Over the course of the 1960s and early 1970s, the nature and public perception of racial and environmental crises in American metropolitan areas shifted dramatically. In response to emboldened and expanding numbers of activists, urban politicians both re-doubled old efforts and adopted new approaches. But how and to what extent did policymaking change? This article focuses on a New York powerfully shaped by Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller, a pragmatic and ambitious man who forthrightly embodied a liberal approach to governing that placed confidence in the state's ability to solve social problems. The complex storm of 1960s era activism and the Rockefeller administration's attempts to adapt to the times revealed important contours of postwar American liberalism—its internal tensions and evolutions and its potential and limitations.
Paul D. Moreno, From Direct Action to Affirmative Action: Fair Employment Law and Policy in America, 1933-1972 (Baton Rouge, 1997 ), especially 107-161; Cary Reich, The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer 1908-1958 (New York, 1996 ), 756-7; Robin W. Winks, Laurance S. Rockefeller: Catalyst for Conservation (Washington, DC, 1997), 21-35, 63-65, 121-139.
2.
Warren Weaver , Jr., “State G.O.P. Backs Housing Bias Bill,” The NewYork Times, February 8, 1961; Douglas Dales, “Governor Signs Bill Extending Ban on Housing Discrimination,” The New York Times, April 23, 1963; James E. Underwood and William J. Daniels, Governor Rockefeller in New York: The Apex of Pragmatic Liberalism in the United States (Westport, CT, 1982), 124-5; on 1960s open space programs, Adam Rome , The Bulldozer in the Countryside: Suburban Sprawl and the Rise of American Environmentalism (New York, 2001), 132.
3.
Underwood and Daniels, Governor Rockefeller in New York, 196-200; “The Rockefeller Record,” December 11, 1973, in Folder 103, Box 2, Series 27, RG 15, Rockefeller Archive Center, Sleepy Hollow, NY (RAC hereafter); Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. House of Representatives, “Analysis of the Philosophy and Public Record of Nelson A. Rockefeller” (Washington, DC, 1974), 22.
4.
Underwood and Daniels, Governor Rockefeller in New York, 206-7.
5.
Robert H. Connery and Gerald Benjamin , Rockefeller of New York: Executive Power in the Statehouse (Ithaca, NY, 1979), 258-61; Underwood and Daniels , Governor Rockefeller in New York, 173ff.; for a guide to understanding the details and consequences of Rockefeller's creative and controversial financing schemes, Annmarie Hauck Walsh, The Public's Business: The Politics and Practices of Government Corporations (Cambridge, MA, 1978).
6.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 261-2; February 27, 1968, Rockefeller press conference transcript, Box 2, Folder 27, Series 27, RG 15, RAC; Underwood and Daniels , Governor Rockefeller in New York, 138; Sydney Schanberg, “How to Twist Arms: The Rockefeller Way,” The New York Times , April 11, 1968.
7.
Eleanor Brilliant, The Urban Development Corporation: Private Interests and Public Authority (Lexington, MA, 1975); UDC Annual Reports, 1969-1975.
8.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 330-8, 341-2; John Joseph Gargan, “ The Politics of Water Pollution in New York State: The Development and Adoption of the 1965 Pure Waters Program,” (PhD dissertation, Syracuse University, 1968), 258-279, 302ff., 393, 399-406, 434; Henry Diamond, “Nelson Rockefeller and the Environment” (unpublished article in authors possession), 13; Richard Terry Sylves, “Construction Grants Decision Making and Distributive Politics: The New York State Pure Waters Program” (PhD dissertation, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, 1978 ), 34-5.
9.
Marshall to Rockefeller re: “Pure Waters Program,” August 10, 1970, on Reel 13, 3rd Rockefeller Administration, RAC; Diamond to Rockefeller, November 5, 1971, in Folder 29, Box 2, RG 15, Series 28, RAC; Peter Kihss, “A Shortage of Pollution-Free Oil Seen,” The New York Times, June 29, 1970; Bayard Webster, “Pollution Ebbing in City's Waters ,” The New York Times, February 25, 1970; Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 342-3.
10.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 339; Gargan, “The Politics of Water Pollution in New York State,” 302-8, 311; Agis Salpukas, “ L.I. Shellfish Beds Reopen as Duck Farms Curb Waste,” The NewYork Times, March 8, 1970; Ron Stone, “Boatmen Battle Pollution in Vain,” The New York Times, January 23, 1969; Sylves, “ Construction Grants Decision Making and Distributive Politics,” 37.
