FOOTNOTES

“Sir, I decline membership in Tammany Society. Originally national and Republican, it has degenerated into a savage barbarity.”

Cheetham then wrote to Grand Sachem Cowdrey for a certified copy of the proceedings, saying he wanted it to base an action which he would bring for the annulment of the charter of the Tammany Society for misuser. Cowdrey expressed regret at not being able to accommodate him. “Tammany Society,” wrote Cowdrey,

“is an institution that has done much good and may and undoubtedly will do more.… I do not think one error can or ought to cancel its long list of good actions and wrest from it its charter of incorporation, the basis of its stability and existence.”

TheAmerican Citizenthereupon bristled with fiercer attacks upon Tammany. “Jacobin clubs,” says “A Disciple of Washington,” in this newspaper, July 29, 1809,

“are becoming organized to overawe, not only the electors but the elected under our government; such are the Washington and the Tammany Societies. The latter was originally instituted for harmless purposes and long remained harmless in its acts; members from all parties were admitted to it; but we have seen it become a tremendous political machine.… The Washington Jacobin Club, it is said, consists of at least two thousand rank and file, and the Tammany Jacobins to perhaps as many.… The time will come, and that speedily, when the Legislature, the Governor and the Council of Appointment shall not dare to disobey their edicts.”

Tammany retaliated upon Cheetham by having a bill passed by the Legislature taking away from him the position of State Printer, which paid $3,000 a year.

Tammany’s comparative weakness in the city, as shown in the recent vote, prompted Clinton to suggest a compromise and union of forces. Overtures were made byhis agents, and on July 13, 1809, twenty-eight of the leaders of the Clinton, Madison, Burr and Lewis factions met in a private room at Coleman’s Fair House. Matthew L. Davis told them the chiefs ought to unite; experience demonstrated that if they did they would lead the rest—meaning the voters. Tammany, he said, welcomed a union of the Republican forces so as to prevent the election of a Federalist Council of Appointment. Davis and Wortman proposed that they unite to prevent any removals from office; that the two opposition Republican clubs in turn should be destroyed and that their members should go back to the Tammany Society, which, being on the decline, must be reenforced. Or, if it should be thought advisable to put down the Tammany Society, “considering its prevailing disrepute,” then a new society should be organized in which Burrites, Lewisites, Clintonites and Madisonians were to be admitted members under the general family and brotherly name of Republican.

De Witt Clinton cautiously kept away from this meeting, allowing his lieutenants to do the work of outwitting Tammany. A committee of ten was appointed to consider whether a coalition of the chiefs were practicable; whether, if it were, the people would agree to it; whether the Whig (opposition Republican) clubs should be destroyed and whether the Tammany Society should be reenforced.

The meeting came to naught. In this effort to win over the Tammany chiefs, De Witt Clinton abandoned his protégé and dependent, Cheetham, who had made himself obnoxious to them. Finding Clinton’s political and financial support withdrawn, Cheetham, out of revenge, published the proceedings of this secret meeting in theAmerican Citizen, and, awakening public indignation, closed the bargaining. A few nights later a Tammany mob threw brickbats in the windows of Cheetham’s house. By his death, on September 19, 1810, Tammany was freed from one of its earliest and most vindictive assailants.

FOOTNOTES[1]Journal of the Assembly, 1821, p. 532, also p. 758.[2]Ibid., 1826, p. 750.[3]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 16, pp. 239-40 and 405.[4]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 16, pp. 288-89.[5]Ibid., p. 316.[6]Ibid., p. 50.[7]Ibid., Vol. 18, p. 194.[8]Ibid.[9]Ibid., Vol. 20, pp. 355-56.[10]Ibid., Vol. 20, p. 308. The full report on Mooney’s administration appears inIbid., pp. 376-92.[11]Although the subsequent laws of the Tammany Society forbade the successive reelection of a Grand Sachem, the incumbent of the office was frequently permitted to “hold over.”[12]Advertisement in theColumbian, May 14, 1810.[13]Wortman had been a follower of Clinton and had been generously aided by him. He suddenly shifted to Tammany, on seeing better opportunities of advancement with that body.

[1]Journal of the Assembly, 1821, p. 532, also p. 758.

[2]Ibid., 1826, p. 750.

[3]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 16, pp. 239-40 and 405.

[4]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 16, pp. 288-89.

[5]Ibid., p. 316.

[6]Ibid., p. 50.

[7]Ibid., Vol. 18, p. 194.

[8]Ibid.

[9]Ibid., Vol. 20, pp. 355-56.

[10]Ibid., Vol. 20, p. 308. The full report on Mooney’s administration appears inIbid., pp. 376-92.

[11]Although the subsequent laws of the Tammany Society forbade the successive reelection of a Grand Sachem, the incumbent of the office was frequently permitted to “hold over.”

[12]Advertisement in theColumbian, May 14, 1810.

[13]Wortman had been a follower of Clinton and had been generously aided by him. He suddenly shifted to Tammany, on seeing better opportunities of advancement with that body.

