"Labor,55  he  concluded,  "as  a  major  part  of  industrial
civilization,  must  share  in  remaking  our  Constitution  and  our
institutions  to  bring  about  economic  security  that  alone  gives
a  real  meaning  to  individual  liberty,  to  marshall  our  tre-
mendous resources  for  the  benefit  of  all  the  people,  and  must
dedicate  its  head  and  its  heart  to  the  greatest  task  American
statesmanship  has  yet  faced.55

The  New   York    Times,  like  Queen  Victoria,   was  "not


AMERICA'S  NO.  i  MAYOR  139

amused"  by  his  irreverent  references  to  the  law  of  supply  and
demand  and  to  the  revision  of  the  Constitution,  but  two  years
later  paid  tribute  to  the  effectiveness  of  his  work  as  an  indus-
trial conciliator.  It  is,  indeed,  worthy  of  note  that  this  "rad-
ical" has  done  more  to  save  his  city  from  the  violence  and
dislocation  of  great  strikes  than  the  practical  politicians  and
law-and-order  authorities  in  many  other  communities.  When
the  American  Labor  Party  was  organized  in  1936,  as  an
adjunct  of  the  New  Deal  campaign,  LaGuardia  hastened  to
support  it,  and  worked,  spoke  and  voted  for  Roosevelt  under
its  auspices.
