Ohio History Journal
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FRANK P. VAZZANO
The Feud Renewed: Martin Davey, John
Bricker and the Ohio Campaign of 1940
They were old enemies, Democrat Martin
L. Davey and Republican John
W. Bricker; two fierce rivals posed
against each other for the second time in a
contest for Ohio's governorship. Their
first race, in 1936, degenerated into a
barrage of accusations and mudslinging.
Their second, in 1940, promised
more of the same. If anything, as
Davey's local newspaper, the Ravenna
Evening Record and Daily Courier-Tribune,
predicted, the 1936 contest would
seem like a "skirmish" after
the two went at each other again.1
Davey always provided the spectacular in
his campaigns. In a political ca-
reer going back to 1913 when he was
elected mayor of Kent, Ohio, at age 29,
he had demonstrated a dramatic flair
second to none. The "boy mayor" served
his hometown for six years and then went
on to three full terms in Congress
in the 1920s.2 After losing
the 1928 Ohio governor's race, Davey won
twice, in 1934 and 1936. Flamboyant in
every political arena, he was likened
to P. T. Barnum, "always a
showman."3
Barnum-like he may have been, but no one
understood voters better than
Martin L. Davey. Cynically, but
accurately, he believed they could be
counted on to "vote their major
prejudices," and he assiduously cultivated
those prejudices. His philosophy was
simple: Ohioans would flock to the
polls to vote against a candidate but
might have to be "dragged" there to sup-
port one.4 In addition, he
maintained extensive mailing lists; postage and sta-
tionery were his greatest expenses in
every campaign.5
No one worked harder to win than Davey.
Typically, a campaign started
nine or ten months before the election
itself when he mailed letters of inten-
tion to Democratic leaders and the party
rank and file. Those letters more
than announced Davey's candidacy-they
also solicited the recipients' advice.
Here Davey was especially astute. He
knew the party faithful would be flat-
Frank P. Vazzano is a Professor of
History at Walsh University. Research for this article
was supported by a Walsh University
Faculty Scholar grant.
1. May 16, 1940.
2. Davey first filled an unexpired term
in 1918 and then won elections in 1922, 1924 and
1926.
3. Cleveland Plain Dealer, April
1, 1946.
4. Ralph J. Donaldson, "Martin L.
Davey," in The Governors of Ohio (Columbus, 1954),
180.
5. Ravenna-Kent Evening Record and
Daily Courier-Tribune, April 1, 1946.
6 OHIO
HISTORY
tered by his request for suggestions,
but he also knew those who took the
time to reply would likely volunteer for
the Davey organization. After estab-
lishing a firm base, Davey assembled his
closest advisers to uncover his op-
ponent's weaknesses and devise
strategies to exploit them.6
Of course, such maneuvering was hidden
from the public. A different
Martin Davey was projected for broader
consumption. "I want to be elected
governor again," he proclaimed in
1940, "in order to put humanity back into
the Governor's office."7 His
successful business, the Davey Tree Expert
Company, incorporated by his father in
1909, failed to fulfill his life. He
needed politics. "It is life,
action. Everything connected with it deals with
human beings. I like politics because I
like people," he declared in a rebuke
to the anti-Davey Cleveland Plain
Dealer in the spring of 1940.8
Bricker, the incumbent, had an easier
time readying for the coming election.
He assumed that the fiery Davey would
become his own worst enemy, and in
the meantime he had merely to contrast
his efficient, scandal-free first term
with Davey's four stormy years as
governor.9 That strategy was obvious
when Bricker told an audience of 5,000
in Toledo that he had "driven every
racket out of the state government"
in the two years he had been in office.
Davey's reputation for venality and
Bricker's for rectitude allowed the gover-
nor to trivialize his opponent.
"Martin L. Davey is the least of my worries,"
he sneered early in the contest.10
Bricker's confidence was understandable.
Three times now he had stood un-
opposed as the Republican nominee for
governor of Ohio. The Democrats in
sharp contrast were in disarray. Their
gubernatorial nominee in 1938, Charles
Sawyer, a former lieutenant governor and
Democratic national committeeman,
had lost to Bricker by more than 118,000
votes and had no interest in another
run at the governorship. With Sawyer out
of the way, Democratic hopefuls
began to test the waters as the primary
season neared. Prominent among
them was former governor George White
who was encouraged to run as the
6. Ibid.
7. Transcribed Shorthand Notes, 1940,
Box 8, Folder 1, Martin L. Davey Papers, MSS 339,
Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio.
8. Martin L. Davey, Four Eventful
Years as Governor, 1940 [Cleveland Plain Dealer
Reprint], Box 7, Folder 17, Davey
Papers, MSS 339, Ohio Historical Society.
9. See statistics appended to Franklyn
Waltman [Director of Publicity of the Republican
National Committee] to John W. Bricker,
March 26, 1940, Box 70, Political File, John W.
Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical
Society, Columbus, Ohio; Cleveland Plain Dealer,
September 17, 1940; Akron Beacon
Journal, November 3, 1940; Carl Wittke, ed., The History
of the State of Ohio: Ohio in the
Twentieth Century, 1900-1938 (Columbus,
1942), VI, 89-91.
On Davey's controversial governorship,
see Frank P. Vazzano, "Harry Hopkins and Martin
Davey: Federal Relief and Ohio Politics
During the Great Depression," Ohio History, 96
(Summer-Autumn, 1987), 124-39, and Frank
P. Vazzano, "Martin Davey, John Bricker and the
Ohio Election of 1936," Ohio
History, 104 (Winter-Spring, 1995), 5-23.
10. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
31, 1940; Ravenna Evening Record and Daily Courier-
Tribune, October 9, 1940.
The Feud Renewed 7
only Democrat who might defeat Davey.
One enthusiastic supporter even
went so far as to describe White as a
"Moses" who would lead the Davey-bat-
tered Democrats "out of the
wilderness."11
White indeed was the only Democrat with
a chance to beat Davey. But
even with the heavy baggage of his
scandal-tainted administration, Davey was
a formidable foe, and White knew it.
Nearly a year before the 1940 primary,
White forecast a Davey gubernatorial
push and feared the harm the former
governor's candidacy could do to Ohio
Democrats.12 Yet White preferred not
to challenge his Democratic rival.
Although interested in the nomination, he
waffled, insisting that he would not
join the race until the "Duke of Kent," as
he derisively referred to Davey, made
his own intentions clear.13 Again, little
more than two months before the primary,
White declared that he would seek
the nomination only if Davey did not,
although he believed he alone could
beat the former governor in the primary
and then defeat Bricker in the general
election. 14
Despite his tarnished governorship,
Davey was the front-runner in the early
maneuvering for the Democratic
nomination. In March, buoyed by petitions
of support from Democrats across the
state, he announced his candidacy.
