PART 7:THE HISTORY OF TAMMANY HALL: "BARNBURNERS" &" HUNKERS",DEFEAT&VICTORY, HARDSHELLS&SOFTSHELLS

The History of Tammany Hall

By Gustavus Myers

CHAPTER XVI
“ Barnburners ” and “ Hunkers ”
1846-1850

TWO factions had lately arisen in Tammany Hall — the “Barnburners” and the “Hunkers.”  Differences in principle had at first caused the division, but it was characterized, nevertheless, by a lively race for office.

The “Barnburners” were the radical Democrats who believed, among other things that slavery should not be extended to free territory.  The nickname was occasioned by the saying of a contractor, a few years before:  “These men are incendiaries; they are mad; they are like the farmer, who, to get the rats out of his granary, sets fire to his own barn.”

The “Hunkers” were the office-holding conservatives, very unwilling to have anything disturb their repose, and above all, opposed to the agitation of the slavery question.  Their influence was thrown wherever possible with the slave holding States.  The term “Hunkers” arose from their characteristic of striving to keep their offices to the exclusion of everybody else—“ to get all they can and keep all they can get.”1

The quarrel was as sharply defined throughout the State as in New York City.  Such men as Samuel J. Tilden, C.C. Cambreleng, William F. Havemeyer and Minthorne Tompkins were the local leaders of the “Barnburners”;  John McKeon, Lorenzo B. Shepard,2 a brilliant young leader who was a noted orator at the early age of 19;  Edward Stralian and Emanuel B. Hart were some of the chiefs of the “Hunkers.”  This factional struggle, together with the dissatisfaction given by the city administration, weakened Tammany, whose nominee, in the Spring election of 1847, J. Sherman Brownell, was defeated by the Whig candidate, William V. Brady.  The vote stood:  Brady, 21,310;  Brownell, 19,877;  Ellis G. Drake (Independent), 2,078.  This was the first time in nine years that the city had been carried by the Whigs proper, though they were aided somewhat by the Native Americans.

“Barnburners” and “Hunkers” laid aside their differences momentarily when President Polk visited the city in June, 1847, one of his objects being to be initiated a member of the Tammany Society.  On June 26 he was waited upon at the Astor House by a deputation of the society, headed by Elijah F. Purdy.  Quite worn out after a torrid day of handshaking, Polk accompanied his escorts to the large room in the Wigwam, where members of the society were usually initiated.  Later, the President emerged, looking happy at having availed himself of membership in a political society which could sway Presidential choices and elections and perhaps determine his own future political fate.

This incident past, the factions resumed their quarrel and warred so effectually that in the general election of November, 1847, the Whigs again won, by more than 8,000 votes.  But Tammany, in its darkest moments, was fertile in expedients.  It now arranged a great meeting for February 5, 1848, in commendation of the Mexican War.  Sam Houston and General Foote made speeches, and one of the Tammany orators assured the audience that though Tammany Hall “erred sometimes,” its “patriotic ardor was never cooled.”  The success of this war brought thousands of voters back to the Democratic ranks in the city.  Besides, “Barnburners” and “Hunkers” were tiring of defeat.  Neither relished exile from office all the time.  They agreed on the nomination of former Mayor Havemeyer, who personally was popular, though the Wigwam leaders had caused his administration to be discredited.  Havemeyer was elected by the slender majority of 928 over the Whig candidate, Mayor Brady.  The Native American party had now about gone out of existence.

But the factions soon disagreed again on national questions, and sent conflicting Tammany delegations to the national convention in Baltimore, in May, 1848.  After tedious debate and much acrimony both were allowed a half vote to each delegate.  When, however, it was seen that the “Barnburners” voted with some other States in support of the principle against the extension of slavery to free territory, a movement was started to reject them.  The prospect of losing the all-important electoral vote of New York State was not pleasant to the convention.  To avoid the arbitrary rejection of either faction the committee on credentials suggested a compromise by which it refused to open the discussion as to which faction ought to be accepted until both had pledged themselves to abide by the decision of the convention.  Knowing that this would be pro-slavery, the “Barnburners” declared that “the Democracy of New York must be admitted unconditionally or not at all,” and withdrew.  The “Hunkers” took the required pledge.

Arriving home, the “Barnburner” delegates issued an address saying that a faction existed among them whose object was the perpetuation and the extension of human servitude.  Bold, unscrupulous and active, it wielded to a great degree the patronage of the Federal Government.  It addressed itself to the fears of some, to the cupidity of others.  By these means it had got possession of the late national convention and had proclaimed a candidate for the Presidency — a man who obtained his nomination only as the price of the most abject subserviency to the slave power.  The “Barnburners” then took steps to name candidates in opposition to Lewis Cass[L] and Gen. W.O. Butler[R], the Baltimore nominees, who had been promptly approved by the “Hunker” element in the Wigwam.  Calling Martin Van Buren from obscurity, they nominated him for President, anticipating the action of the Free Soil convention at Buffalo in August.

