Big Airport Plans Today and Yesterday: Governor Cuomo, Mayor La Guardia and the Shift from City to Metropolitan Scale

Mayor La Guardia Announces the Opening of

Municipal Airport (La Guardia), 1939

(Source: La Guardia and Wagner Archives)

A fortnight ago, Governor Cuomo, flanked by Vice President Biden announced a $4 Billion reconstruction of La Guardia Airport, a project that will be undertaken by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Why the Governor, the Vice President and the Port Authority? Why not the Mayor?

The announcement seemed to beg for some historical context from those of us here at the La Guardia and Wagner Archives.  In the 1940s, Mayor La Guardia too envisioned big airport plans.  But back then, La Guardia’s dream was a grand new airport on Jamaica Bay, and it was the city, not Albany or Washington, who took the lead in planning its own future.  For La Guardia, the new airport at Idlewild (JFK) was an investment to secure New York City’s future dominance in world trade and travel in the emerging aviation era.  Today, in contrast, many New Yorkers think of the airports as a regional enterprise largely divorced from the city rather than one purposed for the city’s benefit.

Our story of the transition of New York’s airports from municipal to regional is set in the 1940s and begins with the early inadequacy of the airport that bears La Guardia’s name.(1)  Then as now, the airports have reflected the tension between New York as a place of aging infrastructure and jostling crowds, and its demand for grand facilities befitting a great metropolis.  

Vice President Biden’s depiction of La Guardia Airport as overcrowded and outdated is a recurring complaint, dating back almost to the Airport’s origins. 

Alair Townsend Debates Ed Koch: "She had the better book!"

Steven A. Levine
Coordinator for Educational Programs

As we approach tomorrow night's mayoral debate at the CUNY Graduate Center, I thought it was a good time to look at how other candidates prepared for a debate by watching a video of Deputy Mayor Alair Townsend describe her experiences as Mayor Ed Koch's practice debate partner in 1985.

 

To prepare for his debate against City Council President Carol Bellamy, his Democratic Primary opponent, Ed Koch chose Townsend. Townsend claimed she was chosen because she had glasses and high cheek bones like Bellamy, but it is also clear she was a more than worthy debate opponent.  When his campaign adviser David Garth told Koch that Townsend had beat him after the first mock debate, Ed Koch responded by saying, "She had the better [debate] book!"  Watch Alair Townsend describe the debate, her preparation and the debate book in this interview with the La Guardia and Wagner Archives' Tara Jean Hickman.

Ed Koch for Mayor 1985 Campaign Commercials

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs

 

When Ed Koch ran for a third term as mayor in 1985, he won handily against a divided opposition, but what is striking to me was the lack of polish in his commercials.  The endorsements by the "regular people" seem unrehearsed and Mayor Koch does not even appear in them.  The commercials seem to emphasize that whatever the critics might say, the people still supported Koch.  They raise the question of whether the supporters were given lines to read or were they expressing their support sincerely?  With the exception of actor Vincent Gardenia's endorsement, they seem more coarsely produced than those of today.  Media wizard David Garth effectively demonstrated Koch's support by the common man and woman.  The election results that year confirmed this perception. Take a few minutes to watch the video to see what you think.

1977 Ed Koch Campaign Commercials

Steven A. Levine
Coordinator for Educational Programs

With the New York City mayoral primaries a week away, I thought it would be interesting to look back at the 1977 mayoral election and how Ed Koch’s campaign commercials helped lead him to victory.  This was a bleak year for New York City, which was teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and could not borrow money on its own credit.  Thousands of police officers, firefighters, teachers, CUNY faculty and other municipal workers had been laid off.   A blackout had led to mass looting in many neighborhoods, Son of Sam was wreaking his terror upon the city, and crime in general was on the rise. 

As the election season began, Congressman Koch was polling at the bottom of a large group of Democratic candidates that included Mayor Abe Beame, former Congresswoman Bella Abzug, N.Y. Secretary of State Mario Cuomo, Congressman Herman Badillo, and Manhattan Borough President Percy Sutton.  Running as a “liberal with sanity,” Koch endorsed the death penalty, attacked the municipal unions and their leaders, and  “poverty pimps.”  Koch ended his advertisements, crafted by campaign manager David Garth with the tagline, “After eight years of charisma [John Lindsay] and four years of the clubhouse [Abe Beame], why not try competence.” 

