Subseries: Henry Maier, 1985 April 25
Note: Access online.

BIOGRAPHICAL BACKGROUND
Scope and Content Note: Raised by maternal grandmother in Springfield, Ohio. Father died when he was eleven months old. Mother lived in Milwaukee, which was his legal residence. Grandparents were very interested in “public life.” Attended many political meetings with his grandparents. Grandmother encouraged him to get into “public life” and on her death bed at age 103, she expressed disappointment that he was only a mayor. “'I raised you to be no less than a governor.'” Active in forensics in grade and high school. Active in athletics--football, basketball, and boxing. When he entered the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he took his stepfather's last name. Original name was “'Nelke'..., which means 'carnation' in German. The name 'Maier' was actually more appropriate because that means 'the leader of the village.'” Never knew any Nelkes because there was a family dispute over who should raise him when his father died. Grandparents were “devotees” of Franklin Roosevelt. Grandmother a teacher; grandfather a farmer who was driven off the farm by the Depression.

COLLEGE YEARS
Scope and Content Note: Attended UW Extension in Milwaukee for two years, 1936-38. Was president of the student council as a freshmen and was the school's orator. As a freshman, lost a speech contest to UW-Madison senior, Jim Doyle, 95 percent to 96 percent. Active in the 'Roosevelt for President” Club on campus in 1936 in Milwaukee. Also active locally with the Progressives and the Socialists. At Madison was a member of the League for Liberal Action. Also, in 1940 for a while was active in the 'Wilkie for President' Club, which he abandoned in the later stages of that campaign. Became skeptical of Phil La Follette when he tried to launch the National Progressives of America. Flirtation with Wilkie was the result of his anti-war feelings. Voted for Roosevelt in 1940. Belonged to a fraternity in Madison because it provided him employment. Worked summers as a construction laborer and a janitor. Graduated 1940.

WORLD WAR II
Scope and Content Note: After graduation, took some graduate courses, got married, had a child. In the Navy was trained as a supply officer. Stationed on a destroyer in the Pacific. The first squadron into Hiroshima after the security forces.

INSURANCE BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: Was hired by an insurance company out of college. Taught agents. Became an expert in comprehensive policies. Hired by another company prior to World War II. After the War, had his own general insurance agency, which he ran throughout his years in the legislature.

WAS A DEMOCRAT FROM THE TIME HE RETURNED FROM THE WAR
Scope and Content Note: Supported McMurray for senator and Hoan for governor in 1946. Voted in the Democratic primary in 1946.

RAN FOR MAYOR OF MILWAUKEE IN 1948
Scope and Content Note: “My immediate image when I returned from war was not necessarily a partisan image.... My interest at that point in my life was largely urban and Milwaukee.” Was not yet 29 years old when he ran for mayor.

EARLY INVOLVEMENT IN THE DOC
Scope and Content Note: “I was involved from day one.” Mayoral campaign cost him his home. Became chairman of the First Ward Democratic Club. Close friends with Tehan and Biemiller.

STATUS OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IN MILWAUKEE, 1948
Scope and Content Note: Statutory organization in place. DOC in Milwaukee did not have the big advantage that Madison had--the backing of a progressive newspaper, the Capital Times. Closest thing Milwaukee got to being backed by a newspaper was the active role of Vi Lomoe, wife of the executive editor of the Milwaukee Journal. She and Maier started a party newspaper in order to put forth a program. Party committeemen at the time “could care less” about a program. “I wanted to introduce a programmatic approach into the party.” Worked every night and weekend for ten months in an effort to break the power of the statutory committeemen. When he felt he had laid the ground work, he called a meeting of the committeemen to ask them “to sign over their powers.” Tehan and Hoan came and told him it was not yet time. “And I said, 'It's tonight or never. I've given ten months to this. I can't give any more time to this.'”

WINNING DEMOCRATIC PARTY POWER FOR THE DOC IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Dan Roan said, “'I never thought I'd see those committeemen sign away their powers.'” They signed over their powers in exchange for a promise of having one of the three votes allotted to each ward. Maier was provisional chairman of the Milwaukee DOC at this time.

ORGANIZING THE DOC IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Maier was elected chairman. Set it up with one chairman for each senatorial district, which constituted the executive committee. This was a manageable group, but the next chairman changed the size of the executive committee to twenty-one, “some ungodly number.”

