(2 of 2)
"Vigilant but Discreet." In July 1928 Assistant Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrandt went personally to Manhattan to give Major Campbell legal assistance in a spectacular set of nightclub raids, coinciding in time with the Democratic Presidential nomination of Alfred Emanuel Smith at Houston. Democrats loudly protested that this was the rankest sort of Prohibition politics. Republican leaders advised Washington that such Dry tactics would lose the G. O. P. many New York votes. Major Campbell quoted Assistant Secretary Lowman as saying to him a month later at a Treasury conference: "The trouble is you've got it too Dry in New York. The people up there on these hot days have their tongues hanging out of their parched throats and a little beer won't hurt them." Following this alleged conversation, the Major received a letter from Commissioner Oftedal, approved by Assistant Secretary Lowman, ordering all agents out of Manhattan breweries.
On Aug. 28 Administrator Campbell received a Lowman telegram, which Undersecretary of the Treasury Ogden Mills later told him had been edited by Secretary Andrew William Mellon. It read: "Any unusual spectacular and sensational activities must be guarded against. . . . Political propaganda is made out of garbled accounts of Prohibition activities. Instruct your agents to be vigilant but careful and discreet."
Major Campbell objected to taking his men out of breweries, to telling them to avoid raids which might be "sensational."
"Horse Doctor!" In retort to Major Campbell's charges, Assistant Secretary
Lowman last week said: "Major Campbell was a horse doctor in the Army. The horses died. He was a moving-picture magnate. The company went bankrupt. As Prohibition Administrator he failed to dry up New York. He had a free hand. As an author his imagination beats that of Dante. I have nothing further to say."
Assistant Secretary Lowman thereupon vanished from Washington, left unanswered a mass of public questions.
Last of Lowman? Last week there were broad reports that the Campbell articles had deeply stirred, sorely embarrassed the Administration, that Assistant Secretary Lowman's resignation might soon be expected.