The enterprise. [volume] (Harlem, Mont.) 1899-1926, 1910-05-04
HEARST NDGAYNOR
IN CONTROVERSY
VERACITY RAISED BY
MAYOR.
HEARST PR0PoUNDS QUESTIONS
Comptroller, Former Comptroller and
District Attorney Takes
Hand in the Dis
cussion.

cussion.
New York, April 30.-Mayor Gayno.
and William Randolph Hearst both is
sued statements on the issue of vara
city raised Thursday night at the join
banquet. of the Associated Press ant
the Newspaper Publishers association
when the mayor said that Mr.. Hear
was a forger and falsifier.
Supplementary statements were is
sued by Comptroller Prendergast, for
mer COMPTROLLER Metz and the district
that there was a possibility of future
legal proceedings as a result of the
mayors address Thursday night.
Mr.. Hearst's statement follows:
Il am net entirely familiar with all
the accusations against Mayor Gaynor
or his attempt to divert attention from
them by an attack on the American
His only claim, when it is ana.
| lyzed, is that the American failed to
print clearly the date on photo
| graphic fac smile of one of the docu-
| ments in the case against him, al
| though the American carried the same
date of the same document clearly
printed in type in the terms Of the
article.
"Anybody who knows the ability of
the gentlemen who edit the American
knows that if they had desired to omit
the date of any document they would
not have been so childish as to print
the date conspicuously in the type
while they were leaving it out of the
picture.
FINALLY, anybody who can read and
think can see clearly that the date in
question is not the important date any
how, but that the important date is
the date of January 4, date in May
Or Gaynor's administration upon which
the payment to Cohalan of $4S,000
finally was signed and actually author
lied. The January fourth signature
was affixed by the assistant chamber
lain in the office of Chamberlain Hyde,
Mayor Gaynor's law partner.
Say your law partner paid the
warrant, if you please; Mr.. Gaynor;
say your law partners assistant paid
it, if you please; but at least explain
why a warrant which the former ad-
ministratiOn held up as eXorbitant was
paid by your administration without
question and without investigation
Answer, Mr.. Gaynor, as a matter
of duty, as a matter OF decency and
as matter of public policy.
"Was not Cohalan the intermediary
between you and Charley Murphy, and
was he not largely instrumental in get
ting you the Tammany Hall nominal
ton?
WAS not Cohalan concerned in the
attempt to steal for you the nominal
ton of the Independence league. which
piece of political porch climbing,
Judge Gaynor, honest judge, eifeotu-
ally stopped.
Did not Comptroller Prendergast,
after you had been seated as mayor,
call your attention to the warrant for
Coholan's $4,000 which was in your
office?
did not Comptroller Prendergast
explain to you what it was and tell
you that if you would send the war
rants back to him he would make a
complete report on it and go to the
bottom Of the matter?
Did you not then fail to send the
warrant back to the comptroller and
fail to ask for the report, but did you
not on the contrary allow this padded
fee to go through unquestioned on JAN
uary 4, 1910?
And even those newspapers that
are now trucking ana lickspittling to
you in the hope of securing the city
advertising will in the end sacrifice
those lucrative contracts for the price
less privilege of telling the truth about
YOU"
For the mayor, Robert Adamson. his
private secretary, gave out the follow
ing statement, made before the mayor
had seen Mr.. Hearsts statement:
THE mayor is not required to sign
warrants at all. They are made out
and signed by the comptroller and
then by the chief clerk of the mayors
office, under authority Of the charter.
More than 275,000 such drafts are
signed in year, some days over L.
1o0 The mayor has never signed one.
The Cohalan claim was for legal SER.
ices in the franchise tax suits. Sew
eral lawyers were paid, including
Judge Alton B. Parker. The claim
was audited and filed last December.
after much evidence was taken. and
thereby became a legal claim against
the city.