Fiorello H. La Guardia | |
|---|---|
 LaGuardiac. 1934–1945 | |
| 2nd Director General of theUnited Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration | |
| In office April 1, 1946 – December 31, 1946 | |
| Preceded by | Herbert H. Lehman |
| Succeeded by | Office abolished |
| 99thMayor of New York City | |
| In office January 1, 1934 – January 1,1946 | |
| Preceded by | John P. O'Brien |
| Succeeded by | William O'Dwyer |
| 5thPresident of the United States Conference of Mayors | |
| In office 1935–1945 | |
| Preceded by | Daniel Hoan |
| Succeeded by | Edward Joseph Kelly |
| Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York | |
| In office March 4, 1923 – March 3, 1933 | |
| Preceded by | Isaac Siegel |
| Succeeded by | James J. Lanzetta |
| Constituency | 20th district |
| In office March 4, 1917 – December 31, 1919 | |
| Preceded by | Michael F. Farley |
| Succeeded by | Nathan D. Perlman |
| Constituency | 14th district |
| 9th President of the New York City Board of Aldermen | |
| In office January 1, 1920 – December 31, 1921 | |
| Preceded by | Robert L. Moran |
| Succeeded by | Murray Hulbert |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Fiorello Enrico Raffaelo La Guardia (1882-12-11)December 11, 1882 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | September 20, 1947(1947-09-20) (aged 64) New York City, U.S. |
| Resting place | Woodlawn Cemetery |
| Political party | Republican |
| Other political affiliations | Bull Moose (1916) American (1916) Democratic (1918) LaFollette Progressive (1924) Socialist (1924) Progressive Labor (1926) City Fusion (1933–1941) American Labor (1937–1941) Ind. Progressive (1937) United City (1941) |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 3 |
| Education | Timothy Dwight School |
| Alma mater | |
| Profession | Politician |
| Signature |  |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  United States |
| Branch/service |  United States Army Air Service |
| Years of service | 1917–1919 |
| Rank | Major |
| Battles/wars | |
Fiorello Henry La Guardia[a] (bornFiorello Raffaele Enrico La Guardia;[b] December 11, 1882 – September 20, 1947) was an American attorney and politician who represented New York in theU.S. House of Representatives and served as the 99thmayor of New York City from 1934 to 1946.[1] He was known for his irascible, energetic, and charismatic personality and diminutive, rotund stature.[c] A member of theRepublican Party, La Guardia was frequently cross-endorsed by parties other than his own, especially parties on the left underNew York's electoral fusion laws. A panel of 69 scholars in 1993 ranked him as the best big-city mayor in American history.[2]
Born to a family ofItalian immigrants in New York City, La Guardia quickly became interested in politics at a young age. Beforehis mayoralty, La Guardia representedManhattan in the U.S. House of Representatives and later served in theNew York City Board of Aldermen. Amidst theGreat Depression, La Guardia campaigned on his support forFranklin D. Roosevelt and hisNew Deal programs and won the1933 election. As mayor during the Great Depression andWorld War II, La Guardia unified the city's transit system; expanded construction of public housing, playgrounds, parks, and airports; reorganized theNew York Police Department; and implemented federal New Deal programs within the city. He pursued a long series of political reforms, curbing the power of the powerful Irish-controlledTammany Hall political machine that controlled the Democratic Party in Manhattan. He also re-established merit-based employment and promotion within city administration.[3]
La Guardia was a highly visible national political figure. His support for the New Deal and relationship with President Roosevelt crossed party lines, brought federal funds to New York City, and cut off patronage to La Guardia's Tammany enemies. La Guardia'sWNYC radio program "Talk to the People", which aired from December 1941 until December 1945, expanded his public influence beyond the borders of the city.[4]
Fiorello Raffaele Enrico La Guardia, with Raffaele later removed and EnricoAmericanized to Henry, was born inGreenwich Village, New York City, on December 11, 1882, to Achille Luigi Carlo La Guardia and Irene Luzzatto-Coen. He was named Fiorello in honor of his maternal grandmother Fiorina, Raffaele after his paternal grandfather, and Enrico after his uncle.[5][6][7]
Achille was born inFoggia,Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, on March 26, 1849, and his father Don Raffaele was a municipal official.[7] Later biographies claimed that Raffaele fought as one ofGiuseppe Garibaldi'sRedshirts.[8] Achille visited the United States in 1878, while on tour withAdelina Patti.[9] Irene, a member of theSephardic JewishLuzzatto family, was born inTrieste,Austria, on July 18, 1859.[7] Her mother Fiorina was a distant relative of Prime MinisterLuigi Luzzatti.[10] Achille, a formerCatholic, was an atheist and Irene was a non-practicing Jew.[7] Achille, age 31, met Irene, age 21, at a dance in Trieste. They knew each other for half a year before they were married by Trieste Mayor Rici Bazzoni on June 3, 1880. The couple moved to the United States in 1880.[11] Achille forbid his children from speaking Italian and Fiorello would not become proficient in Italian until his time as a consular agent.[12]
