Robert Maestri - Maestri As Mayor

Maestri As Mayor

Lacking in any formal schooling beyond the third grade, Maestri was nonetheless a shrewd politician. He began the reintegration of New Orleans into the state’s political structure by reorganizing the city’s fiscal structure, ending the costly practice of borrowing money against anticipated tax revenue and streamlining purchasing and expenditures. He developed a popular personal governing style, going on daily tours of the city to pinpoint problems, and holding daily open sessions in which citizens could come to his office to explain their problems or request help. He used his connections with the Long machine in Baton Rouge to bring state and federal funds to the city, resulting in the construction of a new Charity Hospital and public housing projects for low-income New Orleanians. Once in City Hall, Maestri solidified his control by using spoils politics and patronage appointments, using Old Regular ward bosses to enforce loyalty and dispense patronage, and to guarantee votes for himself and for Longite candidates in local and state elections. With this powerful machine behind him, he was able to easily win reelection in 1942 against reform candidates Herve Racivitch and Shirley Wimberly, taking 75,713 votes out of a total of 137,000 votes cast.

After this easy victory, though, Maestri retreated from his accessible governing style in his second term in order to spend more time running his Old Regular machine, which allowed city services to erode. With the mayor’s attention elsewhere, the corruption and favoritism that already characterized his administration grew even further. Maestri and the Longites had reached a deal with mobster Frank Costello whereby the city would ignore slot-machine laws in exchange for a cut of the proceeds, so prostitution and illegal gambling flourished in New Orleans under Maestri’s tenure. The growing problems of New Orleans in Maestri’s second term were too much for the Old Regular machine to handle, and allowed young reformer deLesseps Story Morrison, Sr., to defeat Maestri in the mayoral election of January 1946. Morrison served until 1961.