Confidently, the former governor
disregarded the possibility of losing the
primary, and in his declaration sounded
as if he were already running against
Bricker. Ignoring his Democratic rivals,
Davey early on attacked the gover-
nor, denouncing him as "weak,
selfish and inhuman." Even Republicans,
Davey claimed, were eagerly awaiting the
opportunity to "retire him to pri-
vate life."15
Davey's confidence proved warranted. He
easily defeated six fellow
Democrats to capture the nomination.
Only George White, who had decided
to enter the fray, was a serious
contender, and Davey beat him by nearly three-
to-one, 311,932 to 122,601. The other
five candidates did little more than
embarrass themselves by cluttering the
race.16 In the campaign, Davey ut-
11. William Jay Ryan to George White,
February 21, 1939, Box 63, George White Papers,
MSS 338, Ohio Historical Society,
Columbus, Ohio. See also A. Dean Alderman to White,
March 12, 1940; Larry J. Corcoran to
White, March 13, 1940; William A. Julian to White,
April 3, 1940; White to Julian, April 7,
1940, all in Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society.
12. George White to Harold K. Claypool,
June 29, 1939, Box 63, White Papers, MSS 338,
Ohio Historical Society.
13. George White to Carl F. Bauer,
January 25, 1940, Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society.
14. George White to H. S. Atkinson,
February 20, 1940; White to E. R. Brown, May 24,
1940; White to Robert A. Best, April 8,
1940, all in Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society.
15. Myrna Smith, Martin L. Davey
Biography, Compiled From News Clippings, etc.,
Unpublished Manuscript, Box 7, Folder 2,
Davey Papers, MSS 339, Ohio Historical Society, 2.
16. Cleveland Plain Dealer, May
16, 1940; Ravenna Evening Record and Daily Courier-
Tribune, May 18, 1940. The other Democratic candidates were
William J. Kennedy, Herbert
8 OHIO HISTORY
tered scarcely a word against his fellow
Democrats; his strategy from the be-
ginning was directed against Bricker and
his record.
Jubilant but weary after his victory,
Davey spent the day at home catching
up on his sleep. He could justifiably
savor his triumph, but quickly the crit-
ics began to swarm. The Cleveland Plain
Dealer chided Democrats for
"throwing opportunity to the winds"
by nominating the controversial former
governor.17 Even more ominous
were the sentiments of many Democrats
who were certain that Davey's nomination
in May spelled defeat in
November.18 The harshest
public condemnation came from James M. Cox, a
three-time Ohio governor himself and the
Democratic Party's presidential
nominee in 1920: "On his record as
governor, he would not deserve election
even though his party were so
unfortunate to nominate him."19 In
Columbus, John Bricker had to smile.
With the Democrats already squab-
bling among themselves, he could
essentially ignore Davey and contemplate
victory in the fall.
Davey faced a serious problem before
battling Bricker in November. Ohio
Democrats were badly divided after a
bitter struggle between Davey and
Charles Sawyer for the Democratic
gubernatorial nomination in 1938.
Sawyer narrowly won the primary but in
doing so had repudiated Davey. The
strategy was not entirely Sawyer's. His
fellow Democrats, certain that a con-
tinuation of the scandals that stamped
Davey's administration portended disas-
ter for the party, wrote a reform plank
into the Democratic state platform in
1938. Accordingly, the Democrats
promised an end to graft, shakedowns and
chiseling. The plank was clearly a slap
at Davey. Recognizing that a cam-
paign promising an end to Democratic
"business as usual" was the only way
to beat Bricker, Sawyer assumed the role
of virtuous reformer. Unfortunately
for the Democrats, the Davey faithful
never forgave Sawyer's "treason" and re-
fused to support their party's nominee,
giving Bricker an easy victory in the
general election.20
Even the national administration, ever
critical of Davey, played a role in his
loss to Sawyer. Three days before the
primary, the Social Security Board in
Washington withheld $1,300,000 from Ohio
retirees because Davey had sent
S. Duffy, Harold G. Mosier, James F.
Flynn and Frank A. Dye.
17. May 16, 1940.
18. Edward B. Follett to George White,
May 16, 1940; White to Charles M. Beer, May 22,
1940; White to Karl E. Burr, May 22,
1940; all in Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society and Parker La Moore
[Editor of the Columbus Bureau of the Scripps-
Howard Newspapers], to John Taylor, May
20, 1940; Taylor to La Moore, June 7, 1940; La
Moore to Taylor, June 10, 1940, all in
Box 1, Folder 1, John Taylor Papers, MSS 205, Ohio
Historical Society, Columbus, Ohio.
19. Quoted in Cleveland Plain Dealer,
October 31, 1940.
20. Richard O. Davies, Defender of
the Old Guard: John Bricker and American Politics
(Columbus, 1993), 44-46.
The Feud Renewed 9
them letters politicizing federal
pension monies.21 Naturally, many of those
pensioners blamed Davey for their new
financial plight and wreaked their
vengeance at the polls. Curiously, after
contributing to Democratic disunity
and abetting a Republican victory in
1938, the Roosevelt administration,
concerned about national implications
for 1940, fretted over the turn of events
in Ohio.22
Forsaken by his own party at home and by
his fellow Democrats in
Washington, Davey refused to help Sawyer
against Bricker in November. His
refusal was consistent with Davey's
political philosophy. A veteran cam-
paigner, Davey invariably extended an
olive branch to those Democrats he de-
feated in primary elections, and he
expected treatment in kind. But Sawyer,
stung by Davey's vitriol during the
campaign, refused to conciliate his oppo-
nent. An angry Davey then withheld his
support, which in turn embittered
the Sawyerites and drove them to seek
revenge in 1940.23 Each side was
convinced of the other's perfidy.
Davey's hardest task, consequently, was
to unite Ohio's divided Democratic
party. His political instincts keener
than ever, Davey in July shattered prece-
dent by summoning every Democratic
county chairman and major state candi-
date to organize for the coming
campaign. Meeting in Davey's hometown of
Kent for two days, the Democrats, with
their gubernatorial candidate orches-
trating everything, met in large groups
and with Davey individually to plan
for November. Caught up in the
enthusiasm of the occasion, the Democrats
appeared to forget the bitterness that
divided them and rallied behind their
host, applauding enthusiastically
whenever he rose to speak. Especially sig-
nificant for Davey was the presence of
Portage County Judge David Ladd
Rockwell, renowned as a brilliant
campaigner. Rockwell's participation in
the July meetings boded well for Davey
and demonstrated that Democrats, at
least at this point, were willing to
reconcile. They now had a unified party
and high hopes for victory in November.24
The ground-breaking Kent conference was
only the beginning for Davey.
He advanced the theme of party unity in
a rousing speech at the Democratic
state convention in Columbus on
September 7. After proclaiming that the
Ohio Democratic Party was stronger than
it had been in years, Davey added:
21. Donaldson, "Martin L.
Davey," 182.