Throughout the slavery agitation up to the firing on Fort Sumter, the South had no firmer supporter than Tammany.  In the hall Southern representatives spoke and spread broadcast their doctrines on every available occasion;  however ultra those doctrines might be, the Wigwam audiences never missed applauding them enthusiastically.

The “Hunkers” immediately opened a series of Cass meetings.  “All the South asks,” said Gen. Stevenson at one of them in Tammany Hall, on June 9, 1848, “is non-interference.”  He was cheered wildly.  As usual, the “regular” Democratic nominations were supported by the backbone of the Democracy in New York City — those who clung to the mere name and forms of the party as well as the active men who lived in office and luxuriated on the spoils.  The “Barnburners,” otherwise now styled the Free Soilers, were quite as active as the “Hunkers,” and their defection on election day enabled Gen. Taylor to carry the city — the supposed Democratic stronghold — by 9,883 votes.

The dissensions in the Wigwam were as pronounced in the Spring of 1849 — at least outwardly.  The two factions held separate Mayoralty conventions on the same night.  The “Barnburners” were naturally eager for Havemeyer, one of themselves, but he would not have the honor.  Hearing that the “Hunkers” were proposing Myndert Van Schaick, an extremely popular man, the “Barnburners” resolved to steal the “Hunkers’” thunder by nominating him themselves.  This they accordingly did, and the bewildered public was treated to the spectacle of Van Schaick standing as the candidate of both the recriminating factions.  There were not wanting those who professed to see in this action an agreement between the leaders on the matter of the local offices.  The Whigs elected Caleb S. Woodhull by 4,121 plurality, and secured over two-thirds of the members of the Common Council.  The Democrats of the “Old School,” — the unyielding “Hunkers” — would not vote for a candidate the Free Soilers approved of;  they either did not vote at all or voted for Woodhull.

The “Barnburners,” practically driven out of Tammany Hall by the “Hunkers,” had been meeting elsewhere.  Tiring of defeats, however, overtures for reunion were made during the Fall campaign.  A fusion resulted, not only in the city but in other parts of the State, and candidates were agreed upon.3  But no sooner had the reunion been declared than a number of irreconcilable “Hunkers” and certain other politicians — including Daniel E. Sickles, James T. Brady, “Mike” Walsh and John M. Bloodgood — formed a self-constituted “Democratic-Republican Executive Committee” to oppose the deal.  On the day before election they sent out a circular denouncing the fusion, and declaring that though it promised much it was really only a means of engrafting upon Democratic time-honored principles a set of abolition doctrines, “hostile to the peace and welfare of the Republic and repugnant to the sympathies and intelligence of the Democratic party.”4

This circular was misleading.  Neither the “Barnburners” nor the “Hunkers” had imposed any sacrifice of principle upon the other.  They merely agreed for the time being to suspend their differences in order to get a controlling influence over the disbursement of municipal finances.  The opinion of each voter on the slavery question was left untouched.

The election was hotly contested, for by the new State constitution the selection of minor State offices had been taken from the Governor and Legislature and given to the people,5 Owing to this defection of a strong Tammany group the Whigs carried the city.  The excitement in the Wigwam, when the result became known, was intense.  Four thousand Tammany men, looking either for office or party triumph, were in a frenzy.  W.D. Wallach, a politician of some note, mounted the rostrum, and under the stimulus of disappointment, held forth in a long and remarkable harangue, to which his auditors listened in comparative silence, though the same utterances at another time might have provoked a riot in the Wigwam.  Men of downright dishonesty, Wallach said, had crept into the organization by the aid of bullies and loafers.  These men of late years had managed to wield great power at Tammany primary elections, where, as everybody knew, matters long had been arranged “upon the assumption that by a free application of money, violence and roguery, the people could and should be controlled.”  What wonder was it, he asked, that thousands of quiet and respectable Democrats had ceased to bow to the authority of regular nominations, however worthy the candidates, when they found more or less of the Tammany nominating committees returned in part notoriously by violence, if not by fraud ?

The breach between the “Barnburners” and the extreme “Hunkers” was reopened and widened by this self-constituted committee’s action.  It led to the formation of two bodies, each claiming to be the genuine general committee of Tammany Hall.  One was led by Fernando Wood, who was suspected of being a “Hunker,” but was too much of a politician to be active against the “Barnburners.”  This general committee was of a compromising disposition.  In brief, it was composed mainly of what were known as political “trimmers ” — men willing to make any sacrifices of principle for individual or party success.  The other committee, of which Henry M. Western was the head, was composed of “Hunkers” and took up the interests of the self-formed “Democratic-Republican Executive Committee.”  It was the first body in the North to call a meeting to denounce the Wilmot proviso.  To all intents standing for principle, each committee sought the tremendous advantages of the possession of Tammany Hall and its political machinery.  By being recognized as the “regular” general committee, its nominations would be “regular” and as such would command the votes of the great mass of Democrats.  To obtain that recognition both committees realized the necessity of obtaining a majority of the Council of Sachems, which, in critical moments, had so thoroughly demonstrated its legal right to eject from the Wigwam any man or body of men it pleased.

