The Scandal of Reform: The Grand Failures of New York's Political Crusaders and the Death of Nonpartisanship

2. Tweed: Reform’s Child and Champion

21 2 Tweed Reform’s Child and Champion “I don’t think there was ever a fair and honest election in the City of New York.” William M. Tweed,  Boss, from the Dutch baas, meaning “master,” is one of New Amsterdam’s finest contributions to the American lexicon, and it still holds special resonance in its native region. The New York Yankees, owned by the domineering George Steinbrenner, are the only sports franchise in the nation run by the Boss. No one in New Jersey, home to Bruce Springsteen, mistakes the governor for the Boss. And delicatessen customers on both sides of the Hudson River are as likely to hear “May I help you?” as they are “Whaddaya need, Boss?” In greater Gotham, boss is embraced as a colloquial expression of deference—except in politics, where it is a slur that carries all the vulgarity of a four-letter word. In the s, William M. Tweed, the son of a Scottish chair maker, became the first individual to win control of Tammany Hall and the first major party leader to earn the title of Boss. Tall and broad with striking blue eyes and a free and easy manner, Tweed had been a member of the Board of Aldermen’s notorious Forty Thieves, and his insatiable appetite for graft would eventually earn him a middle name as well: Marcy. It was given to him by newspapermen who recalled the maxim of an earlier New York politician, William L. Marcy: “To the victors belong the spoils of the enemy.” Although William M. Tweed’s middle initial likely stood for Magear, his mother’s maiden name, Marcy stuck—and continues to stick to this day, even appearing in his official congressional biography. Tweed has become a mythic figure in the parable of reform, the ultimate spoilsman. Yet his rise to power began with the unintended assistance of reformers, who sought to use election laws to bring down his rival, a reformergone -wrong named Fernando Wood. After a stint in Congress, Fernando Wood won the mayoralty in  by bridging the divide within Tammany over whether slavery should be extended into the nation’s new territories and earning the support of many of the elites who had founded the City Reform party, including Peter Cooper. (He also collected his share of fraudulent votes: in the Irish dominated sixth ward, the number of votes for Wood exceeded the number of voters by ,.) Wood proved to be a capable leader, centralizing power in the mayor’s office and winning control of the police department, moves applauded by reformers, who dubbed him a model mayor. But Wood lost support among the sachems for dispensing patronage without proper regard for their requests, and he won renomination only by outmaneuvering and outmuscling them: he gained appointment to Tammany’s Hall General Committee, where he forced through—with help from his loyal gang, the Dead Rabbits—a nominating system that enabled him to name the party’s election inspectors and vote counters. In his successful  reelection campaign, Wood enlisted the police. Some officers stole votes, while others escorted convicts from Blackwell’s Island (today’s Roosevelt Island) to the polls. He also required them to contribute to his campaign chest: captains were assessed between fifteen and twenty-five dollars, patrolmen a lesser amount. Those who didn’t contribute worked shifts that lasted for twenty-four hours, while others were dismissed for petty infractions. The model mayor was also a masterful political manipulator. And Big Bill Tweed was taking notes. The scandal that arose from Wood’s misuse of the police provided the state legislature with justification for rewriting the city’s charter. The new charter, consistent with both the ethos of reform and the political goals of upstate legislators, transferred power from the mayor to state-appointed boards and commissions that would control nearly every major aspect of city government, including three-quarters of its budget. As part of these changes, the city’s police force, called the Municipals, was dissolved in favor of a state-controlled regional force called the Metropolitans. But Wood refused to recognize the new force, resulting in what remains perhaps the most farcical episode of government dysfunction in the city’s history: the two THE EVOLUTION OF REFORM 22 police forces fought over who should be arrested, who should do the arresting, and even who should sit behind the stationhouse...