Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1951-11-06
kefauver Revelations
Are Made Hot Issue in
Many Local Elections
BY the Associated Press

many Americans holding their
noses these days. They may clear
1.-THE air bit with today's off-year
election votes.
Many of the issues in a none
too-interesting campaign were left
over by the recent red-hot Senate
Crime Committee investigation
The hearings turned over the stone
on some pretty Shiny characters
in and out of politics.
Republicans as we'll as Demo-
Gratis were affected. Neither party
was lily-white.
New York. Philadelphia, Cleve-
land. Tampa. Fla: Dearborn
Mich. and Atlantic City, N. j.
These are some Of the places
where morality in government is
sizzling campaign issue.
HALEY For Council.
Nowhere is the hand of Senator
Kefauver, former crime commit
tee chairman, heavier than in New
York City. The senator's chief
committee counsel, Rudolph Hal
ley, is spreading political wings
for the first time.
Mr.. HALEY wants the 25,000-a-
year job as president of New
York's City Council-the city's
second highest post and consider
ed a solid stepping stone to higher
places.
He couldn't get Democratic
organization support, which went
TO Acting Council President
Joseph T Sharley. So Mr.. Haley,
"a Democrat, settled for independ-
Ient-Liberal-Fusion Party backing.
AS an old across-the table foe
of Gambler Frank Costello, Mr..
HALEY has made his chief issue
"Costelloism" in the Democratic
Party. Costello has admitted
friendship with more than one
Democratic big wig in Tammany
Hall.
ID. A. Has Hard Fight.
On Staten Standardized by re-
cent New York State Crime Com
mlttee disclosures of graft in high
IplaceS-DiStrict Attorney Herman
Methfessel is fighting to retain his
$12, 000-a-year job in New York
City's least populous county.
Mr.. Methfessel was depicted by
a Crime Committee witness as a
visitor to home where roulette
was played. Mr.. Methfessel de-
MED any wrongdoing and had the
witness arrested on perjury
charge. For that move, he was
showed aside in the Crime Com
mission inquiry for a special prose-
cutor on orders of Gov. Dewey.
Mr.. Methfessel, a Democrat. was
elected in 1947 with COP backing
also. His Republican-Liberal OPP
ponent, Sidney o. Simonson
escaped the stigma placed on the
local regular COP machine by the
investigators. He licked the regu-
lar Republican machine in pri-
maries.
Revelations in Jersey.
Across the Hudson River, from
New York. the heavy hand of
kefauver rests also on two New
Jersey election battles.
In Bergen County-A stamping
ground for some of the biggest
racketeers in the East-Republi-
can Frank c. Osmers, jr., is run
ming for Congress against Demo-
Icrat Evelyn Seufert.
Because Bergen County Is a
COP stronghold, Miss Seufert has
made much of the crime and cor
Eruption that f1ourished under Re-
publican regimes.
Atlantic City-Kefauverized as
IA hotbed Of gambling and corrup-
tion-has two State Assembly
seats at stake. Gambling is the
issue there, with Democrats trying
to Wrest control from the G. o. P.
Republican-controlled Philadel-
Iphla has a grand jury digging
into municipal corruption and
gambler influence. This lent a
strong talking point to Joseph Sill
Clark, jr.. Democratic nominee for
Mayor.
The harassed G. o. P. drafted a
widely known Protestant minister,
DR.. Daniel A. Polling. to try to
keep control.
In Cleveland, the Republican
candidate for Mayor. William J.
McDermott, has made civic cor
ruption his issue, charging:
1T was necessary for the United
States Government to come in
here and clean up racketeers. The
police department is full of cor
ruption and scandal. :"
The Democratic incumbent,
Thomas A. Burke. has shrugged
off most of the charges. He re-
piled that Cleveland's crooked po-
lice have been weeded out and
punished.
Detroit. itself, finds the Ke-
fauver hearings there no issue.
But the Mayor of neighboring
Dearborn. Orville Hubbard, does.
Running for reelection, Mayor
Hubbard latched onto Kefauver
disclosures of gambling within the
Ford Motor Co.'S Big River Rouge
plant at Dearborn. Mayor Hub
bard says his mayoralty rival, Carl
Matheny. is backed by Ford
money.