22. James A. Farley to George White,
November 28, 1938, Box 54, and Farley to White,
January 12, 1939, Box 63, White Papers,
MSS 338, Ohio Historical Society.
23. Cleveland Plain Dealer, April
1, 1946; Charles M. Beer to George White, May 15, 1940,
Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society; James White Shocknessy to Robert J.
Bulkley, October 24, 1940, Container 23,
Folder 5, Robert J. Bulkley Papers, MSS 3310,
Western Reserve Historical Society,
Cleveland, Ohio.
24. Ravenna Evening Record and Daily
Courier-Tribune, July 9, 1940. Davey knew how to
organize the Democrats and had no
difficulty in courting even old foes like George White.
See George White to H. S. Atkinson, June
5, 1940, Box 64, White Papers, MSS 338, Ohio
Historical Society.
10 OHIO HISTORY
Our whole program has been designed to
carry Ohio for the entire Democratic
ticket, from President Roosevelt to
County Coroner.
We stand as a united party, with the
ability to win and the will to win.
We are just as much interested in our
County tickets as we are in the State ticket,
because good government begins at home,
and we have a remarkably fine group of
Democratic County candidates all over
Ohio.
I speak with pride of my associates on
the State ticket, and our excellent
candidates for the Supreme Court. We
will do battle together for a common cause.
Omitting none of his partisans, Davey
reminded his audience how important
it was to have a Democratic legislature
in Columbus and a third-term
Franklin D. Roosevelt in the White
House.25
Davey had reascended the political
ladder in Ohio. He had seemingly healed
the wounds of 1938 and, by carefully
avoiding calumnies against his primary
opponents in 1940, appeared to have
reunited the party. His ability to rise
from the ashes to new popular heights
confounded his detractors.26 Martin
Davey was back.
Never popular in the press, Davey tried
to turn that liability into an asset.
As he had in the 1936 campaign against
Bricker, the former governor at-
tempted to portray himself as the honest
crusader who refused to become the
pliant pawn of Ohio's big city
newspapers. Bricker, in contrast, Davey
charged, was the darling of the newspapers
because they could manipulate
him. Especially flagrant in a sweetheart
relationship with Bricker were the
Cleveland Plain Dealer, Cleveland
Press, Akron Beacon Journal and the
Toledo Blade.27
In a speech over Cleveland radio station
WTAM, Davey accused Plain
Dealer editor Paul Bellamy and Press editor Louis B.
Seltzer of "covering up"
Bricker's lies about saving millions of
dollars in state monies, while at the
same time the two men deliberately kept
out of their newspapers any positive
news about the Davey administration. Yet
the two gladly vilified the former
governor at the slightest opportunity.
Davey called Bellamy "Lord Paul" and
Seltzer the "bantam rooster,"
and referred to them collectively as "dictators."
Never one to forego any chance to
attack, Davey even claimed that Bellamy
had persuaded Cleveland officials to
create a public park adjacent to the Plain
Dealer building just so he could enjoy the scenery.28
25. Speech at the Democratic State
Convention[,] September 7, 1940, by Martin L. Davey,
Democratic Nominee for Governor, Box 7,
Folder 18, Davey Papers, MSS 339, Ohio Historical
Society, 1, 8.
26. Cleveland Plain Dealer, May
16, 1940; George White to J. B. Albers, May 22, 1940;
White to Harold F. Adams, May 24, 1940,
Box 64, and White to James A. Farley, January 16,
1939, Box 63, White Papers, MSS 338,
Ohio Historical Society.
27. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
20, 1940; Ravenna Evening Record and Daily Courier-
Tribune, October 21, 1940.
28. Cleveland Plain Dealer, November
1, 1940.
|
The Feud Renewed 11 |
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Davey's charges against the press did not end there. The former governor broadened his assault by charging that the Press, Plain Dealer, Beacon Journal, Blade and the Columbus Dispatch, in illicit concert with Bricker, "shook down" liquor distillers seeking to sell their wares in Ohio.29 The col- lusion, Davey explained, went like this: The newspapers solicited liquor ad- vertising, promising that they could get certain brands onto the shelves of state stores. The newspapers, according to Davey, would profit handsomely from the extensive advertising by liquor dealers. In a remarkable display of thoroughness, Davey subscribed to several large newspapers in Ohio, New York City, Pittsburgh and Chicago for April 1940. Most likely aided by his long-time secretary Myrna Smith, Davey then measured every column inch of liquor ads in the papers to "prove" that there was an inordinate amount of space devoted to such advertising in the Ohio press. Davey enjoyed pointing out that the Cleveland Press, for instance, published in a city of one million, carried 3,059 column inches of liquor advertising while the New York World Telegram, with a much broader circulation in a city of seven million, ran
29. Ibid., October 22, 1940. |
12 OHIO
HISTORY
only 2,111 1/2 inches in April 1940.
With these supposedly incriminating
figures in hand, Davey asked his fellow
Democrats at the state convention in
Columbus, "is it not apparent. . .
why the Cleveland Press covers up so
completely for the present
governor?"30
While Davey fulminated, a confident
Bricker refused to respond. His record
in the liquor department was clean no
matter what Davey claimed. He and the
Ohio newspapers had not conspired to
shake down liquor dealers. The truth of
the matter was that he, in startling
contrast to his predecessor, had run an
honest and efficient liquor department.31
Rather than dignify Davey's charges
with arebuttal, the governor simply
answered that his "house was in order."32
Bricker's strategy was simple. Speaking
in Cleveland, he said "the only is-
sue in this campaign is the kind of
government we are to have in this state in
the next two years.... The two candidates
are former governors, and every-
one can see them and measure the quality
of their administration[s]. My
record is well known and so is that of
my opponent."33 Bricker did not have
to attack his rival; merely quoting
Davey's fellow Democrats sufficed. One,
James Metzenbaum, a former candidate for
state senator, declared in 1938 that
the Davey administration was "born
in the cradle of shakedown." Another,
W. Burr Gongwer, a long-time party
chieftain in Cuyahoga County, predicted
statewide losses for Democrats if Davey
led the ticket in 1940. Others felt
similarly.34
Davey simply could not escape the
scandals associated with his governor-
ship from 1935-39. Rather than defend
his record, he decided to accuse his
opponent of corruption. He found his
opening in the bank closings that
swept the state in the 1930s when
Bricker was Ohio's attorney general. As
attorney general, Bricker oversaw the
disposition of monies from Ohio's
failed banks. Bricker, of course, could
not personally supervise the job and
assigned it to a small army of lawyers.
Those lawyers, loyal Republicans all,
in turn had profited handsomely from the
task. Even small town attorneys
made thousands of dollars and those in large
cities like Dayton, Toledo and
Cleveland, hundreds of thousands.35
30. Martin L. Davey, Speech at the
Democratic State Convention, September 7, 1940, Box 7,
Folder 18, Davey Papers, MSS 339, Ohio
Historical Society, 6-7. That Davey or his secretary
actually measured each newspaper's
liquor advertising is undoubtedly true. The Davey papers
at the Ohio Historical Society contain a
thick batch of liquor ads at first puzzling to the re-
searcher but certainly understandable in
context.
