Arthur Eve
Arthur Owen Eve is a retired American politician who served as a Democratic member of the New York State Assembly and Deputy Speaker of the Assembly representing districts in Buffalo, New York. He was the first Dominican-American elected to public office in the United States, and the first African American to win a Buffalo mayoral Democratic primary but was defeated in the following mayoral election.
Eve was elected a New York State Assemblyman in 1966 and by the time of his retirement in 2002 had served in the New York State Assembly longer than any other incumbent member. As Deputy Speaker, he was the highest ranking African American in the New York State Legislature. During his political career he became a political foe of Western New York politician James D. Griffin and of New York State Governors Mario Cuomo and George Pataki. He was a founding member of the New York State Black and Puerto Rican Legislative Caucus. At the national level, Eve was once one of three alternates to the 15-person 1984 Democratic Party Platform Committee.
Eve was an observer and negotiator during the 1971 Attica Prison riot and the first official to enter the facility to hear the demands of the inmates. An advocate for liberal causes such as economic development, education, job training and development, social services, crime prevention and parole reform, day care and housing, Eve was also a leader in the movement to legislate Harriet Tubman Day as a New York State holiday. He is the father of attorney and former candidate for Lieutenant Governor of New York Leecia Eve.
Early life and family
Eve was born in New York City, to an immigrant father from the Dominican Republic. He was raised in Florida. After studies at West Virginia State College he arrived in Buffalo in February 1953 as a product of the segregated south, with less than $10 in his pocket. Eve served in the United States Army from 1953-1955 and achieved the rank of corporal. Eve holds an Associate's degree from Erie Community College and a Bachelor of Science from West Virginia. He had been an All-High basketball player in Florida and became an All-Europe player during his Army tour of duty in Germany, where he ran a program for orphans. After completing his Army service he returned to Buffalo in 1955. Eve's first job in Buffalo was in a Chevrolet plant. While working there he became aware of drugs problems with local youths in the city's parks, and observed a lack of guidance for youth in the community. He surrendered his job to pursue a post in parks recreation, but learned that such jobs were doled out by political patronage to party loyalists. Eve joined the Democratic Party and got one of the patronage parks jobs. By 1958, he was blossoming as an independent activist within the party, pursuing minority rights, and was the only ward leader who was not part of the political establishment. This role led to his 1966 New York State Assembly election victory.Eve and Constance Bowles, also an alumnus of West Virginia State College, were married in June 1956. They have one daughter and four sons: Leecia Roberta Eve, Arthur O. Eve Jr.; Eric Vincent Eve, Martin King Eve, and Malcolm X. Eve. Leecia is a Democratic politician and attorney and a former candidate for Lieutenant Governor of New York during the 2006 election as well as a contender to replace Hillary Clinton as United States Senator when Clinton became United States Secretary of State in 2009. Eric, who was a White House aide under Bill Clinton, ran Al Gore's New York State 2000 Democratic presidential primary campaign. Malcolm also worked for the Clinton administration, and the Obama administration.
Eve, who was an Episcopalian, has a history of being a religious man. He was a deacon in his church in the 1970s. After his retirement from politics, he became an evangelist.
Political career
Assemblyman 1967–1978
Eve was elected to the New York State Assembly in 1966 following several years of service as an independent ward leader in Buffalo. His election came via defeating two-term incumbent Arthur Hardwick, Jr. in a Democratic primary contest. He remained in the Assembly until 2002, sitting in the 177th, 178th, 179th, 180th, 181st, 182nd, 183rd, 184th, 185th, 186th, 187th, 188th, 189th, 190th, 191st, 192nd, 193rd and 194th New York State Legislatures. Eve rose to prominence in the mid-1960s during Buffalo's civil disturbances and rights. He expanded his notability during the Attica Prison riots. During the Buffalo riot of 1967, Eve attempted to organize formal meetings in order to avert physical confrontations. Eve fought against union policies which disallowed minority participation in apprentice programs that led to high paying union jobs on state construction sites. He threatened New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller that he would lie down in front of bulldozers at one of these sites. In 1968, he delayed construction on the State University of New York at Buffalo's Amherst Campus to push through an agreement that New York State and the unions would promote minority access into the construction industry. The protests by supporters of Eve's effort caused Rockefeller to call for an eleven-month construction moratorium starting in March 1969.In April 1969, the construction of the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building at 125th Street and Seventh Avenue became a political quagmire. Originally, Rockefeller had proposed a 20-story office building and a 10-story cultural and civic center, but the legislature only approved funding for the office building. Eventually, there was protesting by the Harlem community that halted construction. Eve brokered discussions between Rockefeller and State Senator Basil Paterson, who represented the disgruntled Harlem community.
