Chapter 2. How To Become a Statesman
Chapter 3. The Curse of Civil Service Reform
Chapter 4. Reformers Only Mornin' Glories
Chapter 5. New York City Is Pie for the Hayseeds
Chapter 6. To Hold Your District: Study Human Nature and Act Accordin'
Chapter 7. On The Shame of the Cities
Chapter 8. Ingratitude in Politics
Chapter 9. Reciprocity in Patronage
Chapter 10. Brooklynites Natural-Born Hayseeds
Chapter 11. Tammany Leaders Not Bookworms
Chapter 12. Dangers of the Dress Suit in Politics
Chapter 13. On Municipal Ownership
Chapter 14. Tammany the Only Lastin' Democracy
Chapter 15. Concerning Gas in Politics
Chapter 16. Plunkitt's Fondest Dream
Chapter 17. Tammany's Patriotism
Chapter 18. On the Use of Money in Politics
Chapter 19. The Successful Politician Does Not Drink
Chapter 20. Bosses Preserve the Nation
Chapter 21. Concerning Excise
Chapter 22. A Parting Word on the Future Party in America
Chapter 23. Strenuous Life of the Tammany District Leader
Preface
THIS volume discloses the mental operations of perhaps the most
thoroughly practical politician of the day--George Washington Plunkitt,
Tammany leader of the Fifteenth Assembly District, Sachem of the Tammany
Society and Chairman of the Elections Committee of Tammany Hall, who
has held the offices of State Senator, Assemblyman', Police Magistrate,
County Supervisor and Alderman, and who boasts of his record in filling
four public offices in one year and drawing salaries from three of them
at the same time.
The discourses that follow were delivered by him from his rostrum, the
bootblack stand in the County Court-house, at various times in the
last half-dozen years. Their absolute frankness and vigorous
unconventionality of thought and expression charmed me. Plunkitt said
right out what all practical politicians think but are afraid to say.
Some of the discourses I published as interviews in the New York Evening
Post, the New York Sun, the New York World, and the Boston Transcript.
They were reproduced in newspapers throughout the country and several
of them, notably the talks on "The Curse of Civil Service Reform" and
"Honest Graft and Dishonest Graft," became subjects of discussion in
the United States Senate and in college lectures. There seemed to be
a general recognition of Plunkitt as a striking type of the practical
politician, a politician, moreover, who dared to say publicly what
others in his class whisper among themselves in the City Hall corridors
and the hotel lobbies.
I thought it a pity to let Plunkitt's revelations of himself--as frank
in their way as Rousseau's Confessions--perish in the files of the
newspapers; so I collected the talks I had published, added several new
ones, and now give to the world in this volume a system of political
philosophy which is as unique as it is refreshing.
No New Yorker needs to be informed who George Washington Plunkitt is.
For the information of others, the following sketch of his career is
given. He was born, as he proudly tells, in Central Park--that is, in
the territory now included in the park. He began life as a driver of
a cart, then became a butcher's boy, and later went into the butcher
business for himself. How he entered politics he explains in one of his
discourses. His advancement was rapid. He was in the Assembly soon after
he cast his first vote and has held office most of the time for forty
years.
In 1870, through a strange combination of circumstances, he held the
places of Assemblyman, Alderman, Police Magistrate and County Supervisor
and drew three salaries at once--a record unexampled in New York
politics.
Plunkitt is now a millionaire. He owes his fortune mainly to his
political pull, as he confesses in "Honest Graft and Dishonest Graft."
He is in the contracting, transportation, real estate, and every
other business out of which he can make money. He has no office. His
headquarters is the County Courthouse bootblack stand. There he receives
his constituents, transacts his general business and pours forth his
philosophy.
Plunkitt has been one of the great powers in Tammany Hall for a quarter
of a century. While he was in the Assembly and the State Senate he
was one of the most influential members and introduced the bills that
provided for the outlying parks of New York City, the Harlem River
Speedway, the Washington Bridge, the 155th Street Viaduct, the grading
of Eighth Avenue north of Fifty-seventh Street, additions to the Museum
of Natural History, the West Side Court, and many other important public
improvements. He is one of the closest friends and most valued advisers
of Charles F. Murphy, leader of Tammany Hall.
William L. Riordon
A Tribute to Plunkitt by the Leader of Tammany Hall
SENATOR PLUNKITT is a straight organization man. He believes in party
government; he does not indulge in cant and hypocrisy and he is never
afraid to say exactly what he thinks. He is a believer in thorough
political organization and all-the-year-around work, and he holds to the
doctrine that, in making appointments to office, party workers should
be preferred if they are fitted to perform the duties of the office.
Plunkitt is one of the veteran leaders of the organization; he has
always been faithful and reliable, and he has performed valuable
services for Tammany Hall.
CHARLES F. MURPHY
PLUNKITT OF TAMMANY HALL
Chapter 1. Honest Graft and Dishonest Graft
EVERYBODY is talkin' these days about Tammany men growin' rich on graft,
but nobody thinks of drawin' the distinction between honest graft and
dishonest graft. There's all the difference in the world between the
two. Yes, many of our men have grown rich in politics. I have myself.
