Once Upon a Time in New York

by Herbert Mitgang

  In an effort to link Roosevelt to big money interests, Walker subjected the Governor to what struck some listeners as an insulting remark: “Now, I won’t argue finances with Your Excellency, especially Wall Street financing, but I don’t know that that necessarily follows, because people fall all over themselves to buy something. That has been done with gold bricks for time out of mind.”

  The steady emergence of Roosevelt as the star of the hearing was echoed in the mainstream press. At the end of the initial testimony by Jimmy Walker, The New York Times editorialized:

  “There is nothing but admiration, so far, for Governor Roosevelt’s bearing in the Walker case at Albany. He has been firm but impartial, anxious to dispatch the business before him, and putting questions which show how closely and deeply he has studied the evidence laid before him with the charges. But what can be said of the methods of the defense? The Mayor himself has behaved well enough, but his counsel have been fighting on every technicality which they could conjure up, and threatening to carry the case to the Court of Appeals if it goes against them after the hearing.

  “Every unbiased reader of the record made at Albany will infer that the tactics of the defense could come only from those who feel that their case is bad and that they must contest the law and the evidence at every point. Perhaps a little reflection over the weekend will induce the Mayor’s lawyers to adopt a more reasonable course, and one less self-betraying, when the hearing is resumed.”

  As the hearings continued in the following days, the exchanges between Roosevelt and Walker’s lawyer became more heated. It was clear that Curtin was getting Roosevelt’s “Dutch” up by lecturing him about the law. In doing so, he was attempting to divert attention from the evidence amassed by Seabury and his sleuths.

  The rancor and sarcasm between Curtin and Roosevelt don’t appear in the mimeographed transcript, but press reports show that they were always present in the chamber. At one point, Roosevelt told Curtin, “Don’t talk anymore. Proceed with the examination.”

  Curtin raised objections to the issuance of “request” subpoenas to witnesses and the admissibility of those witnesses’ evidence.

  ROOSEVELT: In other words, you are raising a technical objection.

  CURTIN: No, it is not; and I haven’t done that up to date.

  ROOSEVELT: You have done it now; you have done it fifty times before.

  CURTIN: I have not, and—

  ROOSEVELT: It is dilatory tactics.

  CURTIN: I beg your pardon; I disagree.

  In an effort to make a record for an appeal about the way Governor Roosevelt was conducting the hearing, Curtin condemned the entire proceeding as unconstitutional. Occasionally, Roosevelt consulted his counsel, Messrs. Fertig and Conboy, who sat on either side of him, but he delivered the decisions of his “court” himself.

  ROOSEVELT [to Curtin]: Counsel, I want to make just one comment, and that is I cannot agree in any shape, manner or form with the suggestion that this hearing is being conducted in any way differently from what hearings have been conducted by a long line of Governors for many decades. The historical record does not accord with the statement which you have made. This hearing is in line, so far as I have been able to find out, with all the proceedings of the past Therefore, it is not exactly fair or right to give the impression that I am conducting this hearing in any way or manner different from any other hearing. Now, I don’t think we need to argue this question further.

  CURUN: I realize you have the right to cross-examine any witness I bring on—

  ROOSEVELT: I don’t think I care to hear anything more along that line, counsel. This is a hearing by the Governor, and I will examine any witnesses that I want to, and I give you the privilege of examining any witnesses that you want to, and I shall cross-examine any witnesses that you bring on, as I want to. Now, I don’t think we need clutter the record any more. Every ten or fifteen minutes you bring up the same point simply to create atmosphere, and I don’t care to hear anything further along that line during the present course of this inquiry. I want that perfectly clearly understood by you.”

  CURTIN: As long as my position is clearly understood, I don’t care.

  ROOSEVELT: Right, and I shall have to insist that that shall not continue to go into the record. You have made your objection on the record about a half-dozen times along the same line. We will consider it made for the balance of this hearing, without making it again.

  The Sherwood mystery remained. One of the charges against Walker was that “for the purposes of concealment he conducted his financial transactions through and in the name of Russell T. Sherwood,” who had avoided questioning by leaving the jurisdiction and hiding in Mexico.

  Walker could not explain how a $10,000-a-year accountant had accumulated nearly a million dollars in five and a half years. It was rumored that the mayor’s putative agent, now missing almost a year, now would return in time to testify for the mayor.

  “Ridiculous,” Walker commented.

  Of course, the governor wanted the mayor to explain the sources of the money in the Walker-Sherwood “tin box.”

  ROOSEVELT: Now, in regard to the safe-deposit box which was jointly in the name of Sherwood and yourself, do you know whether Sherwood had joint-name boxes with other members of your law firm?

  WALKER: I do not. My name was added to that box or, rather, I had access to the box at that time, because of certain papers that I wanted to put in the box that were taken out, and I never was in the safe-deposit vault, never in the bank, never really knew where it was, never used it, directly or indirectly.

  ROOSEVELT: Did you know after the removal of papers from that box that it was continued in your name?

