Gov. Notte brought dignity, honor to his home town

NORTH PROVIDENCE - There have been only a handful of general officers who have called the town of North Providence home.

The first was Lt. Gov. Elisah Brown who held the office from 1765 to 1767. The most recent is A. Ralph Mollis who was elected secretary of state in 2006. In between there has been Attorney General Herbert DiSimone, Lt. Gov. Louis Cappelli and Gov. John A. Notte Jr.

To date, however, only one of these men has attained the state's highest office and has the distinction of having a park named in his honor. Yes, Governor John Notte Park was named after a real person who brought dignity and honor, albeit not without controversy, to the town that he called home for the better part of his life.

John A. Notte, Jr. was born in Providence on May 3, 1909, the son of John A. and Eva T. (Rodina) Notte. Young John attended Classical High School and excelled in athletics. During the 1920s, Notte played on a barnstorming team alongside such Yankee greats as Babe Ruth and Lou Gerhrig. His talents were not unnoticed by athletic administrators as John was named to the All-State baseball and hockey teams as a second baseman and goalie respectively.

Upon graduation from Classical, Notte attended Providence College on a baseball and hockey scholarship and matriculated in 1931. As a young man, John had an insatiable thirst for education and though he briefly considered a career in professional baseball, he instead quenched his thirst for knowledge by attending Cornell University (1931-1932) and ultimately graduating with a Juris Doctorate from Boston University School of Law in 1935.

In 1934, while still a student in his final year of law school, Notte entered another great institution when he married Marie Joan Huerth, also an attorney. The couple would go on to have two children, John III and Joyce. Notte's interest in sports never waned, however, and in the 1940s, he became a part owner of the Providence Grays minor league baseball team.

In 1936, Notte was admitted to the Rhode Island bar and a year later was named town solicitor in the town of North Providence. The experience of serving the legal needs of a growing community like North Providence most assuredly played a key role in sparking John's interest in government.

Not long after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, John answered the call to serve his country in World War II. He joined the Navy where his leadership ability was recognized and resulted in his being promoted to the rank of Lieutenant. Before being honorably discharged in 1946, Notte participated in the invasions of Anzio, Italy, and southern France.

Upon rejoining civilian life, Notte both resumed his career in law, and pursued his interest in government, which led to a 1947 appointment by Governor John O. Pastore to chair the R.I. Veterans Bonus Board. Although serving well in that post, he resigned it a year later to join the staff of Sen. Theodore Francis Green, a position he held until 1957.

In that year, Notte entered the political arena announcing his intention to run for the office of secretary of state. The Democrat was easily elected to office and served a full two-year term before successfully running for lieutenant governor in 1958. Notte served under Republican Gov. Christopher DelSesto, the only Republican since Rhode Island's "Bloodless Revolution" of 1935 to serve in that office.

The groundwork for a run for the state's highest office had been laid and now the die would be cast. The 50-year-old lawyer, military and political leader, after spending some 15 years of his adult life learning the nuances of state politics and government affairs, determined that the time was right to propel himself into a gubernatorial campaign.

Notte's campaign for governor in 1960 was typical of the rough and tumble ethnic politics that have come to symbolize Rhode Island elections. The race between the two Italo-Americans turned into a statement about ethnicity as much as anything else. Even as a candidate for secretary of state four years earlier, according to historian Matthew J. Smith, Notte had been vocally abusive toward gubernatorial candidate Chris DelSesto, accusing him of being a "figurehead, implying that the Republican Party had never been friendly to the Italian." In the end however, Notte would prevail by a margin of 227,318 votes to 174,044 and on Jan. 3, 1961, John A. Notte, Jr. was sworn into office as Rhode Island's 65th governor.

His term of office was met with mixed reviews. While Notte was successful in establishing the state's first family court, holding the first one-day, one-place Democratic and Republican primaries that are so much a part of today's electoral process, and creating a state division of metropolitan government, he also faced some insurmountable challenges that would dictate his future in political service.

Late in the summer of 1962, he called the General Assembly into special session to reapportion the House of Representatives after the State Supreme Court had ruled it necessary. The House was unable to effectuate a plan that was acceptable to the court, however, causing Notte to be criticized by some as an ineffective chief executive. Also at issue was the initiation of a state income tax, something Notte viewed as essential to solving the state's economic problems. The legislature rejected the idea, but did, after much debate, pass two other tax bills that Notte had proposed. Notte quickly vetoed them, however, saying he had changed his mind and was now convinced that they would be bad for the state. In fact, he went on to become the only governor in some 20 years to complete an entire term without a tax increase.

His refusal to raise taxes necessary to fund pet projects and his approval of night horse racing at Lincoln Downs angered the unions. In 1962, Notte became the first Democrat since 1930 to run for governor without the official support of the state's labor unions. Although popular with the people, the lack of union support, his initial support of a state income tax, as well as the youth and charisma of his 39-year old Republican opponent, John H. Chafee, took a toll on the Notte campaign effort.

The hard-fought battle came down to 7,000 absentee ballots that ultimately decided the contest. In one of the closest elections in Rhode Island gubernatorial history, Notte was defeated 163,952 votes to 163,554, a margin of just 398 votes. When in 1971, the state did finally adopt an income tax, Notte said he felt '"vindicated' and called the income tax "the basis of a good tax structure."

Following his loss in 1962, Notte returned to the private practice of law. He did make one final try for elective office in 1967 when he ran for Congress to fill the vacancy created by the death of John E. Fogarty. Although he lost the primary, his public service career was not over. Notte became president of the Aurora Civic Association and was a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion, Knights of Columbus, the Franciscan Mission Associates and the Italian-American War Veterans and other civic organizations. In 1981, Notte received the Exemplary Citizenship Award from Providence College.

On Monday, March 7, 1983, just days after celebrating his 73rd birthday, John A. Notte, Jr. died of heart failure following a six-month illness. His body lay in state in the rotunda of the Statehouse followed by a Mass of a Christian Burial at SS Peter and Paul Cathedral and interment in St. Francis Cemetery in Pawtucket.

Controversy continued to follow Notte even into death when on Feb. 20, 2009, the Providence Journal printed a news story alleging that Notte was paid a $25,000 bribe by organized crime figures early in his term of office as governor. The allegation stemmed from conversations between mob bosses gleaned from FBI tapes planted in the office of a local mob boss over a three-year period. The allegations were never proven and there is no evidence that bribe money was ever offered or accepted.

Despite attempts to tarnish his reputation, John Notte, Jr. stands today as one of the most honest and compassionate people ever to hold public office. At the time of his passing, then Gov. J. Joseph Garrahy called him "a man of quiet courage, a man of genuine dignity ... an honest man who worked hard to make Rhode Island a better and more compassionate state. That will stand as his highest achievement," Garrahy said. Indeed it will.

- Part XI, the final part of this series, will recount the strange story of one of North Providence's most eccentric and mysterious women of the 19th Century, Miss Lydia Wilcox.