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A sachem of Tammany Hall, whom Alexander Sachs once asked how Al Smith knew so much and from where he got his information that made him such a strong advocate for all this labor and social legislation, said, “Al Smith read a book.”

Sachs said, “Did he really? What did he read?”

The sachem said, “He knew Frances Perkins and she was a book.”

It was repeated to me almost the day after it was said so I'm pretty sure it was true. I think it was Alexander Sachs to whom this was said, but it's just possible that it was somebody else. The book part of it had to do with the fact that at that time I could describe what I had seen. That was why he used to like to put me on the stand when they were making factory investigation hearings.

Thus his campaign was voted on these social reforms that he'd voted for. He took office on January 1st, 1919, and within the month of January he appointed me Commissioner of the New York State Industrial Commission. The appointment came as a complete surprise to me. It was his own idea, I afterward learned from him. I probably ought not to say that it was a complete surprise, but it really was because the man who came and told me that he had heard that this was going to be was a man who was in no position to know really. He was a Republican and it was a self-serving item to tell me.