The Tammany men fared badly for a time. During 1809 the Council of Appointment removed numbers of them from office. In November the Federalists elected a majority of their Aldermanic ticket, and in April, 1810, they elected their Assembly ticket by the close majority of 36. Even when the Federalists were beaten the following year, it brought no good to Tammany, for a Clintonite Council of Appointment dispensed the offices. Clinton, though ousted from the Mayoralty in 1810 to make room for the Federalist Jacob Radcliff, was again made Mayor in the Spring of 1811.

But before long affairs took another turn. Tammany was the only real Republican organization in the city. It stood for the national party. As men were inclined to vote more for party success than for particular local nominees, Tammany’s candidates were certain to be swept in at some time on the strength of party adherence. While the rank and file of the organization were concerned in seeing its candidates successful only inasmuch as that meant the success of democratic principles, the leaders intrigued constantly for spoils at the expense of principles. But whatever their conduct might be, they were sure of success when the next wave of Republican feeling carried the party to victory.

De Witt Clinton’s following was largely personal. Drawing, it was estimated, from $10,000 to $20,000 a year in salary and fees as Mayor, he lived in high styleand distributed bounty liberally among his supporters. His income aroused the wonder of his contemporaries. The President of the United States received $25,000 annually; the Mayor of Philadelphia, $2,000. “Posterity,” said one observer, “will read with astonishment that a Mayor of New York should make the enormous sum of $15,000 out of his office.” This was no inconsequential salary at a time when a man worth $50,000 was thought rich; when a good house could be rented for $350 a year, and $750 or $800 would meet the expenses of the average family. Many of those whom Clinton helped picked a quarrel with him later, in order to have a pretext for the repudiation of their debts, and joined Tammany.

Tammany had the party machine, but Clinton had a powerful hold on the lower classes, especially the Irish. As United States Senator he had been foremost in having the naturalization period reduced from fourteen to five years, and he made himself popular with them in other ways. He, himself, was of Irish descent.

The Irish were bitter opponents of Tammany Hall. The prejudice against allowing “adopted citizens” to mingle in politics was deep; and Tammany claimed to be a thoroughly native body. As early as May 12, 1791, at Campbell’s Tavern, Greenwich, the Tammany Society had announced that being a national body, it consisted of Americans born, who would fill all offices; though adopted Americans were eligible to honorary posts, such as warriors and hunters. An “adopted citizen” was looked upon as an “exotic.” Religious feeling, too, was conspicuous. It was only after repeated hostile demonstrations that Tammany would consent, in 1809, for the first time to place a Catholic—Patrick McKay—upon its Assembly ticket.

The accession of the Livingston family had helped the society, adding the support of a considerable faction and “respectability.” The Livingstons, intent on superseding the Clintons, seized on Tammany as a good lever.Above all, it was necessary to have a full application of “respectability,” and to further that end the society put up a pretentious building—the recentSunnewspaper building. In 1802 the Tammany Society had tried by subscription to build a fine Wigwam, but was unsuccessful. The unwisdom of staying in such a place as Martling’s, which subjected them to gibes, and which was described as “the Den where the Wolves and Bears and Panthers assemble and drink down large potations of beer,” was impressed upon the Sachems who, led by Jacob Barker, the largest shipbuilder in the country at the time, raised the sum of $28,000. The new Wigwam was opened in 1811, with the peculiar Indian ceremonies. Sachem Abraham M. Valentine—the same man who, for malfeasance, was afterward (May 26, 1830) removed from the office of Police Magistrate[1]—was the grand marshal of the day.

From 1811 the Tammany, or Martling, men came under the general term of the Tammany Hall party or Tammany Hall; the general committee was called technically the Democratic-Republican General Committee. The Tammany Society, with its eleven hundred members, now more than everappeareddistinct from the Tammany Hall political body. Though the general committee was supplied with the use of rooms and the hall in the building, it met on different nights from the society, and to all appearances acted independently of it. But the society, in fact, was and continued to be, the secret ruler of the political organization. Its Sachems were chosen yearly from the most influential of the local Tammany political leaders.

De Witt Clinton aimed to be President of the United States and schemed for his nomination by the RepublicanLegislative caucus. Early in 1811 he sought and received from the caucus the nomination for Lieutenant-Governor. He purposed to hold both the offices of Mayor and Lieutenant-Governor, while spending as much time as he could at Albany so as to bring his direct influence to bear in person. As a State officer he could do this without loss of dignity. He would have preferred the post of State Senator, but he feared if he stood for election in New York City Tammany would defeat him. The chiefs, regarding his nomination as treachery toward Madison, immediately held a meeting and issued a notice that they ceased to consider him a member of the Republican party; that he was not only opposing Madison but was bent on establishing a pernicious family aristocracy.

When the Clinton men tried to hold a counter meeting at the Union Hotel a few days later, the Tammany men rushed in and put them to flight.[2]Tammany was so anxious to defeat Clinton that it supported the Federalist candidate for Lieutenant-Governor, defeating the aggressive Mayor. But Clinton obtained the caucus nomination for President. His partizans voted the Federalist Assembly ticket (1812) rather than aid the Republican ticket of Tammany Hall. Assisted by the Federalists, Clinton received the electoral vote of New York State, but was overwhelmed by Madison. His course seemed precisely that with which Tammany had charged him—treason to the party to which he professed to belong. In a short time, the Wigwam succeeded in influencing nearly all the Republicans in New York City against him.