The opening struggle between the factions for mastery took place at the annual election of the society on April 15, 1850.  Each body made desperate efforts to elect its list of Sachems.  The ticket in favor of a union of the factions and of reorganizing the “Wood committee” was headed by Elijah F. Purdy, then Grand Sachem, and contained the names of Isaac V. Fowler, John A. Bogert, John J. Manning and others.  Former Mayor Mickle, Charles O’Conor, Francis B. Cutting and M.M. Noah led the rival ticket.

The “Hunkers” brought to the polls many men, who, though still members of the society, long since had gone over to the Whigs and had lost the habit of attending the society’s meetings.  These men claimed the right to vote, and it was unquestionably theirs.  In law the Tammany Society was merely a charitable and benevolent corporation.  No member in good standing could be debarred from voting.  With cheerful alacrity these Whig members lent their aid in distracting the Democratic party into keeping up a double organization.  Officeholders and other men openly attached to the Whig party voted.6  When it seemed that most of the Purdy ticket was elected, the two “Hunker” inspectors suddenly found three more “Hunker” tickets in the ballot box.  Previously this box had been examined, emptied and exposed publicly.  These three ballots, if counted, would have elected one more Sachem of the “Hunker” stripe, giving that faction six of the thirteen Sachems — one short of a majority.  The two “Barnburner” inspectors refused to count them.  The result of the election being disputed, Purdy promptly took possession of the books and papers of the society.

As the best solution of the troubles, the Sachems, on April 26, determined to forbid both committees admittance to the Wigwam.  The Sachems did not acknowledge accountability to any one for their actions, not even to the society which elected them.7  Representing themselves as the supreme judges of which was the real Democratic General Committee or whether there was any,8 the Sachems let it be understood that they would act as mediators.  By a vote of 10 to 1,9 they “recommended” — an action equivalent to an arbitrary order — that the “Wood committee” provide for the election of delegates to a convention in Tammany Hall “to reorganize the New York City Democracy.”  From the substance of the invitation sent out by the society to various conspicuous personages it was evident that, though the “Wood committee” had been favored, somehow a majority of the “Hunker,” or pro-slavery Sachems was installed.10

The plan of a convention was accepted by both factions.  But by manipulating the primary elections for delegates Fernando Wood succeeded in filling the convention with his own creatures, allowing, for form’s sake, a sprinkling of opponents.  Wood, whose aim was to get the nomination for Mayor, was the chief “trimmer,” though each side made concessions.  Various equivocal resolutions touching the slavery question were adopted, and a new Tammany General Committee, comprising “Barnburners,” mild “Hunkers” and ultra-“Hunkers,” was formed.

The “Barnburners” and “Hunkers” then agreed upon a coalition in State and city, uniting on Horatio Seymour for Governor.  Despite the diplomacy of Wood, who had arranged this pact, an explosion was narrowly averted a few weeks later.  Finding themselves in a majority at a slimly attended meeting of the general committee in the latter part of September, 1850, the uncompromising “Hunkers” denounced parleying with Free Soilers, and by a vote of 16 to 11 refused to sustain Seymour.  As soon as their action became known there was a burst of indignation.  The threat was made that if the committee did not rescind it, the Council of Sachems, most of whom, it seems, Wood had won over to his plans, would turn it out of Tammany Hall.  The members of the committee hastened to meet, the ultra-“Hunkers” were routed, and the State candidates strongly endorsed.

CHAPTER XVII
Defeat and Victory
1850-1852

UNDER a new charter the Mayor’s term was extended to two years, and the time of election, with that of the other city officers, was changed to November.  The latter change gave great satisfaction to the leaders, for it enabled them to trade votes.  Trading grew to such an extent that charges become common of this or that nominee for President, Governor, State Senator and so on being “sold out” by the leaders to insure their own election.

The Tammany organization, too, had made a change.  It had adopted the convention system of nominating.  This new method was much more satisfactory to the leaders, because the election of delegates to the conventions could easily be controlled, and the risk of having prearranged nominations overruled by an influx of “gangs” into the great popular meeting was eliminated.

A show of opposition to the proposed program was, however, still necessary.  The first general convention was held in October, 1850.  Fernando Wood was the leading candidate for Mayor, and it was certain that he would be nominated.  But the first ballot showed a half-dozen competitors.  The second ballot, however, disclosed the real situation, and Wood was chosen by 29 votes, to 22 for John J. Cisco.

