me at
the hospital twice, and I must write to him. He started
immediately on hearing that I was hurt. What a good
heart he always has. Give my love to all. I long to see
you, and to go out to the old farm, and walk the old roads.
I am certain it would do me good, but I fear I cannot go
this year. I wish I could go back to work. It would
take my mind out of my throat.
Miss Mary E. Gaynor.
To Men In State's Prison Who Wrote to Him After
He Was Shot on August 9, 1910
St. James, L. I.,
Sept. 15, 1910.
Dear Mr. Hoyt (No. 7494, Clinton Prison) : I thank
you exceedingly for your kind letter and am glad to
31

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
receive the good will which you send me of yourself and all
your companions in the prison. I am well aware that
many of you are not really bad men, but unfortunate men,
and that God so sees you. There are many of us who
would be the same as you are if we had had the same trouble
and obstacles in our lives. So do not be discouraged. I
shall not speak of my trouble in view of the greater trouble
of all of you. Let us all be patient and content.
Fred M. Hoyt, Dannemora, N. Y.

Declines the Governorship
Deepwells, St. James, L. I.,
September 25, 1910.
Dear Mr. Creelman: Your note, with Mr. Watter-
son's, is at hand. Mr. Dix and Mr. Mack have been here
and I have told them finally and positively that I am not a
candidate for Governor, and cannot be made a candidate.
I do not intend to abandon the City.
They say that it seems certain that the convention Avill
nominate me, even though I am not a candidate. That
does not seem probable, and I hope it does not occur.
Although my mind is made up, I do not perceive any
moral question in the case, I am under no obligation
whatever to remain as Mayor. I certainly had no such
compact with those who opposed me and voted against
me; it takes two sides to make a compact; nor had I any
Avith those who nominated and elected me; and if I had,
they would have a right to release me.
As for myself or my political future, I shall not con
sider that at all. Mr. Watterson is in error in supposing
that I have the Presidency in my mind. Never! And it
is too late for me to begin shaping my course for any ambi
tious purpose.
And Avhen a man has gone down into the Valley of the
Shadow, and looked the spectre Death in the face, and said
32

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to it, " I am ready," nothing in this world looks very large
to him, as I can assure you.
You Avill have a hard time reading this letter, as my
shoulder and collarbone are still disabled, oAving to the
injured neck muscles which support them.
James Creelman, Esq.

Declines the Governorship
St. James, September 26, 1910.
Dear Mr. Creelman : I am this day writing a letter to
Chairman Dix, stating that I am not a candidate for
nomination for Governor, and refuse to become such. I
do this to remove all doubt on the subject which may haA^e
arisen by reason of irresponsible statements which I am
informed are being circulated. No utterance of mine has
put the matter in doubt. Some have said to me that the
convention may nominate me although I am not a candi
date. It seems to me that it might appear vain or egotis
tical for me to assume in my letter to Mr, Dix that that
extraordinary thing might happen, I therefore write this
supplemental letter to you to take to Rochester and show
there so as to prevent my nomination if it should appear to
be imminent. Make it plain that if nominated I would
decline to accept. I could not abandon to their fate the
splendid men whom I have appointed to office, and who are
working so hard for good government, nor could I abandon
the people of the City of New York after so short a service.
You may make this letter public in advance of going to
Rochester if in your judgment you think the situation
calls for it. But do not do so unless it be plainly necessary.
Every honest man Avill understand me.
James Creelman, Esq.

33

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Declines the Governorship
St. James, Sept. 26, 1910.
Dear Sir: I have further considered the matter as
you requested when you called on me here with Mr. Mack
last Wednesday, but can only reiterate to you that I am
not a candidate for nomination for Governor. This must
have been well knov^Ti all along, for I have written it to
many people during the last six months. I am not in
fluenced in my course by assertions made here and there
that I made an agreement or compact during the Mayor
alty campaign to serve out the four years if elected. These
false assertions are made by persons who opposed me and
voted against me, and would do so again. I made no such
agreement. I certainly did not make it with those Avho
opposed me and voted against me, I could have had no
compact with them. It takes two sides to make a compact.
Nor did I make it Avith those who nominated and sup
ported me. They did not ask for it. I did say of my
own motion and at the request of no one that I purposed
to devote the next four years to the service of the City.
But this only started a hue and cry against me that I
should make a pledge or compact to that effect, which I
refused to do. And if I had made a pledge, that could
not prevent the voters from electing me to some other
office. I am well aware, as has been pointed out to me, that
there are some large things which a Governor could readil}''
do for the City of New York, by oversight and legitimate
interference, which the Mayor of that city cannot do Avith-
out much time and difficulty, if at all. Among them I may
mention the planning and construction of a comprehensive
system of subways, Avith a single fare over the Avhole
system, which, in the discordancy or dualty of govern
ment, or both, now existing in that city, is a difficult and
protracted matter. But nevertheless my Avish to remain
as Mayor is such that I do not become a candidate for
nomination for Governor. May I add that as matter of
34

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
fact the office of Mayor of the City of New York, con
sidering the power and the constant occasion for the exer
cise of the highest functions of free government lodged in
it, is second to no office in this country save one.
Many tell me and Avrite me that in taking this course
I give up my future. But I shall not take myself or iny
future into consideration. None of us has a future, but
only the present. And if I thought I had a future, I
should be content to entrust it to the people of the City of
New York.
I trust that the convention will nominate some one who
is not a mere dealer in the political commonplaces and
jingles of the last 25 or 50 years, but who has kept pace
and grown with the times, and whose absorbing purpose
Avill be to make the government of the State, in all its
branches, general and local, intelhgent, honest and decent,
and to hft it up and make it an object lesson to the whole
nation. If to do this he has to be more or less meddlesome,
we will all forgive such meddlesomeness, if kept fairly
Adthin the law.
John A. Dix, Esq.,
Chairman, etc. A Morning Prayer November 3, 1910.
Dear Sir: It might be a good thing for you to stop
putting out false statements, even though you cannot get
your campaign speakers to do the hke. I never favored
the nomination of J udge Keogh for Governor, nor was he
a candidate for Governor, so far as I know. I never knew
a dividend to be got out of false statements yet. I sup
pose, very naturally, that the other statements of fact in
your pubhshed statement are equally false. Suppose you
pray every morning for awhile for God to direct you to
tell the truth, and see what fruits it vdll bear.
Ezra P. Prentice, Esq., Chairman,
Republican State Committee. 35

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Cured November 5, 1910.
Sir : I am glad to perceive from your letter of Novem
ber 4, just received, that I have already so far cured you
of your propensity to make false statements that you drop
your forged quotation from my letter to Mr. Ridder, and
use the correct quotation. While the lamp holds out to
burn the Ablest sinner may return.
E. P. Prentice, Esq.,
Chairman.

Socialism and the Red Flag
(Extract from Message to the Board of Aldermen, February 21,
1911.)
I have particularly made the pohce authorities under
stand that those who entertain views of government, or of
economic or social order, different from ours, are not to be
interfered with, or denied the right of freedom of speech
and of assembly on that accoxmt. A propaganda by intel
lectual persuasion and peaceable means for changes in
form of government or in the economic or social order is
lawful and not to be meddled Avith, much less oppressed,
by the police. The Sociahsts do not beheve in indiAddual-
ism, but in collectivism. In place of having the present
condition of individual ownership of property, they would
mass all land and chief products and the principal means,
tools and machinery of production under the control and
operation of the State, in order, as they claim, to bring
about distributive justice, namely, a just division of the
total product of industry among all those who contribute to
produce it by their physical or mental work, after first pro
viding for the non-productive aged or infirm. That it
clearly appears to the rest of us that this scheme would by
doing away with incentives to individual exertion greatly
reduce production, and thereby increase poverty and dis-
36

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
tress, is no reason for denying to those who advocate it
rights secured to every one by our system of government.
And that their flag is red instead of blue or yellow or
green does not annoy or alarm intelligent people. They
chose the color red for their emblem, not to signify that
they favor Adolence or the shedding of blood, as the unin-
teUigent suppose and as actions of those in official author
ity often lead people to believe, but for the purpose of
typifying the common brotherhood of aU men of all nations
through the same red blood which flows through the veins
of aU, and to the end that all war and violence shall cease.
Let the fundamental rights of all on which free govern
ment rests be denied to no one. Those who want to work
changes peaceably through the ballot box have the right to
try to do so. They may let light in on us or we may let
light in on them. As John Stuart Mill says, that which
seems the height of absurdity to one generation often
becomes the height of wisdom to the next.

Argue Like Franklin March 8, 1911.
Dear Sir: Your letter challenging me to a debate
Avith you on Sociahsm is at hand. The mere fact that you
make the challenge is probably proof positive that you are
not fit for such a debate. People who want to force things
down the mental throats of others do their own cause more
harm than good. Did you ever read that part of Benj amin
Franklin's autobiography in which he says that experience
had taught him that the way to convince another is to
state your case moderately and accurately, and then
scratch your head, or shake it a httle, and say that that is
the way it seems to you, but that of course you may be
mistaken about it; which causes your listener to receive
what you say, and as Kke as not, turn about and try to con-
Adnce you of it, since you are in doubt ; but if you go at him
with a tone of positiveness and arrogance you only make an
37

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
opponent of him. I write this to you in the hope that it
may make you stop long enough to think that possibly you
are not so infalhble as you think you are. You compli
ment me because I know the meaning of the red flag of
the Sociahsts, and stated it in my message to the Board of
Aldermen. It is just possible that I have done more to
make the people of New York understand the meaning of
your flag and of Socialism than all that you have ever said
Avith stridulent voice. If you wish to be a teacher, just
read the passage I have mentioned from Franklin, and
cool off a whole lot.
T. N. Fall, Esq.,
Brooklyn, N. Y.

How To Be Happy
March 9, 1911.
My Dear Little Friend : I should be most glad to go
and see you play, but you know I have so many things to
do that I cannot go everyAthere. I am glad that you are
happy as you say. Everybody ought to be happy. It
does no good to be any other way. When anything dis
couraging or annoying happens just say to yourself:
" Well, it is all right. The next time something good Avill
happen." And then you will feel bully.
Miss Juliet Shelby,
Manhattan. A Book Review Mar. 14, 1911.
Dear Mr. Aldcrof t : I thank you for sending me the
two volumes of Stewart Chamberlain on " The Founda
tions of the Nineteenth Century." It is a most remark
able production and will be read by every one who tries
to keep up with and enlarge his mind by what I may with
some degree of accuracy call the philosophy of history. I
38

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECPIES
was about starting for Albany and took the first volume
with me. I read it on the train and also spent most of the
night over it. Some parts of it fascinated me, especially
the splendid fifth chapter on " The entrance of the Jews
into the history of the West." The author gives Greece,
Rome and Judea, in that order, as the nations from Avhich
the basis of our civilization was derived. It seems to me
that he should have reversed the order of their enumera
tion, and said Judea, Rome and Greece. Outside of art
and poetry, the influence of Greece has not been great on
the civilization of the world. In jurisprudence and gov
ernment, in aU that makes up a cohesive structure of
society, her influence has been scarcely felt at all, I had
almost said not at all, while the modern Western world
derives the very warp and woof of its laws and systems
of government from Rome. But when we turn to the
Jews we cannot fail to perceive that our foundations not
only in laws, manners and usages, but also in religion are
set deep in their legislation and hterature. This is par
ticularly true of the English-speaking peoples. The Jews
have brought down to us from that borderline where fable
scarcely ceases and history hardly begins our knowledge
of the one true and ever-living God, Avhich is the sum
and substance of our religion. There are no mysteries
in the Jewish religion. Everything is fact. The Lord
God was the cornerstone fact, and an ever-recurruig his
torical fact. " I am the Lord thy God, who brought thee
out of the land of Egypt, and out of the house of bond
age," is only one of the thousand passages which attest
this. Hence we find that the Jews were never irrevocably
wedded to rehgious forms and ceremonies. They have
constantly changed them throughout all their history,
from age to age, and according to their environment in
their dispersion throughout the world. But to their one
great religious belief or fact they have remained true.
Too much cannot be said of the splendid preface of
Lord Redesdale. It never flags, and his English is so
luminous that all the time it conveys even the shades of
39

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
his true meaning. As I read along in the book itself, I
could not help wishing that he had been the translator
also. But that would have been a very different matter,
for even the best translator, unless he depart into too free
a rendering, cannot do much better than give a result re
sembling the reverse side of a tapestry as compared with
the original.
It is a striking thing that although an Enghshman
born and bred the author wrote in German, and that the
English edition is by a translator other than himself. The
only similar case I have in mind is that of Gibbon who
wrote much of the draft of his colossal work in French.
He somewhere says that he wrote in French because he
had grown so accustomed to that language that he
dreamed in it, and no doubt that was the case of Chamber
lain with German. But his mind also seems to be dis
tinctly German, so saturated is he Avith German literature
and science; whereas the English mind of Gibbon stands
out plain in every ornate sentence and stately passage.
Have you observed the brilliant footnote at page 145?
Richard B. Aldcroft, Jr., Esq.,
New York City.
Are You Certain It Is Your Beard?
April 12, 1911.
Reverend and Dear Sir: Your letter informing me
that as you walk about the city visiting the homes of your
parishioners people apply opprobrious names to you, and
throw empty cans and rubbish at you, and otherAvise
assault you, on account of your beard, is at hand. You
ask me, " Is it a crime in the City of New York to wear a
beard"? No, it is not. I wear one myself and nobody
ever takes any notice of it. How is it they take notice of
your beard? Have you trimmed it in some pecuHar way,
contrary to the Scriptures? For you know the Scriptures
say, " Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither
shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard."
40

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Yes, if they assault you, and throw cans at you, you
have a right to defend yourself to the last extremity ; but
if you find it necessary I Avill have a detective go around
with you for a few days until we arrest some of those who
are Avronging you. Are you certain that it is your beard
which is the cause of the trouble?
Rev, Basil M, Kerbawy,
Brooklyn, N, Y,

Voluntary Music at Playgrounds May 10, 1911.
Dear Mr, Sulhvan: I have your letter expressing the
hope that I will again take up and consider the question of
an appropriation to pay for music in the playgrounds.
You are right in conjecturing that I am a behever in the
playgrounds, I would have as many of them as possible,
I hke to see the children play in the streets, even. They
must play somewhere and we must bear Avith them, I
fear you do not understand why I deprecate the idea of
the City furnishing music to every little playground and
recreation place in the city. It is my belief that the people
who go to these places for recreation vbU improAdse bands
of their own if they are encouraged to do so, and even with
out any encouragement. All over the country there is an
improvised band in every httle locahty that you come to,
even into the edge of the Adirondacks. I was up in the
Catskills and along the Hudson River yesterday and
found a bandstand in nearly every httle settlement and
village where volimteer bands play. Do you know of any
reason why the plain people of this city cannot organize
bands in the same way if we give them a chance? In the
large recreation centers the City may furnish music, but
in the small places it seems to me that the citizens should
improvise their own bands. I suppose some people Avill
laugh at me for saying this, but I think our people can do
it just as well as people all over the State and the United
41

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
States are doing it. Of com-se they will never do it if we
extend our paternahsm to furnishing little bands here and
there all over the city. I think the people can do it here
better than in other locahties, because among the foreign
ers here we have people of musical and artistic talent in
greater proportion than in other locahties where they have
good volunteer bands. I hope you fully understand me,
and that you will correct me if I am wrong.
James E. Sullivan, Esq.,
Manhattan.

Hollering May 25, 1911.
Dear Mr. Loder : Your letter is at hand, and I thank
you for your kind Avishes. You ask me to stop the news
boys from " hollering " their papers. I have a lot of hard
things to do, but I fear the job of stopping the newsboys
from hollering would be the hardest of all. WiU you help
me? Or suppose I delegate the whole matter to you?
Will you undertake the job? I won't delegate you just
yet awhile, however, for I am not certain that I want to
stop the httle fellows from hollering. They do not disturb
me any. A whole lot of people have been hoUering at me
of late, but they do not disturb me, and much less does the
hollering of the httle newsboys disturb me. The fact is I
could sit doAvn and think and work in a boiler shop. That
is one of the qualifications which should be prescribed for
a Mayor of the City of Ncav York.
Cornelius S. Loder, Esq.,
New York City.
The Pleasures and Profits of Walking
(The following is an article published in The Independent,
June 1, 1911. It is in conversational form, and was dictated.)
I fear you are taking me too seriously as a walker.
It is true that I have been walking for a good many years,
42

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
but I do not pretend to be anything more than an ordinary
trudger. During the sixteen years that I was a Justice of
the Supreme Court I made it a rule to walk from five to
seven miles a day. I did this to keep myself in health.
I sat in bad air in the courtroom. In the morning I walked
a few miles, and after leaving court in the evening I
walked a few miles more.
When I became Mayor I simply continued my walk
ing. I walk from my house to the City Hall in the morn
ing and back in the evening. That gives me seven miles
a day. But I am no walker, nor am I an athlete. I walk
for health, and also for the joy of walking.
I have for many years done my princij)al work while
Avalking. As a judge I framed my decisions and opinions
in my mind while walking. I can think best while walk
ing, and then I can come in and sit down and Avrite off
hand the whole subject. But let me say again that I am
no scientific walker although I take long walks.
It is with my walking as with my being a disciple of
Epictetus. During the campaign for the mayoralty,
while every abuse and he was being heaped upon me, I
casually remarked in one of my speeches that what another
saith of thee concerneth more him who saith it than it con-
cerneth thee, as Epictetus says. This seemed to astonish
the whole journalistic fraternity in New York City, as
though they had never heard of Epictetus before. My
walking seemed to astonish them in the same way.
I prefer to walk alone and think. I do not hurry; I
just go along at my leisure. It is true, now and then some
one comes alongside of me and thinks the gait is not a
very leisurely one, but to me it is leisurely because I am
used to it. I do not see why many or most people do not
walk to and from their business every day. A man wrote
me a letter that it was all very well for me to do it, but
that his business was two miles away from his house. I
wrote him back that mine was over three. There is a feel
ing of independence and freedom when you are walking,
and your blood warms up and flows freely, and your body
43

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
becomes purified. As I walk over the bridge every night
and see the cars packed with anaemic young men and
women, some of them with cigarettes, I cannot help pity
ing them. Why do they not get out and walk and make
their bodies ruddy and healthy? Some of them look out
of the car windows, and point at me as though I was a
curiosity because I walk. I think they are curiosities be
cause they ride, and injure themselves with the foul air
of the cars.
I used to be a horseback rider, but you have to keep
that up or else drop it altogether, and you cannot always
have time for it. Besides, it is a rather violent exercise.
I do not think I know any one who has got a dividend out
of it. Then I drove for years. Out of that I reaUy got
nothing. The street car I always abominated. They used
to have stoves in them, and now they heat them by elec
tricity, and the air becomes foul. Some people Avrite to
me complaining that the cars are too cold. They ought
to be made to walk.
You ask me the best time for walking. The best time
is in the sun in fall and Avinter, but if you cannot walk
then, the best tune is Avhenever you can walk. Of course,
if you walk home at night during the long vsdnter months
you walk after dark. Morning walking is very refreshing.
Yes, the walking of men hke Weston does much good
by example. It starts other people walking.
In the country, the best companion for a walk is a
dog. A half dozen dogs is better yet.
No, you do not want any book while you are walking.
You want to think. In the country you can loiter about.
You do not need to walk fast and should not do so. Ob
serve nature. When you come to a barnyard go in and see
the pigs, and the fowl and the cows. Chmb a fence now and
then and go into the fields and look at the crops or the
cattle. I knoAv of no place where there is more philosophy
than in a barnyard. You can learn much from animals.
Within their circle they know much more than we do.
Some of them see and hear things that Ave are incapable of
44

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
seeing and hearing. Very few animals improve by age.
A little pig a day old knows as much as his mother, and it
is the same with a calf or a colt.
I do not like to walk in a park. I hate the roads and
walks in parks. I do not like winding roads. I like to
see where I am going. Crooked roads are irksome.
You want to know what about mountain climbing. I
have done some of that in this country and in Switzerland,
but I do not recommend it. The heart should not be ab
normally taxed. Of course, if your weight is in your favor
you can do some climbing. I went down the other day
and walked up ten fhghts to the top of the building where
the terrible fire was, as I wanted to see the floors which
were burned out. If you want to test your heart just walk
up ten flights Avithout stopping. If you can do it you are
all right, no matter what your age is.
Yes, I regret the falling off in bicycling. I enjoyed
it for years and it did me the world of good. If people
vtdll not walk I would advise them to ride the bicycle. It
will renew their lives. They will be so changed in a month
that they will be astonished.
What nation, you ask, gets the most out of walking.
The English. They are great walkers. When I go to
London I love to just stand and see them walking down
into London in companies in the morning. The sight is
inspiring to me. They walk in from miles around. Here
people are afraid to walk a mile. The greatest rapid
transit facilities in the world are right here in our Ameri
can cities, notwithstanding all the grumbling that is going
on. Wherever you are here in the city of New York you
have a street car at your elbow. The result is that every
body rides and almost nobody walks. This is harmful.
It would be a good thing if we had to walk more or less.
In England they Avalk Avay out to places of recreation.
Now, I do not know what else to say to you. The subject
is summed up very easily. Cultivate the habit of walking
and you Avill never give it up, and it will keep you in
health and make you charitable and forbearing. If you
45

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
take no exercise you become dyspeptic. Your blood gets
thin, and you find fault with everybody, and by and by
you hate everybody, and then you want to be mean to
everybody. That is a terrible condition to be in. Don't you
thinic so ? But if you are in it just get out of it by walking
a few miles every morning and evening. Go out and walk
in the dark if necessary.

Progress of Disease Prevention June 5, 1911.
Dear Dr. Doty: I thank you for sending me your
new book, " Prevention of Infectious Diseases." I did not
lay it down until I had finished it, it interested me so much.
The progress of disease prevention in the last century was
great, and in the latter part of it marvelous. Modern
sanitation has almost done away v^dth diseases in the
Western world which formerly ravaged mankind there.
The most terrible of all was that known under the vague
name of " plague." It often destroyed from one-quarter
to one-half of the population in a few months. Cholera
and smallpox came next in destructiveness ; and other
diseases went on unchecked. As you point out, the dis
covery of the germ origin of diseases in the last century by
Pasteur and Koch has revolutionized sanitation and disin
fection. Long standing rules of disinfection have become
obsolete in the case of certain diseases. The theory of the
communication of such diseases by bedding, rags, clothing,
money, and through the air itself, has been exploded by
the discovery of their germ and just how it enters the
human body and infects it. The germ of cholera can only
enter by the mouth in drink or food and is therefore easily
guarded against by f oUoAving a few simple rules of boiling
and cooking. The germ of j'^ellow fever can only be com
municated by the bite of a mosquito, and more than that,
by the bite of only one particular variety of mosquito,
which inhabits only a limited number of southern localities.
46

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
It does not exist in the northern part of this country. You
therefore do not need to bother with yellow fever subjects
coming into this port, as you point out, except to see that
they do not move on to a locality inhabited by the yellow
fever mosquito. You clear up in my mind something that
made me doubt the mosquito theory at first. The late Dr.
Homer L. Bartlett, of Flatbush, worked in the yellow
fever epidemic at Bay Ridge when a young man in about
1848, I think. He often spoke to me about it years later.
The bedding of the yellow fever ship was thrown over
board and floated ashore, and he said that was how the
disease was communicated ashore; that one or some got it
by contact with the bedding, and others from them, and
so on, until a large part of the community had it. When
it was announced a few years ago that the disease could be
communicated only by Mrs. Mosquito, of a certain variety
which does not exist hereabouts, I kept thinking of the
Bay Ridge epidemic, but you make it all plain. Mrs.
Mosquito was aboard the ship also and went ashore, and
there you are. But I am not so thoroughly convinced of
what you say about rats carrying diseases ashore from
ships and spreading them by their fleas. I give the benefit
of the doubt to Brer Rat, the same as I often have to do
in the case of some human beings who are quite as nasty
and annoying as real rats are, and resemble them very
much in their conduct and methods. I fear the case
against Mr. Rat has been too much taken for granted.
I am glad to see your lucid and useful volume so free
from Greek nomenclature and terminology. I seldom read
a scientific book without being confirmed in my opinion
that the adoption of Greek roots or compounds to express
our scientific names was a great mistake. It would be
much better if we used Anglo-Saxon roots and compounds
for that purpose, the same as the Germans use German
roots and compounds. Then everyone could read an Eng-
Ksh scientific book vpithout a dictionary at his hand as
easily as the Germans read their scientific books. The
result would be a universal diffusion of scientific knowl-
47

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
edge in the English-speaking countries as in Germany.
As it is, it is irksome to anyone to read an Enghsh scientific
book who has forgotten or never studied Greek.
I read with great interest your account of your destruc
tion of mosquito propagation in the marshes on Staten
Island by means of tidal drainage by ditches, for, as you
remember, we looked over that work together.
Dr. Alvah H. Doty, Health Officer,
Port of New York.

Every Citizen A Policeman June 7, 1911.
Dear Sir: Your letter of June 7 is at hand. You
ask if you could be appointed a pohce officer to serve Avith-
out pay, for the reason that you see " so many violations
of the law, spitting on the bridge platforms and walks,
rowdyism in many ways, etc.," that you would hke to have
authority to arrest the culprits. My dear sir, let me tell
you that every citizen has full legal right to arrest anyone
whom he sees committing any criminal offense, big or httle.
The law of England and of this country has been very
careful to confer no more right in that respect upon pohce
men and constables than it confers on every citizen. You
have the same right to make an arrest for an offense com
mitted in your presence that any pohceman has. But we
cannot all be bothering with making arrests, so we employ
a certain number of our fellow citizens for that purpose,
and put blue clothes and brass buttons on them. But their
clothes and their buttons add nothing whatever to their
right to make arrests Avithout warrant. They still have
only the same right which the law gives to all of us. Be
so good as to look at section 183 of the Code of Criminal
Procedure and be couAanced of your powers, and then sail
right in as hard and as fast as you want to, being careful,
however, only to arrest guilty persons, for otherAvise your
48

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
victims will turn around and sue you for damages for false
arrest. Pohcemen have to take the same risk.
Miner H. Paddock, Jr., Esq.,
New York City.

A Government of Laws, Not of Men
June 7, 1911.
Dear Sir: I am in receipt of your letter saying that
aU clubs should be closed at 10 o'clock at night, also all
saloons, and also that piano playing and singing should
not be allowed at any horn- of the night, especially in
summer, when people cannot close their windows, so as to
shut the noise out.
I hereby authorize you to carry out all of these reforms.
It may be that you will first have to get elected to the
Legislature, and pass laws therefor, for you know this is
a government of laws, and not of men, that is to say, those
put in office may not do as they like, but may only carry
out the laws as they are passed by the Legislature. Did
you never hear of this before?
E. H. Jones, Esq.,
New York.

Free Water Supply in Households June 13, 1911.
Dear Mr. Harding: Your favor of June 12 is at
hand, I entirely agree vvdth you in regard to putting water
meters in dwelhngs, I do not believe in charging for
water according to meter for domestic purposes, or for use
in dwellings or tenements, I examined the matter very
carefully over a year ago and came to that conclusion, and
I see no reason to depart from it. If heads of houses had
to pay for water according to meter, they would be uneasy
every time their wives and children took baths, for such is
49

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
human nature. The result would be discomfort and un-
cleanliness. Every one would hesitate to take a bath,
sooner than add to the household expense. This would be
particularly so among the poor and people of moderate
means. I believe in getting an inexhaustible source of
Avater supply, and letting every one use all the water he or
she wants for washing and bathing and domestic purposes.
That is necessary to keep the community clean and in a
good sanitary condition. Tell your Association to stick
to this.
Harold H. Harding, Esq.,
New York City.

The Art of Living Long June 16, 1911.
Dear Mr. Butler : I thank you very much for sending
me your edition of Cornaro's " The Art of Living Long."
I read extracts from it several years ago in a little book of
that other long-lived man and physician. Dr. Thompson,
of England, Avho died in the last century at a great age,
but was born in the preceding century. On receipt of youi*
book I looked through my library but was unable to find
Dr. Thompson's book.
There is abroad an exaggerated notion of Cornaro's
way of living. He was abstemious of food, but not to the
exaggerated extent which we often find stated. Pie did
not starA'^e himself; he would not liaA^e reached the great
age of 102 if he had done so. Lie drilled himself to the
habit of eating just enough and no more. I think most
any of us could get along with Avhat he ate. He tells us
that he limited himself to fourteen ounces of Avine a day.
There is a great deal of nourishment in that amount of
Avine. Very fcAv of us drink any vdne. And then after
telhng how abstemious he was he makes this very naive
statement : " First, bread ; then bread, soup or light broth,
Avith an egg, or some other nice little dish of this kind; of
50

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
meats, I eat veal, kid and mutton ; I eat fowls of all kinds,
as well as partridges, and birds like the thrush. I also
partake of such salt-wa,ter fish as the goldney and the hke ;
and among the various fresh-water kinds the pike and
others." Do you not think that you and I could get along
pretty well on this same diet? However, the essays of this
venerable Itahan of the Sixteenth Century, on how to eat
and how to live, are of great interest and value, and I hope
you may succeed in getting them generally read, for they
would make abstemiousness and the simple life more
general than they now are, with the result of making hfe
happier and longer.
William F. Butler, Esq.,
Milwaukee, Wis.

Night Courts Unnecessary June 20, 1911.
I am one of those who have doubted that we needed
any night court at all. . About all that they exist for is to
let people go who should not have been arrested at all.
When I attended a session of the night court sixty per
cent of those brought in had to be discharged on the spot
for the reason that they should not have been arrested at
all. They were arrested for all sorts of frivolous and
ridiculous reasons. I am trying to stop that kind of
arrests bj'^ the police and if I succeed there will not be
much doing in the night court. As for the criminal classes,
I doubt if we ought to be in any great hurry to discharge
them during the night. It is time enough to arraign them
in the morning. On Cruelty to Horses July 10, 1911.
Sir : The other night when we rode up and down the
territory where the experiment of the fixed post is being
51

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
tried, we were both surprised at the number of dead horses
in the street. I have been watching the horses ever since,
and I see many of them overloaded in the most cruel
manner. Please take the matter in hand and have the
police instructed to interfere in all cases where horses are
overloaded, and if necessary make arrests.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.

On Special Policemen July 26, 1911.
Sir: I beg to enclose to you a letter from Major
General Grant calling my attention to the fact that two
privates of the United States Army were excluded from
the Sulzer Dancing PaAdhon at Coney Island on July 4.
Will you be so good as to make a careful examination of
this matter, and report to me all of the particulars.
I note that General Grant says in his letter that
Special Policeman G. Clark, in accordance Avith the in
structions of the proprietor, excluded the soldiers. I had
supposed that all these special pohcemen, hired out by the
Pohce Department to private individuals to do their bid
ding, and who often commit the grossest outrages at the
command of their employers, had been called in and their
badges taken from them. If any have been allowed to
remain through oversight, please have them removed at
once. It is contrary to the first principles of government
to put pubhc officers in the employ of private individuals,
to be paid by them, and directed in the performance of
their duty by them. If they do not do what these private
employers tell them to do, then they are discharged. The
result is that many wrongs are perpetrated by these special
officers at the command of the private individuals who
employ them. Such a condition is intolerable. Let private
individuals and corporations hire their OAvn watchmen and
52

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
servants as best they can. We should not create police
men to be hired out to them and put under their orders.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.

On Special Policemen July 27, 1911.
Sir: The objection to special policemen is to allow
them to be in the employ and pay of private individuals.
It is contrary to the first principles of government to
allow such a thing. No public officer should be in the
employ and pay and subject to the orders of any private
individual or corporation. To put him in such a position
is to make it inevitable that he will obey the orders of his
employer instead of acting as a sworn public officer from
the standpoint of his public duty and judgment only, as
all public officers should do. Hoav can he do otherwise
than obey his employer when he may refuse to pay him
and discharge him unless he obeys his orders.
The case of the public service corporations who carry
passengers may be different. They perform a pubhc
function, and the City may therefore need to police them
to a certain extent to protect passengers. Will you be
so good as to prepare me a report on that subject. Let
me know the extent to which Ave pohce them now, and
how it is done, and how in your judgment it should be
continued, if it is to be continued. It may be proper to
police them by special pohcemen whose salaries are paid
by them; but in that case we should not make special
policemen of any one or every one presented by these cor
porations, but should, on the contrary, constitute a special
squad of special policemen and assign them for that kind
of duty under direction and control of a discreet officer,
and change them from time to time, so as to do away with
the possibihty of the companies making them presents in
order to induce them to do things Avhich they should not
53

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
do, as in the case of strikes, and the like. And, also, the
companies should deposit a fund with the Police Com
missioner in advance for the payment of their salaries.
They should not be dependent on the companies for pay
ment, but on the Citv.
I suppose you are Avell aware that when these special
officers commit an unlawful arrest or battery and their
employers are sued for it, the courts decide that the em
ployers are not liable, on the ground that such special
officers being public officers are presumed to act from
the standpoint of their public duty, and not under the
orders of their employers. In order to recover against
the employer it is necessary to prove that he ordered the
unlawful thing to be done, whereas, in the case of his regu
lar employees he is liable for their unlawful acts, as a rule,
whether he directed them or not. By having these special
officers, employers shirk such liability.
You also know the trouble I had with these special
officers in the cloak makers' strike, the express companies'
strike, and other strikes. The special officers in the em
ploy of employers in strike disputes conmiit all sorts of
vmlawful acts. In the cloak makers' strike the employees
came to me and asked me to have a list of their men desig
nated as special officers for them, as they had as much
right to special officers as the other side had. I had to
admit that they had as much right to them as the em
ployers had, and I therefore allowed neither side to have
them, but had the regular police preserve order. This
proved to be satisfactory to both sides in cA^ery strike, and
it is the only lawful way.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.
Boys in Streets August 10, 1911.
Dear Madam : Your favor complaining of bojj^s play
ing in the streets is at hand. You ask if a law could not
54

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
be passed prohibiting boys playing in the streets, saying
that it "would be a blessing to humanity." I might ask
you whether if such a law were passed you think it could
be enforced? Our boys have a hard time to get along in
the crowded districts of the city. They must play some
where. I went around to the recreation piers the other
night and found great numbers of them there, but they
cannot all go there. We must bear with them. Have you
any boys? If you had do you think you could keep them
off the streets?
Mrs. Jessie F. Stearns,
New York City.

Street Ball Playing August 10, 1911.
Dear Boys: It is too bad that you cannot play ball
somewhere in peace. Of course the police cannot always
let you play on the street, but now and then they can wink
so hard with both eyes as not to see you when you are
doing no harm to passersby and the street is not crowded.
In the parks you may only play on the places assigned
to baseball playing. The keepers will not chase you out
unless you play where baseball is not permitted. I wish
we had the grounds for you all to play, but unfortunately
we have not. So, boys, do the best you can, and I will
help you a little now and then if you send me word.
Masters LeGrande Sampson, William E.
Westbrooke, Samuel C. Ward, Jr.,
Joseph Carey and Raymond Luetke,
New York City.
A Book Excluded from the Library
August 14, 1911.
Dear Miss Holland: On your complaint that Mr.
George H. Brennan's novel " Anna Malleen " was un-
55

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
justly discriminated against by the trustees of the Pubhc
Library, by their refusal to admit it into the library for
circulation, I looked it through last night, after trying
hard to read it consecutively. I am satisfied that the
notion of the author that his book was excluded on moral
grounds is erroneous. It is quite harmless, but very
stupid. It must have been rejected on that ground. I
cannot help calling to mind that scene of Cervantes in
which he pictures the priest, the barber and the niece sit
ting in judgment on the books of Don Quixote's hbrary,
sparing a few, but committing all the others to the flames,
and especially the stupid ones. If this book had been
there I am certain it would not have escaped the flames.
Miss Mildred Holland,
New York City.

To a Clerk Who Objected to Working Overtime
December 6, 1911.
Sir: If I were you I would do everything I was
asked to do. That is the way to get on in life. Did j'-ou
ever hear it said that he who takes care to do no more
than he is paid for will never be paid for more than he
does? Go right in and do everything from sunrise to
sunset and you will go right up all the time. What do
you think of that?
Mr. Joseph Donahue,
New York City.

Roof Playgrounds August 29, 1911.
My Dear Boys: Your several letters informing me
that you won the ball game on the roof playground of
56

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Pubhc School 188 last Thursday night, and reminding me
of my promise to send a set of balls and gloves to the
Avinners are at hand. I note that one of your letters seems
to betray doubt that I will keep my Avord. I do not
blame the Avriter for his doubts, considering the many ill
things which are being pubhcly said of me. They may
well create doubts even in the minds of the boys. I am
sending you a box of twelve balls, and also a set of mitts
and gloves, I want to tell you how much I enjoyed my
visit to the roof playgrounds of the pubhc schools last
Thursday night, I never saw finer dancing by girls, I
hope that the boys wiU be given dancing lessons next
year. I regret that these playgrounds were closed so early
as August 26 for lack of music. Next year we will try
to remedy that also. The playgrounds and piers ought to
be kept open as late in the season as possible. I also
thank you for electing me an honorary member of your
ball club.
Master Benjamin Blau,
, Crotona Ball Club,
New York City.

On Making Restitution September 6, 1911.
Dear Sir: Your letter is at hand. You state that
some years ago you were a witness before me when I was
a judge, and a false witness, and deceived me, so that I
decided the case wrongly, and that you make this confes
sion to me because you have become a Christian and want
forgiveness. According to my views you have to do more
than this to be forgiven. You have to make amends.
Mere talk does not purchase forgiveness. Where any
thing is stolen or got unjustly it must be refunded before
forgiveness can be expected, if the sinner be able to refund.
That is the way I understand it. So you had better tell
me what the case was so that I may look it up and see
57

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
what loss the defeated party sustained; and then you
must restore his money to him or make good his loss. If
this be not your view, I fear you are in error in supposing
that you have got religion and are a Christian.

How to Find a Wife
September 15, 1911.
Dear Sir: Your letter asking me to find a wife for
you is at hand. How is this ? Why do you send way up
here to New York for a wife? Do you not know the
proverb that he who goes far from home for a Avife is apt
to be fooled? And then again how could I recommend
any good girl here to you? You may not be so attractive
as you think you are. From my way of thinking most
any woman a man happens to meet is altogether too good
for him. But it seems you are unable to find a wife among
all the women of your locality. Do you not think that
you are altogether too particular? I am very certain that
there are many there who would make good wives.
William W. Mummey, Esq.,
Arkansas City, Kans.
The " Wink " Letter to a Little Girl
September 15, 1911.
Dear Miss Roth : I have received your letter of Sep
tember 11, telling me that you and the httle girls in youi"
neighborhood have no place to play after school, and that
wherever you go to play you are chased. I am very sorry
about it, and I will see if I can do something for you.
Some people think you ought to stay in the house all the
time. But you must go out, and you must play some
where, and we must let you play in the streets until there
is some other place provided. Do you know I receive
letters daily from men and women who hate to see the
children play in the streets at all. But on inquiry I always
58

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
find out that they are people who haA'^e no children of
their own. You say you want to skate on roller skates.
Maybe I can get the police up that way to wink so hard
with both eyes that they won't see you when you go by
on your roller skates. But be careful not to run into any
body or bump into an automobile. But there are very few
accidents of that kind. When one such accident happens
a lot of people write to me as though it were the rule
instead of the exception.
Miss Helen Roth.

On Marriage Fees November 3, 1911.
Dear Mr. Cron: You are mistaken in thinking that
anyone in the City Clerk's office or in the Marriage
Bureau extorted a marriage fee from you. The trouble
is that many of you people go to the City Clerk's office for
a license and then desire to get someone to marry you there
or in a room nearby. If you would go away from the
City Hall to your own clergyman or to some magistrate
all this trouble would be avoided. It is an old custom for
those who perform the ceremony of marriage to expect a
fee, and I know of no way of doing away with that custom.
Indeed, most men who marry a girl want to pay a fee to
the person who performs the marriage ceremony. If he
wants to have it done for nothing he should go away to
some minister or magistrate who does not expect a fee.
Men noAv come to the City Hall and instead of going
away with their license go into another room and send for
an alderman to marry them, and then when the alderman
intimates that he wants a fee they raise trouble about it
and write to me. I wish you would all go away from the
City Hall and get married somewhere else, and then this
trouble would be at an end. It is beyond my power to
prevent an alderman from expecting the usual marriage
fee, and from giving a gentle hint that he wants it, if he
59

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
be the sort of man that will do that sort of thing. If I
had tune I would marry you all for nothing. How would
that go? It would evidently suit some of you, but ninety-
nine out of every hundred would want to thrust a fee into
my hand, for such is the good nature and generosity of
the normal man to the man who marries him to the girl of
his choice.
Ralph E. Cron, Esq.,
New York City.

Calling Out the Military Nov. 14, 1911.
Dear Mr. Stanton: Your letter is in error in some
particulars. The men who quit work in the Street Clean
ing Department are not two-thirds non-citizens as you
state. On the contrary, they are all citizens either by
birth or naturalization. So your advice to deport them
has no foundation. Nor do I intend to call out the mili-
tary. This is not a government of military force. It is
a free government. We call out the mihtary only in case
of dire necessity, that is to say, when the regular civil
authorities are unable to put doAvn tumult. Do you not
understand this? I do not like to have people Avrite me
to call out the militia and shoot people doAvn. A Mayor
of New York would have to forget himself to do a thing
like that except in the last extremity. I hope the time is
far distant when it will be necessary to call out troops to
shoot any one down. Ours is a government of law, and
the military power has to keep its hands off until the
regular agencies of civil government are unable to pre
serve order.
Willard G. Stanton, Esq.,
Manhattan. 60

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Propagating Vices in Prisons
November 22, 1911.
Sir: Your favor of November 20th informing me in
full of the great necessity of a new reformatory, and a
new workhouse with a single cell for each inmate is at
hand. The account you give of an average of eight men
to each cell, and of four women to each cell, and the
immoralities which inevitably result therefrom, is most
distressing. We are arresting and convicting people for
certain vices not very easy to mention by name, and at
the same time by confining more than one person in each
cell in our penal institutions Ave are encouraging and
propagating these very same vices. You also point out
that in place of there being an air space or ration of 400
cubic feet to each person, as the laws of modern hygiene
require, there is a space or ration of only 226 cubic feet.
It is not to be wondered at that all the prison congresses,
international, national and state, have through their visit
ing committees condemned these things as uncivihzed. No
doubt the funds should be appropriated forthAvith to
remedy these evils, although the amount necessary may
be milhons. The trouble has been for the last few years,
and is now, a disposition in the government of the city
to cut doAvn all expenses to the last dollar, and to omit
necessary appropriations entirely, especially in the case
of expenditures chargeable to corporate stock, in order to
have funds or borrowing credit to build subways. Some
of us have tried to remove this condition by getting the
offer of operating companies to put up part or all of the
money necessary for subway construction accepted by the
city. As you are aware one company offered to put up
about $100,000,000 for that purpose, but in one way or
another its offer was not adopted but frittered away. I
am quite certain the Comptroller is alive to this matter,
and I trust that the subways will in the end be financed
by private capital to an extent which will leave us a cor
porate stock margin adequate for the things which you
61

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mention, and for hospitals, court houses, bridge ap
proaches, parks and playgrounds, and many other things
which I need not mention and which are now held up. The
notion was propagated in the community by false state
ments daily repeated in certain newspapers, that if the
operating companies put money into subway construction
they would own the subways, whereas the subway statute
is such that only the city can build and own subways, who
ever puts up the capital, and the operating companies can
not get a lease or franchise one day longer by putting up
capital for subway construction. Whether the city puts
up the capital or the companies put up the capital the
franchise they get is the very same. I have always deemed
it lamentable that one or two newspaper proprietors
should have been able by the persistency of their false
statements to propagate a contrary notion even among
intelligent people.
P. A. Whitney, Esq.,
Commissioner of Correction, New York City.

Advising Jews to be Farmers
November 27, 1911.
Sir : I regret that I am not able to be present at yom:
meeting. Its object is to encourage the Jews to become
farmers instead of crowding together in cities. We have
here in this city a large number of Jews, 10,000 it may be,
engaged in peddling, principally from pushcarts. It
would be a great blessing to them if they could be removed
from the city to farms. They certainly could not have
a harder time to make a living as farmers than they have
now. On the contrary they would make good hvings as
farmers. There is no reason Avhy the Jews should not
be farmers. Originally and for thousands of years, the
Jewish race was given almost exclusively to agriculture.
Everything should be done to induce the Jews to return to
62

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
agriculture. The reasons why they ceased to be agricul
turists in the Christian world are very well knoAvn, I need
not repeat them here, I trust your meeting will be of
great benefit,
Joseph W. Pincus, Esq.,
New York City.

Cato as a Farmer November 28, 1911.
Dear Mr. Hubbell : I spent last evening most pleas
antly reading Fairfax Harrison's translation of the elder
Cato's treatise on farming which you sent me. It is
delightful and gave me complete mental relaxation. The
two thousand years which have passed since it was written
have not detracted either from its charm or its usefulness.
He even tells how to smoke and cure hams in substantially
the way which has been used ever since. They knew as
much about seed selection then as we know now. When
I was a boy we used to use seed from our own crops, and
the result was that the potatoes and corn grew smaller and
smaller year after year, and for a long time we did not
know what was the matter. When we brought in new
seeds, especially from a more northern section, we had
abundant proof of what the trouble was. His advice con
cerning manuring the land is perfect. We speak now of
the soil being sour. Cato says that by taking a section of
soil from the ground and pouring water through it and
then tasting the water we can ascertain whether the soil is
sour. If it be sour he says the water will pucker your
mouth. His advice about buying a farm is very shrewd.
A man from the city will go and buy a farm without look
ing to see whether there be a drop of water on it. Old
Cato was too sharp for that. Nothing is more important
on a farm than water. The suggestion that it is better
to buy a farm in an undeveloped state, and have the
63

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES

pleasure of clearing and developing it yourself, is capital.
What he says about wine growing is useful in countries
where wine is grown. It seems that old Cato used to have
a good bout at wine himself occasionally. He also was
very fond of cabbages. I am not certain Avhether his state
ment that if you have drunk too much wine at dinner you
have only to eat five cabbage leaves next morning to feel
as though you had drunk none is correct. Suppose you
and I try that some day and see. Your farm is up in the
Berkshire Hills, while mine is down on Long Island, but
I suppose we both raise some cabbages.
Charles Bulkley Hubbell, Esq.,
New York City.

Books December 4th, 1911.
Dear Mr. Smith: I thank you exceedingly for the
edition of Don Quixote which you sent me. The illustra
tions by Dore are grand. The translation I notice is by
Motteux. Of the Enghsh translations I deem that by
Jarvis the best. It is so deft and nimble. I imagine that
it approaches the spirit of the original more nearly than
any of the others. When a younger man I often enter
tained the intention of trying to learn Spanish in order
to read Don Quixote in the original. I envy your being
able to do so. In translating a work of imagination it is
almost always necessary to depart from hteralness in order
to give the genius and spirit. This Jarvis does, while
Motteux is often painfully literal. And yet his hteral
ness brings out some things that should not be lost. For
instance, in the account of Don Quixote's manner of liv
ing, and what dishes he ate each day of the week, Jarvis
says, " an omelet on Saturdays," which is certainly com
mon-place enough. But Motteux gives the original
exactly, namely, " griefs and groans on Saturdays,"
which was some kind of a mixed dish which evidently
64

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
caused belly ache, or some sort of distress in the paunch.
But cases hke that are few, and the nimble and light
touches of Jarvis which let you right into the spirit of the
narrative are often departures from the literal rendering
of th^ original. At best a translation of a work of imag
ination bears about the same resemblance to the original
as the reverse side of a tapestry to the true side. That
is why I am sorry I do not understand Spanish as you do.
If I did we could continue that discussion of the Avritings
of Cervantes which we commenced on the train up from
Richmond. Let me cite a passage or two to show hoAV much more
attractive the translation of Jarvis is. After Don Quixote
is knocked down by the sail of the wind-mill, Sancho
Panza comes galloping up on Dapple and says, according
to Motteux : " Mercy on me, did not I give your Worship
fair warning? Did not I tell you they were wind-mills,
and that nobody could think otherAvise unless he also had
wind-mills in his head?" But Jarvis more nimbly says:
" God save us, quoth Sancho Panza, did not I warn you
to have a care of what you did, for that they were nothing
biit wind-mills, and nobody could mistake them but one
that had the like in his head." And again, speaking of
the company at Antonio's house who were entertaining
Don Quixote, Motteux says : " Among others were two
ladies of an airy and waggish disposition." Contrast this
with the way Jarvis puts it : " Among the ladies there
were two of an arch and jocose disposition." But I must
not multiply these instances except to quote the rendering
of a proverb. Motteux makes Don Quixote say to
Sancho : "I have always heard it said that to do a kind
ness to cloAvns is like throwing water into the sea." Jarvis
has it that " to do good to the vulgar is to throw water into
the sea."
Cervantes and Shakespeare died on the same day —
or rather one died ten days later than the other according
to the modern reckoning of time, but I do not remember
which. But I find they made use of the same expression,

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Sancho Panza is made to say, " There is some difference
between a haAvk and a handsaw." Shakespeare sa;'S in
Hamlet, " I know a hawk from a handsaw."
Years ago I copied every proverb, or philosophical or
wise saying there is in Don Quixote. I think that an equal
number of good ones is not found in any other book except
the Bible. I am half tempted to quote a few to you and
let you compare them with the original. " Who but a
madman would mind what a madman says," is one. " Dih-
gence is the mother of good fortune," is another. And
this : "It is pleasant to govern though it be but a flock of
sheep." And this : " Some people go out for wool and
come home shorn." And this: " Letters Avithout virtue
are pearls upon a dunghill." And this: " Though habit
and example do much, good sense is the foimdation of
good language." And this: "When they give you a
heifer be ready with the rope." And this of the same mean
ing: " When good fortune knocks, make haste to let her
in." And some or all of those elected to office might well
say with Sancho Panza when his old clothes were being
taken off and he was being dressed up in his official gar
ments when he was entering upon the government of his
island: " Clothe me as you will, I shall be Sancho Panza
still." And it were well if they could all saj?^, as Sancho
did when he gave up his governorship and they had
stripped him of his official garments to reclothe him Avith
his old ones : " Naked came I into this government and
naked come I out of it." And let me wind up vsdth this
one which the ladies might take offense at : " Between the
yea and the nay of a woman I would not undertake to
thrust the point of a needle."
And while I am at it, and since we went into this book
talk on the train at all, I will set down for you the books
which I think have had the largest effect on my life. I
will give them in the order in which I think I was affected
by them: The Bible,
Euchd,

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Shakespeare,
Hume's History of England (especially the notes) ,
Homer,Milton, Cervantes (Don Quixote),
Rabelais, Gil Bias,
Franklin's Autobiography and letters,
Plutarch's Lives,
The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini,
Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations,
Bacon's Works.
I have left out of this hst those works on what for want
of a better name I may call the philosophy of history. I
have derived immense satisfaction and, I hope, much
profit, from them. And no doubt I have omitted some
books I would mention if I took the time.
R. A. C. Smith, Esq.,
New York City.

