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By 8 o'clock, De Sapio had begun the workday that would last for 18 hours (seven days a week). His wavy black hair, streaked at the temples with silver, was meticulously combed. The talcum was in place. He wore the tinted glasses that are his trademark. He sat at a grey, formica-topped kitchen table and, in the manner of a man aware of his clothes, hiked up his big shoulders, thereby pulling up his coat-sleeves to reveal his gleaming cufflinks. Passing through the kitchen was De Sapio's 17-year-old daughter Geraldine (whose fierce pride in her father has led to her attaching to his initials. C.G.D., the phrase, "Country's Greatest Democrat"). About to begin her freshman year at Notre Dame College on Staten Island, Geraldine is working this summer, but not very hard, as a stenographer in De Sapio's national committee-man's office. That morning she was late. De Sapio looked anxiously at his watch. "You better get going," he admonished. "You want to get docked?"
Since dawn, the telephone had been ringing. At 8 the house phone began croaking as the doorman, 16 floors below, helped to screen visitors. De Sapio's wife answered the calls. De Sapio stayed at the kitchen table, talking to a visitor he deemed highly important.
The guest was a pollster who had just completed a postcard survey, ordered by De Sapio, as to the presidential preferences of Democratic voters in New York state. De Sapio places great stock in his polls, used them to confirm his choices of Robert Wagner (over Vincent Impellitteri) for mayor of New York City in 1953, and of Harriman (over Franklin D. Roosevelt Jr.) for governor in 1954. Says De Sapio: "You can't impose your will on the people any more. If they select the candidate in a poll, they'll elect him." De Sapio's surveys also serve the practical purpose of deflating the political stock of the candidates he plans to oppose, and inflating the prestige of the man he favors. Carmine De Sapio has lost some elections—but he has never yet lost one of his polls.
Now he learned that he had won an other. The pollster reported that among New York Democrats, 76% are foursquare behind Averell Harriman for President, only 19% favor Adlai Stevenson (a diehard 1% named Jim Farley, while 4% are undecided). The Boss of Tammany Hall was immensely gratified to receive the glad—but not unpredictable—tidings.
A Long Row to Hoe. For a leader of Tammany to be taking postcard surveys like a sort of political science professor must set the bones of Boss Tweed and Dick Croker to rattling about in their coffins. But the public-opinion poll is only one of the many ways in which Tammany Hall, under De Sapio. has changed, is changing, and will continue to change.