New York: Woise Than Ever

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Lawrence Gerosa, Independent, an amiable trucking millionaire with tight-fisted fiscal ways, was twice elected the city's controller on tickets with Bob Wagner. Dropped by Wagner this year, Gerosa announced that he was the candidate of "God and the good people," is running on a ticket of his own making but has only nuisance value.

Louis Lefkowitz, Republican, who doggedly fought his way up from an East Side Manhattan slum to Fordham Law School, a city judgeship under Fiorello La Guardia, and a successful private practice, has served 4½ years as a hard-working state attorney general. Elated by the rift in Democratic ranks, New York City's feeble G.O.P. tried first to get either liberal Senator Jacob Javits or personable young Representative John Lindsay to run for mayor. Both refused; the party finally settled on Lawyer Lefkowitz, and picked running mates to produce a ticket that sounds like three parts of a Notre Dame backfield: Lefkowitz, Fino and Gilhooley. The G.O.P. campaign, based mostly on the possibility that the Democrats will destroy themselves, has not yet gotten off the ground.

Last week was characteristic of the campaign's level. Gerosa began a merry-go-round of accusations by pointing a finger at Wagner for using city-paid domestic help in his Long Island summer home (the New York district attorney's office looked into the case, cleared Wagner of wrongdoing). Gerosa also complained that Wagner had run up a $5,605 food bill between June and September 1960 at Gracie Mansion, the mayor's official residence. Bob Wagner rose in righteous indignation. "I," he cried, "am the first mayor to pay my own food bills at Gracie Mansion." Then Wagner began tossing out his own accusations: he charged both Gerosa and Levitt with responsibility for a deal that enabled the sponsors of a Queens housing project to make a windfall profit of $2,400,000. Understandably pained, Democrat Levitt accused Wagner of issuing a "vile, vicious slander." The mayor, he cried, was "unfit to hold public office." As for Republican Lefkowitz, who faces only token opposition in his party primary, he spent most of the week vacationing in Saratoga.

As of last week, New York City's voters seemed almost as confused as the can didates. The Times, reporting on a Levitt foray into the garment district, discovered that many voters still did not know who the state controller was—and that those who recalled the name thought he was Lefkowitz. Levitt was regarded as a slight favorite in the Democratic primary on the basis that a small turnout (400,000 or less) would enable his organization support to pull him through. But even if Wagner is defeated in the primary, he will still be the nominee of the Liberal Party and of the brand-new, labor-backed Brotherhood Party, and will appear on the November ballot. So, too, will both Republican Lefkowitz and Independent Gerosa. Thus, there is a distinct possibility that between September and November the same four candidates will still be at it—which should make the campaign even woise than it was before.