Wood was a remarkable man.  As a tactician and organizer he was the superior both of his distant predecessor Burr and of his successors Tweed and Sweeny.  He was born in Philadelphia, in June, 1812, of Quaker parents.  At the age of thirteen, he was earning $2 a week as a clerk.  Later, he became a cigar maker and tobacco dealer, and still later, a grocer.  As a lad he was pugnacious; in a Harrisburg bar-room he once floored with a chair a State Senator who had attacked him.  But he seems to have been amenable to good advice;  for once when a Quaker reprimanded him for his excessive use of tobacco with the observation, “Friend, thee smokes a good deal,” he at once threw away his cigar, and gave up the habit.

Coming to New York, he engaged in several business enterprises, all the while taking a considerable interest in politics.  He was elected to Congress in 1840, serving one term.  Gradually he came to make politics his vocation.  Political manipulation before his day was, at the best, clumsy and crude.  Under his facile genius and painstaking care, it developed to the rank of an exact science.  He devoted himself for years to ingratiating himself with the factors needed in carrying elections.1  He curried favor with the petty criminals of the Five Points, the boisterous roughs of the river edge, and the swarms of immigrants, as well as with the peaceable and industrious mechanics and laborers; and he won a following even among the business men.  All these he marshaled systematically in the Tammany organization.  Politics was his science, and the “fixing” of primaries his specialty; in this he was perhaps without a peer.

His unscrupulousness was not confined to politics.  During this brief campaign he was repeatedly charged with commercial frauds as well as with bribery and dishonest practices at the primaries.  A year later he was shown to have been guilty before this time of having defrauded a partner of $8,000, and he escaped conviction by the merest technicality.2

Political standards in the fifties were not high.  But the rowdy character of a great part of Tammany’s membership, and the personal character of many of its nominees, particularly that of Wood, proved too much to bear, even for those days, and a strong revulsion followed.  Former Mayors Havemeyer and Mickle;  John McKeon, a leader of note, and other prominent Democrats revolted.  The election resulted in a Whig victory, Ambrose C. Kingsland securing 22,546 votes to 17,973 for Wood.  A great Democratic defection was shown by the fact that Horatio Seymour carried the city by only 705 plurality.

So general were the expressions of contempt for the character of the Wigwam that the Sachems resolved to invoke again the spirit of patriotism, and consequently fixed upon a revival of the old custom of Independence Day celebrations.  In 1851 the ruling Council of Sachems was a mixture of compromise “Barnburners” and “Hunkers.”  The committee of arrangements — Elijah F. Purdy, Daniel E. Delavan, Richard B. Connolly, Stephen C. Duryea and three others — sent invitations, filled with lofty and patriotic sentiments, to various national politicians.  “Barnburners” also were invited, the conciliatory Sachems being sincerely tired of a warfare which threatened to exile them all from the sinecures of city and State offices.

The Society of Tammany, or Columbian Order, the circular said, had originated “in a fraternity of patriots, solemnly consecrated to the independence, the popular liberty and the federal union of the country.”  Tammany’s councils were “ever vigilant for the preservation of those great national treasures from the grasp alike of the treacherous and the open spoiler.”  It had “enrolled in its brotherhood many of the most illustrious statesmen, patriots and heroes that had constellated the historic banners of the past and present age... And it remained to the present hour,” the glowing lines read on, “instinct with its primitive spirit and true to the same sacred trust.”

The rhetoric delivered at the celebration was quite as pretentious and high-flown.  But the phrases made no impression on the public mind.  No impartial observer denied that the Wigwam’s moral prestige with the State and national party was for the time gone.  Throughout the country the belief prevailed that the politicians of the metropolis deserved no respect, merit or consideration;  and that they were purchasable and transferable like any stock in Wall street.

If before 1846 nominations were sold it was not an open transaction.  Since then the practice of selling them had gradually grown, and now the bargaining was unconcealed.  Upon the highest bidder the honors generally fell.  Whigs and Tammany men were alike guilty.  If one aspirant offered $1,000, another offered $2,000.  But these sums were merely a beginning; committees would impress upon the candidate the fact that a campaign costs money;  more of the “boys” would have to be “seen”;  such and such a “ward heeler” needed “pacifying”;  a band was a proper embellishment, with a parade to boot, and voters needed “persuading.”  And at the last moment a dummy candidate would be brought forward as a man who had offered much more for the nomination.  Then the bidder at $2,000 would have to pay the difference, and if the office sought was a profitable one, the candidate would be a lucky man if he did not have to disgorge as much as $15,000 before securing the nomination.  Some candidates were bled for as much as $20,000, and even this was a moderate sum compared to the prices which obtained a few years later.

The primaries were attended by “gangs” more rowdy and corrupt than ever;  Whig ward committees often sold over to Tammany,3 and Whig votes, bought or traded, swelled the ballot boxes at the Wigwam primaries.  Nearly every saloon was the headquarters of a “gang” whose energies and votes could be bought.  In Tammany Hall an independent Democrat dared not speak unless he had previously made terms with the controlling factions, according to a relatively fixed tariff of rates.  The primaries of both parties had become so scandalously corrupt as to command no respect.