One other event helped to bring back strength and prestige to Tammany Hall. This was the War of 1812, which Tammany called for and supported. On February 26, four months before war was declared, the TammanySociety passed resolutions recommending immediate war with Great Britain unless she should repeal her “Orders in Council.” The members pledged themselves to support the Government “in that just and necessary war” with their “lives, fortunes and sacred honor.” The conservative element execrated Tammany, but the supporters of the war came to look upon it more favorably, and about a thousand persons, some of whom had been members before but had ceased attendance, applied for membership. Throughout the conflict Tammany Hall was the resort of the war-party. At the news of each victory the flag was hoisted to the breeze and a celebration followed. The successful military and naval men were banqueted there, while hundreds of candles illumined every window in the building. On August 31, 1814, 1150 members of the society marched to build defenses in Brooklyn; but this was not done until public pressure forced it, for by August 15 at least twenty other societies, civil and trades, had volunteered, and Tammany had to make good its pretensions.

The leaders prospered by Madison’s favor. From one contract alone Matthew L. Davis reaped $80,000, and Nathan Sanford was credited with making his office of United States District Attorney at New York yield as high as $30,000 a year. The lesser political workers were rewarded proportionately. Having a direct and considerable interest in the success of Madison’s administration, they were indefatigable partizans. Some of the Tammany leaders proved their devotion to their country’s cause by doing service in the Quartermaster’s Department. Among these were the two Swartwouts (John and Robert), who became Generals, and Romaine, who became a Colonel.

This war had the effect of causing the society to abandon its custom of marching in Indian garb.[3]In 1813 the Indians in the Northwest, incited by British agents,went on the war-path, torturing and scalping, devastating settlements and killing defenseless men, women and children. Their very name became repulsive to the whites. The society seemed to be callous to this feeling, and began preparations for its annual parades, in the usual Indian costumes, with painted faces, wearing bearskins and carrying papooses. The Federalists declared that these exhibitions, at all times ridiculous and absurd, would be little short of criminal after the cruelties which were being committed by the Tammany men of the wilderness. These attacks affected the Tammany Society so much that a majority of the members, consisting mainly of the politicians and young men, held a secret meeting and abolished all imitations of the Indians, in dress and manners as well as in name, and resolved that the officers should thereafter bear plain English titles.

Mooney opposed the change.[4]He would not listen to having those picturesque and native ceremonies, which he himself had ordained, wiped out. He resigned as Grand Sachem, and many of the Sachems went with him. On May 1, 1813, Benjamin Romaine was elected Grand Sachem, and other “reformers” were chosen as Sachems. On July 4 the Tammany Society marched with reduced numbers in ordinary civilian garb. From that time the society contented itself with civilian costume until 1825, when its parades ceased.

The attitude of the political parties to the war had the effect of making Tammany Hall the predominant force in the State, and of disorganizing the Federalist party beyond hope of recovery. Tammany began in 1813 to organize for the control of the State and to put down for all time De Witt Clinton, whom it denounced as having tried to paralyze the energies of Madison’s administration. Meanwhile the Federalist leaders in the city, with a singular lack of tact, were constantly offending thepopular feeling with their political doctrines and their haughty airs of superior citizenship. To such an extent was this carried that at times they were mobbed, as on June 29, 1814, for celebrating the return of the Bourbons to the French throne.

The organization of Tammany Hall, begun, as has been seen, by the formation of the general, nominating and correspondence committees, in 1806 and 1808, was now further elaborated. A finance committee, whose duty it was to gather for the leaders a suitable campaign fund, was created, and this was followed by the creation of the Republican Young Men’s General Committee,[5]which was a sort of auxiliary to the general committee, having limited powers, and serving as a province for the ambitions of the young men. The Democratic-Republican General Committee was supposed to comprise only the trusted ward leaders, ripe with years and experience. About the beginning of the War of 1812, it added to its duties the issuing of long public addresses on political topics. These general committees were made self-perpetuating. At the close of every year they would issue a notice to the voters when and where to meet for the election of their successors. No sooner did the committee of one year step out than the newly elected committee instantly took its place. There were also ward or vigilance committees, which were expected to bring every Tammany-Republican voter to the polls, to see that no Federalist intimidation was attempted and to campaign for the party. The Tammany Hall organization was in a superb state by the year 1814, and in active operation ceaselessly. The Federalists, on the contrary, were scarcely organized, and the Clintonites had declined to a mere faction.

The Tammany leaders, moreover, were shrewd and conciliating. About forty Federalists—disgusted, theysaid, with their party’s opposition to the war—joined the Tammany Society. They were led by Gulian C. Verplanck, who severely assailed Clinton, much to the Wigwam’s delight. Tammany Hall not only received them with warmth, but advanced nearly all of them, such as Jacob Radcliff, Richard Hadfelt, Richard Riker and Hugh Maxwell, to the first public positions. This was about the beginning of that policy, never since abandoned, by which Tammany Hall has frequently broken up opposing parties or factions. The winning over of leaders from the other side and conferring upon them rewards in the form of profitable public office or contracts has been one of the most notable methods of Tammany’s diplomacy.