Grand Jurors December 6, 1911.
Dear Sirs : On consideration I do not wish to recom
mend that the Board of Aldermen give you extra pay.
Men fit to serve on Grand Juries ought to be willing to do
it for the honor of it. Grand Jurors have a high function
to perform, and ought to be men who know that they are
not to be led byr^*he nose by the District Attorney, the
Judge, or any onC|else.
Messrs. Henry W. jimith,
John R. WlJite,
Robert F. Craig, Brooklyn, N. Y.
67

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Arresting Boys August 29, 1911.
Sir: Wilham Eagen, an 18 year old boy, residing
with his parents at 53, Fourth Avenue, Brooklyn, com
plains to me that Detective Barry arrested hun in the
street, locked him up in the station house over night on
the charge of vagrancy, and the next morning when the
case Avas called in court Detective Barry made no charge
against him. Please make a most careful examination
into this case. It will never do to allow boys to be arrested
and locked up over night for no offense. Please let me
have a full report of the matter.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.
A False Police Report on a Boy's Arrest
December 19, 1911.
Sir: Some months ago I v/rote to you of the case of
the eighteen year old boy William Eagen, Avho called upon
me in person and made his complaint. He has been well
brought up, and has always liA'^ed at home AAdth his parents
at 53, 4th Avenue, Brooklyn. Detective Barry arrested
him in the street near his home on August 24th last Avith
out a warrant. He had iieA^er before been arrested or ac
cused of any offense. He Avas taken to the station house
and locked up over night in a cell. The next morning the
said officer arraigned him before a magistrate, and made
a written complaint on oath that he Avas a A'agrant, i. e., a
person without a home, wandering about, and with no
means of support. The officer knew that this Avas untrue.
The boy lived at home and Avorked daily Avith his father
who is janitor of 17 buildings. When "-'Ae case Avas called
on August 28th for a hearing, the offi,Vjr stated that he
could not prove the charge, and the bo^ was discharged.
In my letter to you I asked for a full re^ Drt of the matter.
Later you sent to me the report of Ir-spector Hughes,
chief of the detective bureau, concurred in by the Second
68

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Deputy Police Commissioner. That report disclosed that
the real reason for the boy's arrest was that a burglary of
the apartments of C. W. Daniels, at 449, State Street,
Brooklyn, had been committed, and that the boy was
" suspected " of having committed the same. The things
stolen were a watch, engraved with Mr. Daniels' name, a
locket, studded with diamonds, and engraved in the same
way, and a double chain and fob. The reason for such
suspicion given in the said report was that the father of
the boy was janitor of the building in which Mr. Daniels
had his apartments, that the bulldog did not arouse Mr.
Daniels when the burglar entered, that therefore the burg
lary was committed by some one on good terms with the
bulldog, and that therefore the burglar was probably
young Eagen. Such was the farfetched if not ridiculous
theory. The report went on to state that after being ar
rested and on his way to the station house young Eagen
told the officers who had him in charge that the locket
lost by Mr. Daniels contained 17 diamonds, that it had
been broken up, and that it was useless to look for it.
The report also states that while young Eagen was locked
up in the cell another officer heard him state to a prisoner
in an adjoining cell, who had been arrested on suspicion
of the same offense, " I think they haA^e got it on us," to
which the other prisoner responded, " Shut up, some one
might be hstening." The name of this other prisoner is
Grant, hereinafter mentioned. To this report was at
tached a letter of the Second Deputy Commissioner to
you stating that in his opinion the action of the officer
who made the arrest and false charge of vagrancy was
justifiable. I felt constrained to Avrite to you that his con
duct was unjustifiable. The boy was not a vagrant, and
the charge against him was false. The alleged confessions
were stated to have taken place after the arrest, and were
not revealed to the magistrate at all. I also expressed the
view that the so-called evidence given in the report that
the boy had committed the burglary was no evidence, and
that the alleged confessions stated in the report Avere
09

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
trumped up after the boy's discharge, and after I had
called for a report, for the purpose of trying to justify
the arrest. Nothing further was done at that time, how
ever, as the said chief of the detective bureau said that the
iuA^estigation was still going on and that it was expected
that sufficient evidence would be obtained against the boy.
But instead of any evidence being obtained against him,
one Alexander Moore has since been arrested, indicted
and convicted of the burglary and is now serving a term
in State's Prison therefor, as I have learned. Pawn tickets
for the stolen articles were found in his pockets. The
stolen articles were all obtained in the pawn shop. The
diamonds had not been taken out of the locket. In a
word, the whole report has been proven to be false in every
substantial particular. The statement that this boy made
anything in the nature of a confession is now known to be
entirely false, as -he knew nothing at all about the matter.
The report also states that when the boy was discharged
by the magistrate his mother who was present exclaimed :
" I am going to write to Mayor Gaynor and give you fel
lows the same dose that Duffy gaA^e the officers in his
case " — alluding to young Duffy who was arrested time
after time by the police and locked up, and his picture put
in the Rogues' Gallery, for no offense whatever. I have
sufficiently ascertained that she had not up to that time
ever heard of the Duffy case, and therefore could not have
made such a remark. Also she is not a woman who would
express herself in that manner.
The case calls for disciphne of the officers engaged in
it. It is also necessary that this matter be made pubhc
so that this boy may be fully vindicated instead of being
injured for hfe. It will never do for the pohce to treat
boys in this way. I should also mention that another
young felloAV named Henry Grant was arrested on sus
picion for the same crime. The chief reason for his ar
rest seems to have been that when a boy he had served a
term in the Elmira Reformatory. He was discharged as
reformed. The police should be very careful about ar-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
resting boys who have served a term in a reformatory.
To follow them up and arrest them on sight, on the
slightest suspicion, or on no suspicion, as is often the case,
after they come out, and even follow them to the places
where they are employed, and procure their discharge, is
to leave no course open to them except to become habitual
criminals. This boy Grant was employed as a chauffeur.
I understand that he lost his place because of his arrest.
I trust that this vindication of him will suffice to enable
him to get other work to do. The police must be made to
understand that they cannot arrest and lock people up as
they hke, but that they must keep within the law. The
only way to enforce the law is the way prescribed by law.
That which cannot be done lawfully must not be done at
all by the pohce or any other pubhc officials from the Pres
ident of the United States down. This is a government
of laws and not of men.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.
Coffee Drinking December 20, 1911.
Dear Mr. Gilmore: I thank you very much for the
package of coffee which you sent to my house. It will
do me much good. I did not begin to drink coffee imtil I
was past forty, and I therefore get all the effects of it, and
very httle suffices me. Before I took to drinking a little
diluted coffee I drank cold water for breakfast, dinner
and supper.
William G. Gilmore, Esq.,
New York City.
" Happy New Year "
December 31, 1911.
There is less misery in this world than some miserable
people think. Misery seems to be happiness to some peo-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
pie. If they happen to be Avithout some mental Avorry or
misery they think they are sick. Every one is happy in
some way. The predominant feeling in the world is one
of happiness. We often imagine that if this or that hap
pened to us, or if we met with some accident, or were sick,
we would not be happy. But the one who has lost a leg
or an arm, or even his voice, or his hearing, or his eyesight,
is generally happy.
And this is the happy season of the year.
Nothing makes us so happy as to read the account in
Luke's Gospel of the birth of Jesus. It thrills us. The
picture of the Child in the manger with the cattle looking
on never leaves the mind from childhood up.
We who were children in the country saw the cow
and the ox and the manger and Jesus and all. We hA'ed
with the cattle and loved them. That Jesus was born
among them made us feel that He was really one of us.
It is the central point of democracy in the world.
Some are fond of picturing infants born in castles
and with great surroundings. But this picture of Jesus
born among the cattle in a manger is the one which reaches
every human heart, high and low. Humanity everjrwhere
responds to it.
And in the midst of this elation of soul over the birth
of Jesus comes the beginning of the new year. We are
looking on the bright side of everything, and are able to
begin the new year well.
We are filled with good intentions and are ready to
make promises for our future conduct. But we have to
keep renewing these promises. In fact we have to renew
them every morning in order to accomplish much.
But if we start with a strong impulse we are likely to
keep it up.
Christmas and Ncav Year's were great days in the
country when I was a boy. The greeting was " Merry
Christmas and Happy New Year" everjnvhere. It was
nothing but good Avill to everybody.
And then later on came Easter. The birth of Jesus
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and the day of His Resurrection are the happiest days in
the year. The heart is filled with joy in spite of one's
self. With many Easter is a sort of renewed Christmas,
and it was so when I was a boy, although there were some
who thought very little of either Christmas or Easter.
Where I lived the winter had hardly gone at Easter.
But the thawing snow, the singing of the hens, the cows
licking themselves and one another in the barnyard sun,
the sharp crack of the bursting trees in the woods, and
many other signs, told us that the winter was passing and
the spring arriving. Those were great days.
The city children and the city people have great days
also. The point of view is different, that is all.
And so you say next year is leap year. That tickles
the vanity of all young fellows and men who think that
every woman they meet is disposed to fall in love with
them. But I do not think the women care much about
leap year. They can propose if they want to, but, bless
them, leap year or no leap year, they would rather have
the fellow propose to them.
No, I do not approve of this roystering, and I may
almost say drunken " old year out and new year in "
which some people celebrate here in New York. I would
like to see it done away with.

Pawnshops Jan. 4, 1912.
Sir : I enclose to you a complaint of Marie Behrman.
Please have the matter investigated thoroughly.
May I also now repeat what I said to you orally some
httle time ago, that the habit of detectives telling persons
whose property has been stolen and pawned, that they
must pay the amount advanced on or paid for the article
in order to get possession of it, should be done away with.
The law is that no one is required to pay anything in order
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to get back his stolen property. Nobody can get any
title or lien on it. The force should be warned to stop
this practice absolutely, and a violation of the rule should
merit dismissal. The pawn brokers should not be mere
receivers of stolen goods, as some of them now seem to
be, with the aid and good will of detectives.
Rhinelander Waldo, Esq.,
Commissioner of Police.
Rogues' Gallery Injustice January 8, 1912.
Dear Mr. Waltzer : On receiving your letter inform
ing me that your picture was unjustly in the Rogues'
Gallery, I at once inquired into the case. I found it to
be just as you state, namely, that you had never been
arrested but once, and that the charge of larceny made
against you then by a policeman was found to be un
founded and you Avere discharged. Nevertheless your
picture was put in the Rogues' Gallery labelled " General
thief," and it has been there ever since. I have had it
taken out of the Rogues' Gallery and I am hercAvith send
ing it back to you. I would also like to do Avhatever else
I can to make amends for the very great wrong which has
been done to you. About the time you Avere treated in
this way a large number of other boys in this city were
being treated in the same way. But an end has been put
to that sort of thing, and I trust forever.
Mr. Isidor Waltzer,
New York City. " The Single Tax " Jan. 26, 1912.
Dear Mr. EUsAvorth: The bill Avhich you call the
Sulhvan- Short bill has not been submitted to me. The
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
purpose of it is to throAV all real estate taxes on the bare
ground, and exempt the buildings. This means the carry
ing out of the theory of the late Henry George, i. e., to
have a single tax, i. e., only one tax, i. e., on the bare land
only, all buildings and improvements to go free of taxes.
If you will get Mr. George's book, " Progress and Pov
erty," you will find the whole theory stated. The result
of such a law would be to practically confiscate the values
of all land in cities. The effect would be to absorb into
the pubhc treasury by means of taxes the entire ground
rent, Avhich may be fairly stated at somcAvhere from four
to five per cent, of the value of the bare land. Of course
if all ground rents should be absorbed into the public
treasury, there would be no sale value of land left. To
speak plainly, this would destroy or confiscate all such
land values. You have to decide whether this would be
just. Such a system of taxation may be the best. But
as society has been constituted from the beginning under
a different one, and people have invested their money in
land values under that system, would it accord with jus
tice for society to destroy their investments by a new
system without compensating them for their loss? The
subject is a big one, politically and morally. But read
" Progress and Poverty," and see what you think about it.
T. Gardner Ellsworth, Esq., Sec'y,
Farmers' and Taxpayers' Assn.

Pawnbrokers February 7, 1912.
Sir: The practice had groAvn up in the pohce depart
ment of detectives telhng persons whose stolen property
was found in pawn shops to pay the amount loaned on
the property in order to regain possession of their goods.
They were told that they had to pay the said amount in
order to get their goods. This was all illegal. A person
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
whose property is stolen can follow it anywhere and take
it, and is entitled to take it by law. No one can get any
property in or lien on stolen goods as against the true
owner. An order was therefore issued prohibiting mem
bers of the force from advising or telling ovmers of stolen
property to pay the pavmbrokers in order to regain their
property. The result has been that many pavmbrokers
are refusing to deliver up stolen property without being
paid. I call your special attention to Manning Brothers
who keep a paAvn shop at 584, Eighth avenue, who refuse
to dehver up the jewelry stolen from Mr. Suydam.
I am now instructing the Police Commissioner to send
to you the name of every pawnbroker in the city who
refuses to deliver up stolen goods Avithout being paid the
amount of his loan by the OAvner thereof, and you wiU
please institute proceedings against them for the revoca
tion of their hcenses if they persist in this course.
James G. Wallace, Jr., Esq.,
Chief of Bureau of Licenses.

Police Control of Excise, Gambling and Prostitution
February 10, 1912.
Dear Sir : Since you called on me with the other mem
bers of your committee on the police which was appointed
at the mass meeting, I have continued to consider the mat
ter of taking away from the police department the en
forcement of the law with regard to excise, gambhng and
prostitution, and conferring that power and duty upon a
new department to be created by the Legislature. After
your call I requested Assemblyman Greenberg not to in
troduce the bill he prepared for that purpose (and which
I handed to you), until your committee had fully con
sidered it. If such a bill is to be introduced, I should prefer
that it be under the auspices of your committee.
It is easy for the police to extort money from the
keepers of hotels, saloons, gambhng houses and houses
76

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
of prostitution, under threats of entering their places and
arresting and prosecuting them unless they pay for im
munity therefrom. And such persons are certain to seek to
bribe the pohce. I found that condition in full blast when
I came in as Mayor. It had existed for many years. The
hotels, saloons, gambling houses and houses of fornica
tion Avere paying a weekly or monthly sum for such im
munity. The total sum was immense. I knew that the
recipients would not let go of this graft at my mere bid
ding. I have been struggling persistently ever since to
remove this condition. I think I have succeeded with re
gard to the saloon and hotel graft. I know that I have
measurably succeeded in respect to gambling houses and
houses of fornication. But to remove the evil entirely re
quires time, for it is of long standing and deep seated.
Pohce Commissioners Cropsey and Waldo have put
many gamblers and keepers of houses of fornication out
of business. The result has been to provoke some of them
to reveal facts with regard to the bribery of the police.
It seems to be lost sight of to some extent that all of these
revelations of police bribery came from this enforcement
of the law against the persons who made such revelations.
It was to be expected that enforcement of the law would
bring about such revelations. Rosenthal, for instance,
opened twelve different gambhng places successively after
Waldo was made Commissioner, but was put out of busi
ness every time. While the pohce were still in possession
of the last place which he opened he made revelations
against the police. The same thing occurred in the case
of Sipp, whose house of fornication was suppressed by
the police. And the same is occurring Avith others. But
most of the revelations which are being made are of things
which occurred under former administrations of the city
government, some of them as long as fifteen years ago.
The effort of certain newspapers to make it appear that
these revelations are of occurrences which took place since
Waldo became Police Commissioner Avill not, I am cer
tain, deceive any intelligent person. The ignorant may be
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
deceived for a time, but not the intelligent. Meanwhile, a
considerable number of corrupt officials in the pohce de
partment have been removed or compelled to resign. If
we could get the old time grafters out, we would at the
same time get rid of most of the graft. But it takes time
and patience. They cannot be dismissed without strict
legal evidence. This grafting in the cities in this country
is of long standing, deep seated and inveterate.
But justice requires us to always remember that only
a comparatively few of the members of the police force are
thus corrupted and infected. There are not as many as
100 out of the whole force of 10,000. The great body of
the force throughout the city, in Brooklyn, in Queens, in
the Bronx, in Richmond, and in most of Manhattan, is
doing its duty faithfully day after day. It is only in two
or three localities in Manhattan that this graft cAdl exists.
But the corrupt doings of the few corrupted pohcemen in
these localities give the whole force a bad name, at all
events in the minds of unthinking people. The result is
an unfavorable effect on the whole force, more or less. It
distracts it from its duty. And the indiscriminate abuse
heaped on the whole force by corrupt and sensational news
papers for the derehctions of a fcAv must of course have
a bad effect also.
It therefore seems that it would be a Avise thing to take
away from the police force all supervision over or contact
with the three things I have mentioned and confer the same
on a separate force to be created for that purpose. Of
course that new force would also be subject to the same
temptation, and Avould be corrupted more or less. But
their misdeeds would not reflect on the police force. The
police force would be engaged solely in preserving the
peace, and keeping outward order and decency, and in the
detection and prevention of ordinary crimes, in the which
opportunities for graft are small. It would have nothing to
do Avith the enforcement of the laws concerning excise,
gambling and prostitution, and would not be subject to the
infection of corruption therefrom. 78

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
As I have said, this new force would be open to such
corruption. But the danger thereof would be minimized
if the commissioner of the new force were given the power
to appoint and dismiss at will. That would enable him to
select competent persons and to get rid of every member
of the force of whom he had any suspicion. As it is now
no member of the pohce force can be dismissed except on
common law proof showing him to be guilty of some dere
liction. If the same rule should be made apphcable to the
new force, then I do not see that anything would be gained
by creating such a force.
After careful consideration I favor creating this new
force. But I am not in favor of putting it under a board
of commissioners to serve without pay. On the contrary,
to be effective it ought to be under a paid commissioner
who would have to devote all of his time to his duties. I
have no doubt that better results in government are ob
tained from paid officials than from voluntary officials.
I have all the more reason to be in favor of this new
method for the reason that I have adopted a similar method
in the pohce force itself, and it has worked well. As you
know I made up a separate force within the force itself to
deal with the three things which I have mentioned, and re-
heved the rest of the force from dealing Avith such things.
To leave all of the captains and inspectors free to deal with
hquor saloons, gambling houses and houses of fornication
is only to make extensive corruption certain. I tried to
bring the contact Avith these three things down to one
point, namely, to the commissioner himself. To do that I
created a separate force which was placed under the imme
diate orders of the commissioner. As you are aware, one
of the three heutenants put over that force by the Com
missioner was corrupted. But the extent of corruption
was reduced many fold, and I have no hesitation in saying
that it was never less in the pohce department for a genera
tion than during the last two years. But although that
method has measurably succeeded I think a new force,
wholly disconnected from the pohce force, would work out
79

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
a still better result. And above all things as I have al
ready stated, whatever corruption there might be in that
force would not reflect upon the police force.
I have a letter to-day from Assemblyman Greenberg
who is restless about introducing his bill. I shall send
him a copy of this letter, and it may be that he Avill wait
until you have carefully revised his bill or drawn a new one.
Or it may be Avise for him to introduce his bill and have it
printed so that it may be circulated. In that way we would
get the co-operation of many others. I shall be glad to
confer vdth your committee further about this matter,
and to have a session vdth you in the near future.
Allan Robinson, Esq.,
New York Citv.

^"^* March 8, 1912.
Dear Mr. Gerdes: I regret to say that I have so
many official duties pressing upon me that I cannot just
now devote any time to the tom-cats, as you request by
your letter. There are a few in my neighborhood, but I
go to sleep and let them howl. It amuses them and doesn't
hurt me. But some say that it is the pussy-cats that howl,
and not the tom-cats. How is that? We must not kill
Tommy for the sins of Pussy. And, also, let us remem
ber that the " female of the species is more deadly than
the male."
Theodore R. N. Gerdes, Esq.,
New York City.

A Touch of Philosophy April 18, 1912.
My dear Doctor Finley: I am returning to you the
fine edition of " Marcus Aurelius " Avhich you loaned me.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
The beautiful type and mechanical work added to the joy
of again reading the philosophical reflections of that great
ruler. He wrote them on his tablets for the mere joy of
the thing. He does not seem to have desired to communi
cate them to posterity. But we must not rate them too
high. To say that in their conception and morality they
equal or approach the philosophy of Jesus, as do John
Stuart Mill and others, seems to me a great exaggeration.
Nor do they approach the philosophy and sublimity of
the Old Testament in its conception of a universe subject
to the fixed laws of one God-head. The re-reading of them
has again produced in me the same state of mind with
which I have always laid them down heretofore, namely:
Consider that the great universe of Avhich thou art only
a trivial speck, is governed by fixed laws, and be there
fore content in all things, and especially to die at any time,
and abide God's will of thee, whether of individual future
life, or dissolution into universal mind and matter.
My mind is all the more impressed with this now, for
I have spent much of this day considering the death of
those who went down on the steamship " Titanic," and
preparing to take care of the survivors of that awful
catastrophe on their arrival here tonight.
Dr. John H. Finley, President,
College of the City of New York.

Purchasing Carrots and Cabbages by the Department
of Charities May 6, 1912.
Dear Mr. Fee: Your letter with regard to the rejec
tion of your vegetables is at hand. I must say I deem the
condition that the carrots be of one size as whimsical.
What difference does it make whether they are of uniform
size or not? They may look nicer, but will taste no better
either to men or horses. You would have to have a good
many acres of them to cull out any considerable number
81

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
of the same size. But maybe they think there is some way
of growing carrots all of the same size. And the condi
tion that your ncAV cabbages be white in the head is another
extraordinary notion. New cabbages are rather green.
Late cabbages get wliite in the head after a while. I fear
those who are rejecting your vegetables never raised either
cabbages or carrots or anything else. Try them again,
and see what they say? How would it do if we send them
all out on a farm for a year or so that they may learn at
least the difference between their knee and their elboAV
about vegetables.
James T. Fee, Esq., Manager,
Contract Department, New York.

Police and Boys Playing Ball
May 15, 1912.
Dear Master Van Buren : Your letter complaining of
the police chasing you and your companions out of the lot
where you play ball is at hand. I will take charge of the
matter and see what we can do. Most of the pohce be
have with intelligence, but I am sorry to say there are a
few stupid ones on the force yet that we would like to get
rid of. A policeman ought to be the friend of the boys
on his beat. I am very desirous of having the pohce let
the boys play on every available lot or space in the city.
In this case you have the permission of the owners, and I
do not see why the pohce meddle with you, except to see
that your ball does not fly over the fence and hit someone.
You boys have to play somcAvhere. The people who think
you ought to stay in the house all the time are also very
stupid or else very ill-natured.
Master Charles Van Buren,
Brooklyn, N. Y.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Roost Higher Up May 23, 1912.
Dear Mr. O'Gilby : I sympathize with you in the loss
of your chickens. My hen roost on Long Island has also
been entered. You say there are sixty-five policemen in
your precinct and demand more. Down my way there are
only four constables in a territory about ten times as large
as yours, Avith a population not much less. It is pretty
hard to keep chicken thieves out of chicken roosts by
pohcemen. However, I shall see what can be done for
you and your neighbors. Can you not induce your
chickens to roost higher?
WiUiam S. R. O'Gilby, Esq.,
West New Brighton, S. I.

To a Man Arrested for Spitting May 27, 1912.
Dear Sir: I shall look into your case, but I never
could understand why boys and men will go around spit
ting. It is disgusting. Why should boys and men spit
any more than girls and women? Did you ever think of
that? What is the use of being so nasty?
Mr. Felix R. Solomons,
Brooklyn, N. Y.
Newspapers June 10, 1912.
The National Publicity Bureau : You ask me to give
an interview saying " What I would say to the readers of
3,000 newspapers." I would say to them to be very care
ful about believing all they see in the newspapers.
C. E. Baird, Esq.,
Scranton, Penna. 83

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Sunday Games June 11, 1912.
Dear Dr. Bailey: Your letter communicating to me
the resolution passed by the Prospect Heights Presby
terian Church with regard to playing games in the parks
on Sunday is at hand. A great majority of the people of
the citj'^, and I think of the clergymen of the city, would
be opposed to stopping them. I was myself brought up
to the observance of a still Sabbath. But as we had to
work hard in the fields and woods on week days we were
willing to keep still on Sunday. Of course you know that
is not the case with our city men and boys. Many of them
have no day of recreation except Sunday. What would
you do with them? If they do not play in the fields they
will go somewhere else, as you know. Where would you
have them go? No doubt your church has solved that
problem, and I should be very glad to have you let me
know how it has been solved. Some of our clergymen
who have not been able to solve it are offering to go into
the fields and play with the boys of their congregation on
Sunday afternoons. They dread to have the boys driven
to the saloons, or to worse places. The conditions in cities
and in the country with regard to Sunday are very dif
ferent. Please remember also that people have a right
to indulge in any game or recreation on Sunday which is
not prohibited by law.
Rev. Edwin D. Bailey,
Brooklyn, N. Y.
On the Still Sabbath June 21, 1912.
Dear Colonel Bacon: I have your letter enclosing
the letter of Mr. Steele. If I could lawfully stop games
on Sunday and should do so in one place I would have
to stop them everyAvhere. I have to do the best I can.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
When 1 was a boy we kept still on Sunday, but we worked
in the fields and in the woods every other day in the week,
and it was not a difficult matter to keep still on Sunday.
But the case of our boys and young men here in the city
is very different. Thej^ are cooped up in factories and
workshops and offices the A^diole week, and as a health
measure, to say nothing else, it may be necessary that they
get out in the fields and play games on Sunday. There
is no human law forbidding it, and the vast majority of
people are of opinion that there is no divine law forbid
ding it. One of the Ten Commandments forbids work,
but not play, as has often been pointed out. And as Mr.
Steele says in his letter to you, Jesus departed from the
still observance of the Sabbath, and when called to account
for it said: " The Sabbath was made for man, and not
man for the Sabbath." Nowhere in the world has there
ever been an idea of a still Sabbath except among the
ancient Jews and in the British Isles. Sometimes I think
this is some proof that the lost tribes of Israel found their
way up into the British Isles and settled there. But never
on the continent of Europe was it deemed wrongful or
sinful to take physical exercises and play outdoor games
on Sunday. People there have always, from the remotest
times, resorted to the fields for physical exercises and
games on Sunday, especially after church. When John
Knox went to visit John Calvin at Geneva on a Sunday
afternoon he found him out in the fields playing at bowls
with his two sons and his neighbors. Moreover, the Chris
tian Church never from the beginning prescribed any rules
for the observance of Sunday in respect of physical exer
cises or games or play. Not many years ago, as you
doubtless well remember, some one wrote to the Arch
bishop of Canterbury complaining of Mr. Balfour, then
Prime Minister, for playing golf on Sunday. The Arch
bishop responded in writing that: "It is certain that the
Christian Church has never laid down detailed directions
affecting the actions of individuals in this matter. Each
is responsible to God for using the Lord's Day so as to
85

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
fit him best for the working days that follow." And as
for the civil law, I know of no statute forbidding exercises
or games on Sunday generally. There are certain things
forbidden. Beyond that the law leaves everyone to deter
mine according to his own conscience how he shall spend
the Sunday. But I shall not pursue the subject. You
and I would hke to see eA^erybody go to church Sunday
forenoon, before going to the fields in the afternoon for
exercises, if they decide to go. As it is, the majority of
clergjTnen, I think, as well as of people in general, are
against stopping Sunday exercises and games in the open
fields. The last thing we should try to do in this world
is to force our religious opinions or prejudices on others.
I suppose you saw the uncharitable, and even mean letter,
Avritten to me by the Reverend Bailey. It is no Avonder
his church is nearly empty Sunday after Sunday.
Col. Alexander S. Bacon,
New York City.

Belief in God June 17, 1912.
Dear Mr. Guiteau: I thank you very much for send
ing me your rehgious poem. I say religious, because it
breathes the very spirit of rehgion. And yet Avith those
who find themselves only able to believe in God, Avithout
beheving other things, there should be no quarrel. Every
one can say that he beheves in God, and in His benign
rulership of the universe by fixed laws. If some of us find
it difficult to beheve anything fui-ther, I am certain God
does not condemn us. Why then should anyone else?
Some people say they do not beheve in God, even. I do
not beheve them. No one can sincerely say that.
John Wilson Guiteau, Esq.,
Dobbs Ferry, N. Y. S6

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECIIES
Democracy and Despotism
(To the school children of the City of New York, written at
the request of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, to be read
to them on Independence Day, 1912.) June 29, 1912.
Our country is a free country. Om- government is a
democracy. Democracy is the rule of the people by them
selves. The Avay this is done is as follows: The people
enact their own laws. These laws prescribe how they shall
be governed. Then the people elect their own officials to
carry out or execute these laws. If the number of the
whole people were small enough, they could meet in one
place, in a big hall or in a field, and enact their laws by
their OAvn voice. But as our numbers are too great for
that, we divide ourselves up into sections or districts, and
each district elects representatives, and all of these repre
sentatives meet in what we call the Legislature, and enact
our laws. That is a representative democracy. If our
laws do not suit us it is because we do not elect persons
who carry out our will in the Legislature. That is our
OAvn fault, namely, through ignorance or negligence we
elect unfit men. And if we elect unfit men to office to carry
out or execute our laws, that is in the same way our own
fault. The only way, therefore, to have good laAvs, and
good officials to execute them, is by the intelligence and
virtue of the people. We therefore spend immense sums
to educate the people. The object is to make them fit to
vote. If the people are themselves intelligent and vir
tuous, they Avill vote right, and the result Avill be good
laAvs, good officials, and good government. But if the
people are not intelligent and virtuous, the result will be
the reverse, namely, bad laws, bad officials, and bad gov
ernment. NoAV you see Avhy your parents are paying large
taxes to educate you. If you and the generations who
come after you should lack the necessary intelligence and
Adrtue, then our form of government must come to its
doAvnfall. I hope our common schools will postpone in-
87

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
definitely that fatal hour. The downfall of the rulership
of the people by themselves means a return to despotism.
Under that form of government which we call despotism,
the ruler does as he likes without regard to the people.
He arrests them, he locks them up, he takes their hves, he
takes their property, to suit himself. We must therefore
be vigilant of .every little approach of despotism, however
little it may be. We must see to it that those whom we
elect to office do not go outside of the laws, or set them
selves up above the laws, and do as they please. It always
has been the case throughout the world that the officials
who did this did it on the plea that the laws were not good
enough — ^that they could do better than the laws pre
scribed. Beware of all such officials. We do not want
officials who have any lust of power. We want officials
who are very careful about exercising power. We want
officials who are careful to exercise no power except that
given to them by the people by their laws. There is no
more dangerous man in a free country, in a democracy,
than an official who thinks he is better than the laws. The
good man in office should be most careful not to set a bad
example or precedent for his bad successor, who will come
along sooner or later.
On every recurring Independence Day we should seri
ously consider these things, and consecrate ourselves anew,
even upon our knees, to God's A^dll, in the fuU conviction
that His will is that the people shall by their ever groAving
intelligence and virtue continue to rule themselves, better
and better, year after year, forcA^er.

Happiness ^ July 8, 1912.
Dear Madam: You are looking for happiness in the
wrong direction. I do not think there is any man living
who would suit you. If you want to be really happy for

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the rest of your life, Avork for the happiness of others, and
forget yourself.
Mrs. Clara L. Brown, Chicago, 111.

Workmen's Compensation and Pension Laws
July 23, 1912.
Dear Mr. Archer: I am much indebted to you for
sending me the workmen's compensation act passed in
Ohio this year. The provisions in it requiring the creation
of a state insurance fund, by means of a tax on employers
and employes based on the aggregate wages paid by each
manufactory or establishment, to pay for injuries and
deaths of employes by accidents in their work, create an
admirable system. Nearly all the governments of the
world outside of this country have some similar law for
the benefit of employes. It is an old thing in Europe.
Every European nation has such a law except Turkey
and some states of Switzerland, and throughout the world
we find similar laws as a rule. Prussia had one as early
as 1847, I think. In this country we lag behind the world
in this just and humane matter. I doubt if any govern
ment has a better law on the subject than this newest one
of all which you have in Ohio. But will the courts knock
it over, as the highest court in this state did with the very
moderate one we passed in this state as a beginning three
years ago? People are beginning to see that social and
economic justice requires that we have these laws. The
industrial workers should be paid for the injuries which
they receive in their work, and the dependents of those
killed should be likewise paid. It is easy to accumulate
a fund for this purpose by a light tax on employers and
employes. In England the employers are taxed for a
part, the employes for a part, and general taxation makes
up the remainder of the fund. Russia has a model law on
the subject. I think the recent English one is modelled
S9

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
on the Russian one, but you are more competent on that
head than 1 am.
I suppose you know that here in this city we are em
powered in our discretion to retire on an old age pension
all old persons who have been in the city employment for
thirty years. We also have old age pension laws for sev
eral of our Departments. For example, our street cleaners
have a pension fund out of Avhich thej^ are paid a perma
nent yearly sum after they are retired from the employ
ment of the city on account of old age or physical or
mental disability. And Ave are soon to haA'^e such a law
for all of our city employes. Why should not the same
rule apply to all industrial workers as well as to those who
Avork for the city of New York or other cities? I hope
the time is fast approaching Avhen that will be so. It has
been voluntarily established by some railroads and large
industrial estabhshments. Those of us who ventured to
say a Avord in favor of such things a few years ago Avere
denounced as socialists and anarchists, used as words of
opprobrium, especially by neAvspapers and people who do
not know what socialism is. Let them call it anything
they like. Distributive justice requires that it shall come
to pass. The old Avorkers should not be turned out to die
or live in distress or go to the poorhouse, nor should the
maimed or hurt.
It is very gratifying to learn from you that the Manu
facturers' Association of the United States have passed a
resolution favoring the passage of such laAvs. Such a sys
tem cannot hurt them. It would relieve them of all laAv-
suits for accidents, and of the large payments they are
noAV making to casualty companies, to insure them against
such accidents. Would the tax on them for such a system
be larger than the premiums they are noAv paying the
casualty companies? More than that, the tax would not
really fall on them. It would go into the cost of produc
tion, the same as the insurance premiums they are noAv
paying, and be paid in the end by the whole community
in the price they Avould pay for the articles produced. And
90

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the tax would increase that price by so small a decimal
that it would be scarcely noticeable, if at all.
I notice that both political parties kept aloof from
tliis matter in their platforms this year. But all the same
it is one uppermost in the minds of the people of this
country today, and they Avill attend to it. They do not
propose to lag behind the Avhole Avorld in distributive jus
tice. General prosperity does not depend alone on the
amount of the total product of industry, but more yet on
a just diAdsion of such product among all who helped to
produce it, Avhether by phj^sical work or mental work, or
both, or by furnishing capital.
William C. Archer, Esq.,
Columbus, Ohio.
Rhetoricians August 1st, 1912.
Dear Mr. Greenspan : i thank you very much for your
letter. You understand the matter correctly. I have
not said so much as one word about the Jews in connec
tion with the Rosenthal murder. I have not used the
word at all. In my letter I said that those whose names
have been published in connection with the gambhng
murder, and with gambling, showed them to be " degen
erate foreigners " who gaA'^e the police great trouble. And
if you look at the list of these names you will find that
they are not all Jews, although it contains several or many
Jews. But if the list Avere all Jcavs, I am sufficiently ac
quainted with the Jewish intellect and character to know
that the Jews do not shield criminals of their race any
more than any other criminals. They rate all criminals
alike. I cannot help Rabbi Wise. He is supposed to be
a preacher and a charitable man. That he has borne false
witness against me concerneth him more than it concerneth
me. He seems to read the Hearst newspapers, and accept
their statements as true. What a howling wilderness the
mind of such a man must be. And yet he professes to be
91

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
a teacher and is even a noisy censor. I have no use for
these inflammatory rhetoricians. They are all voice and
no conscience or heart. We all have to do the best we can,
and should of all things stand by the truth and by our
training and convictions. A degenerate outlaw is the
same to me, Jcav or Gentile. I Avish we could be rid of all
such. B. E. Greenspan, Esq.,
New York City.

He of the Crooked Mouth August 7, 1912.
Dear Mr. Rosenfeld: I thank you very much for
your letter. Rabbi Wise does not disturb me. I am con
tent that he and his like bear false witness against me, as
they have been doing for 25 years. The better I have
done or tried to do the more they have lied about me and
abused me. That is their impulse. Rabbi Wise has long
been an exaggerator and uncharitable man in this com
munity. He is all mouth and no conscience. The mouths
of rhetoricians are proverbially crooked. " He of the
crooked mouth," is as true of the rhetorician today as it
ever was. I have not said one word about the Jews. I
have not used the word at all. He knows all this well, but
is capable of asserting the contrary nevertheless. But if
I had used the word, I am sufficiently famihar with the
Jewish character to know that Jews are just as quick to
denounce and disavoAv Jew criminals as any other kind
of criminals. Criminals are mere criminals whatever their
race or nationality. The Jewish race brings down to us
from the tAvilight of history — from that border line where
fable scarcely ceases and history hardly begins — knowl
edge of the one true and ever living God, which is the one
great fact of the world. Such a people are too genuine
92

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and steadfast to be deceived much by rhetoricians or
demagogues, lay or clerical.
George Rosenfeld, Esq.,
New York Cit3\

Work and Abuse August 16, 1912.
Dear Mr. Bobbitt: Thank you for your letter and
for the articles you enclose. Yes, the task of the Mayor
of New York City is a difficult one. I knew that when
I finally consented to run for Mayor, after having refused
to do so twice previously. And when I became Mayor
I said to myself that I would do all that I could for the
people of the city and be content with the result. I also
know all about ingratitude. I do not look for gratitude,
or ask for it. I simply intend to do the best I can. You
mention the outcry of newspapers. I do not even find
fault with that. I have long been subject to abuse. And
I have always been abused most when I did best. What
ever happens, I go right on the same, or try to. As soon
as I became Mayor, I tried to put every department under
a head who would take all politics and graft out of it. And
then I began with one department after the other to rid
it of politics and graft, for they go hand in hand. In that
work I have received neither the aid nor the good will of
the people who make the most noise in this city in the way
of accusation and protestations of virtue. I have no rea
son to complain of that. I never expected their good
will, much less their aid. I have gone right on without
them. I think I have succeeded pretty well in eliminating
graft from the city government. Graft has been deep-
seated here for over 40 years in most of the departments,
if not in all of them. I think it Avill be admitted that I
have driven graft out of nearly all of them. I have even
been fortunate enough to take most of the graft out of the
Police Department. The matter of stopping graft in
93

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
connection with gambling and the like is an awfully diffi
cult task. Of course I have been able to give only com
paratively little time to the Police Department. You
know the large things, and the small things, with Avhich
I have had to deal, and am dealing, since I became Mayor.
Some of them are the largest being dealt Avith anywhere
in the Avorld at this time. The amount of time and mental
and physical exertion Avhich they have consumed is, I
suppose, realized by very few. But that I knew of in
advance, and I am content with it. We tried to cope
with this gambling and like graft in the Police Depart
ment by narroAving the contact of the department Avith the
sources of graft. I could see no other way. We narrowed
such final contact down to a single point, namely, to the
Commissioner himself, with a special squad under him.
And yet now we find that one of the three lieutenants of
that squad Avas taking graft, although he was right with
the Commissioner at headquarters, and under his orders
alone. Of course it has greatly disturbed and mortified
the Commissioner, for he is a young and sensitive man.
As for myself, Avhile I hope I am not without feehng,
nothing disturbs me much. I try to take everjrthing as
it comes along. I of course expected that cases of graft
would develop. The police force as a whole is good. I
hate to see the whole force abused for the derelictions of
one or a few. But they know I have done all I could for
them, and will stand by them. But I hope we shall get
at the bottom of all the graft that exists in the Police
Department. I had started an investigation of my own,
and contemplated public hearings, but Avhen the Aldermen
appointed a special committee for the purpose, I paused,
and concluded to unite in the work of that committee. If,
however, it is to be mere partisan and pre-election work,
to arouse party prejudices, I shall have to withdraw from
it and do the best I can without their aid. You know how
things are started before election to create political preju
dice, and what injustice is very often done thereby. Of
course we have also the case of the army of unfortunate
94

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
women. That is a mournful subject, one more fit to Aveep
over than for political use. That evil exists everyw^here,
now as in the past, and we have to do the best we can vdth
it. Those who drive girls and women to such lives by paj^-
ing them starvation wages are often the ones who cry out
loudest against the public authorities for not exterminat
ing them as mere animals. Who but men made them what
they are? Then let men deal Avith them patiently and
mercifully, and do everything to reclaim them.
B. B. Bobbitt, Esq.,
Editor, The Daily Record,
Long Branch, N. J.
Advice on Marriage September 12, 1912.
Dear Sir: There are plenty of girls who would fill
your description right out in Minneapohs where you live.
Just pluck up courage enough to go right up to them
and tell them that you want a wife. But maybe that would
be too abrupt. I did not go about it that way, because I
did not have pluck enough, and maybe you haven't. But
get around it the best you can, and everything will come
out all right,
H. R. Trimmer, Esq.,
Minneapolis, Minn.

Rhetoricians September 16, 1912.
Dear Mr. Bernstein: I thank you for your kind let
ter, but I have no ill-feeling against Rabbi Wise. Of
course I have observed in common with the rest of the
community that he is without charity or truthfulness, al
though a preacher and teacher. But I have to remember
that he is a mere rhetorician, and you know that rhetori
cians are proA'erbially uncharitable and untruthful. The
95

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mouths of all of them are crooked, to use an ancient phrase,
and you cannot expect truth or charity to come from a
crooked mouth.
David Bernstein, Esq.,
New York City.
A Rhetorician Sept. 18, 1912.
Dear Mr. Miller: I have your letter of September
17th with regard to Rabbi Wise. Yes, I know he has
made several very uncharitable and untruthful attacks on
me. But I bear him no ill will. He is a clergyman, and
it is always a painful sight to see a clergyman with no
charity or truth in his heart or soul. He has never lent
me a helping hand. He has studiously tried to thwart me
and do all the injury he can. I do not know Avhy, except
that it is his nature. He is a rhetorician, and I suppose
you know that as a rule rhetoricians are devoid of charity
or honesty. To air their rhetoric they will say and do the
most unjust and uncharitable things. But if you see him
tell him that I bear him no ill will whatever. I have had
to work hard as mayor to accomplish things Avhich I set
out to do. That he has not offered me his hand concerns
him more than it concerns me, and that is also true of what
he says of me.
L. E. Miller, Esq.,
Editor, The Warheit, Manhattan.
Police Reforms and " The Eternal Priestess of
Humanity, Blasted for the Sins
of the People "
September 18, 1912.
Dear Mr. Hayes : The delay in answering j^^our letter
has been due to the many things which have pressed upon
96

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
me. And then, again, I saw no use in complying with
your suggestion when you called upon me that I enumer
ate for publication the reforms which have been worked
out in the Police Department since I have been Mayor,
until the tide of falsehood and abuse against the depart
ment should subside. My great anxiety has been that
these false attacks on the entire pohce force might affect
the men, and make them indifferent to the performance
of their duties. No one can deny that all possible has
been done to break down the disciphne of the police force.
But I am glad to assure you that from close observation
I am able to say that it has had little or no effect either
on the police force or on the intelligent and decent com
munity, I am not able to say to you what effect it has
had upon the degenerates of the community.
The case of Becker did not surprise me at all. Al
though we had done much to remove grafting and make
it impossible in the Pohce Department, I knew very well
that it would in all probability crop out in more places
than one. The instance which has cropped out has enabled
the degenerate press to characterize the whole force as a
band of grafters. But I am certain that the intelhgent
community still have in mind, and have had in mind all
along, what we have done in the way of reform in the
police force. In no other department has so much been
successfully done. Let me enumerate some of these things :
First — The first thing was to do away with unlawful
batteries and mistreatment of citizens by policemen. All
over the city decent people had been clubbed, mistreated
and insulted for j'^ears. Nothing had been done to stop it.
The evil grew all the time. I think Ave have practically
put an end to all that. It was accomplished only by dis
missing several from the force for unlawful violence and
rudeness. The police now understand that they are the
servants of the community, not their masters. That they
had forgotten it was not due to the men of the force, but
to the arbitrary and lawless way in which they had been
handled and ruled for A^ears. 97

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Second — We then taught the force not to arrest people
and lock them up for petty things, but to take their names
and have them summoned, if even that were necessary.
That is now an accomphshed fact in this city. These petty
arrests have been largely done away with, and where
arrests should be made for minor offenses we have taught
the force to resort to the method of summoning, where the
accused persons have a residence and are knovni. In this
way we have protected citizens generally from being
locked up with criminals, often overnight, only to be dis
charged the next day. We have also in this way destroyed
the occupation of the professional bondsman, which was
the source of large revenue to such bondsmen and also to
officials in the Police Department. In this connection I
should say we have particularly done away with the arrest
ing and locking up of boys for pranks in th^ streets, and
minor things, which many boys are prone to commit, the
same as we did when boys. The arresting and locking up
of boys for such things simply hardens them and turns
them into criminals. I suppose every intelligent person
knows the great changes which have been made in these
respects in the Police Department.
Third — The practice of photographing persons ar
rested for criminal offenses, and even boys, before convic
tion, or for minor offenses, and putting their photographs
in the rogues' gallery, thus disgracing them, and often
making criminals of them, has been stopped. That prac
tice is confined to persons convicted of serious crimes.
Fourth — We have done away with the former practice
of the police to take sides in strikes and labor disputes,
and commit unlawful acts of oppression and violence
therein. The police now understand that their whole duty
in strikes is to preserve the public peace. In order to ac
complish this we had to try and discipline certain officers
who took presents, in one case as much as $1,000, from
employers to do their bidding.
Fifth — We did aAvay with the so-called special police.
There were over 1,300 of them. As you know they were

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
sworn in as policemen, thereby becoming public officers.
They were then turned over to private persons, and put
under their pay and orders. If they did not obey the
orders of their employer they were dismissed. So far as
I know it was the first time in the history of government
that pubhc officers were put under the pay and direction
of private persons. A public officer acts under his oath
and under the law according to his judgment and discre
tion. But these public officers were put under the pay
and direction of private individuals, and had to do the
bidding of their employers in order to receive their pay.
The result Avas gross oppression and interference. You
might as well put the Mayor of the city under the direc
tion and pay of private individuals.
Sixth — There are about 10,000 hotels and saloons in
this city. These places had long been subject to extortion
by those who ruled over the police, in connection with cer
tain outside persons of influence. The moderate average
extortion of $25 a month from each would amount to
about $3,000,000 a year. But the gross sum of the extor
tion was probably much more. This was done away with.
Instead of permitting every officer or member of the force
to go into these places at will, especially on Sundays, and
deal with them, and take money of them, the enforcement
of the hquor laAV in the way prescribed by that law itself
was put into effect for the first time in the city of New
York. The old way was not that prescribed by the law,
but a way designed to levy graft by entering and threaten
ing or making arrests on the spot without a warrant, in
stead of reporting such cases to the District Attorney for
him to prosecute, all as prescribed by the statute. The
law forbids any traffic in liquor in the barrooms of the city
on Sunday and requires them to be vacated. In order
that that requirement might be easily enforced, the law
requires that all blinds or curtains of barrooms shall be
up on Sunday, so that all passersby may see whether there
is anyone therein. The police are required to report on
Monday morning by affidavit every barroom in which this

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
law was violated, or in which anyone was seen. These re
ports are turned over to the District Attorney as required
by the statute for prosecution. The result has been a gen
eral closing of all barrooms in the city on Sunday. It is
true that liquor is sold in the dining room, or the inner
rooms, of hotels on Sunday. The answer to that is that
the statute permits such sales, I found most people under
the impression that the statute forbids the sale of hquor
on Sunday, We never had any such statute in this State,
On the contrary, while the statute forbids the sale of
liquor in barrooms, and requires them to be closed, it per
mits the sale of hquor Avith meals in other rooms in all
places having an hotel license. And the courts decide
what a meal is. The police cannot decide that. A sand
wich has been decided to be a meal. Hence we see sand
wiches furnished with drinks throughout the city on Sun
day. But when you get outside of this city hquor is openly
sold all over the state on Sunday without any sandwich
bemg furnished. The furnishing of the sandwich seems to
put in the minds of people that laws may be in one way
and another evaded. With only 10,000 pohce and 10,000
hotels or hquor places, it is hard to discover and prevent
the unlawful sale of liquor in the inner rooms. But we
have to do the best we can. If all the pohce were devoted
to that work there are not enough to go around. And,
again, it is impossible to enforce this law when the people
of the neighborhood do not support it. No law can be
enforced against the vdll of the community, or a consider
able minority thereof.
Seventh — For many years before I became Mayor,
the police had been in the habit of Adolently smashing into
houses without warrants. The force was not to blame for
this. The blame was with the persons in rulership over
the police. They made the police do these unlawful things.
They made use of these unlawful entries to collect graft
from houses all over the city. The constitution and the
laws forbid the forcible entry of houses except under a
warrant obtained from a magistrate. We put this in force
100

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and stopped all these lawless entries. They were called
by the lawless name of raids. If the prescribed graft was
not paid a raid followed. This was notice to all others in
like case to pay up. The way to enter a house is to get
the evidence against it, and then on that evidence obtain
a warrant from a magistrate, and then enter, warrant in
hand, and make the arrest. This is the effective way of
carrying out the law. If a place is so decorous that no evi
dence against it can be obtained, then leave it alone. You
have to do that with even a murderer. But if the pohce
are allowed to enter all such places at will without a war
rant, they make use of such entries to levy graft to stay
out. The way to enforce the law is the way prescribed by
the law. No one has a right to go outside of, or exceed,
or disregard the law. The highest officer in the land has
no right to do that. If that could be done our government
would not be a government of laws but a government of
men, which is a despotism. The people make the laws,
and those put in office have to conform to them.
Eighth — The detective force has been entirely reor
ganized. All the incompetent persons who were put there
by pohtical and like influence have been put out and com
petent men substituted in their place. I suppose you are
aware that it has done splendid work, and is recognized
as one of the best secret service forces in the world. In
fact, it largely does duty for the whole country, and not
merely for the city of New York.
Ninth — Formerly the vice of gambhng was dealt with
separately all along the line by captains and inspectors
of the Police Department. The result was much corrup
tion of the force by keepers of bad houses and the gamblers
and their alhes. Corruption was possible at every point
of contact. The seven race tracks on which races were
run almost every day in and about the city of New York
had been done away Avith just before I became Mayor.
The result was that the army of gamblers who gambled
on these tracks, were put out of that business, and thrown
on this city. The police had a most difficult situation to
101

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
meet. We organized a special force to deal with gambling.
That special force of 150 men Avas put under the Commis
sioner himself. Three lieutenants were put in charge of
them, and made subject to the orders of the Commissioner
only. It happened recently that one of these lieutenants
was found taking graft from the gamblers. Of course
it was a painful thing to the Commissioner to be deceived
in that way by one immediately under him. But the same
might happen to any commissioner, the same as defalca
tions of bank officers and trusted employes are constantly
happening. It was painful to me, although I fully ex
pected that some cases of graft would develop, I knew
very well that I could not at once destroy the deep-seated
graft of forty years' standing. It is a matter which re
quires systematic work and patience. The event was fol
lowed by all sorts of false accusations against the whole
force. It is now known that Becker was the head and
front of the grafting with which he was connected, in
stead of being the underling or tool of anyone else, I
think that the respectable people of the city have all along
kept their heads about the matter, and not given away to
clamor. They knew the Mayor's job is a hard one, and
also the Commissioner's, At all events, conscious of what
I had done, and tried to do, to reform the police force, I
felt that I was entitled to the goodwill and assistance of
every intelhgent and honest person in the city, without
regard to party politics, for you know I have entirely dis
regarded that in the government of the city. But many
people have attacked me in the most uncharitable and
vicious manner, like Rabbi Wise, for instance. But they
have moA'^ed me less than you may suppose, and you are
well acquainted Avith me. In the midst of the din and
fury I kept saying to myself each day: " Now you must
be patient, A bad thing has happened. But you must
take it as an incentive to work harder than ever to accom
plish what you have set out to do. Bend to God's will of
you and be content." And that is what the Police Com
missioner is doing. He is a younger man, and probably
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
felt the abuse and falsehood more keenly than I did. In
the midst of all the nagging and noise we have made a
most careful investigation, not through the newspapers,
however, and I think we have our bearings. We are going
right on. If we have not received the help and goodwill
which we felt we were entitled to, we do not complain of
it. To do away with the possibility of these gamblers and
the scoundrels who are allied with them corrupting police
officials here and there is a hard thing. But I think we
will do it. We haA^e already taken most of the graft out
of the department, and by patience and persistence it can
all be taken out.
Tenth — We have already eradicated from the Depart
ment all graft in appointments and promotions. For
many years they had been paid for. We resorted to the
simple expedient of appointing and promoting from the
eligible hst in numerical order. Under that system it is
impossible to sell appointments or promotions.
Eleventh — I come now to a mournful subject, namely,
that of unfortunate women. They were in the world at
the beginning of history, yes, at that border line where
fable scarcely ceases and history hardly begins, and they
are here yet. They will continue to be here until by the
aid of moral teaching the hearts and propensities of men
shall be subdued and made better. These women are what
men made them. One of the chief causes of their resorting
to such a manner of life is that very often they are paid
wages which do not enable them to live. They are driven
to it. Yet some of those who treat them in this way come
forward periodically to proclaim the loudest and the most
cruelly against them. If it were possible under the law
to lock all of these women up, which it is not, and we had
places for their detention, which we have not, an equal
number would promptly take their places. We have to
deal with them as best we can. The tendency is for such
women to congregate in one or a few localities. To pre
vent this tendency and scatter them all over the city would
be the worst thing that could happen. By their example
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
they would scandalize other women and girls all over the
city and cause them to go astray. Dealing with them is
a routine. I have never made any change in that routine.
In other words, I have never adopted any new pohcy in
respect of them. I did only one thing in respect of chang
ing the method of enforcing the law with regard to them.
Before I became Mayor it had for years been the custom
to send policemen to drink wine and eat with such women,
and take them to the rooms of the houses in which they
lived, and have them undress. This was to get evidence.
I issued orders that no policeman should be assigned to
any such degrading service. To subject policemen to
such temptation and degradation was an outrage.
In past years I have gone over the literature of the
subject of prostitution, beginning with St. Augustine, and
ending in our OAvn times with Lecky in his " History of
European Morals," and the chapter of Professor Lilly
in his " First Principles in Politics." I wish that every
man in New York who thinks he would like to interfere
with this subject would first read Lecky 's great fifth chap
ter. I cannot forbear quoting this one passage from him :
" Under these circumstances, there has arisen
in society a figure which is certainly the most
mournful, and in some respects the most awful,
upon which the eye of the morahst can dwell. * * *
Herself the supreme type of vice, she is ulthnately
the most efficient guardian of virtue. But for her,
the unchallenged purity of countless happy homes
would be polluted, and not a few who, in the pride
of their untempted chastity, think of her with an in
dignant shudder, would have known the agony of
remorse and of despair. On that one degraded and
ignoble form are concentrated the passions that
might have filled the world with shame. She re
mains, while creeds and civilizations rise and fall,
the eternal priestess of humanity, blasted for the
sins of the people." 104

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
But let me forbear. The subject is one to weep over,
rather than to bring into politics. And yet in this city
little politicians and investigators every few years try to
crawl into office over the bodies of these unfortunate
women, or by starting a hue and cry about them. But
none of them has ever succeeded. NoAvhere else in the
world has such a base spectacle been presented. And
there are others who in this respect, and in all matters of
vice and crime, are constantly bent on humiliating and
degrading this city — the most decent and orderly large
city in the Avorld.
J. Noble Hayes, Esq.,
New York City.
Calmness and Philosophy in the Midst of Clamor
Sept. 24, 1912.
My dear Judge Clearwater: In the largest mail of
encouragement which I have received since I became
Mayor I find your letter of September 20. It Avas very
good of one of your eminence, and not a resident of this
city, to take the time to write me such an encouraging
letter. I am glad you approve of my letter on pohce mat
ters to Mr. Hayes. You speak of what you call the " tre
mendous opposition and astounding abuse " to which I
have been subjected, and say that you do not see how I
stand it, or " preserve your (my) serenity," as you express
it. I have to do the best I can. The clamor and false
statements of vicious persons and newspapers no doubt
hinder me some, but I have to overlook them and go right
along. Every morning I just forgive everybody and then
take up the work where I left off the day before and go
right on. How else could I do it? In the din of clamor
and falsehood I often repeat to myself the saying of
Marcus Aurelius : " There is but one thing of real value,
namely, to cultivate truth and justice, and to live without
anger in the midst of lying and unjust men," That makes
me content, I do not seek the good will of degenerate
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
newspapers. The good Avill of intelligent and honest peo
ple is what I desire.
The job of preventing scoundrels from bribing the
police, and the police from taking bribes from scoundrels,
is a difficult one, I hope I have succeeded largely, and I
hope in the end that I shall succeed entirely. After 40
years of graft and corruption, and of rulership over the
pohce by dishonest, lawless and ignorant men, it is not
an easy thing to bring about a better order of things. I
was not at all surprised when it was found that Lieut.
Becker was taking graft. That was nothing new in the
Police Department. It would have been nothing new
if the Police Commissioner himself was found to be tak
ing graft, according to the past history of that Depart
ment. But I have a Police Commissioner who is incapable
of taking graft. And I have an able and honest man at
the head of each of the other departments of the city, and
reform and good work are being done all the time. Con
scious of this nothing can disturb me, although I may be
to some extent baffled by the opposition of criminals and
degenerates. If I am ever inclined to feel discouraged
when these are joined by persons who believe themselves
righteous, but never give me a helping hand, a mo
ment's withdrawal into my inner self makes me patient
again, and able to see again in the complexities of
things only the slow working out of God's will. And let
ters from men like you, and good women, make me know
that we are not working in vain.
Hon. A. T. Clearwater, Kingston, N. Y.
Stick Pins September 26, 1912.
Dear Mr. Tanenbaum: I fear I have no power to
prohibit the ladies from having stick pins in their hats.
Suppose you apply to the Board of Aldermen? They
seem to be able to do almost everything. I must confess
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that I never saw anyone hurt by a lady's hat pin, but since
you say so, and since the Prefect of the Rhone Depart
ment has issued an edict against ladies' hat pins, I sup
pose they must do much slaughter. But is it altogether
seemly for a man to get his face so close to a lady's hat
pin as to get scratched? Shouldn't such a felloAv get
scratched?Moses Tanenbaum, Esq.,
New York City.
Police Interference at the Polls
October 9, 1912.
Dear Sir: Your letter of October 8th containing a
" protest " and a " demand " regarding where the police
shall be stationed and what they shall do on Election Day
is at hand. Your tone is peremptory, but suffer me to say
unto you that you share a grave misunderstanding in re
spect of the power and duties of the police at elections.
Their duty begins and ends with preserving the peace.
The law provides election officers to conduct elections,
and clothes them with ample powers. It even expressly
confers on them the powers of arrest possessed by peace
officers. The police have no right or power to forbid any
one to vote, or to prevent any one from voting, or to as
sist any one doing the like. Your request that pohce
officers be stationed in the polling places for that purpose
cannot be entertained. Any intimidation whatever at the
polls is illegal. To station policemen in the polls to pre
vent or obstruct or intimidate those who come to vote
might and probably would grow into an evil which would
destroy our system of government. That is the way they
do in Mexico and Russia to carry elections, but not in a
free country. It is one of the ways of despotism. To
avoid such an overwhelming evil our laAV makes every
man a sovereign on Election Day. He cannot be inter
fered with on the way to the polls, or at the polls, unless
he do some act in breach of the peace. The only way to
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
stop him from voting is to challenge his vote as unlawful.
This any election official, watcher or citizen may do. When
that is done he cannot vote unless he take the prescribed
oath, and in that way swear in his vote, as the phrase is.
If he take the oath no one can stop him from voting. If
he refuse to take the oath he must withdraw without vot
ing. If he refuse to withdraw he may be arrested and
taken out. If he vote illegally, with or without the oath,
he may be arrested after he votes, not before.
To allow the police to say who may and who may not
vote, or to interfere to prevent people from voting, would
render our elections no longer free. And free elections
are the cornerstone of our system of government, i. e., of
free government, i. e., of government by the people. Can
you not perceive how rapidly such an evil would grow,
and how fatal it would become? Have you ever read the
law and history of elections in this country, or in Anglo-
Saxon countries? Do you know that from the earliest
times no show of force has been allowed at the polls ? Do
you know that among our earhest statutes in this country
is one copied from an ancient Enghsh statute prohibiting
any military force from being quartered within a certain
distance of a polhng place on Election Day? To allow
everyone to vote who will take the risk of swearing in his
vote may lead to the evil of some illegal votes. But to
allow the police to prevent people from voting by force,
or threats, or intimidation, would result in an infinitely
greater evil. And of two evils the law always chooses the
lesser. Do you perceive what I am trying to make plain
in a few words?
I do not share your predictions of fraudulent or illegal
voting at our coming election in this city. Permit me to
say that nowhere in this state or in this nation are elec
tions more peaceable and honest than in this City of New
York. The police will be near enough to the polls to pre
serve the peace, and to respond to the call of any election
officer or any citizen to quell tumult or make lawful
arrests. But they Avill not be permitted to unlawfully
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
interfere or make unlaAvful arrests. Substantially all of
the fraudulent voting here in years gone by was done
under the encouragement and patronage of pohcemen
stationed in the polling places to do the bidding of cor
rupt pohtical leaders. Did you ever hear of that ?
Dr. Nathan Rattnoff,
New York. City. Immigration October 28, 1912.
Dear Sir: I am not able to think of even one reason
why foreign immigration should be stopped. If you were
to even stop the Italians from coming into this country
it would result in immediate disaster. They are doing all
of our heavy work all over the country. Do you not your
self see what would happen if they were excluded? Why
are people here so eager to exclude foreigners? Are we
not a nation of foreigners? Are not you a foreigner? Or
was not your grandfather one? We might well exclude
foreigners who come over here to peddle or beg, but we
should exclude no foreigner who comes over here to work.
Spurgeon Lane, Esq.,
Wesson, Miss.
Children in Her Way October 31, 1912.
Dear Mrs.  : I thank you for your letter. But
the children on roller skates think you and your motor car
are in their way, while you think they are in your way.
Which is right? The point of view is everything, or at all
events very much, as is the case in all things. Now you
win say that I am joking with you again. Show this to
your husband and I Avill leave him to say whether I have
not got back at you pretty well. We are trying to dimin
ish the roller skating in places where it is dangerous for
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the children to use roller-skates. But of course we cannot
stop them altogether. I should not hke to try to.
Walking October 31, 1912.
Dear Mr. Mayor : Mr. Harvey Thoren walks into my
office this day Avith a letter from you to me dated March
12th last. He informs me that he has walked all the way
from San Francisco here in 7 months and 26 days. He
does not give me the hours, minutes and seconds over. But
he is a red hot picture of health. He is a good, wholesome,
athletic Norseman, born in Sweden. He intends to walk
back, and I am giving him this letter to you. If I had
time I would go with him. It would do me good. They
knock me around pretty hard here now and then, if not
all the time, and some days I feel as though a good long
walk would just suit me — the farther away the better.
But the next day I feel all right and content again.
Hon. James Rolph, Jr., Mayor,
San Francisco, Cal.
Grasshoppers, the Broom Crop and Some Newspapers
November 11, 1912.
Dear Sir: Your letter of November 4th, asking me
to assure the broom manufacturers that the grasshoppers
did not eat up the broom corn crop in Oklahoma, as is
reported in the newspapers, is at hand. I do not know
why the grasshoppers should eat up the broom corn crop
when there are so many other things much more juicy
and satisfactory to their palates. I am therefore quite
ready to believe you, and I shall pass the word around
among the broom manufacturers, if I can. Perhaps the
newspapers will do it, although it is very hard to get some
of them to contradict their own stories. It detracts from
the notion of their infallibilitj^ However, we have some
newspapers here that are just as ready to contradict them-
110

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
selves as to contradict anybody else. They daily contra
dict in their morning edition what they say in their even
ing edition, and in the evening Avhat they say in the
morning.
H. H. Henderson, Esq.,
Yalton, Okla. The Sabbath November 15, 1912.
Dear Madam: I have just received your second letter
to me about Sabbath observance, by which you mean Sun
day observance. I agree with you about observing the
day of rest. But we must be fair and charitable to others.
The Christians do not observe the Sabbath Day, namely
the seventh day, established by God according to the 4th
Commandment, or the 3rd, as some number it. The Chris
tians abandoned that day, and adopted Sunday, which is
the first day of the week. It is all right for us to observe
Sunday, but let us have no miserable little prejudice
against the Jews because they stick to the Sabbath. Some
Christian sects also adhere to the Sabbath, stoutly main
taining that no one had the right to change the day of rest
ordained of God from the seventh to the first day of the
week. Miss Lillian Freund,
New York City.
Kirk Alloway and the " Auld Brig " and the " New
Brig " November 18, 1912.
Dear Doctor Morrison : I have your letter of Novem
ber 6th saying that you are in Ayr, and that you went to
the little inn where Tam O'Shanter and Souter Johnnie
used to booze of evenings " o'er the nappy," and that you
bought a glass of ale for three cents. I was there also some
years ago. I saw the "stirrup cup" and took a good snifter
out of it. It is the cup which they handed to the boozer
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
after he got on his horse and was about to start for home.
I then followed Tam O'Shanter's route along the road
until I came to Kirk Alloway, or what is now the ruins of
Kirk Alloway. I got on tiptoe and looked in. I saw the
whole business, witches, bogles, banshees, hobgobhns, war
locks, and the whole helhsh pack, and also " cutty sark."
I was in tremendous excitement. I am certain I saw the
whole business, just as certain as that I am Avriting you
this letter. My son Rufus was Avith me and saw it all also.
When the lights went out and they all rushed out I fol
lowed as best I could, and was right in the thick of the
bunch when we neared the "Auld Brig." And there be
yond the Doon I saw Tam and his mare in full gallop, and
the tail of the mare in the hands of the witch on my side
of the keystone of the bridge. Everything then vanished
and another feeling came over me. I saw the " Auld
Brig " and the " New Brig " there, and while I did not
kneel down I came very near doing so. I never felt such
a thrill before or since in any place. I have been to the
Shakespeare country often, but my emotions were not
aroused there even a little, and everybody seemed to be in
the same condition. This Burns country is something
wonderful. It stirs the hearts, the spirits, and the
imaginations of all travelers. I suppose that having
visited the inn you will complete the work by going over
the whole route that Tam covered on his Avay home. I
would like to say much more about it but I have not the
time. I am glad to hear that you are in growing good
health. Rev. William Morrison,
London, England.