The discoveries of gold in California and Australia created in all classes a feverish desire for wealth.  Vessel after vessel was arriving in the harbor with millions of dollars’ worth of gold dust.  Newspapers and magazines were filled with glowing accounts of how poor men became rich in a dazzlingly short period.  The desire for wealth became a mania, and seized upon all callings.  The effect was a still further lowering of the public tone; standards were generally lost sight of, and all means of “getting ahead” came to be considered legitimate.  Politicians, trafficking in nominations and political influence, found it a most auspicious time.

This condition was intensified by the influx of the hordes of immigrants driven by famine and oppression from Ireland, Germany and other European countries.  From over 129,000 arriving at the port of New York in 1847, the number increased to 189,000 in 1848, 220,000 in 1849, 212,000 in 1850, 289,000 in 1851 and 300,000 in 1852.  Some of these sought homes in other States, but a large portion remained in the city.  Though many of these were thrifty and honest, numbers were ignorant and vicious, and the pauper and criminal classes of the metropolis grew larger than ever.  The sharper-witted among them soon mended their poverty by making a livelihood of politics.  To them political rights meant the obtaining of money or the receiving of jobs under the city, State or national government, in return for the marshaling of voters at the polls.  Regarding issues they bothered little, and knew less.

The effects of the Whig and Native American denunciation of the alien vote were now seen.  The naturalized citizens almost invariably sided with Tammany Hall, although there were times when, by outbidding the Wigwam, the Whigs were enabled to use them in considerable numbers.

Despite an unusual degree of public condemnation, Tammany managed, by a temporary pacification of the factions and a general use of illegal votes, to carry the city in the Fall of 1851 by nearly 2,000 majority.  But it could not hold the regular Democratic strength, for Wright, the candidate for Governor, received over 3,000 majority.  Frauds were notorious.  In one of the polling places of the Nineteenth Ward, the Wigwam’s candidates for Alderman and Assistant Alderman were counted in after a mob invaded it and forced the Whig inspectors to flee for their lives.  When the votes for the Assembly ticket were counted 552 were announced, although there were only 503 names on the poll list.  This was but an instance of the widespread repeating and violence.

With its large majority in the Common Council Tammany at first made a feint at curtailing city expenses.  The taxpayers complained that the taxes were upwards of $3,500,000, for which there was little apparent benefit.  The new Common Council made professions of giving a spotless administration; but before its term was over it had generally earned the expressive title of “the Forty Thieves.”4  This was the body that with lavish promises of reform replaced the Whig Common Council.  William M. Tweed, an Alderman in the “Forty Thieves” Common Council, was busy in the Fall of this year indignantly defending, in speeches and public writings, the Aldermen from the numerous charges of corruption;  but, as will be seen, these charges were by no means groundless.

Since the passing's of the Equal Rights party, the mechanics and laborers had taken no concerted part in politics, not even as a faction.  But at this period they were far from being lethargic.  The recent discoveries of gold and silver had given a quickened pulse to business, enormously increasing the number of transactions and the aggregate of profits.  The workers were determined to have their share of this prosperity, and acted accordingly.  Old trade-unions were rapidly strengthened and new ones formed.  More pay and shorter hours of work were demanded.  Between the Spring of 1850 and the Spring of 1853 nearly every trade in the city engaged in one or more strikes, with almost invariable success.

Having now no sincere leaders to prompt them to concerted political action, the workers oscillated listlessly between the two parties.  They had lost the tremendous influence secured in the thirties, and the business element had again become dominant.  Legislature and Common Council vied with each other in granting exploitative charters, and the persons who secured these, generally by bribery, were considered the leaders of public opinion.  Every company demanding special privileges of the State maintained its lobby at Albany.  The City Council was more easily reached, and was generally dealt with personally.  Fortunes were made by plundering the city and State, and while the conduct of the agents and actual performers in this wholesale brigandage — the lobbyists, Legislators and Aldermen — was looked upon somewhat doubtfully, their employers stood before the world as the representatives of virtue and respectability.  The one force which might have stood as a bulwark against this system of pillage had been so completely demoralized by its political experiences that it could now only look on and let matters drift as they would.

In the Baltimore Democratic convention the Wigwam was represented by so boisterous a delegation that its speakers were denied a hearing.  Among the delegates were Capt. Rynders, “Mike” Walsh and a number of the same kind.  Cass was their favorite, and they shouted for him lustily;  but on attempting to speak for him they were invariably howled down, despite the fact that Cass had a majority of the convention almost to the end of the balloting.

The Wigwam, however, lost no time in endorsing the nomination of Franklin Pierce.  In this ratification the “Barnburners” joined, ardently urging the election of candidates on a platform which held that Congress had no power under the Constitution “to interfere with the domestic institutions of the States”;  which advocated compromise measures, the execution of the Fugitive Slave law, and which opposed all attempts to agitate the slavery question.

