The Wilmington morning star., 1943-11-06
BY WEsTBROoK PEGLER

BY WEsTBROOK PEGLER
NEW YORK.-The election of Thomas A.
Aurelo to the n1scalled New York County
Supreme Court, Notwithstanding his association
with underworld racketeers and his repudi-
alton by both the Democrats and Republicans
is neither surprising nor depressing in view
of all the circumstances He was repudiated
by the Democrats only in the formal sense
but got their support and their votes because
after all, the man selected by the American
Labor Party as contrast provided no contrast
at all.
few days before the election, the New
York Times, which condemned Aurelio and
supported Matthew NJ Levy, the labor partys
man, an editorial which said in part:
'Mr. Aurelio's only defense with regard to
the Costello affair is that he sought and ac-
cepted support from and pledged undying 10y
atty to man of whose character and back
ground he had no knowledge and about whom
he did not trouble to inform himself. If Mr..
Aurelio could act with this almost incredible
blindness on matter OF the first Importance
to him, how may we expect him to act with
regard to innumerable cases in which he has
no personal concern? How careful how COM
petent, how informed, how discriminating will
be the decisions of such man when he sits
in court? By his own testimony, he admits
that regarding Costello's character he proved
a disastrously bad judge
But the Times might have said exactly the
same Of Mr.. Levy, union attorney who had
associated closely with George Browne, a no.
torious racketeer and betrayer of labor, except
that Mr.. Levy did not solicit Brownies help
in getting the nomination, Browne being
prisoner under sentence by then. If Aureo
acted as the Times says, with almost incred-
IDLE blindness then so did Mr.. Levy and a
little more so because, after all. this Costello
althOuqh we'll known To tho n01iro ro+
notorious to the public Browne was when
Mr.. Levy paid him lavish compliments in the
convention of the movie union racket in Louis
vile in 1910. 1t is hard to see how anyone
could expect Mr.. Levy to be any more COM
petent, informed or discriminating in court
for he, too, had proved to be disastrously
bad judge Of Brownies character.
1t will certainly be hard for the public to
believe that the Tammany politicians who got
Mr.. Aurelio his nomination were equally ig-
norant equally blind, equally babes in the
woods regarding Costello's activities and char
acter,' the Times said further and l. quote
the Times on this only because this particular
editorial best sums up the arguments against
Aurelio that were offered in Levys favor by
the American Labor Party, and the new deal
forces generally.
That is quite true. The Tammany politicians
by reason of their contacts and associations
were In position to get reliable information
about Costello. But on the other hand, Alex
Rose, the secretary of the labor party, who
personally picked Mr.. Levy, was in position
to learn about Brownies character and at least
to experience suspicious Of his betrayal of
labor into the clutches of the criminal under
world and exploiting employers long before
Browne was exposed in the newspapers. Union
officials get around, they gossip at their meet
lngs and conventions and many union men In
California had pointed the finger at Browne
naive but smart, shrewd unioneer of long
experience and it is only fair to apply to him
the same standards that the so-called lib
erals of the new deal applied to the Tammany
politicians and to Mr. Levy the same standards
that were set for Aurelio. And, by the same
token, if the election of Aurelio is a calamity
then the election Of the liberal candidate
would have been equally calamitous.
And it need not necessarily be calamitous
at all unless the liberals prepared to
repudiate their own man, Hugo Black, on the
highest court in the land; for Mr.. Black was
an enrolled member of one of the most brutal,
un-American gangs or ruffians in the history
of the United States who accepted his mem
bership in the Ku Klux Klan in order to win
the political support of this gang for cheap
political job. That explanation however, only
made his offense the worse because a man
of character would nave spurned their support
and fought them
Yet, Hugo Black has not been bad justice
of the Supreme Court of the U. S. A. and
Aurelio, whose record was otherWlse good,
might be just as good on the supreme Court
| of New York county.