INVESTIGATIONS: The Man Who Pulled a Thread

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Then Williams got interested in the income taxes of racketeers. Organized crime cannot exist without political protection, and it was only logical to suspect that the protection might extend to income taxes. Williams got and put into the Senate records the income-tax files of Harry Gross, Frank Costello, Phil Kastel, Ralph Capone, Greasy Thumb Guzik and others. Costello, for instance, was 20 years delinquent in taxes and had not been investigated for ten years. The Treasury protested that it couldn't collect from Costello because he didn't seem to have any property. Williams helpfully furnished the address of a Costello property: 79 Wall Street. How and where could a Millsboro chicken-feed dealer find a fact that was hidden from the Treasury sleuths? Williams found it in the Treasury files.

$81 Million Missing. Along the way, Williams had a notable tiff with the Department of Agriculture. He heard from one of his sources that the department's books did not balance, that a matter of some $350 million could not be accounted for. The law requires every federal department to submit its books to Congress every year. Agriculture's hadn't been submitted for four years. "I called the Comptroller General," says Williams. "They said that the Department books were in such a mess they couldn't be audited."

Williams tried to get the Senate to pass a resolution demanding the books. Senator Scott Lucas "made a big fuss," says Williams, "and then he put into the record a letter from [Secretary of Agriculture] Brannan calling me a liar. Well, I began to wonder if I was right, to tell you the truth."

But "Whispering Willie" was right as rain. He had never been to college, but he had kept the books of a chicken-feed company and his neighbors will swear that he never lost $3.50, let alone $350 million. When he got Agriculture's books, $366 million were missing. Subsequent accounting has reduced the discrepancy to a mere $81 million. Williams, in his small-town way, still considers that a lot of money.

Williams never had a secretary until he went to Washington, but he took a good one along with him, Eleanor Lenhart, a classmate of his daughter. She sorts all the tips that come in, and shows the promising ones to the Senator. "We just can't check everything," he says. "I don't have a doubt in the world that the biggest case of all time will turn up in some committee some day and they'll say, 'Why we gave that to Williams years ago.' "

One of Williams' big worries is that some day somebody will accuse him of fixing a tax case or some other impropriety. His friends tell him not to worry; he's impregnable to smears. He doesn't drink or smoke and is a devoted family man. He admits reluctantly that in the distant past he played a little poker. "But not for money," he adds quickly.