MORE ON WINNING CONTROL OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY IN MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Key meeting was held in early 1949. Much of the preparatory work was done through the newspaper he and Vi Lomoe were producing, harping away at the need for a central organization, the DOC. Later on the Milwaukee Journal passed a rule that no employee's spouse could work in direct political action. Vi later worked on Maier's staff. Her husband, according to many, was the spirit of the Journal, “a very, very tough, objective newsman.” The newspaper Maier and Vi Lomoe put out espoused “a doctrine, because there was a lack of doctrine and we were also relating that doctrine to the necessity to have a central organization, which we could not have if the committeemen were going to run it, were in control.” Maier always program-oriented rather than personality-oriented.

OTHER DOC ACTIVISTS IN MILWAUKEE IN 1948 AND EARLY 1949
Scope and Content Note: Eddie Mesheski. Myron Gorden. Andy Biemiller and his secretary, the future Jean Lucey. “Some of the best friends I had were Bob Tehan and Andy Biemiller and Dan Hoan, a pretty good group to know when you were just cutting your eyeteeth in this business.”

MILWAUKEE'S DEMOCRATIC LEGISLATORS AT THE TIME IGNORED THE PARTY
Scope and Content Note: Thus, they paid little attention to the DOC organizing work Maier was doing. “The party was very much handicapped, particularly in this area because you had big labor, big business, big communications in monopoly form. Where the hell is there room for people running a party who couldn't really get any substantial financing and had no patronage.” That was one of the reasons Maier emphasized program so much. “Because that's all it really had as a weapon.”

1948 MAYORAL RACE
Scope and Content Note: Some of his best friends had managed Carl Zeidler's campaign, especially Bob Block, “who was the real genius of the group.” Formed the New Milwaukee Committee, which “took the first housing survey, that I know of, in the inner core.” Maier finished sixth out of fifteen, right behind Dan Hoan. The new Milwaukee Committee was made up of “post-World War II youngsters.” The committee dissolved after the mayoral election.

THE WISCONSIN DEMOCRAT
Scope and Content Note: Does not recall much about it, but he was very much in favor of a publication. Dan Hoan survived as mayor in Milwaukee for so long because of the Leader. “I always felt that you had to have a basic house organ of some kind, particularly in politics.”

MORE ON ORGANIZING MILWAUKEE COUNTY FOR THE DOC
Scope and Content Note: Maier took squadrons out door to door trying to get membership. “We had a different situation. Madison could almost start bright and glistening and new, but we couldn't swing that kind of a start here.” Today, Milwaukee has some bright young legislators who are starting to challenge Dane County. “History is reasserting itself.”

ELECTION TO THE STATE SENATE IN 1950
Scope and Content Note: Tehan's seat. The question was whether he would run for lieutenant governor or state senator. Chose the state senate seat because he wanted to win.

1950 DEMOCRATIC SENATORIAL PRIMARY
Scope and Content Note: Supported William Sanderson “because I was a protege of Andy Biemiller's and he was supporting Sanderson.... We were talking about farm-labor party representation at that time.” Dan Hoan ran because he had done well as a gubernatorial candidate and felt “he had sufficient stature to make the grade. And Dan was very restive.” Maier, in retrospect, could never understand why Sanderson entered the race. Some people used these races at this time as trial runs for the future; some were just trying to help the Party. “Carl Thompson was a real hero. He never figured he could win, but he damn near gave his life trying.”

DOES NOT RECALL 1951 SELECTION OF GLADYS HOAN AS NATIONAL COMMITTEEWOMAN
Scope and Content Note: Opposition was mainly Hannah Biemiller. “I don't think necessarily Hannah would have been that popular either in the Party.... She could be harsh. Gladys was very personable.” Dan Hoan was more involved in the Party than Andy Biemiller, who was rather aloft from the Party.

DAN HOAN'S SHIFT OF HIS POLITICAL BASE TO NORTHWESTERN WISCONSIN
Scope and Content Note: “Dan was striking in all different directions in those days, to try to get back in. He must have missed it horribly. And he was a young man yet.” Bright. “The great articulator of the Socialist movement. He was not the great organizer of the Socialist movement.” The Socialist organization in Milwaukee was rusty by 1940. Maier “inherited the remnants of the Socialist leadership in 1948 . Zeidler had a few of them, but I got the stalwarts,” the former members of the Socialist Party executive committee.