Achille enlisted in theUnited States Army in 1885, and served in the11th Infantry Regiment as a warrant officer and chief musician. His family lived in theDakota Territory, New York, and theArizona Territory during his time at Fort Sully,Madison Barracks,Fort Huachuca, andWhipple Barracks.[13][7] Fiorello was enrolled in theEpiscopal Church inPrescott, Arizona, and practiced that religion all his life.[14][15]
The onset of theSpanish–American War led to their transfer to St. Louis, Missouri, in April 1898,[16] and then Achille was sent toMobile, Alabama. Fiorello attempted to join the army, but was rejected. He was accepted as awar correspondent for theSt. Louis Post-Dispatch. Achille and Fiorello did not reach Cuba because Achille contractedhepatitis andmalaria, allegedly after consumingembalmed beef.[17] He was discharged from the military on account of his illness on August 22, and given a pension of $8 per month (equivalent to $302 in 2024).[18]
The La Guardia family moved toTrieste in 1898, and lived with Fiorina until her death in 1901. Achille worked as a trucker, a ship provisioner, and managed a hotel and turned down a job from the American Consul of Budapest due to the low pay.[19] He died inCapodistria on October 21, 1904,[20] due to heart disease.[21]
Raymond Willey, a friend of Achille and consular agent of Fiume, had La Guardia hired as a clerk in the Budapest consulate with a yearly salary of $100. In 1903, he was placed in charge of the agency inFiume due to his knowledge of Italian and was commissioned as a consular agent on February 8, 1904.[22] He resigned on May 31, 1906,[23] and left Europe after failing to gain a promotion to consul-general in Fiume or an appointment as consul-general inBelgrade. He worked as an interpreter for the immigration services atEllis Island from November 6, 1907, to 1910. He was a Croatian, Italian, and German interpreter andFelix Frankfurter, who met La Guardia during his time at Ellis Island, described him as "a gifted interpreter".[24]
Upon returning to the United States, La Guardia worked as a fireproof brick manufacturer inPortsmouth, Ohio. He returned to New York City and worked a series of odd jobs such as a translator for theNew York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, a steamship company clerk, stenographer atPratt Institute, and a clerk forAbercrombie & Fitch.[25] In 1912, around 60,000 garment workers went on strike and La Guardia, who was friends withAugust Bellanca, gave speeches in Italian and Yiddish in support of the strike.[25]
La Guardia graduated from theDwight School, a private school on the Upper West Side of New York City.[26] He graduated from theNew York University School of Law and was admitted to the bar in 1910.[27] He became a member of the Garibaldi Lodge No. 542 of theMasonic Order in 1913.[28]Frederick C. Tanner recommended La Guardia for a job working for theAttorney General of New York on September 15, 1911, and he served as the deputy attorney general from January 1, 1915, to 1917.[27][29] He left theAmerican Bar Association in the 1930s stating that it devoted "its efforts to special interests rather than to the uplift and welfare of the profession".[30]
In 1925, La Guardia formed the La Guardia Publishing Company using his savings and a second mortgage to publishL'Americolo, an Italian-language magazine. He competed againstGeneroso Pope'sIl Progresso Italo-Americano andCorriere d'America. The magazine failed, with La Guardia losing $15,000 and his mortgage.[31]
La Guardia joined the Republican club while attending NYU School of Law.[32] He supportedWilliam Howard Taft during the1912 presidential election and replaced William Chadbourne asdistrict captain due to Chadbourne's support forTheodore Roosevelt'sthird-party campaign. La Guardia refused to supportJohn Purroy Mitchel's Fusion campaign during the1913 mayoral election despite Mitchel's support among Republicans.[33]
Republican political bossSamuel S. Koenig convinced La Guardia to run in the 1919 special election for President of theNew York City Board of Aldermen created byAl Smith's resignation to becomegovernor.[34] La Guardia defeatedWilliam M. Bennett for the Republican nomination andPaul Windels worked as his campaign manager. During the campaign he was endorsed byThe New York Times andCitizens Union. He defeated Democratic nomineeRobert L. Moran. Moran suffered from aspoiler effect caused by Michael Kelly, a former Democrat, running as the Liberty Party candidate.
