The Rise of Social Reform Mayors
Over several decades Progressivism evolved from, and into, a multiplicity of “isms” and movements. Their common element was that politics and political action should advantage the “common man”, especially least fortunate of society, the impoverished and much abused immigrant. These social reformers may have been marginally less concerned with structural reforms such as charter revisions, forms of government, budgets or even civil service, but they were not opposed to them. Many structural reforms were useful (strong mayor) to their purposes. The social reform focus, especially in economic development-related policies, was on “people”. Tenement reform, education, mental health reform, immigrant relief, and working conditions (unionism) and social welfare of the poor and working classes were their principal policy concerns—and parks, neighborhoods and playgrounds. In the Progressive Era the most important “people-based reform” was reducing fares on street cars and lowering gas, electric and water bills to urban residents. Regulating the moral behavior of the working class through aggressive police enforcement was regarded more as a misplaced priority—bad working class behavior was the result to low wages, bad housing, lack of recreation opportunities and the like. One should attack these conditions instead of trying to enforce anti gambling, drinking and prostitution[1].
Henry George’s campaign for New York City mayor in 1886 arguably marked the first instance of a social reform mayor in American urban politics. He lost and that was that; but, from that point on wealthy and successful businessmen/professionals, having made their fortunes, entered municipal politics, and got elected as mayors on a “social reform” platform. Social reform mayors advocated policies that addressed the needs of both the average Joe industrial worker/immigrant and middle class. They embraced a “people-oriented” (often neighborhood-level) economic development. The social reform mayor style of economic development was deeply uncomfortable with forms of economic development that assisted the private firm—especially the monopoly capitalists, the utilities, the railroads, and trusts.
Social reform mayors, however, were not immune to adopting physical redevelopment (the City Beautiful) to enhance their city’s competitiveness in the urban hierarchy and promote civic pride among all classes. They were, in their way, competing to be the top “city on a hill”. A cornerstone of their agenda that unified their electoral success was their opposition to local monopolies (electric, water-sewer, and streetcar utilities/franchises). Some prominent social reformers, like Frederic Howe, saw not only monopolistic utilities as harmful, but other sectors, particularly those that distorted the physical landscape for profit (real estate) as well. These early tendencies hint toward an almost instinctive revulsion among social reformers against “growth coalitions” and business-dominated “regimes”.
During these years electric power was coming on line and social reform Progressives believed municipal ownership corrected the corporate abuses of monopolistic private utility franchises and ensured the protection of the average man in a key and necessary service. Over these years, municipal and public utilities were approved in communities across the nation. Connecticut, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Indiana, Kansas, California, Oregon and even Texas and Florida[2] were leaders in this policy, establishing numerous municipally-owned utilities over the next half-century. The municipally-owned utility presents an almost perfect expression of the Progressive economic development program in that it protected the community from distortions created by private profit.
There is a pronounced geographic (Great Lakes) flavor to social reform mayors, laced with a distinctive population migration trend (Yankee Diaspora and immigrant German-Scandinavian). Social reform mayors were working classes, but were either successful/wealthy businessmen or successful/ wealthy professionals. The ultimate fate of most social reform mayors proved to be an inability to sustain the unity of working and middle classes electoral coalition. Future elections tended to be won by business structural reformers or machine-style policy systems. In a few cities Socialist Parties increased strength (New York City and Milwaukee). In some cities, during World War I and Twenties, the working class was able to elect mayors, frequently described by academics as “populist”, who were tolerant of ward machines.
Social Reform and Socialist Mayors:
Community development because of its determination to advantage the “common man”, especially least fortunate of society, and, in these years the immigrant, focused on neighborhoods, and were not actively involved in city-wide matters—except as they related to the neighborhood agenda.. Social reformers may have been marginally less concerned with structural reforms (charter revisions, forms of government, budgets or even civil service), but they were not opposed to them. The social reform focus was on “people”, often protecting them from business, and it was this tread that gave rise to a generation of charismatic and/or ideological reformers with ambitions to help people city-wide.
