Mayor, Anyone?

Over the course of this year, the centenary of William F. Buckley’s birth, we will republish an article by him weekly. This week’s column details — in points ranging from serious to tongue-in-cheek — Buckley’s agenda in the New York mayoral race in 1965.

I f you live in a large city and desire to run for mayor, on what platform, pray, will you run? What has John Lindsay of New York decided to run on? One metropolitan newspaper has carefully and enthusiastically recorded his attributes, the most significant of which, some observers have noted, is the brilliance of his teeth. (Yes, that was a qualification solemnly remarked by one major newspaper.) When the press mulcted from Candidate Lindsay the specific ideas he had for New York, he temporarily deserted his Spenglerian observations about the decline and fall of the City and said that a) he feared the desertion of New York by private industry; b) he thought something ought to be done about the flourishing narcotic trade here; and c) he did not believe that sufficient effort had been made to save the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Back to the teeth.

There is, however, the phenomenon, well remarked by shrewd observers, that goes under the name of the “crisis of the American city.” Such a crisis does exist. New York — and other major cities — become, increasingly, unpleasant places to live in.

Would you like to run for Mayor? Here is a packaged program:

1) Crime. Teenagers caught and convicted of felonies will be either a) put in jail, or b) released in the recognizance of their parents or guardians, who will be legally responsible for recurrent offenses. Said parents would have the right to surrender authority over fractious children by invoking probationary sentences. Communities block-wide, or greater, which, like the Jewish association that calls itself The Maccabbees and has financed its own watchmen to patrol its own area in a crime-ridden quarter of New York, will be given pro tanto relief in their property taxes, sufficient to pay the local police bills. New Yorkers will, in a word, be encouraged to look after their own protection, relieving the municipal police force of an almost impossible job.

2) Narcotics. Anti-narcotic laws for adults should be repealed, and the English system substituted: you can get narcotics for the drug store price of them — provided you come in with a doctor’s prescription. Said doctor will renew the addict’s prescription or not depending on whether he submits to medical attention. Anyone caught selling drugs to a minor will be subject to 15 years in prison. Take the profit away from narcotics peddling, and the narcotic-peddlers go out of business.

3) Race. Petition the state and federal governments for a suspension of property and income taxes for all Negro or Puerto Rican entrepreneurs who establish businesses in those areas that have, by federal decree, been denominated as depressed areas. Let Negro entrepreneurs — using white capital and their own — move into such areas with the kind of economic encouragement that has done so much for Puerto Rico in its renowned Operation Bootstrap.

4) Traffic. No commercial vehicle may load or unload traffic between 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. Double parkers will be fined $10; parkers with diplomatic plates (they are expected to know better), $100. And if Jimmy Hoffa disagrees, why, disagree with him. Or get out of the mayoralty race.

5) Labor Unions. Pass legislation imposing criminal penalties on any labor union organization that seeks to prevent any New Yorker from making his own arrangements, on mutually agreeable terms, with any painter, construction worker, plumber, electrician, or elevator operator.

6) Gambling. Legalize it. Anybody who wants to bet anything with anybody may do so, and the prospective mayor wishes every single bettor the very best of luck, and did you notice the workout yesterday of Lucky Sadler who is running on the 5th at Roosevelt on Election Day?

7) Taxis. Anybody without a police record may operate any car as a taxi.

8) Welfare. Anyone receiving welfare payments who is not a mother looking after children 14 years or younger, or invalided, will report for duty at 8:00 a.m. every morning for street cleaning and general prettification work. No workee, no dolee.

9) Schools. No one will be required to go to any school outside the plausible geographical limits of his residence. School drop-outs under the age of 14 will be sent to special vocational schools, whose administrators will be especially trained. They will be vested with extraordinary disciplinary powers, and charged with a) teaching literacy, and b) giving vocational training. Successful graduates of one year’s experience with such schools will be qualified to re-enter the public schools.

10) The minimum wage law will not apply to children.

11) Any election returns suggesting that the mayoralty candidate running on this program has been defeated will be challenged at the courts.