Under the chairmanship of Dante B. Fascell, the hearings were delving into the federal effort against organized crime-and right there big as life sat subcommittee member Gallagher. It was, as one Justice employe was later to observe, a little like having your cotton crop investigated by a boll weevil. Gallagher had meanwhile become-with Missouri's Senator Ed Long (LIFE, May 26 and Nov. 10, 1967 and July 26, 1968)- a leading congressional spokesman against government invasions of privacy, including the very investigative technique that had first disclosed his own alliance with the mob.

As the hearing proceeded, Congressman Gallagher reflected self-assurance in his questioning of a succession of federal enforcement officials. The thrust of his remarks was that organized crime - specifically the Mafia - was a vastly overblown concept, and that the federal effort against it was too big a weapon for the size of the target, and that innocent people could be wrongly damaged through unwitting association with mobsters.

"Sometimes I have the feeling," he said, "as we go down the path into all sorts of uncharted areas, especially in the area of computers and the invasion of privacy, that if there had been no Mafia, perhaps Big Government would have had to invent one."

In due course he came around to what might have been most on his mind. "When you get into the exotic fields that the organized crime unit has got into . . . it is quite conceivable that anybody who ever was in the same theater with an organized crime identified type is going to find that moment in his life frozen into a government computer, and forever more he remains part of the organized crime complex."

Early last month three LIFE reporters paid a visit to the congressman's offices in Washington after he had agreed to discuss the information gathered by this magazine. With Attorney Lawrence I. Weisman at his side, Gallagher was asked if he had "any association" with Zicarelli.

"No," said the congressman. After that flat assertion, the following was said:

Q: /You/ never called him or talked to him?

A: Let me tell you something. Can I talk off the record? I want to level with you. I want to level with you.

Q: / don't think we ought to get off the record on a thing like this. A: Okay, then, we won't. Mr. Zicarelli on several occasions has called me-ah, one way or another -about his son who was a doctor trying to get into med school and he thought he was being discriminated against. . . . One day he called me straight here. Q: Did you say he called you here?

A: A long time ago. I think twice. I think when the kid was trying to get into medical school.

Q: At your office?

A: Yes. And I think one time in the hustle and bustle and nobody was here and the phone call came through over in the other place Ithe Housel. It was over on the floor . . . he called there cold and said: "I hope you don't mind." I tried to brush him off as best I could, saying it was a long day or something. He said, "Well, I'm a taxpayer. . . ." Well, you know, kiddingly, or whatever the hell. Q: Did you ever get any calls from a Mr. Gray? A: Mr. Gray. . . . I think that is who he (Zicarellil said he was. I don't know. He didn't say who was . . . I think that's probably how the hell he got on the line. Q: Why would he get on the line any faster if he said he was Mr. Gray than if he said he was Mr. Zicarelli?

Joe Zicarelli needed help to buy an airline

A: Well, I wouldn't get on the line if I knew it was Mr. Zicarelli. You know, you've got to try to be circumspect about these goddam things and not hurt a person's feelings or get anybody angry at you. Q: But you did know who he was?

A: What?

Q: You knew who Joe Zicarelli was?

A: Not the first time. Not the first time. . . . I guess he just figured I got it through one time before. But I would try to duck it as much as I could.

At another point in the interview, Gallagher was asked, "Did you ever telephone Zicarelli?"

"Never," he replied.

Q: Absolutely never?

A: Never.

Q: It's not possible that you're making a mistake?

A: That I called Joe Zicarelli? No.

Gallagher also denied that he had met with Zicarelli at any time, in a restaurant or any other place. At this point, Attorney Weisman interjected:
"The congressman said that they [the meetings] did not take place. I haven't talked with the congressman about this but I'll put something on the table and test your sense of fairness. He's willing to take . . . I would advise him to take a lie detector test to determine whether these are the facts. . . .

Gallagher quickly cut in:
"Hey, let me say something. I don't believe in lie detector tests. They're snake oil. That's one of the reasons I'm where I am, because of the investigations that I've had with all this stuff and I became a target because . . . I believe there should be some integrity in what the hell we do and not believe in the whole question of the drift toward a police state and McCarthyism with its new name, Mafiaism. And . . . probably that's why I'm being slammed a little bit right now." Q: The information we have is that you did, in fact, intercede for Zicarelli with the Bayonne police department to slow up investigations that the Bayonne police were making into his lotteries and other gambling that he has over there. Now, I'd like a response to that. A: I categorically deny that that ever happened. I never had any influence with the police in Bayonne.

Q: Did you ever speak to any public official in Bayonne in connection with Joe Zicarelli's operations?

A: I have-uh-Joe Zicarelli is like a legend in Bayonne. All the exfighters and all the people who he probably handed out money to, to help, or something I don't know . . .

Q: Did you ever speak to a public official in Bayonne in connection with Joe Zicarelli's interests?

: No, I never did.

The congressman seemed especially ill at ease when questioned about Edmart.

Q: Were you equal partners in this thing, Congressman?

A: A . . . yes. I hesitate on it because on . . . of the things that I did not like to appear as a partner on the building was, if you're in politics you obviously . . . what I'm undergoing now is . . . takes place many times. But the other problem in politics is that if you appear as a principal in building there are all kinds of people in . . . local political people who set up straw men Iso] that you would have to call them and say: "Would you please remove that straw man?" It might be just the issuance of a permit, or a water pipe, or to turn the heat on, whatever the little thing may be. They set up a pattern of harassing you to the point where . . . and as soon as you call them for that they say: "Oh, by the way, I've got a brother-in-law. Can you get him a job?" Or whatever. It's give and take like that. So for those reasons I never really appeared as an equal partner, but in fact I am an equal partner. I appear as the attorney.

Q: Has it been lucrative?

A: Well, I can't say that I'm getting rich on it. But it's $25,000 . . . $30,000 . . .

Q: Has it been producing that every year?

A: I can't say it produced it this year.

On Sept. 15, 1960, when he was still deputy police commissioner, he called Zicarelli on the pay telephone the gangster was using at the time. Slifka wanted Zicarelli to know that Gallagher was off on a 10-day trip.

"I know, I spoke to him earlier," said Zicarelli. "Where's he going?"