FOOTNOTES[1]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 72, p. 137. Judge Irving and an Aldermanic committee, after a searching investigation, found Valentine guilty of receiving from prisoners money for which he did not account to the city.[2]Hammond, Vol. I, p. 294.[3]R. S. Guernsey,New York City During the War of 1812.[4]Mooney had now become opulent, being the owner of three or four houses and lots.[5]The moving spirit in this committee for some years was Samuel L. Berrian, who had been indicted in August, 1811, for instigating a riot in Trinity Church, convicted and fined $100.

[1]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 72, p. 137. Judge Irving and an Aldermanic committee, after a searching investigation, found Valentine guilty of receiving from prisoners money for which he did not account to the city.

[2]Hammond, Vol. I, p. 294.

[3]R. S. Guernsey,New York City During the War of 1812.

[4]Mooney had now become opulent, being the owner of three or four houses and lots.

[5]The moving spirit in this committee for some years was Samuel L. Berrian, who had been indicted in August, 1811, for instigating a riot in Trinity Church, convicted and fined $100.

By 1815 Tammany Hall obtained control of the State, and in 1816 completely regained that of the city. The Common Council and its dependent offices since 1809 had been more or less under Federalist rule, and from the beginning of the century the city had had a succession of Clintonite office-holders in those posts controlled by the Council of Appointment.

At the close of the War of 1812 the population of the city approached 100,000, and there were 13,941 voters in all. The total expenses of the municipality reached a little over a million dollars. The city had but one public school, which was maintained by public subscription. Water was supplied chiefly by the Manhattan Company, by means of bored wooden logs laid underground from the reservoir in Chambers street. No fire department was dreamed of, and every blaze had the city at its mercy. The streets were uncleaned; only two or three thoroughfares were fit for the passage of carriages, though until 1834 the law required the inhabitants to clean the streets in front of their houses. Many of those elaborate departments which we now associate with political control were then either in an embryo state or not thought of.

The Aldermen were not overburdened with public anxieties. No salary was attached to the office, yet none the less, it was sought industriously. In early days it was regarded as a post of honor and filled as such, but with thebeginning of the century it was made a means of profit. The professional politician of the type of to-day was rare. The Aldermen had business, as a rule, upon which they depended and to which they attended in the day, holding sessions of the board sporadically at night. The only exception to this routine was when the Alderman performed some judicial office. Under the law, as soon as an Alderman entered office he became a judge of some of the most important courts, being obliged to preside with the Mayor at the trial of criminals. This system entailed upon the Aldermen the trial of offenses against laws many of which they themselves made, and it had an increasingly pernicious influence upon politics. Otherwise the sole legal perquisites and compensation of the Aldermen consisted in their power and custom of making appropriations, including those for elaborate public dinners for themselves. It was commonly known that they awarded contracts for city necessaries either to themselves or to their relatives.

The backward state of the city, its filthy and neglected condition and the chaotic state of public improvements and expenditures, excited little public discussion. The Common Councils were composed of men of inferior mind. It is told of one of them that hearing that the King of France had taken umbrage he ran home post haste to get his atlas and find out the location of that particular spot. In the exclusive charge of such a body New York City would have struggled along but slowly had it not been for the courage and genius of the man who at one stroke started it on a dazzling career of prosperity. This was De Witt Clinton.

No sooner did a Republican Council of Appointment step into office, early in 1815, than Tammany Hall pressed for the removal of Clinton as Mayor and announced that John Ferguson, the Grand Sachem of the Society, would have to be appointed in his place.[1]TheCouncil, at the head of which was Gov. Tompkins, wavered and delayed, Tompkins not caring to offend the friends of Clinton by the latter’s summary removal. At this the entire Tammany representation, which had gone to Albany for the purpose, grew furious and threatened that not only would they nominate no ticket the next Spring, but would see that none of their friends should accept office under the Council, did it fail to remove Clinton. This action implied the turning out of the Council of Appointment at the next election. Yielding to these menaces, the Council removed Clinton. Then by a compromise, Ferguson was made Mayor until the National Government should appoint him Naval Officer when Jacob Radcliff (Mayor 1810-1811) was to succeed him—an arrangement which was carried out.[2]

The Wigwam was overjoyed at having struck down Clinton, and now expected many years of supremacy. From youth Clinton’s sole occupation had been politics. He had spent his yearly salaries and was deeply in debt. His political aspirations seemed doomed. Stripped, as he appeared, of a party or even a fraction of one, the Sachems felt sure of his retirement to private life forever. In this belief they were as much animated by personal as by political enmity. Clinton had sneered at or ridiculed nearly all of them, and he spoke of them habitually in withering terms.