LABOR'S ROLE IN MILWAUKEE AND WISCONSIN POLITICS
Scope and Content Note: In 1948 the Machinists endorsed Maier second, behind Frank Zeidler, for mayor. He was pro-labor because of his experiences in the Depression and the fact that his grandfather had a railroad pension to see them through that period. Labor was very important politically in Milwaukee in the 1930s and 1940s, but began to decline in importance in the 1950s. In the 1950s the younger people in the shops forgot “what the hell labor really stood for outside of wages and hours and working conditions.” CIO became “a shadow of the old AFL.” “The bosses' propaganda has again taken -hold.” News media people are the bosses' “agents.” “The man who rose out of the DOC as the rising star of organized labor and the farmers, in my humble opinion, is Gaylord Nelson.” Labor was certainly supportive of what was happening in the DOC and was supportive with its money, but only a few individuals were really active in the party. The Autoworkers, the Steelworkers, the Machinists, and the Teamsters were the most politically active, though the latter sometimes were active with Republicans. In Wisconsin the Teamsters are still more progressive than their national leadership. “Ideologically, I thought the CIO was right on the mark.” Personally, George Haberman was probably to the right of his membership, but publicly he was always in step with what the rank and file really wanted.

DEMOCRATS IN THE LEGISLATURE IN THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: The Democrats in the legislature “religiously worked on the party platform in those days, and religiously enrolled the party platform in the bills.” Fought for those bills also, even though they knew they would not pass. Passed quite a bit of the program when Nelson became governor. Much of the program was for efficiency in government, resulting in the Department of Administration. Also instituted the party platform's call for higher salaries for university faculty.

CREATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Maier held the balance of power “on the integration of higher education, which Kohler wanted. And so, because I had that balance of power, I was able to parley the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee into existence.” University of Wisconsin-Madison fought to prevent this. Maier felt it was very important to get the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee because it had been a hardship for him to attend college in Madison. Unbeknownst to him at the time, he was invited to a meeting as a freshman at the University Extension in Milwaukee to help agitate for a merger of the extension and the teachers college into UW-Milwaukee.

THE REAPPORTIONMENT ISSUE, 1951-1953
Scope and Content Note: “I was the leader for population reapportionment in Wisconsin.” Raised 14,000 dollars to fight for reapportionment. Anecdote about Frank Zeidler charging Maier for long distance phone calls he made on behalf of reapportionment, “a city issue.” Republican Voluntary Committee, meanwhile, was spending 96,000 dollars to fight reapportionment. Democrats won a reapportionment referendum; then the Republicans won a referendum in a light spring election which would permit geography as a factor in apportioning the state senate. The Republicans proceeded to reapportion on that basis and one seat was lost--Maier's. “They said it was the computer that spit me out.” He regained the seat when the state supreme court ruled that this reapportionment was illegal. Anecdote about Zeidler getting cold feet about attending a meeting Maier arranged at the site of the first state capitol in Belmont. Meeting was very successful. Zeidler was well-meaning, but of no help in the reapportionment fight. He put out press releases, but provided no money and no organization. His press releases were simply received as those from “the Socialist mayor of Milwaukee.”

MAIER'S RELATIONSHIP WITH FRANK ZEIDLER
Scope and Content Note: “I stood up for Zeidler in the senate, by the way. I was very loyal to him.” After the “clay boat incident” in regard to the Kohler strike , the legislature was challenging Zeidler's harbor authority. Maier threatened to filibuster. The rest of the Milwaukee delegation was “really shafting him.” “I think that after I became mayor, he just resented the fact that I had a different outlook and a different modus operandi, that was proven to have some success.”

CATLIN BILL
Scope and Content Note: Maier led the longest filibuster in the history of the state in opposition to passage of this bill, which curtailed labor's political contributions. A state senate filibuster differed from the U.S. senate in that one could not read from a printed document without permission and also had to stick to the subject. Maier filibustered for twenty-four hours.

MAIER HELPED WRITE GOVERNOR NELSON'S “SEND THE LEGISLATURE HOME” SPEECH
Scope and Content Note: The Republican senate was blocking all of Nelson's legislation and nothing was getting done. So Maier advised Nelson to send the legislature home. Maier and Ed Bayley wrote the speech. Bayley told Maier on the way into the senate for the speech not to let Nelson change his mind. “Gaylord said the more he read that speech the angrier he got.”

DEATH RESOLUTION FOR SENATOR JOE McCARTHY
Scope and Content Note: As a majority leader, the Republicans showed Maier an innocuous resolution and then substituted a resolution that praised McCarthy's fight against communism. Maier objected on the floor, but “Gaylord ran.” Nelson left the floor of the senate. Maier and two Polish senators voted against the resolution. He thought, with his Catholic district, that he would be criticized, but a Catholic priest commended him for his vote. “Gaylord was very sorry that he didn't stay on that vote day.”

