The Citizen and His Government
by
[Harpers, $2.50]
IN a sense, this book is a political autobiography. It is a summary of the author ’s varied experiences in politics and public life, a first-hand portrayal of American government as a going concern. Certainly no one is bettor qualified than Govenrnor Smith to discuss the actualities of politics, and there are not many who could do it with greater effectiveness than it has been done ’n this volume.
The book is well planned. It begins with first principles and the local political club. In this connection the author writes entertainingly about sidewalk politics, summer picnics, the political opportunities afforded by funerals and wakes, the various kinds of patronage, and the agility with which the district leader manages to ladle out his gravy without spotting the tablecloth. Incidentally, Governor Smith expresses the opinion that district leaders of the older type are now passing out of the picture. He believes issues are likely to be more important than organization or Leadership in election campaigns of the future.
The government of New York City is given a critical survey, with a strong plea for a better integration of its municipal framework by abolishing the boroughs. Both the Board of Estimate and the Board of Aldermen would likewise be thrown into the discard if the author could have his way. Executive power he would vest entirely in the mayor, while complete legislative authority would be given to a small Common council. In fact, what Father Knickerbocker seems to need is a wholly new suit of clothes.
From municipal affairs the book passes to a discussion of state organization and problems. All manner of timely topics are touched upon — methods of campaigning for the gubernatorial office, speechmaking over the radio, the parochialism of legislators, budget systems, the practice of electing judges (which is disapproved), the pardoning power, and the steady growth of executive authority in the states. The hardest thing that a governor has to do, according to the author, is to reconcile his legal and human responsibilities. A conflict between the two is continually arising in the performance of executive duties.
The longest and most interesting chapter of the book is entitled ’Back Stage in a National Campaign.’ It devotes fifty pages to the personal experiences of the Happy Warrior in 1928. The reader is told all about the ‘gentlemen with black senatorial hats and heavy Southern accents, wearing thick gold watchchains laden with fraternal emblems, each one announcing his ability to deliver the vote of an entire Southern state, if not the whole of the South and Southwest .’ He is also given a lot of interesting sidelights upon the methods of raising and spending campaign funds, and is told something about how a candidate manages to circumvent the conscious fakers, panhandlers, and autograph-seeking pests while trying to satisfy the crowds at every watertank town along the paths of travel. ‘It takes a trained political sense to know what really lies behind the cheers of the crowd, as the author plaintively remarks after noting that his tour through the South and West in 1928 attracted the greatest amount of enthusiasm and the smallest of votes ever given to a Democratic: candidate in recent times.
In the latter portion of the volume there are discourses on government and personal welfare, on law observance, and on problems of public finance, winding up with an earnest plea for the reform of our ‘antiquated machine of government.’ Little is added bore, however, to the views which the author has publicly expressed from time to time in his writings and speeches during the past dozen years. All in all, moreover, the book devotes more of its pages to an outline of what government ought to be than to an explanation of what it really is. Nevertheless Governor Smith has given his fellow citizens an illuminating little volume, full of shrewd and sensible observations, written in a dignified, simple style, and pervaded throughout by a high civic idealism.
WILLIAM B. MUNRO