With his conservative message, Koch catapulted to second place in the primary.  He then defeated Mario Cuomo in the runoff and the general election, when Cuomo ran as the candidate of the Liberal Party.  In a city where crime appeared out of control, municipal unions were striking, and the fiscal outlook was bleak, Koch had sensed that a more conservative candidate would appeal to a large portion of the electorate.  His election was a watershed and ushered in years of austerity and a more limited view of what government could or should do.

The dominant issues in this year’s Democratic primary are very different as the Bloomberg era comes to a close.  Crime is at a historic low, but the stop and frisk policies of the NYPD have come under fierce criticism.  The shimmering towers that have risen in Manhattan and on the waterfronts of Queens and Brooklyn are symbols of both increasing prosperity and the rising inequality of New York City.  Whether these themes augur a new watershed for New York’s politics remains to be seen until after primary day and beyond when future historians analyze the campaign advertisements of 2013.

P.S.  To learn more about voting in New York City, check out the Archives’ curriculum, “City Government and You:  Voting Rights and Citizenship.”

Mayor Ed Koch on Gun Control

Steven A. Levine

Coordinator for Educational Programs

I have watched with great sadness and anger the recent epidemic of gun violence in the United States, most notably in Arizona, Colorado, Wisconsin, and today at the Empire State Building. While the motives for these despicable acts of violence have varied, one common denominator has been the prevalence of semi-automatic weapons.

Sadly, this is not a new issue. Twenty-three years ago, Mayor Ed Koch gave a speech calling for federal and city semi-automatic assault weapons bans after five children were murdered in a California schoolyard by a killer with an AK-47. He told his audience that “It’s true that ‘Guns don’t kill people, people do.’ But it’s also true that killers and armed criminals can create large numbers of victims by using a semi-automatic assault rifle.” (Click here to read the speech.) The Archives’ City Council Collection also has a resolution in 1991 calling on the State Legislature “to prohibit the unlicensed possession of semiautomatic assault weapons,” showing that this remained an important issue. (Click here)

The Archives has a wealth of material about issues of gun control and gun violence, including the Bernhard Goetz shootings of 1984. If you would like to learn more about these issues or use documents in your classroom, please feel free to contact me.

Birth Control Politics: 1958 and 2012

Steven A. Levine
Coordinator for Educational Programs


            The New York Times article "Outcry Grows Fiercer After Funding Cut by Cancer Group" highlights the continuing controversy over birth control and abortion politics after the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation announced it had cut funds to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer screenings.  Birth control had already become a major issue in national politics when the Obama Administration mandated that birth control must be available free of cost in all health plans.  This rule included no exemption for religious employers opposed to birth control if they served a large number of people of different faiths, such as Catholic hospitals and universities.  (See The New York Times "Ruling on Contraception Draws Battle Lines at Catholic Colleges")

            In the late 1950s, Mayor Robert F. Wagner faced a similar controversy in New York's public hospitals.  In May 1958, The New York Times reported that there was an unwritten prohibition against prescribing birth control in public hospitals.  Wagner's Commissioner of Hospitals Morris A. Jacobs denied this and stated that "There shall be no interference in proper and accepted therapeutic practices nor intervention in ethical relationships between patient and physician."   Despite this statement, Jacobs refused to allow a doctor at Kings County Hospital in July to fit a diabetic patient with a contraceptive device to protect her health. According to New York State law at that time, birth control could only be given if pregnancy was "deleterious to the health of the patient," a policy laid out in a draft Department of Health policy statement  in 1963.

            This situation placed Wagner in a quandary both politically and religiously.  Protestant and Jewish organizations, as well as Planned Parenthood and the New York Civil Liberties Union, were lobbying to lift the ban on contraception in public hospitals, while the Catholic Church was adamantly opposed.  A consensus politician who avoided conflict, Wagner left the decision to the Board of Hospitals stating, "I am a practicing Catholic. As a Catholic, I would be opposed to the use of contraceptives in city hospitals.  But I have not discussed it with the commissioner or with members of the board."

            The debate continued throughout the summer, with Wagner refusing to intervene.   When the Board of Hospitals met in September, it voted to reverse the policy.  Wagner's position, while sincere, was also shrewd.  In all likelihood, the outcome was what he desired.  He may not have been in direct communication with the commissioner or the Board of Hospitals, but he did know how to count votes and predict the outcome.    Wagner believed in letting professionals decide what was the correct health policy and was able to separate his personal views as a Catholic from the decision.  Not coincidentally, his liberal supporters were able to get the policy they wanted, while Wagner was able to distance himself from it and limit the political damage he took among Catholics and conservatives.