In the Progressive Era the most important “people-based reform” was reducing fares on street cars, lowering gas, electric and water bills to urban residents and, in an age of temperance, stop Privatist (actually Puritan) businessman mayors from regulating working class immigrant moral behavior through aggressive police enforcement. To social reform and socialist mayoral candidates, bad working class behavior resulted from low wages, bad housing, lack of recreation opportunities and the like. One should attack these conditions instead of trying to enforce anti-gambling, drinking and prostitution (Finegold, 1995, pp. 19-22).
After 1910, a brand new phenomenon hit selected cities—socialists were elected in numbers to be mayor and city aldermen. Progressive Era municipal socialists were seldom Marxist, mostly Christian social democrat–Henry George or Herbert Bellamy-style socialists. Milwaukee, an exception, in 1910, elected the “socialist boss” Victor Berger to the House of Representatives, the first of six terms; also elected were Emil Seidel as mayor, and 21 of 35 city alderman. In 1911, George Lunn, a Protestant minister and Christian socialist, was elected mayor of Schenectady. Minneapolis in 1916 elected Thomas van Lear as mayor and over the next decade socialists won mayoralty elections in Haverhill (Massachusetts), Lackawanna (New York), Flint (Michigan), Granite City (Illinois), and Butte (Montana). Between 1910 and 1920 an estimated 174 socialists were elected mayor in cities ranging from Berkeley California and Eureka Utah (Weinstein, 1969, pp. 116-Table 2).
In practice, American urban socialist policy systems proved little different from structural reformers. They acquired the pejorative label of “sewer socialists”. Sewer socialist or not, socialist mayors of this period “clearly focused on improving the lives of urban people rather than reorganizing or restructuring urban government” (Mohl, 1985, p. 127).They eliminated graft and supported the development of administrative capacity and efficiency using accepted scientific management principles. They constructed well-built parks and sewers and paid for them with conventional bond issuance, rather than soak the rich taxation. Milwaukee socialists (which included poet Robert Frost as assistant to the mayor) even established a Bureau of Economy and Efficiency (Finegold, 1995, p. 19).
Social reform and socialist mayors advocated policies that addressed needs of both the average Joe industrial worker/immigrant and middle class. They embraced a “people-oriented” ED, deeply uncomfortable with monopoly capitalists, utilities, railroads, trusts—and streetcar franchises. Social reform mayors, however, were not immune to adopting physical redevelopment (the City Beautiful) to enhance city’s competitiveness and promote civic pride among all classes. They were, in their way, competing to be the top “city on a hill”.
A cornerstone of their agenda that ensured electoral success was their opposition to local monopolies (electric, water-sewer, and streetcar utilities/franchises). During these years electric power was coming on line and social reform Progressives believed municipal ownership corrected abuses of monopolistic private utility franchises. Municipal public utilities were approved in communities across the nation. Connecticut, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Indiana, Kansas, California, Oregon and even Texas and Florida[i] were leaders. Municipally-owned utility presents an almost perfect expression of the Progressive economic development program in that it protected the community from distortions created by private profit. From our perspective, that’s certainly a way to bypass a hybrid EDO.
Henry George’s 1886 campaign for New York City mayor arguably marked the first instance of a social reform mayor in American urban politics. He lost and that was that; from that point on wealthy, successful businessmen/professionals entered municipal politics and got elected as mayors on a “social reform” platform. There is a pronounced geographic (Great Lakes) flavor to social reform mayors, laced with a distinctive population migration trends (Yankee Diaspora and immigrant German-Scandinavian).
