Read Online BOSS TWEED: The Corrupt Pol who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York by Kenneth D. Ackerman - Free Book Online
Authors: Kenneth D. Ackerman
Tags: History
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dressed formally: Prince Albert coats with stiff high collars and black ties though, according to one friend, “his clothes never seemed to fit him quite right.” 12
Kerr now reached across the table and handed Tilden a sheet of paper which showed signs of having been mass-printed. It bore the letterhead “Rooms of the Democratic State Committee”—Tilden’s committee. It had the words “Privately and Strictly Confidential” written across the top and Tilden’s own name signed at the bottom.
“Look at this circular… purporting to be issued by you,” Kerr directed him, “and state to the committee whether you were the author of it or not.”
“I was not,” Tilden answered with a calm perfected in dozens of courtrooms over a long career.
“Do you know personally who was the author of it?”
“I do not.”
The letter and Tilden’s denial already had caused a public uproar. The letter had been telegraphed to hundreds of New York politicos just before Election Day. On its face, it looked like directions for a scam dictated
by Tilden himself: “Please at once communicate with some reliable person
in three or four principal towns and in each city of your county, and request him (expenses duly arranged for at this end) to telegraph to William M. Tweed, Tammany Hall, at the minute of closing the polls … such person’s estimate of the vote,” it read. “ There is of course, an important object to be obtained .” The letter then explained that by firing off preliminary vote counts instantly after the polls closed, they could exploit the usual half-hour delay before actual results normally began to flow over the wires. “Give orders to watch carefully the count,” it went on. “Yours very truly, Samuel J. Tilden, chairman.” 13
Critics saw the implication clearly: that Tammany wire-pullers had wanted an early count of upstate votes—mostly Republican—so they could doctor the count downstate in New York City to produce a big enough Democratic majority to carry the state. In fact, that seemed to be exactly what had happened: Over 200 such telegrams, sent in reply to Tilden’s letter, had reached Tammany Hall on election night, and Seymour had beaten Grant statewide by precisely 10,000 votes—a suspiciously neat margin. F OOTNOTE Tilden had disowned the letter immediately when it first surfaced in newspapers in early November. 14 Now he repeated the same denials for the congressmen.
Kerr continued: “State whether you, as chairman of the democratic State committee, distributed this circular by the mails, yourself, or procured it to be distributed.”
“I did not,” Tilden repeated. “I did not know of its being done, and I did not authorize it to be done” 15
“Do you know whether Mr. Tweed did it or not?”
Tweed. Did he wince at the name? “I do not,” Tilden said.
If any congressmen doubted Sam Tilden’s word, they were gentlemen and didn’t say so. But then Tilden went farther. “I will state what I do know of it,” he said, apparently prompted by the mention of Tweed. But instead of taking the opportunity now to defend his honor by blasting the letter as a forgery and scam, he backtracked. He tried to brush it off as harmless—a well-intentioned safeguard against frauds by upstate Republicans.
“A day or two before the election, I was in the [Democratic State] committee room at the Metropolitan Hotel,” Tilden explained, “and I then understood that a circular had been issued asking for early election returns…. Some gentleman, I think it was Mr. A. Oakey Hall”—Tilden was not likely to forget Oakey Hall, “Elegant Oakey,” New York’s district attorney and also secretary to Tilden’s own committee—“spoke of it as having been intended to prevent the holding back of returns in the republican districts in the [upstate] country until our vote could be calculated, in order that the returns might then be manipulated.” Hall was charging upstate Republicans with
Kerr now reached across the table and handed Tilden a sheet of paper which showed signs of having been mass-printed. It bore the letterhead “Rooms of the Democratic State Committee”—Tilden’s committee. It had the words “Privately and Strictly Confidential” written across the top and Tilden’s own name signed at the bottom.
“Look at this circular… purporting to be issued by you,” Kerr directed him, “and state to the committee whether you were the author of it or not.”
“I was not,” Tilden answered with a calm perfected in dozens of courtrooms over a long career.
“Do you know personally who was the author of it?”
“I do not.”
The letter and Tilden’s denial already had caused a public uproar. The letter had been telegraphed to hundreds of New York politicos just before Election Day. On its face, it looked like directions for a scam dictated
by Tilden himself: “Please at once communicate with some reliable person
in three or four principal towns and in each city of your county, and request him (expenses duly arranged for at this end) to telegraph to William M. Tweed, Tammany Hall, at the minute of closing the polls … such person’s estimate of the vote,” it read. “ There is of course, an important object to be obtained .” The letter then explained that by firing off preliminary vote counts instantly after the polls closed, they could exploit the usual half-hour delay before actual results normally began to flow over the wires. “Give orders to watch carefully the count,” it went on. “Yours very truly, Samuel J. Tilden, chairman.” 13
Critics saw the implication clearly: that Tammany wire-pullers had wanted an early count of upstate votes—mostly Republican—so they could doctor the count downstate in New York City to produce a big enough Democratic majority to carry the state. In fact, that seemed to be exactly what had happened: Over 200 such telegrams, sent in reply to Tilden’s letter, had reached Tammany Hall on election night, and Seymour had beaten Grant statewide by precisely 10,000 votes—a suspiciously neat margin. F OOTNOTE Tilden had disowned the letter immediately when it first surfaced in newspapers in early November. 14 Now he repeated the same denials for the congressmen.
Kerr continued: “State whether you, as chairman of the democratic State committee, distributed this circular by the mails, yourself, or procured it to be distributed.”
“I did not,” Tilden repeated. “I did not know of its being done, and I did not authorize it to be done” 15
“Do you know whether Mr. Tweed did it or not?”
Tweed. Did he wince at the name? “I do not,” Tilden said.
If any congressmen doubted Sam Tilden’s word, they were gentlemen and didn’t say so. But then Tilden went farther. “I will state what I do know of it,” he said, apparently prompted by the mention of Tweed. But instead of taking the opportunity now to defend his honor by blasting the letter as a forgery and scam, he backtracked. He tried to brush it off as harmless—a well-intentioned safeguard against frauds by upstate Republicans.
“A day or two before the election, I was in the [Democratic State] committee room at the Metropolitan Hotel,” Tilden explained, “and I then understood that a circular had been issued asking for early election returns…. Some gentleman, I think it was Mr. A. Oakey Hall”—Tilden was not likely to forget Oakey Hall, “Elegant Oakey,” New York’s district attorney and also secretary to Tilden’s own committee—“spoke of it as having been intended to prevent the holding back of returns in the republican districts in the [upstate] country until our vote could be calculated, in order that the returns might then be manipulated.” Hall was charging upstate Republicans with
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