Besides, to enlarge their power in the city they needed the Mayor’s office. The Mayor had the right to appoint a Deputy Mayor from among the Aldermen, the Deputy Mayor acting with full power in his absence. The Mayor could convene the Common Council, and he appointed and licensed marshals, porters, carriers, cartmen, carmen, cryers, scullers and scavengers, and removed them atpleasure. He licensed tavern-keepers and all who sold excisable liquors by retail. The Mayor, the Deputy Mayor, Recorder and Aldermen were ex-officio Justices of the Peace, and were empowered to hold Courts of General Sessions. The Mayor, Recorder and Aldermen were also Justices of Oyer and Terminer; and the Mayor, Deputy Mayor and Recorder could preside over the Court of Common Pleas with or without the Aldermen. The gathering of all this power into its own control gave further strength to Tammany Hall.

But the expressions of regret at Clinton’s removal were so spontaneous and sincere that Tammany feigned participation in them and took the utmost pains to represent the removal as only a political exigency. The Common Council (which was now Federalist) passed, on March 21, 1815, a vote of thanks to Clinton for his able administration.[3]Curiously, the very Wigwam men who had made it their business to undertake the tedious travel over bad roads to Albany to effect his removal (Aldermen Smith, George Buckmaster, Mann and Burtis) voted loudest in favor of the resolution.

Out of office, Clinton found time to agitate for the building of a navigable canal between the great western lakes and the tide waters of the Hudson. The idea of this enterprise was not original with him. It had been suggested over thirty years before, but it was he who carried it forward to success. The bigotry and animus with which it was assailed were amazing. Tammany Hall frequently passed resolutions denouncing the project as impracticable and chimerical, declaring that the canal would make a ditch fit to bury its author in. At Albany the Tammany representatives greeted the project with a burst of mockery, and placed obstacle after obstacle in its path.

In the intervals of warring upon Clinton, Tammanywas adroitly seizing every post of vantage in the city. The Burr men ruled its councils and directed the policy and nominations of the Republican, or, as it was getting to be more generally known, the Democratic-Republican party. Three men, in particular, were foremost as leaders—George Buckmaster, a boat builder; Roger Strong and Benjamin Prince, a druggist and physician. Teunis Wortman, one of the energetic leaders in 1807-10, was now not quite so conspicuous. What the Wigwam lacked to make its rule in the city complete was a majority in the Common Council. The committees of the Council not only had the exclusive power of expenditures, but they invariably refused an acceptable accounting.[4]The Federalists, though vanishing as a party owing to their attitude in the recent war, still managed, through local dissensions among the Republicans, to retain control of the Common Council. The Federalists, therefore, held the key to the purse. It had always been customary for the Mayor to appoint the Common Council committees from the party which happened to be dominant.

Established forms meant nothing to Mayor Radcliff and to Buckmaster[5]and other Tammany Aldermen, who late in December, 1815, decided to turn out the Federalist chairmen of committees and put Tammany men in theirplaces. Radcliff imprudently printed a handbill of officers he intended appointing, copies of which he sent to his partizans. A copy fell into a Federalist’s hands. At the next meeting, before the Mayor could get a chance to act, the Federalist majority altered the rules so as to vest in future the appointment of all committees in a majority of the board. The Sachems were so enraged at Radcliff’s bungling that they declared they would have him removed from office. About a year afterward they carried out their threat.

In 1816 Tammany elected not only its Congress and Assembly ticket, but a Common Council, by over 1000 majority out of 9000 votes. This victory was the result of the wily policy of further disrupting the Federalist party by nominating its most popular men. Walter Bowne, a late Federalist, an enemy of Clinton and a man of standing in the community, was one of those nominated by Tammany Hall for State Senator, and the support of the wealthy was solicited by the selection of men of their own class, such as Col. Rutgers, said to be the richest man in the State.

Most of Tammany’s early members, certainly the leaders, were now rich and had stepped into the upper middle class; but their wealth could not quite secure them admittance to that stiff aristocracy above them, which demanded something more of a passport than the possession of money. Another body of members were the small tradesmen and the like, to whom denunciations of the aristocracy were extremely palatable. A third class, that of the mechanics and laborers, believed that Tammany Hall exclusively represented them in its onslaughts on the aristocracy. From the demands of these various interests arose the singular sight of Tammany Hall winning the support of the rich by systematically catering to them; of the middle class, which it reflected, and of the poor, in whose interests it claimed to work. The spirit of the Tammany Society was well illustrated in its oddaddress on public affairs in 1817, wherein it lamented the spread of the foreign game of billiards among the aristocratic youth and the prevalence of vice among the lower classes. Again, in May, 1817, the Tammany majority of the Common Council, under pressure from the religious element, passed an ordinance fining every person $5 who should hunt, shoot, fish, spar or play on Sunday—a law which cut off from the poor their favorite pastimes.

Here, too, another of the secrets by which the organization was enabled to thrive, should be mentioned. This was the “regularity” of its nominations. Teunis Wortman, a few years before, had disclosed the real substance of the principle of “regularity” when he wrote: “The nominating power is an omnipotent one. Though it approaches us in the humble attitude of therecommendation, its influence is irresistible. Every year’s experience demonstrates that its recommendations are commands. That instead of presenting a choice it deprives us of all option.”[6]The plain meaning was that, regardless of the candidate’s character, the mass of the party would vote for him once he happened to be put forth on the “regular” ticket. Fully alive to the value of this particular power, the Tammany Hall General Committee, successively and unfailingly, would invite in its calls for all meetings “those friendly to regular nominations.” Its answer to charges of dictatorship was plain and direct. Discipline was necessary, its leaders said, to prevent aristocrats from disrupting their party by inciting a variety of nominations.

