Word: zagri
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...Zagri got down to more serious work when the committee began its voting. In the first critical vote, a ten-man "swing" group of Democrats rejected a union-made plan to bury the bill in subcommittee. Less than an hour later, one of Zagri's ever-busy committee leaks supplied him with a tally on each member's vote. That same day he telephoned union leaders in each swing man's home district, urged protests against the Congressman's "betrayal" of labor. Commanding one A.F.L.-C.I.O. Steelworker official to put the heat on a New Jersey...
...Congressional Hotel. The host: Harold Gibbons, hard-boiled Hoffa deputy from St. Louis, who made his breakfasts politically tasty by flying in union leaders from the home regions of each day's new group of House guests. No fewer than 245 Congressmen heard Host Gibbons introduce Persuader Zagri as his own "community relations" expert from St. Louis. "We are not against legislation," said Zagri smoothly, "but this bill is so defective . . ." Zagri's precise speech and trained legal mind (U.C.L.A., Harvard, University of Wisconsin) sent the guests away impressed; for his part, Zagri methodically rated each Congressman from...
...followup, Zagri concentrated on the Labor Committee's 30 members, developed an easy ally in Chicago Democrat Roman Pucinski (A in the book) and half a dozen others. Zagri also appeared before the committee as an expert witness, and offered no fewer than 59 pages of bill-gutting amendments. Teamster-touting Democrat Jimmy Roosevelt (A) of California introduced the Zagri proposals as a substitute bill...
This campaign of intimidation ran for only a few days before Arizona's Stewart Udall, Democratic leader of the swing group, told Zagri off. "You've got a nerve to go calling my state and telling people I'm voting wrong," he snapped. Zagri brazened it out: ''I'm going to get you in line." Udall exploded as never before in Congress, raked Zagri over until the lobbyist obsequiously agreed that he had voted right. Another Congressman was treated to anonymous threats ("We're going to fix you") on his home and office...
...Damn Lie." The Teamsters' power plant began to backfire. Speaker Sam Rayburn, told that Jimmy Roosevelt and Zagri were claiming that Rayburn was in favor of their bill, sent out a plain comment: "It's a damn lie." Mr. Sam called in the hardest-pressed of the committee members, particularly freshmen, to assure them that the Speaker himself would campaign for any man put in serious trouble by Zagri's efforts. Labor Committee Chairman Graham Harden of North Carolina growled threats about investigating "brazen outside influences...