New York State Governor Thomas E. Dewey Central Subject and Correspondence Files

This series is arranged by gubernatorial term and alphabetically by subject or correspondent therein.

Thomas Edmund Dewey was born in Owosso, Michigan on March 24, 1902. He married Eileen Hutt in 1928 and together the couple had two sons. A Columbia Law School graduate, Dewey entered public service for the first time in 1931 when he became chief assistant United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. In 1935, Governor Herbert Lehman appointed him special prosecutor to investigate and prosecute racketeers. In 1937, Dewey was elected New York County district attorney. He ran successfully for governor three times, obtaining the office first in 1942 and retaining it in both the 1946 and 1950 elections. While serving as governor, he twice campaigned unsuccessfully as the Republican Party's candidate for the presidency (1944 and 1948). Following completion of his third gubernatorial term, he returned to private law practice. Thomas E. Dewey died on March 16, 1971, just eight days shy of his sixty-ninth birthday.

Thomas E. Dewey is best remembered for establishing New York's state university system and initiating construction of the New York State Thruway. As governor, Dewey blended fiscal conservatism with a personal conviction that government bore a share of the responsibility for the welfare of the citizenry. He took measures to increase governmental efficiency and balance the state budget, leading to reductions in spending and decreases in state taxes. He initiated investigations of the state's workers' compensation and mental health care systems, as well as the state police and municipal governments including the city of Albany. Dewey encouraged the state Department of Commerce to assist New York businesses in obtaining contracts during the Second World War, but also began taking measures to ease conversion to a peacetime economy before demobilization of the armed forces.

Dewey sponsored expansion of minimum wage coverage and advocated equal pay for equal work by women. He obtained legislative consent to establish a system of unemployment insurance for returning veterans prior to the end of hostilities and reorganized the state Health and Social Welfare departments to improve services for the blind, aged, and dependent children. Dewey was a strong proponent of civil rights and actively supported the state's landmark 1945 "Law against Discrimination," which established the administrative machinery to eliminate discrimination in employment based on race, color, creed, or national origin. He also introduced public health programs to counter tuberculosis and other deadly diseases, and sought to address overcrowding in state hospitals through both improved outpatient treatment and new construction.

For further information concerning the life and political career of Thomas E. Dewey, see Smith, Richard Norton. Thomas E. Dewey and His Times. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1982; and Rae, Nicol C. "Dewey, Thomas Edmund." In American National Biography, vol. 6, ed. John A. Garraty and Mark C. Carnes, 521-523. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

The central subject and correspondence files of Governor Thomas E. Dewey document communication between the governor's office, state agencies, and the general public regarding the administration of state government during the Second World War and the immediate postwar era. Significant topics include commencement of construction of the New York State Thruway; establishment of New York's state university system; legislation aimed at combating discrimination in employment and in higher education; federal and state aid to education; teachers' salaries, educational television, and moral/spiritual training in schools; establishment of child care centers; prevention of crime and juvenile delinquency; investigations of local gambling operations in numerous cities and counties across the state; and investigations of charges against local government officials, including New York City Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia.

Additional topics include provision of housing, educational facilities, unemployment benefits, and veterans' bonuses for soldiers returning from service during the Second World War. Related topics include war demobilization and conversion to peacetime economy; postwar public works planning; state efforts to influence federal immigration policy regarding persons displaced by war; the Fort Ontario refugee center in Oswego; universal military training; race relations, including reactions to the killing of African American veterans by a white police officer in Freeport; location of the United Nations headquarters site; and the partition of Palestine.

Other topics documented in the records include investigations of conditions in mental hospitals, including the Moreland Act investigation of the management and affairs of Creedmoor State Hospital; Moreland Act investigation of state agencies in relation to pari-mutuel harness racing; investigation of the State Police; investigation of workmen's compensation law administration; integration of social welfare agencies; industrial labor relations, including strikes in the coal and steel industries; unemployment insurance and minimum wage legislation; fuel shortages; residential rent control; flood control; public health issues, including tuberculosis control; development of air transportation policies; and administration of Niagara and St. Lawrence River water power resources.

Subject and correspondence files themselves consist predominantly of original letters and telegrams from public officials and private citizens and organizations; unsigned copies of replies or memoranda from the governor forwarding correspondence to state or local government officials for action; and copies of state and local government officials' replies to the governor and/or the original correspondents. Other types of records include governor's cabinet meeting materials; public hearing minutes; drafts of letters by state agency heads for the governor's signature; press releases; annual and special reports of state agencies; draft copies of legislation and resolutions; budget reports and summaries; gubernatorial messages, speeches, and proclamations; newspaper clippings; publications; and background materials. Moreland Act investigation files include public and private hearing transcripts, exhibits, correspondence, press releases, and final reports.

Series B1852, Index to Central Subject and Correspondence Files of Governor Thomas Dewey, 1943-1954, indexes this series.

Access to certain records documenting Moreland Act investigations is restricted. Records are subject to review by State Archives staff prior to disclosure.