During Eve's first term as an assemblyman, he led the effort to obtain an initial $500,000 of funding to establish the State University of New York system's SEEK/Educational Opportunity Program. Since the 1970s, colleges in New York State have administered the Arthur O. Eve Higher Education Opportunity Program to assist students who may otherwise be unable to attend college because of educational and financial circumstances. Later, in 1988, he would receive the Kennedy Center Distinguished Leadership in Arts-in-Education award.
In the late 1960s, Eve drove a constituent to Attica State Prison, which is from Buffalo. After observing the prison's conditions, he began to introduce prison reform legislation to the state assembly. Since most legislators were fearful of political backlash and avoided prison reform issues, Eve became the primary channel through which prisoners could forward their complaints and requests. His compassion for the prisoners was recognised by them. For example, in the months following the eight-hour November 4, 1970, seizure of the Auburn Correctional Facility, Eve was the only legislator named as a recipient of prisoner complaints.
Eve served as an observer and negotiator in the wake of the 1971 Attica Prison riot. Believing that the situation called for people who were credible to both the prison population as well as to people involved with and observing the situation from outside the prison, he joined Tom Wicker and John Dunne, among others, in entering the prison to hear the inmates' demands. Eve was the first mediator to arrive at the scene of the rebellion. He was the first elected official to enter the prison yard following the riot in which 42 prisoners were taken, and he led the September 11 tour by the requested visitors to the seized Cellblock D as well as other areas of the prison. The prisoners requested direct communication with the Commissioner of Corrections, Russell G. Oswald, and that specific individuals hear their demands, naming Louis Farrakhan, Huey Newton, and William Kunstler; Kunstler eventually agreed to serve as their legal counsel. The primary prisoner demand was that, upon surrendering control of the prison back to the guards, they not be beaten. Farrakhan refused to attend to the situation in person, however, which Eve felt was a turning point in the negotiations. Eve has expressed the belief that Governor Rockefeller was responsible for the massacre that subsequently occurred in the prison, and that Rockefeller made a deliberate decision to escalate the conflict knowing that there would likely be some loss of life. After negotiations stalled over a demand for amnesty, a rescue operation saved 29 hostages and led to 10 inmate deaths. Eve was critical of Rockefeller's decision to not come observe the prison and the negotiations but rather pursue tactical measures: "I think Governor Rockefeller ought to be indicted." In the 1992 Attica civil-liability trial, Eve testified on behalf of the inmates. In March 2001, then New York Governor George Pataki appointed Eve to the Attica Task Force that met with families of Attica prison employees who survived the 1971 uprising and negotiated reparations.
In February 1971, Eve sponsored two bills. One called for a minimum of 0.5% of construction funds be allocated to on-the-job training for construction workers. The other was an initiative to have Buffalo Public Schools be decentralized like New York City Public Schools had been the prior year.
In the 1974 elections, New York State Democratic Chairman, Joseph F. Crangle, attempted to block Eve from obtaining the Democratic nomination. After the 1974 election, Eve was the senior Assemblyman among the blacks and Puerto Ricans. Following the 1974 elections in which 15 of the 18 newly Democratic seats were from non-New York City Democrats, the upstate delegation was credited with giving the democrats a majority. That year marked the year in which upstate democrats demanded that there be some division of the Democratic minority leader, Democratic deputy minority leader, Assistant minority leader, minority whip, and ranking member of the Ways and Means committee, which had all previously been given to New York City officials. Incoming Governor Hugh Carey was also interested in a geographic division of key positions in order to promote party unity. Eve sat on a 1978 Medicaid reimbursement evaluation committee.