31. Lawrence Watt to John W. Bricker,
March 5, 1939, Box 36 and 0. E. Cover to Bricker,
November 8, 1940, Box 135, Bricker
Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical Society.
32. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
22, 1940.
33. Ibid., November 1, 1940.
34. Ibid.
35. Martin L. Davey, Excessive Legal
Fees Under Attorney General Bricker [Fall 1940],
Box 8, Folder 1, Davey Papers, MSS 339,
Ohio Historical Society. According to Davey,
Dayton and Montgomery County lawyers
took in $153,000 in fees, Toledo lawyers $309,000
and Cuyahoga County (Cleveland) lawyers
$715,000. See also Cleveland Plain Dealer,
The Feud Renewed
13
The issue was perfect for Davey who
condemned Bricker for letting greedy
lawyers profit from the misery of small
depositors who had lost their life sav-
ings in the bank failures of the 1930s.
In the scene painted by Davey,
Bricker's rich lawyer friends would
descend on Ohio's failed banks; after ex-
amining the institutions' records and
extracting their personal fees, the attor-
neys would parcel out the remaining
crumbs to the depositors.
Davey's charges struck where Bricker was
vulnerable. The governor, deeply
steeped in the Republican tradition of
self-reliance and economy in govern-
ment, was viewed by some as cold and
heartless. Old age pensioners, Davey
claimed, were among the chief victims of
Bricker's callousness. They had
been misled, Davey charged, by Bricker's
pledge in 1938 to fatten their re-
tirement checks if he were elected and
now were once again being deceived by
similar promises in 1940. The forty
dollars a month Bricker was promising
retirees would never materialize because
the state treasury was empty.36
Bricker was even more vulnerable to
accusations of heartlessness in Ohio's
relief program. The governor's problems
stemmed from an angry dispute in
1939 with Cleveland's Republican mayor,
Harold H. Burton. High unem-
ployment and underfunding by the state
had wreaked havoc with relief pro-
grams in Cleveland and several other large
cities in Ohio. Those problems,
exacerbated by Bricker's insistence that
the cities had to bear greater responsi-
bility for their own relief programs,
precipitated a crisis that captured national
attention in December 1939. Drawn into
the quarrel between the country-
born and bred Bricker and the big-city
mayor Burton were New York City's
mayor Fiorello La Guardia, Secretary of
the Interior Harold Ickes and
President Franklin D. Roosevelt himself.
Burton had complained since November
1939 that Governor Bricker refused
to call the state legislature into
special session to appropriate monies so
Cleveland could meet its relief
emergency. Sixty-thousand Clevelanders,
Burton declared, were but days away from
cold and hunger because the city had
run out of relief funds. Commiserating
with his fellow big-city mayor in a
telephone call in early December, La
Guardia, head of the United States
Conference of Mayors, asked Burton what
he might do to help Cleveland out
of its crisis.37 Shortly
afterward, in a speech in New York, La Guardia scored
Bricker for his meanness in refusing to
respond to the human misery in
Ohio.38
An angry Bricker snapped back:
"Nobody is starving in the State of Ohio,
and nobody will starve in the State of
Ohio. Mayor La Guardia was not
October 31, 1940.
36. Martin L. Davey, Press Release, June
17, 1940, Box 8, Folder 1, Davey Papers, MSS 339,
Ohio Historical Society, 1-2.
37. Cleveland Plain Dealer, December
6, 1939.
38. New York Times, December 6,
1939. La Guardia's speech was not as inappropriate as
it seems. His address was to 200 civic
leaders and health and welfare professionals.
14 OHIO HISTORY
elected Governor of Ohio, and as I
understand it he has plenty to do in New
York. When we need him in Ohio, we will
send for him." Obviously stung
by the charge of heartlessness, Bricker
added: "Ohio's record in social better-
ment compares with any State in the
Union, including New York." Bricker,
deflecting the criticism of his
administration, blamed Ohio's relief problems
on Roosevelt and his New Dealers for
their "political manipulation of the
WPA [Works Progress
Administration]."39 Specifically, Bricker charged that
in 1938, an election year, the Roosevelt
administration deliberately swelled
Cuyahoga County WPA rolls to 74,167 and
after the election reduced them to
29,125.40
The Ohioan's accusations rankled
Roosevelt. From Washington the presi-
dent refuted the charge and claimed that
Bricker was simply trying to make
himself look good by balancing the state
budget at the expense of Ohio's
needy. Secretary Ickes, echoing his boss, called the Ohio governor
"heartless."41
Good sense prevailed over hot tempers
when Burton and Bricker met pri-
vately in Columbus where the governor
suggested that Cleveland issue
$1,200,000 in bonds against delinquent
taxes. The bond monies could then
be used to meet Cleveland's relief
needs. The Ohio Board of Tax Appeals ap-
proved the plan, a private firm
purchased the bonds, the governor released
$398,000 to Cleveland from a "frozen"
state fund, and the crisis was
averted.42
Bricker's position on relief appealed to
many Ohioans who shared his fi-
nancial conservatism and antipathy to
big city problems. They were pleased
to see the governor stand firm against
immense pressures from Cleveland,
Washington, and (as one Bricker
correspondent was certain) even from
Moscow.43 However, by
choosing a balanced budget over the needs of belea-
guered citizens and by supporting rural
over urban Ohio, Bricker opened him-
self to attack during the campaign of
1940, and Martin Davey was quick to
detect the governor's vulnerability.
Scarcely a month after his 1940 nomina-
tion, Davey cited Bricker's hypocrisy in
promising relief aid to Ohioans just
months after the 1939 crisis had passed.
Bricker's interest in relief now,
Davey contended, was merely expedient.
"He has no more heart in it than the
fellow who kicks a stray and hungry dog,
and then throws him a bone from a
39. Ibid.
40. Cleveland Plain Dealer, December
6, 1939.
41. New York Times, December 9,
1939.
42. Ibid., December 7, 1939; Cleveland Plain
Dealer, December 11, 1939; Davies, Bricker,
62.
43. Ceylon E. Hudson to John W. Bricker,
December 9, 1939; F. C. Huth, P. 0. Huth and E.
W. Conner to Bricker, November 9, 1939
[should be December 9, 1939]; J. W. Huddle to
Bricker, December 13, 1939, and J. H.
Johnson to Bricker, December 30, 1939, all in Box
134A, Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio
Historical Society.
