BOSS TWEED: The Corrupt Pol who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York (67 page)

1. “But they have eyes …”: Flick, p. 213
   

2. “This is not a question…”:
   Missouri Republican
   , in
   New-York Times
   , August 24, 1871, in Callow, 268.
   

3. Tweed … $118,000 …into the club: See checks in Tweed confession,
   New York Herald
   , October 10, 1877; bills from Ingersolll, Watson & Company (furniture), June 1, 1871, and C. Boller (cabinets), August 16, 1871, in Tweed papers, NYHS.
   

4. Lower California Company:
   New York Herald
   , August 8, 1871.
   

5. Metropolitan Hotel… $450,000 on renovating: Tweed testimony, Aldermen, p. 310 and 371.
   

6. mayor appealed …“large and influential committee…”: Letter from Hall and Connolly to Dodge, in
   New York Herald
   , August 5, 1871.
   

7. Wall Street abruptly slapped him down: See letter from Opdyle to Hall and Connolly, in
   New York Herald
   , August 9, 1871. With Dodge away, the letter was signed by the Chamber’s First Vice President: George Opdyke, New York’s former mayor during the 1863 draft riots..
   

8. Hall and Connolly… Again … asked business leaders to join him: Letter from Hall to Common Council, August 16, 1871, transmitted August 23, 1871, in
   New York Sun
   and other papers, August 24, 1871. The citizen chose as their members on the committee bank presidents Lennox Kennedy (Bank of Commerce), Thomas Jeremiah (Bowery Savings Bank), and D. Bissenger (German Savings Bank), James Brown (Brown Brothers), chamber of commerce president William E. Dodge, and sugar merchant William A. Booth.
   

9. “The gross attacks of a partisan journal …”: Letter from Hall to committee of aldermen, August 1871. NYMA.
   

10. “I am satisfied that if done at all …”: Letter from Vanderbilt to Jones, undated. Jones papers, NYPL.
    

11. “The litigation promises …”:
    Sunday Mercury
    , August 27, 1871, in the
    New York Herald
    , August 28, 1871.
    

12. “Property owners may well be alarmed ...”:
    New-York Times
    , August 28, 1871. Jennings also used the Tweed sons’ gala opening of the Metropolitan Hotel to attack. In “The Great Carpet Trick,” he pointed to $386,821 worth of alleged city-paid overcharges for carpets: “What became of the carpets…? We cannot answer this. But Boss Tweed’s son has just opened the Metropolitan Hotel.” Jennings presented no other evidence to support this suggested Tweed family swindle.
    New-York Times
    , August 30, 1871
    

13. “It is no secret that the most influential …”:
    Evening Post
    , in
    New York Tribune,
    August 21, 1871.
    

14. “Two Great Questions,” … “Twas him.” :
    Harper’s Weekly
    , August 19, 1871.
    

15. “You have never done anything …”: Harper, p. 292.
    

16. Tweed … transferring … real estate to his son Richard … Connolly’s wife, transferred ownership of … United States treasury bonds: Tweed testimony, Alderman, p. 320,335,348,349,350,351, and 352;
    New-York Times
    , October 27 and 29, 1871; and, regarding Connolly,
    New York Tribune
    , September 12, 1871.
    

17. German Democratic Union … anti-Tweed resolutions : German immigrants had long felt much less enchanted with Tammany than the Irish. Many Germans had fled war, civil unrest, and anti-Catholic oppression in Europe and distrusted paternalistic government. See Bernstein, p. 222-223.
    

18. Council of Political Reform : See Hershkowitz, p. 183 and newspapers.
    

19. “They are since July public enemies…” “The
    World
    blundered terribly…”: Letters from Croly [“DSC”] to Marble, August 13 and September 6, 1871. Marble papers. LC.
    

Chapter 13. Tilden
(pages 191–212)

1. “
   Sam Tilden wants …”:
   T.P. Cook, p. 95.
   

2. “moral conviction of gross frauds”: Bigelow (Tilden writings), p. 587.
   

3. “I think you had better note…”: Letter from Tilden to Cassidy, August, 1871. Bigelow, (Tilden letters), p. 272-3.
   

4. “Where are the Honest Democrats?”:
   New-York Times
   , August 8, 1871.
   

5. “Is it not a good time …”: Letter from Church to Tilden, August 1, 1871. Bigelow (Tilden letters), p. 274.
   

6. “I told him I should appear …”: Quote and Tilden movements from Bigelow (Tilden writings), p. 587-588; O’Brien interview,
   New York World
   , August 16, 1891.
   

7. “We have to face the question …”: Letter from Tilden (in NYC) to Purcell, August 12, 1871, in Bigelow (Tilden letters), p. 275.
   

8. Tilden buttonholed … David Croly: McJimsey, p. 149.
   

9. “When the public mind …”: Letter from Seymour to Tilden, August 12, 1871, Bigelow (Tilden letters), p. 274.
   

10. Tilden ... had caught the fatal weakness : See Bigelow, (Tilden writings), p. 587.
    

11. “I propose now, gentlemen, …”: “An Appreciation” by James C. Carter, in Bigelow (Tilden Letters), p. xvi-xvii.
    

12. “If, by a violent blow …”: Flick, 97-98.
    

13. “Tilden is very positive in his views …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 9, 1871.
    

14. “The
    Times
    rolls itself up …”:
    New York Tribune
    , August 21, 1871.
    

15. “political guerilla”… “English cockney proclivities”:
    New York Herald
    , September 8, 1871.
    

16. Times
    circulation had jumped by 40 percent: Morphet, p. 140.
    

17. “A deadly disease is consuming …”: Accounts of the Cooper Union speeches are from the
    New-York Times
    , September 5, 1871.
    