Examples include Detroit’s Hazen Pingree, nationally renowned Tom Johnson of Cleveland, Samuel “Golden Rule Jones, Brand Whitlock of Toledo, Edward Dunne of Chicago, and Mark Fagan of Jersey City. Some were one-termers; some stayed around awhile and even got elected to higher office. Others, like NYC’s William Randolph Hearst and Chicago’s Robert Merriam were “wannabes” that never made it into the mayor’s office. Despite their policy successes social reform mayors could not sustain their working and middle classes coalition. Subsequent elections were won by business structural reformers or machines.
Probably the two most famous social reform mayors was Detroit’s Hazen Pingree and Cleveland’s Tom Johnson.
[i] As of 2013 an estimated 2000 municipally-owned utilities operate in the United States. See Five Star Consultants, “Municipal Electric Utilities: Analysis and Case Studies” www.fivestarconsultants.com
Social Reform Mayors:
After the late 1880’s several large cities elected mayors who proceeded to enact a series of Progressive social and economic reforms. Social reform mayors “stressed sharing political power with the lower social orders, support for organized labor, toleration of ethnocultural differences and human weakness, and the expansion of urban services at costs affordable to the city dwellers”[3].
Examples include Detroit’s Hazen Pingree, the nationally renowned Tom Johnson of Cleveland, Samuel “Golden Rule Jones” and Brand Whitlock of Toledo, Edward Dunne of Chicago, and Mark Fagan of Jersey City. Some were one-termers; some stayed around awhile and even got elected to higher office. Others, like New York City’s William Randolph Hearst and Chicago’s Robert Merriam were “wannabes” that never made it into the mayor’s office. Social reform mayors were elected in Toledo (Samuel ‘Golden Rule’ Jones, Republican, wealthy oil drilling manufacturer (1897-1903). He was known for his park system, public baths and was a follower of Henry George (land tax—or single taxer). Jones prematurely died, and was followed by a second social reformer, Brand Whitlock (D) (5 terms) a journalist and lawyer.
In Cleveland, Thomas Johnson, a wealthy businessman who acquired his wealth through an innovative streetcar technology/ownership[4], ruled for four terms (1901-1909)[5]. He was followed by Nelson Baker (1911-1915) who further enhanced and refined the Progressive social mayor model. In 1910 Cleveland’s population was about 28% native American (that’s what they called English/Scottish back then), mostly Yankee Diaspora background, with 18% German being the largest foreign stock, with Slavs, Irish and Jews in descending order. Other than the Ohio state political machine, ward machines did not play a significant role in Cleveland politics—in fact the attempt to create a Republican municipal machine by Johnson’s predecessor, Robert McKisson. Cleveland’s first truly “strong mayor”[6] aroused opposition from the Chamber and the formation of the Municipal Association (today’s Citizens League). Frederick Howe was appointed its secretary, but tension developed between his Progressive social reform agenda and the structural reformers that financed the Association.
Mayor Tom Johnson (D) (1901) followed in Pingree’s footsteps. A more or less rogue Democrat and a devotee of Henry George (he was buried next to him in New York City). Johnson’s 1901 election was owed to the city’s native Protestant business vote. The Chamber was a significant power in that first administration, particularly in educational policy, pollution control, and building public neighborhood baths. Forming a cabinet of experts as department heads (Bemis, Cooley and Howe, for example), Johnson cleaned up Cleveland’s police and criminal justice system, developed a strong parks and recreation program, and Johnson, with Chamber support, hired Daniel Burnham thereby initiating a path-breaking Cleveland city beautiful initiative that flirted closely with early urban planning[7]. His regime was honest, efficient, supporter of the merit system.
He also followed the policy adopted by Toledo’s Golden Rule Jones relaxing police intrusion into lower and working class crimes (misdemeanors, drunkenness, truancy, and vice-related behavior)—“replacing an inflexible policy based on moralism with a discretionary policy based on realism”.[8] Johnson’s subsequent elections reduced dramatically his reliance on white native and business vote and increased his support from working and lower class wards. After 1903, the Chamber opposed him; indeed in that year the President of the Chamber ran against him as the Republican nominee. The Socialist Party also opposed Johnson. In both instances, Johnson’s three cent municipal ownership of street cars divided the traditional business community. They were also highly critical of his failure to crack down on immoral behaviors and lower class crime. Many businessmen believed Johnson’s true mission was to, like McKisson before him, create a political machine—filled with experts loyal to him.