The Feud Renewed
15
safe distance to keep the dog from
biting him," Davey claimed.44 The sin
was compounded because Bricker had
$30,000,000 more in state revenues in
1939 than Davey had in 1938, yet the
Republican spent $8,000,000 less on
relief. The former governor conceded
that his opponent had increased Ohio's
relief allotment from $10,000,000 in
1939 to $12,000,000 in 1940, but that
figure paled when compared to the
$27,000,000 Davey had designated for re-
lief in 1936.45 With only a
week to go before the election, Davey, known
for his colorful speech, came up with
some of his best. Contrasting the gov-
ernor's "heartlessness" in the
1939 relief crisis with the Bricker administra-
tion's kindness in feeding thousands of
ducks stranded during a Lake Erie bliz-
zard, Davey proclaimed the moral is
"if you want to eat while Bricker is gov-
ernor, you'd better be a duck."46
Few could match Davey in transforming a
kind deed into a monumental human
failing.
Bricker's obsession with balanced
budgets and government economies no
matter the human cost opened him to
other charges of meanness as well, and
Davey was quick to seize every
opportunity to let Ohioans know that in 1938
they had elected as their governor a man
with a heart of stone. Specifically,
Bricker had no sooner warmed the
governor's chair in 1939 than he began to
fire thousands of Democratic job holders
from the Davey administration.
State law prevented him from doing so
directly, but so dedicated to the task
was he that he asked the
Republican-dominated state legislature to abolish the
government agencies where the Davey
employees found refuge. Once those
agencies were eliminated, the governor
could fire Davey's appointees with
impunity. Within weeks several so called
"ripper" bills passed the legisla-
ture, and Davey loyalists were fired in
droves. Among the casualties were
Keith Lawrence, a Clevelander and a key
Davey supporter in the legislature,
who lost his job in the Ohio State
Unemployment Commission, and Myrna
Smith, Davey's personal secretary, who
was fired from the Pardons and Parole
Commission.47 Months later,
Bricker was still trying to find ways to dis-
charge thousands of Democrats supposedly
protected by civil service. Some
of the appointees, Bricker complained,
were holdovers from Davey's predeces-
sor, George White.48
Bricker's economies, Davey argued, were
just one more example of the
Republican's callousness. No one's job
was safe, Davey declared in a Lima
speech in 1939, no matter how competent
and loyal he or she had been.
44. Martin L. Davey, Press Release, June
17, 1940, Box 8, Folder 1, Davey Papers, MSS 339,
Ohio Historical Society, 1.
45. Martin L. Davey to John W. Bricker,
August 10, 1940, VFM 1491, Davey Papers, Ohio
Historical Society; Cleveland Plain
Dealer, September 17, 1940.
46. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
29, 1940.
47. Davies, Bricker, 51-52.
48. John W. Bricker to Carl F. Wittke,
August 28, 1939, Box 36, Bricker Papers, MSS 340,
Ohio Historical Society.
16 OHIO HISTORY
Bricker had even fired Republicans Davey
had inherited and kindly kept on the
public payroll while he was governor. In
his rabid purge of Democratic job
holders, Bricker had, in Davey's
estimation, "raped civil service."49
By attacking Bricker's
"ripper" legislation, Davey appeared the champion of
working class Ohioans, a role he
cultivated at the Democratic state conven-
tion in September 1940. At Davey's
urging, the party's resolutions commit-
tee proposed to repeal Ohio's three
percent retail sales tax, which generated 45
to 50 million dollars annually.
According to Davey, the tax fell hardest on
average Ohioans and benefited big
merchandisers who collected it. Davey of-
fered no alternative to the state's
largest source of revenue but promised to
appoint a commission of tax experts to
find a fairer way of raising money
that, among other things, would allow an
increase of up to 40 dollars in the
monthly checks of pensioners.50
The wily Davey had stolen fiscal thunder
from the tight-fisted Republican
governor. Bricker, in Cincinnati, told a
radio audience that the Davey plan
was an "utter deceit" and
predicted it would likely kill state aid for the aged. It
was, he said, a "mockery on its
face." Then, as if his audience needed to be
reminded of Davey's 1935 relief quarrel
with Harry Hopkins, Franklin D.
Roosevelt's Federal Emergency Relief
Administration director, Bricker resur-
rected the scandal that had exposed
damning irregularities in the disbursement
of relief monies under Davey. Davey had
abused the public trust before and
was doing it again with his new scheme.51
The Democratic challenger could not
escape his controversial record and
consequently employed the ancient
political strategy of smearing an opponent
in order to divert the public's
attention. To that end, Davey upbraided Bricker
for avoiding combat during the Great
War, conveniently ignoring the fact that
the Republican had tried to enlist in
every branch of the military service but
was rejected by each because of a slow
heartbeat. Desperate to serve his coun-
try, Bricker, through a dispensation
from the Central Ohio Christian Church
Conference, received a one-year
appointment as assistant chaplain to the
329th Infantry. To Bricker's
consternation, however, the 329th embarked for
France before his commission was
granted. Frustrated, Bricker spent the rest
of the war tending to influenza patients
at Camp Eustis, Virginia.52 But the
truth mattered little to Martin Davey
when a clever twist to it might provide
an advantage against an opponent,
especially one he despised so intensely as
John W. Bricker.
Similarly, rumors persisted that Bricker
was anti-semitic, anti-Catholic and
49. Cleveland Plain Dealer, June
20, 1939.
50. Ravenna Evening Record and Daily
Courier-Tribune, September 6, 7, 1940.
51. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
8, 1940.
52. George P. Smith to John W. Bricker,
November 9, 1940, Box 136, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society; Davies, Bricker,
8, 12-13.
The Feud Renewed 17
a racist.53 Even if patently
false, the imputations were impossible to dis-
prove. At best, Bricker could point to
modest black support at a time when
many African-Americans had abandoned the
Republican Party for Franklin D.
Roosevelt's New Deal. And, although it
was unlikely that anything Bricker
did could blunt his enemies' slurs, he
was by 1944 a dues-paying member of
the Urban League, whose motto was
". . . a normal participation for our
Negro minority in the democratic way of
life."54
Hardest of all to discount were Davey's
accusations that Bricker did not
want the Ohio governorship so much as he
coveted his party's presidential
nomination in 1940. Many Republicans
forecast a deadlocked national con-
vention, the perfect scenario for a dark
horse with Bricker's conservative cre-
dentials. Robert Taft and Thomas Dewey,
predicted one, would cancel each
other, and Wendell Willkie would be
bypassed because he was too closely tied
to corporate America. Once this
political debris was cleared, the way would
be open to Bricker's nomination.55
The Bricker hopefuls, however,
miscalculated their favorite's intentions.
