Edwin Jaeckle

Edwin Frederick Jaeckle, (1894 – 1992) was a Republican politician and party chairman in New York State. He was born in Buffalo, New York. During his Chairmanship of the state Republican party in the 1930s, he advanced party discipline to a previously unachieved level, resulting in a dramatic change of fortunes in the success of the GOP statewide.

He was responsible for selecting a New York City District Attorney, Thomas E. Dewey, as the party's candidate for the New York governorship. Dewey won and went on to two unsuccessful runs for the White House in the 1940s. Jaeckle was the campaign chairman of the first run.

"Without Mr. Jaeckle's early support," The New York Times noted in 1992, "Dewey might never have served three terms as Governor of New York or made two runs for President." (NYT May 16, 1992)

"I was not Dewey's man," Jaeckle recalled in an interview. "Nor was he mine. Events brought us together. We were a very strong combination. There was a mutual respect. I was like a trainer with a good horse." (NYT May 16, 1992)

The keys to Jaeckle's success as Republican Party leader in New York were integrity, tight fiscal control and tight control of his office holders.

"You've got to be on the up and up," he said. "You can't take care of friends and relatives if you want to attract people to the party. They have to believe in you and believe in the party structure. That's the secret of politics." (Buffalo Magazine, January 1974)

The corollary to Jaeckle's integrity was good old-fashioned budgeting.

"Do you know I ran the Dewey campaign for governor in 1942 for $200,000. I'd make up the budget and that would be it. I ran it like a business. I never took any expenses. (Wry smile.) And nobody put their hands in the cash register." (Buffalo Magazine, January 1974)

"We [the party under his leadership] never had a dinner to mop up deficits." Buffalo Courier-Express, March 3, 1974.

As for control of the party office holders, Charles Van Devanter reported in his 1944 book, "The Big Bosses," that after Jaeckle assumed the statechairmanship in 1938: "For the first time in three decades, a state boss frankly ran the legislature, shaping the GOP program, and seeing that it was executed. The Albany Legislative Correspondents' Association included in its annual satirical show a song with the refrain: 'You've gotta get Jaeckle's O.K.'"

Jaeckle also was a successful lawyer in private practice. He graduated from the University at Buffalo Law School. His law firm, [http://www.jaeckle.com/ Jaeckle, Fleischmann & Mugel] is still in existence.

Jaeckle died May 14, 1992 in Florida. He is interred at Buffalo's Forest Lawn Cemetery.

In addition to Charles Van Devander's 1944 book, "The Big Bosses," Jaeckle's political life is discussed in Richard Norton Smith's 1982 book, "Thomas E. Dewey and His Times."

Early life

Jaeckle was born in Buffalo on October 27, 1894, of pioneer stock. His parents, Jacob Jaeckle and Mary Marx Jaeckle, were born in Buffalo in the 1850s. His father was a carpenter by trade who developed into a general building contractor. Among other projects, he literally built the family church, St. Peter's United Evangelical, completed in 1877, when he was only 25 years old.

Jaeckle's parents were the children of Germans who arrived at Buffalo during the great migration of the 1840s. Jacob's parents had come from the Black Forest, Mary's from Hesse Darmstadt.

For years the Jaeckles lived in the house Jacob built at 26 Lemon Street in the "Fruit Belt" of citrus-named streets in the German Near East Side of the City. Mary Marx had grown up in that neighborhood, and her father had a grocery store on Mortimer Street. "They were just good hearty German-American people who worked like hell," Jaeckle recalled in 1980 in a Buffalo News Magazine article, March 2, 1980, "Ed Jaeckle at 85: A Lifetime in the Arena of Politics and Power."

Early Career in Politics

While attending the University of Buffalo Law School (Class of 1915), Jaeckle obtained his first taste of politics, purely by chance. A neighborhood restaurateur, Leo J. Schmidt -- a family friend-- was running for state committeeman and needed help. Jaeckle, then 20, offered his services. "I drove him around -- electioneering was done mostly in saloons and bars in those days-- and he was elected." "Man of the Year: Edwin F. Jaeckle," Buffalo (The Sunday Magazine of The Buffalo Evening News), January 1974.

Jaeckle was admitted to the New York Bar in 1916 and, shortly after, Schmidt suggested that he run for the Erie County Board of Supervisors in the 13th Ward. So, in 1917 at age 22 he ran for the nomination bucking the endorsed GOP incumbent. It was Schmidt who taught Jaeckle how to run a political campaign in Buffalo: "working the taverns."

"Of course, we did all our campaigning in taverns. Women hadn't been given the franchise yet. Taverns were the men's neighborhood meeting places, naturally."

Jaeckle survived a brutal primary campaign and won the general election. "So, I was in it," Jaeckle recalled.

Erie County GOP Chairman

Returning from Naval service during World War I (1918-19), Jaeckle returned to Western New York to build his law practice. In 1920, he became Clerk of the County Board of Supervisors. In 1927 he became back tax collector for the County Treasurer's Office. During this time he cultivated his inside knowledge of the political game.

"My chief role always was organization -- practical party activities. I got more fun out of that; more satisfaction."