What is already a wild New York mayor’s race kicked off this spring. Governor Kathy Hochul has called for the the city’s mayor, Eric Adams, to be removed over charges of corruption. Governor Hochul has the power to do this, but she has been understandably reluctant to replace a high official elected by the people. A previous governor, Franklin Roosevelt, faced the same dilemma in 1932—a decision made all the more fraught in that it could have derailed his first run for the presidency.
The mayor in question then was James J. Walker. A dapper, witty sprite of a man, Walker had a quick mind but he could not find it within him to take himself or anything else very seriously. Rarely at his desk before noon, he took months of vacation every year, and had a “hangover room” installed in the basement of city hall.
“Life is a circus and there must be a clown in every circus, and we’ll say ‘New York had its clown,” Walker once told reporters, in a typical quip about how he thought his time in office would be regarded…