After recognizing that Taft had the
upper hand, Bricker committed to his fel-
low Ohioan, labored tirelessly for him
at the convention in June and tried
desperately but fruitlessly to stem the
Willkie tide. At the end, few could
doubt the governor's weary remark to a
friend: "We did all we could to nomi-
nate Bob [Taft] at the convention."56
By mid-October, with only about three
weeks left in the gubernatorial con-
test, Davey grew desperate for an issue
that might galvanize voters. Inventive
even for him, the Democratic candidate
tried to take advantage of a growing
American patriotism fanned by the
international depredations of Adolf Hitler,
Benito Mussolini and the Japanese
militarists. After Davey campaigned in
Marysville, a small town northwest of
Columbus, he complained that Bricker
had gotten local merchants there to
remove their American flags to protest his
visit. Davey's claim of insult failed to
energize the campaign, drawing at
best a mere sigh from the audience when
he mentioned it at a Democratic
rally in Kent.57
53. Julius B. Cohn to John W. Bricker,
May 7, 1939, Box 36, Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio
Historical Society. Charges that Bricker
was anti-black carried over from the 1936 campaign
against Davey. See Ravenna Evening
Record and Daily Courier-Tribune, October 16, 1936,
and Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
19, 26 and November 3, 1936.
54. Charles E. Adams to John W. Bricker,
January 7, 1941, Box 136, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society; Membership
Card for John W. Bricker in the Columbus Urban
League for the Year Ending April 25,
1945, Box 36, Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical
Society.
55. Ben L. Clardy to John W. Bricker,
June 17, 1940; N. I. Perry to Bricker, June 10, 1940;
Eugenie Brown to Bricker, June 26, 1940,
all in Box 135, Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio
Historical Society.
56. Davies, Bricker, 64-66; John
W. Bricker to C. V. Thomas, July 15, 1940, Box 135,
Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical
Society.
57. Cleveland Plain Dealer, October
15, 1940; Ravenna Evening Record and Daily Courier-
18 OHIO HISTORY
Davey's best hope was to link his
fortunes with Franklin D. Roosevelt's.
A similar strategy had worked in 1936
when he seconded Roosevelt's nomina-
tion in a rousing speech in
Philadelphia's Convention Hall. Throughout the
1936 campaign, Davey had invoked
Roosevelt's name and connected Bricker's
with the hapless Alf Landon's. Aided by
a ballot that combined the state and
national tickets, thereby making it
difficult for Ohioans to split their guberna-
torial and presidential votes, Davey had
ridden Roosevelt's broad coattails to
victory in his first contest with
Bricker. In 1936 Roosevelt had carried Ohio
by more than 600,000 votes; Davey had
defeated Bricker by 127,000. If
Davey were to have any chance against
Bricker in 1940, he needed
Roosevelt's help again.
By February, political strategist Dan
Moore had developed a plan that
might work. Moore recognized that Davey
had two obstacles to overcome.
First, too many Democrats would never
forgive the former governor's refusal
to support Sawyer in 1938, and second,
the national administration deplored
Davey and considered him potentially
damaging even to an immensely popu-
lar Roosevelt.58
To counter these liabilities, Moore
recommended that under the pretext of
unifying the party, Davey should get
national committee chairman James
Farley to call an Ohio-wide caucus of
Democratic precinct committeemen.
Using Farley as a stalking horse would nullify
any anti-Davey sentiment that
might undermine party unity. In
addition, either Farley or Roosevelt, not
Davey, should address the gathering.
All this was to be organized by Davey
supporters, who would then demon-
strate so loudly for their man that the
assembled Democrats would be caught
up in a pro-Davey groundswell. The
enthusiasm of the moment would over-
come the opposition of the die-hard
Sawyerites and, most importantly, "wrap
Davey around the neck of the [national]
Administration so tightly and cleverly
that they would be forced into a
position of going along."59 Undoubtedly,
Moore's suggestions had led to Davey's
ground-breaking gathering of
Democrats at Kent in July.
The strategy was sound, but 1940 was not
1936. In 1936 Davey was an
incumbent governor, testy and
embarrassing but impossible to ignore. In
1940 he was tarnished goods, unable to
persuade his own party to renominate
him just two years earlier. Moreover,
the state and national tickets were
printed on separate ballots for the 1940
election, meaning that Roosevelt's
and Davey's electoral fortunes were as
physically divorced as they could be.
Consequently, the president could treat
the Ohioan lightly, which is exactly
Tribune, October 21, 1940.
58. Myrna [Smith] to Martin L. Davey,
February 14, 1940, Box 8, Folder 1, Davey Papers,
MSS 339, Ohio Historical Society.
59. Ibid.
|
The Feud Renewed 19 |
|
|
|
what he did. No national Democrat appeared at Davey's July assembly in Kent. But that was a minor slight compared to the humiliation that Davey experienced in October when Roosevelt swung through Ohio during the cam- paign. During the president's visit to Columbus, Republican John W. Bricker rode with Roosevelt through the city's streets. Democrat Martin L. Davey fol- lowed, not one, but eight cars behind.60 The president was not merely ob- serving protocol by sharing his automobile with the sitting governor while making the challenger bring up the rear; he was sending Davey a message. The physical span between the two Democrats might have been eight cars long, but the political distance may as well have been a light year or more. Roosevelt added insult to injury as he departed the state. Five thousand people had assembled at the Ravenna, Ohio, railroad station near Davey's hometown in expectation that the president would briefly address the crowd. But there was no stop in Ravenna. The president's train raced right through, and only a handful of the eager onlookers could see Roosevelt wave from in- side his private car. Left behind were 5,000 deflated citizens from Portage
60. Ravenna Evening Record and Daily Courier-Tribune, October 12, 1940. |
20 OHIO HISTORY
County and three disappointed bands that
played on even as the Roosevelt
special sped away. Disappointment turned
to anger as some spectators yelled
"Hooray for Wendell Willkie"
to the back of the train as it clattered on to
Akron.61 The message was
clear; Martin L. Davey was not worth a presiden-
tial stop.
Roosevelt could afford to spurn Davey.
Davey could not return the favor.
Consequently, the former governor was
happy to get a second chance to link
his destiny with the president's. The
Saturday before the election, Roosevelt
was scheduled to speak in Cleveland.
Democratic candidates for offices
throughout Ohio clambered to be seen
with a president known for wide coat-
tails. A thousand Cleveland police and
firemen were assigned to keep order in
a crowd expected to reach a
quarter-million or more.
No self-respecting Democratic candidate
could hold his head high if he were
not a part of the Roosevelt event. That
certainly held true for the party's gu-
bernatorial nominee, Martin Davey. At
the same time, Roosevelt, no matter
his personal animus toward Davey, could
scarcely make what promised to be
the biggest speech of the 1940
presidential campaign without his fellow
Democrat as part of the proceedings.
Accordingly, Davey was to introduce the
Democratic state candidates to the
cheering throng of 23,500 crammed into
every seat and aisleway of
Cleveland's vast Public Hall. Ever the
keen politico, Davey recognized that
the crowd was there for Roosevelt and
not for the Ohio Democratic slate.