The election of November, 1852, was not only for President and Congressmen, but for a long list of officials, city and State.  Each of the Wigwam factions began playing for advantage.  On July 16 a portion of the general committee met, apparently to accept an invitation to attend the funeral of Henry Clay.  The “Barnburners,” finding themselves in a majority, sprang a trick upon the “Hunkers” by adopting a plan of primary elections favorable to their side.  Later the general committee, in full meeting, substituted another plan, and a great hubbub followed.  A “committed of conciliation,” composed of members of both factions, was appointed.  When it met, on August 20, the halls, lobbies and entrances of Tammany Hall were filled with a vicious assortment of persons, chiefly inimical to the general committee.  “The bar-room,” wrote a chronicler, “was the scene of several encounters and knockdowns.  It was only necessary for a man to express himself strongly on any point, when down he went, by the hammer-fist of one of the fighting men.”  Even members of the committee, while passing in and out of the room, were intimidated.  Daniel E. Sickles was threatened with personal violence, and it might have gone hard with him had he hot taken the precaution of arming himself with a bowie and revolver.  Members’ lives were constantly threatened;  the scenes of uproar and confusion were indescribable.  Mr. Sickles, for his own safety, had to jump from a window to Frankfort street, and other members were forced to retreat through secret byways.5  It was near day-break when the factions consented to leave the Wigwam.

The anxiety of each was explained by the proceedings at the primaries.  The faction having a majority of the inspectors secured by far the greater number of votes, and consequently the delegates who had the power of making nominations.  At the primaries of August, 1852, fraud and violence occurred at nearly every voting place.  In some instances one faction took possession of the polls and prevented the other from voting;  in others, both factions had control by turns, and fighting was desperate.  One party ran away with a ballot box and carried it off to the police station.  Many ballot boxes, it was alleged, were half filled with votes before the election was opened.  Wards containing less than 1,000 legal Democratic voters yielded 2,000 votes, and a ticket which not a hundred voters of the ward had seen was elected by 600 or 700 majority.  Whigs, boys and paupers voted;  the purchasable, who flocked to either party according to the price, came out in force, and ruffianism dominated the whole.

The police dared not interfere.  Their appointment was made by the Aldermen and Assistant Aldermen, with the nominal consent of the Mayor, exclusively on political grounds and for one year.  The policeman’s livelihood depended upon the whims of those most concerned in the ward turmoils.  A hard lot was the policeman’s.  On the one hand, public opinion demanded that he arrest offenders.  On the other, most of the Aldermen had their “gangs” of lawbreakers at the polls, and to arrest one of these might mean his dismissal.6  But this was not all.  The politics of the Common Council changed frequently;  and to insure himself his position the guardian of the peace must conduct himself according to the difficult mean of aiding his own party to victory and yet of giving no offense to the politicians of the other party.  Hence, whenever a political disturbance took place the policeman instantly, it was a saying, became “deaf and blind, and generally invisible.”7

The necessity of uniting to displace the Whigs from the millions of city patronage and profit brought the factions to an understanding.  Jacob A. Westervelt, a moderate “Hunker,” and a shipbuilder of wealth, who was considered the very essence of “respectability,” and a contrast to Wood, was nominated for Mayor.  Tammany planned to have its candidates swept in on the Presidential current.  National issues were made dominant, and the city responded by giving the Pierce electors 11,159 plurality, and electing the whole organization ticket.8  Fraud was common.  No registry law was in force to hinder men from voting, as it was charged some did, as often as twenty times.  On the other hand, 80,000 tickets purporting to be Democratic, intended for distribution by the Whigs, but not containing the name of a single Democrat, were seized at the post-office and carried in triumph to the Wigwam.

Tammany once more had full control of the city.

CHAPTER XVIII
“ Hardshells ” and “ Softshells ”
1852-1858

THE “Barnburner”-“Hunker” factional fight was succeeded by that of the “Hardshells” and “Softshells.”  How the ludicrous nicknames originated it is not possible to say.  The “Softshells” were composed of a remnant of the “Barnburners”1 and that part of the “Hunkers,” who believed in a full union with the “Barnburners,” especially in the highly important matter of distributing offices.  The “Hardshells” were the “Old Hunkers” who disavowed all connection with the “Barnburners,” or Free Soilers, except so far as to get their votes.  This division also extended to other parts of the State, where perhaps real differences of political principle were responsible for it;  but in the city the fundamental point of contention was the booty of office.

The “Hardshells” boasted in 1852 of a majority of the Tammany General Committee which met on December 2 to choose inspectors for the ward elections of delegates to the general committee for 1853.  The control of these inspectors was the keynote of the situation, for they would return such delegates as they pleased.  Angered at the appointment of “Hardshell” inspectors, the “Softshells” broke in the door of the committee room, assaulted the members of the committee with chairs, fractured some heads and forced the “Hards” to flee for refuge to the Astor House.2

Agreeable to “usages,” the departing general committee instructed the delegates of its successor to assemble in Tammany Hall on January 13, 1853, to be installed as the general committee for the ensuing year.  Until this installation, the committee of the last year remained in power.  In the interval the Sachems, who, in the peculiar mix of politics, were for the most part “Softshells,” decided to take a hand in the game of getting control of the organization, and therefore called a meeting for the same night and at the same time.