GAYLORD NELSON
Scope and Content Note: “A tremendously popular man, tremendously likeable and tremendously talented. I still think, if he'd had the fire in his belly, he could have been president of the United States.” “A remarkably good issue touch. He also had an understanding of how the political system works.” Did not really fault Nelson for avoiding the McCarthy resolution since it was not a vote of any real consequence and since Nelson liked to preserve a working relationship with the Republicans.

MORE ON DEMOCRATIC STATE SENATORS IN THE 1950s
Scope and Content Note: Quite active. Never had a significant split in the senate. Daily caucuses. Once a senator from Superior missed a caucus and Maier had some of his constituents call him and ask where he was.

TODAY THERE IS LESS PARTY DISCIPLINE IN PART BECAUSE THE PLATFORMS OFTEN CONTAIN PLANKS VIEWED AS EXTREMIST BY THE PUBLIC
Scope and Content Note: Also the party has somewhat abandoned its basic economic issues. “Now I think the legislature themselves have been more concerned with the basic issues and less with those fringe issues and I think that there's a gulf between them wanting to really stand for the party platform and the interest in their own reelections.” Lack of fights over control of the party in recent years and “that may also signify a lack of real concern and real attention to what a party basically should be standing for; and that is it ought to be a program vehicle.” Still more concern about patronage than program. Legislators are not program oriented enough either. Too often legislators engage in personal attacks just to capture the attention of the press.

STRUGGLES FOR CONTROL OF THE PARTY
Scope and Content Note: During the transition period, 1947-1955, “I think there was simply people were trying to get into position. This was sort of a horse race as to who was really going to emerge. And of course there is some muscling in that kind of a race. So I think it led to more personality conflicts” but “never, in my opinion, was there any kind of a deep-sixing of the issues.” United in opposition to McCarthy and united in the basic platform of the party. “It wasn't a question of how you were going to run the party. It was who was going to run the party.... That's where the power fights came from.”

MAIER DID NOT TAKE AN ACTIVE ROLE IN THE DEMOCRATIC SENATORIAL PRIMARY IN 1952
Scope and Content Note: Was very involved in the Adlai Stevenson campaign and the reapportionment fight, the referendum for which was on the November ballot. “Between Henry Reuss and Tom Fairchild I didn't feel we could lose.”

MAIER SUPPORTED JIM DOYLE IN THE 1954 GUBERNATORIAL PRIMARY
Scope and Content Note: Was not very active, but felt Doyle had made contributions to the party which should have earned him the nomination. Proxmire was not sufficiently party-oriented. Used to be a bigger supporter of Proxmire. Differences with Jim Doyle were mainly style and personality.

MAIER'S RACE FOR THE U.S. SENATE IN 1956
Scope and Content Note: No one especially wanted to make that race. “My real ambition was someday to be the mayor of the city of Milwaukee. And I thought I'd make that run as a trial. I never expected to win. But I made some personal political gains in the race. Madison opposed me with Elliot Walstead, and Elliot didn't fair very well in that primary.” That was Maier's first statewide race and he did better than Proxmire.^[1] “But I really never had an orientation to be a statewide figure.”

MAIER'S DIFFERENCES WITH THE MADISON RING
Scope and Content Note: Madison people ran Walstead against him in the 1956 primary. Maier “was responsible for Philleo Nash's defeat of Horace Wilkie. And of all the people to defeat, he was the last one I wish I had defeated because I liked him so very much. But... I felt it was time for us to be in the sun somewhere. So I managed Philleo's campaign pretty largely.” An effort to make Milwaukee's presence in the party more visible. “To show that we were here too.” “I had been the hammer out of Milwaukee. I was the one person who would challenge them.” “They took the view that it had to be one of their own. There's always been this feeling--now it's more statewide than it used to be--that there's an arrogation of power in Dane County.” When Nash lost the party chairmanship to Pat Lucey, Maier was not involved in the campaign.

MAIER DID NOT CONSIDER RUNNING FOR THE SENATE IN 1957
Scope and Content Note: Had health problems at the time. Did not have the stamina or the money to make the race.

THE BREAKTHROUGH IN 1958
Scope and Content Note: Many variables. One was the “Republicans were misfiring.” Vernon Thomson was a “perfect foil” for Gaylord Nelson. Also, Nelson had a very broad base of support within the Democratic Party. The Capital Times had a great deal of influence, well beyond its circulation and it was a great supporter of Nelson. Nelson also had many personal liaisons with labor and farm leaders. “And he was likeable, very likable.” The timing was right: a very strong Democratic candidate running at a time when the Republicans had made a lot of mistakes.

