The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Digital Edition > My Day
My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt

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NEW YORK—I am glad that James R. Hoffa has decided against carrying out some of the threats made by himself or his aides concerning the delivery of supplies by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters to police installations in New York City.

It was foolish, both on the part of Hoffa and Henry Feinstein, president of the City Employees Union, Local 237, to threaten such action.

I hope, too, that the reaction of the people of New York will impress these leaders and that they will quickly understand that all of us are subject to public opinion which, when aroused, can lead to effective action.

There evidently will be a struggle in the Republican party over the minority leadership in the new Congress.

This struggle between the liberals and the conservatives exists, of course, in both political parties. It makes me wonder if the time will come when internal rifts become so great that there will be a realignment of parties, with new parties emerging, one representing liberals and the other bringing together the conservatives.

In some ways, this would make an easier division of political thinking and perhaps result in clearer policies for each party. It certainly would make our party alignments easier to explain outside of our own country. I have found the process of explaining American politics quite difficult just because of these inter-party divisions.

I found interesting the recommendations made last week by the Interdepartmental Traffic Council to Mayor Robert F. Wagner for traffic relief in New York City.

The past two weeks of holiday traffic have given all of us here a keen consciousness of the difficulties in driving from east to west or west to east across New York City. Some parking along these crosstown streets, as well as deliveries by cars and trucks and wagons, must be permitted, but sometimes I have the feeling that the people who cause the congestion think of no one but themselves.

I feel that in certain areas regulations eventually may have to be put into effect permitting night deliveries only, but I can well understand the disadvantages of organizing this on even a limited scale. It may, however, have to be done on certain streets to relieve the impossible congestion than now exists.

One-way traffic on more of the north-south avenues may be helpful, although lately I have not found it as difficult going between uptown and downtown as across town.

Basically, perhaps we should limit the growth of our cities beyond a certain population figure, as well as the number and size of private automobiles permitted on the streets. These are drastic measures which probably will be a long time in coming, yet I can see that something of the kind may have to be done in the future.

E.R.

(Copyright, 1959, by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.)


Names and Terms Mentioned or Referenced

Persons
  • Feinstein, Henry [ index ]
         American labor leader; president of AFSCME New York District Council 37
  • Hoffa, James R. (James Riddle), 1913- [ index ]
         American labor union leader
         [ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | ANB ]
  • Wagner, Robert F. (Robert Ferdinand), 1910-1991 [ index ]
         American politician and diplomat; New York City mayor, 1954-1965
         [ LC | ISNI | VIAF | Wikidata | SNAC | FAST | US Nat. Archives | ANB ]
Organizations
Geographic
  • New York (N.Y., United States) [ index ]
Other Terms and Topics
  • Local government--Political aspects
         [ Wikidata | FAST ]
  • New York City -- politics


About this document

My Day by Eleanor Roosevelt, January 3, 1959

Roosevelt, Eleanor, 1884-1962
[ ERPP bio | LC | VIAF | WorldCat | DPLA | Wikidata | SNAC ]

Digital edition created by The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project The George Washington University 312 Academic Building 2100 Foxhall Road, NW Washington, DC 20007

  • Brick, Christopher (Editor)
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  • Regenhardt, Christy (Associate Editor)
    [ ISNI ]
  • Black, Allida M. (Editor)
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  • Binker, Mary Jo (Associate Editor)
    [ VIAF | ORCID ]
  • Alhambra, Christopher C. (Electronic Text Editor)
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Digital edition published 2008, 2017 by
The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project

Available under licence from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

Published with permission from the Estate of Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

MEP edition publlished on June 30, 2008.

TEI-P5 edition published on April 28, 2017.

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Transcription created from a photocopy of a UFS wire copy of a My Day column instance archived at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library.
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