La Guardia supported Republican presidential and gubernatorial candidatesWarren G. Harding andNathan L. Miller during the1920 election. However, he later attacked Miller for his public transit policies and getting rid of welfare programs.[35] His opposition to Miller ruined his chances in the1921 mayoral election and the Republican nomination was given to Henry Curran. He attempted to defeat Curran in the primary, despite warnings from Koenig and Windels and was defeated.[36]
La Guardia considered running in the1922 gubernatorial election and published his ideas for the Republican state platform in the column in theNew York Evening Journal given to him byWilliam Randolph Hearst. Koenig was able to compromise with La Guardia to avoid a primary with Miller. La Guardia favored Smith, the Democratic nominee, during the1928 presidential election.[37]
La Guardia ran for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives fromNew York's 14th congressional district during the1914 election. He chose to run as he noticed during a25th Assembly district Republican club meeting that nobody was nominated for it as Frederick Marshall unexpectedly withdrew. The district was a stronglyDemocratic andTammany Hall. He lost to Democratic nomineeMichael F. Farley, whom he accused of being illiterate.[38][39] Louis Espresso and Harry Andrews managed his campaign.[40]
Clarence Fay, the Republican district leader in the 25th Assembly district, sought to haveHamilton Fish III nominated for the seat in the1916 election. Tanner unsuccessfully attempted to convince La Guardia to not run. Fish withdrew before the primary and La Guardia won the Republican nomination. He appealed to the different ethnic groups in the district and was endorsed byNew Yorker Staats-Zeitung which traditionally supported Democratic candidates.[41] He defeated Farley by 357 votes.[42]
Tammany Hall and the Democrats supported La Guardia in the1918 election in order to prevent an anti-warSocialist victory. He defeated Socialist nomineeScott Nearing in the election.[43][44] La Guardia resigned from theUnited States House of Representatives on December 31, 1919.[45] He was given the Republican nomination forNew York's 20th congressional district to succeed retiring RepresentativeIsaac Siegel in the1922 election. He defeated Democratic nominee Henry Frank and Socialist nomineeWilliam Karlin.[46][47][48]
La Guardia attended theConference for Progressive Political Action in 1922.[49] Koenig told La Guardia that his renomination was dependent on him supporting the Republicans in the1924 presidential election. La Guardia considered supporting the Democrats but declined to do so after the nomination ofJohn W. Davis. He gave his support toRobert M. La Follette and theProgressive Party. La Guardia announced his departure from the Republican Party on the front page ofThe New York Times. He and Gilbert Roe managed La Follette's presidential campaign in the eastern United States. La Guardia, running with the Socialist nomination, raised $3,764.25 (equivalent to $69,065 in 2024) and defeated Frank and Siegel in theelection. La Guardia's campaign manager,Vito Marcantonio, was elected to Congress in his own right a decade later.[50] La Guardia's partisan affiliation in Congress was labeled as Socialist andVictor L. Berger, the only other Socialist in Congress, described him as "my whip".[51][52][53]
La Guardia returned to the Republican Party in the1926 election and won by 55 votes against Democratic nominee H. Warren Hubbard and Socialist nominee George Dobsevage. He was the only Republican elected to the U.S. House from New York City.[54][55] He defeated Democratic nominee Saul J. Dickheiser in the1928 election.[56] He defeated Democratic nomineeVincent H. Auleta in the1930 election.[57]
La Guardia considered running for reelection to Congress as a Democrat in the1932 election and the option received support fromWilliam Green,John L. Lewis, andRobert F. Wagner. Political bossJohn H. McCooey supported him running as a Democrat, but Tammany Hall leaderJames Joseph Hines opposed him and had the nomination given toJames J. Lanzetta. Lanzetta defeated La Guardia in the election due to thecoattail effect ofFranklin D. Roosevelt's victory in thepresidential election.Robert M. La Follette Jr. stated that "the people have temporarily lost one of their most faithful servants".[58][59]
La Guardia was interested in airplanes and served as a director and attorney forGiuseppe Mario Bellanca's company. He enlisted to fight inWorld War I and was promoted to captain by October 1917. He and Major General William Ord Ryan trained Italian pilots inFoggia.[60] La Guardia becamecertified to fly on December 12, 1917. KingVictor Emmanuel III of Italy gave him the Flying Cross.[61]
La Guardia rose to the rank of major in command of a unit ofCaproni Ca.44 bombers on theItalian-Austrian front. While he was away at war his office was managed by Andrews and Marie Fisher while constituent services were handled by RepresentativeIsaac Siegel. A petition with over 3,000 signatures was given to SpeakerChamp Clark on January 8, 1918, asking for La Guardia's seat to be vacated, but Clark refused to allow a motion to vacate La Guardia's seat.[62]
