“Second-Toughest U.S. Job”

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32145, 14 November 1969, Page 8

“Second-Toughest U.S. Job”

Mr John V. Lindsay was re-elected Mayor of New York last week after a tough, bitter campaign in which the three major candidates used appeals which cut across accepted party lines. Standing as an Independent Liberal after he had lost the Republican nomination to a conservative, Mr John J. Marchi, Mr Lindsay won narrowly from the Democrat, Mr Mario A. Procaccino; he polled twice as well as Mr Marchi. The conservatism evident in other recent American municipal elections was also apparent in New York; Mr Lindsay could hardly have succeeded had not the opposition been divided. This alone defeated the middle-class demand for tougher enforcement of law and order, a theme which the other candidates espoused. But Mr Lindsay will still be a major liberal voice in the country, and one to which the White House must pay attention. Mr Lindsay faces a formidable task during his next four years in what he has called “ the second“toughest job in America” (after the Presidency). He admits that in his first term he made mistakes, but says he will continue his policy of “ activism intervening directly in the city’s problems, expecting to win some of his battles and lose others. Both his rivals said they would behave more as company executives, attempting to find compromise solutions to the problems of a city which all three suggest has become almost ungovernable. Mr Lindsay’s major achievement in four years was to keep New York Tree from the riots which have plagued other large American cities. He claimed to have arrested the rising crime rate; he has certainly not reversed it. The problems of corruption, smog, traffic congestion, and racial tension remain.