Jessica Tisch is taking on the dirty work

Desperate times call for desperate measures. 

Mayor Eric Adams’ recent appointment of Jessica Tisch as police commissioner is reminiscent of another troubled New York City mayor’s gambit to save his political career. In December 1928, Mayor Jimmy Walker found himself in a precarious position. 

The NYPD scandal at that time — its inability to solve the murder of notorious gambler Arnold Rothstein — was dragging down his administration just as he was gearing up for reelection. Much like Adams, Walker had doled out important political posts to cronies and let them run their agencies roughshod. 

He and his police commissioner, Joseph Warren, had at one time shared a law office. While Warren himself wasn’t corrupt, he was not the dynamic leader the police department needed at that time. In fact, after Rothstein was shot, Warren let the chief of detectives take an extended vacation, leaving the investigation with little oversight. 

With the chief of detectives out of the way, the investigation fell into the hands of the chief of the Confidential Squad, Lewis “The Honest Cop” Valentine. This worried Walker since Valentine might uncover something that would lead back to the administration. That was the last thing Walker could afford. That meant one thing, Warren who had practically ceded control of the police department to his underlings, had to go, much in the same way Adams forced Police Commissioner Edward Caban to make a hasty exit while still claiming he had his full support. 

When Warren received the news that he was out, he grumbled to the reporters that he had wasted three years as police commissioner toiling for the city. Ironically, the man Walker handpicked for the position had no desire to become police commissioner. His name was Grover Whalen (no relation) and he managed the famous Wanamaker’s Department Store. His job paid 10 times the police commissioner’s salary, an unheard of $100,000 per year during the Depression. 

Much like Jessica Tisch, he was considered very wealthy. But he possessed excellent managerial skills and was well-known to all New Yorkers as the face of the city’s famous ticker-tape parades. He had also served as spokesman for Walker’s predecessor, Mayor John Hylan. Walker arranged for Whalen’s department salary to be put in escrow while he served as police commissioner, so he would not lose money by accepting the post. 

The first thing Whalen did after he was sworn in was to fire the chief of detectives and the chief inspector. The men he put in their place were well respected superior officers. He ordered a thorough review of the Rothstein investigation. Although the reassessment implicated a highly decorated detective, Whalen was unable to get a conviction of either the detective or the alleged murder suspect. 

He demoted Valentine to captain and jettisoned him to a command in Long Island City where he was no longer a threat to Walker or even lowly patrolmen who Whalen said no longer had to worry about plainclothes spies from the Confidential Squad peeping around the corner. 

He also created the first comprehensive department manual so members of the force could have a handy reference to guide them through their daily duties. He used his business connections to provide new eight-point uniform caps to all patrolmen free of charge. These reforms went a long way to restoring the public’s confidence in the police department and the patrolmen’s sense of morality. 

Walker’s plan worked. He easily defeated Fiorello La Guardia in 1929. With that out of the way, Walker was overheard on election night saying, “Now Grover can go.” 

If Eric Adams is successful in his reelection bid, it will be in part because Tisch did his dirty work by ridding the NYPD of people he himself was reluctant to cast aside and the reforms she has already started to put in place. The question is, will she be rewarded for her hard work, or be told it’s time to go?

Bernard Whalen is a former NYPD lieutenant and the co-author of “The NYPD’s First Fifty Years” and “Case Files of the NYPD.”