During La Guardia's tenure in the U.S. House, he served on theJudiciary committee.[63]Oswald Garrison Villard, editor ofThe Nation, stated that he was "the most valuable member of Congress today".[64] La Guardia supported impeaching Secretary of the TreasuryAndrew Mellon on the grounds of him serving as a director of a private company, theAluminum Company of America, while serving in thepresidential cabinet.[65]
La Guardia requested the pardon ofThomas Mooney. In 1931, James Smith, a black railroad porter, was put on trial for assault but was unable to pay for a lawyer. La Guardia took the casepro bono after being requested byA. Philip Randolph and Smith was acquitted on September 26.[66]
La Guardia's supporters wanted him to run for mayor in the1925 election, but he declined as he would be unlikely to defeatJimmy Walker.[54] He received the Republican nomination on August 1, 1929.[67] In 1929, La Guardia ran for Mayor once again. This time, he received the Republican nomination, once again defeating William Bennett.[68] However, he lost the general election to Walker in a landslide.[69]
MayorJimmy Walker and his Irish-runTammany Hall were forced out of office by scandal and La Guardia was determined to replace him. La Guardia ran on the Fusion Party platform, which was supported by Republicans, reform-minded Democrats, and independents.[70] La Guardia had enormous determination, high visibility, the support of reformerSamuel Seabury and a divisive primary contest. He also represented previously underrepresented communities, appealing to a wide range of cultural backgrounds with his lineage.[70] He secured the nomination and expected an easy win against incumbent MayorJohn P. O'Brien; however,Joseph V. McKee entered the race as the nominee of the new "Recovery Party" at the last minute. McKee was a formidable opponent, sponsored by Bronx Democratic bossEdward J. Flynn. La Guardia promised a more honest government, championing greater efficiency and inclusiveness.[70]
La Guardia's win was based on a complex coalition of Republicans (mostly middle-classGerman Americans in the boroughs outside Manhattan), a minority of reform-minded Democrats, Socialists, a large proportion of middle-class Jews, and the great majority of Italians, whose votes had previously been overwhelmingly loyal to Tammany.[70] During his mayoralty, La Guardia served as president of theUnited States Conference of Mayors from 1935 until 1945.[71]
La Guardia came to office in January 1934 with five main goals:[3]
La Guardia achieved most of the first four goals in his first hundred days, as FDR gave him 20% of the entire nationalCWA budget for work relief. La Guardia then collaborated closely withRobert Moses, with support from the governor, DemocratHerbert Lehman, to upgrade the decaying infrastructure. The city was favored by theNew Deal in terms of funding for public works projects. La Guardia's modernization efforts were publicized in the 1936 bookNew York Advancing: A Scientific Approach to Municipal Government, edited byRebecca B. Rankin.
In 1935, a riot took place in Harlem. Termed theHarlem riot of 1935, it has been described as the first modern race riot because it was committed primarily against property rather than persons. During the riots, La Guardia andHubert Delany walked through the streets in an effort to calm the situation.[70] After the riots, La Guardia convened the Mayor's Commission on Conditions of Harlem to determine the causes of the riot and a detailed report was prepared.[70] The report identified "injustices of discrimination in employment, the aggressions of the police, and the racial segregation" as conditions which led to the outbreak of rioting;[70] however, the mayor shelved the committee's report, and did not make it public. The report would be unknown, except that a black New York newspaper, theAmsterdam News, subsequently published it in serial form.[72]
La Guardia governed in an uneasy alliance with New York's Jews and liberalWASPs, together with ethnic Italians and Germans.[73] An unorthodox Republican, he also ran as the nominee of theAmerican Labor Party, a union-dominated anti-Tammany left wing group that supported Roosevelt for president beginning in 1936. La Guardia supported Roosevelt, chairing the Committee of Independent Voters for Roosevelt and his running mate,Henry A. Wallace, with SenatorGeorge W. Norris during the1940 presidential election. La Guardia was the city's first Italian-American mayor, but was not a typical Italian New Yorker. He was a RepublicanEpiscopalian who had grown up in Arizona and had a Triestine Jewish mother[74] and a lapsed Catholic father. He spoke several languages; when working at Ellis Island, he was certified as an interpreter forItalian,German,Yiddish, andCroatian.[75] It served him well during a contentious congressional campaign in 1922. When Henry Frank, a Jewish opponent, accused him of antisemitism, La Guardia rejected the suggestion that he publicly disclose that his mother was Jewish as "self-serving". Instead, La Guardia dictated an open letter in Yiddish that was also printed in Yiddish. In it, he challenged Frank to publicly and openly debate the issues of the campaign entirely in the Yiddish language. Frank, although he was Jewish, could not speak the language and was forced to decline—and lost the election.[76]