An Extorted Marriage Fee
November 19, 1912.
Dear Sir: I have received your letter of November
18th complaining that an Alderman on marrying you the
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECtlES
day before at his house demanded $20 of you as his fee,
and that you paid him, for the reason that it would have
mortified you too much to make a protest in the presence
of your bride and other ladies who were present. Of
course the Alderman committed a great outrage, and he
no doubt knew that you would pay him sooner than dis
pute with him openly. He had no right to charge you
anything. I receive many letters of a similar kind. My
advice to you all is to go to clergymen to be married, and
then you will be treated properly. I do not by this mean
to say that all of the Aldermen would treat you as this
Alderman did, but unfortunately some of them would.
You say it was all the money you had with you, and that
you expected to use it for immediate expenses with your
bride. I certainly sympathize with you. If someone had
held you up in the street and taken it away from you it
would not have been worse. You may sue the Alderman
to get your money back, but if you do he will no doubt
say you made him a voluntary present of the $20, and who
knows, the judge or jury may believe him.
Kai Brodersen, Esq.,
New York City.

Noise December 9, 1912.
Dear Mr. Davis: You complain to me of the clock
on the Metropolitan Building. You want me to stop it.
You say it strikes 4 times on the quarter, 8 times on the
half, 12 times on the three-quarters, and 16 times on the
hour, making 40 times every hour, or 210 times from 8
A. M. to 12 noon every day. I am sorry for you. But
really does the clock make as much noise as Dr. Park-
hurst does? You know we all have to bear with some
thing, and I am willing to bear my share of it.
Frank L. Davis, Esq.,
New York City. 113

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Why Did You Not Write to Dr. Parkhurst
or Rabbi Wise? Dec. 11, 1912.
Dear Emelie: Your letter directed to Santa Claus,
New York City, has been delivered to me, since you also
wrote my name on the corner of the envelope. You tell
me all your troubles and poverty, and how you hope that
something will be in your stocking on Christmas morn
ing. I should not be a bit surprised if that happens. I
wish I could have Santa Claus put something in every
little stocking in the land. But why did you not write
to the Reverend Mr. Parkhurst, or the Reverend Rabbi
Wise, instead of to me? Do you not know even way doAvn
in Mississippi that according to their own statements they
are the good men here, and that I am a bad one?
Miss Emelie Wilson,
Landon, Miss.
" Thinks He Is Pious When He Is Only Bilious "
December 12, 1912.
Dear Sir : I thank you for the good- will of your let
ter. You advise me to " pay no attention to Dr. Park
hurst " and harsh people like him. When did I ever pay
any attention to him or them, or even to the Reverend
Rabbi Wise, except now and then to say a joAdal word or
two about them, to make them feel good? Yes, the Rev
erend Parkhurst began at me right after I became Mayor
and has continued ever since. He condemned me because
I did not prevent the pictures of that prize fight out West
over two years ago from being exhibited in the theatres,
although I had no lawful power to do so. On other pages
of the newspaper in which he then wrote and still Avrites
a daily column, the pictures of the fighters as they went
through the fight were exhibited in the most repulsive
and naked form, day by day, with other nude and nasty
pictures. But he did not object to that. He stuck to his
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
$5,000 a year job of writing his daily column. He con
tinues to do so, although his daily article is often, or most
of the time, cheek by jowl with such pictures, not to men
tion other obscenities. But we should not condemn him
on this score offhand. For it may be that when he takes
his newspaper home at night he only reads his own column,
and does not learn of the rest of its contents. Or it may
be that his wife does not permit this newspaper in her
home, as is the case with so many other good wives. And
therefore he may see only his ovni column. Dr. Parkhurst
does not want to help. He wants to quarrel. And yet,
I have no ill-will against him. I would give him a boost
any day to help him to Heaven, if that be what he is after
in abusing me. We must not let his rancor and uncharity
enter or influence our souls. We should be charitable to
him and succor him and try to reform and lift him up.
You say he has sold himself out to this sensational news
paper, and is hired to write against me as he does. Even
so, we should not have ill-will against him, but only charity
and good-will. When a man hires himself out he must
obey orders or quit. And he may be able by some species
of casuistry to convince himself that he is doing right when
every one else sees that he is uncharitable, unkind and
doing wrong. Who knows, and who will be first to cast a
stone at him? Judge not lest ye be judged. We must look
upon him in charity and kindness. Yes, he puts his picture
at the head of the daily column he writes. It is true that
it is painful to see such a thing in a clergyman. But he
evidently thinks he is a very handsome fellow, and prints
his picture at the head of his column because he thinks we
are all of his opinion about it, and dote and feast our eyes
on it the same as he does. He therefore thinks he is giv
ing us pleasure in exhibiting his picture for us to look at
it. So we must be kind and forbear with him in this also.
It is true that we cannot imagine Jesus doing such a thing
if He were here. He would not hire Himself out to a
sensational newspaper, and in addition put His picture
at the head of His column. Much less would He widte
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
unkind and uncharitable things. His great heart would
go out to all of us, and especially those of us who, like you
and me, are sinners. Did you ever think of that? But
still we must be kind and charitable to Dr. Parkhurst. No
doubt he thinks he is a good man, and that is an addi
tional reason why we should be kind and charitable to him.
To think one's self good, or better than others, is a mental
trait which is hard to overcome by those who are afflicted
Avith it. It is even reckoned a disease among physicians
and has a name. That is an additional reason why we
should forbear and overlook. And you know there are
people who think they are pious when they are only
bilious. Edward Hillin, Esq.,
New York City.

Scattering Vice December 16, 1912.
My Dear Mr. Mayor : Your letter of December 14th,
asking for a full copy of my address about vice and crime
before the New York University, is at hand. I have no
copy except as it appeared m the newspapers, and you
seem to have that already. There are a grovsdng number
who think that unfortunate women should be licensed and
regulated. I do not believe it, I do not think that any
good has come of such regulation anywhere. How are
you going to make them come forward for a license, to
start with? And then what good would the hcense do?
Some say you might check disease thereby. My informa
tion is that that kind of disease is just as rife in the places
in Europe where these women are licensed and inspected
as in England where they are allowed to run entirely loose.
Is not that the fact? Our legislators passed a law a few
years ago requiring that all of these Avomen arrested and
brought into the courts should be medically inspected, but
our courts promptly declared the act unconstitutional, as
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
infringing on the liberty of the citizen. You know our
courts have the habit of doing that sort of thing. Nor do
I beheve that the law prescribing districts for such women
to live in would be successful. How are you going to
make the women go there and live there? Moreover, the
men would not be seen crossing the hne of that district.
Everybody would point at them. The natural tendency
of these women is to congregate in districts, and no law is
needed for that purpose. But so soon as you fix a dis
trict for them by law, men will be ashamed to be seen going
there, and of course the women will not stay there in that
case. I suppose that what the Mayors of cities should do
is to see that they are not driven out of the districts in
Avhich they naturally congregate, and scattered all over
the city, as Parkhurst did with the women here some
years ago. From a limited number of houses he scattered
them into thousands of flats and dwelhng houses all over
the city, to the great scandal and misleading of women and
girls hving therein. The licensing of gamblers is equally
objectionable. If you license a limited number, what
would all the others do? You would have just as much
trouble to keep them from running gambling houses as
you have now. It is easy for people to talk, Mr. Mayor,
but you and I have to do the best we can under the con
ditions which surround us. These few virtuous people
who think that we ought to be able to make everybody as
virtuous as they are, or rather as virtuous as they think or
pretend they are, all at once, would make the worst fist of
all dealing with the matter if they had the chance. But I
do not think they will ever be given a chance. People
have too much sense for that. While we have gambhng
and other vices here, and some graft, I suppose you know
that this city is the most orderly and decent among the
large cities of the world. Certain degenerate newspapers
and others hold it up as the contrary, but they deceive
nobody. Hon. George J. Karb,
Mayor, Columbus, O. 117

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
" The Vestibule of Hell " and " Scam.ps "
December 16, 1912.
Reverend and Dear Sir : I thank you for sending me
the address to your congregation regarding conditions in
Greenpoint, Brooklyn. I am aware that your congrega
tion is very large, and it is due to you that I take notice
of what you say. I agree with you that the people of
Greenpoint are not given over to vice and crime and dis
order. The very few preachers who are saying that are
mere notoriety seekers, and, as a rule, minister to empty
benches, as might be expected. People go wilhngly to
hear those who have the great charity and love of Jesus in
their hearts. There are bad people in Greenpoint, the
same as everywhere else, and we must do the best we can
to turn them from their evil ways. I see one clergyman
over in your immediate neighborhood says that Brooklyn
is the " vestibule of hell." These are his words. What a
charitable soul he must be. And yet the truth is, shoAvn
by the records, that Brooklyn is freer from crime and vice
than any other equal population in the world. Its entire
criminal business above the grade of petty offences is dis
posed of by one criminal court. Just think of that being
true of 1,750,000 people. And yet there are some scamps
who call Brooklyn the " vestibule of hell." But we must
be charitable and kind to them, and try to reclaim them
from their uncharity, and their propensity to bear false
witness. Rt. Rev. P. F. O'Hare,
Brooklyn, N. Y.

Segregating Vice December 17, 1912.
Dear Sir : I have read your letter of December 16th,
with great interest, and I thank you for it. But you must

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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
remember that the mere passing of a law does not do a
thing. It is one thing to pass a law, and quite another to
enforce it. The things which you advocate could not be
done unless a ncAv law were passed. Neither could they
be done if such a law were passed. You would have a
law that all prostitutes should live in a certain section of
the city, to be definitely bounded and set apart. Will you
be good enough to let me know how you would get the
women to go there and hve there? Who would pursue
them and catch them and put them there? And how
strong a guard would you need around the district to keep
them there when you got them there? And if such a dis
trict were bounded and established, do you think men
would go there? Do you not know that they would be
ashamed to be seen going there? Every one would point
at them and laugh. And if the men did not go there cer
tainly the women would not stay there. This thing has
been tried in different places in Europe and has always
proved a failure. I think it was tried the last time in
Rome, Italy. I have been told there is such a district in
Hamburg. If there be one bounded and estabhshed by
law, I feel certain it is only for sailors and their trulls. It
might be that people of no shame or feeling would resort
to such a district, but the number of such people is limited.
There seems to be a large number of people who think that
aU you need is to pass a law that the thing be done. And
then you advocate that all such women be medically ex
amined once a week. Well, if you could keep them all in
that district by force, it may be that you could examine
them all in the same way. But you cannot keep them
there. How then are you going to find them to examine
them? Do you think they would all present themselves
voluntarily on a pubhc notice? We did have a law passed
here a few years ago that such women brought into the
courts should be medically examined and treated, but our
highest court declared that law unconstitutional and void.
Have you ever thought of all the difficulties in the way?

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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
No one is fit to participate in government who has not
studied government and law. You might as well call a
cobbler in to cut your leg off instead of employing a sur
geon. You also want a laAV locating all gambling houses
in the same way. But you would have just as much dif
ficulty to carry out that law. The gamblers would
do just as they do now, run gambhng houses secretly
wherever they can, and leave the police to find
them out and prosecute them. And your law pro
viding for the hcensing of a limited number of
gamblers, and that no other gambhng houses should be
permitted, would be equally a dead letter. Those who
could not get licenses would do just what gamblers are
doing now, namely, open up secret places and take their
chances with the police, and corrupt the pohce. And in
the same way I might follow you through all your recom
mendations. Of course you are entirely honest about them
all, but you could not enforce them hj the mere passing
of a law, nor could such a law be enforced. There is no
more unwise thing in the Avorld than to pass laws which
cannot be enforced.
B. F. Schwartberg, Esq.,
Brooklyn, N. Y.

Washington and Lincoln December 24, 1912.
Reverend and Dear Sir : I spent two dehghtf ul even
ings reading your recent book, " Washington and Lin
coln." Once I began I could not lay it aside until I had
read it through. I have always had a fondness for those
books which give us what I may call the philosophy of
history. I wish you had the leisure to take this book as a
skeleton and fill it out, for it is evident you have the phil
osophical mind necessary for that Idnd of writing.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
The reading of your book stimulates many reflections.
Washington and Lincoln were great and true men, but it
is easy to exaggerate the greatness of individual men. No
man, or mountain or even planet seems large when you
think of God. There is much of halo around the names
of Washington and Lincoln. The great eras in which
they lived are epitomized or apotheosized in them. And
in that way they survive as great. That is what made
Ehzabeth so great, or to be called so great. The great
men, the great deeds, the great events which surrounded
her made her great.
This is more true of Washington and Lincohi than of
any other two characters in history of whom I can now
think. But when you brush aside the halo and make allow
ance for the reflected greatness, a great man remains in
the case of each.
The general impression of Washington is largely
mythical. We think of him as a good man, who told the
exact truth always, and never got angry, and suffered
everything patiently, and was of great justice and ac
curacy of judgment, but not a genius or of extraordinary
abihty. This is all in the main true of him ; but as a matter of
fact he was of warm blood and prone to passion, as his
contemporaries agree. He is even known to have sworn
hke a trooper at times. And his face was pitted, and he
had decayed teeth, and other physical imperfections.
But when we remember that he was Commander in
Chief of the Colonial armies in the Revolution, and con
sider the vast extent of that conflict, and the things which
he did and suffered, and the patience, vigilance, and pru
dence which he exercised, we have no doubt that he was a
great man.
He was great even in his succession of defeats. He
looked larger after each, even to most of his contempo
raries. No severer test than this can be applied to a man.
The theatre of that war was one of the largest ever
knoAvn in the world. Its strategy and logistics involved
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the longest distances of any Avar since Alexander Avent
into Asia. Think of a British column coming doAvn from
Canada by the Mohawk Valley to meet at the Hudson
River another British column coming around from
Canada by Lake Champlain and Lake George, the
strategy being to take possession of the Hudson River
and thereby cut New England off from the other colonies.
It was defeated by the check at Oriskany and the sur
render of Burgoyne at Saratoga. Large strategy was
met by large strategy.
Think of the distances covered by the two columns that
made the attack on Quebec, one going by the lakes and the
other way across Maine. The prisoners surrendered by
Burgoyne at Saratoga were sent to Boston, and thence
way down to Charlottesville, Va.
And, at the end, not to mention the battles fought and
the immense distances covered meanwhile. South and
North, the troops of New York, Pennsylvania, and New
England marched way down to Yorktown in Virginia and
there ended the war by the surrender of Cornwallis.
These are only some instances which show the great
ness of the War of the Revolution. To those who con
sider what war is and what strategy is in war, Washing
ton never appears greater than during the two long years
in which he sat down with his 4,000 or less ragged troops
at the Highlands of the Hudson and stood guard over that
great river which held and united the New England
colonies with the other colonies and the loss of which would
have been fatal to the Revolutionary cause.
He looked only to the result. He betrayed no anx
iety for fame, much less to do brilliant things for the sake
of fame. If the best strategy was to sit still he was will
ing to sit still. From whatever aspect we view him during
the long struggle we still see his greatness.
When we look at him we find that he looked like other
men and had weaknesses. But all the time there was a
saving grace of patience in the man which balanced all his
other qualities, good and bad, strong and weak, and made
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
out of them all one of the most perfectly poised charac
ters of history.
He fully illustrates the saying that patience is the
possession of great souls.
Then when it was all over the simple man still re
mained. He was entirely content to go back to his farm
and his slaves and his whisky distilleries and go to work.
His character also appears to have been developed
before he became General of the armies. He had had con
siderable military experience, had marched long distances,
and fought as a soldier before the Revolutionary War.
No one can contemplate him on the march with and at the
awful defeat of Braddock without being impressed with
the greatness of his character.
And eight or nine years after the Independence was
achieved, when he was called from his retirement to help in
the formation of the National Constitution and to be
President, his judgment and wisdom were still equal to
every test.
He was not the equal in knowledge of history,
economics, and government of the men who surrounded
him; but after he had listened patiently to their counsels
his judgment was safe and sound.
I do not perceive that he was a man of instinct. Nor
does he seem to have had a single superstition — one of the
weaknesses of great minds. Nothing came fully to him
except by advice and reflection.
The character of Lincoln was different.
He also lived in a great time, amid great events, and
surrounded by great men, who did great things, all of
which is epitomized or apotheosized in him.
But when we look to see the actual things which he per
sonally did we perceive that his life was in that respect a
contrast to that of Washington.
He signed the Emancipation Proclamation. That was
a momentous fact in history. But it had to be almost
extorted from him. And the Russian Emperor had done
the like not long before. 123

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
There were those who saw early, even from the be
ginning, that that measure would consolidate and energize
those devoted to carrying on the war. But he was slow
to see it. And yet he did finally see it, and do it and, it
may be, at the best time, namely, in the fullness of gesta
tion and time.
Unhke the case of Washington, those around him,
and especially members of his cabinet, did not greatly re
spect him. Many of them were certain that they knew
much more than he did. Some of them called him an old
fool, others a buffoon.
He was blamed for every blunder or failure of his
Generals in the field.
The newspapers, including practically all of them in
New York City, condemned him as incompetent and
small. His Generals ridiculed him and resented his inter
ference. McClellan showed contempt of him. Even
Grant smiled at his military advice. In his Memoirs
Grant tiells us how when he had been called to Washing
ton to take charge of all the armies, and especially the
Army of the Potomac, Lincoln brought out an old map
on which he had marked the positions held by the troops
on both sides in Virginia, and pointing out two streams
which ran into the James (or the Potomac?) advised
Grant to put his army between these two streams,
and with his flanks thus protected, move along against
Lee's army. Grant dryly says that he remained silent,
Lincoln not perceiving that the two streams would be as
much of a protection to Lee's flanks as to his.
Grant says he would not reveal his plans to Lincoln
for the reason that he was so kind-hearted that some one
would pick them out of him, and in that way they could
become known to Lee.
But he had more philosophy than all of his advisers
and Generals and critics put together. And hereui was
his greatness. His name will live principally because of his literary
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
ability and his philosophy, both of which were tran
scendent. The letter he wrote to the woman who had lost five
sons in the war, his speech at Gettysburg, and some parts
of his second inaugural would make the literary and
philosophical reputation of any man.
His philosophy was constant and shone through all his
acts. He died at a fortunate time for his fame. What a dif
ferent figure might he be to-day if he had lived to go
through all the passions of the next four years of the
reconstruction period.
But even in that case his philosophy would in after
years Adndicate him and reveal his true greatness. But it
would take time.
I note the setting you give to the adoption of the Dec
laration of Independence, including the incident of Frank
lin saying facetiously to his associates that if they did not
hang together they would hang separately.
But it has always seemed to me that that event was not
as heroic as generally considered. If it had occurred at
the beginning of the Revolution it would be one of the
most heroic things in history.
But when we remember that Lexington and Concord
and Bunker Hill and Ticonderoga had been fought more
than a year before, that the people of all of the Colonies had
deposed their royal GoA^ernors, and set up Governments
of their ovsti, that Canada had been invaded and Quebec
assaulted by the Colonists, that Howe had evacuated Bos
ton — ^that, as a matter of fact, every Colony was at the
time independent and governing itself — ^the Declaration
of Independence by the Congress of the Colonies ceases to
have that aspect of heroism which we generally attribute
to it. The Declaration of Independence only recognized
an existing condition.
And when we come to the making of the National Con
stitution, it seems to me that that work has been the sub
ject of exaggeration also. 125

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
You quote the alleged remark of Gladstone that the
American Constitution was " the most wonderful work
ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose
of man." But it was not struck off at a given time. On the con
trary, the different Colonial or State constitutions, which
had been framed with wisdom and care, one after another,
during a generation, or nearly so, served as a model for it.
Excepting the separation of the National powers
from the State powers, and the conferring on the National
Government exclusively those things which pertain to in
ternational sovereignty, I do not recall anything in it, or
any principle in it, which the framers of it did not have
right at hand in the state constitutions and bills of rights.
That nice and complete subdivision of the poAvers of
government among the three branches of government, the
executive, the legislative, and the judicial, which has been
so much extolled, was common to all of the State con
stitutions and bills of rights and was expressed therein
in the most scientific and felicitous manner.
It is enough to refer to the Virginia and Massachu
setts constitutions and bills of rights as samples of them
all. This separation of the powers of government was
already expressed in the Massachusetts Bill of Rights in
a manner which has never been excelled, viz. :
" In the Government of this Commonwealth, the
legislative department shall never exercise the ex
ecutive and judicial powers, or either of them; the
executive shall never exercise the legislative and
judicial powers, or either of them; the ju(Jicial
shall never exercise the legislative and executive
powers, or either of them; to the end it may be a
government of laws and not of men."
You help to do justice to Thomas Paine.
What a strange thing it is that that extraordinary man
was so long set down as an atheist. Some people still think
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
he was an atheist. And yet no man ever had a fuller be
lief in the existence of God, or a greater reliance upon him.
He was an infidel, it is true. But an infidel may not
be an atheist. A Unitarian is an infidel. Every one is
an infidel who does not believe in all the fundamental doc
trines of Christianity.
We are not so prone to call people infidels as we once
were. Most of us are now quite content with a man who
can say that he sincerely believes in the existence and good
ness of God. If he finds it difficult or impossible to be
lieve that there are three Gods or three persons in the one
God, and the like, he is looked upon with charity, at least.
You make some allusion to the morality of the great
men of the period of Washington and Jefferson and Ham
ilton and Franklin. You specify Jefferson and Franklin.
Thomas Hamilton, the young Enghshman who
traveled through this country and wrote about it in 1832
or thereabout, sums up all the political scandal about Jef
ferson as follows, viz. :
" The moral character of Jefferson was repul
sive. Continually puling about liberty, equality,
and the degrading curse of slavery, he brought his
own children to the hammer and made money of
his debauchery."
And he goes on to say that even at his death Jefferson
did not by his Avill free his numerous offspring, and that
a slave daughter of his was afterward purchased by a so
ciety of gentlemen at auction in New Orleans to testify
their admiration for the statesmanship of her father. And
he quotes that line so often bandied about concerning Jef
ferson during his lifetime, namely, " Who dreamed of
freedom in a slave's embrace."
But I think the world now knows that this was mainly
the slander of political enemies. It is certain that it did
Jefferson no harm at the polls, from which we may well
infer that it was not generally believed.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Franklin did have a natural son, and took to wife a
woman who was the Avife of a man who had deserted her
but was still living.
But some allowance has to be made in such things in
new countries where society has not yet assumed a settled
form. You also say of Franklin that his writings can hardly
be pubhshed to-day unless in an expurgated edition. I
do not understand this. I do not see a thing in them to
expurgate. I am aware that some have expurgated his
autobiography, but the things which they cut out seem to
me the very things most necessary for our boys to read.
And they are expressed in words chaste and wholly inof
fensive. May I call your attention to an error in your book.
You say that Chief Justice Taney said in his opinion in
the Dred Scott case that " negroes were so far inferior
that they had no rights which the white man was bound to
respect." This is an old error. It has been repeated so often,
and in such trustworthy places, that it is not extraordinary
that you give credence to it. It was repeated by the
political orators all over the country in the Fremont cam
paign, and again in the first Lincoln campaign, and
thousands of times has it been written in newspapers and
books. And yet there is not a Avord of truth in it. Chief Jus
tice Taney never said it, or anything like it.
In his decision he speaks of the negro race as " that un
fortunate race," and gives a history of their condition dur
ing the century preceding the Declaration of Independ
ence and the Constitution of the United States. And the
words you quote occur therein. Let me give the whole
passage : "It is difficult at this day to realize the state
of public opinion in relation to that unfortunate
race, which prevailed in the civilized and enlight
ened portions of the Avorld at the time of the Decla-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
ration of Independence and when the Constitution
of the United States was framed and adopted. But
the public history of every European nation dis
plays it in a manner too plain to be mistaken.
They had for more than a century before been re
garded as beings of an inferior order, and alto
gether unfit to associate with the white race, either
in social or political relations; and so far inferior
that they had no rights which the Avhite man was
bound to respect; and that the negro might justly
and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit.
He was bought and sold, and treated as an ordinary
article of merchandise and traffic, whenever a profit
could be made by it."
And he adds:
" And in no nation was this opinion more
firmly fixed or more uniformly acted upon than
by the English Government and English people.
They not only seized them on the coast of Africa
and sold them or held them in slavery for their own
use ; but they took them as ordinary articles of mer
chandise to every country where they could make
a profit on them, and were far more extensively
engaged in this commerce than any other nation in
the world."
Instead of speaking of the negro race as having no
rights which the white man was bound to respect, he spoke
of it in charity and commiseration, clearly reveahng that
he was of no such opinion.
And indeed, at the time of the Dred Scott decision,
namely, in 1856, the negro had equal rights with the whites
in most of the States of the Union, and many rights of
person and property were secured to them also in the
slave States.
At the beginning we had slaves in the States here in
the North. But one State after another freed its slaves
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
by passing a statute for that purpose. They seem to
have done it because slavery was economically unprofit
able in the North.
And in a number of States, as in New York and
Pennsylvania, the taking effect of these statutes was set
far enough ahead to enable slave owners to bring their
slaves South and sell them before the statute became
operative. But I must not go on this way, or you will find me
loquacious. My purpose was only to express to you the
delight I experienced in reading your book ; all the greater
on account of my agreeable personal acquaintance with
you. I hope it will have a wide sale. It deserves it.
Everybody in your congregation ought to read it first, if
they have not done so already.
Rev. Robert W. McLaughlin, Pastor,
Park Avenue Congregational Church, Brooklyn.

Free Speech and a Free Press
December 27, 1912.
To the Honorable The Board of Aldermen, Gentle
men: I return disapproved the proposed ordinance. No.
89, entitled, " An ordinance relative to motion picture
theatres." I am constrained to do this because of the provisions
therein creating a censorship. It is provided that the
Board of Education shall appoint one or more censors to
examine all motion pictures in advance and determine
whether they may be exhibited or not.
It has hitherto been the understanding in this coimtry
that no censorship may be established by law to decide in
advance what may or may not be lawfully printed or pub
lished. Ours is a government of free speech and a free
press. That is the cornerstone of free government. The
phrase " the press " includes all methods of expression by
130

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
writing or pictures. In past ages there were censorships
to decide what might be published, or even believed.
Every Christian denomination has at one tune or another
been subjected to such censorship. The few were very
anxious not to give freedom of speech or of the press.
They thought the many were not fit for it. They therefore
set themselves up as censors and guardians over the bulk
of their fellow men. The centre of thought was then
among the few, and they were very anxious to keep it
there. But in the course of time, in spite of all opposition,
the centre of thought began to pass from the few to the
many, where it is to-day. It was then that censorships,
and all interference with freedom of speech, of the press
and of opinion, began to give Avay by degrees, until in the
end all of them, at all events with us, were abolished. And
that is now substantially true under all free governments
throughout the world.
In our fundamental instruments of government in this
country, which we call constitutions, we expressly guaran
teed from the beginning free speech and a free press, and
prohibited the passing of any law abridging the same.
The provision in the constitution of this state on that sub
ject, which is substantially the same as the like provision
in the constitution of the United States, and also of the
states generally, is as follows:
" Every citizen may freely speak, Avrite, and
pubhsh his sentiments on all subjects, being re
sponsible for the abuse of that right; and no law
shall be passed to restrain or abridge the liberty of
speech or of the press."
So universal has been the opinion that these constitu
tional provisions abolished all censorships of the press,
and forbade them in the future, that I have been able to
find only one attempt in this country to set up such a cen
sorship before this one of yours. Our constitutional pro
vision plainly is that publications whether oral, or printed,
or bj'^ writing, or by pictures, shall not be restrained in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
advance, but that every one shall be free to speak or pub
lish what he sees fit, subject to beiag prosecuted afterwards
for libel, immorality, obscenity or indecency therefor.
There seems to be a few among us who wish us to retrace
our steps, and resort to censorships again in advance of
publication, and make it a crime to pubhsh anything not
permitted in advance by the censor. Do they know what
they are doing? Do they loiow anything of the history
and literature of the subject? Do they know that the
censorships of past ages did immeasurably more harm than
good? Do they ever stop to think that such censorships
now would do even more harm than they did in past ages,
in comparison with Avhat little good they might possibly
do? I do not believe the people of this country are ready
to permit any censor to decide in advance what may be
published for them to read, or what pictures may be exhib
ited to them. Our laws forbid the publication of any
libelous, obscene, indecent, immoral or impure pictui-e or
reading matter. Is not that enough? If anyone does this
he commits a criminal offense and may be punished there-
for. If this ordinance be legal, then a similar ordinance in
respect of the ncAvspapers and the theatres generally Avould
be legal. Are you of opinion that you have any such
power as that? If so, you should probably begin AAdth the
newspapers and the so-called high-class theatres. Once re
vive the censorship and there is no telling how far we may
carry it. These moving picture shows are attended by the
great bulk of the people, many of whom cannot afford to
pay the prices charged by the theatres. They are a solace
and an education to them. Why are Ave singling out these
people as subjects necessary to be protected hj a censor
ship? Are they any more in need of protection by censor
ship than the rest of the community? That was once the
view which prevailed in government, and there are some
among us, ignorant of or untaught by past ages, who are
of that view now. Are they better than the rest of us, or
worse? 132

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
When I became Mayor the denunciation of these mov
ing picture shows by a few people was at its highest. They
declared them schools of immorality They said indecent
and immoral pictures Avere being shown there. I person
ally knew that was not so. But I had an official examina
tion made of all the moving picture shows in this city.
The result was actual proof and an official report that
there were no obscene or immoral pictures shown in these
places. And that is the truth now. Wherefore then is
all this zeal for censorship over these places?
The truth is that the good, moral people who go to
these moving picture shows, and very often bring their
children with them, would not tolerate the exhibition of
obscene or immoral pictures there. A place in which such
pictures were exhibited would soon be without sufficient
patrons to support it. At all events, the criminal law is
ample to prevent the exhibition of such pictures. I have
asked these people who are crying out against the moving
picture shoAvs to give me an instance of an obscene or im
moral picture being shown in them, so that the exhibitor
may be prosecuted, but they have been unable to do so.
What they insist on is to have the pictures examined in
advance, aiid allowed or prohibited. That is what they
are still doing in Russia with pictures and with reading
matter generally. Do they really want us to recur to that
system? Perhaps I should say I understand that comparatively
few of your honorable body are in favor of the censorship.
Many of you voted for the whole ordinance in the belief
that the Mayor had the right to veto the censorship pro
visions and let the rest of the ordinance stand. But I find
that the Mayor may not do that. The censorship pro
visions are not independent of the rest of the ordinance,
but interdependent and so connected therewith that the
whole ordinance must stand or fall as a whole.
I trust you will pass the ordinance which the com
mission prepared. It safeguards these most important
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and wholesome places of amusement physically and
niorally. Decides a Newspaper Contest About Boiling Eggs
And so I am to decide this great egg question, how to
cook an egg, and how long to cook it? First you must
get the egg, a fresh egg. But where are you going to get
it? That is the most difficult part of the question. It is
a hard job. Call in some one else to decide that. Consult
the hens. Hens sing in the laying season, which some
people seem to doubt. If you can get the egg while the
hen is singing you will be sure it is fresh. And then about
cooking it. I see you have brought it down simply to a
question of boiling it. How to boil it? I decide that you
can only boil it in boiling water. And how long? Why,
that is easy to decide — as long as you hke. If you want
it as hard as a bullet, boil it 30 minutes. If you want it
nice and soft, as soft as the pates of some people, you can
only boil it a httle while. On that head I decide in favor
of the httle girl who answered my question in the school.
She said that it would take six minutes — by which she
meant that from the time she went to get the egg until
she took it out of the pan cooked, six minutes would elapse.
She was entirely right. And I suppose she also meant
that you would put the egg in the water before the water
boiled, and let the water heat and begin to boil with the
egg in it. I decide that she was right in that also. If
you let the water boil, and then throw the egg in, the
shock is too great for the egg. You see I know a good
deal about eggs and cookiag eggs. I am just the right
one to decide this egg question.
His Tongue Hung in the Middle
January 3, 1913.
Dear Sir: Your letter calhng my attention to some
words of Rabbi Wise, and also giving me some of his per-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
sonal history, is at hand. Never mind about Rabbi
Wise. He cannot stop his tongue from Avagging at both
ends, for it is hung in the middle. I suppose some people
like to listen to a man like that. It is a mental rest to
them. These rhetoricians have all been the same from
the beginning of the world. " With malice toward all
and charity toward none," seems to be his frame of tongue,
and that suits all who are of the same frame of mind. The
self-sufficient, all-sufficient, insufficient Rabbi Wise. How
is that? I wish him a Happy New Year. He is such a
pious and truthful man. I understand he is a man of
such firm faith that his daily morning and evening prayer
is as follows: " Oh God (if there be a God) save my
soul (if I have a soul)."
J. C. Brooks, Esq. A Man of Accomplishments January 7th, 1913.
Dear Mr. Harris: Your letter about Rabbi Wise,
who you say is not a Rabbi at all, is at hand. The par
ticulars you give of him are quite interesting. But I fear
you take such blatherskites too seriously.
He is a man of vast and varied misinformation, of
brilhant mental incapacity, and of prodigious moral re
quirements. B. Harris, Esq.,
New York City. Reply to a "Screech" January 8th, 1913.
Reverend Sir: Your letter complaining that the
Water Department is annoying you by examining the
plumbing of your house, and requiring a leak to be re
paired, was duly received. You say that this course on
the part of the Water Commissioner is (I quote you) " so
135

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
positively annoying, that no decent, intelhgent citizen de
sires to own a piece of tenement property." You also
say as follows: "I ask you in all fairness and justice
are you going to allow this sort of mismanagement to con
tinue? Can't you find an intelligent man with common
sense to put at the head of the Water Department?" Your
letter is uncharitable from beginning to end. And with
out hurting your feelings may I add it is what is usually
called mean. I receive such letters now and then, but
this is the first one that has come from a clergyman. Do
you know Mr. Thompson, the head of the Water Depart
ment? Do you not know that he is conceded to be a first
class man, and probably the best Water Commissioner
the city ever had? Why do you try to strike him behind
his back by writing such a letter to me? Why did you
not go to him and be fair and square with him?
But I overlooked the uncharitable tone of your letter,
and had a careful examination made into your case. I
am able to report to you that a lealdng faucet was found
in your house, that you repaired it, and that your plumb
ing is now in good condition. May I also inform you
that Mr. Thompson instituted an examination of the
plumbing throughout the city to prevent waste of water
by leaks. The result has been a vast saving to the city.
By this system of inspection Mr. Thompson has saA'ed in
Brooklyn alone 10,000,000 gallons daily since last August,
which, at meter rates, is a saving of $922,355. And allow
me to add that this Avas done at a cost to the city of less
than $25,000. In the borough of Manhattan OA'^er 60,-
000,000 gallons a day is being saved in the same Avay at a
like cost.
Now do you not think you owe Mr. Thompson an
apology? Do you not think you ought to go to him as
one man goes to another, and say a word of commendation
to him instead of abusing him?
Rev. Frederick J. Keech,
Brooklyn, N. Y. 136

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Tribute to Motherhood January 8, 1913.
Dear Mr. Riess: I am in receipt of your letter in
forming me that your father-in-law and your mother-in-
law, aged eighty-six and eighty-five years respectively, are
to celebrate their diamond jubilee next Sunday, after hav
ing been married sixty years. I wish I could attend.
The most important thing of all is that they have raised a
family of eight children. They are deserving of the
highest honor, especially the mother. The women of this
country who are postponing motherhood, or refusing it
altogether, are denying themselves the greatest happiness
that can come to a woman.
Julius Riess, Esq.,
New York City.
To the Mayor of " Boyville" January 15, 1913.
My Dear Mr. Mayor: I am informed by your let
ter of your election as Mayor of Boyville. I congratu
late you, and greet you. I hope your administration will
be a success. It cannot be a success unless you have a
good mental and physical spine. And also some patience
and philosophy. And also as little conceit and smartness
as the law allows. The self-sufficient, all-sufficient, in
sufficient fellow in office makes every one smile and
shrug his shoulder, if not both shoulders, and sometimes
wink his left eye also. You have duties to perform. You
must not be swerved from the performance thereof by
clamor, by abuse, by lying, by corrupt newspapers, by the
influence of party politics, or be led by any influence ex
cept your desire and purpose to do God's will. If you
go along in that line your administration Avill be a success.
Every evil influence will be against you, it is true. And
such influences are very powerful in our time, and es
pecially in our cities. But you will succeed. Some of
137

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the mud thrown at you may stick for a while, but before
your term is up it will all have worn off, or been brushed
off by the hands of just men and women, and you will be
seen of all as a true man who has done his duty. I do
not knoAv what kind of a city Boyville is, but I suppose
it is very much like all other cities, made up of good peo
ple, and bad people, and uncharitable people, and a few
people whose minds, like their livers, are filled with ulcers,
of people who want to help you, and of people who want
to hurt you, with a few people thrown in who hate every
body else, and think they are better than anybody else,
when they are only more bilious than anybody else. If
you are so fortunate as to be Mayor of a city that has all
good people, then my letter has no application. How
ever things may be, I wish you every success.
Hon. Edgar Mills,
Mayor of " Boyville,"
Chicago, Illinois.
Slavery January 16, 1913.
Dear Mr. Howe: Your letter of January 16th sug
gesting that one of the negro race be put on the committee
for the celebration of the 300th anniversary of the settle
ment of Manhattan Island, is at hand. You remind me
that shortly after the arrival of the first settlers the first
negro slaves were brought here and sold at auction at the
old stockade. How strange all that sounds. But it
sounds still stranger that slavery existed in the State of
New York when Lincoln was born in 1809, and was not
abohshed until the year 1827, namely, by an act of the
Legislature. Some people are astonished when they hear
this, and doubt it. On January 1st, 1863, President
Abraham Lincoln by proclamation freed the slaves in all
sections where armed insurrection against the United
States existed. This left slavery untouched in the states
and sections not in a state of insurrection. Slavery was
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
finally abolished throughout this nation in 1865 by a con
stitutional amendment. It took over 1800 years of
Christianity to strike the shackles from the slave.
I knew out in Flatbush, now a part of Brooklyn, an
old woman who was owned as a slave there when she was
young. Her name was Maria Jackson. She died at the
age of 105 years a few years ago. Her husband had also
been a slave there. I often talked Avith her on the sub
ject, and she said her hfe as a slave was happy and that
they were all well treated.
The committee is now made up, and out of my hands,
but I AviU see if the chairman can find a place for one of
the negro race.
James H. HoAve, Esq.

Pierre Loti's Nonsense Febry. 17, 1913.
Dear Mr. Johnson: I fear a lot of people are an
noyed by the article of Pierre Loti in the February
Century. If it had appeared in some minor magazine,
it would not matter, but appearing in the Century it
wiU receive credence all over Europe. The picture he
gives of this city is quite grotesque.
As his ship comes up to the dock he says he sees " A
thousand chimneys belch forth black smoke or white
eddies of steam." The fact is that Europeans immedi
ately notice that unlike other large cities this city is almost
free from black smoke. There are very few chimneys
here belching black smoke. They are the exception here,
but the rule in other cities. This is the one great city
which has remained comparatively free of black smoke.
And then he says that " On all sides enormous signs are
spread out not less than 40 feet high." Now it may be
that he saw one sign of that kind. He continues : " The
shriek of whistles, the dismal moaning of sirens, the rum
ble of motors, and the din of factories, deafen the ear."
139

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES

This is all before he gets ashore. He says that on the
declaration paper they gave him aboard ship one question
asks him, " Are you an idiot?" Is that true?
He finally gets to his hotel. It is of such great height
that he cannot tell the number of stories. The elevators
in it are " prodigious." It overlooks Central Park, so
that he can see the trees, and yet we find further on that
it is somewhere over on Broadway. From his window he
says he looks down on the buildings, " all of them red, a
dark red, shading into chocolate brown. Everywhere are
walls of red brick ; everyAvhere terraced roofs, without tiles
of course, but covered with some sort of waterproof ma
terial, also painted red." From what hotel vsdndow could
he see anything like this ? Where are these red buildings ?
He goes on: "These terraces (namely, these terraced
roofs), form promenades for the inhabitants, their dogs
and their cats. Men sit there in their shirt sleeves."
Where are all these terraced roofs in the city of New
York? I am aware that we have a feAV public roof gar
dens, but for our houses to be covered Avith terraced roofs
is something none of us knew up to this time.
Still at his window he goes on as follows : "A never-
ending roar reaches me from below. There are automo
biles, as in Paris, and in addition, the elevated trains, which
run on a noisy iron trestle level with the second or third
stories of the houses. But underground there are still
others, rumbling like thunder in the boAvels of the earth."
From his skyscraper window he even hears the thunderous
rumble of the subway trains. I did not knoAV that Ave
could hear these even from the surface of the street.
He is interviewed by the reporters. They ask him
what he thinks of the women of New York, and he
answers: " I have seen only one woman since I arrived,
a chambermaid in the elevator, and she was a negress."
What hotel in New York City has negresses for chamber
maids or servants?
At 9 o'clock at night he descends from the lofty story
of his hotel and joins the crowds below in Broadway,
140

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
from which we learn that his hotel is in BroadAvay. He
gives a picture of what he sees on the sidewalk, as fol
lows: " And what a mixture of races. One recognizes,
as they pass, Japanese, Chinese with the European hair
cut, Greeks, Levantines and fair-haired Scandinavians."
Did he see, even one of these, unless the last? If he did,
it was quite unusual. He then says that many handsome,
well-dressed women Avent by, and goes on to say: " But
really there are too many negresses. One passes at every
step a black face under a large hat trimmed with roses."
Who else ever saAV this procession, especially of negresses
in Broadway or any other street here?
He goes out into Central Park on Sunday. He tells
us that squirrels have taken possession of the park. Now
we all know that in two or three places in the park squir
rels come around your bench for a nut, but he gives this
as the case all over the park.
He then speaks of the luxury " in the opulent quarters
that surround the park." He says: "Mulatto door
keepers in gallooned liveries stand under marble or
porphyry portals flanked by Greek, Byzantine or Gothic
colonnades, and by wrought-iron gateways of which our
own cathedrals might be proud." I have been along Fifth
avenue very often, and into some of the houses, but I
never saw any of these mulatto doorkeepers, nor did any
one else.
These are some of the most extravagant things in this
article. Where he saw one negress he seems to imagine a
procession of them, and so on Avith all the sights and
sounds Avhich he writes of.
May I also say a word about the article in your same
number, " Lincoln as a boy knew him." Such articles are
very often filled with exaggeration. The writers of them
draw on their imagination very largely in order to
heighten their own consequence. Did this boy ever see
Mr. Lincoln in the handball court, and hold his coat?
Why should Lincoln ask him to hold his coat while he
played? And then why should we believe that lincoln
141

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
received while playing " the inevitable chaffing of the
Irish players and spectators?" Why should they be so
rude as to chaff him? Was Lincoln so grotesque that
people chaffed him in that way? I think not. I think
he was one of the most dignified of men. He dressed like a
dignified gentleman, and acted like one. Among his
slouch hat contemporaries he even wore a " tall hat." This
writer also gives other interviews with Mr. Lincoln that
seem to me wholly apocryphal. When he went to Lin
coln, the practicing attorney, for a subscription for a fire
company he says he told Mr. Lincoln the name of the en
gine was to be " The Deluge," whereupon Mr. Lincohi
entered into a discussion of the subject, and said he liked
that name better than " Spouter " or " Gusher." How
does he remember this? Other like questionable things
are stated. And he says that Avhen Lincoln Avas running
for the Presidency there was a large political meeting held
outdoors in the suburbs of Springfield, and that " about
the grounds were hogsheads of ice water and washtubs of
lemonade." Now I can attest that there was no such
use of ice water at that time. It came into use much
later. Robert Underwood Johnson, Esq.,
Editor, Century Magazine,
New York City.

Subways and Corrupt and Rag-bag Newspapers
Feb. 17, 1913.
Dear Sir : Your letter about the subways is at hand.
You say as follows: " I personally am in favor of the
city building and controlling the subways, but I thought
you might have a good reason to the contrary, so if you
will please enlighten me I shall be very much obliged."
As you seem to be an honest man, I am willing to
Avrite you fully about the matter. You say you favor
142

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the city building and controlhng the subways, and want
to know the reason why I am not of the same view. It is
very discouraging to me to learn that you think I am not
of that view. You could only have been brought to that
view by reading certain false and corrupt rag-bag ncAvs-
papers we have here. You certainly have never heard
or read a word from me to the effect that I was not of that
view. Of course you may have read the intentionally con
trived falsehoods and forgeries to that effect by the news
papers I have referred to. I am, as I always have been,
in favor of the city building and controlling its subAvays.
Do you not know that I publicly advocated that for years?
And, as a matter of fact, do you not know that the city
does build, own and control its subways? Do you not
know that the city is now about to build many miles of
subways and is to own and control them? The present
subway was built by the city, and is owned and controlled
by it. Every dollar that went into its construction was
furnished by the city. Do you not know all this? If not,
where or under what basket, have you been living?
And, as I have told you, the subways which are now
about to be built are to be built, owned and controlled by
the city. The city, however, has not sufficient borrowing
credit to build them, imless through a long course of years.
Therefore the operating companies are putting up one of
them one half and the other a large part of the money to
construct these subways. But the companies do not build
them or own them. They only operate them on a lease.
The money they put in for construction they pay over to
the city and the city builds the subways with that money
and the amounts it puts in. Did you never hear that?
And the city owns and controls the subAvays from the
beginning. That the companies put in part of the money
for construction gives them no ownership of the subways.
The money they put in is paid back out of the earnings.
The city does not guarantee it in any way. The money
the city puts in is paid back in the same way. And when
the subways are completed they are leased out to these
143

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
companies for a term of years. That lease is drawn by
the city, and gives it full control. And the city may end
that lease by the terms thereof at any time after ten years,
and operate the roads itself if it sees fit.
The companies put in all of the money to equip these
roads. The city puts in nothing for equipment. The
city could not put in anything for equipment because it
has not the money, namely, it has not sufficient borrowing
margin to raise the monej^ You know, of course, that by
a provision of the constitution of the state the city cannot
borrow money or incur indebtedness beyond a sum equal
to 10 per cent, of the real estate values as they appear on
the assessment rolls. Did you never hear of that? If
you never heard of these things why don't you read some
decent newspaper and learn them, and let the rag-bag
newspapers go?
Now I have answered your questions fully. You speak
only of the city building and " controlling " the subways.
You do not speak of the city " operating " them. The city
could not operate them now because, as I have shown you,
the city has not borroAving credit enough to raise the
money to equip them. If we waited until the city could
by degrees build and equip these subways out of its own
funds, we would have to wait one quarter of a century at
least. Did you never hear that? The whole cost is to
be about $300,000,000. Moreover, I think most of us feel
that city politics and government are not yet quite suf
ficiently stable and safe here to entrust to it the operation
of our railways. We therefore lease them out for terms
of years to operators; and when these leases are up the
equipment also becomes the property of the city. The
roads belong to the city from the start. And, moreover,
as I have told you, there is a provision in the lease that
after ten years the city may take all these roads and equip
ments over and operate them itself, if it be in a financial
condition to do so.
Now have I answered you, and are you satisfied? Do
not be deceived by rag-bag and corrupt ncAvspapers. Why
144

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
not drop them, and start in reading decent newspapers
from this time on.
Emanuel Deutsch, Esq.,
New York City.

The Recall and Clamor Feb. 18, 1913.
Dear Sir: You ask for, my help in your forthcoming
debate on the question of the recall. I do not belieA^e in
the recall either for judges or any other officials. We
already have ways of removing corrupt or wrong-doing
public officials without calling a vote on the question. And
also our terms of office are generally so short that we can
recall officials quickly enough at the end of their terms.
If the recall existed more officials would give way to clamor
than now. We have officials enough now giving way to
the abuse and clamor of demagogue scamps and their
ignorant followers. And past history illustrates to us
that public clamor is almost always in the Avrong. It is
no better noAv than when it sent Jesus to the Cross. And
Ave often mistake clamor for the voice of the community.
It is so loud that we think it includes everybody, whereas
in fact it may include very few. But these few make more
noise than all the rest of us. As you Avell know out in
Kansas, one stridulent grasshopper in the angle of a fence
makes more noise than the noble herd of cattle nearby.
The official whom we should all honor is the one who stands
up like a man against clamor. We hear much nowadays
from certain public officials that they are elected to please
the people by doing as they wish. There is no more dan
gerous notion among us than this. Officials are elected
to rule according to the laws, Avhether the people like it or
not. The people make their own laws by their represen
tatives sent to the legislature. Then they elect executive
145

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and judicial officials to stand by these laws and carry them
out, clamor or no clamor.
George A. Swift, Esq.,
Salina, Kansas.

