Into a Sea of Angry Sharks: Knoxville's Progressive Mayor Samuel G. Heiskell

The following cartoon that ran in the June 17, 1900 issue of the Knoxville Journal and Tribune illuminated one of the most pressing issues facing Knoxville and its citizens in the late 19th and early 20th century--the city's grim financial situation. As Knoxville mushroomed in both population and geographical size thanks to the captains of industry and merchant princes that funded the city's post-Civil War boom and subsequent annexations, its city fathers struggled to fund its public school system, essential city services, etc., etc. The political cartoon above reflects an enduring dilemma faced by Mayor Samuel G. Heiskell across each of his five terms (two decades) in office: how to balance the need to expand and fund the city's fire and police departments while also making much-needed, albeit, expensive purchases such as state-of-the-art firefighting apparatus in the wake of two disastrous conflagrations to Knoxville's central business district (not to mention another large fire in the vicinity of present-day Krutch Park), while at the same time meeting the financial obligations of administering the needs of one of the mayor's most heralded progressive reforms--expanding and improving the city's public school system.  

 

Map of Knoxville (1886) Library of Congress 

Knoxville's most-elected mayor, Samuel Gordon Heiskell dominated local politics for nearly two decades as the twentieth century dawned over the New South's "Great Jobbing Market" or "Queen City of the Mountains." At a time in which Knoxville's two political parties were nearly evenly divided and traded jabs at the ballot box every two years for control of city government, Heiskell stood out among the city's fathers in both parties who were traditionally fiscally conservative and adhered to a laissez-faire governing mindset. Heiskell's brand of Democratic politics incorporated the ideas of the nation's leading Progressives. He preached a message of civic boosterism and reform that earned him a reputation as one of the New South's most progressive leaders. In his efforts to implement his agenda, Heiskell ruffled the feathers of the city's conservative fathers at every turn. 

Southern Review (May 1898)

Financial matters had plagued the city throughout the 1890s, made worse by the Panic of 1893 that swept across the globe. Under Republican control, retrenchment was the watchword of the day. Budgets were tightened, spending curtailed, putting incredible strain on the city's ability to meet the needs of its citizens. There was a public outcry for much-needed reform, regulation, services, and safety, a call for a new era of responsive city government. It was in this environment that Knoxvillians, in early 1896, sought change and pinned their hopes on a thirty-seven-year-old ambitious lawyer turned politician. In his first election for major in 1896, Heiskell had campaigned as a progressive warrior that would cure the social ills of a modernizing, urban Knoxville. Heiskell promised to clean up the city's slums and pledged to issue fines and enforce nuisance laws on the statute books to crack down on the city's whore houses. His administration's policies effectively corralled local prostitutes into the Bowery's red-light district along Central Avenue, thus keeping them out of what Heiskell referred to as the more "respectable" neighborhoods. 

 

But Heiskell had also pledged to enact sweeping social, political, economic, and legal reforms that came with a hefty price tag. He championed educational improvements to uplift all Knoxvillians--both white and black. Although he endorsed racial segregation, very much a product of his time, Heiskell pushed ahead in his efforts to build more schools for whites and blacks alike (Knoxville's first public school for black children opened during his first administration in 1897). During his two decades in office, the number of city schools, teachers, and student enrollment nearly tripled. Moreover, he led the way to establish a public library. 

Journal and Tribune, June 17, 1900

Heiskell's political opponents countered that the mayor could not pay for his ambitious campaign promises and would further bankrupt the city's finances. As such, Heiskell proposed several initiatives and even took politically risky positions that often drew some angry opposition among various groups and especially his Republican enemies.





In 1896, Heiskell endorsed the consolidation of both West and North Knoxville as a means to help raise the necessary tax revenues to help fund his reforms and augment necessary city services such as the fire, police, and street departments. Republican aldermen issued a protest noting that "Knoxville proper is now carrying as heavy a burden of Public expense as it can possibly carry and pay its current expenses." They observed that at the present necessary city services such as the fire, police, and street departments were inadequate to serve the city itself and had faced draconian cuts over the past few years due to budget shortfalls. Moreover, the cost to operate the existing city schools had already exceeded the amount allocated by about $4,000. In closing, the Republicans admonished Heiskell to reconsider his plans to annex North and West Knoxville who had failed or were barely paying their current expenses respectively. Their annexations would so bankrupt Knoxville that their children and their children's children would be paying on the debt incurred from such a fiscally irresponsible decision. Heiskell ignored the Republican minority on the board and endorsed the annexations in a popular referendum that passed nearly 5 to 1 on July 23, 1897. Despite Knoxvillian's endorsement of annexation, Heiskell found much opposition among both fiscal conservative Democrats and Republicans to increase expenses for city services. Even Knoxville's Million Dollar Fire, which exposed the city's inadequate fire defenses, prompted little immediate support within both political parties for increasing fire personnel and purchasing much-needed fire apparatus.

 

Heiskell continued to press forward into risky political territory to help fund his proposed reforms and expand and full-fund much-needed city services. In the early 1900s, Heiskell appeared to throw all caution to the wind and willingly commit political suicide when he waded into the thorny issue of prohibition. It was a sea of angry of sharks made up of the usual suspects, those who sought to block Heiskell at every turn. Prohibition, a central issue in Gilded Age Tennessee politics, gradually gained momentum as a coalition of religious fundamentalists (Women's Christian Temperance Union, Anti-Saloon League, and other like groups) and conservative politicians in both political camps mounted an effective campaign that washed over the state. By the dawn of the twentieth century, the whole state was dry except for its four largest cities. In Knoxville, Heiskell took a firm stand against prohibition and tried his best to counter the prohibitionists by putting forth an economic argument. He reasoned that under the current saloon tax, roughly about $30,000 had been brought into city coffers annually and that the loss of that revenue would result in the city being forces to raise property taxes to balance that loss. His argument had little effect on the prohibitionists, who, led by the city's fundamentalist churches and Republicans, successfully revised the city charter to made Knoxville effectively dry--in name that is.    

 

Throughout his five terms in office, the city's fiscally, conservative mindset largely kept Heiskell in check, undermining his grand vision for sweeping progressive reforms. Still, the Progressive warrior resonated among the people who continued to reelect Heiskell despite the fiercely, divided nature of Knoxville politics at the time.