  WALKER: I did not. I don’t know except whatever privilege I had in the beginning, I never paid for it, for instance. I had the right of access to it, in 1924, and I don’t know that it was ever changed, and it never developed that I knew of it until the investigation opened. Certainly, then, I didn’t go down and say, “Take my name off,” in the middle of an investigation.

  ROOSEVELT: Isn’t it a curious thing for you, when a man with whom you had a safe-deposit box, and who looked after your personal affairs, disappears, and the whole town is looking for him, and he briefly turns up, not to communicate with him?

  WALKER: There wasn’t any opportunity to communicate with him that I know of after he was served with a subpoena, and I had no reason to believe he would disobey the subpoena.

  ROOSEVELT: I wish he were here today.

  WALKER: So do I wish he were here, and if there was any way for me to find him, he would be here.

  Mayor Walker said he was willing to discuss the charges before the governor providing they were presented “innocently and unintentionally, if Your Excellency pleases.” By contrast, Walker claimed, the Seabury investigation was conducted “by inferences, upon inferences, upon inferences.”

  In response to questions by Governor Roosevelt about why he awarded franchises to certain companies without necessarily accepting the lowest bid or any competitive bid at all, Mayor Walker advanced a rather ingenious theory about the independence of what he called “the executive mind.” This is how Walker rationalized his solo decision-making power:

  “I submit to Your Excellency that this cross-examination of the executive mind certainly has no foundation in law, any more than I have got a right to cross-examine you here about why you have arrived at decisions you made today. Mine was an executive administrative act for which I am responsible to the people, and I am going to waive it, and I am going to answer it, but I want to here give a close-up on the character and the aspect of the investigation we have had, which would not be obtained or permitted any other place. There are some prerogatives that an executive has, and his reasons for making up his mind.”

  Walker had a little more trouble when confronted with a document which showed his signature on a check that he used while junketing around Europe in 1927. The governor pointed out that the check read: �
��Pay to the order of the Equitable Trust Company of New York, $3,000; value received and charge the same to the account of James J. Walker.”

  In other words, Roosevelt pointed out, the check was drawn on a bank in which Walker didn’t have an account, meaning someone else would make it good.

  With two young women tossing roses in his path and Joe Quintano’s eight-piece brass band playing “Hail, Hail, the Gang’s All Here,” Jimmy Walker returned to Grand Central Terminal at eight o’clock one evening, on a special train, after the first few days on the witness stand in Albany. Governor Roosevelt and Judge Seabury returned to their homes in Hyde Park and East Hampton.

  Questioned by reporters about who had ordered them to greet Jimmy Walker triumphantly at Grand Central, the bandsmen claimed to be “friends of the Mayor,” rather than musicians hired for the occasion. Quintano said that “someone,” name unknown, had suggested that it would be nice if his band showed up to cheer the mayor. The flower baskets and flower girls were supplied by Peter Cappel, who was head of the New York Jewelers Exchange as well as the owner of a real estate company.

  Five thousand people turned out to hear the band and greet Walker at the station as he emerged from the train with his lawyers, office assistants, and bodyguard, police captain Thomas O’Connor. A gray-haired woman, eluding fifty uniformed policemen, five sergeants, a captain, and an inspector, broke through the lines, flung her arms around the mayor, and kissed him three times. He was, as usual, carefully dressed for the crowds. Walker brushed off his single-breasted lightweight blue suit and black-and-gray-striped tie, waved his jaunty straw hat, and entered his waiting limousine.

  The mayor spent the weekend resting at the Larchmont estate of A. C. “Blumey” Blumenthal, a California real estate operator, former movie magnate, and theatrical investor. Blumey, a social climber and celebrity chaser, used his palship with Walker to impress bankers and financiers. Walker often visited Blumey in his suite at the Ambassador Hotel in Manhattan, where the mayor performed marriage ceremonies for show-business personalities.

  The atmosphere in Larchmont was relaxing. Blumenthal was married to Peggy Fears, a former Ziegfeld showgirl; their palatial home was usually papered with beautiful chorines, who lounged around the swimming pool, and name personalities who appeared between the dot-dot-dot items in gossip columns.

  Blumenthal confirmed that he was ready to offer his friend Jimmy Walker a $100,000-a-year job should he be removed from office. “No, not in the movies,” Blumenthal said. “The trouble with that figure of $100,000 is that I believe the Mayor could easily earn $500,000 a year if he returned to the practice of law. The man is brilliant. I don’t know an attorney who can equal his oratory.”

  That skill could do little for him back in Albany. Returning for further grilling by Governor Roosevelt, Walker was closely questioned about the $246,000 he had received from the secret brokerage account set up for him by Paul Block, the publisher. (In Depression-era dollars, this was a fortune—close to ten times more than the mayor’s $25,000 annual salary, before it was raised to $40,000.) A headline in The New York Times, above an article datelined Albany, explained:

  WALKER SAYS HE USED WORD ‘BENEFICENCE’ WRONGLY;

  OBJECTS TO BEING PUT ON TRIAL FOR HIS ENGLISH

  But there was far more to the story than the mayor’s vocabulary. It involved a secret brokerage account, cash transactions, and influence peddling over a contract for subway tiles—the most incredible tale heard during the hearings.