Subway Financing February 21, 1913.
Dear Sir: Your letter is at hand. You say you ob
ject to the city or the railroads going to the firm of Mor
gan & Co. for money. The city does not go to Morgan &
Co. for money. When the city sells its bonds they are
publicly advertised and go to the highest bidder. The bid
ders and purchasers are many. You can bid for and pur
chase even one bond if you wish. As to railroads, I am
sure I do not know where they will get money to bmld
and carry on their enterprises except of bankers. Where
would you have them to go for it? To cobblers? We do
not buy shoes of bankers or money of shoemakers. One
of these subway companies borrows its money through
Schiff & Co. ; the other through Morgan & Co. As a mat
ter of fact I am informed that 280 banks and indiAdduals
agree to take the bonds. I do not know that Morgan &
Co. take any of them. Of course you may not understand
that these operating companies cannot sign the contract
with the city to put in and pay over to the city the vast
sums which they are called upon to expend in building the
subways without first having made a contract for the
money with bankers, or people who deal in or lend money.
They are not in a position to contract with the city until
they first have a contract securing to them the money
necessary. They cannot pick the money up off the street
as they go along. I understood their bonds are being
placed at 96. I should think that was a fairly good
placement of them at this time. The city is in no way
liable for these bonds. The city does not guarantee them.
It has nothing to do with placing them. It is none of the
146

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
city's concern where the companies borrow their money.
The city takes note in the contract of only the actual
amount of money which the companies put in. The
amount actually paid over to the city and no more is
funded. The interest on it is paid out of the profits of the
railroads. Also a sinking fund sufficient to pay the
bonds off inside of 40 years is put aside out of such profits.
The city puts in one-half of the construction money, and
the companies put in the other half. But they ha\'e to pay
their half over to the city, because, as I suppose you know,
the city builds the railroads by contracts publicly let. The
companies do not build them. And of course you know
the city owns the railroads from the start. The companies
put in all of the money for the equipment of these rail
roads. The city contributes no part of that. I have
already stated to you that the interest and sinking fund
on the bonds of the company are paid out of the earnings.
The interest and sinking fund on the city's money are
paid in the same way. Then if there be any over-plus it
is divided equally between the companies and the city.
That is the contract. The operating lease is for a term
of 49 years. But the contract contains a provision that
at any time after the expiration of ten years the city may
end the lease and take over the property and operate the
railroads itself, or turn them oA-^er to a new operator, as
it may see fit. I thought I would write you all this, be
cause you seem to be an intelligent man, and I hope you
are desirous of knowing the facts. You ask whether the
companies can go to any other bankers besides Morgan &
Co. for money? Yes, they can go to any banker they
see fit. Hundreds of bankers throughout this country are
furnishing funds to railroads and other enterprises. An
intelhgent man should not be bamboozled into beheving
that they have to go to Morgan & Co. I have already
told you that one of these companies goes to Schiff & Co.
You say that the city has " only grafting, incompetent, or
stupid public officials to look after the public interests." I
am sorry you think so. In fact, I do not believe you think
147

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
so. You only try to make yourself think so. My asso-:
ciates in the city government are men of the highest
honesty and intelligence. Of course I have to let you
think anything you see fit of me. I might suggest that I
am well known here, and have a record in the service of the
public. By that I am willing to be judged, however
hard you may try to feel against me. It may be you
look for that millenium when officials and bankers, and
all useless people, shall be done away with.
Henry J. Home, Esq.,
New York City.

A Dramatic Criticism March 5, 1913.
Dear Mr. Robinson: I am glad that the play (Dam
aged Goods) is to be given. Nevertheless I think it is
over-wrought, and over-stated, and that it strikes many
false notes. This is also true of the play " Maternity "
by the same author. From my observation it is false from
beginning to end. It exhibits alleged phases of human
nature which must be very rare indeed. The same is true
of the other play in the volume edited bj^ Bernard Shaw.
The part of the play " Damaged Goods " which exhibits
the woman going up and down and getting in relation
with men simply to communicate her disease to them
through deviltry or revenge, is false. I doubt if any
Avoman in the world ever did such a thing. The Avind-up
of the play also seems to me to destroy the effect of the
play in general. After bringing out the great point that
the disease is a lingering one the play Avinds up by recon
ciling the husband and wife on the ground that all danger
is now over. That part of the play is quite an encourage
ment to men given to lewd Avomen.
I am very certain that none of these plays Avill survive
as literature. There is very little in them Avhich is true
148

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to nature, and much which is entirely false to nature and
experience.Frederic H. Robinson, Esq.,
New York City.
On Commission Government March 6, 1913.
Dear Sir: Your letter asks me to help you in a de
bate in your High School by giving you reasons for and
against the proposition " that all cities having ten thousand
or more population should have a commission form of
government." In the first place, the phrase " commission
form of government " is loose. It has no scientific or ac
curate meaning. What you mean is whether a city should
be governed by a small council or a large one. Why,
therefore, not say so in so many words? There is no city
in this country being governed by a commission. When
Galveston Avas destroyed by flood the legislature passed
an act creating a commission and naming the five com
missioners to govern that city. That is the only case of a
city being put in charge of a commission that I know of.
But the courts declared the act unconstitutional and void.
Some cities are ruled by a large elected council, called the
Board of Aldermen, or the Common Council. That was
formerly the case with all of the cities in this country.
But of late years the tendency has been to substitute a
small elected council or board for the large one. Some
people inaccurately call this small council or board a com
mission. It is not a commission.
I have no objection to give you my opinion in respect
of whether the large council or the small one gets the bet
ter results in city government. I think the small one does.
Large councils have proved to be failures in this country.
Their membership is poor, whereas in the small council
you can get a good membership. And the small council is
also more workable. It is not subject to so many delays
as the large council. 149

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Here in this city we have a large council of 73 called
the Board of Aldermen, and a small council of 8 called
the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. This small
council does substantially all the important council busi
ness of the city. The large council has been shorn of
nearly all of its powers. They have been transferred to
the small council. In a few years our large council will
probably be done away with altogether. It is very hard
to get anything out of it. There are some exceedingly
good men in it, and others who are not so good, to say the
least I ought to say.
Lest you be too certain of small councils, let me remind
you that the great Tweed frauds were committed in this
city by a small board or coxmcil. And if you look about
the country now I should not be surprised if you found
dishonest and incompetent government here and there
under small councils. No frame of government, however
good, will secure good government. That depends upon
the men put into office. Devise as you wiU, contrive as
you will in forming instruments of government and laws,
in the last analysis you have to trust somebody. Govern
ment depends more on men than on laws. Good men AviU
give good government even with bad laws. As Wilham
Perm says in his preface to the frame of government which
he gave to the colony of Pennsylvania, namely :
" When all is said, there is hardly one frame of govern
ment in the world so ill designed by its first founders, that,
in good hands, would not do well enough ; and story tells
us, the best, in ill ones, can do nothing that is great or
good; witness the Jewish and Roman states. Govern
ments, like clocks, go from the motion men give them;
and as governments are made and moved by men, so by
them they are ruined too. Wherefore governments rather
depend upon men, than men upon governments. Let men
be good, and the government cannot be bad; if it be ill,
they will cure it. But, if men be bad, let the government
be never so good, they will endeavor to warp and spoil it
to their turn." 150

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
I hope my letter will help you in your debate, but you
forgot to tell me which side you are on.
Hubert Smith, Esq.,
Bartlesville High School,
Dewey, Okla.

A Rebuke March 25, 1913.
Sir : Your letter of March 24th is at hand. I have no
notion that it is written to me in good faith. In fact every
one will perceive that it is a dishonest letter, and not writ
ten in good faith. Your statement that I have in any way
opposed or embarrassed the District Attorney in the in
dictment and prosecution of offenders in the Police De
partment is known to you to be a falsehood, and know
ing it to be a falsehood you are quite capable of uttering
it. I have unceasingly done all I could, in so far as I
could spare the time, to further and assist the discovery of
graft in the Police Department, and the prosecution of
offenders therefor. This I have done ever since I came
into the Mayor's office, and before, as you are very well
aware. Hereafter when you wish to utter conscious false
hoods concerning me to the public, do not take the dis
honest method of writing a letter to me, when the letter
is not meant in good faith at all.
Rev. C. H. Parkhurst, Manhattan.

The Recall March 26, 1913.
Dear Mr. Mayer: You say that you are one of five
judges of a recent debate on the subject of the recall, and
that the judges being unable to agree they ask me to de
cide the question. Our terms of office throughout this
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
country are so short that we can recall bad officials soon
enough at the end of their terms by leaving them at home.
We do not need to go to the turmoil and trouble of a recall
by popular vote during the term. If officials commit any
wrong in office we have ways of removing them already.
And then, again, threat of the recall could be used to in
timidate officials and make them do what they would not
do if left to exercise their sound judgment. Public
officials are too much influenced by clamor now. If the
recall existed, many more of them Avould be giving away
to clamor than now. And I suppose you know from his
tory that clamor has seldom if ever been right. Clamor
is no better now than it was when it sent Jesus to the Cross.
It is the duty of all public officials to stand up against
clamor. The worst kind of clamor is that incited by a rich
demagogue. May I say to you that within two years cer
tain demagogues were demanding the recall of the Mayor
of this city because he favored the subway system which
has since been agreed upon and adopted with general ap
proval. Plow manj'^ people would now vote to recall him
on that score? But at that time probably a great many
would have voted to recall hiiri. And so I decide against
the recall.
Leo K. Mayer, Esq.,
Brooklyn, N. Y.

Recall of Judicial Decisions March 28, 1913.
Dear Mr. Hubbard: I have your letter of March
24th, asking me to assist you in a debate which is to take
place between Georgetown College and the Kentucky
State University, on the proposition that Avhen an act of
the legislature is declared void by the highest court, 20
per cent, of the voters may require the court's decision to
be submitted to a vote of the people, so that they may
overrule the decision if they see fit, by their votes. This
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
is what has come to be popularly called of late the recall
of judicial decisions. I am not able to favor such a method.
I do not think it should be adopted. We already have
a method of nullifying or recalling such decisions. We
have practiced it all over this country since the beginning
of our government. When the courts declare an act of
the legislature void for being unconstitutional, the method
is to submit a constitutional amendment to a vote of the
people to change the law so as to make the laAv as the
people want it, instead of leaving it as the court decided
it. This is and has always been a common thing among
us. In this state we pass such constitutional amendments
freely. Only a few years ago we passed five. There is
one up to be voted on this year, namely, with regard to
the Employers' Liabihty statute which our highest court
declared unconstitutional and void. No doubt the people
will overrule that decision, or recall it, if you prefer that
word. In a similar way, when the courts make a decision
which does not involve any constitutional point, but only
some ordinary legal question, if the people are not satis
fied Avith the decision, the legislature may change the law
to conform to the enlightened will of the community.
And the people are free to choose legislators to suit them.
I think these ways of overruhng or recalling decisions,
i. e., by changing the law as declared by such decisions,
to conform to the enhghtened judgment of the com
munity, are much better than to submit each obnoxious
decision to a A'^ote of the people for approval or reversal.
Indeed, I doubt if that method would be practical. In
most cases something more would need to be done by way
of legislation than the mere upsetting of the decision. If
it be thought that it is noAV too difficult to get constitu
tional amendments submitted to a vote of the people, the
method ought to be made easier. In this state it is quite
easily done from year to year, but in addition to that our
constitution contains a requirement that it be submitted
to revision every twenty years.
I am enclosing you a speech which I made at Yale
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
University last year, from which you may draw some
material. Robert Hubbard, Esq.,
Georgetown, Ky.

Ragbag Newspapers April 2, 1913.
Dear Sir: Your letter of April 1st, quoting from a
certain morning newspaper what it gives as a declaration
of mine, that the foreigners here " Have as much right
to ask us to change our flag as we have to prevent them
from drinking liquor on Sunday," and rebuking me for
this utterance, is at hand. You must be a very stupid
man, or else very vicious, to beheve any such thing. Do
you not know that that newspaper makes up such things
from day to day? Does not everybody know that I never
say anything to that newspaper at all? But let me ease
your mind by saying to you that I never said what you
attribute to me. Would it not be well for you to give up
the ragbag, corrupt newspapers, and read decent news
papers? Do you not know we have several decent news
papers in this city?
E. Hamilton, Esq.,
Brooklyn, N. Y.

Commending the Police April 8, 1913.
Dear Mr. Albertson: I am glad to receive your letter
about the police. There is no better pohce force in the
whole world. And the detective branch of it is recognized
everywhere as the best in the world. The abuse heaped on
the force for now over a year is wholly unmerited. There
are a few grafters on the force. I have been driving them
154

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to the wall ever since I have been here. All the revelations
that have been made are by criminals whom the pohce put
out of business. I expected more revelations than we have
had. If we had left these criminals alone there would have
been no revelations. Every time we threaten a person
running a house of debauchery or gambling now he threat
ens to go and disclose to the District Attorney. We tell
him to go ahead — that is what we want him to do.
Kerr F. Albertson, Esq.,
Manhattan.

What Would Jesus Do? April 14, 1913.
Dear Sir: You tell me you have been elected a Jus
tice of the Peace at Oak Park, Ilhnois, and desire to ad
minister your office the same as Jesus would do if he were
there instead of you. You ask for my advice. You say
you beheve the present system of fines for minor offenses
is wrong in principle, for the reason that it " tends to
increase crime and promote disrespect to law." You also
say that the law allows you to collect fees for yourself.
You ask if Jesus would assess such fines and collect such
fees, if he were in your place. You seem to be a man who
thinks himself wiser and better than the law and above
the law. That kind of a man is the most dangerous that
can be put into office, especially in a free country. The
law is made by the representatives whom we elect to the
legislature. You are elected a Justice of the Peace to
accept the laws thus made, and carry them out. If you
do not wish to do that you ought to resign. You think
you are wiser and better than the law, but if you make
inquiry you will probably find few people who are of that
opinion. " What would Jesus do? " you ask me. If he
accepted the office he would also accept the law as it is and
administer it faithfully. He would not take the law into
155

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
his own hands. He would not assume to do as he liked.
He would say, " I do not think this law is wise, but the
the legislature made it, and I have to abide by it, and, prob
ably they are wiser about it than I am." And he would
go on and administer the law as he found it. Indeed, that
is the way he acted when he was on this earth. He abided
by the laAV. He constantly quoted the law. Where he
did not like the law, he advocated a change to something
better. He attended the synagogue and taught the law
there. It was the abuse and misuse of the law which he
denounced. If you do not hke the laws as they are in your
locality, you ought to get yourself elected to the legisla
ture, and then work hard to change them. But as a judge,
you must abide by the law. Are you unconscious of the
fact that by your oath of office you have sworn to do so?
Suppose every judge in this country, from the highest to
the lowest, took it into his head to ignore the law, and
decide cases to suit himself. What a woeful condition that
would very soon put us all in. And yet you, a httle Justice
of the Peace out in Oak Park, Ilhnois, want to act in that
way. As to your fees, neither .Tesus nor any one else cares
whether you collect them or not.
Henry Neil, Esq.,
Justice of the Peace,
Oak Park, 111.

Segregating Virtue April 23, 1913.
Dear Mr. Goodman : I am glad indeed that you are
engaged in the work, and I hope we will be able to do
something worth the while.
The document submitted to me by Mr. Schoenfeld
(Prettyfield) is one of the most extraordinary that has
ever come to my attention. I think I will have to write
him a letter about it. It seems to be based largely on the
notion that all that is necessary to do a thing is to pass
150

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
a law for it to be done. Will he catch all the women and
put them in these places? And will he then stand guard
and keep them there? Or does he think they Avdll go there
and stay there voluntarily? Ask him what he thinks of
segregating virtue instead of vice. Would it not be an
easier job? But Ave must not poke too much fun at him.
Elias B. Goodman, Esq.,
New York City.

Tom Paine May 14, 1913.
Dear Mr. Vanderweyde: Owing to other engage
ments I am not able to accept your invitation to speak at
the Dedication of the Paine Monument in New Rochelle
on Memorial Day. One of the greatest perversions in
history Avas the dissemination of the falsehood against
Paine that he was an atheist. A few people fastened that
upon him. But now he is emerging from that blight. No
firmer behever in Almighty God ever lived. He was an
infidel, in that he did not beheve all the essential tenets
of the Christian religion. But that he was a disbeliever
in Almighty God was a mere fabrication.
W. M. Vanderweyde, Esq.,
New York City.

Preface to the Police Manual of Laws and Ordinances
May 17, 1913.
To the Pohce Force : In this digest of laws and ordi
nances you will see the word " arrest " frequently used.
But you now all know that you do not arrest without a
warrant for small offenses unless it is quite necessary to
do so. You serve a " summons " instead as often as you
can. A book of summonses will be given you with this
157

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
digest. And remember you are not obhged to arrest (or
summon) for every little offense. The law says you
" may " arrest without a warrant for every misdemeanor
committed in your sight. It does not say you " must."
You must use your good judgment. In the case of httle
batteries, and rows, and the hke, it most often suffices to
send the offenders along about their business. And in
case of ordinance violation, it also often suffices for you
to admonish the offender that he will be arrested or sum
moned, if the violation continue.
Stay on your post if possible. You should never leave
your post with a prisoner unless it is necessary. Summon
him or her instead if the offense be small. Sometimes the
offender may be a stranger, and have no home or place of
business. Then you may have to arrest. But not if the
offense be trivial. Use your good discretion.
To show how intelligently you are already acting
along these hues, let me tell you that by using your good
judgment in the way I have mentioned, and also resorting
to the summons, you have already reduced the enormous
number of arrests without a warrant made in the year
before I became Mayor, namely, 235,168, down to
132,923. And of the 235,168 boys, giris, men and women
thus arbitrarily arrested and locked up in station houses
in that year, 102,257 were promptly discharged by the
magistrates as having been arrested for no cause or for
too trivial cause. Did you ever think of the amoimt of
humihation, suffering and anguish caused by these un
necessary arrests, and the tendency they had to make
criminals, especially of boys? You have done away Avith
that barbarous condition in three years, and I thank you
for it. And meanwhile, while petty pohticians and cor
rupt newspapers have been trying to defame and degrade
you, for their own ends, you have gradually worked out
other great reforms.
Remember that your chief business is to keep outward
order and decency, and arrest real criminals, not good
citizens guilty only of some small thing.
158

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
To an Inspired Genius May 22, 1913.
Dear Sir: You let me know by your letter that you
have extraordinary powers and are very anxious to do
something great. And you ask for my advice. Do not
try too hard to do something great. I advise you to begin
vrith little things. Do little things. If you have some
thing to teach, teach it to two or three, or to those aroimd
you. Those who are waiting for some great occasion to
do something great rarely do anything at all. Do what
comes to your hand. Be simple. Perhaps your notion
that you are able to do something great is a false one.
Wherever you are do your simple duty first. If you do
it well it Avill lead to larger things, and in that way you
will grow, and it may be by experience become great, and
then, if occasion offers you may do something great. But
do not wait. I think it very improbable that you are
inspired. Arthur D. Pickens, Esq.,
New York City.

Books May 23, 1913.
Dear Mr. Allen : I am very glad to comply with your
request. All the book lovers I have knoAvn have been
good-hearted and true. I sign the slips to be pasted in
your " Epictetus " and " Intellectual Development of
Europe " as you request. I cannot say that I have derived
much from " Epictetus." Nor am I learned in that book.
That I am is a mere newspaper statement. When I was
running for Mayor, and lying newspaper proprietors were
inventing every sort of lie concerning me, I made some
allusion to it one night in one of my speeches and said:
" That another saith of thee concerneth more hun who
159

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
saith it than it concerneth thee " — adding " as Epictetus
says." That is all the justification the newspapers ever
had for saying that I was a lover of Epictetus. But the
"Intellectual Development of Europe" is one of the books
which have had a distinct effect on me, and I am glad you
rate it high also. Whatever I am it helped to form me.
In my article in the " Independent " a few months ago on
books and reading I gave a hst of the 12 or 15 books which
have impressed and benefited me most, and mcluded
therein the " Intellectual Development of Europe." Of
course some of the scientific parts of that book have be
come obsolete, but as a whole it is still a great book and
Avill always remain such.
Charles Dexter Allen, Esq.,
Montclair, N. J.

Bill Boards May 23, 1913.
Dear Miss Scheff : Your letter is at hand. I am glad
you are organizing a " City Beautiful Association," with
the main object of doing away with the disgusting bill
boards which confront us all over the city. But you must
remember that in order to carry out your purpose of
censoring and regulating them we must get legislation.
If the next Legislature be in the humor to give you such
legislation be ready with a bill all prepared for them be
fore they are got out of it. You Ioioav the old Spanish
proverb, " When presented with a heifer be ready with
the rope." I am wilhng to help you draw the bill. Do
not indulge the hope that the proprietors of these bill
boards will voluntarily permit you to censor or regulate
their use. One of the biggest and nastiest of them all is
owned by a newspaper proprietor of this city who pro
fesses to teach ethics and morals to us all. He is so good
that he spends much time chastising me, especially when
I happen to do something good — for he has a singular
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
hate for good in any one except himself. No week passes
that I do not receive a letter of complaint about the
character of the advertisements on his great big nasty bill
board. It is in a fine residential district, and disgusting to
the whole neighborhood. Of course this newspaper pro
prietor with his usual craft has the land on which this bill
board is erected in the name of a dummy ovnier. I will
try to help you and your association as much as I can
while I remain in office, and when I go out of office I sup
pose that even you Avill no longer think of me, much less
ask for my help, or that I go and see you in " M'lle
Modiste," or anything else. How do you like that?
Miss Fritzi Scheff,
New York City.

Classical Music May 29, 1913.
Dear Madam: I think it would be better for you to
first talk with the Park Commissioner about the giving of
free concerts of classical music, as my time just now is
very much taken up. Also at this time the city has no
money to spend for additional music. And then again I
am not able to see that the city should furnish Grand
Opera music. Only a fcAV people are able to understand
it. The great Rufus Choate was not able to understand
it with all his refinement and fine nervous system— as
fine as the finest stringed instrument. When he went to
the opera he had to say to his niece: "My dear, please
interpret to me the libretto, lest I dilate with the wrong
emotion." It is with music as with poetry. Nearly all
of us are able to enjoy simple music or a simple poem.
But only a few among us are able to enjoy hstening to
Grand Opera music or the reading of Milton's " Paradise
Lost." Music is the expression or voice of poetry — light
music of light poetry, and heavy and intricate music of
like poetry. When we read again Collins' dehghtful
161

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
" Ode to the Passions " we fully realize this. You re
member how trippingly it begins —
" When Music, heavenly maid, was young.
While yet in early Greece she sung," etc., etc.
Mrs. Henrietta Spader, Manhattan. Selfishness June 3, 1913.
To the Honorable the Board of Aldermen: The habit
of all selfish people, and especially if they be big and fat,
is to take the end place on the seats of the summer cars
which run crosswise of the car, and stick there, instead of
moving along to the other end as other people get on the
car. This causes great inconvenience. All those who
come after these selfish people have to climb over their
legs, and press by them as best they can. I would sug
gest to you to consider whether you should not pass an
ordinance making this selfish practice a misdemeanor, and
requiring those who enter cars with cross seats to move
as far in as there is a vacant space to sit down. The self
ishness and hoggishness of some people in this matter is
a distressing spectacle, to say nothing of the inconvenience
which they cause, especially to mothers with little children.
Newspaper Exaggerations June 3, 1913.
Dear Mr. Poole: I thank you for your thoughtful
letter, and for enclosing me the editorial from the Jersey
paper. The editor knows what he is talking about. There
are a lot of people here who are thinking the same thing, in
spite of our sensational press. This Jersey editor Avas not
at all upset when he saw the flaring headlines in the New
York newspaper, "New York's Amazing Record of Hold
ups." The amazing number disclosed Avas 687 in a year.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Probably the major part of this number was fictitious.
But taking it all as true, it averaged less than two a day.
When that daily average is compared to over five millions
of resident people here, and hundreds of thousands of
transients, including crooks who come here from all over
the United States, it no longer seems amazing, but small,
and maybe amazing for its smallness. But that is the
way our sensational newspapers in the City of New York
defame the city. But the scamps have run their course.
They are no longer able to say anything to hurt this
city. There is no more decorous or orderly city on the
face of this earth than this city of New York. And that
there are a few grafting policemen no longer damns this
city in the eyes of sensible people. There will always be
some of that kind, in a force of ten thousand men, but
the number has been groAving less and less for years.
Pierce N. Poole, Esq.,
New York City.

Books on Marriage and Sex June 4, 1913.
Dear Mr. Clews: The ncAv book of your daughter
Mrs. Parsons which you were so good as to send me has
afforded me much pleasure. I sat up late two nights to
read it through. I could hardly lay it doAvn. It is inter
esting from the first hne to the last. Its title, " The Old-
Fashioned Woman," does not give much if any hint to the
contents. I think the sub-title, " Primitive Fancies about
the Sex," is better. It gives a pretty good clue to the
contents. The relation of the sexes will never become a
tame subject. This book shows the way man has looked
on woman, and woman on man, from the beginning. The
intimacies, the attractions and the antipathies of the sexes,
one to the other, are all portrayed. I wish I had time to
Avrite a review of your daughter's former book, " The
Family," and also of this her later book. I think it was
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
five years ago that I read " The Family." And then I
reread it twice. It gives all the hterature and forms of
marriage from the marriage of individuals to the wholesale
marriage of one tribe by another. These two books con
sist of the most interesting and fascinating reading mat
ter that I know of. Please present my congratulations to
Mrs. Parsons. She is a woman of talent. Her books
will be widely read.
Henry Clews, Esq.,
New York City.

Condemnation Commissioners June 9, 1913.
Sir: I am enclosing to you a letter from the Dock
Commissioner. By all means let us bend every effort to
have a respectable commission appointed by the court to
condemn the property for the new long piers at 45th
Street. It would be too bad to have a commission of httle
people appointed who would drool over the matter for
months or years, and then soak the city for two or three
times the value of the property. Will we ever get rid of
that sort of business? The quality of commissioners ap
pointed to condemn land was better for a while, but of
late it seems to me there has been a great f alhng off. Some
of the Judges appoint excellent commissioners. Would
that they would all do so.
Archibald R. Watson, Esq.,
Corporation Counsel.
Advises the Governor Against Purring People
June 10, 1913.
Dear Governor Sulzer : I thank you for sending me
your speeches and other hterature with regard to the
question of primaries. I could not help reading your
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
speeches with sympathy. Their directness and lucidity
impressed me strongly. But since I have been Mayor
I have kept from meddhng with matters outside of the
city government, and on the whole I think it better that I
should continue to do that. You know the many things
I have to meet here, and if I mix myself up in state poli
tics my situation would be still harder than it is now. The
partisan vileness down here is something dreadful. There
are people here that purr around you and me, only to
betray us at the first opportunity. I suppose you have
already perceived that. They are scoundrels of the worst
kind. They have not an honest hair in their heads. They
are not men for you and me to associate with or have any
thing to do with. You have an honest purpose in view.
They have not an honest thought. The better I do, or
try to do, the better any head of a department here does,
or tries to do, the more venomous become their attacks.
They do not want anyone to do well except themselves.
And they are incapable of doing anything worth the while.
They have neither the length, the breadth nor the thick
ness to do it.
Hon. William Sulzer, Governor,
State of New York,
Albany, N. Y.

The Police Force June 12, 1913.
Dear Mr. Cowl: I am glad you sent the message to
Alderman NicoU commending Commissioner Waldo for
the way in which he has discharged his duties all through
your district, namely the retail dry goods district. The
whole town now perceives that Mr. Waldo is an honest
man and has done no Avrong thing. Most people have
seen that all along, notwithstanding the investigators and
the clamorers. They have stampeded nobody. I have felt
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
safe with Mr. Waldo because I knew that he was honest.
Some come and tell me that it needs a thief to catch a thief,
and they want another Byrnes, or another Devery, or some
such person at the head of the police force. Out with such
people. The investigators and the clamorers have not been
able to put their finger on a single wrong thing that Mr.
Waldo has done. And during all the noise he has stuck to
his duty vvdth the force xmder him like a man. He has not
flinched once. Of course the scent and the cry of the whole
pack has been pointed against me, and they wanted to
make Waldo the victim. But they have miscarried. How
pitifully httle they all look to-day. All they are able to say
is that a few grafters were found in the police force. And
what of it? Did we not all know that there were some
grafters in the force, and that there had been grafters there
for more than a generation? And are there not grafters in
the London police force and in every pohce force? Are
they not from time to time found out and convicted? But
who caused the recent graft disclosures except Mr. Waldo?
He closed up gambhng houses and worse houses under the
law of nuisance, on a legal basis which we estabhshed, vrith
the result that the debased men and women proprietors,
seeing that they were put permanently out of business,
came forward and made disclosures of graft for twenty
years back. The Commissioner caused these disclosures
by the performance of his duties, and yet an attempt was
made to raise a hue and cry against him on account of them
as though he had done something wrong. The first was
the case of Rosenthal. He opened in succession twelve
gambling houses, and each one Avas promptly closed up,
one after another, and when the last one was in the actual
possession of the police, Avho stayed there day and night,
and he saw his occupation was gone, he revealed that a
pohce lieutenant was his partner. The same was the case
with Sipp and his beastly houses, and the equally beastly
houses of the two women, Goode and Hertz. When they
were put out of business they came forward with their stor
ies of graft, running back for a generation. They had cor-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
rupted policemen for that length of time. And the fellow
Purcell was also called to defile this town with his ancient
story. And a few days later he murdered his child and
attempted to kill his wife. But there was no halt in the
attempt to degrade the police force and this grand city.
And, these are the sources of all the revelations of graft.
And now when the: police continue to put such infamous
places out of business, the proprietors shake their fingers
and threaten to go and tell their tales, and they are told
to go ahead and tell everything. Every one is now per
ceiving the truth. Not a wrong thing has been disclosed
against Mr. Waldo. He is an earnest, hardworking man.
I expect other revelations of graft and I hope they will
come. We want to get at all the grafters. We have got
rid of the old timers one after another. Of the nineteen
inspectors that were there when I became Mayor only six
remain. In one way and another we have edged them out.
The young men who are coming up to take their places are
the finest in the world. No body of men anywhere, mili
tary or civil, is selected so carefully and with such severe
tests. They have to be of a certain height and weight and
muscle, and their hearts and lungs and organs have to be
perfect. And when they pass that examination, they have
to undergo a mental examination which excludes everyone
not of good intelhgence. When I saw 5,000 of these young
fellows svring by in the recent parade it made me tingle
from head to foot. No such number of perfect men was
ever seen in line before anywhere in this Avorld. And all
the while I kept saying to myself, " Just think of the
way they have been outraged for a year by corrupt scamps
and little pitiful investigators. They have been denounced
in every way because there are a few grafters in the force,
as though that was anything extraordinary. Every pro
fession and business calling has as large a percentage of
grafters, if not larger, than exists in the police force."
Clarkson Cowl, Esq.,
New York City. 167

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
On Books and Reading
(The following is an article published in The Independent.
It bears the form of a sort of talk with another — a method often
adopted by the Mayor in dictating matter.)
And SO you wish to visit me here in my hbrary and get
from me an article on hbraries, and books, and reading,
and learned men and bookish men, and bookshops, and so
on. It is a large subject. I can only skim over it with
an every day recollection. There are so many public
libraries here now that people do not need to buy books.
And these libraries have all kinds of books, even rare and
curious ones. The number of familiar old bookshops
diminished as these public libraries grew. According to
Professor Mahaffy, there was a bookshop in ancient
Athens. I never think of the burning of the great library
of Alexandria without a pang. It is said that when con
sulted by his general who had captured that city in the
seventh century the Arabian Caliph Omar said that if
the books of the hbrary contained only what was in the
Koran they were superfluous, if anything else they were
heretical, and that therefore in either case they should be
burned. This story was invented long afterwards. The
Arabians were a learned people. They were not burners
of books. Every department of science was enriched by
their learned men. Western civihzation owes them much.
The very numerals in which we keep our accounts we got
from them. Libraries preserve errors as well as truths.
I suppose there are as many errors as truths in them. The
errors as well as the truths of each age are stored in books.
That written down in books as the height of wisdom in one
age often becomes the height of folly in the next. This
is so in science, in theology, and in everything. And so
books lead us into many false paths unless we are wary.
I suppose we all know a few very wise people who are un
able to read at all. There is a large amount of innate
knowledge in all of us. It develops with the growth of our
minds and bodies from birth. It is the same with all
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
animals. Who taught the ant to bite every grain of corn
she carries into her hill lest it take root and grow? She
did not read it in any book. But I fear I am wandering
away from what you want. Reading, you say? Read
ing is to no purpose without thinking, except for pastime
or amusement. Reading is thinking Avith the head of
another person instead of your oAvn. One who reads
without thinking gradually fritters away his power of
thinking. Reading may be an aid, but to possess a
thought we have to work it out ourselves, and make it a
part of ourselves. The self -thinker is equipped for action.
He who reads without thinking is not. When called upon
for action he is all the while trying to recollect the words
or thoughts of others which he has read, and to shape his
words or acts thereto. No one ever did a considerable
work in the world who was not a self -thinker. Too much
reading weakens the judgment. What we absorb by re
flection becomes part and parcel of our mental processes
and comes forth spontaneously for use when the mind
enters the society of facts or ideas to which it belongs.
Mere feats of memory are of little or no use. To be able
to remember and repeat many names, or verses, or the
hke, may be likened to the physical feats or tricks of acro
bats. They excite the same attention by their novelty,
and are alike of little worth. The Roman General who
is said to have been able to repeat the names of all of his
soldiers seems to have had no other distinction. Absorp
tion, not verbal memory, forms judgment. There was
for a long time in this country a distrust of scholarly and
bookish men in respect of business or public affairs. We
have not altogether got over it yet. They were called
" hterary fellers." But history shows that such men have
given the best government and achieved the best results
when given the opportunity. We elected a learned,
literary and bookish man President of the United States
the other day in Woodrow Wilson. Such men acquit
themselves well when called into government. But that
happens only to a few. It is the same in general business
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and affairs. Men who make themselves learned in a cer
tain calling or business by means of study excel the men
of long experience but without learning. Of the great
rulers who were learned it is easy to cite instances. Alex
ander the Great was a student, philosopher and learned
man. He possessed all the learning of his time. Aris
totle was his tutor, and he served for a time as his
amanuensis. When he went into Asia on his great mili
tary expedition he took a retinue of learned men with him.
Wherever he went he sought out the learned men and
philosophers and conversed with them. He called to see
Diogenes in his tub at Corinth, and after conversing with
him said as he turned away: " Were I not Alexander I
would wish to be Diogenes." Caesar was also a man of
learning, an orator, and given to philosophy. He wrote
a book of apothegms which is imfortunately lost. The
philosophical mind has always been prone to express
itself in parable, or aphorism or fable. As an orator he
was capable of holding his own against Cicero. His
" Commentaries " have not been exceUed as a model of
pregnant narrative. At the same time he could be nimble
and jocose of wit, as when being hailed as king by some
of the populace he responded that his name was not King
but Caesar — King being a sur-name with the Romans as
Avith us. The emperor Marcus Aurelius left liis philo
sophical thoughts in writing. He seems never to have
had any desire or intention of publishing them. In the
midst of camps and great affairs he mused over them and
wrote them down on tablets as a solace to his own soul.
He had a true conception of God and the universe. As I
finished reading his book again not long ago I could not
help writing on the flyleaf as follows : " Consider that
the great universe, of which thou art only a trivial speck,
is governed by fixed laws, and be therefore content in all
things, and especially to die at any time, and abide God's
will of thee, whether of individual future life, or dissolu
tion into universal mind and matter." That is the sum
and substance of what his mind leaves other minds preg-
170

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
nant of. Napoleon was one of the greatest readers of
his time and much given to the society of learned men.
He took a large body of scientific and learned men along
with him in his military expedition to Egypt. When he
came back he dressed in the garb of the academicians for
a time and consorted with men of learning. He read in
his coach, as he traveled on his campaigns, and if a book
impressed him as worthless he threw it out of the window.
It is said his route could be traced by the litter of books
along the roadside. But I suppose this is exaggeration.
Lord Rosebery in his book on Napoleon says that he had
a library of 800 volumes on the field of Waterloo. Did
you ever hear of a more astonishing thing? You cannot
help doubting it, you say. Nor can I. But it is true that
he carried many books about with hun, and had special
editions printed and bound for his OAvn library.
Frederick the Great was a literary man. He kept Vol
taire, the greatest thinker and hterary genius of that age,
by him for a time to commune with him over poetry, phil
osophy and learning. Do you not think the minds of
these two men were much alike? No? Well, it has always
seemed so to me. They were each what some call queer,
jealous of each other, and spat and quarreled like cats.
Queen Ehzabeth was learned to a singular and rare de
gree. To the end of her long life she had set hours for
study and reflection. She was fond of men of learning
and philosophy. There never seems to have been any
objection to hterary men in public affairs or as statesmen
in Great Britain. England presents a long hst of literary
men who came to eminence in public affairs, as Burke,
Disraeh, Gladstone, and I hope you will let me add Bal
four. His book, " Foundations of Belief," has been taken
too httle note of. Nor should the present Churchill be
omitted. Gladstone was the most bookish of Enghsh
statesmen. He thrust his spoon into every dish. But he
was superficial. He will not survive either as orator or
writer. He was a rhetorician, but not an orator. Seldom
have the rhetorician and the orator united in the same per-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
son. Most of the world's orators have been only plain,
some of them poor, speakers. It is hard to beheve that
Demosthenes being asked for the first, then the second,
and then the third requisites of an orator, answered each
time " action." Instead of being a requisite, action can
be dispensed with. The three requisites for an orator are,
first, the man (an honest man Avith a purpose), second, a
message to dehver (something to say), and last and least,
the way of saying it. Some orators have been stutterers.
Lord Bacon says Moses stuttered. Rhetoricians have
always been distrusted as dishonest. Orators never. The
Roman Republic banished the rhetoricians several times.
How would it do for us to do the like? The name of Lord
Bacon cannot be omitted when learned men and philoso
phers who were eminent in public affairs are mentioned.
His writings are one of the world's marvels. It is seldom
so prodigious a mind has ever been conferred on any of
the sons of men. It might not be easy to give a hst of
literary men among Irish statesmen. A few of them
were orators. Parnell does not seem to have read any
thing. He was the bookless statesman. He was ignorant
even of Irish history. And he was neither rhetorician nor
orator. We had philosophers and literary men in pub
hc affairs in this country at the beginning, more than later
on. Benjamin Franklin stands out incomparable at the
head of them all. Jefferson was a great student as the
writings he left after him attest. He was also a phil
osopher. Hamilton does not seem to have had even a
touch of philosophy, but in political economy, in history,
and in the art of government was the ablest man of has
time in all the world. Nearly all of the men developed by
the French Revolution were learned or literary men. The
only exception I can think of at this moment is the brewer
Santerre, whose name survives only because he had a voice
which could be heard all over Saint- Antoine, and, as I
think some say, half way out to Saint-Cloud. We find
Robespierre at the age of nineteen corresponding with
Benjamin Franklin on a scientific topic. Even Marat
172

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
was an educated and scientific man. He was an eminent
and fashionable physician in Soho Square, London, for
ten years. He returned to France to participate in the
French revolution. Carlyle tries to damn him by calling
him " horse-leech." He also pictures him as unclean,
even nasty, in his person. He hints even worse than he
says. You may know what I mean if you read Gibbon's
Latin footnote concerning the same thing said of the Em
peror Juhan. But, all the same, Marat was murdered
while in his bath tub in his own home — rather conclusive
proof that he was of cleanly personal habit. At the head
of the Champlain delegation which recently came over
here from France was Hanotaux, formerly head of the
French Foreign Office. He is a bookish and literary man.
He is often seen in the bookshops of Paris, or groping
along the long row of little book stalls on the opposite
side of the Seine — ^more than a thousand in number. The
late John Hay in this country was also the better equipped
as Secretary of State by his literary accomplishments.
But I must not run on this way further. You want me to
saj'- something about my oasti hbrary and books and read
ing? I would rather pass that over. I have collected
my books one by one. As I wanted a book I bought it.
In that way a library grows fast enough and you have the
books you want. And your hbrary is part of you all the
time. My advice is not to buy a whole library at once.
Yes, I have spent some time in the old bookshops of New
York. They are now, alas, nearly all passed away. I
saw men in them who have since come to eminence. It
would serve no purpose to enumerate the names of these
old bookshops. You could get any sort of book at Leg-
gatt's. One of the last of them was Miller's in Nassau
street. How he liked to talk with you about books, and
what infinite trouble he would take to get a book for you.
One day I went in and asked him for " Goschen on Ex
change." He scratched his head and said he did not have
it, but would get it and send it to me next day. After
three days I got a letter from him that there was not a
173

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
copy of it to be found in the city of New York, and that
he had sent to England for it. I had recently heard the
debate in the British Parliament in 1893 on the closing of
the Indian mint to the coinage of silver, and the speech of
Balfour on bimetalism, and had bought and read the best
books on that subject. I then wanted to read the lead
ing books on exchange, as the growing disparity between
gold and silver was dislocating the international exchanges
of the world. I mention this incident as it made me doubt
ful of following the lead of our bankers and financiers and
business men here on these subjects, then much rife among
us, for if they were students thereof the standard books
treating of them would have been for sale here. By the
way, Goschen is an example of how a man of learning on
any subject may come to the front in public affairs in
England. The appearance of his book on exchange
caused him to be made Chancellor of the Exchequer over
the heads of others, at a bound — per saltum, as the phrase
is. Uncut editions are annoying to those who frequent
bookshops. And the " expurgated edition " — ^what shall
I say of that? Just think of an expurgated edition of
Rabelais. I picked one up in a bookshop in London some
years ago. I think it had a very short sale. What places
of infinite solace the old bookshops were. You ask me to
give a hst of ten or fifteen of the greatest books. I would
rather not try to do that. But I have no objection to giv
ing you a hst of the books which have affected or shaped
me the most. They are as follows: The Bible, Euclid.
Shakespeare, Hume's History of England (especially the
notes). Homer's Iliad, Milton ("Paradise Lost"),
Cervantes ("Don Quixote"), Rabelais, "Gil Bias,"
Franklin's Autobiography and Letters, Plutarch's Lives,
The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini, Gibbon's " De-
chne and Fall of the Roman Empire," Adam Smith's
" Wealth of Nations," and Bacon's Works. I should add
the leading books which deal with what I may call the phil
osophy of history, such as Draper's " Intellectual De
velopment of Europe," Lecky's " History of European
174

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES '
Morals," Buckle's " History of Civilization " and the late
Emil Reich's " Success Among Nations." The " Imita
tion of Christ," filled with religious philosophy hne after
line, should not be omitted. More copies of it have been
read in the Christian world than of any other book save
the Bible. It has soothed the hearts of more than forty
generations of Christians. The author of it is not known,
with certainty. Protestants and Catholics claim it and
read it alike. The Bible is incomparably the greatest book
of all. The philosophy, the poetry, the imagery, the ele
vation of thought, of the Old Testament have never been
approached. No one has since come into the world
capable of AA^iting the TAventy-third Psalm, for instance.
By the way, Shakespeare was born on the day Cervantes
died, wasn't he? Some of the commentators on Shakes
peare say that the word " hand-saAV " in Hamlet is a
copyist's error for " hernsaw," some sort of a bird. It oc
curs in the passage " I know a hawk from a handsaw."
But here is the same thing in " Don Quixote," namely,
" There is some difference between a hawk and a hand
saw." The most jaunty and nimble piece of narrative in
our language, if not in any other, is Lord Bacon's " New
Atlantis." Just read it and see. To bring your style
down from stilts, and make it easy and plain, read Ncav-
man's " Apologia." We must not fail to mention Bur
ton's " Anatomy of Melancholy," which is the greatest
collection of curious learning to be found in any book.
ancient or modern. It is a marvel of learning and re
search. The Baconians claim that Bacon wrote it as well
as the Shakespeare plays. They say they trace his cypher
through it. I hope you will not think I am loquacious if
I tell you how I once convinced three of my four associates
when I was a Justice of the Appellate Division of the Su
preme Court by citing Burton's " Anatomy of Melan
choly " as an authority. It was a divorce case against a
man. The proof showed that he met the Avoman at the
railroad station, that they came together in a hack with
their baggage to the hotel, that the man registered them
175

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
as man and wife, and that they went to the bedroom as
signed to them. One of the judges wrote an opinion
that this evidence Avas not sufficient. I wrote an opinion
that the legal inference of misconduct could and should be
draAvn from it, that they did not go there to say their
prayers, and cited that passage of the " Anatomy of Mel
ancholy " which says of a man under such conditions,
" It is presumed he saith not a paternoster." The case
is known as the " Paternoster case." Now we cannot keep
on this way, and maybe we might as well stop here. We
have looked all along the shelves, and you see that some
of my books are below the mark. If they had been in Don
Quixote's library when his books were put on trial by the
curate and the barber, after he got home from his first
sally and was put to bed by his housekeeper and nurse, I
am quite certain they would have been burned up in the
same heap with the foolish books they condemned and
committed to the flames. The comparatively few books
which were printed in the first century or less after the art
of printing was discovered are called the " Incunabula."
The images of the minds of writers are preserved forever
in their books, while images of the body are lost after a
few ages. I am all the time wondering if in the excava
tions of houses at Pompeii and other places they will not
finally discover the lost books of Livy. Yes, artistically
bound books are great sources of pleasure. I have not
talked with anyone on that subject since the death of the
late William Matthews. He had a choice collection of ex
quisitely bound books. As good an authority as I know
on that subject, and particularly on inlaid books, is Mr.
Daniel Treadwell, who still survives among us at a fine
old age. How do I read? If the book be worth while,
always pencil in hand. Many of my books are spoiled in
that way. Just look at them. Yes, I often copy into
notebooks the passages I mark. See this passage marked
in the Odyssey — how Ulysses in his wanderings sighed to
see again " the smoke rising from the hearths of his native
land." And this noted on the margin, that " When he es-
176

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
caped from the den of Cyclops he did not go back for his
cap and belt." He was out of danger and knew enough
to stay there, unhke some other people. There are a large
number of proverbs and wise maxims in " Don Quixote "
— more than in any other book I can now think of save the
Bible. See this curious one I have marked: " Between
the yea and the nay of a woman I would not undertake
to thrust the point of a needle." And here is this
marked: " The mountains breed learned men, and phil
osophers are to be found in the huts of shepherds." But
we cannot go into this. I have several times thought of
pubhshing a full collection of them.
The Parks June 12, 1913.
Dear Mr. Davis: I read your booklet on the parks
through last night, and derived much profit and satisfac
tion from it. It is the best statement on the subject that
exists, I think. I notice that it was written in 1897, which
accounts for the parks of three boroughs being left out.
I only vsdsh you had the time to write a similar paper Avith
regard to the parks in those three boroughs.
There is no city in the world, I think, which has so
many natural parks and breathing places. I have some
times thought we could get along without our large parks,
on account of the natural places for recreation and breath
ing which we have. The Hudson River, the Bay, Coney
Island, Rockaway, Long Island Sound, and the shores
of these waters, not to mention others, are all natural
parks. I suppose one hundred people go to these places
to one that goes into our large parks.
I have sometimes thought that the Bronx Parks were
too large. It is a long walk to get into them. Would it
not be better to have smaller parks?
I think that Prospect Park is the most beautiful park
in the whole city. When I consider that park, and the
continuation of it by the splendid driveway to the ocean,
177

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
I think there is nothing to equal it in the world. I have
seen nothing to equal it. And then its approach by the
great Eastern Parkway is also grand. And at its prin
cipal entrance is one of the noblest arches in the Avorld.
Gherardi Davis, Esq.,
New York.

Tolstoy and Henry George June 12, 1913.
Dear Mr. Bernstein: I thank you very much for the
copy of your book, " With Master Minds." It was in
tensely interesting to me, and I could not lay it doAvn
until I had finished it. You portray Metchnikoff wdth
much more simplicity and homeliness of character than I
had any idea he possessed. I had formed an entirely dif
ferent opinion of his personality from his brilliant scien
tific writings. Count Witte has always been a fascinating
subject to me. Your article still leaves that impression
on my mind undiminished. He was a very brilliant man.
The way he handled himself as the Peace Representative
of Russia at Portsmouth has rarely been equalled in
diplomacy. From what you disclose, he was cAddently
backed up by his government. Notwithstanding the
pressure brought to bear from this country, as disclosed
by the despatches which you print, the government of the
Czar never flinched, but stood on the proposition that if
Japan wanted to make peace without asking for an in
demnity, peace would be made, and that othervrise the
war might go right on. It seems that Witte was not
bluffing at all, but meant just Avhat he said. I suppose I
ought not to say it, but I Avas never satisfied with Tolstoy,
and after reading your chapter on him I am still in the
same frame of mind. He was never able to see that
Shakespeare was above the ordinaiy, or worth while.
Just think of that. Is it not proof that his own mind was
not of full stature? I have never been able to see that he
178

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
had any settled philosophy. It always seemed to me that
he was a man of generahties, and, as you know, error
lurks in generalities. He had no fixed principles. Nor
had he any coherent philosophy. Nor did he have even
an ordinary understanding of economical matters. He
stated to you, as he often stated to others, that the Henry
George theory of taxation put into practice would give
the Russian peasant farmers free use of the soil. I have
never been able to see how he spelled that out. I do not
think he understood the Henry George theory. Henry
George never saw any such thing in his theory. Put in
practice it might help the Russian small farmer, the same
as aU tenants, a httle. The Henry George theory is to
value the bare land, i. e., the land without the buildings
and improvements, separately, and put a tax thereon
equal to the ground rent, and thereby absorb the entire
ground rent into the public treasury, instead of having
such ground rent kept by the proprietor or landlord, as
now. That would limit him to collecting and retaining
for himself only the rent for the buildings and improve
ments. Of course he would have to collect all the rent,
but the ground rent he would have to pay over to the gov
ernment as taxes. Under this system the tenant would
have to pay the very same amount of rent, namely, rent
for both land and improvements. That the landlord
would have to pay the ground rent over to the govern
ment would not help the tenant, except in so far as it
might benefit the whole community. And this method of
taxation would help the whole community, except the
landlords, by reducing or doing away Avith taxes on prop
erty other than the bare land. Henry George contended
that these ground rents taken as taxes would prove to be
sufficient to pay all the expenses of government, so that
all other taxes could be done away Avith. Whether this
would prove true or not, it is true that the amount of these
ground rents would lessen other taxes to that extent, and
in that way the tenants would be benefited to some ex
tent, namely, like the rest of the community. I do not
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
see how tenants would be benefited any further than that.
Tolstoy in his enthusiasm very often, or most of the time,
had, it seems to me, a very wrong notion of things. He
does not seem to have studied or understood anything
deeply, unless the human heart, and I think he was very
often in a state of exaggeration in that respect. His esti
mate of men and of hterature was very much at fault.
Just think of him rating Tucker, of Boston, the head of
the anarchists in this coimtry, as a great writer. I do not
see any signs of greatness in anything that Tucker Avrote.
Think of Tucker compared with Shakespeare!
But my intention was to express my thanks to you
for your book, and not to go into a discussion of it or of
the men you portray.
Herman Bernstein, Esq.,
New York City.

Literature of Weights and Measures June 17, 1913.
Dear Dr. Kunz : Mr. Spencer has shovim me your let
ter of June 12th commending the adoption of the New
International Metric Carat of 200 milligrams by the
Bureau of Weights and Measures of this city for the
measure of weight of precious gems. It does me good
to have you take notice of that official act. The great work
of securing uniform and honest weights and measures for
this city, which was begun very soon after I came into
the office of Mayor, and has been continued ever since,
is now almost complete. You would know that without
my saying so, since we have got as far as estabhshing a
standard method of weighing precious gems. The work
has been an intensely interesting one to me. Some years
ago I read the exquisite report of John Quincy Adams to
the Senate of the United States on weights and measures.
The subject fascinated me, and I read other literature on
the same subject. So that when I became Mayor I was
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
prepared to take up the matter and do ^way with the
frightful dishonesty in weights and measures which pre
vailed all over this city. And you know how the Bureau
of Weights and Measures was then officered and manned,
and what they were doing there, or not doing, rather.
From the earhest times one of the first acts of govern
ment has been to establish honest and just standards of
weights and measures. You find much on the subject in
ancient literature. It recurs again and again in the Old
Testament. " A false balance is an abomination to the
Lord; but a just weight is His dehght," as we read in
Proverbs (11 — '1). It has a literature all its own. The
work of the Department of Weights and Measures here
during the last three-and-a-half years is now being copied
not only all over this State but all over this country.
Dr. George F. Kunz,
Manhattan.

Arresting Children June 17, 1913.
Dear Mr. Colhns: I am most glad to receive your
letter. It encourages me to continue my efforts to teach
the police not to arrest children unnecessarily, and bring
them into court, or any one else, for that matter. But
especially children should not be brought into court under
arrest unless it be absolutely necessary. Nothing has
such a tendency to make a boy a criminal as to arrest him
and bring him into court, and of all things to lock him up.
When he has had that experience once or twice or three
times, he is quite certain to become a criminal. I have
pretty well done away with all that sort of thing in the
city of New York. I have been teaching the police not
to make such arrests, and not to make any arrests unless
necessary, during all this clamor against them which has
been going on. I enclose to you the preface which I re
cently wrote to the new digest of laws and ordinances
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
which was prepared for the pohce. These reforms can
be worked out only by constant attention. You cannot do
them all at once. I have tried to do them little by little,
teaching the 10,000 men on the force with a spoon, as it
were. They had been so long taught to arrest everybody,
including children, whom they saw committing trifles, that
the abuse could not be abated except by patience and time.
I would that there were more people in this city who under
stood this thing as you do. But I think all of our people
are now coming to see what we haA'^e been doing in the
Pohce Department. By doing away with these petty and
unnecessary arrests, I have diminished the number of ar
rests in this city over 100,000 a year. A man of your ex
perience can tell how much suffering, how much anguish,
how much provocation to a criminal life was prevented
thereby.John C. Collins, Esq.,
New Haven, Conn.

