Word: pendergast
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Before this scrutiny began, the people had known two main and contradictory facts about Harry Truman: 1) that he was once the beholden creature of Kansas City's behemoth boss, Tom Pendergast, as corrupt a machine politician as the U.S. has seen in this century; 2) that Truman has done an excellent job as chairman of the Senate War Investigating Committee...
Broke and dispirited, Harry Truman turned to politics. With the backing of American Legionnaires, who had made his haberdashery their hangout, he won the nod of Boss Pendergast for county judge. Faithful, efficient, unimaginative, never one to make trouble, he stayed in this administrative post for ten years...
...alarmed. Huey Long, Bilbo and Boss Crump managed without grand opera; and grand opera north of the Mason & Dixon Line manages without Hague, Pendergast and Curley...
Harry Truman, who rose to the U.S. Senate under the sponsorship of Kansas City's old Pendergast machine, responded with a bit of his political philosophy. "I'm a Jackson County organization Democrat and I'm proud of it," he said. "That's the way I got to be a county judge, a senator and candidate for vice president." Then he added...
Truman, who had never aspired so high, was elected Senator, benefiting from the lists of dead people whom Tom Pendergast habitually voted every election. Five years later Pendergast was sent to the penitentiary for a $443,550 income tax evasion. Said Harry Truman: "I won't desert a ship in distress." Years later he added: "Tom Pendergast never asked me to do a dishonest deed. He knew I wouldn't do it. When Tom Pendergast was down and out, a convicted man, [people] wanted me to denounce him. I refused. . . . I wouldn't kick a friend." Newsmen...