Participation Type
Paper
Presentation #1 Title
A Partnership for Change Forged in the Steel City: Michael Musmanno & Henry Ellenbogen
Presentation #1 Abstract or Summary
In 1930 author R.L. Duffus, in article entitled “Is Pittsburgh Civilized?” characterized the city as being under the control of a clique of Scots-Irish big businessmen. While this was true at the moment Duffus was writing, the winds of change were blowing. By 1935, the city’s diverse ethnic and racial minorities had jelled together into a durable coalition that moved Pittsburgh from the Republican to the Democratic column. Exemplars of this change were two very different young lawyers who first came into prominence in the late 1920s – Michael A. Musmanno and Henry Ellenbogen: one Italian and the other Jewish, united in a common purpose. Both of them liberals, they eventually became associated with the New Deal, sharing a strong pro-labor bent. They would cooperate closely over the course of their long careers. The first instance of this cooperation came in 1929 at the start of their public lives with their joint effort to end Pennsylvania’s Coal and Iron Police system. Musmanno, fresh from his work as a member of the Sacco & Vanzetti defense team, had recently been elected to Pennsylvania’s State House, representing its 12th legislative district. Ellenbogen was working at the time as General Counsel for Pittsburgh’s newly created branch of the American Civil Liberties Union. In this effort, these two men took on Pittsburgh’s, and by extension Pennsylvania’s, power elite. While both men eventually went on to distinguished careers in public life, this initial fight would always be a touchstone for each of them. This paper looks at their partnership in this effort, how it worked, and how it was a harbinger of the major political shift that was soon to take place in Pittsburgh’s politics.
At-A-Glance Bio- Presenter #1
Richard P. Mulcahy is Professor of History and Political Science with the University of Pittsburgh’s Titusville Regional Campus. He is the author of A Social Contract for the Coal Fields and was section Co-editor for “Health” in The Encyclopedia of Appalachia. He is also a Fellow of the Center for Northern Appalachian Studies at Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.
A Partnership for Change Forged in the Steel City: Michael Musmanno & Henry Ellenbogen
In 1930 author R.L. Duffus, in article entitled “Is Pittsburgh Civilized?” characterized the city as being under the control of a clique of Scots-Irish big businessmen. While this was true at the moment Duffus was writing, the winds of change were blowing. By 1935, the city’s diverse ethnic and racial minorities had jelled together into a durable coalition that moved Pittsburgh from the Republican to the Democratic column. Exemplars of this change were two very different young lawyers who first came into prominence in the late 1920s – Michael A. Musmanno and Henry Ellenbogen: one Italian and the other Jewish, united in a common purpose. Both of them liberals, they eventually became associated with the New Deal, sharing a strong pro-labor bent. They would cooperate closely over the course of their long careers. The first instance of this cooperation came in 1929 at the start of their public lives with their joint effort to end Pennsylvania’s Coal and Iron Police system. Musmanno, fresh from his work as a member of the Sacco & Vanzetti defense team, had recently been elected to Pennsylvania’s State House, representing its 12th legislative district. Ellenbogen was working at the time as General Counsel for Pittsburgh’s newly created branch of the American Civil Liberties Union. In this effort, these two men took on Pittsburgh’s, and by extension Pennsylvania’s, power elite. While both men eventually went on to distinguished careers in public life, this initial fight would always be a touchstone for each of them. This paper looks at their partnership in this effort, how it worked, and how it was a harbinger of the major political shift that was soon to take place in Pittsburgh’s politics.