It was through this fertile agency that “bossism” became an easy possibility. With the voters in such a receptive state of mind it was not difficult to dictate nominations. The general committee was composed of thirty members; its meetings were secret and attended seldom by more than fourteen members. So, substantially,fourteen men were acting for over five thousand Republican voters, and eight members of the fourteen composed a majority. Yet the system had all the pretense of being pure democracy; the wards were called upon at regular intervals to elect delegates; the latter chose candidates or made party rules; and the “great popular meeting” accepted or rejected nominees; it all seemed to spring directly from the people.

This exquisitely working machine was in full order when the organization secured a firm hold upon the city in 1816. The newly elected Common Council removed every Federalist possible and put a stanch Tammany man in his place. The Federalist Captains of Police and the heads and subordinates of many departments whose appointments and removal were vested in the Common Council were all ejected. This frequent practice of changes in the police force, solely because of political considerations, had a demoralizing effect upon the welfare of the city.

Both parties were as responsible for this state of affairs as they were for the increase in the city’s debt. To provide revenue the Aldermen repeatedly caused to be sold ground owned by the municipality in the heart of the city. This was one of their clumsy or fraudulent methods of concealing the squandering of city funds, on what no one knew. They were not ignorant that with the growth of the city the value of the land would increase vastly. It was perhaps for this very reason they sold it; for it was generally themselves or the Tammany leaders who were the buyers. One sale was of land fronting Bowling Green, among the purchasers being John Swartwout, Jacob Barker and John Sharpe. A hint as to the fraudulent ways in which the Tammany leaders became rich is furnished by a report made to the Common Council respecting land in Hamilton Square, bought from the city by Jacob Barker, John S. Hunn and others. The reportstated that repeated applications for the payment of principal and interest had been made without effect.[7]

By 1817 the Federalists in New York City were crushed, quite beyond hope of resurrection as a winning party. The only remaining fear was Clinton, whose political death the organization celebrated prematurely. Public opinion was one factor Tammany had not conquered.

This inclined more and more daily to the support of Clinton. Notwithstanding all the opposition which narrow-mindedness and hatred could invent, Clinton’s grand project of the Erie Canal became popular—distinctively so throughout the State, then so greatly agricultural. On April 15, 1817, the bill pledging the State to the building of the canal became a law, the Tammany delegation and all their friends voting against it.

Gov. Tompkins becoming Vice-President, a special election to fill the gubernatorial vacancy became necessary. A new and powerful junction of Clinton’s old friends and the disunited Federalists joined in nominating him to succeed Tompkins. This was bitter news to Tammany, which made heroic efforts to defeat him, nominating as its candidate Peter B. Porter, and sending tickets with his name into every county in the State.

Inopportunely for the Wigwam, the resentment of the Irish broke out against it at this time. Tammany’s long-continued refusal to give the Irish proper representation among its nominations, either in the society or for public office, irritated them greatly. On February 7, a writer in a newspaper over the signature “Connal,” averred in an open letter to Matthew L. Davis that on the evening of February 3, the Tammany Society had considered a resolution for the adoption of a new constitution, the object of which was to exclude foreigners entirely from holding office in the society. This may not have been strictly true, but the anti-foreign feeling in the organizationwas unquestionably strong. The Irish had sought, some time before, to have the organization nominate for Congress Thomas Addis Emmett, an Irish orator and patriot and an ardent friend of Clinton. As Tammany Hall since 1802 had not only invariably excommunicated all Clintonites, but had broken up such Clinton meetings as were held, this demand was refused without discussion. The Irish grew to regard Tammany Hall as the home of bigotry; the Wigwam, in turn, was resolved not to alienate the prejudiced native support by recognizing foreigners; furthermore, the Irish were held to be Clintonites trying to get into Tammany Hall and control it.

The long-smouldering enmity burst out on the night of April 24, 1817, when the general committee was in session. Two hundred Irishmen, assembled at Dooley’s Long Room, marched in rank to the Wigwam and broke into the meeting room. The intention of their leaders was to impress upon the committee the wisdom of nominating Emmett for Congress, as well as other Irish Catholics on the Tammany ticket in future, but the more fiery spirits at once started a fight. Eyes were blackened, noses and heads battered freely. The invaders broke the furniture, using it for weapons and shattering it maliciously; tore down the fixtures and shivered the windows. Reinforcements arriving, the intruders were driven out, but not before nearly all present had been bruised and beaten.[8]

Clinton received an overwhelming majority for Governor, Porter obtaining a ridiculously small vote in both New York City and the rest of the State.[9]Thus in the feud between Tammany Hall and DeWitt Clinton, the latter, lacking a political machine and basing his contest solely on a political idea—that of internal improvements—emerged triumphant.