  Said Roosevelt, “The testimony is fairly clear that the Mayor received nearly $250,000 from Paul Block, less deductions for income taxes, up to the time of the closing of this account in August 1929. And, again, I think probably the easiest way would be to have you, Mr. Mayor, tell us the story about that account, its inception, and in general what was the result of it?”

  Walker replied, “Well, that seems to be more important just at this time, if Your Excellency please. There is a cruel reference—Mr. Block’s attitude—in the conclusions propounded by Mr. Seabury. When I used the word ‘beneficent’ I didn’t think I would be on trial for my selection of English. If I had been years ago I probably would have been convicted, as most men who speak that language. Evidently the word beneficence has been subjected by a very keen mind, with very subtle reasoning—coupled again with inference and innuendo.

  “Now, Mr. Block never was interested, so far as I know, in any tile that was ever manufactured or sold to the City of New York. More than that, Mr. Block never attempted for himself, or on behalf of anyone else, to sell tile or anything else to the City of New York. That’s a fact. So that the question becomes difficult to me—while that inference remains. It was gratuitous, and not predicated upon any testimony.”

  But under polite but steady prodding by Roosevelt, Mayor Walker admitted that he had actually visited the Beyer Tile Company plant with Paul Block, and there met Dr. Robert S. Beyer, a chemist. Walker’s close friend State Senator Hastings was already on the tile company premises when the mayor and Block showed up; Hastings was arranging for approval of the tile by the city’s Board of Transportation. The tile deal fell through, but it was discovered that Block, Hastings, and Beyer were the main stockholders in the company.

  In an attempt to wiggle out of the original impression that he had meant to convey during the legislative hearings in Manhattan—that Block had given him financial aid and comfort out of the goodness of his heart—Jimmy Walker now put a new spin on the word, blaming himself rather than any dictionary for his grammatical slipup.

  WALKER: Now, my word ‘beneficence’ has all the shortcoming of a man who doesn’t choose the proper word at the proper time. By beneficence, I meant good nature in managing this account—using his best judgment, with the judgment that followed. That is what I mean by the word ‘beneficence’—Block managed it, he handled it.

  Regardless of what the account was called, Walker asserted, “There wasn’t a dollar of a taxpayer’s money in it.”

  The fact remained that Block was a shareholder in the tile company, and the Beyer Tile Company was hoping for a major contract with the city. About the money, Walker stubbornly maintained that “it had nothing to do with James J. Walker, the official, or with any official acts throughout his life. It was a private transaction between friends, which it seems difficult to have to argue about, that there is such a thing as friendship without an ulterior motive.”

  Roosevelt simply observed, “It’s the most extraordinary business proposition I ever heard of.”

  Following the Seabury script, Governor Roosevelt now began to question Mayor Walker about his brother, Dr. William H. Walker, who served as medical examiner to the Department of Education and the City Pension Retirement Fund. Dr. Walker made a fortune splitting fees with a small group of doctors who monopolized the city’s workmen’s compensation cases. He received a kickback of one-half the fee, to the very cent, of every case the doctors handled.

  At first, the mayor denied any knowledge of his brother’s business. Then he added, “I don’t know of itself that fee splitting is wrong. I have done it. I don’t know if Your Excellency has done it in your law practice or not, but most lawyers have.”

  Governor Roosevelt’s tone of voice changed; he did not appreciate the comparison of his old law practice to the practices of either of the Walker brothers.

  ROOSEVELT: Wait a minute, do you consider that fee-splitting is a proper, ethical medical practice?

  WALKER: If the city was not defrauded, I don’t see anything unethical about that. I can’t sit here and indict somebody of a crime when I have no knowledge of the commission of it.

  ROOSEVELT: All right, I will put it in the form of a hypothetical question: Do you consider it to the interest of the City of New York to have doctors who are paid sums for specific compensation cases, pay a half of those sums to other doctors who have not treated in those cases?

  CURTIN: Just a minute—

  WALKER: I want to answer that. I wouldn’t con
sider it ethical for any employe of the city—doctor, lawyer or otherwise—to give away any of his salary to anybody for any sinister or any illegal purpose. But I know of no law, no rule, or no ethics that permits the city to say to a man, when they pay for services rendered, what he shall do with his money.

  To the end, Walker defended the Tammany system and insisted that money changed hands in the course of personal favors among friends, never as a quid pro quo.

  After the mayor had been on the stand for more than a week, Governor Roosevelt invited Curtin to produce any witnesses.

  “Not at this time,” Walker’s counsel said.

  The same invitation was made to Judge Seabury. He, too, seemed satisfied that Roosevelt had covered the “conclusions” against Walker, and said, “Not as the record stands at present.”

  On the surface, all involved appeared to agree with the way that Roosevelt had conducted the hearings.

  All, perhaps, but Jimmy Walker himself. This brief exchange took place between the governor and the mayor:

  ROOSEVELT: I think that concludes the direct examination of the Mayor by me.

  WALKER: What? What direct examination?

  ROOSEVELT: Direct examination of the Mayor by me.

  WALKER: I never want to be cross-examined if that was direct.