Lincoln June 17, 1913.
Dear Mr. Cain: Your interesting letter of June 16th
is at hand. But you must not compare me to Lincoln.
That is too much. I do not deserve it. It is true that dur
ing the latter half of his first term, and especially at the
end thereof, all the dogs, as you put it, were barking and
snapping at him. But let us not call them dogs. They
were human beings, with all the meanness, all the vanities,
that belong to human nature. We are all just as God
made us, only some of us a great deal worse, as the old
proverb says. I believe every newspaper in the City of
New York denounced Lincohi as inefficient, and even in
competent, and declared that he should not be renomi
nated, and could not be re-elected. He Avas blamed for
every fraudulent army contract, for every grafter, for
every blunder of his Generals in the field, for everything
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that happened. His biographers unite in telling us the
keenness of his suffering. The leaders of his party wanted
to get rid of him. Each of them thought he was a greater
man than " old Abe," and they did not hesitate to tell
their friends so. They even said he was an old fool and
a buffoon. But he had more philosophy in his little finger
than all of them had in all of their bodies and brains put
together. And the people knew it. And they renomi
nated him and overwhelmingly elected him. After he was
renominated those who ridiculed and decried him further
nagged, fretted and humiliated him by forming a national
committee to ask him to withdraAv so as to save the wreck
which would foUoAV his defeat. This is all matter of his
tory. But it is not my case as you want me to think. I
am not to be compared to Lincoln, simply because I am
howled at and abused by newspaper proprietors — ^by the
two miserable little Pulitzers of the World, for instance.
Of course all the little Pulitzers of that day howled at
and ridiculed Lincoln, and did all they could to thwart
him. But the " big " newspaper proprietors and editors
did the same. All I can claim for myself is that I am
just a plodder, and have plodded along as well as I could.
I know that I have not been able to do much, but at the
same time I know that I have done the best I could. I
have had a pretty tough time of it, but I have borne it the
best I could. Except for the feelings of my family I
would be willing to bear anything. The very worst would
not cost me a moment's sleep or pain.
Jewett P. Cain, Esq.,
New York City.
Segregation of Vice June 19, 1913.
Dear Sir: Your letter of June 18th is at hand. You
ask me about several questions deahng with the social evil.
You will find that in previous letters of mine which haA'^e
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
been published I have answered all your questions. I have
often said the method of breaking into houses without war
rants enabled the pohce to collect graft. I have been say
ing it for ten years. Do you not know that perfectly
well ? You ask me whether it would not be better to segre
gate the evil. How would you do it? It is very easy to
mark off a district by law or ordinance. But how would
you get the women to go there and stay there? Will you
undertake the job to catch them and bring them into that
district? And after you get them there, who will keep
them there? And if you could get and keep them there
do you suppose that the men would go there when every
body would be pointing at them and laughing at them for
going into that district? You ask me whether it would not
be better to hcense such women? No, sir, I do not be
lieve in licensing vice. And you ask whether the women
should not be inspected. How could you find them to in
spect them? If there were a law for such inspections how
many out of the whole number would come forward for
inspection? And if they did not come forward how do
you think they could be found? But I cannot cover the
whole matter with you. I say this much only to ask you
to think a little about the thing. It is easy to pass laws
and ordinances, and to talk and say this ought to be so
and that ought to be so, but the doing of it is another
thing. No law should be passed which is not enforceable.
B. S. Barrett, Esq.,
Brooklyn.
Clamior and the Administration of Justice
June 26, 1913.
Dear Mr. Stearns : I thank you very much for your
letter. The district attorneys and certain judges over
here in the county of New York have for years been re
sponding to newspaper clamor and framing up indict
ments against innocent persons, as in the case of Hyde,
which you mention. It is so atrocious that one can hardly
184

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
realize that such a thing could exist, but it does exist here.
It has gone on for years in answer to periodical corrupt
newspaper clamor. And those who do it do it to obtain
popularity. But instead of obtaining popularity they
have always ruined themselves in the estimation of all in
telhgent and just minds, and in the end it is always the
estimation of the community at large. The people of
this coimtry wiU not stand for any such business. I sup
pose you know we have four counties here in the city of
New York, each Avith its own district attorney, grand
juries, and courts. This practice of framing up criminal
cases exists only here in the county of New York. In the
other three counties, namely. Kings, Queens, and Rich
mond, no such thing has ever happened or could happen.
In those counties you could not get a grand jury together
which would permit itself to be led by the nose by the
district attorney or the judge to find such an indictment.
Over here the district attorney and the judge tell the grand
juries that they are their legal advisers and that they must
do as they advise. It is a falsehood. There is no such law.
On the contrary, while the grand jury has to listen to their
advice, it is then the duty and prerogative of the grand
jurors to do as their judgment dictates. They cannot
be required or forced by any advice to find an indictment.
That in the end is for them to say in their sound judg
ment and discretion. The grand jury which indicted
Hyde was worked on for two months before it could be
induced by a bare majority of one to indict him. The in
dictment stated no criminal offense, there was no evidence
of any criminal offense, and there was no criminal offense.
So that when it got to the appeal judges they did not
merely reverse the conviction, but they said that there was
no offense at all in the whole matter, and pitched the
Avhole thing out of the courts. Indeed, they said that what
Hyde did it was his duty to do. Just think of a district
attortiey and a judge who would under such circumstances
cater to newspaper clamor and dictation even to the con
viction of a man innocent of any criminal offense what-
185

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
ever. To do justice to all of our other judges hereabouts
every one of them said that there was no offense. But
those engaged in the business thought they would make
themselves popular by conforming to the clamor of cer
tain corrupt newspaper proprietors who are supposed to
have much power here but in fact have none. Such a con
dition is dangerous to the liberties of every one. All that
Chamberlain Hyde did was to ask several banks who had
deposits of city money to make loans to the Carnegie
Trust Company in order to tide that company over diffi
culties, at the same time promising meanwhile to leave
such city deposits with them. The city had eight hundred
thousand dollars deposited in the Carnegie Trust Com
pany, and it Avas the duty of the Chamberlain to do what
he could to sustain that bank in order to save the city's
money. The Secretary of the United States Treasury
does this every time there is trouble in Wall Street. He
deposits money with certain banks with the understanding
that at his request they must sustain other banks by loans.
Hyde did not ask any bank to make a loan without se
curity. On the contrary, all the loans were made on abso
lute security, so that they were paid at once as they be
came due. Just think of a man being convicted under
such circumstances as that. He had the right to draw the
city's deposits out of any banks as he saAv fit, and deposit
the same with the Carnegie Trust Company, on good se
curity, of course. Instead he asked certain banks to make
the loans, promising that he Avould leave the city deposits
with them meanwhile. But the falsehood was given out
from day to day as a grand jury secret that money was
paid to Chamberlain Hyde. There was not a scintilla of
evidence of any such thing. At the trial, to make some
pretense in this respect, it Avas shown that fom- months
after the alleged offense was committed, namely, the re
quest that the loan shpuld be made by the Northern Bank,
a note of another person endorsed by Mr. Hyde Avas dis
counted in the Carnegie Trust Company, and promptly
paid when it became due. No one can think of such things
186

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
without perceiving the degradation which the administra
tion of the criminal laAv in this county of Ncav York has
come to. I am speaking plainly about the matter, because
I hope all intelligent people like you will see to it that no
such infamous thing happens again. The courts ought to
be sanctuaries of refuge against clamor, instead of places
where clamor is used to inflame and corrupt the adminis
tration of justice.
Theron C. Stearns, Esq.,
Jersey City, N. J.

Literature of Weights and Measures July 2, 1913.
Dear Mr. Strong: I appreciate your letter of June
25th with regard to the work of the Bureau of Weights
and Measures. Some years ago I read the report of John
Quincy Adams to the United States Senate about weights
and measures. It is a classic. It covers the whole htera
ture of the subject, and I knoAV of no more enticing htera
ture. It runs through all history, ancient and modern.
Much of it is in the Old Testament. For instance, " A
false balance is an abomination to the Lord; but a just
weight is his delight," as we read in Proverbs. One of the
first duties of government from the beginning of organized
society has been to provide for a uniform standard of
weights and measures, and to enforce the use of the same.
When I came in as Mayor I found the city filled with false
Aveights and measures. The law cannot be said to have
been enforced at all. I hnmediately took the matter up,
and the young man at the head of that bureau has now
brought the work ahnost to completion, as you might
yourself conclude since he has got so far along as even to
establish a standard carat for the weight of precious stones.
It is very gratifying to him and to me to have notice
taken of his work by intelligent men, such as you have in
the City Club, The great milhons of the city know of the
187

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
work, because they know that they have been protected
from dishonest weights and measures.
C. H. Strong, Esq., President, The City Club,
Manhattan.

Animals July 3, 1913.
Dear Professor Osborn: Yes, I shall be glad to ap
point one of your Trustees to the Board of Education. I
should have done it before if I had been reminded of it. I
had not heard any proposition to drop the nature study
from the curriculum of the public schools. Of course that
matter is wholly with the school authorities, but I shall
speak of it to some of them the first opportunity I get.
I am much struck with one remark you make, that
hundreds of thousands of our children never see a hving
wild animal or bird. But I have several times gone much
further than that. There are a very large number of peo
ple in this great city, larger than most people have any
idea of, who have never seen a calf or a pig. We provide
wild animals for them to look at, but not domestic animals.
If I had my way we would have domestic animals for the
people here to see. I am certain that a sow with a htter
of pigs would be more intensely interesting to most people
than any wild animal. And cow and calf, mare and colt,
and so on, would also be most interesting. Is there any
natural sight so interesting as a litter of pigs nursing?
Prof. Henry Fairfield Osborn,
New York City.
A Safe and Sane Fourth July 8, 1913.
Dear Mrs. Rice: I thank you for your letter, and
especially for your article on " The Child and the Fourth."
188

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS ANI) SPEECHES
It shows the many ways in which our boys and girls can
celebrate Independence Day with pleasure and profit. On
last Friday (Independence Day) I went from my house
through the Borough of Brooklyn and through the Bor
ough of Queens to the City hne. What I saw gave me
the greatest of pleasure. I did not hear the sound of an
explosive anywhere. But every few blocks my motor car
was stopped at the crossing and I got out and saw a local
procession go by. These processions were made up mostly
of school children, but there were in them also a good
many groAvn-up people. What delighted me was that
they had their own local bands of music. The number of
these bands seems to be growing all over the city. Boys
come together, each one furnishing a musical instrument,
and practise music, and make up regular musical bands.
This always has been so all through the country districts,
not only in the villages but in the farm districts, and even
up into the edge of the Adirondacks. It has always
seemed to me that we should encourage the forming of
such bands here. Some people want the city to hire bands
and put them everywhere to play music. I think it is
much better to encourage the forming of these volunteer
bands. They are an education to those who belong to
them and a dehght to the whole neighborhood. It is not
every one who can understand classical music. Very few
understand it. But of course the city should furnish pub
lic music also in the parks and at the principal centers.
Yes, it makes every one rejoice that the crippling, blind
ing and killing of children and grown people by explosives
on Independence Day is a thing of the past.
Mrs. Isaac L. Rice,
Manhattan.
Degradation of Newspaper Writers
July 11, 1913.
Dear  : Your letter of July 10th is
at hand. I have often thought over the matter which yoii
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mention. The present position of newspaper writers, and
especially of those Avho write the news, is degrading to the
last degree. They are mere slaves. Worse than that,
they are dishonorable slaves. The corrupt newspaper
proprietor browbeats them, and kicks them about as he
sees fit. He does not leave them free to write the honest
truth, but dictates to them that they must he, garble,
forge, steal, or do anything to write down the official or
person who is the subject of the animosity or cupidity of
such proprietors. And if they refuse to do it they are
kicked out. How long Avill the newspaper writers con
tinue to allow themselves to be degraded in that way?
I am of course acquainted with the young men who serve
as reporters here at the City Hall. They are, as a rule,
fine young fellows. But some of them have to come
around to my office shamefacedly to get the news only to
forge and pervert it in the way which I have said. I pity
them. They do not want to do it. They have to do it or
get out. It seems to me the newspaper writers ought to
protect themselves at least to the extent that typesetters,
pressmen, and other mechanics protect themselves. At all
events they ought to band together and protect themselves
against the degradation of being made to write falsehood
and abuse. On Christmas
Christmas is the happiest day in the year. It is the
birthday of Jesus, the greatest figure that ever came upon
this earth. The farther we recede from him the more
colossal he grows. He was the greatest teacher that ever
came on this earth, and yet he never wrote a line. What
he taught was propagated by word of mouth until the
Gospels were written in a much later time. No one can
read the account of the birth of Jesus in Luke's Gospel
without being thrilled. The picture of the child in the
manger Avith the cattle looking on never leaves the mind
from childhood up. 190

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
We children in the country saw the cow and the ox
and the manger, and Jesus and all. Maybe city children
do not see it so vividly. We lived with the cattle, and
loved them. That Jesus was born among them made us
feel that he was really one of us. Yes, Christmas seems
the same to me now as when I was a child. We used to
hang up our stockings. We could scarcely go to sleep.
But we did manage to get to sleep the same as chil
dren do now. And like them we were up before day
light to see what Santa Claus had brought. What he
brought us Avas very little in value, but very great in our
imaginations. We beheved in his sleigh, in his reindeers,
in his coming down the chimney, and the whole business.
We did not entertain the least doubt of it. I have great
difficulty to doubt it now, but I have some difficulty in
making my children beheve it after a few years. They
have Santa Claus now coming in an automobile, and with
false keys to open the front doors, and a whole lot of
things that I do not like at all. But the world is ad
vancing. I do not remember ever having seen the little
chap, but I am certain that he used to come around in the
country when I was a boy. I think I have seen his foot
steps in the snow, and also the tracks of his reindeers and
sleigh. I am glad the Brooklyn Times is issuing a Christ
mas supplement. I wish I had time to add to its litera
ture. I Avish every one who reads the supplement would
then read the account of the birth of Jesus in the Gospels.
And then let them read say the 23rd Psalm, and the
Twelfth Chapter of Ecclesiastes. They will feel happy.
Veto of a Separate Vice Department
I feel constrained not to accept this bill on behalf of
the city. I shall state the reasons in numerical order.
1. The design of the committee of eminent citizens
who examined into the matter Avas to take away from the
Police Department the administration of the liquor tax
laAV, the laws against gambling, and the laws concerning
191

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
female prostitution, and place the same in a separate de
partment. It has been the case here, and in the cities
through this country, that the keepers of hquor places, of
gambling places and houses of prostitution, pay politi
cians, and to some extent police officials, to secure a lenient
administration of the law in their case. The exposure of
this condition from time to time has had a bad effect on
the police force here as a whole, although its membership
is now of a very high order and there is no better police
force in the world. That even a few members of the pohce
force extort graft, or are tempted to take it, creates a dis
trust of the whole force by those who are affected by
clamor instead of thinking for themselves. It was there
fore thought best by the said committee to take the ad
ministration of the law respecting these things away from
the pohce force, and leave it, untempted and undisturbed,
to perform that which has always been its chief duty,
namely, to preserve outward order and decency, and pre
vent, detect and arrest for the ordinary crimes. But this
bill does not carry out this plan. It leaves the enforce
ment of the liquor tax law with the police force, instead
of bringing it into the proposed new department, although
the major part of the corruption money paid to police
officials and politicians in the past has come from that
source. It was stated on the hearing before me that the
enforcement of this law was left with the police for the
reason that I have estabhshed and carried out a plan which
has done away with such corruption under it. While that
is true, such corruption may very easily be revived here
after. We have also during the last few years done away
with most of the corruption from the other two sources.
That might be alleged as a reason also for not turning
the administration of the laws in respect of them over to
a separate department. If this thing is to be done at all
it should be completely done. That is what the report of
the committee of citizens called for. This bill is not in
accordance with what the committee asked of the Legis
lature. 192

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
2. This bill provides for a Department of Public Wel
fare, to consist of a board of seven commissioners, remov
able by the Mayor only for cause after a trial. This is
contrary to the present scheme or constitution of govern
ment of this city. The board of seven members would
probably result in discord and inefficiency. Our present
system of single heads of departments to be appointed
and removed by the Mayor at pleasure, was brought in
for grave cause. I know of no reason to abandon it. It
has worked well and has never been abused. The idea
seems to be to divide the responsibility for the enforce
ment of these laws. That is a weakness to be deprecated.
It is much better to center the responsibility, and experi
ence has proved that the place to center it is in the Mayor.
The people of this great city ought to be able to elect a
Mayor in whom they would have full confidence and who
would neither shrink from nor shirk any responsibility.
I think the Mayor of this city can always rest assured
that his fellow citizens will treat him with justice, however
malevolent the attacks of petty politicians or corrupt
people or however loud, senseless or corrupt clamor
against him may be.
3. There are two very dangerous sections in our city
charter. The possibilities of oppression, extortion and
blackmail under them by those who enforce the laws are
without limit. The sections I refer to are 315 and 318.
The former makes it the duty of the police, and empoAvers
them, at all times of the day and night, to visit certain
places mentioned, including " all houses of ill fame or
prostitution, and houses where common prostitutes re
sort," and " all gambling houses," and " restrain all un
lawful and disorderly conduct or practices therein."
Under this section the police had long claimed the right
of visitation to these places, and to enter them by force
without warrant. Indeed, literally read, the section em
powers the police to preserve order in such places. That
would practically amount to hcensing them and putting
them in charge of the police to keep order in them. The
other section, namely, 318, empowers the police to enter
193

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
any house in the city under a mere " report " to them of
two householders that they believe such house to be a
house of ill fame or a gambling house. No oath is re
quired. This is contrary to the provision which is found
in the bill of rights or constitution of every state in this
union, and of the United States, that entrance into houses
and searches and seizures therein cannot be made except
on a warrant issued by a magistrate on the oath of vrit-
nesses before him showing probable cause. This section
of the charter wholly disregards this great constitutional
safeguard, which is common to every civilized government
in the world. For that reason it is void. No better device
for the practice of official extortion and blackmail could
be devised than that afforded by these two sections. They
have been dead letters since I haA'^e been Mayor. I have
forbidden any house to be entered or any search or arrest
to be made under them. It is always easy to get a war
rant from a magistrate to enter a house when necessary.
If no evidence can be found to lay before a magistrate on
oath, that in itself shows that the house should not be
entered. In years gone by the pohce have made use of
these two sections of the charter to assert the right of
forcible entry and visitation and inspection of houses at
vrill. In that way they were able to collect any amount
of money they saw fit, and in fact high officials of the
pohce department one after another, and year after year,
retired millionaires. This is all a matter of history. In
1905 my predecessor appointed a commission to consider
police matters. These two dangerous sections of the
charter were pointed out to that commission, together
Avith the extortion which had long been practised under
them. The result was that the said commission recom
mended their repeal to the Legislature. But they were
not repealed. And now, when I had supposed it was well
known that these two sections of the charter had been
made dead letters, and were no longer in use, the Legis
lature solemnly re-enacts them both in the bill now before
me. Under no circumstances could I be induced to sign
194

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
this biU Avith these two sections in it. We have far more
to fear in this country from the gradual encroachment of
arbitrary power than from all the vices of hquor drinking,
prostitution and gambling combined, if not from all the
vices combined. It must never be forgotten that the exer
cise of arbitrary power brings in its wake sooner or later
all of the vices, and especially the detestable vices of offi
cial oppression, extortion and blackmail.
4. And finally, there is no exigency calhng for this
bill. As a rule all unwise legislation is passed in time of
senseless clamor. Never in thirty years has there been so
httle corruption in the police force as now. And yet some,
who hsten only to public clamor, instead of thinking for
themselves, would have it that corruption is so rife in the
police force that we need to humihate that force by taking
away from them certain of their powers. Of the 10,000 men
on our pohce force there are not 50, probably not 25 cor
rupt ones. During the last year disclosures of the taking of
graft by a few members of the police force during the last
several years were made. They were made in every case
by some one whose corrupt house, whether gambhng house
or worse, had been seized and put out of business by order
of the police commissioner. Some lose sight of the fact
that the disclosures were in this way forced by a strict ad
ministration of the law by the police commissioner. Men
and women who had kept these infamous houses for a
generation, and during that time had tempted and cor
rupted the pohce, were arrested by the police and their
houses were closed as public nuisances. The law makes
every gambling house or house of ill fame a pubhc
nuisance, and the police, or the citizens generally, have a
right to abate it. I caused that law to be revived, and it
is under it that the police take possession of such houses.
From time to time as they have arrested the keepers of
such houses, and taken possession of the houses as pubhc
nuisances, such keepers have threatened to disclose that
they had been paying protection money to the police or
politicians, and in four or five instances such disclosures
195

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
were actually made. In place of the pohce force being
blamed, it should be commended for having caused such
disclosures by the enforcement of the law. One would
think from the clamor that has been raised against the
police commissioner that the police have done nothing in
this matter, but that it was all done by some other per
sons. Rosenthal opened, one after another, twelve
gambling houses within a year. Each one in turn was
seized by the police. After the twelfth one had been
seized, about one year ago, and the police were in pos
session of it, he concluded that he could no longer conduct
his business in the city of New York, and then made dis
closures that he had corrupted a police heutenant, Becker
by name. The same thing happened with Sipp, whose
dirty houses were seized. He made disclosures of graft.
The same thing happened with the women Goode and
Hertz. The same thing happened with a saloon keeper,
and these are all the sources of graft disclosures which we
have had. And the disclosures have been principally of
things that happened many years ago. In place of there
being any dereliction on the part of the police during the
last three years, it was the full performance of duty by
them which brought about these disclosures. In fact, the
two commissioners Avhom I appointed worked from the
beginning to spot the dishonest officers on the force and
get rid of them. In that way we actually got rid of tAvelve
inspectors and captains, and the recent conviction of four
captains raises the number to sixteen. The people of this
city are beginning to perceive the truth of this matter. In
place of their police force having failed, its efficiency was
never at as high a point as it is today, or as it has been
during the last three years. Nor do the police take the
law into their own hands. They proceed against all evil
houses as public nuisances. The character of a house is
proved by those who frequent it. A house to which
gamblers or prostitutes resort is a public nuisance. The
police observe these houses, and then get warrants against
them as public nuisances, and proceed against the pro-
196

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
prietors, and take possession of the houses, and abate the
nuisances. This has noAV been going on for three years,
during which scores of such houses have been permanently
put out of business. It was bound to bring out disclosures
of corruption. I have been surprised that it has not
brought out more. When corrupt disclosures are thus
brought out, the accused officers are indicted and pros
ecuted.

197

A FEW SPEECHES OF
MAYOR GAYNOR
We give here a few of the many
speeches of Mayor Gaynor. They
have been picked out at random from
the typewritten copies of his speeches.
All of his many speeches, excepting
two, since he has been Mayor have been
delivered without notes, extemporane
ously, and most of them almost on the
spur of the moment, and taken by sten
ographers. Sometimes his speeches are
decidedly free and colloquial, and some
times are quite formal and precise, to
suit the occasion. Good humor always,
and sometimes wit, runs through them.
He has made more speeches than any
former Mayor of New York, and it
may be more than all the former
Mayors of New York put together.
Many of his speeches have been de
livered at banquets. All of his speeches
would fill several volumes. They cover
a great variety of topics, and show
that he has studied and thought over
many things.

Mayor Gaynor's Letters and Speeches

PART II— SPEECHES

Personal Reminiscences
(Remarks at the Sons of Oneida Dinner, Hotel Astor, January
28, 1913.)
Gentlemen of the Sons of Oneida : I am very happy
indeed to greet you all. It is very seldom I get a chance
to be toastmaster, but I am President of your society.
I generally have the other end of it. So I will try to be
as good a toastmaster as I know how. From what I have
seen of toastmasters since I have been Mayor I do not
remember a single one to pattern after. As a rule you
cannot get a word in edgewise with them. They say
everything. No matter what your subject is, and no
matter how well you have prepared it, they manage
in some way to say it before you get a chance to
say it. I am not going to do that to-night. I am
going to stick to my own business if I can. I have
a hard time to do that as Mayor, and some think I
do not do it. And a few think I do. Of course I think
the few are right. There are not so many of us sons of
Oneida County, but still we are of good quality. What
we lack in numbers we make up in quality. I do not know
when I have seen so many men together for Avhom I have
so great an affection. There are men here who remind me
of my boyhood days.
Every one of you has some particular idea with regard
to old Oneida County, and what a grand old place it was.
I remember every foot of it. Ea'^cu the streams and creeks
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
in which I fished, in the spring. I could enumerate them
all. The Unadilla. Did you ever hear a prettier name
than the Unadilla? And the Saquoit, and the Oriskany;
and the raging Mohawk, of course I cannot leave that out.
They are making the barge canal of it now, but it is there
yet. And all the places that I can enumerate and the
familiar names, even Verona Springs. There is some one
here from Verona Springs. Who is it? (A voice — " Mr.
Cady." ) That is his name. My father went out to Verona
Springs once and brought home a barrel of sulphur water.
It was to cure us of all the diseases that we had, and to
prevent us from ever having any other. (A voice — " The
judge left the water out in the field and got well.") You
are quite right, Cady, my father put it out in the barn
near the pig pen. (A voice — " What effect did it have on
the pigs?") Well, it smelled so bad that even the pigs
could not stand it. So he took the barrel of sulphur water
and he put it out in the middle of the Dexter lot, a ten-
acre lot on the farm, as far away from the house as we
could get, and we could not stand it even that far away,
Cady, and I think we finally went and knocked the end
of the barrel in and got rid of it. They were trying to
make a watering place of Verona, and that was the result.
Forgive me, Cady, I may be doing you and Verona great
harm. (Mr. Cady — " I forgive you.") All right. Yes, all
sorts of memories. I see Marsh over there. Many a time
I went through Whitesboro and looked at the sign of the
clockmaker Marsh. I guess he was Marsh's grandfather
by the looks of Marsh over there now. I have known him
ever since he has been down here. He may be older than
he looks, but at all events his father, or grandfather, kept
the clock store there. But we cannot go into all these
things. All of you have memories, local ones, as dear as
mine. Of course my closest memory is to the old farm
house. I was calling off names to you a moment ago, but
the name of the place where I saw daylight and spent my
boyhood on the farm was " Skeeterboro," dearest of all.
The origin of the name is too obvious to need me to pause
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to explain it to you. Skeeterboro forever with me. The
next closest memory to me of course is the schooUiouse up
at Skeeterboro. Now, do not imagine that Skeeterboro
was a village or that the houses were close together. We
lived close enough together for peace sake so far as I re
member, but I do not think any of us were within half a
mile of each other. There were the Christies, and the
Marrs, and the Sutliffes and the Paynes, and the Park-
hursts, and so on. Probably it is due to the Parkhurst
family, if there be any of them here, that I say they were
in no way related to Rabbi Parkhurst of New York. He
is a friend of mine. But those were all capital people.
And the schoolhouse, you all have a memory of some little
schoolhouse up there, except those of you who were born
in that great metropolis called Utica. My schoolhouse
on the outside today is just the same as it was when I went
there. It has never been painted to this day. The one
that my mother went to just over the river in the town of
Marcy where she was born and reared was painted red,
and every time I saw it I was struck with awe. But the
one I went to has not had a touch of paint to this day.
They have, however, put the city desks in. In those days
the desks slanted down from the four walls inward, and
then the benches were along in front of the desks, and we
studied our lessons sitting on the benches with our face
to the wall, and then when we were going to recite we
threw our heels over the bench and faced about to the
teacher, and at the same time faced the big stove in the
center of the room that burned the cordwood. And many
a day in the winter have I tramped to that schoolhouse.
And sometimes to get home they had to turn out and
dig out the snow. And how often we had our ears frozen
on the way to school or while out playing, or our faces
frozen even, and when our ears thawed out sometimes they
hung over so that they came down flat almost. I have
one thick ear. I suppose you can see it. But I got that
in a Long Island snowstorm three years ago. I got it
bad that night. It reminded me of Skeeterboro and going
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to school. And then right within three-quarters of a mile
of our farm, and the same distance from the little school-
house is the site of the battle of Oriskany. There is a fine
monument there now showing where that decisive battle
was fought. The result of putting that monument up is
that every person living in that whole country up there
round about knows all about the battle of Oriskany. But
I may as well tell you and. get rid of it, that never in the
schoolhouse or out of the schoolhouse did I ever in my
boyhood hear of the battle of Oriskany. After I came
down here the Oneida County Historical Society put up
this grand monument, and afterwards when I went up
there I Avas surprised to learn that it was so close to the
house in which I was born and the schoolhouse to which I
went to school. And yet it was one of the decisive oc
casions of the Revolutionary War. No one can stand at
the base of that monument now without realizing the mag
nitude of the Revolutionary War. One column was com
ing down from Canada, a British column I mean, through
the Mohawk Valley, and another was coming way around
by the Lakes from Canada, and they were going to meet
on the Hudson at Albany and take possession of the Hud
son River and thereby cut the New England colonies off
from the other colonies, a thing which would have been
fatal to the Revolutionary cause. Herkimer and his
neighbors checked the column which was coming down
through the Mohawk Valley, and Burgoyne (that strange
character who wrote the opera, " The Barber of Seville,"
isn't it? — a strange character) — ^met his fate at Saratoga,
surrendered at Saratoga, and that was the end of that
gigantic scheme of the British. Think of the distances
they traveled in those days. But I will not go into that
subject. I mention the matter more to show the value of
monuments as teachers of history. New England got
ahead of the whole country by early erecting monuments.
The monument at Bennington, the monument at Bunker
Hill, and others. The story of the New England battle
fields was told by monuments from the start. But more
important battles occurred elsewhere, whose story re-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mained untold chiefly because no monuments were erected
to them. Monuments have always been the greatest
teachers of history. When you see a monument you ask
what it means and you learn all about it. So that from
the beginning of the world the monuments have been the
great teachers, and now the monument at Oriskany, the
monument at Saratoga, the little monument to Baron
Steuben, have taught that whole part of the state the great
event of the war which occurred in those localities. Those
were great days. I would like to just say a few more
things but I won't. I was up there a few years ago, five
years ago, I think, the last, and I went through the neigh
borhood where I was born. Every family was gone that
was there when I Avas there except one. Half of the boys
in the school that I went to were Welsh. My chum in the
school was Bill Griffiths. He is alive up there yet, and he
is the only one that I know of. He runs a threshing ma
chine. There is one other Griffith that I have a notion to
name — she is dead and gone — and that was .lane Griffith,
his sister. It didn't happen, but it might have happened.
And I came from the neighborhood and walked down and
through Cider Street. Some of you know where Cider
Street is. It is a country road down to Oriskany. My
home was three miles west of Oriskany and about five
miles from Rome. And I walked down to the little vil
lage cemetery, just before you get into Oriskany, about
sunset, and I went over the stile, and went through the
tombs, the modest tombstones, and there I saw all these
names. Most of them were sleeping there. I would not
like to say that I knelt down, but I certainly was greatly
affected. All of you have experienced the same thing.
There they were sleeping. Those that were not sleeping
had moved off to the west and other places. And I will
tell you before I introduce the speakers what happened
at the last visit as I was on the way up to Skeeterboro.
I was going along the road and I just came to the first lot
of my father's old farm called the Dexter lot, and I met a
man on the road. I could not be mistaken. I went to
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
school with him; but he does not live in Skeeterboro now;
he lives a little way off, near by towards Hampton, and I
knew it was Tom Philhps as soon as I saw him. There
may be some here that remember the Philhps family.
And I bade him good day, and he bid me good day, and
spit more or less tobacco juice on the road, and we sat
on the fence and talked, and he told me finally he was in
much trouble. He didn't know who I was — I was then
a Justice of the Supreme Court; and he said he was in
much trouble and I says, what is it? Well, he says, not
long ago I went down to Oriskany one Saturday night
and I got rather high. We never said drunk up there.
We always said we got high. That is an Oneida County
expression and it is used elsewhere. And he said a chap
down there, I got into a fight with him, and he gave me a
good hcking. Oh, he says, he beat me bad. Well, I
says, what of that? Yes, he says, but he came up here
about a month afterwards and I met him on the road and
I went for him and I gave him a good hcking. So I says,
what of that? That is an every day occurrence up here,
or used to be. Well, he says, he wasn't satisfied, but he
went up to Rome to the District Attorney and got me
indicted. He says, I have thirteen children and, I think
he said, ten cows. And he says I see no way except to
sell a couple of cows and hire a laAvyer to defend me, and
that goes pretty hard with me. I talked it over with him
and we finally parted. He did not know who I was, but
when I got home to Brooklyn I sat doAvn and Avrote a
letter to the District Attorney at Rome and told him
poor Tom's case and the trouble he was in, and it is need
less to say that Tom did not have to sell his two cows to
hire a lawyer. He was fortunate enough to meet a lavs^er
on the road. I wrote the District Attorney and told him
about some of the ancient customs up in that county. I
told him the whole story as Tom gave it to me, but I wrote
also in the letter that when I was a boy up there such
things as that never happened; that if a fellow got licked
he never went up to Rome to indict anybody for we had
206

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES.
an ancient custom among us that before we entered into a
fight we always said, " say no law and I will lick you."
Then if the other fellow said " no law " that meant that
the laAV was off, and however the battle went there was to
be no law suit and no indictment. I said to him in my let
ter that I did not know whether poor Tom observed this
ancient custom or not, but however it may be I hoped he
would be as lenient with him as possible. But that was
the custom when I lived up there. When we wanted to
battle we said to the other fellow, " say no law and I AAdll
lick you," and if he was brave enough he said, " no law,"
and then we had it out, and settled it right there, and there
was no law afterwards. I would like to have that custom
doAvn here. If we had it there are two or three fellows
down here that own nasty newspapers, and I would like
to have it out with them on that basis. I don't want to
boast because I am growing old, but I really think I
could do them up. They may think they can do me up
with their dirty pens, but I think I could do them up the
other way. I think I have sand enough left in me for
that, and it would not require much either, to tell the truth.
Now there is old Skeeterboro for you. There are other
things I could talk about but some of them would be mel
ancholy, and some of them would be a twice told tale. I
would like to be there again. I would like to go out and
gather the beechnuts in the fall and do many things that
we used to do in those days. Now you see I am forget
ting that I am only the toastmaster. I might as well say
when I got through with Skeeterboro I came down to
Utica, and I stayed there and studied and kept as still as
I could for about a year and a half or two years. I
thought Utica was a wonderful place. And finally I got
ready to leave Utica also. So I went doAAm to the trunk
store and bought me a good big trunk. And I had my
name painted on one end of it. I never expected to come
back to Utica either. I had my name painted on the end
of it, and big letters under it, " Utica, N. Y." I thought
that would give me recognition wherever I went. But I
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
only got a very little ways off from Utica before nobody
knew who I was, and I didn't get much further away be
fore nobody knew or cared anything about Utica. So I
shook the dust of Utica off my feet. But we have with
us here to-night one who is a great figure in Utica. He
was there when I was there. We all looked up to him.
If there was anything requiring public spirit in the place
we turned to him as the Mussulman turns towards Mecca
when he wants to say his prayers, or thinks he does, which
is the same thing. And that was my old friend T. R.
Proctor, of Utica. We will have a few words from Mr.
Proctor. Abuse of OfHcials
(Speech at the Dinner of the Citizens' Association, Bay Ridge,
April 17, 1913.)
Mr. Chairman and FelloAV Citizens: I thank the
chairman for his kind introduction. He said that he hesi
tated about saying much that was good of me, because he
loiew I would not like to listen to it. It may be that is
so, or maybe I would like to listen to it; but the fact is I
very seldom get the chance to listen to anything good of
me. I have grown so used to being spoken ill of that it
does not sound right when anybody says anything good
of me. I feel as though there was something the matter.
I think it is Macaulay who says, speaking of the habits of
the ancient Germans in the time of Caesar, when they were
excessive drinkers. He says that they drank so hard and
were so continuously drunk that if they happened to get
sober they thought they were sick. And so it is with my
self. I have been abused so much that when anybody like
your Chairman here says something good of me I think
there must be something the matter with me. I feel sick. I
think the Comptroller here at my right feels a httle bit
that Avay too, because for the last year or so he has not
been dealt with any too gently either by some of these
abusers of me, particularly about the subways. But it is
all over, and I hope well over. I come here really because
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
your Chairman asked me to come, and I knew of no way
to say no. We see him over in the Board of Estimate
pretty often. We almost wind the clock over there by
him, his comings in and goings away are so regular; but
he always has something to say that is helpful. He
doesn't come over to abuse us or annoy us. We sit there
sometimes and hear ourselves compared to Tweed and
ancient malefactors who left a bad memory after them.
For instance, the day that we passed the subway busi
ness, finally, we all sat up there in a row, and we kept as
still and as square faced as we could while five people
spoke. I think they were sent up by the Hearst news
paper office. The Comptroller is helping me out. But I
was going to say just what he suggested to me. He is
not able to remember, and neither am I that any one of
them was quite sane. Those are the kind of people that
Hearst generally sends up to talk to us. Now and then
the two little Pulitzers help add to the number, and send
up two or three puny little fellows like themselves to tell
us what to do. ' But on this particular occasion they
called us Tweed and all the malefactors that have pre
ceded us for 50 years, and we let them all talk. And
one of them went back to the rear of the hall, and when
everybody had said all he wanted to say, he said, well, I
have this to say anyhow, that this is the first time in my
life that I was allowed to express my opinion fully. But
others come over there to help us, and others do help us.
I suppose you all help us. Do you? I am looking
around to see if I can see somebody to blame, but I don't
see anyone it so happens. That is what we need in office.
We need a good word, now and then, even though we do
not deserve it. It makes us feel better. And disposes us
to do better. You want to treat your public officials with
common decency. We do not ask to be coddled. We do
not invite everybody to agree with us in our opinion. On
the contrary we give public hearings when the law does
not require it, so as to give the citizens an opportunity to
express their honest opinions ; and as I whisper to my as-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
sociates next to me now and then when a bumptious fel
low gets up to talk to us " Now, this fellow will let a great
flood of hght in on us, or possibly we can let a little ray
of light in on him." That is the way we consider it. But
the citizens can be very helpful to our officials by exercis
ing patience and intelligence. Mere abuse is no good.
We have received infinite help in the large things which
we have done since we came into office from the different
associations throughout the city like yours. You have
sent delegations. Sometimes you have differed from us.
Sometimes you agree with us. But in either case you
helped us, because your difference was honest, and your
help was honest. But when things degenerate into mere
abuse and into party animosity — I won't say party ani
mosity, but little partisan animosity — ^then you can get
very little good out of government. When you put peo
ple into office that settles it. From that hour on you
want to help them. It is not a party matter at all. It is
a matter of good government. And now if you will
allow me to leave myself out of the case just for one mo
ment I beg to say that looking all over this country at the
cities and the States, and looking over Europe so far as I
am familiar with Europe, from the Comptroller and the
Borough Presidents, to the heads of departments of the
city, there is not a more competent body of men anywhere
to be found so far as I know. Mr. Pounds told me this
evening, and it is all right. Pounds, for me to mention it,
that he was at some dinner lately and the man next to hun
asked him if he was a college graduate, and he said yes,
and the man laughed, and he said, well I didn't think there
was a college graduate in the whole city government. Just
think of a miserable little coot like that. Why, he wasn't
decent enough to know who the members of the city gov
ernment were. That was what was the matter with him,
and there are too many like him, when the truth is, if
you take the elected officers of this city, which are three
in number, and then the Borough Presidents, and then the
heads of departments of the city, seven-tenths of them
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
are college graduates and men of the highest standing.
Most of them were men of large business themselves, com
petent men, scholars, and gentlemen. Why, it does me
good when I look at them. I wish we had the whole out
fit in this room to-night. They are a good looking lot of
fellows too: Present company excepted. Mr. Cleary
says he saw me down at Richmond at the waterways con
vention. I was there. I was at Washington at another
convention similar to that, and in other parts of the coun
try at similar conventions. I was not thinking about what
he has been talking about, that some people there knew me
by repute to some extent; but what did me good at all of
these places that I have attended was to see some of our
city officials here get up and make speeches on subjects that
were enlightening to these conventions. That is what did
me good — ^to let those people get the sight of an official of
the city of New York. Why, some of our newspapers
here would lead the rest of the country to think that those
in office here are a lot of thugs. They are pictured as
thugs in the papers, some of them even with balls and
chains on their legs ; and we must not blame the rest of the
country if they think there is some truth in that, although
I hope we have said enough in the last year or two to make
the whole country sit up and take notice that we have some
newspapers here that are utterly unworthy of belief in
any respect whatever. They are that because their pro
prietors are that. When you get a low bred newspaper
you have got a low bred proprietor behind it. Blood will
tell in everything. But I will not go on at length. I
arose only to say a few words. You have a long toast list.
I came here more to thank the people of this locality for
the assistance they have rendered us with regard to the
docks, with regard to the subways, and with regard to
other things that we are doing. There is no use bringing
up things that are past. We have had a hard struggle
with some things, but we have worked them out the best
we knew how. This must be said, however, in any gov
ernment, however intelligent or however good it is — and
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
I allude to government of course among a free people —
however good and intelligent it may be, most of what is
done that is timely and good originates not hi the gov
ernment itself but from the outside. Government after
all only registers the will of the people within the law. I
have no patience at all — I may as well say it plainly —
with those elected to office who come in saying that they
are going to do whatever the people want. That is no
way to enter into office. The way to enter into office is
with the intention of doing what the law requires, and
then within the law, the people can express what they
want, and help to carry it out. All the public works of
the city, subway, docks, or what not, are things with which
the intelligent people are familiar. It is for them to orig
inate things, and then come forward to the government
and suggest them and carry them out, and in that respect
we have received as much assistance as we have any reason
to expect. You live over here in a growing neighborhood.
Some people are always saying that they wish the city to
grow rapidly, and all the vacant spaces to be filled in. I
know all those who own vacant real estate are very much
of that point of view. They want a subway in every
street. But that really is not the view to take of it. The
city ought to grow normally. We have no reason for
rushing it, or hurryhig it. Our duty is simply to keep up
with the growth of the community, and to do the things
required for the comfort of the community. Lincoln
often said that all he professed to do was to keep up with
the people. He did not rate himself a political leader.
He said, " I manage to keep up with the procession."
That was his homely way of saying it. That meant that
he had absolute reliance in the judgment and intelligence
of the people; and when he said people he did not mean
every fellow with no visible means of support and with a
patch on his trousers. That is not what he meant. But
he meant the intelhgent people, the good people, the just
people, who constitute the spine of society and keep so
ciety in order. We realize all that in what Ave have been
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
doing amidst the abuse. We realize the inestunable bene
fit which societies like this here to-night are to the city
when they are directed right, when they are patient, and
when they come forward not to scold but to help. The
scolding element in the community is not a very large one,
but the few scolders there are among us make more noise
than all the rest of us. Dr. Parkhurst and this clergy
man over here in Brooklyn who says that Brooklyn is the
vestibule of hell, make more noises than all the other
clergymen in the city, don't they? And yet the others are
all working and helping and doing the best they can for
society and abusing nobody. If they see something
Avrong they come forward and talk to us, and help and call
attention to it. But noise, no. " Still waters run deep."
Or, as the saying is, " the shallows murmur when the deeps
are dumb," and to use one more expression, one stridulent
grasshopper in the angle of a fence makes more noise than
the noble herd nearby. Pious Dr. Parkhurst. Bilious
Dr. Parkhurst. He thinks he is pious when he is only
bilious. Self sufficient, all sufficient, insufficient Dr.
Parkhurst. Forgive me, but he is a man of vast and
varied misinformation, of brilliant mental iwcapacity and
of prodigious moral requirements. These people make
much noise but do no good. Their hearts are filled with
evil. They love nobody. They do not want to help the
Comptroller. They do not want to help the Mayor.
They do not want to help anybody. They want to find
fault for their own exploitation and sensation. Now
these people we forgive of course, twice a day. We for
give them but we desire to have nothing to do with them.
But people like you who help us and take us by the hand
and show that whatever your hope is, or whatever your
prejudices are, you still have an honest heart. People
hke that we welcome every hour in the day. The latch
string of the City Hall and the Comptroller's office and
in all of the offices hangs out for people like you all the
time.

213

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
The "Single Tax"
(Speech at the Lower Rents Exhibit, 29 Union Square, February
17, 1913.)
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: I came up at the re
quest of Mr. Ingersoll, just to say a few words. I have
known him for many years, and he has long worked in
and taught these matters. Rent is caused by population.
Where there is no population there is no rent ; and where
the population becomes congested rent becomes high. The
congestion of population produces more evils than high
rent. It produces all sorts of physical and moral evils, as
you see in this city here. Why should these congestions
of population exist? I may ask. There is plenty of room
in the world. All the people on this globe if collected
here could stand up in the city of New York and each one
would have two feet square to stand on, if I remember
right. So you see the people of the world in proportion
to land space are not so many after all. And they could
all be put in the State of Texas and have about two or
three acres apiece, I don't remember exactly. And yet
these congestions of population occur here and there aU
over the world, and create many social and physical dis
orders, as well as this high rent which you proclaim
against. Your object is to reduce rents. How do you
go about reducing rents? Why, there is only one way to
reduce rents — or two ways, rather. One is to disperse
the population; the other way is to increase the number
of houses all the time, and make supply match or exceed
demand. Rent depends on supply and demand of houses.
Some people think that rents rise as taxes rise. Some
people think that all a landlord has to do is to add his
taxes to his rents. But these things are not so. Taxes
may be going up while rents are going down. I saw
the time in Brooklyn when we were paying a rate of $3
in the 100 for taxes, and yet rents did not go up while
the taxes were going up. They went down, and were far
lower than over here where the tax rate was much lower.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
You cannot increase rents by high taxes, except in an in
direct way. If taxes are so onerous on the buildings that
people stop erecting buildings, why then you have a
scarcity of houses and buildings ; and in that indirect way
there may be an increase in rents brought about under the
rule of supply and demand. Now, these are first prin
ciples that I am talking to you about. And yet here I
am in the presence of the philosophers on this subject. I
suppose you will listen to me with impatience expecting
me to launch out into something new on the subject.
There is nothing new. You single taxers have developed
the whole case, so far as I know. I have heard you here
and there. If you have not made as much progress as
you think you should have made I think I can state one
reason for it. In your speeches and writings in years
past you have been a httle too cock-sure. Some of you
have been acrimonious. Some of you say you think other
people are very dense and ignorant because they do not
think as you do. In other words, you try to ram your
theories down the throats of people before they are ready
to receive them, the same as they feed Strasburg geese to
make their hvers swell. No one ever succeeded that way.
Frankhn treats on that in his Autobiography. He says
the way to convince a man is to express a little doubt about
it yourself. Just shake your head, and wag it a few
times to this side and then to that, and may be shrug one
shoulder and then the other, and say, " Well, it seems so
to me, but I am not clear and may be wrong about it."
And then the other fellow will take it all in, and turn
around and try to convince you. That is the way to con
vince people. I am sure some of your orators do not
adopt that method, because I have listened to them now
and then. This single tax question has been now widely
discussed all over the world. The phrase " single tax " I
never thought any too happy. The object is to concen
trate all taxation on the land. Now, to uninitiated people
who are listening to me that means on the land and build
ings and improvements. But it doesn't mean any such
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
thing. Your theory is that the taxes should be put on
the bare land alone, and that the buildings and houses and
improvements should all go free of taxation. That in a
word is the so-called George theory. I may express it
otherwise by saying that your theory of taxation is to ab
sorb all ground rents into the public treasury by way of
taxation ; that is to say, the rental value of the bare ground,
without anything on it. Never mind the buildings, you
say, but tax the land up to its rental value, and get the
whole ground rent into the pubhc treasury as a tax. Here
is a bare lot. Well, it has a rental value, or it has none.
If it is worth anything it has a rental value of, say, 4 per
cent., or 5 per cent., of such value. If the lot is worth
say, $1,000, then presumably it has a rental value of 4
per cent, of $1,000, or 5 per cent., and that should all be
levied as a tax according to your theory. And then here
is another lot with a building on it, a lot worth $5,000, say,
and the building worth $10,000. Well if the place is taxed
$500 under the present system of taxation, that means that
two-thirds of it is on the building and the other third on
the land. Your theory would distinguish between the
building and the land and find out the value of the land,
the lot, and tax that according to its ground rent, and no
more, so as to draw the whole ground rent into the treas
ury, and let the building go free. Now, that is the theory.
But every man out of one hundred that you speak to on
this subject thinks you mean to tax the buildings and the
land, which is not the theory at all. All buildings, all im
provements, being done by the hand of man, let that all go
free and tax only the land which God made, according to
its rental value. .The rental value is not created by the
owner, but by the growth of population, by society at
large, and therefore belongs not to any individual, but to
society at large. That is your theory. And you say that
that would produce revenue enough to pay all the ex
penses of government. I do not know whether that is
true or not. I have never run it out carefully enough to
know. I did once run it out in the city of Brooklyn Avhen
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the taxes were high there, and as near as I could make out
the taxes being paid there were equivalent to the ground
rent of the whole city. I thought so, yet I may have been
mistaken. I mean that if the total tax were taken it was
equivalent to all the ground rent in the city at that time.
Now, the taking of the ground rent by taxation may be a
perfect system of taxation, as philosophers and econo
mists admit the world over. But there is a difficulty
about it. You know things in this world are not always
ideal. And it is pretty hard to get them ideal. I know
they are not ideal with me. I have a pretty tough time
of it. You have to deal with all sorts of minds and con
ditions, and they do not produce the ideal. They produce
a sort of average, and that average is very often a pretty
poor one. But we have this great satisfaction, that it is
getting better in the world all the time. The average of
things grows steadily better year by year all over the
world, I think, and particularly here. The difficulty that
I perceive about putting your system of taxation into
operation is this, namely, that you cannot do it now with
out injustice. If society had started in that way, it
would have been easy. But now it is difficult to change
without doing injustice. We have to admit that the value
of the naked land is created not by the fellow who has his
foot on it and owns it, but by the increase of population
and industry all around it. Why, within the last few
years in this city the lands over in Queens and over in
Brooklyn in the outskirts which sold from $100 to $500
an acre are selling for more than that per lot, 20 feet
front. You have to pay more for a lot than those who
bought up these lands paid by the acre when they bought
them. They have not done anything to it; it is the same
bare land. But you and I and the rest of us who want to
buy a lot always have to pay that increased price, although
we created it ourselves. We do not get it by the acre.
Others buy it by the acre and sit down on it until popula
tion increases around it, and gives it an increased value,
and then you and I pay these high prices for the land
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and we build a house on it. So that if the theory of ab
sorbing all the ground rent is put into force at once, why,
John the butcher and Wilham the baker, and those who
bought these lands and built on them are the ones that
would suffer. Whoever has the land has to suffer. Be
cause to absorb by taxation the whole ground rent of the
land would destroy the value of the land. Now, it is very
easy to say that the present method is unjust — that inas
much as society, not the owner, creates values of the bare
land, society should own these values and have the benefit
of them by taking them uito the treasury by taxation as
I have described. Now, as a moral proposition you would
have to cudgel your head a good deal to get away from
that. But the trouble is to put it in force without doing
injury to everybody who has bought land on the present
baisis. It would, in fact, be a confiscation of the land.
There is no doubt about that. We may as well speak
plain about it. I am speaking of the bare land, mind.
So it all comes down to this, namely, in place of adopting
at the beginning this system of absorbing the ground rents
by taxation, society by universal consent, or by the con
sent of the majority, adopted a different system, and has
lived by it up to the present time; and the rule is that
when society does a thing, creates a condition, although
that condition is not ideal, or not even right, economically,
nevertheless society should not suddenly change from that
condition if it thereby wrongs a great many people, or
most people, or even a respectable minority of people.
What society creates and suffers ^.nd builds up, society
must bear. If one of you went over to Queens county
and bought a lot for $1,000, whereas the man you bought
of bought the whole tract for only $100 an acre, for us to
put your system of taxation into A^ogue now would destroy
your lot; and your $1,000 is wiped out Avith one stroke;
because land, you know, has no value except what value
the ground rent gives it, its usable value, its rentable
value. And when that is all absorbed into the treasury
your land is there, to be sure, but your $1,000 is not there.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
It is wiped out. You have got your foot on the lot yet, but
in place of being worth $1,000 it is not worth $1. So that
the difficulty is to put in force this system of yours. I
refrain from arguing it either pro or con. All I need say
is that I have tried to keep up with it as I have with all
else in the world that has been happening under my nose.
I believe I have not been afraid to look into anything. I
never condemn a man because he has something new in his
head, or thinks he has ; and somethnes they only think they
have, you know. I say to him, " You are the man I have
been looking for, what is it you have in your head? Let
us talk. Maybe I can let a little light into your head, or
you can let a great flood of hght into mine." I had the
first edition of Henry George's book, and I have it yet.
And while I was forced to admit that the system of taxa
tion it advocates was ideal, I could not concur in his chap
ter which advocated the putting of it in force at once, and
thereby confiscating all the individual or private property
in land which society by the present system had built up.
And society has done the best it could, as all sorts of in
terests and all sorts of minds have settled on this method
of private OAvnership of land, and of the buildings being
considered a part of the land, and of the taxation being on
the land and buildings together. Mr. Ingersoll wrote me
and tells me that your object here is to further your
propaganda, but only gradually, namely, to lessen year
by year the valuation of the buildings on land, one twenty-
fifth this year, one twenty-fifth next year, and so on. In
that gradual way you see that in 25 years you would have
ehminated the buildings entirely, and all the tax would
fall on the land. So in place of kilhng at one stroke my
friend over in Queens who paid $1,000 for his lot you
would kill hun gradually, one twenty-fifth each year,
and m 25 years they have got him all done up. They say
you would not feel it, it would be done so gradually. Now
I have no objection to having this matter discussed here
or elsewhere, and to join in. I have concealed nothing of

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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
my own opinions since I have been Mayor. A man told
me last Thursday, he said, " Don't you go up to that place
and talk on this subject. It will hurt you." I told him
I was ready to be hurt, but that I did not think it would
hurt me at all, that nobody ever hurt himself by having
an open mind and being ready to consider and discuss
things that concern human kind. I do not know whether
you can bring it about. I do know that the chapter in
Mr. George's book that proposed to do it right off the reel
on the ground that all injustice should be remedied forth
with did not commend itself to me. While I might be
wilhng to bear it myself I cannot help saying that many
people would have a gross injustice done to them by put
ting into immediate operation any such system. But this
method of gradually doing it is not open to the full force
of that objection. If you can do it so gradually and so
slyly that we neither feel it nor knoAV it, why it may be we
had better let you go ahead and do it. I don't think we
will object very loud if we do not feel it or if it does not
pinch us or do us any harm. Now, how could it do good,
you ask me, to remove the tax on buildings and concen
trate it all on the land on which the buildings stand and
the bare land not yet occupied? Why, they say it would
do it this way; and it brings me back to what I said at
the start. If buildings were no longer taxed that would
stimulate people to build buildings; but when you clap a
tax on buildings then people are not in a hurry to build
them. They have to calculate it all out and see where
they are coming out, where they can get the rents to pay
interest and taxes. But if buildings were freed from
taxes there would be more buildings put up ; and the more
buildings put up the lower rents Avould be. So I am back
now at the quitting point, that is to say, I am back to my
starting point — that rents of buildings depend on supply
and demand; therefore, any system of taxation which
stimulates the building of buildings, which multiplies the
number of buildings, automatically and necessarily lowers

