Political Favor Quotes
See Louis XIV for an earlier similar idea.
Patton always believed that Eisenhower wanted to be President. At the beginning of the war Patton was much senior to Eisenhower, but President Roosevelt promoted Eisenhower above many more senior generals. Eisenhower thought Patton the best fighting general in the army, but a public relations and administrative problem. Several times when he had gone too far, Eisenhower reprimanded him but kept him in his command position. After the fighting was over, Patton became the military governor of part of Germany and was not as successful at peacekeeping and nation building as he was at fighting. Eisenhower was convinced that Patton would destroy himself and get fired by the army command and the President if he continued as governor. Patton confused Eisenhower’s prudent and politic demeanor with the allies as a lack of courage. And Patton could never get over the fact that Eisenhower and never commanded an army fighting in the field. He was jumped to Supreme Allied Commander, in a very bold and brilliant stroke by FDR who passed over many senior generals.
This quotation is valuable because it illustrates the classic implementation of the political spoils system before there was civil service with a merit system. This was not only typical of how people get government jobs, but it was the virtually the only way. In the language of the day, this letter from the Governor to a major political boss says: “Give this fellow a job. He is a loyal party man. Don’t give him a good job—a minor job will do, He is not that important.”
Her co-leader, Martin J. Healy, was accused of accepting a bribe from a judge in exchange for his appointment. What makes this quotation particularly interesting is the fact that she was speaking before a reform organization, yet it is clear that Mathews herself saw no immorality in party officials accepting kickbacks. One of the major problems in reform was that most of the Tammany Hall leaders and voters had a different morality from the reformers and many genuinely thought that the situation as it existed was only “fair.” Reform, as with civil rights, required a transformation of public opinion and sense of right and wrong. See {626674} for one of her solutions to political corruption.
When Aaron Burr—with the aid of Tammany Hall—won political control of New York City from Alexander Hamilton and the moneyed aristocracy, Hamilton was greatly impressed by the new methods: carriages for the sick and infirm and elderly on election day, for example. He concluded that his own party, the Federalists:
The Cloture motion was the motion to terminate the Southern Filibuster against the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Johnson needed substantial Republican support as the Solid Democratic South was all opposed to any kind of civil rights legislation. What is interesting is that Johnson, known as the champion arm twister, knew when to twist and when not to. Mundt, although a serious conservative and generally opposed to the Federal government controlling local human interaction, had also been a school superintendent and was a decent and fair-minded man who was personally offended by the over a century of unfair discrimination and overt racism. Johnson would either have Mundt’s vote from conviction or he would not get it, and pressure was not likely to work with him.
Halleck was in the President’s office when he made this call. Johnson could not get the Civil Rights Bill out of the Rules Committee in the House as the Chairman was a Southern racist. The only alternative was a Discharge Petition where more than half the House members sign a petition to bring the Act to the floor for a vote. But earlier in an attempt to maintain Republican Party Discipline, Halleck—the Republican Leader—had publicly announced that any Republican who signed a discharge petition would be expelled from the party. However Purdue University was in Halleck’s District and they had started a program in Space Engineering. Halleck went to visit Webb and Purdue received a huge set of NASA grants and contracts to build up their Space Program. Halleck called Republican House members and told them that he had changed his mind about the discharge petition which was signed and filed shortly thereafter enabling the House to vote in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In a number of the future years, the selection of the NASA Astronauts was so stringent that only Purdue graduates were able to be selected.