FOOTNOTES[1]Hammond, Vol. I, p. 399.[2]Valentine in hisManual of the Common Council of New York, for 1842-44, p. 163, states that Ferguson held on to both offices until President Monroe required him to say which office he preferred. Ferguson soon after resigned the Mayoralty. He held the other post until his death in 1832.[3]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 29, p. 150.[4]As late as July 28, 1829, the Common Council refused such an accounting. Charles King, a prominent citizen, memorialized the Council, through Alderman Lozier, to furnish an itemized statement of the expenditure of over half a million dollars for the previous fiscal year. By a vote of 15 to 6 the Council refused to grant the request. A public agitation on the question following, the board later rescinded its action, and supplied the statement.[5]Buckmaster had a record. On October 9, 1815, the Common Council passed a secret resolution to sell $440,000 of United States bonds it held at 97—the stock being then under par. About $30,000 worth was disposed of at that figure, when the officials found that not a dollar’s worth more could be sold. Investigation followed. Gould Hoyt proved that Buckmaster had disclosed the secret to certain Wall street men, who, taking advantage of the city’s plight, forced the sale of the stock at 95. Buckmaster was chairman of the general committee in 1815 and at other times, and chairman of the nominating committee in 1820.[6]New York Public Advertiser, April 13, 1809. This journal was secretly supported for a time by the funds of the Tammany Society.[7]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 18, p. 359.[8]The National Advocate, May 10, asserted that the Irish entered Tammany Hall, shouting “Down with the Natives!” but the assertion was denied.[9]Clinton’s vote was nearly 44,000; Porter’s not quite 1,400.

[1]Hammond, Vol. I, p. 399.

[2]Valentine in hisManual of the Common Council of New York, for 1842-44, p. 163, states that Ferguson held on to both offices until President Monroe required him to say which office he preferred. Ferguson soon after resigned the Mayoralty. He held the other post until his death in 1832.

[3]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 29, p. 150.

[4]As late as July 28, 1829, the Common Council refused such an accounting. Charles King, a prominent citizen, memorialized the Council, through Alderman Lozier, to furnish an itemized statement of the expenditure of over half a million dollars for the previous fiscal year. By a vote of 15 to 6 the Council refused to grant the request. A public agitation on the question following, the board later rescinded its action, and supplied the statement.

[5]Buckmaster had a record. On October 9, 1815, the Common Council passed a secret resolution to sell $440,000 of United States bonds it held at 97—the stock being then under par. About $30,000 worth was disposed of at that figure, when the officials found that not a dollar’s worth more could be sold. Investigation followed. Gould Hoyt proved that Buckmaster had disclosed the secret to certain Wall street men, who, taking advantage of the city’s plight, forced the sale of the stock at 95. Buckmaster was chairman of the general committee in 1815 and at other times, and chairman of the nominating committee in 1820.

[6]New York Public Advertiser, April 13, 1809. This journal was secretly supported for a time by the funds of the Tammany Society.

[7]MS. Minutes of the Common Council, Vol. 18, p. 359.

[8]The National Advocate, May 10, asserted that the Irish entered Tammany Hall, shouting “Down with the Natives!” but the assertion was denied.

[9]Clinton’s vote was nearly 44,000; Porter’s not quite 1,400.

With Gov. Clinton at the head of the Council of Appointment, Tammany men expected the force of his vengeance. They were not disappointed. He removed many of them for no other reason than that they belonged to the organization.

Hoping to make terms with him, the Wigwam Assemblymen, early in 1818, presented to the Council of Appointment a petition praying for the removal of Mayor Radcliff and the appointment in his place of William Paulding, Jr. “Radcliff,” the paper read, “is an unfit person longer to fill that honorable and respectful office.” Clinton smiled at this ambidexterity. It was rumored that he intended to award the honor to Cadwallader D. Colden, a Federalist supporter of the War of 1812, and one of the Federalists Tammany Hall had sent to the Assembly in 1817, as a means of breaking up that party. Colden now let it be understood that he sided with Clinton.

The whole Tammany delegation lived in a single house at Albany and met in a large room, No. 10, in Eagle Tavern. “This system of acting as a separate body,” admitted Tammany’s own organ,[1]“was very injudicious to our city. It created suspicion and distrust among country members; it looked like a separate interest; a combination of a powerful delegation to frown down or overpowerthe delegation of a smaller county.” Colden did not join in these nightly meetings. One day he was coaxed in to take a glass of wine. To his surprise, upon opening the door of No. 10, he found the delegation in caucus. The meeting seemed to be waiting for him before transacting business. He had scarcely taken a seat, when one of the members arose, and in a long speech protested against any member of the city delegation accepting an office, and suggested that each member should pledge himself not to do so. Colden saw at once that the resolution was directed against himself. He exclaimed energetically against the trickery, declaring that he had not asked for the office of Mayor, but would accept it if offered. The meeting broke up; Colden was appointed Mayor, and Tammany Hall from that time denounced him.

