Much of our state’s corruption (so sayeth Tom) can be traced to May 15, 1917 - the day that Frank "I am the law" Hague began his thirty-year reign as Mayor of Jersey City. Hague was one of the state’s first political bosses and at the time his influence was felt well beyond his native city. Because the illicit political machine he built was so formidable, Hague would not only dominate the political scene in Jersey City, but he would also leave his unmistakable signature of corruption on county, state and national politics as well. In 1947, Hague walked away from his $8,000 a year post a multi-millionaire. Historians believe that the criminal enterprise Mayor Hague sat atop netted him up to 1 million dollars a year in illegal kickbacks. And to the great disappointment of New Jersey residents everywhere, this sad past would serve only as prologue. Over the next sixty years, scores of disgraced public officials from both political parties, serving on every level of government, would be escorted out of courthouses with raincoats over their heads . . . Senators, Congressmen, State Legislative leaders, cabinet members, big city mayors and even judges. Corruption probes would come to define the political life and times in New Jersey.
Gosh, where to begin . . . we'll start by noting that the twin pillars of Kean's campaign for the U.S. Senate are (1) capitalizing on residual goodwill from vague public memories of his father’s reign as governor, and (2) capitalizing on residual ill will from vague public memories of the notion that Hudson County, home turf of Bob Menendez, is somehow the birthplace of political corruption in New Jersey. That's why Hague, whose reign actually ended fifty-seven years ago with the defeat of his nephew, is supposed to be relevant to the political campaign now taking place over a seat in the U.S. Senate.
Frank Hague was in fact the virtual dictator of Hudson County for three decades, and his political machine was so powerful that governors and presidents had to reckon with him. Because New Jersey was at the time still a mostly rural state, with only a few semi-big cities, Hague could use Hudson County’s well disciplined voting bloc to help swing state elections to his preferred candidates. New Jersey governors Edward I. Edwards (1920-1923), George Silzer (1923-1926) and three-termer A. Harry Moore (1926-29, 1932-35, 1938-41) were all Hague-favored Democrats, and Republican governor Morgan Larson (1929-1932) won the GOP nomination because Hague had a bloc of Hudson County voters register as Republicans in order to tilt the primary away from a candidate Hague thought would be too uncooperative. The saga of the "One-Day Republicans" secured Hague’s place in political history, and triggered an opera buffa legislative probe led by state senator Clarence Case that helped cement the image of Hague we have today.
Since governors approved judicial appointments, Hague used his pull to vet judges and shield his machine from all but the most determined legal attacks. Venal? Corrupt? Power hungry? Hague was all that and more. Ironically, he arose from a downtrodden part of Jersey City called the Horseshoe, which had been gerrymandered into existence by the Republican legislature in order to minimize the political strength of the city’s growing immigrant population, which tended to be Catholic (notably Irish-Catholic) and vote Democratic. Thus did the WASP-dominated GOP power structure incubate its own nemesis via its abuse of power.
So if Hague was such an operator, why is Tom Kean Jr. all wet on this subject? First of all, because Hague was not by any stretch of the imagination the first or even one of the first political bosses. Nor were the bosses all Democrats. Check out the history of the Republican-run political machine based in Atlantic City, starting with the career of Enoch “Nucky” Johnson, who was so popular with gangsters and bootleggers that he personally hosted a May 1929 mobster convention that met in Atlantic City to work out the future of racketeering in the post-Prohibition era.
Part of the reason Hague extended his reach all the way to the governor's mansion was sheer necessity. The Republican-dominated legislature was in the back pocket of the railroad interests, which were permitted to use Jersey City's waterfront land virtually tax-free. When Hague attempted to make the railways pay a fair amount for their use and abuse of Jersey City, corrupt Republicans dealt him repeated setbacks.Later on, when Hague was at the apex of his power, plenty of Republicans were willing to play ball with him in order to benefit from his influence. Even Walter Edge paid due respect to the canniness of Hague’s instincts, and the efficiency with which his machine delivered the social services that were the cornerstone of Hague’s influence at home.
And as bad as Hague may have been, he had plenty of company. The reason the urban political machines are considered bywords for corruption is that their constituents were unacceptable to the WASP aristocracy, which as a general rule had no problem with corruption or political skullduggery as long as the proceeds ended up in well-manicured hands.
One of my fellow bloggers, Thurman Hart, has a site called New Jersey Tammany as a left-handed salute to the Democratic machine that dominated New York from Tammany Hall. It is a sign of the conflicted legacy of political machines that while Tammany produced W.M. Tweed, one of the most notorious bosses, it also produced Al Smith, one of the most beloved politicians in New York history. And while we rightly admire Thomas Nast, the cartoonist who helped bring Tweed down, we should acknowledge that the Irish accents in Tammany Hall offended Nast at least as much as the corruption. Check out Nast’s cartoons depicting Irish-Americans as baboons with derbies, or Catholic priests as predators trying to poison the minds of American children, and you’ll see what I mean. And let us not forget that Clarence Case, the leader of the probe into Hague’s operation, had been part of the defense team for accused killer Frances Hall in the Hall-Mills murder case. Hague’s influence had been crucial to reopening the case after the initial investigation bogged down, which meant Case had a political and professional score to settle with the boss of Hudson County.
This post has gone on way too long, but I want everyone to appeciate that New Jersey's political history is not just shady, but well-shaded with grays. Anyone who goes looking in it for unsullied angels is living in a fairy tale. And anyone who thinks that Tom Kean Jr., aspiring rubber-stamp candidate for the party of Tom DeLay and Jack Abramoff, would seriously effect any kind of change in this area is a born sucker.
Cross posted at The Opinion Mill. |