La Guardia's 1933 campaign coincided with the rise of racial and religious hostilities in Germany, and he supported a more anti-Nazi response while in office.[70] He publicly supported groups that engaged in boycotts of German goods and spoke alongside RabbiStephen S. Wise, leader of theAmerican Jewish Congress.[70] In 1935, La Guardia caused an international stir when he denied a masseur license to a German immigrant, stating that Germany had violated a treaty guaranteeing equal treatment of American professionals by discriminating against American Jews.[70] Despite threats from Germany (including a bomb threat against New York City's German Consulate), La Guardia continued to use his position as mayor to denounce Nazism.[70] During his reelection campaign in 1937, speaking before the Women's Division of theAmerican Jewish Congress, he called for the creation of a special pavilion at the upcomingNew York World's Fair, "a chamber of horrors" for "that brown-shirted fanatic," referring to Hitler.[77][70] He also led anti-Nazi rallies and promoted legislation to facilitate the U.S. rescue of the Jewish refugees.[78][70] He also appointed more racially and religiously diverse judges, includingRosalie Loew Whitney, Herbert O'Brien,Jane Bolin, andHubert Thomas Delany.[70] La Guardia would soon regret appointing O'Brien, who used his position as Domestic Relations judge to oppose some New Deal policies, leading to La Guardia's condemnation of him with the famous line, "Senator, I have made a lot of good appointments and I think I am good ... but when I make a mistake, it's a beaut."[79]
La Guardia criticized thegangsters who brought a negative stereotype and shame to theItalian community.[80] His first action as mayor was to order the chief of police to arrest mob bossLucky Luciano on whatever charges could be found. La Guardia then went after the gangsters with a vengeance, stating in a radio address to the people of New York in his distinct voice, "Let's drive the bums out of town." In 1934 he went on a search-and-destroy mission looking for mob bossFrank Costello'sslot machines, rounding up thousands of the "one armed bandits," swinging a sledgehammer and dumping them off a barge into the water for the newspapers and media. In 1935 La Guardia appeared at theBronx Terminal Market to institute a citywide ban on the sale, display, and possession ofartichokes, whose prices were inflated by mobsters. When prices went down, the ban was lifted.[81] In 1936, La Guardia had special prosecutorThomas E. Dewey, a future Republican presidential candidate, single out Lucky Luciano for prosecution. Dewey led a successful investigation into Luciano's lucrative prostitution operation, eventually sending Luciano to jail with a 30–50 year sentence. The case was made into the 1937 movieMarked Woman, starringBette Davis.
La Guardia proved successful in shutting down theburlesque theaters, whose shows offended his sensibilities.[82] He also came to the assistance ofcomic book creatorsJoe Simon andJack Kirby, when they were openly threatened by sympathizers ofNazi Germany with their newsuperhero character,Captain America, when he arranged police protection.[83] As part of his campaign against organized crime in the early 1940s, La Guardia bannedpinball games, calling them gambling machines. The ban held until 1976, when avid playerRoger Sharpe proved the actual skill involved in the game.[84][85] La Guardia spearheaded major raids throughout the city, collecting thousands of machines. The mayor participated with police in destroying machines withsledgehammers before dumping the remnants into the city's rivers.[85]
La Guardia's admirers credit him, among other things, with restoring the economy of New York City during and after theGreat Depression. He is given credit for many massive public works programs administered by his powerful Parks CommissionerRobert Moses, which employed thousands of voters. The mayor's relentless lobbying for federal funds allowed New York to develop its economic infrastructure.[86]
To obtain large-scale federal money the mayor became a close ally of Roosevelt and New Deal agencies such as theCWA,PWA, andWPA, which poured $1.1 billion into the city from 1934 to 1939. In return, he gave FDR a showcase forNew Deal achievements and helped to defeat FDR's political enemies in Tammany Hall (the Democratic party machine based in Manhattan). La Guardia and Moses built highways, bridges and tunnels, transforming the physical landscape of New York City. TheWest Side Highway,East River Drive,Brooklyn Battery Tunnel,Triborough Bridge, and two airports (LaGuardia Airport, and, later,Idlewild, now JFK Airport) were all built during his mayoralty.[87]
In 1943, La Guardia saved theMecca Temple on 55th Street from demolition. Together with New York City Council PresidentNewbold Morris, La Guardia converted the building to theNew York City Center of Music and Dance. On December 11, 1943, City Center opened its doors with a concert from theNew York Philharmonic—La Guardia even conducted a rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner."[88]
1939 was a busy year, as he opened the1939 New York World's Fair atFlushing Meadows–Corona Park, Queens, opened New York Municipal Airport No. 2 in Queens (later renamed Fiorello H. La Guardia Field), and had the city buy out theInterborough Rapid Transit Company and theBrooklyn–Manhattan Transit Corporation, thus completing thepublic takeover of theNew York City Subway system. The U.S. arrival ofGeorg andMaria Von Trapp and their children fromAustria that fall atEllis Island who would eventually become the Trapp Family Singers was another significant decade-ending event that year in La Guardia's mayoralty.