In Albany, Clinton was vigorously pushing forward the Erie Canal project; the Tammany men were as aggressively combatting it.[2]While Clinton was thus absorbed in this great public enterprise the Wigwam was enriching its leaders in manifold ways. An instance of this was the noted Barker episode. Jacob Barker was a Sachem, a leader of great influence in the political organization, and such a power in financial and business circles that at one time he defied the United States Bank. He and Matthew L. Davis were Burr’s firmest friends to the hour of Burr’s death. Early in 1818 a bill prohibiting private banking, prepared at the instance of the incorporated banks, which sought a monopoly, passed the Senate; though as a special favor to Barker the Senate exempted from its provisions the latter’s Exchange Bank for three years. But Barker desired an indefinite lease. To create a show of public sentiment he had the hall packed with his friends and creatures on April 14, when resolutions were passed stating that the proposed bill would destroy all competition with the incorporated banks, “benefit the rich, oppressthe poor, extend the power of existing aristocracies, and terminate the banking transactions of an individual whose loans have been highly advantageous to many laborious and industrious mechanics and neighboring farmers.” The Legislature granted the privileges Barker asked. A few years later (1826) the sequel to this legislative favoritism appeared in the form of one of the most sensational trials witnessed in early New York.

The year 1818 saw Tammany Hall in the unusual position of advocating a protective tariff. The War of 1812 having injured domestic manufacturing, the demand for such a measure was general. Party asperity had softened, and Republicans, or Democrats—as they were coming to be known—and Federalists alike favored it. The society made the best of this popular wave. It issued an address, advising moderate protective duties on foreign goods. But New York then, and until after the Civil War, was a great shipbuilding center; and the shipbuilders and owners and the importing merchants soon influenced Tammany to revert to the stanch advocacy of free trade.

The almost complete extinction of national party lines under Monroe caused the disappearance of violent partizan recriminations and brought municipal affairs more to public attention. From 1817 onward public bodies agitated much more forcibly and persistently than before for the correction of certain local evils. Chief among these were the high taxes. In 1817 the city tax levy was $180,000; in 1818 it rose to $250,000, “an enormous amount,” one newspaper said. Though the city received annually $200,000 in rents from houses and lots, for wharves, slips and piers, and also a considerable amount from fines, yet there was a constantly increasing deficit. The city expenses were thought to be too slight to devour the ordinary revenue. The Democratic, or Tammany, officials made attempts to explain that much of the debt was contracted under Federalist Common Councils, andsaid that sufficient money must be provided or “the poor would starve.”

At almost the identical time this plea was entered, E. C. Genet was laying before the Grand Jury a statement to this effect: that although it was known that the aggregate capital of the incorporated banks, insurance and commission companies in New York City, exclusive of one branch of the United States Bank, amounted in 1817 to about $22,000,000, in addition to the shares in those companies, yet the city and States taxes combined “on all that vast personal estate in New York City are only a paltry $97,000.”

The explanation of the blindness of the Wigwam officials to the escape of the rich from taxation is simple. The Tammany Hall of 1818 was not the Tammany Hall of 1800. In that interval the poor young men who once had to club together in order to vote had become directors in banking, insurance and various other corporations, which as members of the Legislature or as city officials they themselves had helped to form. Being such, they exerted all the influence of their political machinery to save their property from taxation. From about 1805 to 1837 Tammany Hall was ruled directly by about one-third bankers, one-third merchants and the remaining third politicians of various pursuits. The masses formed—except at rare times—the easily wielded body. The leaders safeguarded their own interests at every point, however they might profess at election times an abhorrence of the aristocracy; and the Grand Jury being of them, ignored Genet’s complaint.

A new series of revelations concerning the conduct of Tammany chieftains was made public during 1817-18. Ruggles Hubbard, a one-time Sachem and at the time Sheriff of the county, absconded from the city August 15, 1817, leaving a gap in the treasury.[3]John L. Broome,another Sachem, was shortly after removed from the office of City Clerk by the Council of Appointment for having neglected to take the necessary securities from Hubbard. John P. Haff, a one-time Grand Sachem and long a power in the organization, was removed by President Monroe on November 14, 1818, from the office of Surveyor of the Port, for corruption and general unfitness.[4]

But the most sensational of these exposures was that concerning the swindling of the Medical Science Lottery, by which Naphtali Judah[5]and others profited handsomely. The testimony brought out before Mayor Colden, November 10, 1818, showed that a corrupt understanding existed between Judah and one of the lottery’s managers, by which the former was enabled to have a knowledge of the state of the wheel. Not less than $100,000 was drawn on the first day, of which Judah received a large share. Further affidavits were submitted tending to show a corrupt understanding between Judah and Alderman Isaac Denniston in the drawing of the Owego Lottery, by which Denniston won $35,000. John L. Broome was also implicated in the scandal, and Teunis Wortman, while not directly concerned in it, was considered involved by the public, and suffered a complete loss of popular favor,[6]though retaining for some time a certaindegree of influence in the society and organization.

Always as popular criticism began to assert itself, Tammany would make a sudden display of patriotism, accompanied by the pronouncement of high-sounding toasts and other exalted utterances. Such it did in 1817, when the society took part in the interment of the remains of Gen. Montgomery in St. Paul’s Church. And now the Sachems prepared to entertain Andrew Jackson at a banquet, and also indirectly signify that he was their choice for President. William Mooney, again elected Grand Sachem, sent to Gen. Jackson, under date of February 15, 1819, a grandiloquent letter of invitation which, referring to the battle of New Orleans, said in part:

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