18. “the ignorant Irish voting element”:
    The Nation
    , August 24, 1871.
    

19. “the Anglo-Saxon race has never …”:
    The Nation,
    September 7, 1871.
    

20. “in our opinion, Hall, Connolly …”:
    The Nation
    , September 2, 1871, in Lynch, p. 371-372.
    

21. Played for suckers…: “The revulsion of feeling was all the more powerful because of the implicit character of the misplaced confidence which had preceded it,” wrote
    New-York Times
    reporter John Foord. Foord, p. 93.
    

22. “Saints Lashing Sinners”:
    New York Sun
    , September 5, 1871.
    

23. “followed the example of Mr. Tilden”:
    New York World
    , September 5, 1871.
    

24. “I saw, as the roll proceeded, ….”: Tweed interview,
    New York Herald
    , October 26, 1877. See also
    New-York Times
    , October 17, 1857 and September 21,
    1860.]
    

25. “I was the best friend he ever had”: Tweed testimony, Aldermen, p. 146.
    

26. “[Y]ou had to waste much time …”: Tweed testimony, Aldermen, p. 147.
    

27. “from 1868, and including the granting …”: Barnard testimony, Barnard Impeachment, p. 1638.
    

28. “I never called at her house …”: Barnard testimony, Barnard Impeachment, p. 1664.
    

29. “Why, I presume I got it out of my safe …”: Barnard testimony, Barnard Impeachment, p. 1667.
    

30. “Do you think Judge Barnard …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 7, 1871.
    

31. “suffering from the convenient …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 7, 1871.
    

32. “What of it; do you think that I can tell …”: Specifications, Barnard Impeachment, p.58. Another time, referring to a lawyer recently assaulted on the street, Barnard said from the bench: “My enemies are very unfortunate; one of them went home from his woman and fell down dead in his house; another tried to make a little capital by getting himself knocked in the head; but he got knocked too hard.”
    

33. “[I]f the court should grant your injunction …”: Barnard proceedings in
    New York Herald
    , September 8, 1871.
    

34. “Knowing Barnard as we do …”: Lynch, p. 375. Another theory had it that Sweeny conceived the injunction and signaled Barnard to approve it to put pressure on Connolly and Tweed. See Wingate, III, p. 374.
    

35. “We owe to Barnard …”: Tweed interview,
    New York Herald
    , October 26, 1877.
    

36. Tweed … “fatigued and worn”:
    New York Sun
    , September 9, 1871.
    

37. Tweed had pulled his circle together several times: Records showed nomeetings of the Board of Apportionment in July or August 1871, but starting up again regularly on September 5, the day after the Cooper Union meeting. See affidavit of Richard Storrs, September 11, 1871. Boss Tweed in Court, Reel 1. “[W]e were in the habit of meeting daily, or at least three times a week—sometimes daily—at my private office,” Tweed recalled. Aldermen, p. 141-2.
    

38. “That fellow was seized with the idea …”: Tweed interview,
    New York Herald
    , October 26, 1877.
    

39. Connolly … “fatigued and careworn” … “I have no opinion to give,”:
    New York Sun
    , September 9, 1871.
    

40. Tweed and Connolly both had hired lawyers: Tweed chose Willard O. Barrett, Connolly picked William A. Beach, and Mayor Hall relied on corporation counsel Richard O’Gorman.
    

41. “When the damaging evidences….”: New York Tribune, September 9, 1871.
    

42. “Gentlemen, to resign would be to confess …”:
    New York Sun
    , September 18, 1871.
    

43. “Mr. Sweeny was not greedy …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 9, 1871.
    

44. “If William M. Tweed and Richard B. Connolly have made…”:
    New York Herald
    , September 8, 1871.
    

45. “the man who is his own lawyer ..”:
    New-York Times
    , September 10, 1871.
    

46. “Yes you can”:
    New-York Times
    , September 10, 1871.
    

47. “sink or swim with his colleagues,…”:
    New York Sun
    , September 13, 1871.
    

48. “Well, what do you think of the matter ...”:
    New York Sun
    , September 9, 1871. Reprinted in the
    New-York Times
    and other papers, September 10, 1871.
    

49. “typographic display”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 13, 1871.
    

50. “Nothing to be ashamed of”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 13, 1871.
    

51. “If I go to murder …”:
    New York Sun
    , September 19, 1871.
    

52. breaking under strain: Said the normally-sympathetic
    New York Sun
    : “He shakes his fist, and stamps his foot, and threatens, and whines, and plays sick, and reveals the wounds which his public castigations have inflicted.”
    New York Sun
    , September 11, 1871.
    

53. Lynes remembered: See Lynes testimony, in
    New-York Times
    , September 22, 1871.
    

54. “singularly unfortunate to himself”:
    New York Sun
    , September 12, 1871.
    

55. Erie Railway and the Hannibal and St. Joseph ... tumbled in value … as did city bonds … Connolly might … dump bonds :
    New York Tribune
    , September 12, 1871.
    

56. “Too thin”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 12, 1871.
    

57. “I have just been informed …”: Hall to Connolly, in
    New York Sun
    and other newspapers, September 12, 1871.
    

58. “Hall, don’t send me that letter”:
    New York Sun
    , September 18, 1871.
    

59. “You may mail it …”:
    New York Sun
    , September 18, 1871.
    

60. : “I am prepared to resign at once …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 13, 1871.
    

61. “If Hall ever asks Tweed to resign …”:
    New York Sun
    , September 13, 1871.
    

62. “This is the flag …” “with the air of a grand seigneur…”:
    New York Sun
    , September 13, 1871.
    

63. “I am so overwhelmed with business …”:
    New York Tribune
    , September 13, 1871.