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Woodrow Wilson As I Know Him
Chapter I - The Political Laboratory
by Tumulty, Joseph P.
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My introduction to politics was in the Fifth Ward of Jersey City, New
Jersey, which for many years was the "Bloody Angle" of politics of the
city in which I lived. Always Democratic, it had been for many years the
heart and centre of what New Jersey Democrats were pleased to call the
great Gibraltar of Democracy. The ward in which I lived was made up of the
plainest sort of people, a veritable melting pot of all races, but with a
predominance of Irish, Germans, and Italians, between whom it was, like
ancient Gaul, divided into three parts.
My dear father, Philip Tumulty, a wounded soldier of the Civil War, after
serving an apprenticeship as an iron moulder under a delightful, whole-
souled Englishman, opened a little grocery store on Wayne Street, Jersey
City, where were laid the foundation stones of his modest fortune and
where, by his fine common sense, poise, and judgment, he soon established
himself as the leader of a Democratic faction in that neighbourhood. This
modest little place soon became a political laboratory for me. In the
evening, around the plain, old-fashioned counters, seated upon barrels and
boxes, the interesting characters of the neighbourhood gathered,
representing as they did the leading active political forces in that
quaint cosmopolitan community.
No matter how far back my memory turns, I cannot recall when I did not
hear politics discussed--not ward politics only, but frequently the
politics of the nation and the world. In that grocery store, from the lips
of the plainest folk who came there, were carried on serious discussions
of the tariff, the money question, our foreign relations, and all phases
of the then famous Venezuelan question, which in those days threatened to
set two continents on fire.
The make-up of the little "cabinet" or group which surrounded my father
was most interesting. There was Mr. Alexander Hamill, the father of
Congressman Hamill of Jersey City, a student of Queen's College in Ireland
and who afterward taught in the National Schools of Ireland, a well-read,
highly cultured, broad-minded man of affairs; and dear Uncle Jimmie
Kelter, almost a centenarian, whose fine old gray hair gave him the
appearance of a patriarch. Uncle Jimmie nightly revelled in the recital to
those who were present as ready listeners, his experience when he was
present at a session of the House of Parliament in London and heard the
famous Irish statesman, Daniel O'Connell, denounce England's attitude of
injustice toward Catholic emancipation. He loved to regale the little
group that encircled him by reciting from memory the great speech of
Robert Emmett from the dock, and excerpts from the classic speeches of the
leading Irish orators like Curran, Sheridan, and Fox.
While these discussions in the little store wended their uneasy way along,
a spark of humour was often injected into them by the delightful banter of
a rollicking, good-natured Irishman, a big two-fisted fellow, generous-
hearted and lovable, whom we affectionately called "Big Phil." I can see
him now, standing like a great pyramid in the midst of the little group,
every now and then throwing his head back in good-natured abandon,
recounting wild and fantastic tales about the fairies and banshees of the
Old Land from whence he had come. When his listeners would turn away, with
skepticism written all over their countenances, he would turn to me, whose
youthful enthusiasm made me an easy victim upon which to work his magic
spell in the stories which he told of the wonders of the Old Land across
the sea.
I loved these delightful little gatherings in whose deliberations my dear
father played so notable a part. Those kind folk, now off the stage, never
allowed the spirit of provincialism to guide their judgment or their
attitude toward great public affairs. I recall with pleasure their
tolerance, their largeness of view, and fine magnanimity which raised
every question they discussed to a high level. They were a very simple
folk, but independent in their political actions and views. Into that
little group of free, independent political thinkers would often come a
warning from the Democratic boss of the city that they must follow with
undivided allegiance the organization's dictum in political matters and
not seek to lead opinion in the community in which they lived. Supremely
indifferent were these fine old chaps to those warnings, and unmindful of
political consequences. They felt that they had left behind them a land of
oppression and they would not submit to tyrannous dictation in this free
land of ours, no matter who sought to exert it.
In this political laboratory I came in contact with the raw materials of
political life that, as an older man, I was soon to see moulded into
political action in a larger way in the years to come. I found in politics
that the great policies of a nation are simply the policies and passions
of the ward extended. In the little discussions that took place in that
store, I was, even as a youth, looking on from the side-lines, struck by
the fine, wholesome, generous spirit of my own father. Never would he
permit, for instance, in the matter of the discussion of Ireland--so dear
to his heart--a shade of resentment or bitterness toward England to
influence his judgment in the least, for he believed that no man could be
a just judge in any matter where his mind was filled with passion; and so
in this matter, the subject of such fierce controversy, as in every other,
he held a judgment free and far away from his passionate antagonisms. I
found in the simple life of the community where I was brought up the same
human things, in a small way, that I was subsequently to come in contact
with in a larger way in the whirligig of political life in the Capitol of
the Nation. I found the same relative bigness and the same relative
smallness, the same petty jealousies and rivalries which manifest
themselves in the larger fields of a great nation's life; the same good
nature, and the same deep humanity expressing itself in the same way, only
differently apparelled.
One of the most interesting places in the world for the study of human
character is the country store or the city grocery. I was able as a boy
standing behind the counter of the little grocery store to study people;
and intimately to become acquainted with them and their daily lives and
the lives of their women and children. I never came in contact with their
daily routine, their joys and sorrows, their bitter actualities and deep
tragedies, without feeling rise in me a desire to be of service. I
remember many years ago, seated behind the counter of my father's grocery
store, with what passionate resentment I read the vivid headlines of the
metropolitan newspapers and the ghastly accounts of the now famous
Homestead Strike of 1892. Of course, I came to realize in after years that
the headlines of a newspaper are not always in agreement with the actual
facts; but I do recall how intently I pored over every detail of this
tragic story of industrial war and how, deep in my heart, I resented the
efforts of a capitalistic system that would use its power in this unjust,
inhuman way. Little did I realize as I pored over the story of this
tragedy in that far-off day that some time, seated at my desk at the White
House in the office of the secretary to the President of the United
States, I would have the pleasure of meeting face to face the leading
actor in this lurid drama, Mr. Andrew Carnegie himself, and of hearing
from his own lips a human and intelligent recital of the events which
formed the interesting background of the Homestead Strike.
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