The Story of “Boss” Tweed | BRI’s Homework Help Series

0:15 Boss Tweed was born William M. Tweed in 1823 in Manhattan to Scottish and Irish immigrants. Tweed knew how deep the city’s problems were firsthand, and he wanted to make a difference. Yeah, well, New York wasn’t always as it was today. Post Civil War, it was the dump of all dumps. Dirty, lots of crime, illness, poverty, you name it.

0:35 The system wasn’t just broken, it was never in place. You couldn’t even walk down the street without someone dumping trash out their window on you. Something had to be done. Tweed worked extensively in public service. He was a volunteer firefighter, served on the Board of Education, the Board of Supervisors, and eventually became a state senator.

0:56 He was a real New Yorker, grew up in a tough environment. He made something of himself. He rose up quick and got himself control of Tammany Hall, and he ran that operation. Tammany hall was a dominant political machine in New York that controlled the Democratic Party and most of their votes. Over half of New York’s population at the time were German and Irish immigrants.

1:19 He helped thousands of us get naturalized as citizens. In 1870, the state of New York granted New York City a charter that gave local officials, not the state, power over local offices. It became known as the Tweed Charter. Yes, he had poor people working solid jobs for the first time, living in good homes with food and heat. So bad people gave him votes. Can you blame them?

1:41 Admiration wasn’t enough for him. Everyone has a thirst for something, and Tweed’s was for power. He rounded up his own fleet of goons and crooked cops to crack heads for him. He had to stay in control. This circle of corruption became known as the Tweed Ring. He accepted bribes’and, kickbacks in exchange for jobs and favors. He drew up added costs for hospitals and even the Brooklyn Bridge.

2:05 But in reality, he would pocket the money. Tweed had his hands in everything. He brought up a ton of New York real estate. So much so, that at one time, he was the third largest landowner in the entire city. He had a mansion on Fifth Avenue and in a state in Connecticut where he would throw big parties and weddings. All right,

2:25 it still isn’t really known how much he actually stole, because he was good at it. Some say 50 million, other people say 200 million. Whatever it was, it’s more money than I’ll ever see, that’s for sure. His biggest shame was fixing elections based on voting boxes, falsified election results. Tweed even put his own man in as mayor.

2:46 There were more people voting in those phony elections than there were actual citizens in the city. Thomas Nast, a political cartoonist for Harper’s Bizarre Magazine, drew up a series of political cartoons mocking Tweed and his corruption. He didn’t mind the newspapers much, but those cartoons really brought him down, because, like Tweed said, even though his constituents couldn’t read, they could see they’d had enough.

3:09 Tweed was arrested in October 1871 and indicted on counts of embezzlement, forgery and larceny. He was found guilty in 1873 and sentenced to twelve years. They got them. Guy rose the city for the mud pits and they arrested him. Even in jail, Tweed was a mastery of deceit.

3:30 In 1875, he bribed his way out of prison and escaped in disguise. He fled to Spain, where he worked as a seamen on a boat, but was eventually recaptured and put back in prison, where he caught severe pneumonia and died in 1878. I would rather live in an Emerald City with a guy like Tweed at the top than live

3:53 in a cesspool with a goody two shoes at the top. The precedent that Tweed said was that crime pays, but that’s not how it’s supposed to work. He could have been remembered as a hero. Instead, he’s a memorable crook with some cool cartoons made about him. Boss Tweed accomplished a lot, but he let greed get the best of him. It ruined him and stained his accomplishments.

4:14 And no laundry detergent can get those stains out, not even Tide.