Read Online BOSS TWEED: The Corrupt Pol who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York by Kenneth D. Ackerman - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Kenneth D. Ackerman
Tags: History
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exactly the same scam they were alleging against Tammany.
Tilden then dismissed both charges as unrealistic: “I did not attach any importance to the statement, for the reason that I did not think it probable.” Fixing the count, reporting fake returns simply could not be done, he argued, either by Democrats in New York City or by upstate Republicans.
In fact, later that day, Oakey Hall himself would appear as a witness and tell the congressmen that, yes, he did write the letter, he considered it proper, and he’d had Tilden’s name signed to it “because it was the usage to sign the name of the chairman of the main committee.” 16
The congressmen must have scratched their heads. On its face, Tilden’s story didn’t add up. It was fog within fog. Listening to Tilden’s monotone voice on that cold December morning with sunlight flooding in through wide windows from the street, they had to wonder: If the letter were harmless, then why had Tilden made such a fuss to deny his connection with it? Was he embarrassed at his own stupidity in being tricked? Or was it really a scam after all, with Tilden simply hiding behind a technicality? Was Tilden just as guilty as the others?
If his performance was vague, guarded, but purposeful, it was vintage Samuel Tilden. Tilden doubtless had spent hours planning it, shaping its nuances and calculating its impact. He was playing politics, something he’d done his entire life.
Born in New Lebanon, New York in 1814, Sam Tilden had grown up in a political household. His father, Elam Tilden, a well-connected farmer and grocery store owner, counted as personal friends old-style New York wire-pullers from future president Martin Van Buren to New York U.S. Senator Silas Wright and Governor William Marcy. F OOTNOTE He invited them to plot strategy at the family dinner table for his son, young Sammy, to see. After studying at Yale and New York University, Tilden had settled in New York City in the 1840s to practice law and quickly joined the game. He became the city’s Corporation Counsel in 1843, founded and edited a Democratic partisan newspaper, the Morning News , in 1844, and served a term in the state legislature in 1846. He joined Tammany Hall and became a Sachem in 1856. As a lawyer, he prospered—by one account, his clients included fully half the railroads in the northeast United States in the mid-1850s. 17 By the end of the Civil War he’d purchased a large townhouse at 15 Gramercy Park and counted himself financially independent, owning two iron mines, sheaves of railroad stocks, and an office at 43 Wall Street.
Along the way, Tilden also had shown an independent streak. Nominated for state Attorney General in 1856, he’d refused support both from the Know-Nothings and the anti-liquor Prohibitionists, denouncing each for its own intolerance. He lost the election and afterwards defeated the Know-Nothings in a high-profile courtroom drama when they’d challenged the election of a friendly city comptroller using doctored vote tallies. 18 He had campaigned against Lincoln in 1860 and, during the Civil War, co-founded New York’s “Society for the Diffusion of Political Knowledge” which circulated anti-war, anti-Lincoln tracts. 19
Socially shy, frequently bedridden with colds and flues, Tilden distanced himself from casual human contact. He spent his free hours at the Manhattan Club at 96 Fifth Avenue where he’d paid $500 to become a charter member. “As a rule people did not like Tilden at a first meeting,” a biographer explained. “He seemed cold, self-centered, vain, too cocksure, and too omniscient”; he had an irritating habit of telling people “I told you so” and hesitated about answering direct questions. 20 His bachelorhood raised eyebrows in New York, forcing even friendly biographers to explain how he “found a fairly satisfactory substitute for a sweetheart and children in his absorbing law work,” as one wrote. “His deepest feelings were
Tilden then dismissed both charges as unrealistic: “I did not attach any importance to the statement, for the reason that I did not think it probable.” Fixing the count, reporting fake returns simply could not be done, he argued, either by Democrats in New York City or by upstate Republicans.
In fact, later that day, Oakey Hall himself would appear as a witness and tell the congressmen that, yes, he did write the letter, he considered it proper, and he’d had Tilden’s name signed to it “because it was the usage to sign the name of the chairman of the main committee.” 16
The congressmen must have scratched their heads. On its face, Tilden’s story didn’t add up. It was fog within fog. Listening to Tilden’s monotone voice on that cold December morning with sunlight flooding in through wide windows from the street, they had to wonder: If the letter were harmless, then why had Tilden made such a fuss to deny his connection with it? Was he embarrassed at his own stupidity in being tricked? Or was it really a scam after all, with Tilden simply hiding behind a technicality? Was Tilden just as guilty as the others?
If his performance was vague, guarded, but purposeful, it was vintage Samuel Tilden. Tilden doubtless had spent hours planning it, shaping its nuances and calculating its impact. He was playing politics, something he’d done his entire life.
Born in New Lebanon, New York in 1814, Sam Tilden had grown up in a political household. His father, Elam Tilden, a well-connected farmer and grocery store owner, counted as personal friends old-style New York wire-pullers from future president Martin Van Buren to New York U.S. Senator Silas Wright and Governor William Marcy. F OOTNOTE He invited them to plot strategy at the family dinner table for his son, young Sammy, to see. After studying at Yale and New York University, Tilden had settled in New York City in the 1840s to practice law and quickly joined the game. He became the city’s Corporation Counsel in 1843, founded and edited a Democratic partisan newspaper, the Morning News , in 1844, and served a term in the state legislature in 1846. He joined Tammany Hall and became a Sachem in 1856. As a lawyer, he prospered—by one account, his clients included fully half the railroads in the northeast United States in the mid-1850s. 17 By the end of the Civil War he’d purchased a large townhouse at 15 Gramercy Park and counted himself financially independent, owning two iron mines, sheaves of railroad stocks, and an office at 43 Wall Street.
Along the way, Tilden also had shown an independent streak. Nominated for state Attorney General in 1856, he’d refused support both from the Know-Nothings and the anti-liquor Prohibitionists, denouncing each for its own intolerance. He lost the election and afterwards defeated the Know-Nothings in a high-profile courtroom drama when they’d challenged the election of a friendly city comptroller using doctored vote tallies. 18 He had campaigned against Lincoln in 1860 and, during the Civil War, co-founded New York’s “Society for the Diffusion of Political Knowledge” which circulated anti-war, anti-Lincoln tracts. 19
Socially shy, frequently bedridden with colds and flues, Tilden distanced himself from casual human contact. He spent his free hours at the Manhattan Club at 96 Fifth Avenue where he’d paid $500 to become a charter member. “As a rule people did not like Tilden at a first meeting,” a biographer explained. “He seemed cold, self-centered, vain, too cocksure, and too omniscient”; he had an irritating habit of telling people “I told you so” and hesitated about answering direct questions. 20 His bachelorhood raised eyebrows in New York, forcing even friendly biographers to explain how he “found a fairly satisfactory substitute for a sweetheart and children in his absorbing law work,” as one wrote. “His deepest feelings were
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