Remembering Martin Begun, a nonpartisan public servant

When Martin Begun passed away two Saturdays ago, New York lost one of its most revered and accomplished sons.

Don’t feel badly if you do not recognize Marty Begun’s name, for he personified a Gotham tradition of private citizens quietly, and without much fanfare, performing public service, sometimes from inside but oftentimes outside government, by honestly translating solid policy to politicians and practical politics to policymakers.

There are actually two competing New York traditions in our mix of politics and government. In one camp is what I call the “children of Tweed,” from George Washington Plunkitt on to Jim Marcus and Carmine DeSapio in the water scandals of the 1960s, and Mike Dowd and Stanley Friedman from the Parking Violations Bureau scandal of the 1980s. New York has too often spawned political fixers who saw their opportunities and took them. Recent years have provided scores of examples of those who unfortunately followed in Tweed’s corrupt footsteps.

But the annals of New York have also given rise to an honored tradition of true public service. From Elihu Root, through Russell Davenport, Rose Schneiderman and Bayard Rustin, New Yorkers have stepped up to carefully knit good policy and practical politics.

Here again, don’t feel badly if you don’t know of Russell Davenport’s work for Willkie in 1940 building bipartisan support opposing Hitler, or Rose Schneiderman’s championing of workers’ rights in the garment industry. Neither Davenport nor Schneiderman sought the limelight.

In our time, Dick Ravitch has been a Templar-esque knight, helping state and local governments overcome fiscal crises, including New York in the 1970s, and more recently in Detroit and Puerto Rico, while directing our attention for decades to the importance of an MTA capital plan. After a recent City & State Institute conference education, keynoted by Merryl Tisch, one could see the former Regents chancellor performing a key advocacy role going forward on education issues.

I call this group of public servants the “children of Alexander Hamilton,” for Hamilton was the first and perhaps the best practitioner of this art form. (As an aside, it is appropriate therefore, that Lin-Manuel Miranda put the spotlight on Hamilton in his smash Broadway play, as his father Luis Miranda’s work in health care and on behalf of Hispanic empowerment has long walked this Hamiltonian path.)

Marty Begun’s career placed him in this valued tradition of public service. From Marty’s political work as a Democratic district leader on the East Side of Manhattan, to his short service as chairman of the old Liberal Party and his longtime role at NYU’s medical school as a tribune for better health care for all New Yorkers, Marty Begun brought folks together in the pursuit of better public policy for the greater good of New York.

Marty was always politically astute, but rarely partisan. He brought his bipartisan friendships with conservatives and liberals together as a force enabling New York leaders from Robert Wagner and Ed Koch to David Dinkins, Rudy Giuliani and Mario and Andrew Cuomo to make sounder, public policy decisions. Yet Marty did so without ever reaching for these headlines himself.

In fact, Marty’s greatest pleasure was spotting young political talent and nurturing those emerging leaders with deep wisdom, sweetly dispensed. Marty mentored a Roman legion of elected officials to the benefit of what reformers call good government.

Finally, to be Martin Begun’s friend was a rare treat, for there was no one who practiced friendship with a kinder hand than Marty. As someone lucky enough to be his friend for over three decades, I shall miss him very much.

Let us hope that some young man or woman we don’t yet know will soon replicate Marty by practicing the craft of public service, not for their own aggrandizement, but to make the public square a finer instrument of democracy, ultimately expanding the promise of American life here in New York.

Bruce N. Gyory is a political and strategic consultant at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP and an adjunct professor of political science at SUNY Albany.