Johnson obsessively pursued a three cent streetcar fare, and did all he could to seize control of Cleveland’s private electric plants. Like Hazen Pingree in Detroit, he was stymied in his efforts to control streetcar fares and acquiring control of the electric facility—in his case by forces led by the Ohio Republican state machine. While called by Lincoln Steffens as the “best mayor of the best city”, Johnson was frustrated, especially in regards to his two signature projects. Four years later, his city lawyer, Newton Baker, Johnson’s corporation counsel, was elected (1913) mayor. Baker ran on the Progressive agenda developed by Johnson and his support was principally from the working class foreign stock. Considerably more disposed to consensus decision-making, Baker was able to forge relationships with structural reform/business elite organizations (like the Municipal Association and the newly formed Cleveland Association) and diffuse fears of establishing a machine. Baker, seizing upon a successful passage of Cleveland’s Home Rule charter (which rejected city manager form of government), was able to take over the electric utility and convert it into municipal ownership. Subsequent Progressive mayoral candidates, however, were unable to maintain the coalition between the middle class and working class that Johnson had forged, and Baker had enhanced.
Tom Johnson has come to be regarded as the poster child for social reform mayors. Hazen Pingree, whose case study in Detroit is presented below, is the pioneer of this policy system, however, and the mayor who popularized it—and its electoral coalition and policy agenda. For more than a decade, these social reform mayors were the buzz in the media and Policy World. Their attraction to “experts” frequently provided employment for Policy World figures—in fact, this period may be the one in which Policy Worlders crossed over into the Practitioner World the most. Social reform mayors are widely regarded as characteristic of the Progressive Era, so this section does not include an individual I regard as the most important social reform mayor of all time, Fiorello LaGuardia, three term mayor of New York (1933-1945). Our history will, of course, discuss Mayor LaGuardia in a future chapter, but keep in mind the Progressive social reform mayor did not die out after World War I.
[1] Kenneth Finegold, Experts and Politicians, op. cit., pp. 19-22.
[2] As of 2013 there are an estimated 2000 municipally-owned utilities remaining in the United States. See Five Star Consultants, “Municipal Electric Utilities: Analysis and Case Studies” www.fivestarconsultants.com
[3] John D. Buenker, “Edward F. Dunne: Limits of Municipal Reform” , Paul M. Green Melvin G. Holli (Eds), the Mayors: Chicago Political Tradition (Rev Edition) (Carbondale, Southern Illinois University Press, 1995), p. 34.
[4] The irony of Johnson’s inability to obtain the three cent fare on Cleveland’s streetcar system was that the streetcar innovation from which he made his fortune was the streetcar fare box.
[5] Cleveland’s social reform politics exposes an important weakness of Ohio’s (and Pennsylvania’s) state-level Republican Party machine. From 1895 to Johnson’s victory in 1901, three insurgents challenged Hanna’s control over Cleveland-two successfully. State-level machines focused chiefly on control of federal offices and national politics; they were surprisingly inconsistent in controlling their Big City municipal governments. While Mark Hanna (head of Ohio’s state political machine) was electing Presidents, he lost control over both Cleveland and Cincinnati.
[6] The result of 1891 charter reform, the so-called Federal Plan, which provided the mayor control over department heads and created the potential to form an “administration” or, absent civil service, a political machine.
[7] Thomas S. Hines, “The Paradox of Progressive Architecture: Urban Planning and Public Building in Tom Johnson’s Cleveland”, American Quarterly, Vol. 25, No. 4 (Oct, 1973), pp. 426-448.
[8] Kenneth Finegold, Experts and Politicians, op. cit., p. 87.
Ron W. Coan 