The object of the old general committee was to allow only delegates whose seats were uncontested to vote on the organization, or the contest of seats, which would return a “Hardshell” committee.  The Sachems, on the contrary, favored voting by those who had the endorsement of two of the three inspectors.

The “Hardshells” insisted that the Sachems had unwarrantably interfered;  that this was the first time in the history of the society of any interference as to the manner of organizing the general committee;  that the only power the Sachems had was to decide between contending parties for the use of the hall for political meetings, and that even then their power was doubtful.

The Grand Sachem ordered the doors of the meeting room locked till 7:30 o’clock, at which hour both factions streamed in.  Soon there were two meetings in the same room, each with a chairman, and each vociferously trying to shout down the other.  Neither accomplished anything, and both adjourned, and kept adjourning from day to day, awaiting positive action by the society.

The “Softshell” section of the general committee called a meeting for January 20, but it was prohibited by the Sachems.  When doubt of their authority was expressed, the Sachems produced a lease executed in 1842 to Howard, the lessee of the property, by the Tammany Society, in which he agreed that he would not lease, either directly or indirectly, the hall, or any part of the building, to any other political party (or parties) whatever, calling themselves committees, whose general political principles did not appear to him or the Sachems to be in accordance with the general political principles of the Democratic-Republican General Committee of New York City, of which Elijah F. Purdy was then chairman.  Howard had also agreed that

“if there should be at any time a doubt arising in his mind or that of his assigns, or in the mind of the Grand Sachem of the Tammany Society for the time being, in ascertaining the political character of any political party that should be desirous of obtaining admission to Tammany Hall for the purpose of holding a political meeting, then either might give notice in writing to the Father of the Council of the Tammany Society, in which event it was the duty of the Father of the Council to assemble the Grand Council, who would determine in the matter and whose decision should be final, conclusive and binding.”

Of the thirteen Sachems, eleven were “Softshells” a predominance due to the activity of the “Barnburners.”  The “Hardshells,” without doubt, were in a majority in the Tammany Society and in Tammany Hall, but they had taken no such pains as had their opponents to elect their men.  The Sachems’ meeting on January 20, professedly to decide the merits of the contest, called for the ward representatives in turn.  The “Hardshells” refused to answer or to acknowledge the Sachems’ authority to interfere with the primary elections of the people.  The Sachems then named by resolution the general committee they favored, thus deciding in favor of the “Softshell” committee.  There was no little suppressed excitement, since the members of the Tammany Society, it was naively told, though allowed to be present, were not allowed to speak.

Alderman Thomas J. Barr, a member of the Tammany Society and chairman of the “Hardshell” committee, handed to the Sachems, on behalf of his associates, an energetic protest.  Summarized, it read as follows :

“Tammany Society is a private association, incorporated for charitable purposes.  There is nothing in its charter, constitution or by-laws making it a political organization in any sense of the term.  The Democrats of New York City have never, in any manner or by any act, vested in the society the right to prescribe the rules for their government in matters of political organization.

“The society comprises among its members men belonging to all the different political parties of the day.  The only political test of admission to membership is to be ‘a Republican in favor of the Constitution of the United States.’  It is, besides, a secret society, whose transactions are known only to its own officers and members, except so far as might be the pleasure of the Council to make the proceedings public.  It can never be tolerated that a body which, in the language of its charter, was created ‘to carry into effect the benevolent purpose of affording relief to the indigent and distressed,’ and which is wholly independent of the great body of the Democracy shall be permitted to sit in judgment upon the primary organization of the Democratic-Republican party of the city of New York;  and such a state of things, if its absurdity be not too great for serious consideration, would amount to a despotism of the most repugnant character and render the Democratic party of the city an object of contempt and ridicule everywhere.... Tammany Society owns a portion of the premises known as Tammany Hall, which is let to Mr. Howard and forms the plant of his hotel.  This fact is all that gives to the Tammany Society any, even the least political significance.

“The general committee derives its powers from the people, who alone can take them away.  The committee in its objects, its organization and its responsibilities to a popular constituency is wholly distinct from and independent of the Tammany Society, its council or its officers, and to be efficient for any good purpose must always so remain, leaving to the Tammany Society its legitimate duty of excluding from Tammany Hall those who are hostile to the Democracy and its principles.”3

In the bar-room many leaders of the excluded faction were assembled, surrounded by their fighting men.  When the Sachems’ adverse decision was announced, their anger found vent in a sputter of oaths and threats, and the sum of $15,000 was subscribed on the spot for the building of a rival Tammany Hall.  It is almost needless to say that the rival hall was never built.