11.
Moreno, From Direct Action to Affirmative Action, especially 145-53; Roger Waldinger, Still the Promised City?: African Americans and New Immigrants in Postindustrial New York (Cambridge, MA, 1996), 174-197.
12.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 178; Eugene T. Reed to Rockefeller, February 13, 1967, and Jack Greenberg et al. to Rockefeller, July 20, 1967, Reel 25, 3rd Rockefeller Administration, RAC.
13.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 178-80; “Governor Backs Strict Bias Law and Overhaul of Rights Panel,” The New York Times, March 28, 1968; Debevoise to Rockefeller, November 13, 1967, Reel 24, 3rd Rockefeller Administration, RAC.
14.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 180, 188; Marshall to Debevoise, June 4, 1968 , Marshall to Rockefeller, January 9, 1970, Marshall to Mangum, January 16, 1970, Reel 24, 3rd Rockefeller Administration, RAC.
15.
Magnum to Marshall, February 3 and July 24, 1970, Reel 24, 3rd Rockefeller Administration, RAC; David Shipler, “Data of Lefrak Said to Come from Urban League,” The New York Times, August 8, 1970; NYS Division of Human Relations News Release, May 19, 1971, Reel 22, 4th Rockefeller Administration; Paul Good, “ The Bricks and Mortar of Racism,” The New York Times Magazine, May 21, 1972.
16.
Elizabeth H. Haskell and Victoria S. Price, State Environmental Management: Case Studies of Nine States (New York, 1973), 136-43; Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 164-66.
17.
Haskell and Price, State Environmental Management, 151-55, 159; New York State DEC, “The First 3 Years” (Albany: July 1, 1973); Henry Diamond to Rockefeller, February 8, 1971, “Rockefeller Reports and Papers,” Box 60 and Diamond to Rockefeller, February 13, 1971, “Rockefeller Bi-Weekly Reports,” Box 60, Department of Environmental Conservation, Commissioner's Files (Series 13063-78), New York State Archives, Albany, NY (NYSA); Office of the State Comptroller, “Audit Report on the Pure Waters Program” (Albany: March 31, 1972); Diamond speech, April 13, 1971, in “Diamond Speeches 1971,” Box 16, Department of Environmental Conservation, Executive Office (Series 13063-80), NYSA.
18.
On the state office building controversy see Brilliant, The Urban Development Corporation, 83-90; Long and Robinson, How Much Power to the People? A Study of the New York State Urban Development Corporation's Involvement in Black Harlem (New York, 1971), 25-42.
19.
Brilliant, Urban Development Corporation, 85; Long and Robinson, How Much Power to the People?, 33; Simon Anekwe, “Sit-In To Stop Work,” New York Amsterdam News, July 7, 1969; Juana Clarke, “The Coalition Tell Its Side,” New York Amsterdam News, August 2, 1969; William Border, “State Postpones Harlem Building ,” The New York Times, July 3, 1969; “Summary of ARCH's Position,” attached to Logue to Rockefeller , December 24, 1969, in Folder 3e, Box 271, Series IX, Logue Papers, Sterling Library, Yale University (LP hereafter).
20.
Walker to Logue, Folder 699, Box 304, LP; Brilliant, Urban Development Corporation, 88, 121-4; Long and Robinson, How Much Power to the People?, 87-9.
21.
Logue to Dolly, May 1, 1969; Walker to Logue, May 15, 1969, and July 2, 1970, Folder 699, Box 304, LP; Brilliant, Urban Development Corporation, 88, 121-4; Long and Robinson, How Much Power to the People?, 87-9; Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner, Children, Race, and Power: Kenneth and Mamie Clark's Northside Center (Charlottesville, VA, 1996), 40, 217-36; Robert A. M. Stern el al., New York1960: Architecture and Urbanism Between the Second World War and the Bicentennial (New York, 1995), 880-1.
22.
Simon Anekwe , “Reclamation Site Still Occupied,” New York Amsterdam News, July 12, 1969; Charlayne Hunter, “ Response Mixed to State Offer of Aid for Harlem Office Site,” The New York Times, September 20, 1969; C Johnson, “Sale of State Site in Harlem Urged,” The New York Times, September 30, 1969.
23.
HuxtableAda Louise“The State Office Building Dilemma ,” The New York Times, November 2, 1969 .
24.
