Word: wagnerism
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Robert Wagner, Democrat-Liberal, was elected mayor in 1953 and re-elected in 1957, both times under the sponsorship of the Democratic organization bosses he is now attacking. His first term was plodding; his second has been studded with proliferating scandals: inadequate or nonexistent school maintenance, graft in the real estate bureau, profiteering in slum-clearance projects, conflict of interest in the city council, extortion in the police department, bribe taking in the controller's office and by inspectors of departments that supervise buildings, markets, water supply, gas and electricity. Trying to hold onto the support of reform Democrats...
...second term as state controller in 1958-and was the only Democrat to win statewide office in Nelson Rockefeller's Republican sweep. With that credential as a vote getter, and as a down-the-line party regular, Levitt was the organization leaders' logical choice to buck Wagner in the primary. Accepting the bosses' decision, Levitt amiably announced that he had received a popular "mandate." Where Wagner's platform style is spare and uninspired, Levitt's is florid and uninspired...
Lawrence Gerosa, Independent, an amiable trucking millionaire with tight-fisted fiscal ways, was twice elected the city's controller on tickets with Bob Wagner. Dropped by Wagner this year, Gerosa announced that he was the candidate of "God and the good people," is running on a ticket of his own making but has only nuisance value...
Last week was characteristic of the campaign's level. Gerosa began a merry-go-round of accusations by pointing a finger at Wagner for using city-paid domestic help in his Long Island summer home (the New York district attorney's office looked into the case, cleared Wagner of wrongdoing). Gerosa also complained that Wagner had run up a $5,605 food bill between June and September 1960 at Gracie Mansion, the mayor's official residence. Bob Wagner rose in righteous indignation. "I," he cried, "am the first mayor to pay my own food bills at Gracie...
...state controller was-and that those who recalled the name thought he was Lefkowitz. Levitt was regarded as a slight favorite in the Democratic primary on the basis that a small turnout (400,000 or less) would enable his organization support to pull him through. But even if Wagner is defeated in the primary, he will still be the nominee of the Liberal Party and of the brand-new, labor-backed Brotherhood Party, and will appear on the November ballot. So, too, will both Republican Lefkowitz and Independent Gerosa. Thus, there is a distinct possibility that between September and November...