Responding to popular disdain for the sometimes corrupt City Council, La Guardia successfully proposed a reformed 1938 City Charter that created a powerful newNew York City Board of Estimate, similar to a corporate board of directors.[citation needed] La Guardia was also a supporter of theIves-Quinn Act, "a law that would ban discrimination in employment on the bases of 'race, creed, color or national origin' and task a new agency, the New York State Commission Against Discrimination (SCAD), with education and enforcement."[70] The bill passed in 1945, making New York the first state in the country to create an agency tasked with handling employment discrimination complaints.[70]
In 1941 during the run-up to American involvement inWorld War II, President Roosevelt appointed La Guardia first director of the newOffice of Civilian Defense (OCD). Roosevelt was an admirer of La Guardia; after meetingWinston Churchill for the first time he described him as "an English Mayor La Guardia".[89] The OCD was the national agency responsible for preparing for blackouts, air raid wardens, sirens, and shelters in case of Germanair raids. The goal was to psychologically mobilize many thousands of middle-class volunteers to make them feel part of the war effort. At the urging of aviation advocateGill Robb Wilson, La Guardia, in his capacity as Director of the OCD, created theCivil Air Patrol withAdministrative Order 9, signed by him on December 1, 1941, and published December 8, 1941.[90] La Guardia remained Mayor of New York, shuttling back and forth with three days in Washington and four in the city in an effort to do justice to two herculean jobs. La Guardia focused on setting up air raid systems and training volunteer wardens; however, Roosevelt appointed his wifeEleanor Roosevelt as his assistant. She issued calls for actors to lead a volunteer talent program, and dancers to start a physical fitness program. That led to widespread ridicule and the president replaced both of them in December 1941 with a full-time directorJames M. Landis.[91]
The war ended the Great Depression in the city. Unemployment ended, and the city was a gateway for military supplies and soldiers sent to Europe, with theBrooklyn Navy Yard providing many of the warships and the garment trade providing uniforms. The city's great financiers, however, were less important in decision-making than the policymakers in Washington, and very high wartime taxes were not offset by heavy war spending. New York was not a center of heavy industry and did not see a wartime boom, as defense plants were built elsewhere.[92] Roosevelt refused to make La Guardia a general and was unable to provide fresh money for the city. By 1944, the city was short of funds to pay for La Guardia's new programs. La Guardia was frustrated and his popularity slipped away and he ran so poorly in straw polls in 1945 that he did not run for a fourth term.[93][94] In July 1945, when the city's newspapers were closed by a strike, La Guardia famously read thecomics on the radio.[95][96][97]
La Guardia opposed theEspionage Act of 1917 and stated that "if you pass this bill and if it is enacted into law you change all that our flag ever stood for and stands for".[98] He supported theLeague of Women Voters in the 1920s.[99] He voted in favor of theChild Labor Amendment.[100] He proposed legislation to create aholiday in honor ofChristopher Columbus.[66]
As a congressman, La Guardia was a tireless and vocal champion ofprogressive causes, including relaxed restriction on immigration, removal ofU.S. troops from Nicaragua to speaking up for the rights and livelihoods of striking miners, impoverished farmers, oppressed minorities, and struggling families. He supportedprogressive income taxes, greater government oversight ofWall Street, and national employment insurance for workers idled by the Great Depression.[101] He supported allowing the direct election of theGovernor of Puerto Rico.[66]
In domestic policies, La Guardia tended towardsocialism and wanted tonationalize and regulate; however, he was never close to theSocialist Party and never bothered to readKarl Marx.[102] WhenBenito Mussolini'sFascist Italy invadedEthiopia on October 3, 1935, a Black protest of Italian vendors at the King Julius General Market onLenox Avenue and 118th Street turned into a riot and 1,200 extra New York City policemen were deployed on "war duty" to quell the riot.[103] In December 1935, at an Italian-American rally, attended by 20,000, inMadison Square Garden, La Guardia presented a $100,000 check to the Italian Consul General,[d] part of a total $700,000 raised from Italian-Americans to help fund theinvasion.[105][103][106] During a new riot that began on May 18, 1936, in Lenox Avenue, Harlem, following reports of Italian atrocities and the fall ofAddis Ababa, La Guardia rejected demands from the African-American community to withdraw additional police squads sent to contain the street fighting. This added to the perception within the Black community of Harlem that La Guardia represented Fascist Italy in New York.[107][108]
