New York
Plastrik, Stanley
A MID-SUMMER LOOK AT THE PROSPECTS for "new" or "radical" politics in the New York-New Jersey region produces mixed reactions. At one end of the political spectrum is a not very attractive...
...did well in a series of local races provided, however—and this is important to note—their appeal to the enrolled Democrats (only 25 percent of whom went to the polls) was broad-based and not merely a reiteration of quasi-New Leftist slo gans...
...There is a widespread attitude among the electorate that it "really doesn't matter" for whom they vote...
...Who, after all, isn't...
...Hence, it is not surprising to find Jack Newfield, ace political analyst of the Village Voice, writing on July 2, 1970 that "election results confirmed the existence of several long-term political and sociological trends favorable for the growth of a new party that can either win a four-way race in 1972, or at least replace one of the two old parties immediately...
...No one in the metropolitan area is talking "new party," but the number and influence of independent "swing" voters is growing, and the party affiliations of candidates mean less than ever...
...Perhaps what is new is a feeling that it is not so much the machine but the system which makes participation unimportant: the machine absorbed into the system which operates in a computerized, programmed manner to punch out some candidate who mouths phrases largely devoid of sense...
...Not one candidate had made that a part of his platform, even as a matter for discussion...
...But arguments in favor of a new party deserve a serious hearing...
...Apart from this truism of American history there is the fact that, right now, calls for new parties are DISSENT sends its congratulations to the grape pickers of California and to Cesar Chavez on their splendid victory...
...Which is something like saying that the presence of dead cells in the urine of a two-year old confirms the "long-term trend" of its approaching death...
...The price is that it enables conventional, machine politicians (Daley, O'Brien, Wagner, LBJ, Humphrey, etc...
...Of course, the only answer to such adevelopment would be the transformation and realignment of the Democratic party through reemphasis on domestic programs...
...In this respect little if any progress can be reported...
...Meanwhile, off to the side is the much subdued Mayor Lindsay who may be the key figure on the national scene, particularly with respect to liberal-left politics...
...The mass of voters appear puzzled and dis COMMENTS AND OPINIONS turbed...
...A good many Democrats for example will support Goodell over Ottinger this fall...
...PROFOUND APATHY AND INDIFFERENCE to the political process strikes this writer as a far more serious matter than vague hopes for a new party...
...And the game of making and breaking the machine is an old American sport...
...At the other end, Kenneth Gibson, a black man, has skillfully won an election for mayor of Newark, thanks to a fair amount of white support...
...He has taken over his thankless job in a serious and considered way...
...none has ever been formed or conceived outside of the host body...
...New-party talk, however, is probably empty, steering attention away from the real issue of organization...
...Each new party has emerged after long travail out of an old party...
...Study the life of American political movements and parties...
...In my view, the principal tactical argument against a new party is the clear indication that such steps are selfisolating and fruitless...
...If there is one thing the polls did not indicate it is a serious tendency toward a new party...
...At one end of the political spectrum is a not very attractive candidate for governor of New York, Arthur Goldberg, with little prospect of winning in November...
...Abzug came through successfully, and a youthful reform challenger like Peter Eikenberry almost defeated the hack John Rooney in Brooklyn's 14th Congressional District...
...to exercise an influence they ought long ago to have lost...
...Not to mention a number of conservative white professional unions of firemen, policemen, etc., endorsing Bill Buckley's brother for the Senate...
...Similarly, Reform Democratic candidates, * Have conservative movements (as distinguishedfrom crackpot reactionary groupings like the BirchSociety) finally found the formula for a mass baseand a wide appeal: to police and firemen professional associations, the "hardhat" type of unions, small property owners and, above all, lower whitemiddle class...
...What seems behind Jack's premature yearnings for a new party is that, except for Bella Abzug, none of his candidates won...
...Perhaps most encouraging of all were the results in the Congressional primary battles where candidates like Herman Badillo, Edward Koch, Mrs...
...so that it will reflect some realities of our political life and the actual concerns of people...
...considered by the bulk of the American people as divisive, polarizing, and separatist—which is precisely what they are...
...After all, the "machine" has been around since the day Aaron Burr formed Tammany Hall...
...Apart from avoiding a premature move, the problem for Lindsay seems to be: which coalition shall or can he command...
...That is, how to do something with the creaking political machinery (remember 1 out of 4 enrolled Democrats took part in the recent primaries...
...Or to continue the contrast: Paul O'Dwyer, a candidate in the Democratic primaries and surely the most attractive among the lot (but without much of that luck of the Irish), runs a close second in a lethargic campaign dominated by TV extravagance, while a number of important New York unions are supporting Rockefeller for a fourth term round as governor when his writ as "progressive" has clearly run out...
...Here is a phenomenon that anyone who has contact with ordinary people finds shocking...
...In a word, some change, some progress, but a long way to go before one can speak of a transformation of the Democratic party into an instrument representing a new coalition of urban masses, minorities, and new middle class...
...No one will getanywhere just because he's against Vietnam...
...Or the system produces a TV candidate (Ottinger, Samuels, etc...
...A bland and issueless candidate, he was almost nudged out in the primaries by Howard Samuels, a newcomer with a decidedly demagogic image...
...A MID-SUMMER LOOK AT THE PROSPECTS for "new" or "radical" politics in the New York-New Jersey region produces mixed reactions...
...Admittedly, we pay a price for the prevalence of this viewpoint, which is largely but not entirely a conservatism reflecting the nation's mood...
...It is a moment of uneasy calm in New York politics, not nearly adequate as a response to the national crisis...
...Perhaps he has grasped the fact that today coalitions come and go, quickly forming and then decomposing around the image of some national figure...
...Does it go beyond the cynical conviction that the "machine" runs the show and hand-picks the candidates...
...Things could change and we hope they will, but right now we are experiencing an unhappy consequence of the decomposition of the labor-liberal-minority-intellectual alliance...
...No one in the New York area looks forward with much eagerness to whatever the campaign will bring after Labor Day...
...It slows down the vital process of changing the parties to conform with modernizing trends...
...COMMENTS AND OPINIONS New Coalition Democrats, etc...
...whom one cannot place in any familiar context and who seems disturbingly artificial...
...Jack, spare us thy blessing...
...Cautiously and with some skill, Lindsay watches the moves of others...
Vol. 17 • September 1970 • No. 5
