100 years ago in The Record
Wednesday, July 25, 1917
Mayor Cornelius F. Burns “has not and will not say directly whether he will be a candidate for re-election,” but the head of the Rensselaer County Democratic party assures The Record today that Burns will seek a fourth term this fall. Burns was first elected mayor in 1911, defeating three-term Republican incumbent Elias P. Mann. He was recently re-elected president of the New York State Conference of Mayors. There’s no doubt about Burns’s future as far as Joseph J. Murphy is concerned. “The Democratic party will renominate him,” he says, “and I believe he will accept the nomination as a further proof of his willingness to accept any duty ever imposed on him whether it were of a municipal, political, civic or charitable character.” Burns will be a heavy favorite in next November’s election, now that the Republican party appears to be stuck with a mayoral candidate deeply unpopular with the party leadership. Fourth Ward alderman George T. Morris, a frequent critic of both the mayor and his own party on fiscal conservative grounds, declared his mayoral candidacy before GOP leaders had a chance to endorse anyone, and no one is currently willing to face him in a primary. “The majority of the enrolled Democrats as well as the vast number of our citizens regardless of party alliances recognize in Mayor Burns an exceptional executive,” Murphy says.
“Never in its history has the city enjoyed an administration so efficient in government, so careful of the people’s moneys, so free from scandal and so sincere in its ambitions and efforts to keep Troy astride of the times and make it a thriving, prosperous industrial center and a wholesome, attractive place in which to live.”
Murphy claims that Burns recently “sought to be relieved of the responsibilities of an office which he has administered to the utmost satisfaction of his fellow citizens.”
The county Democratic leader urged Burns to stay on. “To permit him to retire at such a grave crisis would be a serious mistake, a step backward that might have a very disastrous effect on the future of the city.”
The “grave crisis” is the U.S. war against Germany. While Mayor Burns has no comment on Murphy’s interview , he does address today’s official announcement that Troy will contribute 178 men to the U.S. Army following last Friday’s military draft.
Troy’s quota is “almost a hundred lower than what the most conservative officials had estimated,” In light of the more than 800 Trojans already serving on a volunteer basis, the mayor “did not see where any more could be demanded from the city.”