La Guardia sponsored labor legislation and railed against immigration quotas. His major legislation was theNorris–La Guardia Act, cosponsored with Nebraska senator George W. Norris in 1932. It circumvented Supreme Court limitations on the activities of labor unions, especially as those limitations were imposed between the enactment of theClayton Antitrust Act in 1914 and the end of the 1920s. Based on the theory that the lower courts are creations not of the Constitution but of Congress, and that Congress, therefore, has wide power in defining and restricting their jurisdiction, the act forbids issuance of injunctions to sustain anti-union contracts of employment, to prevent ceasing or refusing to perform any work or remain in any relation of employment, or to restrain acts generally constituting component parts of strikes, boycotts, and picketing. It also said courts could no longer enforceyellow-dog contracts, which are labor contracts prohibiting a worker from joining a union.[109][110] La Guardia opposed an attempt to raise the sales tax during the Great Depression and instead supported taxes on luxury items and a graduated income tax for people earning more than $100,000.[111]
La Guardia supported theLeague of Nations. He called for Fiume to be given to Italy despite it being promised toYugoslavia by theTreaty of London.[112] He supported theFebruary Revolution, but criticized AmbassadorDavid R. Francis for supportingAlexander Kerensky rather thanLavr Kornilov.[113] La Guardia had a reputation for his disdain ofisolationism; instead he supported using American influence abroad on behalf of democracy or for national independence or against autocracy. He used his influence to speak in favor of the League of Nations and theInter-Parliamentary Union as well as peace and disarmament conferences.[114]
In 1946, PresidentHarry S. Truman sent the ex-mayor as an envoy to Brazil but diplomacy was not his forte. Truman then gave him a major job as head of theUnited Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), with responsibility for helping millions of desperate refugees in Europe. La Guardia was exhausted and after seeing the horrors of war in Europe called for a massive aid program. Critics ridiculed that as worldwide WPA and the biggest boondoggle ever. He sided withHenry A. Wallace in calling for peaceful coexistence with the Soviet Union, and attacked the new breed of Cold Warriors.[115] He provided UNRRA funds to the Soviets despite warnings that the Kremlin was funneling the money towards its military. UNRRA shut down at the end of 1946. Despite his declining health, La Guardia attacked the emerging "Truman Doctrine" that promised American financial and military intervention to stop the spread of Communism.[116]
La Guardia opposedProhibition in the United States.[117] He was one of the first Republicans in Congress to voice their opinions against prohibition.[118] He testified to that effect before the first session of Congress in 1926.[119] On June 19, 1926, La Guardia mixed near beer and malt extract, which were legal, to create2% beer in order to protest prohibition. He was immune from prosecution as a member of Congress.[120]
La Guardia was a man of short stature; his height is sometimes given as 5 feet 0 inches (1.52 m), but an article inThe New York Times in 2006 gave his height as 5 feet 2 inches (1.57 m).[121]
La Guardia met Thea Almerigotti, an immigrant from Trieste, while marching in a union picket line in 1913.[122] They married on March 8, 1919, in a Catholic ceremony atSt. Patrick's Cathedral.[123] Their daughter, Fioretta Thea La Guardia, was born in June 1920 but died on May 8, 1921, and Thea died on November 29. The death of his wife was described as "the greatest tragedy of La Guardia's life" by M.R. Werner, who aided La Guardia when he wrote his autobiography.[124]
Marie Fisher, La Guardia's second wife, had volunteered for La Guardia's 1916 congressional campaign and became his secretary after his election. They were married by Rev.Ole J. Kvale, a Lutheran like Fisher, on February 28, 1929.[125] They adopted two children:
La Guardia's sister,Gemma La Guardia Gluck, married Herman Gluck, a Hungarian Jew, in 1906. The couple later moved to Budapest.[132] They were living in Hungary and were arrested by theGestapo on June 7, 1944,[133]Adolf Eichmann andHeinrich Himmler knew that Gemma was La Guardia's sister and ordered her to be held as a political prisoner. She and Herman were deported toMauthausen concentration camp in Austria.[134][135] Gemma did not learn until her release that Herman had died at Mauthausen.[134][135]Gemma was transferred from Mauthausen to the notorious women'sconcentration camp at Ravensbrück, fifty miles fromBerlin, where—unbeknownst to Gemma at the time—her daughter Yolanda (whose husband also died in the camps) and baby grandson were also held for a year in a separate barracks.[136] Gemma Gluck, who was held in Block II of the camp and assigned prisoner #44139,[133] was one of the few survivors of Ravensbrück,[137] one of the few American-born women interned by the Nazis along withVirginia d'Albert-Lake, and wrote about her time there.[138][139]