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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
rents ; and it seems that is what you are driving at, to get
lower rents. So go ahead. If you can do it I am satis
fied; but whether I have helped you any by coming up
here I do not knoAV. International Peace March 22, 1910.
Gentlemen of the American Peace and Arbitration
League: The civilization of the West seems to be
reaching that point in its slow development along the lines
of the precepts of Christianity when as a matter of hu
manity, or, it may be, only of self-interest, or, it may be,
of both, it is calhng for universal international peace, and
especially peace between the West and the East. We
have to ask ourselves in a sober Christian spirit whether
this can ever come about until the civilization of the West
first recognize that the East has a civilization also. We
shall never establish peace Avith the East by persisting in
the unkindness of calling it uncivilized. No universal
peace can be based on a bigoted or uncharitable conception
by our civilization of theirs. That the civilization of the
East is different to ours will not justify us in continuing
to call the East uncivilized. It has a civilization all its
own, a thousand years older than ours, and though quite
different to ours, we ought in Christian charity to be able
to perceive all, yea, the very much, that is good in it. The
East was civilized, was learned in the sciences, schooled
in philosophy and the precepts of virtue, and had the ele
gancies of life, including a splendid architecture, when our
ancestors still ran naked in the woods and lived in holes in
the ground. Our OAVn sacred literature we borrowed or
took from the East. All of it, Old Testament and New,
was written by Asiatics, with the possible exception of the
Gospel according to John. The civilization of the East
may not have progressed, and may to some extent have
retrograded, in the last thousand years. That depends,
however, on the point of view of Avhat civilization is. From
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
being warlike, the nations of the East generally during
that period of time became unwarlike and peaceful na
tions, in fact, non-resistent on principle, hke our Quakers,
while the Christian nations of the West have continued
warhke and aggressive all the while, most of the time in
the name of Christianity itself, even when warring vrith
one another. The constant aggressions of the West upon
the peaceful and unwarlike East, instigated by commercial
enterprise, if not commercial greed, have been invariably
in the name of Christianity. We have taken possession
of their choicest provinces and their best ports. And now
in the progress of time we call for universal peace.
Whether it is within God's Providence that the long
gathering resentment engendered by Europe's trespasses
on the Eastern nations can be allayed without war unless
amends and restitution be first made, is a matter for sober
thought. Let us hope and pray that justice be done, and
that lasting compromises and adjustments be made, so
that there be no need to resort to war for the redress of
wrongs. That the mind of the East is receding from the
ethical precepts which made it non-combatant is now mani
fest. Japan has already completely given them up, and
emerged as a mighty combatant Avith the nations of the
West. We are now pleased to say that she has become
civihzed and taken her place among the civihzed nations
of the West; not because she has adopted the precepts of
Christianity, or the fundamental precepts of our civiliza
tion, or abandoned any of her OAvn, for she has not; but,
it would seem, only because she has resorted to the use of
gunpowder as strong and cannon as large as our own.
The slow growth of the precepts of Him of Peace who
walked and taught beneath the bended pahns of Palestine
2,000 years ago, may now at last in the slow progress of
time be inspiring the nations of the West to advocate and
proclaim peace on earth and good Avill to all men and all
nations. Let us hope that the spirit of war and aggres
sion may not be aroused and grow up in the East while it
is decaying and disappearing in the West. Let us do our
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
part to avoid it by seeing that Christian charity and justice
be done to the East by the West, so that the peaceful
spirit of a thousand years in the East may be retained in
conjunction with the same growing spirit in the West, to
the end that around the world there shall be a universal
peace, founded on the universal brotherhood of all men
and all nations. West and East, undisturbed by the acri
mony of religious tenet or national or racial arrogance.
Though Christianity has done much it has been a slow
growth. It took nearly 2,000 years of Christianity to
strike the shackle from the slave. When it examines its
own slow history, no reason will be found to view other
civihzations otherwise than in the spirit of toleration and
peace. This spirit alone can bring universal peace on
earth. The Tariff, High Prices and Gold
(Speech delivered February 8, 1912.)
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen: The question before
the country is not one of free trade, but of levying our
tariff on imports in a way which while it raises a sufficient
rcA^enue Avill work the least injury and do the most good
to the people of the country as a whole. That idea took
root among us when we were still British colonies
strugghng for independence, and has grown ever since.
No doubt it has branched out, now and again, into abuses
and into favoritism by law to individuals or classes, which
is the worst of all abuses in government. It is these abuses
we want to do away Avith, and that is the issue.
Tarut Changes Need to Be Gradual and Prudent
But we may not prudently entertain the notion of
doing away with our immense tariff structure at one
stroke. In that way we would create disorder and panic,
and do great harm to honest business and honest people.
Our tariff system has been long in the building — even from
colonial days, as I have said. To pull it down all at once
would be a revolution, and lead to great disasters. When
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
society creates any system by law, and especially after it
has fostered it for a long time, and every one has con
formed to it, society should not do away with it except in a
way so well considered and gradual as to do no unreason
able harm to individuals and to the community. Even a
tethered bull who has wound around his stake while
grazing until he has brought his nose up against it, has to
slowly unwind again sooner than tear his nose to pieces in
an effort to get away.
History of Building Up of Our Tariff System
I say our tariff system again, for system it is. It may
serve a purpose amidst so much talk to see how our tariff
system, with all of its favoritisms, injustices and crudities,
hasgradually grown up. It is the result of repeated votes
of the country on the question. There are signs of a real
izing sense throughout the country that we have gone to
extremes and ought to recede.
After we had achieved independence as a nation, one
of our first aspirations was not to remain dependent on
foreign countries for manufactured articles. The people
of the colonies had been subjected to that condition — had
been admonished that they should be agriculturists and
depend on the mother country for manufactured goods —
and were much averse to it. That was one of their griev
ances. Hence we find that the tariff law of 1789 — the
first passed after the adoption of the constitution — was
drawn for protection as well as to raise revenue. The next
tariff act, that of 1794, went still further in the direction
of protection against foreign imports and in favor of our
small struggling home industries. The tariff act of 1816
continued in the same direction. And so it went on with
out much if any objection until after 1830, when some
States and locahties began to strongly object that since
they were solely agricultural they were receiving no bene
fit from this tariff system. The matter was brought into
party contentions in that way. There followed some re
duction of tariff duties. The tariff act of 1857 went in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that direction and made wool free. The commercial hard
times which ensued made the tariff question still more
acute. It became more than ever a party question. But
the extremes to which tariff taxation was to attain later
were not then thought of. I do not suppose that Hamilton,
and later Clay, who favored a reasonable protection, ever
foresaw the unscientific extremes it was to grow to.
War Tariffs
In 1861 the so-called Morrill Tariff Act was passed.
It was based on the principle of protection. During the
Civil War duties were put on and raised to get more
revenue, but also with an eye to protection. The Act of
1864 went still further, and into high protection, by which
I mean more than the protection of American wages.
After the close of the war manufacturers had grown so
used to high protective tariffs that they loudly objected
to any proposal to reduce them. These tariffs did more
than protect wages — ^they added to profits. The Act of
1883 continued in the line of high protection. In the Til-
den presidential campaign the Democratic platform de
clared that all Custom House taxation should be for rev
enue only, and he won, so great was the dissatisfaction
with tariffs that were deemed unconscionable. Cleveland
was elected eight years later, namely, in 1884. His party
won not so much on the tariff, or any other issue, it may
be, as on things that entered into the personal honesty of
the two candidates, for the vote was a close one. On ac
count of certain things in the past career of Mr. Blaine,
he was unacceptable to a large number in his own party.
When Mr. Cleveland ran the second time the issue was
distinctly on the protective tariff, but he was beaten. My
own observation at the time was that many Democrats
feared that Mr. Cleveland really Avanted free trade, and
were not ready to go so far, and that he Avas beaten in
that way. During the ensuing Republican administration
under President Harrison, the McKinley Tariff Act was
passed. It went to the extreme of high protection, and
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
alarmed and ahenated those who no more wanted the ex
treme of protection than the extreme of free trade. At
the next election Mr. Cleveland came in as President
again on the issue of tariff reduction. Then followed the
Wilson Tariff Act. It was the result of compromises. It
was found that Democratic Representatives and Senators
from' States having protected interests were not always
vrilhng to give up such protection. I need only mention
the case of sugar, Avithout raking up the scandal which
grew out of the defeat by the votes of Democratic Rep
resentatives and Senators of the proposal to put it on the
free hst. What occurred during that Congress made men
see how largely this tariff question is local and selfish.
When the Repubhcans came in at the next election under
McKinley the Dingley Tariff Act was passed. Like the
McKinley Act it was based on high protection. We have
since had the Pajme Act, which follows the McKinley
and Dingley Acts. It is not easy to say that the tariff
question had any influence in the last three Presidential
elections. They were comphcated by other issues, that of
joint metalhc money being paramount and controlling in
at least one of them.
Should Not Create Favoritism or Injustice
This review suffices to remind us that the question
which confronts us is not one of free trade, but of a judi
cious but firm reduction of the tariff. All of its extremes
should be cut out. Free trade is a long way off. We must
have sufficient revenue, and, therefore, an import tariff
tax. But it should be so apphed as to produce no injus
tice or favoritism.
Let us then stand to the assertion of principle that we
recognize no excuse for a protective tariff on any article
except to protect the American workingman from having
his wages run down to the level of wages in the country
which produces that article. When a tariff tax goes be
yond this, the excess should be cut off. Such excess does
not benefit the workingman. It makes every one pay to
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
aggrandize a few. It is a scandalous thing to have a tariff
tax on manufactured articles so high as to enable the man
ufacturer of such articles in this country to sell them
abroad at a profit at a price lower than is exacted in this
country. And we must stand to this further principle, namely,
that, except for revenue only, there is no excuse at all for a
tariff tax on imported articles which, from peculiarities of
soil or chme, or any other special and abiding cause, we
cannot produce at all, or cannot produce enough of them
for our consumption. If our lands are generally of so high
a grade, for instance, that they are put to a more profitable
use than sheep raising, and therefore we do not and in the
nature of things will not produce wool enough for our own
use, then there should be no tariff on wool, unless out of
necessity for revenue. And so on all down the list.
Enlightened Judgment of Country to Decide
Let the question be submitted to the enlightened judg
ment of the country. Mark well that public opinion on
the subject has now groAvn to be stronger than mere party
opinion. I feel that I am not mistaken in this.
President McKinley saw plainly that the gathering
sentiment of the nation would not put up any longer with
a protective tariff which goes beyond protection to Ameri
can wages, and was preparing to yield thereto. Let me
quote what he said in his speech at the Buffalo Exposition
immediately before his unfortunate assassination :
" We must not repose in fancied security that
we can forever sell everything and buy httle or
nothing. If such a thing were possible, it would
not be best for us or for those Avith whom we deal.
We should take from our customers such of their
products as we can use Avithout harm to our indus
tries and labor. Reciprocity is the natural out-
groAvth of our wonderful industrial development
under the domestic pohcy now firmly estabhshed.
What we produce beyond our domestic consump-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
tion must have a vent abroad. The excess must be
reheved through a foreign outlet, and we should
sell anywhere we can and buy wherever the buying
Avill enlarge our sales and productions, and thereby
make a greater demand for home labor. The pe
riod of exclusiveness is past. The expansion of our
trade and commerce is the pressing problem. Com
mercial wars are unprofitable. A policy of good
will and friendly trade relations will prevent re
prisals. Reciprocity treaties are in harmony with
the spirit of the times. Measures of retahation are
not. If perchance some of our tariffs are no longer
needed for revenue or to encourage and protect
our industries at home, why should they not be
employed to extend and promote our markets
abroad?"
Pubhc opinion is now ripe for the change. Let us not
disappoint it. Let us go with it. I do not say let us lead
it. Enlightened pubhc opinion in this country is such
that the statesman does enough who divines it, keeps up
with it and conforms to it.
High Prices
The kindred subject which you have assigned to me
in connection vrith the tariff is that of high prices. Now,
of course, a protective tariff raises prices. That is what
it is designed for. That is the reason why it is levied. But
in view of the complaint about present high prices, it
should in justice be pointed out that our tariff is not wholly
responsible therefor. The tariff is not responsible for the
extent to which prices have risen since 1896, which, I be
lieve, was the year in which the present rise in prices set
in. The rise since that year has been general in Europe
as well as here. The cause, Avhatever it is, is world-Avide.
It cannot therefore be said to be the tariff in this country.
Moreover, as the tariff did not produce these high prices
in former years, there seems to be no reason to lay them
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to the tariff now. The protective tariff is undoubtedly re
sponsible for the raising of prices. But there are other
causes. May I also suggest that it would be an interesting
study to find out whether prices have risen most on pro
tected or unprotected articles since 1896.
The Trusts and Prices
We must therefore look to other causes for present
high prices. Some lay them to what we call the trusts — a
word which I wish we could get rid of, for it is very vague,
and very few seem to know just what it means. A trust
means a combination into one partnership or under one
management, as a business unit, of all, or of a predominant
number, of the corporations engaged in any particular
manufacture. The first combinations of this kind were
called trusts, because they were formed under trust agree
ments, there then being no statute to enable them to form.
The first we know of were the sugar trust and the oil
trust. All of the 16 sugar refinery corporations combined
under an agreement by which trustees were appointed to
run them all as a business unit, instead of their being run
separately and in competition as theretofore. Under the
agreement the stock holders in the refinery corporations
surrendered their stock to these trustees, who issued them
trust certificates therefor instead. The Standard Oil trust
was formed in exactly the same way. The then existing 49
separate Standard Oil corporations which were dispersed
throughout the country were massed into one business unit
by the very same kind of a trust agreement as that of the
sugar trust. But in this State our highest court finally
decided that the sugar trust was illegal and had to disband.
That was in 1892, I think. It based its decision on a very
simple ground. It held that corporations could not be
come co-partners with each other, or unite in any way
together for business purposes, but that each had to do
business separately. It decided that only individuals could
become co-partners. We have nothing to fear from co-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
partnerships of individuals, because individuals die, and
co-partnerships of individuals therefore last only a short
time as a rule. But corporations do not die. Their hfe is
perpetual, as a rule. The Court pointed out that the com
mon law of the land did not allow them to become co
partners or unite together for business purposes ; that they
are mere artificial creations of statute, and that as no
statute allowed them to unite together, they could not do
so. At about the same time the highest court in the State
of Ohio made the very same decision Avith regard to the
Standard Oil trust. Both of these trusts were in that way
broken up. But straightway the State of New Jersey
passed a statute enabling corporations to unite and become
a business unit, just as the sugar trust and the oil trust
were. The device of that statute is very simple. It
allowed corporations to be created to own the stock of any
number of other corporations. We have become used to
calhng such a corporation a holding company. It ovpns
and holds the stock of other corporations. Both the sugar
corporations and the standard oil corporations availed
themselves of this statute. A sugar corporation was
formed in New Jersey and the stocks of all these sugar
refining companies, hitherto for a time held by trustees,
as I have stated were transferred to it, in return for which
it issued its stock to the stockholders, who thus surrendered
their stock. In the very same way a new Standard Oil
Company was formed under this statute in New Jersey, to
which was turned over all the stock of the said Standard
Oil companies. And in this way all of the Standard Oil
companies were again massed as a business unit, and all
of the sugar corporations were massed as a business unit.
The courts had declared them to be illegal as a combination
under the said trust agreements, as I have stated, and then
the Legislature of the State of New Jersey stepped in and
passed a law which enabled them to legahze and perpetu
ate themselves as a combination or business unit by means
of a holding company. And so they continue to this day.
And then followed the formation of many other trusts in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the same way. Some other States passed a law similar to
that of New Jersey. But four-fifths of the trusts of this
country are organized and exist under this New Jersey
statute. You already perceive what I am coming at,
namely, how easy it is to get rid of the trusts if we want to.
It is only necessary to repeal that New Jersey statute,
and the similar statutes which Avere passed in some of the
other States. The outcry against these trusts seems to be
quite as loud over in New Jersey as anywhere else in the
country. That being so, why is it that that New Jersey
statute has not been repealed before this? Why is it that
no one in office or out of office over in New Jersey has
asked the New Jersey Legislature to repeal it? No Gov
ernor has sent a message to the Legislature of any State
which has this statute calhng for its repeal so far as I
have heard. From which some people might deduce, that
the cry against the trusts is whoUy insincere. Since they
can be abohshed so easily, do you not think that they ought
to be, or else that those that fail to even try to repeal them
should stop crying out against them at the top of their
voices? We must not lay ourselves open to the charge of
being mere demagogues. If the people want the trusts
broken up or prevented they need only to elect Governors
and legislators who Avill carry out their Avill.
The question to what extent trusts are responsible for
present high prices should be carefully considered. No
party, no statesman, no sensible man, should follow mere
clamor, or try to advantage by it. I have not been able to
find any trustworthy hterature in which the question has
been carefully considered. Monopohes no doubt tend to
raise prices, and the trusts, which are monopolies, no
doubt, therefore, tend to raise prices. It were much better
if we used this hard word monopoly instead of this soft
and rather obscure word trust, and then people would
understand us. It might also be well to examine whether
present prices are highest on trust articles or other articles.
That does not seem to have been carefully examined into,
either. 231

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Economic Laws Govern Prices
But in a study of this subject it is necessary to note
that the notion which some have that trusts can run prices
up or down as they see fit, and to the extent they see fit, is
fallacious. A manufacturer has to buy the raAV material
which he manufactures into an article which he sells. If
it were possible for a manufacturer, having a monopoly, to
run the price he pays for the raw material down as low
as he hkes, and the price at which he sells the finished
product up as high as he hkes, he would of course have the
best of us entirely and be able to make any profit he saw fit.
But he can do neither of these things. There are economic
laws which prevent it; and you know that economic laws
are as regular as the laws of the seasons, or the revolutions
of the earth, if you let them have free play. There is an
economic point below which the manufacturer, monopohst
though he may be, cannot go in buying the raw material
without injuring himself. The producer of the raw mate
rial has to receive enough for it to pay the cost of produc
tion and also make a profit to enable him to support him
self. As soon as the seUing price goes below that he
ceases to grow or produce the article; he cannot or Avill
not continue to do it at a loss or Avithout a profit. In that
way the production of that article diminishes, and to such
an extent that the manufacturer has to raise his price in
order to stimulate its production, so that he can get enough
of it for his manufacture. You therefore see there is an
economic point below which he cannot force down the price
of raw material vrithout injuring himself. And in the
same way there is an economic point above which he can
not raise his sale price of the finished product without hurt
ing himself. If he puts the price up too high the con
sumption of it vrill fall off. Some Avill buy one-third less,
some one-half less, and some will do without it entirely.
In that way the manufacturer is obhged to lower his sale
price so as to sell his finished product and prevent a loss.
But there is a zone betAveen these two outlying prices, that
for the raw material and that for the finished product, in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
which monopolies may cause the price to fluctuate. How
wide that zone is I cannot now stop to closely define. I
imagine it is somewhat wider than my hand, however. But
aU I wanted to point out is that the trusts or monopohes
are controlled by certain economic laws which prevent
them from doing absolutely as they see fit Avith prices.
These laws keep them within a restricted zone at least.
But within that zone they can do much extortion.
Large Gold Production Causes High Prices
Looking further for the cause of present high prices,
I am not able to doubt that the principal cause is the great
and ever increasing output of gold since 1883. The output
in 1883 was only $95,000,000 in round numbers. Ever
since it has increased by leaps and bounds, until its pro
duction in 1909 reached the enormous sum of $454,000,000
in round numbers. The exact statistics for the last two
years are not at hand, but it is known that they will show
a still groAving increase. In fine, the gross output of gold
since 1883 is over $7,000,000,000 (seven bilhons of dol
lars). The world has had other periods of great produc
tion of the money metals, but never anything so great and
continuous as this.
And every such period has been one of high and ad
vancing prices and prosperity. High and advancing prices
do not mean hard times, but good times, if the cause be a
natural one. But, on the other hand, hard times are
marked by low and f alhng prices. That is the history of
commerce and the world. No one but a gambler can con
tinue to do business on a falhng market. If you have to
sell to-morrow at a price lower than you pay to-day, it is
only a question of time Avhen you shall have to quit. His
tory affords examples of the effect of a large production
of money metal on business and prices. It has always
brought high prices and prosperity. To run prices up arti
ficially by combinations, monopolies, unscientific laws
which thwart or fetter commerce, or the hke, is an evil.
But if they go up from natural causes they are not an evil.
233

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
They are normal and natural, and the normal and natural
are good in this world. The influx of the money metals
into Europe caused by their first discovery on this conti
nent revived commerce, raised prices and produced a long
period of prosperity. In the period of 20 years from 1789
to 1809 prices doubled on account of the production of the
money metals, business revived and thrived, and prosperity
was on every hand. The same result was produced by the
great output of gold from the mines of California and
Australia, beginning with 1849. There are men still hving
who remember it. You may ask why rising prices did not
set in right after 1883, when the present period of large
output of gold set in, instead of not shovring themselves
until about 1896, if the output of gold is their cause. The
answer is, first, that rising prices do not set in at once or
concurrently with the increase in gold output, but not until
some years after such increase sets in, and a large stock
of gold has accumulated therefrom; and, second, because
silver was demonetized throughout most of the world;
that is, put out of use as money during the period from
1883 to 1896, metal money being thereby largely reduced.
But that reduction was finally more than made up by the
production of gold and in due order prices began to rise
because of the increase in money metal, although such
metal had been reduced to gold only.
The value of any given product depends upon its quan
tity. If potatoes or corn are short or scarce, their price
goes up. The same is just as true of gold. Its value, hke
the value of other products, depends on its quantity and
the cost of its production. Hence, the greater the output
of gold and the cheaper the cost of its production, the
less its value grows in relation to other products. The
gold in the dollar grows of less value in relation to the
value of other commodities, and its exchangeable value or
purchasing power therefore grows less. It buys less corn
or potatoes because it is worth less. In other words you
have to give more money than formerly to buy the same
thing or amount thereof. It takes more gold to purchase
234

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
a given amount of wheat, or potatoes, or wool because
gold by reason of its plenty or over plenty has grown less
valuable. In place of saying prices are higher we could
express the same idea Avith as much, or even more, ac
curacy, by saying money is lower, and that means gold
money, for gold is now the sole equation of all moneys and
all values. The time may come when the present great output of
gold Avill have reached its highest point, although some
say not. They say that the sources of gold, including the
waters of the ocean, are so great that it is more hkely that
the time Avill come when gold AviU be so plentiful and
therefore so cheap that it vrill have to be done away with as
money. But if instead the time comes when its production
decreases and falls off, lower and lower, year after year,
then after some years, or a few years, the contraction of
gold AviU begin to have its natural effect, and prices will
begin to fall, and continue to fall year after year. Then
everybody will be complaining of low and falling prices,
the same as some are now complaining of high and rising
prices. Will not that period of low and falling prices be
hard times? What say you? Many people still ahve have
gone through such a period, and know the hard times
brought by low and falling prices. Let none of us there
fore be so certain that high prices are an evil. Every one
wants a high price for what he has to sell. But he natur
ally wants to pay low prices for the things he has to buy
to hve. He cannot make economic laws work that way.
There must necessarily be a general level of prices, de
pendent on supply and demand of products, including
gold. What Would Jefferson Say
(Speech at the Jefferson Day Banquet, April 13, 1912.)
Gentlemen of the National Democratic Club : " What
would Jefferson say?" is the toast you give me. Yes,
235

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
what would Jefferson say? He was a progressive man,
but prudent and careful. He picked his steps. He did
nothing headlong. But he was conscious that the world
moves, and he tried to move with it. He was a radical, if
you Avill, but not the kind of radical who wants to pull
everything up by the roots, or every pillar down, before
he has something better to plant or put in its stead. He
was neither demagogue, nor humbug, nor self-seeker. He
wanted to do good to his fellow men, and knew that good
in this world was growth, not stagnation. He knew that
all good growth, physical, mental or moral, was gradual
and often slow growth. How gradually the tree grows
and matures, and the blade of wheat, and this body of
ours, and how long and patiently the Almighty sat brood
ing over this world of ours before it was fit. And in the
same way how gradually things mental and moral grow
and mature. He knew that the universal law in all things
was either growth or decay. He only smiled at the stupid
conservatism which proclaims that everything is right just
as it is, and has held up its hands and cried out in all
ages, " Don't disturb the existing order of things." He
knew that the existing order of things is often a bad, and
sometimes the worst possible order of things. The exist
ing order of things in this country even Avithin the memory
of many still liAdng was that one human being might oAvn
another. He was a progressive, but felt his way, and
blazed his way, all the time that we might follow.
Obstructive Court Decisions
Yes, what would Jefferson say of things to-day?
There is a provision in all of our constitutions, national
and state, that no one shall be deprived of life, hberty or
property without due process of law, or except by the law
of the land, as it is sometimes expressed. This safeguard
is not new with us. We derived it from England. It is
expressed in Magna Charta. Nor is it peculiar to Enghsh-
speaking countries. It is common in one form or another
to every civilized government. No one ever thought of
236

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
giving it anything but its plain meaning until in recent
years, since 1870, in this country. Then some court at
tributed an indirect meaning to these words liberty and
property. The phrase to deprive one of his liberty
had always been understood to mean to interfere Avith the
hberty of the person, to put one under physical restraint
by some form of interference, arrest or imprisonment.
And to deprive one of his property had a similar plain
meaning. No one in England or in any other place except
here has ever thought of their having any other meaning.
But since 1870 in this country courts have been interpret
ing these words of the Constitution in their widest sense.
And this constitutional exegesis has developed so rapidly
that necessary social and economic progress is being
blocked by court decisions. What would Jefferson say
to it? We know what he would say. He opposed all
forced constitutional interpretations by the courts while he
was hving, and said that if allowed to run their course the
Constitution and our form of government would be sapped
and mined by the courts in their natural tendency to ag
grandize themselves with power over the legislative and
executive branches of government.
Tenement House Tobacco Case
Let me give examples of the extremes to which these
decisions have gone. In this State we passed a law that
tobacco should not be manufactured in the living rooms
of tenement houses. The enlightened sentiment of the
people of the State was that this was a humane health and
comfort measure. It was thought that children should
not be born and brought up in the fumes and odors of to
bacco. But our Court of Appeals would not have it. The
statute took away from the tenant his " liberty " to work
at what he hked in his tenement, and therefore violated the
said constitutional provision, said the Court. In the same
way the Court said it deprived him of his property,
namely, his leasehold, to the extent that it deprived him
of one use of it. 237

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Underground Bake Ovens Case
Afterwards our Legislature passed a statute regulat
ing the sanitary condition of our underground bake ovens.
They are hot and unhealthy places to work in, and the
bread made in them may easily be unsanitary. The work
in them is principally during the night. The statute fixed
ten hours in twenty-four as the maximum hours of work.
The United States Supreme Court declared this uncon
stitutional and void for depriving journeymen bakers of
the " liberty "of working all night, if they choose, in hot
underground bake ovens.
Women Night Work Case
Next our Legislature passed an act that women should
not be employed in factories between 9 o'clock at night and
6 o'clock in the morning. Enhghtened pubhc sentiment
was that the health of our women and of their offspring
would be conserved by this law. But our Court of Ap
peals declared that it deprived women of their " liberty "
to work all night, or as long as they liked in factories. To
such a use indeed did they stretch this sacred word hberty.
Employers^ Liability Case
Last year our Court of Appeals declared unconstitu
tional and void the Employers' Liabihty Act passed by
our Legislature the year before. It deprived the employer
of his property without due process of law, said the Court.
Thirty-two different governments of the world, including
England, have such laws, and have had them for many
years. Even Russia has a model one. Prussia had one
as early as 1847. Nowhere in the world except here did
any one ever suggest that such a law takes the employer's
property without due process of law. Nor do we see how
it does. The damages for injuries and manglings and
deaths of the workers from explosives, machinery, and so
on, which the employer would pay would simply enter into
the cost of production, the same as the cost and repair ex-
238

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
pense of machinery, and be included in the price we would
pay for the finished product. How is that taking the
property of the employer at all? And yet this statute
which did away with the semi-barbarous rules of the com
mon law that the worker has to take all the natural or in
herent risks in his employment, including that of negli
gence by any fellow worker, which have been done away
Avith even in England whence we took such rules, and pro
vided for a just system of compensation for death and in
juries from such risks, the same as is done everywhere in
the ciAdlized world except in this country, was struck down
on the forced and false construction of this constitutional
provision. Such Decisions Cause Growth of Socialism
What would Jefferson say to such a state of things?
He would say, " Beware. Unless you keep pace with the
social and economic progress of humanity, and do these
things, they Avill be done over your heads." It is no won
der that we have a state of unrest, and that what is called
Socialism is growing. The judges who are thus putting
themselves in the way of just and humane laws, called for
by the spirit of Christianity and social progress, say that
it is their duty " to protect the populace from themselves."
Just think of that. When and where and how did we ever
confer any such mission as that upon them? Who set them
up to protect us from ourselves? We elect Legislatures
to carry out our will by laws.
RECAI.L OR Nullify Such Decisions
The Legislature which has just adjourned passed a
proposed constitutional amendment to nullify or recall this
Employers' Liability decision, and if the incoming Legis
lature also passes it, it will be submitted to a vote of the
people of the state a year from next fall. And some are
crying out against this as revolutionary. What do they
mean? Our constitutions are adopted by vote of the peo
ple, and the people have the right to amend them in the
same way when they see fit. And that is what they have
239

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
been doing from the beginning. And they have frequently
overruled or recalled obnoxious decisions of the courts in
that way. And why should they not? In 1905 the people
of this state overruled or recalled by a constitutional
amendment four or five decisions of our highest court de
claring unconstitutional and void the statutes requiring
payment by contractors of the prevaihng rate of wages on
state and municipal works, and fixing the maximum hours
for a day's Avork. The other day a lot of laAAyers put forth
a statement warning the community against changes of
the constitution by popular vote. What do they mean?
Favoritism in Railroad Freight Rates
And what would Jefferson say about some other things
now in the minds of many in this country?
The railroads are not private roads but pubhc high
ways. That is the first law of their being. The land for
them was taken under the eminent domain power of gov
ernment to take property for public use. It was taken for
a public use, namely for public highways. It could not be
taken for private use. What would Jefferson say to fav
oritism in freight rates to shippers on these pubhc high
ways instead of the same rate being exacted of all ahke?
What would he say to favorite indiAdduals or coteries being
charged freight rates so much lower than their business
rivals as to enable them to drive such rivals out of business
by under-selhng them that much in the markets, and there
by creating monopolies in themselves? Would he not say
that the general freight agent of everj'- railroad in the
country ought to be appointed by government if necessary
to do away with such a crying wrong? Such agent need
not fix the rates, but his duty would be to see that there
was only one rate for all in like case — ^that every one paid
the same rate. The Trust or Holding Companies
And what would Jefferson say about the so-called
trusts, if I may use that misnomer? 240

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
In several states, and also in the District of Columbia,
there are statutes enabhng corporations to be formed to
own, hold and vote on the stock of other corporations with
out limit. This is what we call the " holding company."
It is the " trust." The stock certificates of all the corpora
tions engaged in the same kind of business, such as sugar
refining, for example, can be transferred to such a hold
ing company, and in that way all of such corporations are
brought under one management and control, and made
a single business unit, thereby doing away with all com
petition and rivalry among them, and enabling the holding
company to raise prices to the consumer, more or less.
What would Jefferson say to doing away vrith competition
among corporations in the same line of business and in that
way? I think he would say the holding company statutes
should never have been passed, and ought to be repealed
by degrees, or superseded by a national corporation law
under which no such thing would be permitted. Under
these holding company statutes, including the one for the
District of Columbia, passed by the National Congress
itself, these unions of corporations engaged in the same
business may be lawfully formed. That is what these
statutes were passed for. But after corporations are thus
united under a holding company the United States brings
suits to dissolve them for being monopolies and in restraint
of trade. What would Jefferson say to such folly and such
a game of cross purposes as that? What would he say to
passing statutes to enable such combinations to be formed
and then bring suits to break them up? Would he not
say, " If such combinations are inherently injurious by
destroying competition, and interrupting the freedom of
trade, why do you not repeal the statutes under which they
are formed?" These combinations are our own artificial
creations. They could not exist except for these statutes.
If we do not want them we have only to repeal the laws
permitting them to be created. First, business was done
by the individual. Next, in order to have larger capital
and business, partnerships of individuals came into vogue.
241

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Combination could go no further than this without the aid
of some legal device. Then statutes were passed for the
creation of corporations — ^mere artificial entities — so that
there could be more capital combined to produce larger
business, and also to do away wdth the inconvenience and
breaking up of business partnerships caused by the death
of one partner after another and the distribution of their
estates. But these corporations which were allowed by
statute could not unite together as partners or in any way
for business purposes. Each had to stand alone and do
business alone. Next these holding company statutes were
passed — ^the first one not until 1885 — enabhng corpora
tions to unite or be combined as a business unit under a
holding company in the Avay I have stated. These are the
different stages leading up to the gigantic unions of cor
porations which we now have. Should there be statutes
permitting these combinations of corporations ? Now that
they have been permitted for a full generation the question
is more difficult. But what would Jefferson say of these
mighty combinations, with revenues and capital and ha-
bihties even larger than those of the United States Govern
ment itself ? Would he say that they ought to be permitted
to exist and to grow? In the end every one in the coimtry
will have ceased to be an independent business entity, and
will be a mere servant of one of these great concerns if they
continue. Does that tend to make men better citizens, or
weak and indifferent ones, by reason of a feehng of de
pendence and servitude? What would Jefferson say?
Periodical Constitutional Conventions
What would Jefferson say to have the Constitution of
the United States amended so that every 20 years there
would have to be a new constitutional convention to re
port amendments to the Constitution to be submitted to
the vote of the people? No one doubts that constitutions
should not be changed in a hurry or rashly, but all the
same as time goes on, and conditions change, constitutions
of government need to be changed. Lincoln said that a
242

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
constitution should not outlast a generation. He did not
mean that at the end of that time the whole instrument
should go by the board. He meant that it would probably
need to be amended by that time. Our States have very
generally recognized this by putting requirements in their
constitutions that constitutional conventions be held at
stated intervals. It is now very cumbersome and difficult
to amend the Federal Constitution. Should we not have
it amended so as to call for constitutional conventions at
stated periods? Would not Jefferson say yea?

Do Our Courts Stand in the Way of Social and
Economic Justice, and If So,
By What Authority ?
(Address Before the Yale Forum, at Yale University, New Haven,
Connecticut, May 7, 1912.)
President Hadley, Governor Baldwin, Ladies and
Gentlemen: I had some misgivings about coming here
at all and leaving the busy life which surrounds me in the
city of New York, but I thought I might possibly say
a few words of some interest to you older people and of
some guidance to you young men, and especially to you
young men who are studying law. The subject is, " Do
our courts stand in the way of social and economic jus
tice — and if so, by what authority? " I suppose we may
in this country question even the authority of the courts
if we see fit. We have outgrown the divinity of kings
and of legislatures and executives, and I suppose we have
a right to outgrow the divinity of courts too if we see fit,
having at the same time due respect for them. The sub
ject is a very broad one. Perhaps the phrase " distribu
tive justice " might express it more fully. And when I
say " distributive justice " I do not mean merely the jus
tice administered in the courts, but distributive justice in
the widest sense. You young men growing up to the bar,
of all other men, should have this distributive justice in
243

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
mind. That mere rule of thumb justice which we asso
ciate with the administration of the law in the courts falls
far short of expressing what I mean. The first duty of
government, the prime duty of government, is distributive
justice to all. That means justice in its widest sense, the
social and economic sense as well as the legal sense. If
government fails in that it fails at the essential point and
has no excuse for existence. Prosperity does not depend
wholly on the amount of the total product. It depends
even more largely upon the just distribution of the total
product among those who produce it. I should define
prosperity to be the highest production the community
is capable of consistent with the mental, moral and phys
ical health and growth of its members, accompanied by
a just distribution of the total product among those who
produce it. I do not mean by that share and share ahke
to every one. I mean distribution according to the pro
ductive capacity of each, whether that capacity be mental
or physical, or both. Distributive justice also means that
those engaged in the production shall be otherwise fairly
dealt Avith — ^that they be not forced to work an undue
number of hours, that they have proper machinery, and
of all things that they be paid for the injuries which they
receive in their work without their wilful fault, especially
from the dangerous machinery of our times. That enters
into distributive justice. In what I have to say all these
things enter. If the courts set themselves up against this
distributive justice then the courts are not fulfilling their
office. I do not come here to pass any undue criticism upon
the courts. I was a Judge myself you know for sixteen
years and I have to be careful and not say too much.
And I have Judge Baldwin here behind me too, which
makes me more or less circumspect, if not nervous. Nor
do I come here to adA^ocate the recall of the judiciary. I
see that frightens none of you, however. Down my way
it seems to frighten some people to mention it. It doesn't
frighten me a particle. I am not here to advocate it. But
244

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
strangely enough every time I say anything on the subject
on which I speak to you to-night I see great headlines
the next day in that sort of newspaper which we have
down in New York — I don't know whether you know
much about it — I see great headlines, " The Mayor ad
vocates the recall of the judiciary," when I have never
said a word to that effect. In fact I am not in favor
of the recall at all; I may as well relieve your minds
by saying that right off. Here in the East with our
short terms of office — and I think the like is the case
all over the country — I do not see what need we have of
the recall of officials. Their terms are up quick enough
and they can be recalled by being left at home. I believe
Judge Baldwin's term even is only two years as Governor.
Why, you would not have time to recall hun if you wanted
to. And then when you did you would find out you had
made a mistake. But this I have to say, that if the recall
is to be adopted I do not wish to see the Judges excluded
from it. Every time we have a dinner of the Judges in
New York, or a meeting, they denounce the recall of the
Judges. It seems to be all right to them for everybody
else to be recalled. At all events they say nothing about
that. And yet their terms are for fourteen years, and if
anybody down there is to be recalled, I say include the
Judges. This thing of having a recall held over them,
the Judges say, might intimidate them so that they would
make wrong decisions. But if it would intimidate the
Judges, I think it might intimidate some of the rest of us
too, might it not? And we might do something that we
would be sorry for afterwards and that the people would
be sorry for too. I did not run the danger that any of
you would say that I am for the recall of the Judges, and
it was hardly worth while to speak about those newspapers
which report everything by headlines, and report it wrong
at that. We might as well let them alone. I knew of a
great big husband once with a little bit of a wife, and she
used to beat him and mistreat him. One of the neighbors
saw her at him one day, and asked, " Why do you submit to
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that? " and he says, " Why it doesn't hurt me and it
pleases Mary Ann." That would apply to some of our
New York newspapers; but I dare say to no newspaper
up here. That is why I am so free to talk about it away
from home.
Now, to come closer to my subject whether the Judges
stand in the way in this country of economic and social
reform, I want to say to you at the outset that what I have
to say hinges on a constitutional provision. And that con
stitutional provision, my young law school friends, is the
one which prescribes that " no one's hfe, liberty or prop
erty shall be taken except by due process of law," or, as
it is sometimes expressed, " except by the law of the land "
— phrases which mean the same thing. Now that consti
tutional safeguard is in every one of the fundamental in
struments of government in this country, national and
state, which we call constitutions of government. It was
put in these fundamental instruments at the beginning.
It was not in the national constitution at its first adoption,
but certain states insisted, and it and others were put in
a very few years afterwards. But this safeguard of which
I speak is not peculiar to this country. It can be traced
back far. It has its foundation even in Magna Charta.
It is there in substance as all the courts point out. It runs
through British constitutional history. Nor is it peculiar
to English or American constitutional laAv or history. A
similar safeguard is to be found in every civihzed govern
ment in the world, expressed hi one form or another. We
somethnes run away with the notion that this safeguard
is only in Enghsh and American history. Not at all.
They have it all over Europe, that no one's hfe, hberty
or property shall be taken except in a laAvful way, that is
to say, by due process of law.
But what I call your attention to is that the courts in
this country, beginning in about 1870, began to give this
phrase a large meaning. They have taken the words
" liberty " and " property " in this provision and given
them an elastic and enlarged meaning which nobody
246

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
dreamed Im-ked anywhere in this provision. Why, when
King John signed Magna Charta at the demand of his
Barons and undertook therein not to deprive any of his
subjects of his " hberty " except by the law of the land,
they all meant that he should not arrest them or imprison
them or restrain them of their personal hberty except by
due process of law. King John certainly did not think
the word " hberty " he was signing for meant liberty for
a woman to work all night in a factory, or anything like
that. In the same way wh^n this safeguard was adopted
in our fundamental instruments of government in this
country, no one understood it to have such a meaning.
You shall not deprive a man of his hberty and property
except by due process of law. To deprive him of his lib
erty was understood to mean to arrest him and lock him
up or restrain his physical liberty. And to take his prop
erty meant to actually take his property. And not in
England or on the continent of Europe, or anywhere else
in the world, has any other meaning been attached to these
two words, except in this country, and here not until about
1870. Some Judges who got tired of the ordinary rule
of thumb in deciding cases began to see in this word " hb
erty " boundless meanings — liberty to make any kind of a
contract, liberty to do what you like in your house, liberty
to work as long as you like. And in the word " property "
they began to see not merely physical property, but uses
of property. And in the decisions thus made I respect
fully say the courts have often forgotten that no owner
ship of property gives any one a right to use his property
in any way which is inconsistent with the rights, safety or
comfort of the community. That is a fundamental prin
ciple with regard to property. It used to be an old-
fashioned thing for people to say of their property, and
even the railroad companies used to say it in this country
some years ago, " Well, do not we own it and cannot we
do as we like with our own? " I do not think a man Avith
an automobile has a right to do what he likes with it. No
more has a man with a piece of land, or any other prop-
247

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
erty. He has got to use it consistently with the wel
fare of the whole community, and the whole community
has a right to deprive him of the use of it to the extent of
making him conform to that welfare.
Now, I will take up some court decisions to illustrate
to you how the courts, as I think, and as many think, have
gone far afield in the interpretation of the words " liberty "
and " property " in this constitutional safeguard. I am
not saying to you anything new with me. I said this when
I was a Judge. I put it in the form of an address some
years ago, at a time when it made people look somewhat
askance at a man to say as much. But, I tell you, people
do not look so much askance nowadays as they used to
about a good many things. And I have had a very dis
tinguished recruit to my side within a year, who is saying
something about this throughout the country.
The first case I shall call your attention to is known
in my own state as the tenement house tobacco case. There
are similar decisions in other states, but I shall cite from
my own state mostly in order not to be offensive. I AviU
start with the tenement house tobacco case. You know
Avhat a condensed population we have in a part of the City
of New York. Well, benevolent men and women in going
around there found in the little rooms in these crowded
tenements certain things being manufactured that were
not wholesome. They found tobacco being manufactured
into its various products in the living rooms of these poor
tenements. Benevolent people who help the poor saw it
and they saw the evils of it. They saw httle clhldren born
into this world and brought up in bedrooms and kitchens
in the fumes and odors of tobacco. They also saw longer
hours of work than would be the case if workmen left their
work at the shop and went home. So they went to the
legislature and got a law passed forbidding the manu
facture of tobacco in the living rooms of these tenements.
And the Governor signed it. Well, they thought they had
accomplished something important. And a great many
thought so, and a great many more to-day think so than
248

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
thought so then. But it got into the courts and fmally the
highest court in my state, the Court of Appeals, decided
the case. And it said that that statute was unconstitu
tional and void because it deprived the leaseholder, the
tenant, of his " liberty " and his " property " Avithin the
meaning of this constitutional provision. It is one of the
pioneer cases, and the Judge who wrote the opinion waxed
eloquent over this thing. It could not be allowed, the
depriving of a man in his tenement of the " hberty " to
bring his children up in the fumes of tobacco. That lib
erty was too valuable to be taken away from him. I have
had the case brought in from the library (taking up a
copy of the New York State Reports*) . The Judge said
in these very words : "It arbitrarily deprives him of his
property and of some portion of his personal liberty."
Some " portion," mind you. I wonder he did not say
" potion " in place of portion. The idea of dealing out
liberty by portions may do for judicial English, but I do
not advise you young law students to adopt it. If there
is anybody on this earth that the earth has least use for it
is the httle rule of thumb lawyer, especially if he goes
about with a green bag in his hand as I have seen them do
in Boston. That kind of a little lawyer generally grows
up and after a few years has a face of parchment, and he
does everything just by rule of thumb. My young friends
in the Law School here, broaden out. Be laAvyers and be
judges, but not little rule of thumb lawyers and judges.
I almost say to you be men first and lawyers second. Yes,
after an eloquent disquisition this Judge says this statute
arbitrarily deprives this tenement leaseholder of his "prop
erty " and of some portion of his " liberty," within the
meaning of this constitutional prohibition against depriv
ing anybody of his liberty or property without due process
of law. The court said that it deprived him of hberty to
use his tenement as he saw fit. The word " liberty " in
this constitutional provision, the court said, meant liberty

*Matter of Jacobs, 98 N. Y. Reports, 98.
249

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to manufacture tobacco in your tenement under your chil
dren's noses if you wanted to. The sum and substance
of it is that the court said that this constitutional guaranty
gave the tenant hberty to do that in his tenement, and
therefore the legislature could not take it away from him.
Well, if the premises were correct the conclusion would
be correct. And then they said that it deprived him of
his property within the meaning of the Avord " property "
in this constitutional provision in this, that it deprived him
of one use of his property, namely, the use to manufac
ture tobacco — as though he could not go elsewhere and
get another room to manufacture tobacco in. But that
was the reasoning. I suppose I ought not to poke fun
over it, because it is a serious matter, but it is not always
easy to be serious when you do not see the thing in the
same light as other solemn people see it. And so doAvn
went this health statute in a heap, declared void because
it deprived the tenement house lessee of the liberty to use
his tenement for anything he saw fit, and deprived hun of
his property in as much as it deprived him of one use of
his one-year leasehold, or whatever it was. That was the
decision. It was all reasoned out very fine. But do the
words " liberty " and " property " in the constitutional
provision mean any such thing? Not in England up to
this hour, where this constitutional phrase originated, has
anybody ever dreamed of it meaning any such thing. No
where in the civilized world except in this country has
anybody said it meant any such thing. Why, the Barons
never dreamed at Runnymede that they were extorting
from King John by Magna Charta liberty to manufac
ture tobacco in a tenement bedroom.
The next case in order was the bake-oven case in my
state. A bake-oven, you know, is underground. And if
any of you ever were in a bake-oven I do not need to say
another word about bake-ovens. It is the hottest and
most uncomfortable place on the face of the earth. It is
a hard place to work in. It is hot and unhealthy, and no
one can stand it without injury to health. So in the same
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
way in the state of New York we had a law passed pre
scribing sanitary regulations for the bakeries. Much med
ical opinion was got together about it, and statistics were
looked up to see how long bakers hved. And bread can be
very easily made unsanitary by an unsanitary baker. The
rheum of his eyes and the sweat of his body may not be
very pleasant to have in your bread the next morning,
though you know nothing about it. And disease may be
disseminated in that way. These bake-ovens are excep
tional. They are underground and as hot as Tophet, if
I may use such an expression here. It reminds me of the
saying of General Phil. Sheridan, that if he owned both
Texas and Tophet, he would lease out Texas and live in
Tophet. Texas was a hard place in those days, and these
bake-ovens are much harder. The law was passed pre
scribing regulations for them. One of the regulations was
that 10 hours a night was all that a baker should work in
these places. To do credit to our state courts, they said
it was a reasonable law — that it was a fair health law —
and they approved of it. But it got up to the Supreme
Court of the United States in some way and that court,
by a vote of 5 to 4, as is usual in important matters, de
cided that the act was unconstitutional and void because
it deprived the journeyman bakers of the " liberty "
of working all night in bake-ovens if they wanted to. That
is exactly the decision. They said it took away their lib
erty. There were no journeymen bakers that I know of
clamoring for any such hberty. Judge Peckham, who
wrote the opinion on which the case was decided, said
(reading from United States Reports*) : " The question
involved is whether the statute is a fair, reasonable and
appropriate exercise of the pohce power of the state, or
is it an unreasonable, unnecessary and arbitrary inter
ference with the right of the individual to his personal hb
erty," That was exactly the language of the Judge.
Judge Hohnes, who wrote one of the dissenting opinions,

*Lochner Case, 198 U. S. Reports, 45.
251

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
said it looked to him as though it was only an installment
of what we might look for hereafter. And he intimated
that the legislature had the right, if it saw fit, to prescribe
10 hours a day for everybody, in office and out of office.
Judge Peckham said for the court the question was
whether it was a fair and reasonable exercise of legislative
power. And he said, no, it was not. But who is the judge
of that, pray? Who made him the judge of it, pray?
Who made any court in this land the judge of that
against your will? If you, by which I mean the in
telligent people of any state, conclude that it is a fair
and reasonable thing to limit the hours of work in these
bake-ovens to 10 hours in one night, if enhghtened public
sentiment comes to that conclusion, I want to know where
any court in this land was given the power to set that
enlightened pubhc sentiment at naught and overthrow it.
To say that this is a government of the people is trite, and
I am sorry to say sometimes laughed at nowadays. They
spell it in New York in some of the newspapers p-e-e-p-u-1
in order to make ridicule of it. They think that when you
say the people you mean every man who has a patch on
his trousers and no visible means of support. I think you
and I do not mean that when we say the people. I say
the people up here at Yale University and the enhghtened
people of the country. Everybody knows more than any
body. It was always so, and I think the enhghtened
opinion of the people on a question like that may be more
safely followed than that of a few judges, and should be.
NoAvhere in the civilized world did any bench of judges
ever arrogate to themselves the right to decide over the
heads of the legislature and the community whether such
a legislative act is fair and reasonable until it was done
in this country. Fair and reasonable? Don't we know
whether it is fair and reasonable as a health measure for
the benefit of societj'^ to prohibit tobacco from being manu
factured in tenement rooms with little children playing
around and tasting and smelling it and learning how to
use it, and having their health injured by it? And in the
252

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
same way, do Ave know or do we not know whether it is
fair and reasonable to prescribe 10 hours for night work
in an underground bake-oven. Some of you go down into
one to-night and see whether you would like to stay there
any longer than 10 hours, if you have any doubt about
what I am telling you. That is one of the problems I
have in New York now to keep the bakeries sanitary.
Good bread depends upon it. Good bread depends upon
the health of these men who cough and sweat there while
they are at their work.
Now, the police power, as it is called, gives the Legis
lature power to pass any law for (quoting from a volume)
" the health, comfort, morals, safety or general welfare of
society." That is the definition of the pohce power. And
the courts profess to be all agreed that any statute passed
for the health, comfort, morals, safety or general welfare
is a good and valid statute notwithstanding this constitu
tional provision. But, say the courts, we, however, will
keep the decision to ourselves of the question whether a
given statute is fairly and reasonably for the " health,
comfort, morals, safety or general welfare." It is not
enough that the Legislature and those who elected it think
so and say so. The legislature may debate it. They may
collect statistics on it. Benevolent people may work upon
it. The law may be passed unanimously by the Legisla
ture and signed by the Governor and meet the wishes of
the whole state. But we, we, mind you, or I, if it happen
to be one judge, reserve to ourselves, or to myself — big I
and little you — the question whether it is such is reason
able and fair and necessary, or not. All I say is that we
haA^e given no such power to the courts. And in reserving
that question to themselves how do they do it? Why, they
do just what I am telling you. They go to this constitu
tional provision, which we borrowed from England and
which is world wide, and they take these two words " lib
erty " and " property," and they say the statute deprives
a man of his liberty or his property or both within their
meaning as used in such provision — deprives him of his
253

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
hberty to sweat all night in a bake-oven and of his liberty
to manufacture tobacco under the noses of his httle chil
dren in tenement rooms, and that such statute is not for
the health, morals, comfort, safety or general welfare.
Now, I am speaking with all respect. I said all this years
ago, and I was wondering whether it was altogether safe
to say it up here among you people of steady habits in Con
necticut. But inasmuch as you students here come from
all parts of the United States I thought I would venture
to speak about it. Do not understand me as deriding the
courts. Nobody has more respect for them than I have.
We all respect them. But never let any one get it out of
your mind that the judges are pubhc officials just hke
mayors and governors, like myself and Governor BaldAvin,
and open to public criticism just as we are, neither more
nor less. We cannot criticise them while they have a case
before them. Ordinary decency requires that we remain
mute — not like some newspapers which tell them how to
decide it and do the whole thing for them. We have to
keep still until they have made their decision. But as soon
as they make it we have a right to discuss and criticise it
if we want to, and pick it to pieces if we can.
The next case in order in my own state is the factory
women's act. Now what was that? The Legislature with
unanimity passed a law and the Governor signed it that
women should not be permitted to work in the factories of
the state between the hours of 9 at night and 6 in the
morning. Now do you understand what I am saying?
You may think I am joking but I am not. It was not
between 6 in the morning and 9 at night. We all thought
it was enough to work from 6 in the morning until 9 at
night for women in factories, so we passed a law that
between 9 at night and 6 in the morning they should quit.
Now, why did we do that? Why, we did it because they
have done it all over Europe and in England and all over
the civilized world, as they have with regard to other like
cases. We did it because we wanted our women healthy,
and also good looking, if you will allow me. That counts
254

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
for a good deal in this world with a woman. But for a
man the homelier he is the better so far as I know, espe
cially so far as getting along with the women is concerned.
And the Governor signed the act. Nobody ever dreamed
of the law having anything the matter with it. We wanted
healthy children also, and you do not have healthy children
unless you have healthy mothers. I have already read to
you the pohce power law which permits any statute for
the welfare of the community or the health of the com
munity or the morals of the community to be passed. Isn't
it to the welfare and health of the community that women
bear healthy children, which they cannot do unless they
are healthy themselves? But it got into our Court of
Appeals and they were indignant. I cannot express it
any other way. Read the opinion of the court.* There
is a tone of indignation in it. And what was it? Why,
they said you are depriving the women of the liberty to
work all night if they want to. Well, now, we had not
heard any woman clamoring for that liberty in our state.
But the Court of Appeals cited this constitutional pro
vision that you may not deprive any one of his liberty or
her liberty Avithout due process of law. And they said
here is a statute, with no process of law, just in the stroke
of a pen depriving her of the liberty to work all night if
she sees fit. And dovm it went. This word liberty was
stretched to mean that. Of course when you get going in
this world down hill the farther you go the faster you
go until you fall prone. And sooner or later the courts
have to fall prone Avith these cases. And that statute was
destroyed. Now I do not want to say anything too strong,
so I almost have to appeal to President Hadley and Judge
Baldwin here present if it is not a reasonable thing to say
that a statute hke that should meet with the assent of
every man and woman. And so it did until it got into the
Court of Appeals of the State of New York, and these
venerable gentlemen thumbed the Constitution and found

?Williams Case, 189 N. Y. Reports, 131.
255

MAYOR. GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
this clause, which they were very famihar with, that no
woman should be deprived of her liberty without due
process of law. And that is the fate the case met. Since
then a case came up in the Supreme Court of the United
States from Oregon, I think,* and the Supreme Court
was confronted with this decision in our state. But finally
they rejected it and held the statute from the West to
be good. They interpreted this same constitutional pro
vision in the United States Constitution. Thus we have
this same word " liberty " in the same context held to mean
one thing by the one court and another thing by the other.
They said that women were the wards of the nation and
bore our children, and that such a statute was reasonable
on its face. But they still asserted and kept to themselves
this power of deciding whether it is reasonable or not,
which I say is your right and not theirs. We all know
whether it is right or not without submitting it to a bench
of judges, men for years withdrawn from affairs of life,
men who have not kept note of the economic and social
progress of the world, men who, maybe, are years behind
their times. Most men do not advance after 40. What
they know up to that date they think is just right and they
will stick to it. But the forerunners of human thought
are afoot all the time, and they lead the way in this world.
The world is advancing all the time, not going backward.
And these statutes come along as the mere expressions of
economic advancement and social advancement, and to
have them meet such a fate on the theory that they con
flict with this constitutional proAdsion, passed only to safe
guard the individual in his liberty and property, is dis
tressing. Now, we also passed several statutes in our state with
regard to work done for the state or any municipality by
contractors, that the rate of wages paid should be the pre
vailing rate, as it is expressed, and that 10 hours should
be a day's work. That was done because the contractors

