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Chapter 7 section 3
Ch. 7.3
-- What was the political machine and what did they do for a city?
- The political machine was an orginized group that controlled the activities of a political party and also offered services to voters and businesses in exchange for political or finantial support
- After the Civil war they gained control of local government in Baltimore, New York, San Fransisco, and other major cities
- it was orginized like a pyramid
- at the base were local workers and captains who tried to gain voters support on a city block or neighborhood
- durring election time the Ward Boss worked to secure the vote in the ward
- Ward Bosses helped the poor and gained their votes by doing favors or providing services
- at the top was the City Boss who controlled the activities fo the political party throughout the city
- - Tell me about Boss Tweed and Tweed Ring.
- William M. Tweed or "Boss Tweed" became the head of Tammany Hall, New Yorks powerful Democratic political machine in 1868
- Between 1869 and 1871 Boss Tweed led the Tweed Ring, a group of corrupt politictians
- when the construction of the New York County Courthouse cost the taxpayers 13million, while the actual construction cost was 3 million. The difference went to Tweed and his followers
- Thomas Nast helped arouse public ourtage against Tammany Hall's graft and the Tweed Ring was finally broken
- Tweed was accused of 120 counts of fraud and extortion and as sentenced to 12 years in jail later reduced to 1 year
- after leaving jail he was quickly arrested because of another charge
- Tweed escaped durring his second sentence
-- What caused all this corruption in government?
- The desire for power and money made local politics corrupt in the industrial age and also infected natinal politics
-- Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James Garfield, Chester Arthur, Grover Cleveland, Ben Harrison, and Grover Cleavland and William Mckinley were all presidents durring the late 1800s. Were they a reform president or a status quo president?
- Rutherford B. Hayes: reform
- couldnt convince congress to support reform so he used other means
- when Hayes decided not to run for reelection a free-for-all broke out at the republican convention between Stalwarts and reformers
- neither side won so to decide the convention settled on predidential canidate James Garfield
- James Garfield: status quo
- to balance out Garfields ties to reformers the republicans nomintated for vice president Chester Arthur
- Garfield angered the Stalwarts by giving reformers most of his patronage jobs once he was elected
- Chester Arthur: reform
- Chester Arthur turned reform when he became president after Garfield was shot twice by a Stalwart who wanted Arthur to be president
- Grover Clevenand: status quo
- tried to lower tariff rates but congress refused to support him
- ran for reelection on a low-tariff platform against the former indiana senator Ben Harrison
- elected again in 1892 and was the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms
- supported a bill for lowering the McKinley Tariff but refused to sign it because it also provided for a federal income tax
- Benjamin Harrison:
- the grandson of president William Henery Harrison
- his campign was financed by large contributions from companies that wanted tariffs even higher then they were
- Cleveland won about 100,000 more popular votes than Harrison , Harrison took a majority of the electoral votes and presidency
- once in office he won passage of the McKinley Tariff Act of 1890which raised tariffs to their highest level
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