Consequently, after fulfilling his
obligation to the state candidates, Davey be-
gan to fire the assembly:
. . . who fed hungry people by the
millions when they had no place to turn?
Who was it who gave jobs to [the]
unemployed?
Who was it who gave us the great social
security program?
Who put humanity into the government of
the United States?
To every rhetorical question, the
frenzied Democrats roared, "Roosevelt!"62
Had the president been on the platform
at the moment, he would have been
impressed by how Martin L. Davey could
work an audience. But Roosevelt
was still outside, inching his way through
the mass of well-wishers jamming
Cleveland streets.
The moment may have belonged to Martin
Davey, but the hour belonged to
Franklin Roosevelt. Nearly five minutes
of cheering delayed the president's
speech, and even after he began, his
remarks were drowned out by continued
applause and shouts. When he could
finally be heard, Roosevelt attacked the
New Deal's critics, stressed the need
for political continuity in Washington
amid the growing perils in Europe and
Asia, and ignored both his Republican
61. Ibid.
62. Cleveland Plain Dealer, November
3, 1940.
The Feud Renewed
21
rival, Wendell Willkie, and the fact
that his quest for a third term upset an
honored tradition established by George
Washington in 1796. Through it all,
Davey sat alongside hundreds of other
platform guests. When it was over,
Roosevelt was off to Hyde Park for rest
and a final fireside chat from the com-
fort of his study on the last Monday
before the election. Davey had no such
luxury; he campaigned hard to the end,
addressing a crowd in Canton on the
same Monday night. Bricker, after a
round of speeches in Cleveland on
Sunday, retired to Columbus for one
final radio broadcast on election eve.
Even before the first votes were
tallied, Bricker forces sensed victory.
Republican state chairman Ed Schorr
anticipated that his man's margin would
be "unbelievably large."63
A Cleveland Plain Dealer poll predicted that
Bricker would carry Cuyahoga County
alone by more than 112,000 votes.64
In the other camp, Democratic state
chairman J. Freer Bittenger, more a wish-
ful thinker than an accurate forecaster,
claimed Ohioans would elect Davey by
a margin of 320,000.65 More realistic
Democrats seemed content that they
had done their best for Davey by
maintaining a harmonious front during the
president's Cleveland speech.66
From the earliest returns onward the
outcome was never in doubt. The
votes rolled in for Roosevelt and
Bricker. When it was over, the president had
easily fended off Willkie nationwide and
carried Ohio by 150,000 votes. The
win was easy but nothing like the
triumph of 1936 when he won the state by
600,000 votes. Davey, more than anyone
else, profited from Roosevelt's
enormous coattails in that election.
Portentously though, in 1936 Bricker
had run 300,000 ballots ahead of Alf
Landon. That feat was all the more re-
markable because Ohioans had to split
their tickets to vote for Bricker. The
same was not true for 1940. In a
presidential election decided more by human
than Olympian proportions, Davey could
not expect to coast on a Roosevelt
tide. This time Bricker won by more than
364,000 votes, a record-shattering
margin for an Ohio gubernatorial
election. Moreover, he was only the second
Republican reelected governor of Ohio
in the first forty years of the twentieth
century.67 Especially painful
to Davey was the fact that he barely carried his
own Portage County.68
At 11:35 the next morning, Davey wired
tersely to Bricker:
"Congratulations on your reelection
and best wishes for a successful adminis-
63. Akron Beacon Journal, November
3, 1940.
64. Cleveland Plain Dealer, November
3, 1940.
65. Akron Beacon Journal, November
3, 1940.
66. Robert J. Bulkley to James White
Shocknessy, November 4, 1940, Container 23, Folder 5,
Bulkley Papers, MSS 3310, Western
Reserve Historical Society.
67. Davies, Bricker, 70. George
K. Nash, 1900-04, was the first. See Robert H. Bremner,
"George K. Nash," in Governors
of Ohio, 136-39.
68. Ravenna Evening Record and Daily
Courier-Tribune, November 6, 1940. Davey's
margin was 734 votes.
22 OHIO
HISTORY
tration."69 Bricker
waited more than two weeks before acknowledging
Davey's wire with one equally brief:
"Thank you for your telegram of con-
gratulations."70 It was
no accident that neither man addressed the other as
"governor," with Bricker
making sure that the salutation in his telegram read
"Dear Mr. Davey." The election
was over, but there was neither a good loser
nor a gracious winner. After two fierce
campaigns, neither man could stom-
ach the other.
To friends and supporters, however,
Bricker could scarcely conceal his joy.
He wrote to one: "I am bubbling
over....";71 to another, "I felt like letting
out a whoop that you could hear clear
over in Medina County."72 He espe-
cially enjoyed the 60,000 vote majority
he won in normally Democratic
Cuyahoga County, calling it one of the
"bright spots" in the election.73 It
was different in the other camp. Davey
was simply tired.74
Bricker won primarily because he represented
honest government. A young
minister in Ravenna summarized it best
when he wrote to the victor: Your
election "has made firmer my faith
that it is possible to be honest and still be
Governor."75 Assuredly,
the frequent charges of corruption leveled at Davey
had to make Bricker look good if only by
comparison. Many Ohioans were
elated that the Davey chapter in Ohio
politics was finally closed. One Bricker
supporter called Davey a
"disgraceful menace" and was glad to see him
gone.76 Another scornfully
announced that "Martin L. can now return to his
first love, tree trimming," while
still another gloated that Bricker's decisive
victory would send Davey into permanent
retirement.77 The most colorful
remark came from a Republican in Portsmouth.
Apologetic because his
Scioto County went for Davey, the man
wrote the triumphant Bricker,
69. Martin L. Davey to John W. Bricker,
November 6, 1940, Box 135, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
70. John W. Bricker to Martin L. Davey,
November 22, 1940, Box 135, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
71. John W. Bricker to Chase M. Davies,
November 13, 1940, Box 135, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
72. John W. Bricker to C. R. Aldrich,
November 14, 1940, Box 136, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
73. John W. Bricker to W. A. C. Smith,
November 18, 1940, Box 136, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
74. Myrna Young Smith, A Letter to
Martin L. Davey From His "Man Friday," March 31,
1946, in The Davey Bulletin, 33
(July 1946), 8-9, Box 7, Folder 24, Davey Papers, MSS 339,
Ohio Historical Society. Smith wrote
this as a eulogy to Davey on the day of his death.
75. James M. Davis to John W. Bricker,
November 12, 1940, Box 135, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society. See also
Geo[rge] L. Sandrock to Bricker, November 10, 1940,
Box 136; Walton T. Skaggs to Bricker,
November 8, 1940, Box 136, and Charles F. Carr to
Bricker, November 6, 1940, Box 135, all
in Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical Society.
76. Robert S. Beightler to John W.
Bricker, November 7, 1940, Box 136, Bricker Papers,
MSS 340, Ohio Historical Society.
