The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1930-03-15
BASED on information from Labor Research
e. Association

70. Association
THE brutality and terrorism of Tammany Hall,
controlled by city administration and police,
gives to the New York workers splendid op-
portunity to have an insight as to who are our
judges and guardians of peace. District At
Ii ney Grain, together with the entire city adj
ministration proclaimed the five leaders of the
New York Unemployment Demonstrations on
March as ''the most dangerous five men living
in our community" However, an insight into
the record of Walker, Whalen, District Attorney
Grain, and the Tammany administration as a
whole will make clear to the workers why such
brutality was used in suppressing the demon
stration, and the heavy sentence imposed upon
the five leaders of the New York demonstration
of March 6.
POLICE COMMISSIONER WHALEN
Who is this Grover A. Whalen, what is his
record? Before becoming Police Commissioner
of New York, he was general manager of the
John Wanamaker Department Store, where
young girls and boys work for from $12 to S14
a week, where the hours of work not limited,
where during the holiday periods the sales
people and the shipping clerks work from Il
to 16 hours a day, where women workers in that
department store are not allowed even to sit
down, Police Commissioner Whalen is one OF
the New York millionaires with interests IN
many big strike-breaking corporations. He is
President and director of the American
Trans Oceanic Company. He is a trustee OF the
Metropolitan Savings Bank. He is director
of the Advertising Club of New York. This is
not the first public office that Grover Whalen
held in New York City. He was Commissioner
of Plants and Structures in New York, and while
holding this office, developed system of graft
and political favoritism in giving out permits
for the operation of bus lines. He and many
other politicians working with him enriched
themselves from the revenue of bus lines in the
Bronx.
Because he was connected with the I'm
Wanamaker Store, which gives considerable
amount of advertisement in the capitalist press
Grover Whalen, as treasurer succeeded to nave
the capitalist press in New York City support
all his policies. When assuming the post as
police commissioner, Grover Whalen developed
a system of terror and smuggling of strikers IN
order to cover up the implication of Tammany
Hall.in the Rothstein murder case.
..aa MAYOR WALKER
The corruption and strike-breaking activity
of the city apparatus particularly developed I'M
der the administration Of Mayor Walker, one OF
the ring-leaders of Tammany Hall. His at
titude toward the working class is particularly
characterized by his long record of strike-break-
ing activity against the workers. Immediately
after his reelection in 1929, the first act OF
Mayor Walker was to increase his salary by
$4,000 annually, which amounts today to
$4,000 year, and proportional increase TO
the Presidents of the five boroughs. This is
done in the face of continuous unemployment
and starvation wages that the city employees
receive today. 1t was already proven that Mayor
Walker derives income from other business con-
Germs and corporations. The reported income
of Mayor Walker in 1928 was $287,000 which
he made largely in IR.T. stock. Besides send
ing his police to slug workers, besides the Tam
many Judges issuing Sweeping injunctions,
Mayor Walker is also known for his order Of
evicting all the unemployed from public lodgings
on the ground that they were "unsanitary."
1t is not at all surprising that Chief City
Magistrate William McAdoo, and District Attor-
ney Crane are so vicious against the unenl-
ployed and their leaders. William McAdoo has
a long record of anti-labor activity while serv-
ing in New Jersey legislature, in the house OF
representatives, as notwithstanding OF the
Navy during the Cleveland administration, as
police commissioner of New York IN 19O4-l905
during which he showed himself IN the most
brutal fashion as agent of the bosses and as
a bitter foe of labor. The same applies to Dis
1r1cL ATTORNEY SIdHe, WIN SOAoidCio iooVSi5
Minor, Amter, Lester and Raymond as the five
most dangerous men in New York City. This
stool-pgeon of the bosses who is definitely i'm
plicated In the Rothstein murder case, dope
smuggling, in the magistrate record and in other
acts of corruption and graft of Tammany Hall,
is now trying to white-wash himself by his
ferocity against the leaders of the unemployed.
This chieftan of Tammany Hall is today work
ing for salary of $4,000 year. All these
grafters and parasites are part of the famous
Tammany Hall machine which controlled the
City administration in New York City for many
years A description of the role of Tamrnany
Hall is given by the bourgeois writer M. H.
Werner in his book ''Tammany Hail." where he
states:
'Tammany men must always be supplied
With desirable political jobs. The HALF is not
only an association and building where men
whose interests are mutual may meet in order
10 express those interests in politics. it is also
symbol of the fact that every one is work
ing for his pocket and his benefit all the time.
1t is virtually based on the principle of per-
sonal ACKNOWLEDGMENT for its members, cor
ruption graft, racketeering, thievery, election
frauds and general rotteness are justified in
the eyes of Tammany men in order to secure