The Germans abandoned Gluck, her daughter, and her grandson for a possible hostage exchange in April 1945 as the Soviets advanced on Berlin. After the liberation of the camps, Gemma later wrote that the Soviets were "violating girls and women of all ages", and the three struggled asdisplaced persons in postwar Berlin because they did not speak German and had no identity papers, money, or means of documenting where they had been.[140][141][142] Gemma finally managed to get word to the Americans, who contacted Fiorello, who was then director of theUnited Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) and had been unable to locate his sister and brother-in-law since their disappearance. He worked to get them on the immigration lists but asserted in a letter, included in the appendix of Gemma's memoir, that her "case was the same as that of hundreds of thousands of displaced people" and "no exceptions can be made". It took two years for her to be cleared and sent to the United States. She returned to New York in May 1947, where she was reunited with her brother only four months before his death. As he had made no provision for her, she lived the remainder of her life in very reduced circumstances in a public housing project in Queens until her death in 1962.[140][142]
La Guardia died ofpancreatic cancer in his home at 5020 Goodridge Avenue, in theFieldston neighborhood ofRiverdale, Bronx, on September 20, 1947, aged 64.[143] La Guardia is interred atWoodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.[144]
A 1993 survey of historians, political scientists, and urban experts conducted by Melvin G. Holli of theUniversity of Illinois at Chicago ranked La Guardia as the best American big-city mayor to serve between the years 1820 and 1993.[145] According to a biographer, Mason B. Williams, his close collaboration with Roosevelt's New Deal proved a striking success in linking national money and local needs.[146] La Guardia enabled the political recognition of new groups that had been largely excluded from the political system, such as Jews and Italians.[73] His administration (in cooperation with Robert Moses) gave New York its modern infrastructure.[86] His far-sighted goals raised ambitions for new levels of urban possibility. According toThomas Kessner, trends since his tenure mean that "people would be afraid of allowing anybody to take that kind of power".[3]
New York'sLaGuardia Airport,LaGuardia Community College,LaGuardia Place, and various parks and buildings around New York City are named for him. Known for his love of music, La Guardia was noted for spontaneously conducting professional and student orchestras and was instrumental in the creation of the High School of Music & Art in 1936, now renamed theFiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts.[147] During his mayoralty, in May 1935, the city's 258-acre shelter for its homeless and unemployed men inChester, Orange County, New York was renamed Camp La Guardia. It operated under that name for 72 years before closing in 2006.[148]
In 1972, theUnited States Postal Service honored La Guardia with a 14-cent postage stamp.[149] InTel Aviv, LaGuardia Street and LaGuardia interchange are named in his honor.[150] A street inRijeka, Croatia, is named after Fiorello La Guardia. La Guardia worked in Rijeka as a U.S. Consular Agent from 1903 to 1906, when the city was known as Fiume and was under Hungarian administration. It was during this time that Rijeka's port played a vital role in connecting the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the United States, featuring direct passenger service between Rijeka and New York.[151]
| U.S. House of Representatives | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Member of the U.S. House of Representatives fromNew York's 14th congressional district March 4, 1917 – December 31, 1919 (resigned) | Succeeded by |
| Preceded by | Member of the U.S. House of Representatives fromNew York's 20th congressional district March 4, 1923 – March 3, 1933 | Succeeded by |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Republican Nominee for Mayor of New York City 1929 | Succeeded by |
| Political offices | ||
| Preceded by | Mayor of New York City 1934–1945 | Succeeded by |
| Government offices | ||
| Preceded by None | Director of Civilian Defense 1941–1942 | Succeeded by |
| Non-profit organization positions | ||
| Preceded by | Director-General of the UNRRA 1946 | Succeeded by |
|  | |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Artists | |
| People | |
| Other | |
