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1873-1944
"All the ills of democracy can be
cured by more democracy." — Alfred E. Smith
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Smith was born to Alfred Emanuel Smith and
Catherine Mulvihill and initially grew up in the
multiethnic Lower East Side of Manhattan, on
Oliver Street, New York City. His four
grandparents were Irish, German, Italian, and
English, but Smith identified with the Irish
Catholic community and became its leading
spokesman in the 1920s. On May 6, 1900, Alfred
Smith married Catherine A. Dunn, with whom he
had five children.
Smith's first political job was as a clerk in the
office of the Commissioner of Jurors in 1895. In 1903
he was elected to the New York State Assembly.
He served as vice chairman of the commission
appointed to investigate factory conditions after a
hundred workers died in the disastrous Triangle
Shirtwaist Factory fire in 1911. Smith crusaded
against dangerous and unhealthy workplace
conditions and championed corrective legislation.
In 1911 the Democrats obtained a majority of seats
in the state Assembly, and Smith became
chairman of the powerful Ways and Means
Committee. In 1912 he became the majority
leader, and in 1913 he was elected as Speaker of
the Assembly.
Smith was elected governor of New York in 1918.
During his term, New York laws governing
workers' compensation, women's pensions, and
child and women's labor were strengthened with
the help of Frances Perkins, soon to be FDR's
Labor Secretary, and ahead of many states. After
the 1928 election, he became the president of
Empire State, Inc., the corporation which built
and operated the Empire State Building.
He died on October 4, 1944, at the age of 70,
broken-hearted over the death of his wife from
cancer five months earlier; he is interred at
Calvary Cemetery, Queens, New York.
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