There was no real party division on most of the things that were of
concern in State politics, both Republicans and Democrats being for and
against them. My friendships were made, not with regard to party
lines, but because I found, and my friends found, that we had the same
convictions on questions of principle and questions of policy. The only
difference was that there was a larger proportion of these men among the
Republicans than among the Democrats, and that it was easier for me at
the outset to scrape acquaintance, among the men who felt as I did, with
the Republicans. They were for the most part from the country districts.
My closest friend for the three years I was there was Billy O'Neill,
from the Adirondacks. He kept a small crossroads store. He was a young
man, although a few years older than I was, and, like myself, had won
his position without regard to the machine. He had thought he would
like to be Assemblyman, so he had taken his buggy and had driven around
Franklin County visiting everybody, had upset the local ring, and came
to the Legislature as his own master. There is surely something in
American traditions that does tend toward real democracy in spite of our
faults and shortcomings.
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