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Edward KocheEdward Koche
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Session:         Page of 617

Then Jim Lanigan ran in 1961 for district leader and he won in a race that I think could only be described as a victory for Wagner. Wagner ran against the bosses in his reelection campaign for mayor and pulled in most of the reform forces in Manhattan. In fact, the only club that didn't win its race was the New Chelsea club that had refused to support Wagner. Bob Klampitt was the head of that. I don't know what the hell he's doing now, but at that time it was such a bad judgment.

Anyway that was 1961. Then Jim Lanigan was the first person to beat Carmine DeSapio, but nobody remembers him. He's sort of like a no person because personally he was not a good person, and he betrayed the Village Independent Democrats at a later time, which we can go into, and I just have no use for him, although my anger has somewhat attenuated. I've seen him on two or three occasions since that time, and he's such a pitiful looking character that I don't dislike him as much as I did initially.

But in 1962 I ran for the Assembly, and in the Assembly race we had the following situation facing us: the Village Independent Democrats at that time were probably the strongest of the reform clubs, and it thought it would like to run somebody against Passannante (he's still in the Assembly -- William Passannante), and I said, “I'll run against him.” Nobody seemed to want to run against him, and I without any question wanted to be in public office and so I said, “I'll run.”

I could not get universal support here in the district. The





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