McCall to Logue “Re: Interim Report on UDC/Harlem,” December 22, 1969, in Folder 691, Box 303, JP; Logue to Rockefeller, December 24, 1969, in Folder 3e, Box 271, LP.
25.
This assessment is based on Brilliant, Urban Development Corporation, 87-90 and numerous letters and meeting minutes especially in Folders 3c, 3h, Box 271 and Folder 669, Box 303, LP.
26.
Except where noted elsewhere, this Adirondacks section draws from Philip G. Terrie, Contested Terrain: A New History of Nature and People in the Adirondacks (Syracuse, NY, 1997); Richard Booth, “New York's Adirondack Park Agency,” in Brower and Carol, eds., Managing Land-Use Conflicts: Case Studies in Special Area Management, (Durham, NC, 1987) 140-184; Paul Schneider, The Adirondacks: A History of America's First Wilderness (New York, 1997); Frank Graham, Jr., The Adirondack Park: A Political History (New York, 1978); Richard A. Liroff and G. Gordon Davis , Protecting Open Space: Land Use Control in the Adirondack Park (Cambridge, MA, 1981 ).
27.
Liroff and Davis, Protecting Open Space, 28, 68; Ian McHarg , Design with Nature (Philadelphia , 1969); for more on McHarg, see Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 181-87.
28.
In addition to Graham, Jr., The Adirondack Park: A Political History, chapter 26, see Michael R. Silverman, “ The Impact of Competing Pressure Groups on the Passage of the New York State Adirondack Park Land Use Bill of 1973” (PhD dissertation, New York University, 1976), chapter 4 for the list of amendments and detailed analysis of political battles in the legislature.
29.
Schneider, The Adirondacks, 306ff, 318; Terrie, Contested Terrain, 178; James Howard Kunstler, “For Sale,” The New York Times Magazine, June 18, 1989, 22-25, 30-33.
30.
Diamond, “ Nelson A. Rockefeller and the Environment,” 5-6.
31.
Connery and Benjamin, Rockefeller of New York, 274-280, 356-362; Nelson Rockefeller, Our Environment Can Be Saved (New York, 1970), 26-7; Nelson A. Rockefeller, “ Transportation: Balance and Growth,” October 16, 1970 , in Folder 945, Box 44, Press Office Sub-series I, RAC; Allan Talbot, Power Along the Hudson: The Storm King Case and the Birth of Environmentalism (New York, 1972), 160-185; Marilyn Weigold, “Bridging Long Island Sound,” New York Affairs2 (Spring 1975), 52-65; Michael N. Danielson and Jameson W. Doig, New York: The Politics of Urban Regional Development ( Berkeley, 1982), 133-36; “Rockefeller Record,” December 11, 1973, Folder 103, Box 2, Series 27, RG15, RAC.
32.
Reich, The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 156; Creel to Scrivner, July 22, 1969, in Folder: Urban League of New York (1965-69), Box 110, Series 4, Rockefeller Brothers Fund Papers, RAC; Levy to RBF Files, June 5, 1970, Folder: Urban League of New York (1970-71), Box 233, RBF; Singletary to Marshall, August 23, 1969, Reel 25, Rockefeller 3rd Administration, RAC; Shipler, “Data on Lefrak Said to Come From Urban League,” The New York Times, August 8, 1970.
33.
Republican Governor George Pataki shut down the HUDC in 1995. Debate between critics and defenders of the HUDC during this final period can be followed in: Brett Pulley, “Governor Closes Harlem Development Agency,” The New York Times, August 31, 1995; Matthew Purdy, “Audits Indicate Misuse of Funds By Aid Agency in Harlem,” The New York Times, May 1, 1997; Matthew Purdy, “Ex-Leaders of Harlem Agency Defend Development Record,” The New York Times, May 10, 1997.
34.
Wood to Logue, December 4, 1973, in Folder 692, Box 303; Cogsville to Logue, March 27 and October 11, 1974, and Logue to Cogsville, November 12, 1974, in Folder 693, Box 303, LP; Brilliant, The Urban Development Corporation, 130-32.
35.
Sheila Rule, “ Signs of Harlem Rebirth Seen in Construction Spurt,” The New York Times, March 1, 1980; David W. Dunlap, “Harlem's Apollo Theater To Be a Cable TV Studio,” The New York Times, May 18, 1982; George Dugan, “Powell sees `Breaking Point' on Harlem Building,” The New York Times, October 13, 1969; “Name Change to Honor a Harlem Hero,” The New York Times, July 20, 1983.
