Background
Clarence Lexow was born on September 16, 1852 in Brooklyn, New York, United States, the son of Rudolph and Caroline (King) Lexow. His father was editor of the Belletristisches Journal, a German-language periodical published in New York.
Clarence Lexow was born on September 16, 1852 in Brooklyn, New York, United States, the son of Rudolph and Caroline (King) Lexow. His father was editor of the Belletristisches Journal, a German-language periodical published in New York.
For his secondary schooling Clarence attended the German-American Collegiate Institute of Brooklyn and at sixteen went with a brother to Germany, where both boys spent several years in study at the universities of Bonn and Jena. The father had counted on his training as a preparation for journalism, but the sons were attracted to the law as a profession. Returning to New York, Clarence Lexow was graduated from Columbia University Law School in 1874.
Lexow was admitted to the bar and practised in the city until 1881, when he removed to Nyack, Rockland County, New York, largely for reasons of health. After a time he began to take a modest part in up-state politics and rapidly developed into an organization Republican in the period of Thomas C. Platt's dominance. After an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a seat in Congress, he was chosen a state senator in 1893.
During his first term, the revelations of police corruption in the City of New York made by the Rev. Dr. Charles H. Parkhurst led the Chamber of Commerce to ask the legislature for an investigation. The leaders of the Republican majority in that body acceded to the demand, less with the intention of reforming conditions than with the view of exposing Tammany Hall's control of the ballot-box. Lexow moved for the appointment of a Senate special committee and was named as chairman. The matter seems to have been to him only a tactical move in partisan politics, though it may be set down to his credit that in a period marked for political hypocrisy he made no hollow profession of loftier aims. He and his committee were quite unprepared to deal with the mass of evidence of police extortion and blackmail that was marshaled by John W. Goff as counsel. Lexow and his colleagues, however, in the words of Dr. Parkhurst, "in time became disciplined to a receptive attitude of mind. " Police captains broke down and confessed their guilt on the witness stand; scores of indictments and dismissals from the force followed; a city administration pledged to reform was elected. Throughout the investigation, Lexow took only a perfunctory part. A leader of vision, with a similar opportunity, might have headed a triumphant crusade for civic decency. Failing that, he might at least have secured for himself an independent position as a legislator. Lexow did neither the one thing nor the other. Although his name was long a reminder of one of the most dramatic episodes in New York municipal history, the man himself never rose above the confines of narrow partisanship. In his report as committee chairman the outstanding feature was a recommendation for a bi-partisan board of police commissioners. This suggestion was opposed by the enlightened public opinion of the city and was rejected in later legislation.
As head of the Senate committee on cities Lexow had charge of the Greater New York charter, enacted in 1897. His own account of that law, as it appears in The Autobiography of Thomas Collier Platt (1910), gives the major part of the credit for the measure to Platt. For two years Lexow had been recognized as one of the group of senators who could be depended on to block reform bills at Platt's behest. In 1898 his service in the Senate ended. He was chairman of the New York Republican convention of 1895, and a presidential elector in 1900. The remainder of his life was devoted to his law practice.
Lexow was a member of the Republican Party.
Lexow married Katherine M. Ferris on February 3, 1881. They had a son and two daughters.