Review
This editor limited this review of Maury Maverick's second book to 375 words. It proves that the editor does not know his man, former congressman and now mayor of his native town of San Antonio. No politician ever had a more descriptive or significant name — maverick, an unowned and unbranded calf. Maury is neither owned nor branded, and he has some of the characteristics of a bull calf that has known neither knife nor iron. Yet as the reviewer writes this a jury in San Antonio is just ready to bring in a verdict, to say whether he is to be branded with conspiracy to pay poll taxes for people to vote in the election which made him mayor. I have read the evidence and I know what the decision will be, even though it has not been given.
In Blood and Ink is not intended for the professional historians. They may not like it because it has too much Maverick in it. It has not been dry-cleaned and dessicated. There is something for people to object to. But it is all Maverick, an amazing blend of bold thrusts, shrewd proof, language that hits like a sledge hammer and then murmurs down to poetry so good that it can be done in prose without giving offense.
People have called Maverick radical, socialistic, and even communistic, but the proof for the charges can not be found in In Blood and Ink. When similar damaging accusations were brought against that keen minded Lincoln Steffens, he confounded his hearers in court by saying: "I am worse — I am a Christian." It seems that, if one may judge by In Blood and Ink, Maury has confessed by implication to being a democrat who is radical enough to believe that Congress, President, Supreme Court, and the "third government," the corporations, should conduct the affairs with which they are entrusted in the interest of the American people. "Democracy for me," he says, "is liberty plus economic security. To put it in plain language, we Americans want to talk, pray, think as we please — and eat regular." And who does not?
My stint of words is exceeded and news has come that Maury Maverick is not guilty of conspiracy — or so the jury decided. This will please some people and astonish some. Thus is a strange character, such as legends are made of, plowing his way through American life with a mixture of Maverick blood in his ink.
University of Texas
In Blood and Ink is not intended for the professional historians. They may not like it because it has too much Maverick in it. It has not been dry-cleaned and dessicated. There is something for people to object to. But it is all Maverick, an amazing blend of bold thrusts, shrewd proof, language that hits like a sledge hammer and then murmurs down to poetry so good that it can be done in prose without giving offense.
People have called Maverick radical, socialistic, and even communistic, but the proof for the charges can not be found in In Blood and Ink. When similar damaging accusations were brought against that keen minded Lincoln Steffens, he confounded his hearers in court by saying: "I am worse — I am a Christian." It seems that, if one may judge by In Blood and Ink, Maury has confessed by implication to being a democrat who is radical enough to believe that Congress, President, Supreme Court, and the "third government," the corporations, should conduct the affairs with which they are entrusted in the interest of the American people. "Democracy for me," he says, "is liberty plus economic security. To put it in plain language, we Americans want to talk, pray, think as we please — and eat regular." And who does not?
My stint of words is exceeded and news has come that Maury Maverick is not guilty of conspiracy — or so the jury decided. This will please some people and astonish some. Thus is a strange character, such as legends are made of, plowing his way through American life with a mixture of Maverick blood in his ink.
University of Texas
WALTER PRESCOTT WEBB
