Summary Of Plunkitt Of Tammany Hall

William L. Riordon is the author who wrote the book “Plunkitt of Tammany Hall”. Williams L. Riordon author’s background comes from him being a journalist who collected George Washington Plunkitt plain talks, newspaper and among other things to be able to put together the “Plunkitt Tammany Hall” book. The book offers Plunkitt importance as a political figure in New York City and several accomplishments he had made during his time. William L. Riordon included a list of various office passions he held while being part of Tammany Hall. Riordon clearly admire the way George Washington Plunkitt would talk and the philosophy that he had with the grafts. William L. Riordon believed he was destine to share the amazing story of a well respected

William L. Riordon the author of the book Plunkitt of Tammany Hall wrote this book to be able to justify political machines. William L. Riordon begins the book with a series of different chapters that are categorized into sections that talked about ideas and philosophies that the Ex. Senator George Washington Plunkitt had. William was able to manage and tied the book together by adding some of George Washington Plunkitt rostrums that were the bootblack that stands in the county courthouse. The author also wrote this book to express his admiration towards the Ex. Senator George Washington Plunkitt. Riordon believed that George Washington Plunkitt was “perhaps the most thoroughly practical politician of the day”(Tammany hall /Preference 1).

Smith’s intention for his audience is that the new land is everything you can wish for without a single fight. Smith starts by describing the content and pleasure that risking your life for getting your own piece of land brings to people. He is luring his audience in by telling that it is a wonderful world of vast food and gratification. Smith wants his audience to be more of the joyful individuals who look for the good in every...

George W. Plunkett justifies Tammany Hall as being legitimate, non-corruption or as a “distinction between honest graft and dishonest graft (3).” He argues that politics should be for personal acquirement. He states, “I seen my opportunities and I took ‘em (3).” This influenced Plunkett’s position of power. He like many other district leaders used a “sort of monopoly (4)” and honest graft such as to “fix up a big park (4)” to solidify their positions of power by securing voter support through “direct contact with the people (91)”. This included maintaining “his popularity (97)” and keeping “watch (98)” of everyone in their district. Leaders focused on providing assistance to people in need in exchange for votes because “his subsistence depends

In his monograph, William Cooper’s Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic, Alan Taylor uses the life of William Cooper, a man who rose from humble beginnings to become a land speculator and a member of the U.S. Congress, to depict the transitions that occurred on the frontier of the early American Republic. He proves that William’s life is a pure example of the transition happening in the frontier communities of America, in terms of politics and society. In Taylor’s thesis, the American Revolution created opportunities for new men to make money and to build a name for themselves. The Revolution left behind a legacy of equality, and with the expansion of the settlers, values of the colonial past were questioned,

Despite Hamilton’s opposing beliefs, his attempts to persuade everyone were highly successful, due to the fact that his actions lead to the selection of his bitter, political enemy, Thomas Jefferson, as our nation’s third chief executive, despite the differences they had. Hamilton was able to persuade the House of Representatives to vote for Jefferson over Burr by writing,“From Alexander Hamilton to Harrison Gray Otis.” In this letter, Hamilton elaborates on how choosing Jefferson is the best option because he is the “less evil” between the two of them. However; the outcome of the election affected not only Hamilton’s political career, but his personal life in numerous ways, as well. As far as his political career goes, he lost an immense amount of support from the Federalists.

7. On the Shame of the Cities- In Lincoln Steffens, The Shame of the Cities, Plunkitt says that he does not know how to make decisions. He talks about the Philadelphia Republican Gang and Tammany Hall being almost the same. Plunkitt thinks he is all wrong. Plunkitt seems to talk about politicians stealing, saying that they in 1905 are no worse than 1835 as a class. It just means that the old timers had nothing to steal, while the politicians in 1905 were surrounded by temptations.

Samuel Seabury, when writing the Letters of A Westchester Farmer, is debating in the press the legitimacy of the Continental Congress that meet in Philadelphia a few months before, condemning this gathering as subversive to the British Empire and Seabury equates the colonial demand for legislative rights as arrogant and “whiggish nonsense”. Alexander Hamilton challenges these

Before civil service reform, elected officials could easily remove anti-Tammany city employees and replace them with Tammany supporters in return for their work during the campaign. This sort of "spoils system" encouraged young people to get involved with politics and to love their country. According to Plunkitt (and he gives many examples) after civil service examinations young men become anarchists or in the worst case one joins the Spanish army and actually fights against the same men he used to support and love. Not only did this "spoils system" encourage young people, it also helped hold the United States party system together. And that, according to Plunkitt, would all change if supporters were not rewarded with government jobs for their work. However, the Civil Service act of 1883 did more to instigate the merit system in politics than anything else. Plunkitt's arguments against the civil service reforms are amusing but his generalities make his argument difficult to believe. One would assume that Plunkitt's motivation for attacking civil service was because of his personal motivation not the reasons presented in his "Very Plain Talks on Very Practical Politics." Plunkitt clearly was a politician for himself and his supporters, in all he cared very little about the welfare of New York City as a whole.

Is it possible for the protectors to become the abusers? In late 19th century New York City this was a very true reality, mostly thanks to the political machine that was Tammany Hall. Tammany Hall was a New York City political organization that began in the late 18th century. It controlled the Democratic Party’s nominations at it was often named the party’s “political machine.” Boss Tweed, was a New York politician who became Tammany’s leader in the late 1860’s. Because he was the party’s boss, he was able to appoint high ranking government official which gave him access to an enormous amount of public money which was used often for personal gain. One of Tammany Hall’s most known critic was Thomas Nast, who starred Tweed and his followers

hard for people to buy their own land, which is why it was only a

My first step was to look at all the problems there would be if I did decide to get the land. The next one is seeing if it was really worth wanting to go unconstitutional for this. One of the first problems that came up was where to get the money from. France was offering the purchase to

this piece of land for a very cheap price. For fifteen million dollars the United States

Another of Plunkitt’s views that leaves a bit of a cloudy feeling is his view of looters and practical politicians. He explains the difference using Tammany Hall and the Philadelphia republicans as the examples. He says “The Philadelphians ain't satisfied with robbin' the bank of all its gold and paper money. They stay to pick up the nickels arid pennies and the cop comes arid nabs them.”(29) He makes it as clear as possible that a practical politician only takes just enough and that a looter takes more than his fair share. The explanation of this goes along with that of graft, it seems that he is trying to convince himself that he is honest and not doing any wrong.

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