Tammany Hall
Tammany Hall was the nickname given to the Executive Committee of the Democratic party that controlled New York throughout the nineteenth century. Although it suffered a few setbacks, Tammany remained a force until the middle of the twentieth century. The base of its strength were the new immigrants, for a time mostly Irish, that flocked to the United States through Ellis Island during this time. The tough unemployed youth were the enforcers of party discipline. More established immigrants contributed money and votes. The bosses had much patronage to hand out as rewards to the faithful. If you do a good job all your life as a precinct captain, maybe your nephew would get a plum job as a bridge inspector. That is, if he agreed to pass along part of his income to the party.
Tammany was named for an Indian chief, Tammenend, who was a sort of mascot in the early days. In the beginning it was actually a reform movement, aimed at wresting power from the aristocrats (the Federalists) in favor of the middle classes. Some colorful characters are part of the rich history of Tammany Hall. Aaron Burr was one of the early bosses. People were willing to overlook the corruption, because Tammany delivered the food and shelter that the poor needed. But the abuses became flagrant in the time of William “Boss†Tweed, in the 1860’s.
While he was a Congressman for one term, Tweed found that legitimate politics was hard work for little pay. He returned to the city and established a law practice, which was just a front for influence peddling. Methodically, he took control of city contracts, until as much as 85 percent of all city bills were fraudulent. For example, he got the city to send all its printing jobs to the press he owned. They had to buy marble for the new courthouse from him. At prices that he set. The proceeds were divided up among himself, the Mayor, the City Comptroller and other party bosses. A fraction trickled down to the masses, which made the whole scheme look legitimate in the eyes of the participants. There were cries for reform in the New York Times. Boss Tweed had accumulated many enemies along the way, who brought him down. Eventually he died in jail.
But Tammany continued under other bosses. Reforms came and went for many years. It took the political genius of Franklin Roosevelt to finally put a dent in the system. He cut-off a main source of Tammany’s power, jobs on the Federal payroll. The New Deal programs made the poor less dependent on Tammany’s handouts. They were unable to stop the election of their enemy, Fiorello La Guardia, as Mayor. Roosevelt supported him on a “Fusion†ticket although La Guardia was a republican. Tammany was unable to control women, who started to vote in large numbers in the early thirties. Immigrants, who were the backbone of the machine discovered better avenues to power. Many of them were also becoming affluent and moving out of the city. Still, Tammany exercised some influence on City politics as late as 1970 when Mayor John Lindsay finally extinguished it.
You can beat City Hall. It takes courage, luck and persistence. And you will lose most of the time.