*Muller Case, 208 U. S. Reports, 412.
256

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
on large works very often move into a community with an
army of men that they had on some work maybe a thousand
miles off, Avhere labor was cheap. That law was passed not
to have the community dislocated by such things as that,
but to have the local prevailing rate of wages paid. But
our Court of Appeals struck these laws down one after
the other as depriving a man of his liberty to work for
any wages he saw flt — for 90 cents, say, when the prevail
ing rate was $1.50. But as I will show you later those
decisions all went by the board.
Another decision I wish to call your attention to was
made a year ago last winter, by our Court of Appeals, the
highest in the state.* It was on the Employers' Liability
act. Now, let me say preliminary that 32 different gov
ernments of the world have an Employers' Liability act,
coupled with insurance, often. Every civilized country in
the world has it outside of this country. Prussia had one
as early as 1847. Russia has a model one, and we some-
tunes say Russia is uncivilized. Lloyd George, three years
ago, modeled the Enghsh act after the Russian one. And
what a great statesman they said Lloyd George was. But
he simply took the Russian act and copied it. They had
one in England already, but it was rather old and out of
date. But all over Europe, all over the British Colonies,
all OA^er the world, in 32 different governments or more,
such a law exists. The old common law rule, as we call it,
is that the workman takes all the inherent risks of the
business. Well, when people had nothing but hoes and
shovels and hand-looms and the like to work with there
was not much risk to take. But now with our comphcated
machinery and our explosives, the worlanan takes a great
deal of risk. The judges very often say in a bungling way
that the workman " assumes " the inherent risk of the
work and the place where he Avorks. He does not assume
it at all. He is not given a chance to say a word about
it. The law casts it upon him, the common law rule which

*Ives Case, 201 N. Y. Reports, 271.
257

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
we took from England but which England discarded years
ago. He has also no redress if injured by the neghgence
of a fellow worker. He is told to sue his fellow worker.
What a consolation that is. Well, now, in England that
has all been done away with. It is done away with all
over Europe, everywhere except here. We have stuck to
it in my state as though we worshipped it. But in this
statute passed three years ago in my state it was enacted
that the common law rules that the workman took all the
inherent risks of the business, machinery, blasting and
everything, and of the negligence of his fellow workers,
was abrogated. And then the statute enacted that unless
lie was hurt by his own wilful negligence he should be
paid by the employer. All the enlightened employers in
my state wanted the law. All the workmen wanted the
law, and all people who have kept pace with the economic
progress of the world wanted the law. And it was passed.
The employers had reason to want the law. Now there
are certain insurance companies that insure them against
accidents to their workmen. One employer pays $1,500
a year to the company to insure him against all these acci
dents, and another $10,000, and so on, according to the
size of their business. A few years ago I was talking to
an educated man on that subject, and I said there ought
to be a fund made up by government by taxation of manu
facturers to pay those people who lose their legs and arms
and the dependents of those who lose their lives by dan
gerous machinery. And he said I was " talking sociahsm."
I said to him that some people are much frightened about
socialism but that socialism like that did not frighten me
any. It seems to me that if everybody was put on the
level of socialism, and everybodj^ was paid a wage by the
state, everybody would be doing as little as he could. The
total product would grow less all the time and there Avould
be more poverty than the world ever saAv. That is the way
I look at socialism, and yet I may be wrong. " But," he
says, " you are talking sociahsm." I asked him if he was
not insured against accidents to his worlanen. He said
258

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
he was, and paid $1,500 a year. I told him that the in
surance company employed an army of lawyers, an army
of investigators, an army of process servers, and in that
way ate up the fund made up by the premiums paid in,
leaving enough however to pay a fair dividend to the stock
holders. And that if the state taxed all employers to pay
for these accidents without any law suit at all they might
be paying less of a tax than they are noAV paying to the
insurance companies for it. " Well, I never thought of
that," he said. I said, " That is socialism, is it? You
ought to begin to think about it." So, as I said, in my
state we were willing to have this law and it was passed
and the Governor signed it. There was no party question
about it. The legislature was practically unanimous. But
the statute was challenged in the courts, and this old friend
of ours, the constitutional guaranty that your property
shall not be taken without due process of law, was brought
up again, and the courts said that to make the employers
in the factories pay for these injuries of workmen was to
take that much money from them without due process of
law and therefore was taking their property without due
process of law, and therefore violative of this constitutional
guaranty. And the statute was declared void. Well, now,
let us see. Does it take any one's property at all? A
manufacturer has to pay for the machinery and when it
is broken he has to repair it. And all that goes into the
cost of his product. And if he has to pay people who
have their hands crushed and who are otherwise hurt, will
not that enter into the cost of his product also? Doesn't
he simply add that, a mere decimal too small to be noticed,
to the selling price of his article? And therefore it is you
and I and the whole community in buying that article who
pay this fund that goes to pay these people, and not the
manufacturer at all. That is an economic proposition,
and I see no answer to it. Nor do I see any reason why
we should not make the expense of such injuries a part of
the cost of manufacture, the same as the cost and repair of
the machinery. Do you see any reason why one should
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
not be on a par with the other? They have done it all
over the world, and why should we not do it here? Why
also should we not go further if necessary as they do, and
impose a tax on the manufacturers to create a fund to be
put in trust in the hands of the state to pay these ex
penses? We simply add one other cost to manufacture.
I referred a moment ago to the Prussian law of 1847. It
was a tax on wages to create such a fund, and it was such
a decimal that the manufacturer, sooner than be bothered >
with the bookkeepmg of it, as a rule paid it himself, and
the laAV soon after was amended to cast it on the manu
facturer. The tax is not so large. People look at these
things too seriously. When you come to spread a tax
over all the manufacturers of the state you know a small
tax will raise a large sum and will pay all these maimed
and injured people and go into the cost of the manu
factured product and all who buy manufactured articles
pay the money that goes to pay for these injuries, and
hardly feel it. We have got to pay for them in some
way, either in the poor-house or in some more respectable
way, and I think we had better choose the respectable
way. But this Employers' Liability act in my state we
cannot have. I read this morning that the United States
Senate had passed a national one, and I was sorry to see
that even 15 Senators voted against it.
Now what is the remedy for these things? I have
kept my remarks to my own state and the Supreme
Court of the United States. My state has been a woeful
offender, and other states quite as bad. What are you
going to do? You cannot put tobacco out of your tene
ments. You cannot prescribe hours of work at night in
the bake-ovens. You cannot forbid people to employ
women between nine at night and six in the morning in
factories. You cannot have an insurance law or an Em
ployers' Liability law to pay people who are injured at
work. What are you going to do? I referred a moment
ago to the decisions of our Court of Appeals declaring
those acts void which said the prevailing rate of wages
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
should be paid on state and municipal work by contractors,
and that 10 hours a day should constitute a day's work.
How did we get rid of those decisions, do you suppose?
In 1905 we passed a constitutional amendment nullifying
them, or to use a word now grown famihar and quite ex
pressive, we " recalled " them all.* Some people are
talking about recalling decisions as though they had dis
covered something new. Why, we have been doing it
from the foundation of our government. When the
courts decide things in the way we do not want, the legis
lature passes an act making it as the people want it over
the heads of the courts. But where it is a constitutional
question the legislature cannot do it. We have to do it
by constitutional amendment. Some are clamoring
against submitting these questions to the vote of the peo
ple — some say populace, so little respect have they for
the people. We talk about the intelhgent people that
come out of Yale and our colleges and our splendid sys
tem of schools — ^that is what we mean when we talk about
the intelhgence of the people, and I tell you the intelh
gence of the people governs in the end. And the intelli
gent people control those who are not intelhgent. I once
made the statement before an audience that there was at
least one highly intelligent man in each block in the City
of New York, and that in the end, as he thought, that
block would think. His mind would come pretty near
ruling that block. And a man said to me, " Never say
that again. If you ever want to run for office you will
only have that one man in the block to vote for you."
And I said to him, " My dear sir, I can say that with im
punity because every man in the audience will think he is
that one man in the block." That is what we did with
these five decisions. Now the legislature of my state this
year, before adjourning, passed a joint resolution to sub
mit to a vote of the people the question whether we should
not overrule this Employers' Liability decision, too. It is

*N. Y. State Constitution, Art. 12, Sec. 1.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
nothing new at all, this recalhng of decisions. Those
that think it is new are only discovering an old thing
which they think is new. Some people are clamoring
against submitting it to the vote of the people. Why the
constitutions of our states are adopted by the people, are
they not? And the people can alter them by their vote,
can they not? I see no difference between adopting the con
stitution by a vote of the people and the people amending
it when they see fit, and as they see fit, by their vote. That
is the way we do it in fact throughout all our states. But
it is not done that way under the federal constitution, but
will be, I assume, some time. Our legislature passed this
year a joint resolution to submit that decision to a vote of
the people, and our system is that two succeeding legis
latures have to pass the resolution and then the following
fall the people vote on it at the election. So that you see
in eighteen months we can bring about a constitutional
amendment in my state. And that is the way generally
throughout the states of the nation. And a year from
this fall we will submit to the people of my state the
question whether we will recall this decision striking down
the Employers' Liability act. And you people in Con
necticut will see us recall it. We intend to go along a
little. The national constitution is not so easily changed. We
have been six years now at work in the process of chang
ing it so as to overrule the income tax decisions, and it
looks as though we would be six years more at it. There
is no provision in the federal constitution for calhng con
stitutional conventions. In my state and in many, if not
most states, there is a provision in the constitution that
there must be a constitutional convention every twelve
years. We have to have it whether we want it or not,
and that gives the people from all over the state a chance
to come up and suggest constitutional amendments. Lin
coln said that a constitution should not outlast a genera
tion. He did not mean by that that a constitution should
go by the board as a whole at the end of every generation.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
He only meant that at the end of a generation it would
need changes. There is no use talking of these constitu
tions being sacred. Why, they are sacred in a certain
sense, but they are not sacred enough to stop the progress
of humanity and of the world. They are not sacred
enough to stop social and economic progress by any
means, and every generation that comes along is con
fronted by new conditions — that is what Lincoln meant
when he said that a constitution should not outlast a gene
ration. The English constitution, which the judges some
times say is unwritten, has always been changing. I do
not see how it is unwritten, however. I would like to
know what part of it is unwritten. The habeas corpus
act, the bill of rights, the petition of right, the act of set
tlement, and so on — all of it that I know anything about
is written. But it has ahvays been changing, gradually,
very gradually, from generation to generation. Macaulay
has this fine expression with regard to it: " Although it
has been constantly changing there never was an instant
of time in which the major portion of it was not old."
That expresses how we must deal with constitutions. The
changes must be gradual, mature and careful. So that
we may be able to say of our constitution as Macaulay
said of the British constitution, " constantly changing, but
there hever was an instant of time in which the major part
of it was not old." So I would advocate putting in the
national constitution an amendment that we have a con
stitutional convention by congressional districts every fif
teen or twenty years, and give the people of this country a
chance to ask for changes. When the courts decide things to
be unconstitutional we are helpless unless we can get to
gether and change our constitution by vote, and that ought
to be brought around as easily as possible. Not as easily
as possible in the rash sense, but as easily as possible with
mature thought, Avith care, and with a reasonable lapse of
time before voting — time for full discussion and thought.
Now, I have probably said enough to lodge in your
minds what I wanted to communicate to you on this sub-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
ject. I have omitted much, but I hope I have said enough
to start you men here, especially in the law school, to
thinking about these things. Don't go out of college as
mere iconoclasts wanting to break everything, like some
calling themselves radicals, who go around pulhng up
everything by the roots before they have something else
to plant in its place. I do not want you to be that kind
of men, but careful men, and mature men, and broad men.
Do not go into the honorable profession of the law in a
narrow spirit. Do not sit down and worship a decision
simply because judges made it. . An unjust decision can
not last in the nature of things. Courts sometimes think
when they make a decision they have settled a thing for
ever. It is not so. If you had hved in the time of the
Dred Scott decision would you have sat doAvn and wor
shipped it? The Dred Scott decision which took a negro
boy and remanded him back into human slavery in the
state from which he came only hastened, the coming hbera-
tion of the slave. It was open to discussion and to criti
cism like all official acts. And so you young men com
ing out of here to the bar, do not be the little rule of
thumb lavvyer that I spoke about at the beginning, but
let your minds grow and expand. And look at the law
as a growth, a growth to keep pace with economic groAvth
and social growth, and then you shall have social justice
and economic justice, or, to use a phrase that I hke bet
ter, you will have, for you will bring it about in your gene
ration, distributive justice to all.
Distributive Justice
(Remarks at the Dinner of the Trust Company Section of
the American Bankers' Association, Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, May
9, 1912.) Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen : My part according to
the programme is to welcome you in behalf of the City of
New York. If you are satisfied with that much I Avill be
perfectly willing to sit down. I most heartily welcome
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
you. You are here from 36 states of the nation, as I
understand it. Thirty-six — why not from all? And I
welcome you all. I feel in perfectly good company; I
may as well say that too. I am right here Avith what some
of our statesmen call the octopus. Or if I may use the
plural, in its homeliest way, about 700 octopuses, I under
stand, are in this room. Altogether you make one great
big octopus. Well, I am not a bit afraid of you, and I
feel entirely comfortable, because we have a good many
of the same kind, as Mr. Morgan knows, right here in the
city of New York. I confess that I have found you just
about hke the rest of mankind. You have a bad name in
some quarters, but I have found that your heart and your
head are about the same as the rest of us. I do not want
to say anything bad of you, to tell the truth — I might
want to borrow a thousand dollars tomorrow, so I will be
careful. If you are to be hung, drawn and quartered here
in the city of New York, I think I will turn that part of
the job over to Judge BaldAvin of Connecticut, at my right
here. Perhaps he has some blue law up in Connecticut that
he has brought along in his vest pocket that vidll very fairly
dispose of you.
But if your reputation is somewhat shady in some quar
ters, I have to remind you that it is nothing new. That is
something of very long standing. I hate to quote any
classical author when these gentlemen of the press are
around, because it astonishes the whole journahstic world.
In the most harmless way I once quoted one sentence from
Epictetus, and I never heard the last of it up to this time.
First they seemed to think I quoted from some bad book.
But by degrees they learned that I simply quoted from a
harmless philosopher who had been or was a slave when
he dictated his philosophy.
Your reputation was bad even before the time of the
elder Cato. (To the reporters: Cato, Cato, I said. Did
you ever hear of him before?) And I will let you know
what he said about you, or what he says that other people
said about you. It is in De Re Rustica — you college grad-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
nates have all read that in the original, his treatise on farm
ing. It is a sort of a Horace Greeley book, " What I know
about Farming," by the elder Cato. And he was telling
how honorable it was to make money out of farming. And
then he said it is also at times worth while to gain wealth
by commerce, were it not so perilous, or by usury were it
equally honorable. And usury in those days meant any
kind of interest. It was not a hard word as it is now. And
then he says " our ancestors, however, held and fixed by
law that a thief should be condemned to restore double,
but a usurer quadruple." And then he continues, " We
thus see how much worse they thought it for a citizen to be
a money lender than a thief." Now none of the modern
statesmen have said anything as bad as that about you have
they, from Oregon to Connecticut? I have not heard of
anybody saying anjrthing quite so bad. They call you an
octopus, and they laugh the next day when they want to
borrow a thousand dollars and say they did not mean it
at all. And you laugh also and lend them the money,
sometimes to get rid of them, and without security. You
are glad to do it. But you have your useful place in the
world like everybody else. Society is very complex. If
we were all bankers I don't know what would become of us.
And if we had no bankers I don't know what would be
come of us or of you either. You have your useful place
in the world, and your honorable place. I don't look upon
you with any alarm whatever. On the contrary I look
upon you as performing not only useful but an absolutely
necessary office in every civihzed community in the world.
Of course we don't want too many of you. The monied
interests are always dreaded. Those who charge interest
for money are always hated. But it is nothing new. I
wish some of you would read the history of the House of
Fuger beginning in the fifteenth century in Germany.
You Avill find it in the recent volumes, " The Foundations
of the Nineteenth Century." Some chap came there into
Dusseldorf, a weaver, and he saved his wages, and he be
gan to loan it around here and there, and finally he became
266

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
a banker. And during all the rest of that centurj^ and
all the sixteenth century, for that matter, the house of
Fuger financed pretty much everything that there was in
Germany, even the operations of the church in the collec
tion of the indulgence money, as you read in history. They
heard as much about them as we hear about the house of
Morgan, if I may take that name in vain again (turning
toward J. Pierpont Morgan). But they lived there in
their day and their time, and passed away. They had their
enemies, and they had their friends, and I suppose on the
whole probably they served a useful purpose. At all
events they tried to. And that is what you are trying to
do. I asked the distinguished gentlemen on my right and
on my left what the laws of usury were generally through
out the country. I understand, in fact I knoAV, that in
most of New England they have had the good sense to do
away with the usury law. Scathed and blasted by the logic
and reasoning of Bentham and Mill, and such minds, the
usury laws disappeared from England and from the con
tinent of Europe so far as I know, but we still harbor them
to a large extent in this country. My own state here has
the most illogical, nonsensical and, I might say, wretched
usury law on the face of the earth. We pass a statute pre
scribing a rate for money and then we make penalties for
anybody who agrees to take a higher rate. And one of the
penalties is that the whole loan is forfeited. Well, that is
done to protect the borrower they say. Did you ever hear
such nonsense in your life? To protect the borrower.
Why, if the borrower has no credit he cannot borrow, and
if his credit is poor he has got to pay the rate for such
credit. And inasmuch as the whole loan may be forfeited
if he chooses to go into court and resist payment, why he
has to be charged an additional sum in the rate for that
risk, hasn't he? That is as plain as your five fingers. And
yet when some attempts in this state have been made to
repeal that nonsensical law you would think that the pillars
of the temple were about to be pulled doAsm. They say
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
it is to protect the poor. Oh, dear me! Protect the poor!
It only adds to the rate the poor have to pay for money,
the risk that I am telling you. Every risk in the loan
has to be considered in fixing the interest which has to be
paid. Now many of our states have done away with that,
foUoAvdng England and Europe. The borrower they say
is the servant of the lender. Yes, to some extent that is
true. Then they reason that the borrower and the lender
are not on equal terms, and therefore they will enact a law
that the lender shall only charge 6 per cent, because he is
dominant over the borrower. But you are not obhged to
lend it at all, and if you are taking a big risk you charge
for it in some way or another. Somebody at my right or
my left told me there is such a thing as getting a commis
sion on the outside ; so that what they call the poor man,
that they do love to protect so much, and in their bung
ling do not protect at all, very often has to pay a very much
higher rate than he would have to pay if there were no
usury law. The law says in this state, for instance, 6 per
cent. But dear me, half the time money is being loaned
for 3 per cent, and 4 per cent. Bonds and mortgages are
placed here now at 4 per cent, and 4I/2 P^^ cent. — why not
6 per cent.? Why, because money is not worth 6 per
cent, and you cannot get any more than 4I/2 per cent, for
it. That is the economic law. You might as well pass a
law to change the seasons. As Macaulay says: " In spite
of the Legislature the snow AviU fall when the sun is in
Capricorn, and the flowers Avill bloom when he is in
Cancer." So that all these laws are futile. Absolutely
futile. But the trouble is the danger of saying so. I have
the unfortunate habit of saying anything I like. So to
morrow, no doubt, somebody will say that I want to abol
ish the usury laws for the benefit of the bankers. Not one
bit of it. It would not benefit you a particle. It would
reduce the rate of interest, and you know it, every one of
you who has thought of it — especially any of you who have
read the hterature on the subject. They know it in Massa
chusetts, and they know it in the western states, and in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
some of the southern states. But I am sorry to say, here
in my own state with a plain economic thing hke that, we
have an economic falsehood on the statute books for gen
erations, and no legislature to change it. But I suppose
it vrill come along. Everything happens, you know, if you
live long enough. You don't loiow what may happen to
you. This sort of law serves its time and then passes away.
The great struggle and the effort of everybody is really
to do the best for all. The great effort of society, as long
as we have known anything about organized society, has
been to bring about what I may define in two words, dis
tributive justice. That is to say, justice to all, according
to their merits and according to their productive capacity.
And that is the great object of government, and the great
aim of every honest man, whether he be a banker or not.
Do not be mere httle bankers, thinking about your
own little clique, and your own little seh^es. If you
do you will be like little parchment lawyers that we
see going around with their little rule of thumb way of
doing things and knowing nothing else on earth.
Broaden out, you intelhgent men, and help to bring
about distributive justice to all — to those above on
the ladder and those below on the ladder, all the way
down. And don't be so mean and pitiable that you cannot
put your eye first at the very foot of the ladder. I could
make a wager that four-fifths of you started at the foot of
the ladder yourselves. So look down at those at the foot,
and remember that they are entitled to distributive justice
too. We read the statistics of your banks, how much your
deposits are, and how much your loans are, and we read
the statistics shoAving the total product of the industry of
the country. The figures are enormous. And then we all
say: "What a prosperous country. The total product
of industry last year was so many billions, beating every
nation on the earth," and then Ave boast and say: "How
prosperous!" My friends, remember distributive justice when you
have that in your minds. Prosperity does iiot depend
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
wholly on the total product of a country. It depends even
more on a just distribution of that product among all who
contributed by their work to produce it, whether that work
was mental or physical or both. You may have the
mightiest production, but until you have a just distribu
tion among all who contributed to it, you will not have
distributive justice and you will not have prosperity, a con
tented society. So look to it that your own calling does
not dwarf your minds. An animal lives in a little circle,
as I know every time I look at my dog, or my horse or my
cow or my pig, or even my goose, and Avithin that horizon
that animal knows more than Ave do. And you may know
all within your circle. But broaden out. Do not let your
little circle be to you the horizon of humanity or of man
kind. If you do, you are not fulfilling your office in the
world. You intelligent men, with great power in your
hands, prosperity is the highest production that a com
munity is capable of consistent Avith the moral, mental and
physical health of the members of that community, accom
panied by a just diAdsion of the total product among those
Avho produced it. I do not say share and share ahke. No,
but according to the productive capacity of each. Emula
tion and ambition are the mother of all good things in
the world. What would the world be without them? So
that the rewards of industry go to each and all according
to the various productive capacities. And the loafers and
criminals who produce nothing, Judge Baldwin, I suppose
you and I, all of us, have to support them and bear with
them the best we can. That seems to be the order of the
world. So I will simply urge you to take that broad view
of things. I started out by facetiously saying that maybe you
have a bad name in the community. I Avant to say some
thing on the other side of it. Wherever you go through
out this country, especially outside of the large cities,
where people know each other, in the small Adllages and
cities, the banker is always recognized as an honest man
and a useful citizen in the community. And he does much
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
good in the community. And if you have a bad name and
the monied interests are complained of, it is because there
is some instinctive feeling that here and there, by means
of money, there is too much power in the hands of a few
people. That you want to counteract. You want to coun
teract it by your justice, and by your humanity. Not by
dohng out charity, but by doing justice, by working all
the time as intelligent citizens, after the manner of states
men who promote that distributive justice which satisfies
everybody and makes all people brethren.
Of course, there is a notion in the world, and it seems
to be growing, that the state had better take all the bank
ing unto itself, all the railroads unto itself, all the lands
unto itself, all the implements and means of production,
and all the factories, and everything, unto itself, and run
them all. That is Socialism. I am aware that about 99 out
of 100 think the Socialistic propaganda is to cut all the
property up into little bits and give each one an equal bit.
Just think of cutting all the land here on Manhattan Is
land, or in the city of New York, up into 5,000,000 bits and
giving each one a bit. What would you do with your bit?
Build a skyscraper on it? But they have no such thing in
their minds at all. That is absurd. You all laugh at it.
That is not their propaganda. Their propaganda is to
mass everything under the control of the state. In place of
dividing property up into little bits, they mass it all in one
lump under one control, namely, of the state, and then let
the state pay everybody. I think under that system each
one of us would do just as httle as he could, wouldn't he?
All ambition and emulation would be gone. The mother
of excellence in the world is competition. It would be
gone. The state would be the only landlord, the only em
ployer. Competition Avould be gone, and everyone doing
as httle as he could because he would only be paid a little
anyhow. The result would be that the total product would
be small, and grow smaller and smaller. The result would
be more poverty under that regime than the world ever
saw before. And it would not last one generation — ^that
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
is my opinion, publicly expressed for your benefit, and
anyone else that may care to listen. But in the other
way of competition we do not want to drive it to the extent
of putting our hobnails into the flesh of our brethren and
those Avho are struggling around us, whether in the poht
ical field or in the bankers' field, or in the workmen's field.
We want to know there is one great God over us all.
Knowing that solemnly and sincerely we should use it in
the practical affairs of life, and try to do justice to all.
And that is distributive justice. Now, you bankers, from
all parts, go home and try to do that.

The Lessons of Farming
(Extract from Speech at the Syracuse Fair, September 12, 1911.)
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the State of New
York: What particularly interested me in looking over
your exhibit so far as I have gone is the growth of the
State in its farming interests since I was a boy on the
farm, which I may Avithout any vanity mention since so
many others have taken the liberty of lugging it in by the
heels. I happen also to have been born and brought up
on a farm, and have a vivid recollection of farming con
ditions in those days. We had an awful hard time to
live. The best of what grew on the farm was not eaten
at all. We scarcely ate butter, and never drank any
milk, except skimmed milk. We seldom ate flesh meat,
except pork, and seldom eggs, strange as it may sound to
the prosperous farmers of to-day. Those were the things
which brought in the only ready money which we had, and
we saved our butter and such things until the agent came
around to buy them and turn them into ready cash to pay
the bills of the year. The rest of the year we just lived the
best we could on the skimmed milk and what was left, and
then in the winter — I won't exactly undertake to tell you
how we lived. We lived somehow or another, or I would
not be here and when we came out of it all with pretty
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
good constitutions, and we came out of it also with some
preparation for life. The great quality of perseverance
is learned on the farm as nowhere else. The city people
rush about mad to make a dollar, and jump on a car and
spend five cents and go back and forth with no time to
spare, and do just their formal tasks as they have to do
them from day to day. There is no education in it.
There is nothing ennobling about it. There is no time
left to them to think or to invent or to do any great thing,
so that the cities, according to their population, do not
produce the number of considerable or great men they
should produce. But out in the country the lessons are
entirely different. You learn the lessons of hardship.
You learn that you have to work, wet or dry, and in the
hot sun, and stick it out too in the hot sun or in the rain;
or go into the woods in the winter and log it and cut and
skid your logs and haul them out, and hew out the snow
banks in order to get in and out half the time. And when
you look at a great big cornfield, with all its rows of corn,
a great field, just think of going to work to cultivate and
hoe that corn. It is bad enough to think of a little garden
where you have to get down on your hands and knees to
weed. That is tedious enough. But the big cornfield or
the big potato field, why the city chap without any educa
tion or perseverance — by the time he had done half of one
of these long rows would begin to count how many there
were left, and quit. He would say " This is an endless
job." But the country boy has to stick it out, row after
row and day after day. So that in after life a big task
put before him does not look so big, because he has been
taught the experience that if he goes to work at it silently
and systematically, that sooner or later, and soon enough
at that, it will all be done. Now, is not that what we
learn in the country above all other things; so that when
we come down to the city and go in among the " smart "
people — I mean the people who think they are so much
smarter than we are — we are not at all feazed, we are a
little awkward no doubt, we do not dress quite the same,
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but we after all have some habits that equip us to come
into the competition with them and do fairly well. How
is that? On Opening a Jewish Theatre
(Address at the Opening of Kessler's Second Avenue Theatre,
September 14, 1911.)
This theatre really is astonishing. There are a cer
tain number of people in this great city who think the East
Side is a sort of slum. Oh, how much they do sympathize
with you. And how much a year some of them are being
paid for sympathizing with you. I wish they AA^ere all
here to-night to listen to this play. The name of the play
is " God, Man and Devil." I cannot say it in Yiddish,
but that is the way it is in English. Now, that is a pretty
comprehensive play. It takes in the heavens above and
the earth beneath and all the fire and water under the
earth. Nothing is left out. I think after being Mayor
for a year and a half that I could almost Avrite a play on
that subject myself. The great trouble, though, very
often, is to distinguish the man from the devil. They
look a good deal alike sometimes and act a good deal ahke,
too, and maybe this play will develop that trait as you wit
ness it. However, I trust and am assured that it is a
good play of high dramatic art. I do not know why it
should not be. You people are of a dramatic race. Your
whole history is drama and tragedy, from the twilight of
fable, from the days of Abraham, down to this hour.
Where else outside of your scriptures, the Old Testament
in our bible, is there so much of exalted poetry, of ex
alted tragedy? All the literatures of the world in these
respects and in others nowhere approach the books of what
we call the Old Testament. And every one written by
one of your race — one of the Jewish race. That is no
flattery to tell you that, because the whole world knows it.
And I might go much further and say that what we call
the New Testament — the second part of our bible — ^that
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
every chapter and every line of it also was written by a
Jew. So that the Christian bible — the bible that we all
read — Old Testament and New Testament, was all of it
written by Jews. And when a Christian picks up his
bible to read it, and has that fact in his mind, how on
earth is he going to have any ill will towards the Jew?
And yet, after taking all of your scriptures and all of the
New Testament, written by Jews, I am sorry to say that
in some way or another they did turn around and show ill
will towards you, Avhich, however is happily dying out all
over the world, and I shall not make further mention of it.
May be some of it does survive yet, but God knows I
don't know how it does survive or how it ever existed at
all. It certainly will not survive much longer, even in
Russia. So you people are worthy of this theatre. This
theatre never would have been built (with all respect to
the architect and to the builder), except that you wanted
it and that your genius was here waiting for it. Is not
that so? And so they came along and built it for you,
and somebody put up the money for it, and I suppose
he is going to make his dividends out of it hereafter
through your genius for the drama and through the in
stinct that you have for good plays and good music.
The programme said that Mr. Johnson, the builder,
was going to give me the key of the building. I guess it
is out in the door there somewhere. Where is it, Johnson?
The next speaker is Mr. Kessler, so if I had the key, Mr.
Kessler, as the programme says, I would give it to you
and I would also say to you, " Sir, while you are the lessee
of this theatre, you go and lock that outer door up tight
with that key sooner than let anything foul or indecent in
the way of plays enter this theatre. Hold the drama up.
Honor the people that come here to take an interest in
the drama." I am sorry to say it, but there are some peo
ple in the city of New York now of base mind, dealing
Avith the drama, that only want to pull it down in the
mud, and I hope this will never occur within the walls of
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
this theatre. It never will so long as the people of the
East Side remain what they are now— pure of mind, aspir
ing to advance in the world, pure of heart and with an
artistic temperament. I tell you that since the beginning
of the world art and filth never went hand in hand, never.
And they never will. Look at the masterpieces of comedy
and tragedy. Look at the pieces played by Bonne, and
Von Sonnenthal, and Rachael, and Bernhardt. Why,
those were great actors and actresses because they played
legitimate plays — plays filled with morality and genius,
which did not degrade the community, but while they ele
vated us mortals up almost, as the saying is, to the skies,
brought angels down, and purified the minds of every
body. That that is the future of this theatre is the hope
Avhich I now express in declaring it open and delivering it
over to you, Mr. Kessler.

Farmers' Prices
(Address to Farmers from Pennsylvania at City HaU, August
81, 1911.)
I am very glad indeed to receive you, farmers from
Pennsylvania, all of you, as I understand. Most people
in this city think that they are paying you altogether too
much for what you produce and send down here. I hap
pen to have been born and reared on a farm, so I think I
may say that I am of a different opinion. I know we
had a pretty hard time when I was at it, to make both
ends meet, and I guess it is pretty much the same all over
the United States yet, although we hear some people
here in the city talking about the farmers rolling in wealth
with their high prices. The figures read here this morn
ing show that although we do pay unconscionably high
prices here these prices do not go to you. Apparently
only about one-third of it ever reaches you. The rest
goes to the carrier and the middleman, and so on. The
people in the cities also do not remember that if you are
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
receiving higher prices for your farm products than you
formerly did you are, on the other hand, paying much
higher prices for everything which you have to buy. So
that the case with you is about the same as it used to be.
It is just about the same old story — to AVOrk hard sunny
day and rainy day all the year round, and live. That is
about what it amounts to in the country the same as in the
city. Now, these high prices are general. You only
need to go to London or Paris to find the prices there
higher than ever, the price of living. Some of you know
that without my reminding you of it. One of the chief est
causes of the advance in prices of commodities all over the
world is the excessive output of gold. Really the thing
ought to be put the other way. The real cause is that
money is cheaper than it used to be. That is to say, a
dollar of gold or paper, which is equivalent to gold, is
cheaper than it used to be and will not buy as much as it
used to buy because the gold mines are putting out such
great quantities of gold, the like of which was never known
in the world before. Gold, which is only a commodity
like all other commodities, is growing less valuable all the
time, the more of it that is mined, and therefore a given
amount of gold will buy a less and less quantity of com
modities. So it has come to pass that you almost have to
put up two dollars to buy what you used to be able to buy
for one dollar. Now the largest cause that I know of for
that, is the over production of gold or the great produc
tion of gold. I need not tell intelligent farmers that
when you expand money, money becomes of less value and
therefore purchases less; but we generally state it in the
other way, that other commodities have grown high when
in fact the medium of exchange, money, has grown less
valuable. There are other causes also which account for
the high prices, and some of them are the causes which you
have laid here before me this morning — of the commodi
ties going through too many hands before they reach the
consumer, and then the freight rates, although it must be
said in justice to the railroads, that the freight rates here
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
except for local hauls are not excessive. They are far
greater in Europe than they are here, gentlemen, as you
happen to know. The trouble in this country has not
been excessive freight rates. The trouble has been that
the railroads have assumed to give favorite rates to a few
people. That has been the trouble. And so far as I had
any advice to give when that matter was rife in Washing
ton, I stated to the then President, who consulted me
about it, not to try to lower rates too much but to have it
established that no man could have his freight carried ex
cept at the same rate that every other man pays. The
reason for that is this, that the man who can have his
freight, whether it is oil or steel or iron or wire fence or
what not, carried at a rate lower than his competitor, can
thereby undersell his competitor in the market that much
and drive him out of business, and thereby create the
monopolies and trusts that have been created all over this
country. I do not think there is a man in this country
that fears honest competition against anybody. We
have all got bravery enough to be ready to compete vrith
any comer and all comers; but when you are the pro
ducer of a commodity and you have a rival that you are
competing with producing the same commodity and you
find that he can have his commodity carried over the rail
roads of the country to the markets at a price so much
below you that he can undersell you that much in the
market and destroy your business, then the raih'oads are
being used for the most damnable purpose that anything
was ever put to in this world. And it is my belief that all
of the trusts in the country, substantially, were built up
on favoritism in freight rates. You would just as leave
compete in your line with any man, but if he can have his
commodity carried to market at one-third less than you
are paying or one-half less, why all you can do is to throw
up your hands and sell out your business to him and quit.
Now, the government is doing I suppose all it can do to
stop that. Some people are so easily deceived that they
think it all has been stopped. I am not quite so credulous
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
as that. In fact, I happen to know that it has not been
stopped. But in the course of time, I suppose we will
stop it some way or another. The people of the country
AviU stop it. And then those monopolies cannot be created
out of railroad rates any longer and thereby get the con
trol of prices in the hands of a few people of the country.
Now I have mentioned to you the two chief things
that are meddling with and disturbing prices — the great
output of gold, which we cannot complain of because that
is in the province of Almighty God and the laws of nature.
The other we can complain of and do complain of and it
must stop.
Now, your object to get your things down here and
get them to the consumer as near to the price that you re
ceive as possible, is most laudable. I assure you we will
be glad to get them at that price if you can manage to give
them to us. You may encounter a hard job, but if you
persevere and your movement spreads, why I think some
thing can be accomplished on that line. I can only say
that while I am here I shall be very glad to meet you and
assist you in any way that I can.

Advice on Entering Politics
(Speech at the Dinner of the Politics Club of Columbia Uni
versity, March 13, 1913.)
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Pohtics Club : I
notice you have good lungs any way, whatever else may be
the case. I certainly am very glad to meet a body of
young men like this. It almost makes me feel young my
self, if that were possible. At all events it makes me feel
quiet, and think of some, things that I do not think of in
the surroundings of my daily life. Most of the people
that I meet, or many of those I meet, are mere self-seekers,
without sincerity. I suppose you know there is a large
percentage of the city that is wholly corrupt. You are
young politicians; you are associated under a club of
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that name. Your desire is to go into pohtics from high
motives. But the first disappointment you will encounter
is that you Avill be surrounded by men of bad motives, low
motives, selfish motives. You all think now that you have
high motives, and I have no doubt it is so. Whether
you will preserve them or not is another thing, when you
get out into contact with the world. But you must try to.
I hardly know what to say to you. I was looking over
the letter of Mr. Trimble, your chairman, on the way up
to see what cue I could get ; and he says he would hke me
to speak to you about the duties of young men entering
politics and the problems they will encounter. And
then he wants me to tell what are the most serious dif
ficulties in the government of a great city. Just think of
that. I have a notion to begin at the last of his queries
and tell them, but may be it is just as well that I should
not do so. The duties of young men entering pohtics is
what he mentions first. Now your duties are about the
same wherever you may be; but of course they vary ac
cording to the locality in which you start hfe. I suppose
some of you intend to be lavvyers, and some doctors ; some
are going into business and some will be engineers, and
so on. Wherever your lot is cast, if you enter pohtics you
will have duties to perform. Every man should enter
politics. That is to say, every man should perform the
duties of a citizen, whether he be a college graduate or
not. But I suppose you have something further than that
in mind. You contemplate that you shall actually go
into the field of politics. You contemplate possibly that
you will run for office. You all contemplate no doubt you
will have my office in a few years, those of you who hve
in the city of New York at all events; and I am sure I
wish you all to have your wish in that respect. But of
all things first analyze your mind and see what your mo
tives are. See whether you are going into pohtics really
from high motives or not. Are you going into pohtics to
help the community or to help yourself? It is very easy
to deceive ourselves. But my advice to you is to go into
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
pohtics only after a firm resolve that your whole and only
motive is to help the community in which your lot is cast.
Just forget yourself. Don't be a self seeker. If you
go into pohtics in that spirit then you will do much good.
If you go into pohtics simply to seek your own personal
advancement and welfare then it were much better that
you stay out of politics. We can do nothing in this world
worth while unless we are inspired by the motive of doing
good to others. All the great men of the world, except
those who were moved by ambition and by wrong motives,
and are miscalled great, became great in that way. The
philosophers were great in that way. Moses was great
in that way. Jesus was great in that way. They hved
for others, not for themselves. And at the same time it
is no harm for me to say that those who hve in that way
take care of themselves also. At the same time others
take care of them. But do not b6 a self-seeker. For
young men to go into pohtics just to be gabby little fel-
' lows, making a noise and trying to get into office, is a very
poor way of entering life. Indeed, do not do it. Have a
motive — a high motive; and then do the best you can,
whatever your pursuit in life may be. Everybody has
duties. Mr. Trimble said. What are your duties in enter
ing office? Why, we all have duties whether we enter
pohtics or not, and our duties are to our fellow men. We
have a duty to our family, to those nearest us; but the
greatest duty of all that we have is the duty which we owe
to humanity, then to our oaati country, and then to those
around us. Some would say the country first and hu
manity second. That is a false theory. Let your hori
zon be just as wide as you can make it. You will be all
the greater for that. And you cannot be really great un
less your horizon is the horizon of all humanity. No one
was ever great with a less horizon than that. Do not
over-shoot the mark either. Do not be too eager. Be
self-contained. Know what you want and then pursue
that course. Why, when you look around and see the lit
tle noisy and gabby politicians you certainly have no wish
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
to join them, if that is what you mean. That Avould be
miserable business. Be self-contained. Very often
young men entering into politics want to go to the Legis
lature. They generally start out that way. That is the
way Lincoln started out, and most of the great men that
you can mention. Well, what course should you pursue
in that respect? Why, you should go there for a purpose,
if that be the way you start. How many wrecks I have
seen at Albany in my time. I never was a member of the
Legislature, but I have been an onlooker for a long time.
I did think once when I was a young chap hke you that
that was the height of my ambition, to be a member of
the Assembly, and it is a great ambition too. But I saw
young men go there, and it was failure after failure. The
reason was as a rule that they had no sand in them. They
had no moral stamina. They did not know enough when
they went up there to go and hire a boarding house about
two miles away from the Capitol, and go there every time
the Legislature adjourned, night or morning. In place
of that they would run out of the Legislature and then
run down to the hotel and stand in the lobby like great
men, and the rest of the time they would stand at the bar.
And they would talk to everybody that came along, and
made themselves little. In that way they acquired frivo
lous habits and bad habits, and they came doAvn home
transformed. You know what I mean. Every time I go
to Albany or to Washington I cannot help looking at
the people around, not only some of the legislators, but
the people who come there. Did you ever see such a lot
of gabby people, and so many sharpers and so many small
people. And they look so cagy, did you ever notice? I
was over in Washington recently, and that was the one
thing I said to the man who was with me, " Let's get away
from here. I never saw so many cagy looking people."
At the Capitol— even at the White House, in the outer
room and especially in the lobby of the hotels— every man
a gabby, cagy little fellow. Now you avoid that. Don't
do that. Be a self-contained man. Be a studious man.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Why, it is enough to make one shiver to have some of these
gabby little people come near you at all, they are so smart.
I acknowledge they are smart. They could give us aces
and spades, if that be the right term, and beat us in small
things. But I think we would have the best of them every
time in large things. And that is where you want to
stand. Be studious people. Do not give up your studies.
Keep reading when you go out of here. If you are
studying mathematics, continue the study of it. It is one
of the greatest drills for the mind. That has been one of
the solaces of my life. I don't mind saying that I like
now to take a problem of Euclid and pore over it and do it
again, and think I am as smart at it as I was when I was
your age, which of course I am not. And the same with
your reading. Pick up especially works of the phil
osophy of history. There was once a great professor here
in New York who wrote " The Intellectual Development
of Europe," Professor Draper, I think he was a professor
here in this University. The book is now somewhat out
of date scientifically — I admit that. There are some
errors in it. But read books like that. Read Lecky.
Read Hallam. Read the book of Emil Reich, " Success
Among Nations." Read Green's " History of the Eng
hsh People." And such books as that. And then, of
course, other books, like the Bible and Shakespeare, and
works of autobiography, like Franklin and Benvenuto
Cellini. I ought not to mention Cellini again, because I
happened to mention him not long ago, and the book stores
here in a few days hadn't a copy left, there were so few
people in this city that had ever read him, and yet it is one
of the finest autobiographies ever written. Keep up your
studious habits, and the identity which you acquire here.
You are not doing much more here than learning how to
learn. Unless you acquire the studious habit here you
might as well go home to-morrow. And do not be under
the delusion that you can get to anything great in this
world without preparation. It is a false notion with which
you boys and young men are sometimes deluded. I do
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
not know whether any of the professors are here. But
you are sometimes deluded by your professors. I have
seen it often enough. You are told things that are ex
aggerations. Do not rely upon your genius. I know
you are all geniuses. But nevertheless do not rely on it.
It has been said by a man who has sense that genius is two
per cent, inspiration and 98 per cent, perspiration. And
that is about true. The only genius there is is the genius
of getting ready. That is genius. No man ever lived who
knew how to get ready better than Csesar or Napoleon;
and yet boys coming out of college think they won their
great victories, and did their great things, just by inspira
tion, by genius. Why, when Napoleon came on the field
of battle he knew not only all the troops he had, but he
knew where they were. He knew even where every bread
wagon was. And he was able to pick them all up and
throw them on the enemy because he had them in hand.
He had got ready. He tramped around his camps at
night in bad weather when his soldiers were asleep. And
he went away out sometimes ahnost alone to reconnoiter
the country and he knew every road and every stream and
every obstacle. That is genius. Get ready and you are
a genius. But if you think you can do it without getting
ready you are more fool than genius, I can tell you that.
And you cannot do that without keeping up your thought-
fulness and your study. You must do it to succeed.
Some of you think you want to be laAvyers, I suppose;
and you think you will be a great laAvyer by being a talka
tive fellow. Never was a talkative fellow a great laAvyer.
Not even once. The saying is that no lawyer ever came
to fame with a straight back or without a pale face. That
tells the whole story. To be great in anything you have
to toil terribly, in the language of Sydney Smith. There
is no other way to do it. You have got to pay the price;
and if you are not willing to pay the price you cannot do
it. Some of the people in the rear of the court room think
that fellow with an immense diamond in his shirt bosom
and with a very loud voice is the greatest lawyer there.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
But there is another chap there that they hardly hear, and
who maybe looks quite insignificant; but the Judge and
the jury know that he is the great laAvyer. He knows
something. The fellow with the big diamond and the big
voice is more fit to run a slaughter house. We have such
people here in the City of New York, I know that. Some
of them are dead and gone, and some of them remain still.
But do not imitate them. Take my word for it that the
studious man, the equipped man (doctor, laAvyer, engi
neer, business man), he is the man who will come out
ahead of everybody else. He knows how to do it, and he
is serious too. He does not look at his oAvn figure all the
time, nor does he practise before a looking glass to see
how nice his gestures are. Yet I have heard professors
advise boys going into politics and the law to study
gestures and practise before looking glasses, and adjust
their hair in a very nice manner, and all such foppery and
foolery as that. Why, it amounts to nothing. The man
is what amounts to something. Lincoln was a great
lawyer — tried great cases — ^lost great cases — won great
cases. You are told, maybe, in the school that he would
not take any case unless he knew it was a good one and
that he could win it. Don't believe any such nonsense as
that. He was a lawyer; and he took good cases and«bad
cases because it was his duty to do it. What would be
come of us if nobody would take our case unless it was a
good one? Such talk. He was lawyer for the Illinois
Central Railroad Company for years, and defended dam
age suits, cases where poor fellows lost their arms and
their legs. Do not allow these things to deceive you at
all. Take the Avorld as it is. Then you are told that
Webster never lost a case; and Choate never lost a case,
and so on. Why, they lost more cases than they won
after they were 40 years of age, because people Avho had
hard cases came to them with them. It is not the test of
a lawyer whether he wins his case. The test is what
equipment he brings into it, and how he conducts it. That
is the test. And have no exaggerated notion, you young
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
politicians and lawyers (the two things go together very
largely), have no exaggerated notion about eloquence and
oratory. Don't let them fool you about that either. I
suppose you have all read by this time that it is said that
Demosthenes when asked the first great requisite of ora
tory said " Action," and then asked for the second great
requisite, again said " Action," and the third time he re
peated " Action." What kind of an orator would he be
that was all action and nothing else? What nonsense
when you come to analyze these things. Some of the
greatest orators that ever lived stood still with their hands
on the table or in their pockets. In place of action being
the great requisite even once, let alone three times, the first
requisite of all is a man with a purpose — an honest man,
with an honest purpose — that is the first requisite ; and not
some fellow who cannot keep his hands still. The next
requisite is to have something to say, a message to dehver.
And the third requisite, and the least of all, is the manner
of saying it, and what gestures you will make while say
ing it. Now, there is the orator. You may easily learn
from history that the greatest orators, or many of them,
were only fair speakers, and many of them poor speakers.
Some of them stuttered even. Lord Bacon says Moses
stuttered. I don't know how he found it out. If the man
is there, and the matter is there, he Avill make himself
understood somehow. And of course it is well that he is
able to make himself fairly understood by the use of
words. But he will make himself understood. And that
is the orator. The greatest orator who survives in the
Enghsh tongue is Burke, who emptied the House of Com
mons when he got up to speak. The House of Commons
may have preferred to go out to the restaurant for tea, if
that be what they drank there, but the world listened to
what he had to say. And he was a great orator. So
have no false notions about that. Don't be a little blather
skite. There is an immeasurable distance between a
blatherskite and an orator. Do not confound eloquence
or oratory with rhetoric. I have heard rhetoricians that
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
could talk from the beginning of the week to the end in
the most beautiful manner, but they were not orators.
They made no slips of grammar. Their words were
beautiful. But they were mere words. I have seen
great feats of rhetoric, and I have heard great orators. I
have heard great orators that some people would not
listen to. The greatest feat of the human voice or of
great rhetoric that I ever heard was at Chicago at the Con
vention that nominated Grover Cleveland the last time, I
think. It was held in a great big place called a wigwam,
covering a block or two. Why, nobody could be heard.
Orators came up all day from noon till midnight to the
platform from all parts of the country, who were rated
great orators in their locality; but they could not CA'^en be
heard in that vast place. I did not believe there was a man
in the world that could be heard there. I had read in books
of men speaking to 30,000 people in the open air and
being heard, but I did not believe it, and I do not believe
it now, to tell the truth. And I did not believe there was
a person in the world that could be heard in this hall of the
convention. And yet about one o'clock in the morning
when everybody had been yelling and everybody had been
tired out, and every orator in the country had tried to be
heard, I saw a man who was sitting right in front of me
get up and go down the aisle and jump up on the reporters'
table, and then up on the stage and lean back against a
table on the stage preparatory to speaking. And it was
nothing but confusion and noise. And in a few minutes,
I mean a few moments, a few seconds, you could hear a
pin drop all over this vast place. I could hear nothing
but the breathing of people around me. The breath of
people was quickened as this man proceeded. And he
only leaned back against the table as if to say " I do not
care one cent whether you listen to me or not ; I am going
to talk for a while." And he did talk for half an hour
or more in absolute silence — ^the first silence that was heard
in that convention, and the last. He was from New
York. But I confess when he got through I could not re-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
member a thing that he had said except one, and that was
that Grover Cleveland was the most popular man in the
United States on every day in the year except election
day. To this hour I do not remember another thing that
he said. But he was a great rhetorician. I do not say
he was a blatherskite. I leave you to judge of that. That
was a great feat of the human voice. But what he said
had no wings. It has not come down to you; let alone is
it going down to after generations. The man after all
who wins in the long run is the man of a sincere and honest
purpose. He may be a poor speaker. He may stutter,
or have some impediment, or have difficulty in collecting
his thoughts. But he will be ahead at the end of the race ;
I will bet any money on that ; unless it is some httle miser
able httle twenty-yard race, or something like that. I
am speaking now of a race where wind tells. Some of
you may think I am jocose, but I am not. I mean every
word of it. I have observed all these things in the course
of my life. I have seen great statesmen, great speakers,
great rhetoricians, and a few orators. But I am telhng
you that the man who at your age learns to be self-con
tained, who has no desire to be a gabby fellow, no desire
even to be a rhetorician, but a great desire to do something,
will beat them all in the end. You can rely upon that.
So that is what you are here in this college for. Now you
see what you get by Trimble asking me to tell you how
to enter politics. Why, if you think you want to enter
pohtics to dazzle people you won't dazzle them at all.
They will say, what a miserable little fellow he is. But
if they see that you are a man Avho has some high thoughts,
who is self-contained, who is not consumed in airing him
self all the tune, then they will have confidence in you.
And remember, my young friends, that silence has a won
derful power. I have to go out and speak at night so
much now that I have almost forgotten it. There is a
little book written about the power of silence, which is
worth reading. Have no desire in entering politics, or
entering any profession or occupation, to talk merely to
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
talk. Do not talk unless you have something to say. If
you have got something to say you have a right to talk,
but if you only want to hsten to the sound of your own
voice like some people who come in the Board of Estimate
dovsTitOAvn, why, I would say to you Don't. Simply be
self-contained enough not to put yourself forAvard until
you have got something to say, and then you will have
people to listen to you.
Now the next thing that Mr. Trhnble said in his let
ter was for me to mention some things that you have to
encounter now in the field of politics. Well, there are
many things. The last Presidential campaign opened up
many things. I cannot say that that campaign opened
them up. They were rife already, but it is for us to
broaden out to meet them squarely and fairly. If you
are going into politics you have got to meet the growing
situation from year to year. My advice to you is not to
be too conservative. But of all things do not be too radi
cal either. The human race is like an infant learning to
walk. It can only learn to toddle and to walk just so
much. And if you in your great zeal run ahead shouting
your theories you will find yourself alone after you have
gone a little distance. Lincoln always said that he was
not a leader at all — that he only tried to keep up with the
people, and I think that was so. There have been events
in the world where the theorists and people of large ideas
got ahead of their time. That was the trouble with Jesus,
and he lost his life through it. He went farther than they
would follow. His motives were not merely religious,
but political and economic, as you see in reading the Gos
pels. He went further than the times would go with him.
The French Revolution leaped forward a hundred years.
They changed the calendar. They changed everything.
They changed the weights and measures, which is a curious
study in itself. They did many great things, but they
went further than the people would follow, and the result
was that it all doubled back on itself, and they had to go
back to the front ranks of the people and resume the step
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
by step method. To give a familiar illustration, when
they estabhshed their weights and measures they used
Greek terms. But, dear me, the people had been using
their hand and their foot and common terms for weights
and measures, and they sunply would not accept the Greek
nomenclature that they tried to impose on them. I only
mention that as an illustration of the whole thing. And
it is only now in France that the French people are giv
ing up the idea of the yard and the foot and the hands
and so forth as standards of measure. So that while you
must not be too conservative you must not be too radical.
We have among us now in this country people calling them
selves radicals who think it is radicalism to pull everything
up by the roots. It is radical to go to the root of matters,
but to go to pulhng everything up by the roots until you
have something else to plant instead is the height of folly.
The column in this room here may be rotten, but to go and
pull it down would be only to pull the whole roof doAvn on
top of you. The way to do it is to prepare a better
column and have it ready and jack up the roof and take
the old column out and put the new one in. It is the same
in government and in politics. You have to proceed in
just that way. Do not be under the delusion that you
can do it in any other way. It is not possible. You
should proceed patiently. No matter how advanced your
ideas are and what great projects you have in mind you
must always remember that to carry them out you have to
begin at the point where you stand, and go step by step
up to them and do them just as you would do if you Avere
a carpenter in fashioning something out of a plank or a
board; or if you were a blacksmith making a horseshoe,
you could not make a horseshoe by snapping a finger, nor
can you do anything else in this world in that way. You
have to do it by degrees and in an orderly manner. So
that is one lesson you will have to learn in pohtics. It is
better that you learn it here than afterwards. It is bet
ter that you start out that way than to run half your
career only to find that you have got to come back and
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
begin over again that way. Every little while some mis
erable demagogue comes along. Sometimes he is a rich
fellow, maybe sometimes he is poor. If he is an 80 mil
lion dollar demagogue he is the worst kind of a dema
gogue, I assure you, and he will get people to run after
him and will tell them not how it should be done, but that
he will do it. People do not stop to think how he will do
it. Why, he can only do things through law and through
the machinery of government. If you need new laws
you have to pass new laws. And we very often think
(and that is one of the falsest notions in politics) that
we can cure ills by passing laws. Not so. The distance
between the passing of a law and its observance is often
immeasurable. No law is worth anything unless it is
backed up by the community. And even then you have
hard work to get it enforced. The Ten Commandments
are not too well observed so far, are they? And yet they
are backed up by the community and by all the preachers.
Good men in office will produce good government even
with bad laws, but bad men in office will not produce
good government with the best of laws. Remember that,
too. So that the making of laws is not everything. There
are some people who have an itch to change the law all the
time and make a new law. They think that will do the
whole thing. There is something the matter in the Police
Department. Forthwith they want a new law ; when it is
not law at all that is wanted, but unceasing work for years
maybe to bring about the remedy. Mr. Waldo has
spoken of the Police Department. It is a fair example.
Committees are sitting and advising Albany what laws
to pass because there are a few corrupt policemen. Why,
you cannot stop a grafter by passing a law. You have
got to catch him or stop him in advance. There is no
other way. There is a committee down from the Legis
lature taking the views of people on the same subject, and
everybody who thinks he has a view is very eager to come
forward to give it; and I might say those who haven't any
views at all are eager to come forward and air themselves.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
And yet. What is the trouble? Why, it all comes down
to a simple thing in the Police Department. We have
been fighting it ever since Waldo came in and before.
When I became Mayor the Commissioner that preceded
him entered upon it and we have been at it ever since.
For a long time there have been some corrupt police in
the city. A few years ago there were many. There were
heads of police who were going out millionaires, one after
the other. I do not think anybody is becoming a million
aire under Waldo. I have not heard of it. I doubt it.
Things are much better now than they ever Avere before.
Mr. Waldo spoke of the fixed posts and the police out on
duty all over the city night and day, and what he does to
keep them there. Why, you people over here (some hve
maybe in Brooklyn, where there are nearly two milhons
of people, or in Queens, or maybe in Richmond, or in the
Bronx), is there any graft of the police there? If there
be any it is an isolated case of somebody getting a dollar
or two. There is no one there to tempt them. You can
find them all over this great city night and day doing
their duty like clockwork, ready for any emergency, or
to answer any call. They are not even tempted. But
here in Manhattan, which some people think is the city,
there are two or three districts where all the gamblers and
all the harlots and all the corrupt people congregate, and
want to do illegal things, and in these two or three dis
tricts they are constantly bribing the police. And yet
from all this hue and cry you would think that that was
general all over this city. Why, it is only local in two or
three places, and there we have almost done aAvay with it.
And look at recent events. You would think, I say, that
this corruption was general. Why, all that has been re
vealed that happened since I am Mayor was revealed by
the enforcement of the law by Mr. Waldo, and Mr.
Cropsey his predecessor. All the indictments and prose
cutions have grown out of two cases. First was the case
of Rosenthal, who was murdered. Well, what is his case?
Why, during Mr. Cropsey's administration and Mr.
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Waldo's he opened twelve gambling places, one after the
other. He had been a gambler all his life. And those
twelve places were taken possession of by the police one
after the other, under the law of nuisance, on which basis
I put the police after I became Mayor. The folly of
going up and arresting a man in a gambling house and
soberly coming down with him, when the roulette wheel
begins to start before you get to the street! It is incon
ceivable that any one would indulge in such folly. The
way we do is, when we take places like that, to take pos
session of them and hold them until they are vacated, and
that you young lavsyers will find is perfectly legal. They
are a pubhc nuisance. Houses where gamblers and bad
people resort are public nuisances, and even citizens can
go and take possession of them. But the police are hired
for that purpose, and that is the way we do it. And
Rosenthal's twelve places were closed one after the other,
and the twelfth place was in the hands of the police for
three weeks the night he was shot. They were in posses
sion night and day. And when his twelfth place was
taken away from him he then revealed the fact that a lieu
tenant of pohce guaranteed him for that twelfth place
that if he gave him a certain amount of money a week the
place would have immunity. But did it get immunity?
No, not at all. That heutenant of police could not give
him unmunity. The whole thing was in the hands of the
Commissioner under the squad which was organized for
that purpose, and he sent the squad with the warrant
which had been obtained, and took possession of the place;
and that led to all these revelations, forced by the police
department itself. And yet you would think that some
body else did all that. And we furnished all the Avit-
nesses, every witness, that convicted all these people,
every one of them. The lieutenant of police was con
victed, and yet you would think that the pohce depart
ment was engaged in trying to shield everybody in place
of stopping them. That is politics. Do not go into that
sort of politics. Be a man first and a politician second,
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and you will come out better in the long run. The other
case from which the revelations came was the case of Sipp.
He kept another kind of house — a horrible house — I
would not describe it even among men. And when the
police took possession of this house and held it, then he
began to reveal that he paid a patrolman or somebody
money, and these later indictments have aU come out of
that. After revealing something he ran away, and we
had him brought back; and really we were denounced for
bringing him back. Such is the state of the times in
which we tried to do our duty. Committees have been
going on taking evidence of things which happened under
Theodore Roosevelt when he was Commissioner, and since,
and the headlines of the newspapers, and even the matter
(after cutting all the dates out), would indicate that they
were happening now. That is the way things are done.
I branched off into that as a mere illustration. But to
come back to things that you will have to encounter and
solve, take this great question between capital and labor
which is now on the eve of solution. You will have to de
cide the employer's liability. You will have to decide on
the laws to pension employees who are hurt and maimed
and also those who are too old to work. The City of New
York does it now. We do it in our street cleaning depart
ment, and in other departments. And we now have a gen
eral law for the pensioning of people after a certain
age and with certain infirmities by the city. I do not men
tion the police one, because that is rather different. But
the city is setting the example in this matter. Why should
not the manufactories of the country do hkcAvise? Do
you know any reason? Do you know why a man who has
lost his leg or his arm in the industrial pursuits of the
State should be turned out to beg? I confess I do not
know a single reason. In Europe it is not so. All over
Europe — ^in Prussia as early as 1847 — these pension laws
have been passed and have been in force ever since. We
lag behind the whole world in these matters. But oh, you
say. How could that be done? That would tax the manu-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
facturer to death. Why, the tax would be so small that
they would not loiow that they were paying it. They are
paying more noAV to the indemnity companies to indemnify
them against accidents than they would pay under such a
tax, I think. I certainly think they are paying as much.
Nor does it fall on the manufacturer. He pays it in the
first instance, to be sure, but it enters into the cost of his
product, and he gets it back when he sells his product.
If a wheel flies off an engine or a machine is broken, he
has to pay for that, doesn't he? And it enters into the
cost of manufacture. If a man's leg is broken or ripped
off why should not that also be paid for on the same prin
ciple and enter into the cost of manufacture. For a fa
mihar illustration, you aU buy hats. Why, the extra price
of a hat under such a system would be so slight that you
would not know you were paying it. That is the way it
works out. The manufacturer pays it. In some coun
tries it is a tax on wages simply, but the manufacturer
generally pays the tax on wages, the tax on the pay roll,
and that goes into the state fund, and all these people are
provided for. When they become superannuated and un
able to work any more they do not have to go to the poor
house. If we send them to the poor house we have to
take care of them, don't we? Why not then take care of
them in some decent manner, these mauned and crippled
workers, when they are no longer able to work? By what
reason will any one longer deny them the natural right to
be supported by the community whom they serve? The
community would not feel it. It would be for the benefit
of the whole community. It simply enters into the price
of all manufactured articles. This matter was discussed
somewhat in the late campaign. The Progressive Party
brought it forward more than the other two parties. It
is a thing some of us have been talking about for a long
time. Then there are other things especially that you
young laAvyers should begin to think of. We have now
the courts declaring acts of the Legislature void which
we passed to bring about these economic things. Now
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
I will give you a few illustrations in this state, passing over
them rapidly. The first one I will pick out is the tobacco-
tenement house case in this city. The Legislature passed
a law that tobacco should not be manufactured in tene
ment houses in this city. They passed it as a health
measure. Good people Avho go around among the poor
saw the evils of having tobacco in small tenements poison
ing the children and women, and making disagreeable
odors, had it passed. But our courts declared it void.
The ground they put it on was that it was taking away
from this tenant in this flat his liberty and his property.
It was taking away from him the liberty to do as he liked
in his own house and taking away his property, inasmuch
as it took away one of the uses of his leasehold. Now just
think of that. Why, if there is any principle of law
that we know it is that a man cannot use his property as
he likes. He has to use it so as not to injure the com
munity. I would not like to let people with automobiles
use them as they like, nor people with tenement houses
either. That is all subject to regulation. This comes
under what we call the police law — health laws — laws for
the benefit of the community. But they said it took away
his liberty and his property, and Magna Charta says you
shall not take away hberty or property except by due
process of law. I wonder if King John or any of the
barons thought that meant liberty to poison children in a
tenement house with the fumes of tobacco. Why, in that
tune they took it literally. Liberty — a man should not
be arrested, locked up, by the King, or that his property
should not be taken by the King as he marched through
the country for military purposes or anything else. The
next thing Avas the bake-oven case. A law was passed
that they should not work in these bake-ovens more than
ten hours a day. You happen to know that it is night
work as a rule and in an awfully hot place. So the Legis
lature thought it well in order that Ave might have healthy
bread that they should not work there and injure their
health any longer than ten hours a day, and that was de-
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
clared void on the ground that it took away from the
baker his liberty, namely, his liberty to work the whole 24
hours if he wanted to. The other one was the law for
bidding women to be employed in factories between 9
o'clock at night and 5 in the morning. It is almost pre
posterous to talk about it, nine at night to five in the morn
ing for women to work in factories. But they declared
that void on the ground that it deprived her of her liberty
to work all night if she saw fit; whereas it was a health
law, a law to safeguard the women in their health, and
thereby have healthy children and a healthy race. The
next one was the Employers' Liability law, which I have
already spoken about; and that was declared void on the
same ground, that it took the property of the manufacturer
without due process of law. Magna Charta Avas brought
in again and the Constitution of the State. Why, it didn't
take his property at all. As I have already told you, if
he paid the tax it went into the cost of manufacture, and
he got it back in the price of the articles. They are pass
ing one in the Congress now, and no doubt the Supreme
Court of the United States will declare it valid. The
two other cases that I have mentioned to you are the ones
with regard to the employment of minors. That statute
forbade children under 14 years of age being employed in
factories. It simply forbade them being employed at all,
and made a severe penalty for employing them. And yet
when the cases came up in court the courts said. Yes, the
employers are forbidden to employ them. Nevertheless,
the child cannot recover if he was negligent, if he got too
near the machine, if he put his hand into it, if he fell into
it. I tried a case myself when a judge where the boy
went up on a ladder and fell down into the machine, and
on appeal they said he had no business up on the ladder,
and he would not have been hurt if he had stayed where
he was put — ^j ust as though the law did not mean what it
said, that it forbade him to be there at all, and to allow
him to be there at all was what caused the accident. The
other law was requiring all machines to be guarded or
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
muzzled. The law prescribed that they must be muzzled
by the manufacturer, and yet when a man was hurt by get
ting into an unmuzzled cogwheel, they said by working
there and seeing it was unmuzzled he took the risk, and
therefore he could not recover. Took the risk? Why,
what could he do. He had to live. The manufacturers
could all leave them off, and everybody would have to
work and take the risk. And yet there is a statute requir
ing that all these machines be muzzled. Now you young
men have to meet all these economic and industrial things,
and I mention a few of them to you to-night. I have just
skimmed over it. I just want to open up your minds to
things that confront you, and that are now on the eve of
solution. Fifteen years from now they will all be solved,
not by me, and those who live with me, but by you young
men. That I am absolutely certain of. Just as soon
as you get these things in your minds you wiU solve them.
Now the last thing in Mr. Trimble's letter was " The
chief obstacle to good government in the city." The
chief obstacle, gentlemen, is a corrupt press. There is
nothing that confronts the American people in some parts
of this country which requires a remedy more than the
license of the press. Those put in office by you have got
to submit to abuse day after day, year after year, how
ever honest or however they are striving to do their duty.
Falsehood, lying and abuse day after day. If you say
anything about them, why, they are aAvfully thin skinned,
you know. They feel it right off. I do not say that the
entire press here are that way, but we certainly have some
that are that way; some in the hands of demagogues and
scamps — you can call them nothing else. For instance,
we have had the subways under way here ever since I came
in as Mayor. We took the matter up with the resolve to
solve it and to solve it in the best way we possibly could.
My associates are honest, intelligent men. They had no
purpose in the world except to do this thing right. And
yet we had no sooner entered upon it than certain news
papers here laid down the manner in which we should do
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
it, and because we didn't see it our duty to do it in the
way they told us we must do it, why, for two long years
we have had to endure the abuse of these scoundrels. I
do not hesitate to say that they are scoundrels. That does
not include all the newspaper proprietors here by any
means, but you know whom it includes, unless you don't
read these filthy papers at all. We held conferences in
which this great matter was discussed from day to day, but
we would leave the City Hall only to see these newspapers
held up by the newsboys with the great headlines : " The
Subway Steal," and the " Subway Deal," and the " Sub
way Job," and the city being sold out to Tom Ryan, who
has no more to do with it than the man in the moon by the
way. The city being " turned over to Morgan & Com
pany." The city " being looted by Belmont," and so on,
who by the way also has not the slightest thing to do with
the matter. And it has gone on for two years in just that
sort of way. One of the largest things in the whole
world is this subway business, in point of engineering, in
point of legal difficulties and financial difficulties. It is
the most difficult problem on the face of the earth. And
we have been working away on that, only to endure this
abuse from day to day. Two days ago we had the final
hearing in the Board of Estimate and the room was filled
by respectable people. But five poor people, against
whom I desire to say nothing — maybe they were mental
defectives — passed before us comparing us to Boss Tweed,
and warning us that this robbery should not go on, and,
in the language of one of them, that this rotten contract
should not be permitted, and that we were a band of
thieves as one of them said. To all of which we listened
in patience because it was as nothing compared to what
these vile scoundrels who oAvn these ncAvspapers had said
of us for two years continuously. Why, they provoke
these people to do it. They provoke people to physic
ally assassinate you, let alone assassinating your character.
Roosevelt was assassinated in the last campaign by these
scoundrelly people. They provoked it. The fellow
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
pulled their editorials out of his pocket to show Avhy he
was doing it. The moral assassin is worse than the physi
cal assassin, especially these poor mentally deficient peo
ple who read these things and take them seriously. Now
I mention this thing for the sake of my associates. I
have now been a long tune in public matters. I entered
political matters when I was a young fellow, about the age
of some of you now in this room, and I have been at it
nearly ever since in one way and another. For many
years on the outside. I had no desire to hold office at all.
I enjoyed the work on the outside. And I have got to
that point where nothing said about me affects me much.
Nothing that could happen to me would affect me much.
I think I would be satisfied under most any circumstances.
I think we all ought to feel that way, especially if you are
going into political life, young men. Take things as they
come. Whatever God's Avill may be of me, I am content.
Just say that over and over to yourselves if you are going
into public life, because you will have much to endure, be
cause you will have, I suppose, newspapers of that kind
still left maybe when you begin your careers, and they Avill
tell you what to do and if you don't do it they vrill try to
blackmail you into doing it. They will try to coerce you
into doing it. If you don't do it they will abuse you.
Worse than that, scoundrels will come to you with arti
cles written up about you and ask you to read them and
say they have some intention of publishing them in such
and such a paper. All these things are resorted to. And
some of them say (the thing happened to me when I was
a younger man than I am now with regard to a paper here
in this city), how much is it worth to you not to publish
it in that paper. I wrote a letter to the proprietor of that
paper but never got a word back from him. He was
probably no better than the fellow who offered me the
article. You will encounter all these things, but you will
have to stand up against them. There is nobody on this
earth more despicable than the man who comes into pubhc
office and gives way to newspaper dictation. That is not
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
government. The same may be said of a man who gives
way to clamor of any kind, especially if it is newspaper
clamor or created by newspapers. Why, they have the
effrontery to lay down what you must do, but under your
official oath you think another course is the preferable
one, and then you have got to be called a thief. Your
children in school and in colleges like this, and your daugh
ters in boarding school, will have to see these things in the
papers about you, and be twitted about it. It is a condi
tion that you young men coming into public life will have
to confront and do away with. Men are staying out of
public hfe on account of it, and men who are in pubhc
life, sooner than to be the victims of these scoundrels and
have their daughters in school and their sons and their
wives mortified day after day, are willing to get out.
And it is so in several parts of this country, and it is time
that it was stopped. And I will say to you young men
that that also is a mission that you have. You can do a
great deal now in your own way in that respect. It is an
awful thing. Why, my associates are as incapable of
steahng as any man on this earth, or of doing a AAnrong
thing. And yet it is a steal and a deal and a job, and the
turning of the city over to private interests, and so on,
without a word of truth. The matter is done entirely
for the interest of the city. I suppose you young men
all know what the subAvay contract is. I will just tell
you in three words in closing. We have a subway
here now. It was built entirely by the money of
this city. No man put a dollar into it, except the city.
And when we came to extend the subways the question was
whether we would build an independent system or whether
we should extend this present subway so as to have a single
5 cent fare all over the city. If we built an independent
system here there would be two roads and two fares, and
to transfer here and there you would have to pay an addi
tional 5 cents. In looking the whole field over we saw the
right thing to do was to extend our present system and
we went about to do that. The city lacked funds to do all
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that. But the city has to build it. And the city owns it
as soon as it is built. The city has absolute ownership of
the subways. But it does not operate them. We lease
them out for operation. And not havmg money enough,
or credit enough to do this gigantic work, which takes
nearly $325,000,000, the operating companies said that
they would advance to the city what the city lacked, and
we were only too glad to do it. The city can only borrow
up to 10 per cent, of its real estate valuations, and that
hmit is almost reached. It would take us 25 years to com
plete the work of building, but the operating companies
said we will put in part of the money. And then these
newspapers said that on that account they were going to
own the roads. Why, under the statute they cannot build
or OAAm them. But they can advance the money to the
city to build, and the city is glad to get it because the city
is short of funds to do it. And they put the equipment in
entirely. And yet some people are calling on the city not
only to build but to equip and to operate when we have
not half money enough to build, let alone equip. These
companies put their money in. But does the city obhgate
itself to pay them back? Not one dollar. We refused.
We said to them, if you put this money in you must de
pend on the earnings of the roads to get it back. You
must depend on the earnings of the roads for every dol
lar of interest and sinking fund. The city wiU agree to
pay nothing whatever. And that is the way the thing is.
Out of the earnings they are paid the interest and sink
ing fund, and in the same way the city is paid interest and
sinking fund on its money, the part it puts in. And all
over that is divided equally between the contracting com
panies and the city. Now that is the whole contract. And
yet maybe some of you think that the subways are to be
built and owned by these companies. Why, they have to
turn their checks over to the city month by month to build.
Look at the papers and see the city advertising for con
tracts to build. We are building one in Broadway already.
And it is going on, and also those in the Bronx and in
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
Queens. The city advertises and gives out the contracts
and builds them. The companies which operate them said
to the city, we Avill put up what you lack, so as to have
them built speedily and be ready for operation. They
have to rely on the earnings for the interest, sinking fund
and principal — the sinking fund of course pays the prin
cipal in about 40 years, you can figure that up for your
selves. And yet look at the vile abuse, the charges of
thievery and jobbery and dishonesty that my associates
have had to endure. And some of them young men.
Some of them not so much older than some of you here^
starting out in hfe vsdth such abuse. You think probably
that we should hire lavsyers to bring libel suits every day.
Well there are none of us who can afford that. When
some 80 millionaire scamp owns a newspaper he can hire
lawyers by the dozen or by the score, but you cannot ; you
have not got the funds. And I have not seen any great
eagerness on the part of the citizens of this city to come
forward to make up a fund to enable us to do so so far.
They look on. And yet I am perfectly satisfied that we
have the good vrill of the community. And that they
understand that we have done right and done the honest
thing. Now you are going into politics, some of you, and
you will have to prepare yourself for all these things. You
will have to be men of iron. If you have a weak heart you
will be dead in a short time. If you are nervous they will
kill you sure. Some people have to go to bed over these
things. But after a while we grow used to it. I cannot
say we grow used to it, that would be going too far. If
a man was a bachelor vrith nobody dependent on him he
might grow used to it, but a man with a wife and sons and
daughters, I do not think he can ever grow used to it, be
cause he has to think of them.
Now, young men, I wish you well. I have said more
than I intended to say to you, but if you start out as I
said to you in the beginning, with settled habits, Avith
studious habits, and with a purpose and with a resolve to
be steady workers and persevere, you can be just as sure
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
as you are here that you will come out all right in the end
and that the end won't be very far off either.