1960 MAYORAL CAMPAIGN
Scope and Content Note: There were no major issues that separated Maier and Henry Reuss. “It was relatively a gentlemen's campaign. Jack Kohl, who is scarcely a friend of mine, said that it was one of the most brilliant campaigns in history. And I think that that is possibly true. It wasn't highly funded, but it was well-executed in the field and the television debates helped me greatly.” Maier went to sixty-five factory gates in the dead of winter. “I walked every main street in Milwaukee.” Did not spend any time going to small meetings and did not make the rounds of the party meetings. Concentrated heavily on a platform: “The Seven Steps to Progress,” seven program papers. Reuss also had “the sleeping bag thing” and also was not provided much debate experience in Congress.

MAIER'S POLITICAL AMBITIONS
Scope and Content Note: “I'm essentially an urban man.” Wanted to be mayor. The Farmers Union twice asked him to run for governor because as state senator he voted one hundred percent right on its roll call “'and you understand the problems of poverty and that's the most important consideration.'” “I never wanted to live in an executive mansion, and I wanted to live in Milwaukee. I passed up some Washington opportunities too. I never wanted to live in Washington. And, by and large, we've had an effect. We've had our influences. And we're not done yet.”

MAIER AND MILWAUKEE'S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE STATE GOVERNMENT
Scope and Content Note: Got along fine with Gaylord Nelson as governor. Only difference with governor Lucey was over the machine and equipment tax exemption. Did have differences with governor Warren Knowles “because Warren didn't know that I knew that he was criticizing me for the handling of the riots.” John Reynolds “was not at all an urban governor,” but Maier had no big issues with him. Milwaukee legislators were very friendly with Maier until “the present crowd got elected.” According to state senator Mordecai Lee, John Norquist and other Milwaukee legislators “make hay” in Madison with upstate Democrats by attacking Maier. “'That means they can keep their chairmanships.'” That was never a problem until the Democrats got a majority in the state senate. “By the way, there's been some easing of that since that statewide survey of the Journal's in which I had a job rating neck and neck with Bill Proxmire, 82-84 percent.” “They always thought I was the mutton-head around the state because of a few goddamn legislators that are demi-gods out of Milwaukee.” Mayors throughout the country traditionally fight governors because the latter have “the resources and mayors don't have them.”

MILWAUKEE LEGISLATORS ON MILWAUKEE ISSUES
Scope and Content Note: Some were bad on the prison issue whether to locate a state prison in Milwaukee, but the state senators were pretty good on that issue. Not too bad on shared taxes. Abominable on the sewerage issue. “Seems to me that there's some drifting towards business that oughn't to be there. You're never going to satisfy business.”

MAIER ON BIG BUSINESS
Scope and Content Note: “They just happen to get surveyed more than any other class.” When business got “too big for its britches and produced 1932,” the electorate “knocked them off.” When labor started to get too big, the electorate gave it the Taft-Hartley Act. Now business is getting too big again, and “if we can ever get by the national media and the networks, ...we'll get back to the people.” This follows John C. Calhoun's doctrine of the concurrent majority.

MAIER'S MASTERS DEGREE, 1964
Scope and Content Note: Wrote his thesis on the office of mayor. Used it as an opportunity to think through his theories of leadership. Published by Random House. It “was no great strain.”

MAIER'S FREELANCE WRITING
Scope and Content Note: Started writing in order to teach himself to write better. Started this as a state senator and the masters thesis was just another part of it. Politicians need to take courses in statistics, algebra, and trigonometry, and learn the discipline of writing.

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY OF WISCONSIN DOES NOT HAVE A SUFFICIENT URBAN POLICY
Scope and Content Note: Particularly true of Tony Earl. Maier had high hopes that Earl would be a great governor. Earl promised Maier he would not destroy the “growth formulas and this is his mission now.” Milwaukee is “overloaded” with services to poverty and the underprivileged and Earl wants to add a prison to it. The leaders of the party have never even asked for an urban policy. Earl's tax policy is too far to the right for Maier. “The idea of a special program to give tax breaks to the rich. Jesus Christ! At the expense of the cities.”

OUTSTATE VIEW OF MILWAUKEE
Scope and Content Note: Confusion over the fact that the suburbs are not part of the city. “Some people think that we have the wealth along with the poverty.” Madison press corps is unfriendly to Milwaukee.