I've made a big fortune out of the game, and I'm gettin' richer every
day, but I've not gone in for dishonest graft--blackmailin' gamblers,
saloonkeepers, disorderly people, etc.--and neither has any of the men
who have made big fortunes in politics.
There's an honest graft, and I'm an example of how it works. I might sum
up the whole thing by sayin': "I seen my opportunities and I took 'em."
Just let me explain by examples. My party's in power in the city, and
it's goin' to undertake a lot of public improvements. Well, I'm tipped
off, say, that they're going to lay out a new park at a certain place.
I see my opportunity and I take it. I go to that place and I buy up all
the land I can in the neighborhood. Then the board of this or that makes
its plan public, and there is a rush to get my land, which nobody cared
particular for before.
Ain't it perfectly honest to charge a good price and make a profit on my
investment and foresight? Of course, it is. Well, that's honest graft.
Or supposin' it's a new bridge they're goin' to build. I get tipped off
and I buy as much property as I can that has to be taken for approaches.
I sell at my own price later on and drop some more money in the bank.
Wouldn't you? It's just like lookin' ahead in Wall Street or in the
coffee or cotton market. It's honest graft, and I'm lookin' for it every
day in the year. I will tell you frankly that I've got a good lot of it,
too.
I'll tell you of one case. They were goin' to fix up a big park, no
matter where. I got on to it, and went lookin' about for land in that
neighborhood.
I could get nothin' at a bargain but a big piece of swamp, but I took it
fast enough and held on to it. What turned out was just what I counted
on. They couldn't make the park complete without Plunkitt's swamp, and
they had to pay a good price for it. Anything dishonest in that?
Up in the watershed I made some money, too. I bought up several bits of
land there some years ago and made a pretty good guess that they would
be bought up for water purposes later by the city.
Somehow, I always guessed about right, and shouldn't I enjoy the
profit of my foresight? It was rather amusin' when the condemnation
commissioners came along and found piece after piece of the land in the
name of George Plunkitt of the Fifteenth Assembly District, New York
City. They wondered how I knew just what to buy. The answer is--I
seen my opportunity and I took it. I haven't confined myself to land;
anything that pays is in my line.
For instance, the city is repavin' a street and has several hundred
thousand old granite blocks to sell. I am on hand to buy, and I know
just what they are worth.
How? Never mind that. I had a sort of monopoly of this business for a
while, but once a newspaper tried to do me. It got some outside men to
come over from Brooklyn and New Jersey to bid against me.
Was I done? Not much. I went to each of the men and said: "How many of
these 250,000 stories do you want?" One said 20,000, and another wanted
15,000, and other wanted 10,000. I said: "All right, let me bid for the
lot, and I'll give each of you all you want for nothin'."
They agreed, of course. Then the auctioneer yelled: "How much am I bid
for these 250,000 fine pavin' stones?"
"Two dollars and fifty cents," says I.
"Two dollars and fifty cents!" screamed the auctioneer. "Oh, that's a
joke! Give me a real bid."
He found the bid was real enough. My rivals stood silent. I got the
lot for $2.50 and gave them their share. That's how the attempt to do
Plunkitt ended, and that's how all such attempts end.
I've told you how I got rich by honest graft. Now, let me tell you that
most politicians who are accused of robbin' the city get rich the same
way.
They didn't steal a dollar from the city treasury. They just seen their
opportunities and took them. That is why, when a reform administration
comes in and spends a half million dollars in tryin' to find the public
robberies they talked about in the campaign, they don't find them.
The books are always all right. The money in the city treasury is all
right. Everything is all right. All they can show is that the Tammany
heads of departments looked after their friends, within the law, and
gave them what opportunities they could to make honest graft. Now, let
me tell you that's never goin' to hurt Tammany with the people. Every
good man looks after his friends, and any man who doesn't isn't likely
to be popular. If I have a good thing to hand out in private life, I
give it to a friend--Why shouldn't I do the same in public life?
Another kind of honest graft. Tammany has raised a good many salaries.
There was an awful howl by the reformers, but don't you know that
Tammany gains ten votes for every one it lost by salary raisin'?
The Wall Street banker thinks it shameful to raise a department clerk's
salary from $1500 to $1800 a year, but every man who draws a salary
himself says: "That's all right. I wish it was me." And he feels
very much like votin' the Tammany ticket on election day, just out of
sympathy.
Tammany was beat in 1901 because the people were deceived into believin'
that it worked dishonest graft. They didn't draw a distinction between
dishonest and honest graft, but they saw that some Tammany men grew
rich, and supposed they had been robbin' the city treasury or levyin'
blackmail on disorderly houses, or workin' in with the gamblers and
lawbreakers.
As a matter of policy, if nothing else, why should the Tammany leaders
go into such dirty business, when there is so much honest graft lyin'
around when they are in power? Did you ever consider that?
Now, in conclusion, I want to say that I don't own a dishonest dollar.
If my worst enemy was given the job of writin' my epitaph when I'm gone,
he couldn't do more than write:
"George W. Plunkitt. He Seen His Opportunities, and He Took 'Em."