Conditions in New York
(Remarks at the East Side Club, New York City, November 12,
1912.)
Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the East Side Club:
I certainly hope, more than that, I know from the temper
of you, that you will do much good in this part of the city.
This programme of having city officials come here and
explain the working of their departments is capital. I
suppose that is why you called me first to start it. So keep
it up. I will not say much about my own department and
about myself. There are other people saying enough
about me without my saying anything. Maybe I would
make it worse than they do if I went into it. The card
here says the club is appointed to aid in securing perma
nent good government for the city of New York through
the election and appointment of honest pubhc officers.
That expresses the whole thing. And Mr. Lustgarten
says it is made up of both parties. That is a slip of the
tongue. He ought to say all parties, because we all know
that there are now three big ones. And I understand also
that a good many others are loose, especially down in this
part of the city. That means I suppose that on election
day you vdll not vote as mere machines, that you vriU not
vote as the mere automaton of any party or any party
leader but as you think you ought to vote. I must confess
it has ahvays been astonishing to me that in local govern
ment people are so reluctant to vote otherwise than accord
ing to their national party and national pohtics. Now I
would like to know what national politics have to do Avith
local affairs anyAvhere in this country much less in the city
of New York. And yet I hear men all the time saying,
" Why, I didn't vote the Repubhcan ticket, or the Demo
cratic ticket, at the last municipal election, because it was
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
not my party." And some of them go further and say,
" My grandfather was a Republican or a Democrat, and
my father was, and I am, and I always will be." What a
howling wilderness is in the head of such people as that,
especially when they apply it to local affairs. How does
any man know that in national affairs he will remain in
the same party till he dies? Only a man that knows noth
ing says any such thing as that. We have a Bull Moose
party now, made up in six months or less, and half of those
who are in it never dreamed of being in it, I suppose, until
the election was coming on. So that your non-partisan
ship to be effective has to be intelligent. Why, in national
pohtics a man that is a Repubhcan has to stand up to his
principles on election day ; and the man who is a Democrat
has to stand up hke a man to his. But when a local elec
tion comes around, why on earth should he vote according
to his national politics ? No reason when you vote for an
alderman or a mayor or any other local officer who has
simply local duties to perform and has nothing to do with
national pohtics whatever. So we ought to have national
pohtics standing alone; state politics standing alone; local
pohtics standing alone, absolutely alone. And for that
reason in 1894 the constitution of this state enacted that
all local elections should be in years when there was no
national election, and the Legislature last year passed a
law separating the state ballot from the national ballot in
order to give the people a chance to vote independently.
I do not know how they came to do that, but they did it.
Some of them were bemoaning it after they did it, and I
beheve they did a good job Avithout knowing it. And
they had better leave it alone. People knew how to vote
anyhow, and they vote as they hked anyhow. Mr. Lust
garten has spoken of the talk in past years about the East
Side. Every infamy and every crime was attributed to
this locahty in the city. I do not want to take anything
to myself, but I beheve I stood up against it from the
start. I said before I ran for office and I have said it often
since that the people down here were just as intelhgent
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
and just as moral, and maybe a little more so, as in some
other parts of the city where the people think they are a
great deal better. But there was such a patronizing air
about things down here. People came slumming and peek
ing in your windows, seeing how you lived and what you
ate, and so on; called to see what your wife was doing;
and she knew her business maybe better than they did.
Their more fit place probably would have been to stay home
and take care of their own house. You know, I suppose,
that there is crime everywhere. There is immorahty every
where. And vice everywhere. But there are certain
preachers and others in this town whose head when you
mention vice is filled with only one thing, one nasty vice.
How their head is so filled with it I don't know. There
certainly must be some reason for it. When I say Adce
I include all the Adces, and I do not forget bearing false
witness against your neighbor either, or lying about pub
lic officials. I include them all. But the proportion of
vice down here is not greater than elsewhere. The statis
tics show that. You have a great population here. Your
chairman said one million people live down here. I hadn't
thought it so large as that. That is an awful congestion
of people. The tendency of people seems to be to get to
gether, to get their heads as close together as they can, and
then, complain of congestion. If all the people on this
globe were brought here to the city and stood up on their
feet, each one would have two square feet, I believe. All
the people of this earth could stand up in the city of New
York, and have I think two square feet to shuffle around in.
And all the people of this earth could be brought down
into Texas and get three acres each. So you see there are
not so many people on this earth compared Avith the space
of this earth after all. Why they all want to get down
here on the East Side is more than I can understand. It
must be a pretty good place. And crime is incident to
a community hke this as to all others. There is crime out
in the country. There is immorality in the country.
There is theft in the country. I live in the country half
306

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
the year, so I can talk by the book; and I was brought
up also in the country. So that the saying that we often
hear that God made the city, but the devil made the small
town, has some truth in it. You have had down here
lately a cropping out of crime that has attracted the at
tention of everybody, and in my judgment altogether too
much has been made of it. A handful of criminals get to
gether and do a murder. Why that happens all over the
world. One member of the police force out of ten thou
sand was found to be in with these criminals and taking
graft from them, and making money out of the community
with them ; and the murder was the result. And you would
think to hear some people talk, and you would think from
reading some of our dirty low-lived newspapers that not
only was this section here of the city, but the whole city
reeking vrith vice and crime; whereas the contrary is the
case. The alderman of old London who is to be the next
Lord Mayor was in to see me not long ago, and he said
the thing that attracted him most of all in this city — and
he walked all over it out of curiosity night and day — was
the absolute outward propriety of the streets everywhere
that he went in all sections of the city. He said he never
in his life, and he had travelled all over Europe, had seen
so few CAdl women in the street, so few drunken people, so
few disorderly people. He said it was the most orderly
city that he ever saw in the streets and outwardly. Why,
I told him we all knew that. But he probably had been
reading some of our dirty newspapers who are always de-
fihng this city. Now the mere fact that a lieutenant of
pohce went wrong astonished me none. Why it did not
start the circulation in my blood. I would not have been
surprised if some of the top people in the police force had
been caught at it, but it was a lieutenant. There was noth
ing extraordinary at all. And yet this city has been behed
all over the earth as having a police force made up entirely
of grafters, clubbers, and disorderly characters of all kinds.
Well I have done what I could to stop that sort of thing
in all the departments, and especially in the police depart-
307

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
ment; and I beheve I have done more in the pohce de
partment than in any other. I was told here to-night that
the pohce in this section of the city are very different from
what they were a few years ago. I was told that they
mind their own business and do not meddle vrith orderly
people. I was told that they no longer smash into places
and intrude into places and thereby collect graft out of
people who do not want to have their doors smashed in.
And I was glad to hear it. Some of the people did not
know what I was driving at.
I am sorry to say that some clergymen when I have
said that this city must first of all have outward order
and decency preserved, hold me up as upholding aU se
cret crime and indecency. Rabbi Wise you know gives
me a whack now and then. He is a charitable man. He
is a preacher of God. And he ought to know what charity
is. I have heard him speak. I do not wish to say any
thing against him. But I have all my hfe distrusted
rhetoricians. People who have got tongues hke his I do
not take much stock in. They talk so much that their
mouths get around on the sides of their faces. And so
wdth others. They think nothing of saying the most cruel
things about a public official, cruel things and mean things.
But do they ever come in to help ? No, never. They have
never extended their hand to me and said " I will help
you." Not a bit.
They think that the pohce ought to go around clubbing
everybody and doing as they see fit, but I disagree with
that. I tried to reduce the pohce force to order. I have
tried to cut it off from all graft. I know that I have suc
ceeded at least two-thirds, and I think I will succeed three
thirds before I get through. But to have to do things
against the ill Avill of people that ought to help you is a
painful thing. Some clergyman named Carson the other
night made a terrible philippic against me, hterally flayed
me ahve, held me up as a vicious man and all that. I do
not know what my neighbors who have seen me coming and
going out for twenty-five years, think when they read such
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
stuff from such people, not to mention what is printed in
the newspapers. But I am here yet, and I am pretty well
off and have some respect, as I perceive, and maybe I
stand it better than they do. Maybe they are going down
while they are talking and maybe their talk is really hf ting
me up a httle. At all events I have no ill Avill against any
of them. I have tried to give a good honest government to the
city and I am satisfied Avith that. I have tried to rule the
city on high ground. I have not allowed the city govern
ment in any branch, as every head of department will tes
tify to you, to be controlled or influenced by anybody on
the outside. No politicians or boss or organization has
any control whatever over this government, whether it be
the Tenement House Department, the Dock Depart
ment, the Charities Department, or any other part of the
city government. Now that means that I must get
whacked a good deal. When I read on the card that your
object is to promote good city government I was saying
to myself: " After aU isn't a man in office as Mayor here
in a more comfortable position if he is the mere exponent
of some pohtical party. Wouldn't it be easier for me to
sit at the City HaU and turn the government pretty well
over to Sam Koenig, or somebody else, and go on my way
each day and when anything happened I have at least a
big party to back me up and fight vrith me."
Now, it seems when anything happens I have nobody
to stand up with me, except the people in general, and
very often they are too busy to bother their heads very
much AAdth it. The malignant ones seize hold of anything
that happens. More than that, they go around and dig
pitfalls for me to step into, and in that way my road is
much harder and rougher than it would be if I had some
sohd party back of me. I admit that. There is no doubt
about it whatever. My course would be much easier if
I reposed on some party and when I wanted to appoint a
tenement house commissioner I could send word up to
the leader of that party to send me down a tenement house

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
commissioner and when I wanted a police commissioner
I could do the same thing, and then if anything happened
in the tenement house or the pohce departments I would
have a party to stand up and fight with me. So there iff
something to have a party back of you, but I must say
that would prostitute government in a way that I could
not countenance. So when I was nominated for Mayor I
was asked no questions. It was perfectly well known what
my ideas were on that subject, and after I became Mayor,
well, people made suggestions to me and I made the ap
pointments all my own and selected them aU, and those
who didn't get what they wanted said, " Well you are
Mayor and you must do what you think best." So I have
had no growl, no quarrel with anybody. I must say they
have all been reasonable with me. I must say that. If
they didn't get what they wanted they certainly have been
reasonable and handsome toward me. I never will say
otherwise than that.
Now, the order of this community down here is never
illustrated better than on Election Day. There was one
candidate for Governor this year who was very apprehen
sive that this whole East Side was going to reek with cor
ruption on Election Day. He sent people to me to beg
me to put police in every poll down here, and extra pohce
all through here, and if I didn't do it they said there was
going to be the greatest rioting and illegal voting down
here that was ever known. I told them I didn't beheve it.
I also received a letter from Dr. Ratner whom I do not
know, and he gave it to me pretty hard, and he pubhshed
his letter, and he said I ought to put pohce in every poll
to put out everybody who had no right to vote. I wrote
him that the pohce had no right to decide who should vote
and who should not, that we elected election officers and
the law clothed them with the power of conducting the
elections, and that the police had no power to say to any
man " You cannot vote." I told them they did that sort
of thing in Russia and in Mexico. I did not know then
that he was a Russian himself or I would not have used
310

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
that word. But it seemed that I hit the nail right on the
head. He wanted me to do what he had seen done in
Russia, I suppose ; put the soldiers and the police right in
the polls and when a man that was going to vote the wrong
way came along to throw him out in the street. That
was done in the city of New York for a long time. And
it was terrible that I would not allow the police to go in
the polhng places. I made them stand out in the street
where they belong, and the strange thing is that they did
not find out until this year that I did that. Every election
that has occurred in New York since I have been Mayor
has been conducted in the same way. I had the order is
sued that the police should stay out on the sidewalk and
walk up and down in a 100 foot space in front of the polls.
If the election officers wanted anybody arrested the law
gives them the power to arrest them on the spot. Then
all they have to do is to call this policeman and say, " Take
this man to a magistrate." But to put policemen in poll
ing places was never known in this world until it was done
here. Every man is a sovereign on Election Day. He
doesn't want to rub up against brass buttons at the door
when he goes in to vote. The law does not permit any
body to interfere with him from the time he leaves his
house until after he comes out of the polling place. Do
you know that? And yet I have seen election officers in
this city issue the day before Election threats that they
were going to arrest 10,000 people in the polls and that
10,000 warrants were out. The law makes the smallest
threat a crime. A threat to deter people from going to
the polls. Every man has a right to come to the polls.
He may be challenged. If he is challenged what saith
the law? An oath is put before him and read to him. If
he takes that oath no power on this earth can stop him
from voting. That is what that oath is for; in the lan
guage that we ordinarily use, he swears his vote in. No
pohceman, no election officer, no one from the President
of the United States down to the humblest policeman can
311

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
interfere with that man if he will take that oath. Well,
you say in that way some people will vote fraudulently.
Yes, a few will. But in the other way it will grow until
thousands are thrown out of the polls and not allowed to
vote. So the laws says of two evUs we will take the lesser
evil. It is so hard to get that into the heads of people from
Russia hke Dr. Ratner. And I am sorry to say it is hard
to get it into the heads of some Americans too. They
want everything done by the pohceman. And yet in past
years when there were frauds and repeaters at the polls
in this city it was substantially aU done through the Pohce
Force. The repeaters went around in squads and when
they felt the friendly hand of the pohceman on their
shoulders to move up and vote, they felt very courageous,
and the pohce were very often given a list of these people
and they waited for them to come along and encouraged
them to go up and vote. But this has all gone. Nowhere
in this country is there less illegal voting than right here
in the city of New York and right here on the East Side
of the city of New York. Why, I told the Commissioner
to get me a list of the arrests made on Election Day.
Most of them were made on warrants granted before
Election. I am going to get, I cannot give it to you to
night, the number of people that were held for any criminal
offense on Election Day. I doubt if it is five in the whole
city, and yet we hear this talk year after year.
And then there is a notion abroad that you people need
pohcemen to keep you in order. When we have a pohtical
meeting people think they must have an army of pohce
there. Now I did something this year that will make you
laugh because nobody knew about it. It was given out
in the paper that a Bull Moose meeting up at Madison
Square Garden was to be pohced by 1,000 pohcemen.
Didn't you read that? Hearst put it in his paper, so it
must be true. I had already two years ago instructed the
Pohce Commissioner to stop sending pohcemen to pohtical
meetings except to large meetings that might need protec
tion on the outside. It used to be the fashion to have them
312

MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
inside at meetings hke this and at weddings and funerals.
Now I asked Waldo how many he was going to have at
the Bull Moose meeting. " Well," he said, " I guess
about 100." I said, " Waldo, cut it down to 50." And
there were just 50 policemen at that meeting. They were
all on the outside and we didn't allow one to go in the in
side at all, but I suppose all the Bull Moosers think there
were 1,000 pohcemen there. And I am going to tell you
more, that the 50 that were there were not needed at all.
Respectable American citizens can meet vrithout 1,000
pohcemen to keep them from cutting their throats. Why,
up in the country where they have great pohtical meetings
in this state and all over they have no policemen and no
constables there at all. Those people well understand they
can take care of themselves. There is never anything done
that is disorderly. You would think here that if we came
to a meeting without the pohce we would all fall to and
kill one another. We don't go to meetings for that pur
pose. We go to hear the orators and what they have to
say, and then we go home peaceably. And then the Wil
son meeting was coming on, so I said to Waldo, " I have
a notion to have no policemen go there." He said, " Well
the others had 50, and maybe this year we ought to give
them 50." So I said: " All right, let the 50 go." But the
next time we AAdll keep quiet and send nobody at all and
see what happens. Now I have let the cat out of the bag
so that if you have a big meeting here next year maybe
there Avill be no pohcemen at all, and those people that
read what I am saying tonight Avill certainly, like Dr. Rat
ner, be writing me letters to send pohce to keep the people
from kilhng one another. The general order and decency
of the American people is not excelled anywhere in the
world. The British people would not allow policemen to
go to their political meetings or interfere with them.
Neither will they in any other part of Europe, except
where despotism prevails, and I think we can do quite as
well in the city of New York.
The office of our police force is first of all to preserve
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
outward order and decency, to keep the streets in good or
der, to prevent tumult and riot and disorder of all kinds,
and keep the streets open to travel, to arrest felons whom
they see on the streets, arrest whoever commits any serious
criminal offense. That being done, then we have a secret
service force to deal as best we can with gamblers and un
fortunate women, the cut-throats and people who do
things in secret or behind closed doors. Those we have to
take care of the best we can. Criminals will always be
with us.
Some people think that the Mayor ought to stop every
thing in 48 hours. He ought to be able not to have a single
unfortunate woman in the streets, a single gambler, a
single criminal. I have to ask some of these good people
sometimes what they have done to rescue a single woman
from the hfe that she is leading. There are societies here
in this city which are working constantly in these works.
I could almost kneel down to the men and women who
work in them and devote their lives to it. Do they ever
get up and denounce the city officials? Why, they come
in to see us. They work with us. They are people of all
denominations. They rescue boys, they rescue girls, they
rescue unfortunate women. They try to make people bet
ter, and in that way, and in that way alone, my friends,
the world grows better. The world does not grow better
by force or by the pohceman's club. He can only keep
order, while the preachers preach and others work to
morally uplift people so that they won't commit crime or
vice. That is his office. Some would have it all done as
you would eat a cookie, in half an hour, right off. Why, if
we do it all, I tell them, now, we won't leave anything
for our successors to do and they will feel lonesome. We
can only do our part, and if we do that Ave do enough.
The world is better today than it ever was before. It
grows better all the time. It can only grow better grad
ually. All growth in this world that is good is gradual
growth. You know how gradually the tree grows, how
gradually the crops in the field grow and mature. How
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MAYOR GAYNOR'S LETTERS AND SPEECHES
gradually this body of ours grows from the mother's womb
up, and how long this world was growing and was brooded
over by Almighty God before it was fit for us to live in.
And so it is in intellectual things and in spiritual things
and in moral things. They can only grow by degrees, lit
tle by little. We have to be patient and make people bet
ter little by little, from generation to generation. Those
great preachers who think I am such a bad man, if they
would only do their share in that respect they would do
all that Almighty God expects of them and all that He
knows they can do. That is the mission that you and I
have and that is their mission, and let us carry it out as
best we can. Let us work and teach in the only way that
we can to hft up and improve, namely, patiently, day by
day, little by httle, yea, even as Isaiah says, " hne upon
hne, hne upon line, precept upon precept, precept upon
precept, here a little, and there a little."

315

Index

Accident Insurance; 257-260.
Accidents: Arrests for; without warrant;
22.
Adams; John Quincy: 180, 187.
Aldermen: Board of: Letter to: 130.
Message to: 36.
American Bankers' Association; Speech
before: 264.
American Peace and Arbitration League;
221.
Appraisal; Commissioners of: 17.
Arrest; False report on a boy's: 68.
Arresting: boys; 68, 82, 98, 198.
children; 158, 181.
Arrests; Citizen's right to make: 48.
Diminished number of: 158, 182.
Petty: 98.
Unnecessary: 51.
without warrant; 22, 158.
Assassination; Attempt at: 13.
Prisoners write after: 31.
Inciting to: 299.
Moral: 300.

Bacon; Col. Alexander: still Sabbath; 84.
Bake Ovens Case; 238, 250, 296.
Ball-playing in streets; 55, 82.
Bancis; Neighbourhood: 189.
Banks and bankers; 266, 268.
Beard? Are you certain it is your: 40.
Becker; 97, 102, 106, 196.
Bilious critics; 138.
Biliousness and piety; 114.
Bill boards; 160.
Bimetalism; 174.
Biographical sketch of Mayor Gaynor; 7-14.
Blackmail; The press and: 300.
Bondsmen; Professional: 98.
Books; 55, 64, 66, 159, 163, 168-177.
Boys; Arresting: 68, 98.
Letter to: 55.
playing in streets; 54, 55, 82.
Boyville; jSIayor of: Letter to: 137.
Bribery; 106.
Burns; Robert: Birthplace of: HI.
Cabbages; 64, 81.
Carnegie Trust Company; 186.
Carrots; 81.
Cato as farmer; 63, 266.
Cats; 80.
Censorship; 130, 132.
Cervantes; 65.
Charities; Department of: 81.
Charity and Justice; 271.
Chickens; Teaching: to roost higher; 83.
Children: Arresting: 158, 181.
playing in streets; 55, 58, 82, 109.
Christmas; 190.
Citizens' Association Address; 208.
City Beautiful Association; 160.
Civil Service Commission; Letter to: 23.
Clamor; 105, 145, 152, 184, 195, 301.
Clay; 225. , ,
Clearwater; Hon. A. T.: 105.
Cleveland; Grover: Chicago Convention;
287
and the' tariff; 225, 226.
Coffee drinking; 71.

Commerce; Expansion of: 228.
Commission form of government; 149.
Commission; Police: of 1905; 194.
ODmmissioner of Police; 8, 102, 106, 167,
195.
Commissioners of Appraisal; 17, 164.
Tax: 18.
Compensation; Workmen's: 89.
Competition and hob-nailed boots; 272.
Congestion; 306.
Constitution; English: 263.
of U. S. A.; 125, 126.
Constitutional Convention; Periodical:
242, 262.
Constitutions; Amending: 239, 261, 262,
263.
need to be changed; 242.
Lincoln on: 262.
Cornaro ; "Art of Living Lang "; 50.
Corruption in Police Department; 78, 192,
292.
Councils; City: Size of: 150.
Court decisions; "Obstructive": 236, 243-
264.
Court House; Brooklyn: 18.
Courts on Social and Economic Justice;
243-264.
Cowl; Clarkson: Police; 165.
Creelman; James: Letters to: 32, 33.
Criminals: Making: by arresting; 181.
Criticism; 138, 182.
of judicial decisions; 254.
Cropsey; Commissioner: 77, 292.
Cruelty to horses; 51.

" Damaged Goods " ; 148.
Davis; Gherardi: Letter to: 177.
Death; In presence of: 26.
Democracy and Despotism; 87.
Detective force; 101.
Detectives; Little men for: 23.
and stolen property; 7Z, 75.
Dingley Tariff Act; 226.
Disease; Prevention of: 46.
Distribution; Just: 244.
Prosperity and: 270.
"Distributive Justice"; 36, 243, 264-272.
Dix; John A.: Letter to: 34.
"Don Quixote"; 20, 56, 64, 177.
Doty; Dr. Alvah H.: Letter to: 46.
Dred Scott Decision; 128, 129.
Drinking on Sunday; 154.
Drivers: Street Cleaning Department:
"might freeze"; 16.
Eagen; William: 68.
East Side Club Address; 304.
Edwards; W. H.: Letter to: 16.
Eggs; How to boil: 134.
Election Day on East Side; 310.
Elections; Fraudulent: in Brooklyn; 10.
Free: 107.
Emancipation Proclamation extorted
from Abraham Lincoln"; 123.
Employers' Liability Act; 153, 238, 257,
259, 261, 294, 297.
Epictetus; 43, 159, 265. .
"Eternal Priestess of Humanity"; 96.
Excise; Police and: 76.

317

INDEX

Farmer; Cato as a: 63.
Farmers; Address to: 272, 276.
Jews advised to become: 62.
Prices obtained by: 276.
Farming; Lessons of: 272.
Flag; The Red: 36.
Flatbush; Election at: 8.
"Foundations of Belief*'; 171.
" Foundations of the Nineteenth Cen
tury"; 38, 266.
Fourth of July; Safe and Sane: 188.
Franklin; Benjamin: 37, 125, 128, 172,
215, 283.
Frederick the Great; 171.
Free speech and free press; 130.
Free trade; 226.
Freedom of speech and of assembly; 36.
Freight rates; 240, 277, 278.
Fremont campaign; 128.
French Revolution; 172, 289.

Gamblers; Licensing of: 117, 120.
Gambling; 76, 94, 101, 102, 120, 166, 191.
houses; 293.
Gaynor, Mayor, Biographical Sketch, 7-14.
Gaynor; Miss Mary MT . : Letter to; 26.
Gaynor; Rufus: 26, 112.
Genius; To an inspiredt 159.
George; Henry: 74, 178, 179, 216.
George; Lloyd: 257.
God; Belief in: 86.
Gold; 233. 277, 279.
Good Friday; 20.
Goode; 166, 196.
Goodman; Elias B. : Letter to: 156.
Government; Three branches of: 126.
Commission form of: 149.
Democracy and Despotism; 37.
of laws; 8, 23, 49, 71.
registers the will of the people; 212.
Governorship: Declines: 14, 32, 33, 34.
Graft; 17, 79, 80, 93, 97, 102, 103, 106,
154, 166, 184, 192, 195, 291.
Grand jurors; Payment of: 67.
Grasshoppers and broom crop; 110.
Greenberg; Assemblyman: 76, 80.

Happiness; How to attain: 38, 90.
Happy New Year; 71.
Hard times: 233.
Hayes; J. Noble: Letter to: 96.
Hearst; W. R.: 291, 303, 312.
newspapers; 209, 291, 303.
Hell; "Vestibule of": 118.
Hertz; 166, 196.
Hillin; Edward: Letter to: 114.
Holding Companies; 230, 241.
Hold-ups; New York's "amazing record"
of: 162.
"Hollering" of newsboys; 42.
Horses; Cruelty to; 51.
Hubbell; Charles Buckley: Letter to: 63.
Hyde Case; 184.

"Imitation of Christ"; 175.
Immigration; 109.
Import tax for revenue; 224.
Income tax; 262,
Independence day : 87.
Declaration of: 125.
Independent; Article on Books and Read
ing; 168-177; On Walking; 42.
Indictments against innocent persons; 184.
Insurance; Accident: 259.
State: 259.
"Intellectual Development of Europe";
159, 174, 283.
Interest; 268.
Introduction; 5, 6.
International Peace, 221.

Jacobs; Matter of: 249.
Japan; 222.
Jefferson; Thomas: 127, 172, 235.
Jefferson Day Banquet Address; 235-243.
Jesus; 72, 152, 190, 281.
got ahead of his time; 289.
Motives of: 287.
"What would Jesus Do?" 155.
Jewish Theatre; Opening of: 274.
Jews; 21, 39, 62, 91, 92.
Johnson; Robert U. : Letter to: 139.
Journalism of New York City; 31.
Journalistic scoundrels; 31.
Judicial decisions; Criticism of: 254.
Recall of: 152.
Judge; Mayor Gaynor as a: 11.
Jurors; Grand: 67.
"Justice: Distributive:" 36, 90, 243, 264-
272.

Keech; Rev. F. J.: Letter to: 135.
Kessler's Second Avenue Theatre; Speech
at: 274.
Kirk Alloway; 111.

Lands for city; Waste in acquiring: 17.
Laws; cannot cure ills; 291.
not enforceable should not be passed;
184.
A government of: 8, 23, 49, 71.
Leaders; Political: 212.
Lecky; "History of European Morals";
104.
Liberty; Interference with: 236, 246.
Lincoln; Abraham: 120-130, 138, 141, 182,
212, 282. ,
on constitutions; 243, 262.
as a lawyer; 285.
" only tried to keep up with the peo
ple"; 289.
Liquor Law; 99, 191.
Local Government; National politics and:
304.
Lochner Case; 251.
Long life; How to attain: 50.
Loti; Pierre: 139.
Lustgarten ; Mr. : 304.

McKane; John Y.: 10.
McKinley: on reciprocity; 227.
Tariff Act; 225.
McLaughlin; Rev. Robert W. : Letter to:
120.
Magna Charta; 236, 246. 250, 296.
Marcus Aurelius; 80, 105, 170.
Marriage; Advice on: 95.
fees; Aldermen and: 112.
fees at City Hall; 59.
and sex; Books on: 163.
Massachusetts Bill of Rights; 126.
" Maternity "; 148.
Mayor Gaynor: 12.
Biographical Sketch, 7-14.
First letter as: 15.
Power of the: 193.
Mayors and political parties; 309.
Metropolitan tower clock; 113.
Military; Use of: in strikes; 60.
Mill; John Stuart: 37, 81, 267.
Miller; Rev. O. R.: Letter to: 25.
Mills; Edgar: Letter to: 137.
Minors; Employment of: 297.
Morgan & Co.; 146, 147, 299.
Morrill Tariff Act; 225.
Morrison; Rev. William: Letters to; 20,
111.
Motherhood; Tribute to: 137.
Motion Picture Theatres; Prize fight pic
tures; 25, 114.
Ordinance relative to: 130.

318

INDEX

Motion Pictures; Censorship of: 130,
Music; Classical: 161, 189.
in playgrounds; 41.

Nature Study in schools; 188.
Negroes; Inferiority of: 128.
New Year; Happy: 71.
New York; Conditions in: 304-315.
Credit of: 144.
"decorous and orderly"; 163.
Hold-ups in: 162.
Newsboys '"hollering"; 42.
Newspaper : dictation ; 300.
falsehoods; 245.
writers; Degradation of: 189.
Newspapers; 83, 105, 110, 124, 137, 154,
162, 163, 190, 211, 299, 307.
Night Courts unnecessary; 51.
Noise and Dr. Parkhurst; 113.
Northern Bank; 186.
Northrop; W, B. : Introduction; 5, 6.
Nuisances; Public: Gambling houses and
houses of ill fame are: 195, 196,
293.
Office; Good men in: 291.
Officials; Abuse of: 208.
O'Gilby; W. S. R.: Letter to: 83.
" Old-Fashioned Woman " ; 163.
Oneida; Address to Sons of; 201.
Orator; Requisites of an: 172.
Oratory; 286.
Outlook; Article on Roosevelt; 23.
Overcrowding in prisons; 61.
Overtime; working; 56.
Paine; Thomas: 126, 157.
Parkhurst; Rev. C. H.: 113, 114, 117, 213.
Letter to: 151.
Parks: 177.
Classical music in the: 188.
Parsons; Mrs.: "The Family"; 163,
"The Old-Fashioned Woman"; 163.
"Primitive Fancies about the Sex";
163.
Paternoster Case; 176.
Patrolman's kind act; 20.
Pawnshops; 73, 75.
Payne Act; 226.
Peace; International: 221.
Penn; William: 150.
Pension Fund; Street Cleaners'; 90.
Pension Laws and Workmen's Compensa
tion; 89.
Personal Tax; Reminiscences, 17, 201-208.
Philosophy in barnyard; 44.
Pictures; Prize fight: 25, 114.
Piety and biliousness; 11 4,
Pincus; Joseph W.: Letter to: 62.
Playgrounds; Music in; 41.
on roof; 56.
Police; 165.
arresting boys; 68, 82, 98.
Commendation of: 154.
Commission of 1905; 194.
Commissioner; 8, 102, 106, 167, 195.
corruption; 78, 165, 195.
First duty of the: 313.
East Side: 306.
Election frauds; 310.
control over excise, gambling, and
prostitution; 76. , , .
force less corrupt than for thirty
years; 195.
maltreating citizens; 97.
Manual; Preface to: 157.
being reduced to order; 308.
at the Polls; 107, 310, 311.
Power Law; 253, 255.
and prostitution; 76, 94.

reforms and " Eternal Priestess of
Humanity"; 96.
Special: 98.
Policeman; Each citizen a: 48.
Policemen; Big and little: 23.
Special: 52, 53.
Political parties; Mayors and; 309.
Politics; Advice on entering; 279-304.
National: in local affairs; 304, 305.
National, State and Local: 305.
State: 165.
Polls; Police at the: 107, 310, 311.
Prayer against lying;^ 35, 36.
Presidency not in mind: 32.
Politics Club; Speech to the: 279.
Press; Coercion by the; 300.
Corrupt; 298.
Freedom of; 130.
Prices; 232, 276.
Gold production and: 233, 277.
High: Tariff and Gold Speech; 223-
225.
of protected goods in other coun
tries; 226.
and supply and demand; 235,
Trusts and: 229, 233.
Prisoner; Letter to: 31.
Prisons; Overcrowding in; 61.
Vice in: 61.
"Progress and Poverty"; 75.
Prosperity and just distribution; 244, J7U.
Prostitutes; 116, 119, 184.
Prostitution; 76, 94, 103, 104, 105, 117,
192.. ^ f
Protection of wages; 225, 226.
Protective Tariffs; 225.
Public lands; Waste in Condemning: 17.
Public nuisances; 293.
Purcell; 169.
Purring people; 164.
Race tracks; 101.
Rag-bag newspapers; 142, 154.
Raids; Police: 101.
Railroads; 240, 277.
Ratcatcher; A learned: 19.
Reading; 169.
Recall; 145, 151, 152, 245.
Reciprocity; 227.
Red flag; 36.
Reform; 212.
Reminiscences; Personal; 201-208.
Reno fight pictures; 25, 29, 114.
Rent; 214.
Reporters; 190.
Restitution; 57.
Revolution; War of the: 123.
Rhetoricians; 91, 92, 95, 96, 135.
Riverside Drive stage coaches; 15.
Robinson; Allan; Letter to: on Police; 76.
Rogues' Gallery injustice; 74, 98.
Roller-skating in streets; 58, 109.
Roosevelt; Theodore: 17, 23, 299.
Rosenthal; 77, 91, 196, 292.
Russia and Japan; 179, 
Ryan; Tom: City sold out to: 299.
Sabbath; 84, 111.
Saloons; 99.
Santa Claus; 114, 191.
Schiff & Co.; 146, 147.
Schools; Public: 87, 188.
Seat hogs; 162. .
Secret Service force; 314.
Sheahan; Thomas: Letter to; 21.
Single tax; 74, 179, 214-221.
Sipp; 77, 166, 196, 294.
Slavery; 130, 138. „ , ,^
Smith; R. A. C: Letter to: on Books; 64.
Socialism: 36, 37, 239, 258, 271.
Speech; Freedom of: 130.
Spelling: "Simplified": 16, 19.

319

INDEX

Spitting; Man arrested for: 83.
Stick pins; 106.
Stolen property; Pawnshops and: 73, 75.
Street Cleaners' Strike; 60.
Street Opening Bureau; 17.
Streets; Playing in: 54, 55, 58, 82, 109.
Strikes; 60, 98.
Subways; 34, 61, 142-145, 146-148, 212,
298, 299, 301, 302.
Sugar tariff; 226.
Sugar trust; 229.
Sullivan-Short Bill; 74.
Sulzer; Hon. William: Letter to: 164.
Summonses; 157.
Sunday; 84, 85, 154.
Supply and demand; 235.
Syracuse Fair; Speech at: 272.

Taney; Chief Justice: on negroes; 128,
Tariff: High Prices, and Gold; 223.
History of the American: 223.
High prices and the:, 223,
question local and selfish; 226.
Public opinion and the: 227.
for revenue only; 225.
taxation; Extremes of: 225.
Tariffs are too high; 224.
and prices at home and abroad; 226.^
and profits; 225.
War: 225.
Tax: Commissioners; 18.
Income: 262.
Personal: 17.
Taxes; Rents and: 214.
Tenement House Tobacco Case; 237, 248,
296.
Thieves and usurers; 266.
Thompson; Commissioner: 26, 136.
Thompson; Dr.: 50.
Thoren; Harvey: 110.
Tilden presidential campaign; 225.
Titanic; 81.
Tolstoy; 178, 180.
Trade; Expansion of; 228.
Trust; Definition of a; 229.
Trusts; 229, 240.
and freight rates; 278.
made legal in New Jersey; 230, 231.
and prices; 229, 231.
How to get rid of the: 231, 241.
Tucker; 180.
Tweed frauds; 150, 209.

Underground Bake Ovens Casef 238, 250,
296.
Unitarians; 127.
Usurers and thieves; 266,
Usury; 266.
Defence of: 267.

Value; 234.
Vice Commission; 76.
Vice; Definition of: 306.
Department; Veto of separate: 191-197.
in prisons; 61.
Scattering; 116.
Segregating: 118, 156, 183,
Virtue; Segregating: 156.
Voltaire; 171.
Voting; Fraudulent: 107.
Illegal: 312.

Wages; Local rates of: 257, 260.
Waldo; Rhinelander: Letters to: 51, 52,
53, 68, 73, 106, 165.
Walking; 16, 42. 110.
War tariffs; 225.
Warrant; Making arrests without: 52, 158.
Breaking into houses without: 100,
193, 194.
Washington and Lincoln; 120-130.
Waste in condemning public lands; 17.
Water; Company deal in Brooklyn; 9.
Department and waste of water; 136.
supply in houses; 49.
Watson; A. R. : Letters to: 17, 164.
Watterson, Mr.: 32.
Webster; 285.
Weights and measures; 180, 187.
Weston; E. P.: 16, 44, 110.
Wife; Finding a: 58.
Williams Case; 255.
Wilson Tariff Act; 226.
Wilson; Woodrow: 169.
"Wink" letter to little girl; 58.
Wise; Rabbi: 91, 92, 95. 96, 102, 114,
134, 308.
Witte; Count; 178.
Women's Night Work Case; 238, 254, 297.
Wool; Free: 225, 226.
Workmen's Compensation; 89.

Yale Forum; Address before: 243-264.

320

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