The Sachems later replied to the protest with the defense that their lease to Howard obliged them to act as they did.  By that lease the succession of Elijah F. Purdy’s committee alone was at liberty to meet as a general committee in Tammany Hall;  they (the Sachems) had not recognized Barr’s committee as such, and moreover did not admit the claim the “Hardshell” committee made of their right to hire a room separate from the majority in a building in which they had no property whatever.  The Council of Sachems insisted that it had exercised the right of excluding so-called general committees, before;  that Tammany was a benevolent society, and that benevolent societies had the same right as others to determine who should occupy their property.

The “Hardshells” attempted to rout the “Softshells” at the regular meeting of the Tammany Society on February 12, but the Sachems’ action was confirmed by a vote of two hundred to less than a dozen.  Each faction then strained to elect a majority of the Sachems at the annual election on April 18.  Private circulars were distributed, that of the “Softshells” being signed by Isaac V. Fowler, Fernando Wood, Nelson J. Waterbury, John Cochrane and others.  It breathed allegiance to the national and State administrations, the regular organization and to the Baltimore platform.  The “Hardshell” circular had the signatures of Richard B. Connolly, Cornelius Bogardus, Jacob Brush and others styling themselves the “Old Line Democrats.”

The “Softshells” elected their ticket, and Isaac V. Fowler, afterward postmaster, was chosen Grand Sachem.  This vote of a few score of private individuals decided the control of Tammany Hall and the lot of those who would share in the division of plunder for the next year.

“With the exception of some few quarrels,” one friendly account had it, “which fortunately did not result in any personal damage to the disputants, the affair passed off very quietly.  While the votes were counted upstairs some interesting scenes were presented in the bar-room, which was crowded with anxious expectants.  Language of a rather exceptional character, such as ‘political thieves,’ ‘swindlers,’ etc., was employed unsparingly, but as the majority was peaceably inclined, there were no heads fractured.”

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Chapter of Disclosures

1 The Century Dictionary derives the word from the Dutch honk, post, goal or home.  The transition in meaning from “goal” to “office” is easy and natural.

2 Shepard became Grand Sachem at an early age.  He was one of the very few influential men achieving prominence in the society or organization against whose character, public or private, no charges were ever brought.

3 New York Weekly Herald, November 3, 1849.  James Gordon Bennett, editor and owner of this newspaper, “was a recognized member of the Tammany party.”  (“Memoirs of James Gordon Bennett and His Times,” 1855, p. 80.)  When Bennett first contemplated starting a newspaper, it was to the Young Men’s General Committee that he applied for funds.  Though professing to be independent, the Herald nearly always supported Tammany Hall.  In 1837-39, however, it had supported Aaron Clark.

4 The committee advertised the stand it had taken in the Democratic journals of the city on November 5.

5 The city charter of 1846 (laws 1849 c187?) had likewise increased the number of elective offices in the municipality.

6 New York Evening Post (Democratic), April 16, 1850.

7 New York Weekly Herald, May 4, 1850.

8 Ibid.

9 Evening Post, May 2, 1850.

10 Seven Sachems signed the letter of invitation, which read in part:  “Brothers of this society look with deep concern at the present critical state of the country and are not unmindful of the services of those who are laboring to thwart the designs of the fanatics and demagogues who are waging an unholy crusade against a union of independent sovereignties, which union has done much to advance and perpetuate the principles of American liberty throughout the world.... We have no sympathy with those who war upon the South and its institutions.”

1 Wood’s was an attractive personality.  He was a handsome man, six feet high, slender and straight, with keen blue eyes, and regular features.  His manner was kindly and engaging.

2 Wood was charged with having obtained about $8,000 on false representations from his partner, Edward E. Marvine, in a transaction.  Marvine brought suit against Wood in the Superior Court, and three referees gave a unanimous decision in the plaintiffs favor.  The Grand Jury, on November 7, 1851, indicted Wood for obtaining money under false pretenses, but he pleaded the Statute of Limitations.  A friendly Recorder decided that as his offense had been committed three years previously (on November 7, 1848), the period required by the statute had been fully covered.  The indictment, therefore, was quashed, and Wood escaped by one day.

3 New York Tribune, May 5, 1852.  (This admission on the part of a Whig journal caused a great stir.)

4 There was another “Forty Thieves” Council five or six years later, which must not be confounded with the earlier and more notorious one.

5 The Herald, which, as usual, supported Tammany this year, described (August 24, 1852) these violences in detail.

6 The political lawbreaker had a final immunity from punishment in the fact that Aldermen sat as Justices in the Mayor’s Court, which tried such culprits, if ever they happened to be arrested.

7 See Report of Chief of Police Matsell, Documents of the Board of Aldermen, Vol. XXX, part 1, No. 17.  The extreme turbulence of the city at this time may be judged from the fact that, despite the comparative immunity of political lawbreakers, during the eight years 1846-54, 200,083 arrests were made, an average of 25,010 a year.

8 The vote on Mayor stood:  Westervelt, 33,251;  Morgan Morgans, 23,719;  Henry M. Western, 861;  blank and scattering, 227;  total, 58,058.