From Big House to White House?

RUDY GIULIANI'S domestic affairs have recently been in the news (his three wives, his relationship with his children) so maybe it's time to look at another of his family ties.

Rudy's father, Harold Giuliani, spent time in Sing Sing for armed robbery. On the other side of the fence, as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, appointed by President Reagan, Giuliani prosecuted the heads of New York's five mob families: Paul Castellano (Gambino), Carmine Persico (Colombo), Tony Corallo (Lucchese), Philip Rastelli (Bonanno) and Tony Salerno (Genovese).

Selecting Rudy as its man of the year for 2001, Time included this on Giuliani's father:

"By conventional standards, Harold Giuliani was not a great man. In 1934, he was arrested for robbing a milkman at gunpoint in the vestibule of a Manhattan apartment building. A court-appointed psychiatrist diagnosed him as an 'aggressive, egocentric type.' He served a year and a half, and then went to work as a bartender and enforcer for his brother-in-law Leo D'Avanzo's loan-sharking operation, according to court documents and eyewitness accounts uncovered by Giuliani biographer Wayne Barrett."

As the case against the top bosses of the New York mafia began, Giuliani explained his strategy and objective in simple terms:

"Our approach is to wipe out the Five Families." In equally simple terms, he described his mission: "To make the justice system a reality for the criminal."

The "reality" in this case turned out to be hundreds of years in prison for eight top-level New York mob bosses. Before leaving the courthouse, never to see freedom again, Corallo offered the traditional "Cent'Anni" toast, "May we live 100 years." Replied Lucchese family underboss Salvatore Santoro, "I think it's time to get a new toast."

Arguing that it's a mistake to "socialize the responsibility for crime," a mistake to turn the explanations for crime into excuses for crime, Giuliani stressed individual accountability rather than collective culpability:

"We elevate human beings by holding them responsible. Ultimately, you diminish human individuality and importance when you say, 'Oh, well, you're not really responsible for what you did. Your parents are responsible for it, or your neighborhood is responsible for it, or society is responsible for it.' In fact, if you harm another human being, you're responsible."

Said another way, Giuliani didn't use his neighborhood or his mob-connected in-laws or his father's criminal past as an excuse for failure.

In 1993, he became the first Republican in a generation to be elected mayor of New York City. In 1997, in a city where Democrats hold a 5-to-1 registration advantage over Republicans, Giuliani was re-elected with nearly 60 percent of the vote.

By the time his eight years were over, overall crime in the city (rapes, assaults, burglaries and car thefts) was down 64 percent, the murder rate was reduced 67 percent, taxes were cut 20 percent, and the squeegee men (windshield cleaners who coerced drivers into giving them money at traffic lights) were out of business.

The city's economy was growing faster than the nation's for the first time since World War II, Times Square was no longer a porno district, tourism had increased by 50 percent, the city payroll was cut by 20,000 jobs without layoffs, construction permits had increased 60 percent, and the mob was gone from the Fulton Fish Market. The city jobless rate had dropped from 10.3 to 5.1 percent, 640,000 fewer people were collecting welfare and an inherited $2.2 billion budget deficit was turned into a multibillion-dollar surplus.

Before Giuliani, from 1990 to 1993, taxes in New York City went up $1.5 billion and the city lost 340,000 jobs - 192,000 in 1991 alone, the largest annual job loss ever in an American city.

To reverse the downward spiral, Giuliani eliminated or reduced 23 taxes, saving individuals and businesses a record $8.1 billion. The result was a record 450,000 new jobs created in the city's private sector in seven years and a 55 percent increase in overall personal income. "Tax reductions spur growth," explained Giuliani.

All told, not a bad step up from Sing Sing in one generation. *

Ralph R. Reiland is an associate professor of economics at Robert Morris University in Pittsburgh.