77. J. W. Damschroder to John W.
Bricker, November 6, 1940, Box 135, and Walter H.
Albaugh to Bricker, November 11, 1940,
Box 136, both in Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio
Historical Society.
The Feud Renewed 23
"we ... come to you with bowed
heads-so darned ashamed of the vote given
your opponent [that] we are afraid to
look a sheep-killing dog in the face."78
Davey tried to put the best face on the
results, citing several reasons for his
loss. First, Bricker enjoyed all the
advantages of an incumbent. State em-
ployees, eager to keep their jobs, had
worked hard to get their boss reelected,
and voters, more willing to support a
sitting administration, had swollen
Bricker's campaign coffers. The split
ticket separating Davey from Roosevelt
on the ballot had also hurt, the former
governor readily acknowledged. And
charges of corruption involving
kickbacks from contractors doing business
with the state and special deals with
friends of the administration that had
dogged Davey during his second term from
1937-39 resurfaced to haunt him
in the 1940 campaign.79 Looming
largest, though, was the inescapable fact
that Ohio Democrats, weary of Davey's
misbehavior in office and angry over
his perfidy in the Sawyer campaign of
1938, were willing to sacrifice their
man in 1940.80
After the election, Bricker preferred to
let bygones be bygones. He could
afford to because he had a political
future. He won the governorship in 1942
and in 1944 ran for vice-president on
the losing Republican ticket alongside
Thomas E. Dewey. He capped his long
political career with two terms as a
United States senator in 1946 and 1952.
Afterward, with minimal contro-
versy, Bricker settled comfortably into
the role of elder statesman.81
The same was not true of Davey.
Bricker's success galled his old foe.
Even before the 1940 election, Davey
sent several sneering, mean letters to
Bricker, denouncing him for
transgressions largely magnified if not entirely
contrived. A relatively insignificant
article in the May 1944 issue of
Cosmopolitan Magazine, claiming that Davey left Ohio $40,000,000 in debt
when he turned over the governor's
office to Bricker in 1939, prompted an
angry complaint to the editor from
Davey. In his correspondence to and about
Bricker, Davey never failed to refer to
his rival as "Oh righteous governor" or
to condemn his actions as
"unscrupulous."82 Such anger likely took its toll
78. F. W. Sheridan to John W. Bricker,
November 18, 1940, Box 136, Bricker Papers, MSS
340, Ohio Historical Society.
79. Facts From a Study of Election
Statistics [1940], Typescript, Box 7, Folder 18, Davey
Papers, MSS 339, Ohio Historical
Society.
80. Arthur J. Bellar to John W. Bricker,
February 28, 1940, Box 134A; Lucille Denny to
Bricker, [November 6, 1940], Box 135,
both in Bricker Papers, MSS 340, Ohio Historical
Society; Cleveland Plain Dealer, November
6, 1940; Donaldson, "Martin L. Davey," 182.
81. Bricker roused the nation in 1952
when he proposed a constitutional amendment that
would have limited the president's
executive order powers. According to the "Bricker
Amendment," no international
agreement could become law without congressional approval.
It lost by one vote in the senate in
1954. See Marvin R. Zahniser, ed., "John W. Bricker
Reflects Upon the Fight for the Bricker
Amendment," Ohio History, 87 (Summer, 1978), 322-
33.
82. Martin L. Davey to Governor John W.
Bricker, August 2, 1940; Davey to Bricker,
August 10, 1940; Davey to Bricker,
August 24, 1940; Davey to Bricker, August 31, 1940;
24 OHIO
HISTORY
on Davey's health. Three months after
his devastating loss to Bricker he suf-
fered a heart attack. He was 56 years
old. After months of bed rest, the for-
mer governor was sufficiently recovered
to run the family business in Kent.
Five years after his first thrombosis,
he suffered another, this one fatal.
Mourners, common and powerful alike,
streamed to Kent to pay their final re-
spects to Martin Davey. John Bricker was
not among them.83
Davey to the Editor of Cosmopolitan
Magazine, June 2, 1944, all in VFM 1491, Davey Papers,
Ohio Historical Society. Obviously not
satisfied with merely setting the record straight for the
editor of Cosmopolitan and the
magazine's readers, Davey circulated a "Dear Friend" letter to
present his case and to denounce Bricker
for his "falsification" of public records. See Martin
L. Davey to Dear Friend, June 2, 1944,
VFM 1491, Davey Papers, Ohio Historical Society.
83. Bricker died in 1986 at age 92 after
several debilitating strokes.
FRANK P. VAZZANO
The Feud Renewed: Martin Davey, John
Bricker and the Ohio Campaign of 1940
They were old enemies, Democrat Martin
L. Davey and Republican John
W. Bricker; two fierce rivals posed
against each other for the second time in a
contest for Ohio's governorship. Their
first race, in 1936, degenerated into a
barrage of accusations and mudslinging.
Their second, in 1940, promised
more of the same. If anything, as
Davey's local newspaper, the Ravenna
Evening Record and Daily Courier-Tribune,
predicted, the 1936 contest would
seem like a "skirmish" after
the two went at each other again.1
Davey always provided the spectacular in
his campaigns. In a political ca-
reer going back to 1913 when he was
elected mayor of Kent, Ohio, at age 29,
he had demonstrated a dramatic flair
second to none. The "boy mayor" served
his hometown for six years and then went
on to three full terms in Congress
in the 1920s.2 After losing
the 1928 Ohio governor's race, Davey won
twice, in 1934 and 1936. Flamboyant in
every political arena, he was likened
to P. T. Barnum, "always a
showman."3
Barnum-like he may have been, but no one
understood voters better than
Martin L. Davey. Cynically, but
accurately, he believed they could be
counted on to "vote their major
prejudices," and he assiduously cultivated
those prejudices. His philosophy was
simple: Ohioans would flock to the
polls to vote against a candidate but
might have to be "dragged" there to sup-
port one.4 In addition, he
maintained extensive mailing lists; postage and sta-
tionery were his greatest expenses in
every campaign.5
No one worked harder to win than Davey.
Typically, a campaign started
nine or ten months before the election
itself when he mailed letters of inten-
tion to Democratic leaders and the party
rank and file. Those letters more
than announced Davey's candidacy-they
also solicited the recipients' advice.
Here Davey was especially astute. He
knew the party faithful would be flat-
Frank P. Vazzano is a Professor of
History at Walsh University. Research for this article
was supported by a Walsh University
Faculty Scholar grant.
1. May 16, 1940.
2. Davey first filled an unexpired term
in 1918 and then won elections in 1922, 1924 and
1926.
3. Cleveland Plain Dealer, April
1, 1946.
4. Ralph J. Donaldson, "Martin L.
Davey," in The Governors of Ohio (Columbus, 1954),
180.
5. Ravenna-Kent Evening Record and
Daily Courier-Tribune, April 1, 1946.
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