Newspaper criticism for three days had been particularly severe. Editors made many charges, and were fertile in suggestions as what ought to be done to reorganize the presumably “demoralized” police department. The present writer feels confident, however, that a careful search of the files for those days will disclose hardly any suggestions likely to be at all helpful to public servants in the discharge of duty. Many questions with no real bearing on the case had been brought up by the journalists, and the Commissioner, who was patient in answering the newspaper men, began to be a little tired.
On Sunday night his big office was filled with reporters. They sat about everywhere. He had admitted them because he wanted them to see that he was working. From time to time they quizzed him in this fashion:
“Is it true that you and Commissioner Waldo have quarrelled?”
“Is Waldo going to resign?”
“Do you favor the Sullivan law against pistols?”
“Will the ‘dead line’ be maintained now?”
“Hadn’t the daily ‘line up’ of criminals ought to be restored so that detectives will know crooks when they see them?”
“Hasn’t Mayor Gaynor tied the hands of the police?”
And so forth, and so forth, and so forth.
Suddenly, on Sunday night, Dougherty turned and read the newspaper men a lecture. He said that he wanted them to understand that he was no spring chicken at his business, that he was working eighteen hours a day, and that he knew he would show results if the people would only be patient, and give him time. His only recommendation in the way of new laws or reforms was for a statute that would enable the police to put known criminals, without occupation or visible means of support, at work mending roads. He outlined a plan which, rather strangely, did not get any attention in the newspapers at all. His idea of dealing with idle criminals, he said, was to have a cart, with commissary and sleeping quarters for twelve men. As soon as twelve idle criminals with records had been sentenced, they would pull this cart out of town themselves, under guard, and go to work repairing roads. If that plan were adopted, New York would not only be as free from criminals as the District of Columbia, where a similar measure is enforced, but the roads all around the city would be so well cared for that they could be used as roller-skating rinks.