"Ring" development in New York City, it is important to have, besides the facts already stated, some conception of the low status of life in certain portions of the City.' The party boss early saw the political value of food, picnics and entertainments, in his endeavor to herd the vote of these quarters. The conditions, in certain parts of New York City, even today far from ideal, were infinitely worse in 1865. A party of investigators pictured the life in the low sections of the Fourth and Sixth Wards as follows:

We first visited some houses in Fisher's Alley, . . . In these houses we found a family in each room, some with half a dozen lodgers in addition. Children swarmed in the dark passages, on the broken stairs and in the noisome back yards. The walls were cracked, the ceilings leaky, the broken floors mended in some places with barrel staves nailed over the holes and the windows so patched and dirty as to exclude much of the light.'

The owners of these barracks and cellars had become conscious of danger from a new Board of Health which had been appointed ten days previous to the publication of this report. The investigators state that

fifteen hundred loads of filth had been already removed from the Fourth Ward, and in many courts and alleys only a dirty tide mark on the walls remains to tell of their recent condition. Some streets [Cedar Street for instance] were still ridged up to the height of nearly two feet for their entire length.'

'Talcott Williams, Tammany Hall (In Historic New York, 1899), vol. ii, pp. 33-79.

The Nation, vol. i-ii, p. 332.

The Nation, vol. i-ii, p. 332. The report continues: "We next descended into a number of lodging.cellars, not more than one in five of

Is there much room for wonder at the power of the ward boss, when one considers the allurements he offered, as a momentary relief from these conditions? "The filthy condition of the city entailed a fearful sacrifice of life," says Gustavus Myers, "the average deaths yearly being no less than thirty-three in one thousand. Nearly all the 220 health wardens and special inspectors under Francis I. A. Boole, the city inspector, were illiterate and unfit." One of the above health wardens, when asked by the Senate committee of investigation the meaning of the term "hygienics," answered: "I suppose it is some odor that arises from the stagnant water." Speaking of the condition of New York City, Andrew D. White, who was on the Senate committee, said: "The facts which I brought out were sufficient to condemn the whole existing system twenty times over."3 The sordid congestion in New York City, together with Tammany's

I

which was lighted, except perhaps by a window in the upper part of the room. Dark, damp, unventilated and so cramped that we were frequently unable to stand upright, these dens paid a rent of from nine to sixteen dollars a month... Although we were always careful to leave the door open wherever we entered, a few minutes in such an atmosphere were enough to produce oppression of the lungs and a disagreeable taste in the mouth. What must it be towards morning, after a dozen men and women have been sleeping there for hours? . . . Turning into East Gotham Court, we found a block of tenement houses, upwards of one hundred and fifty feet long, standing at right angles to the street... The narrow alley-way which gave access to these dwellings was pierced, at regular intervals, with open gratings, down which we looked into a continuous open sewer, the common sink of all. It was fortunate for us that the keen cold kept down its terrible exhalations." 1 Gustavus Myers, A History of Tammany Hall (New York, 1901), p. 248.

"Senate Documents, 1865, vol. ii, no. 38, p. 467.

'Autobiography of Andrew D. White (New York, 1905), vol. i, p. 126. Cf. Matthew Hale Smith, Sunshine and Shadow in New York (Hartford, Conn., 1883), passim.

ability to utilize this condition for its own ends, was the chief source of the power for Tammany Hall. Further, when one considers the fact that New York City has always counterbalanced the remainder of the State politically, it appears clear that this same condition was one of the chief sources of power for the Democratic Party in New York State.

Under the discussion of party campaigns it will be shown that the political control of the congested districts in the cities of the State was closely related to the liquor traffic. In each campaign and especially in 1867, the influence of this element was a determining factor. New York City alone in 1865, it is estimated, had 10,000 places where intoxicating liquors were sold, with gross receipts annually of $5,000,000, assuming an average of $500 to each place.' Co-equal as a field for police graft and political jobbery, we find that a low estimate of the value of the real and personal property invested for immoral purposes in New York City was placed at $5,000,000. Further, it was estimated that the amount of money spent in houses of assignation, together with the sums required for the expenses of criminal and humane institutions resulting from the social evil, must total at not less than an additional $5,000,000.3

Industrially, the condition of New York State in 1865 was strong. It is true that between 1861-5 there was a period of depression in shipping, due to the use of American vessels for war purposes, the occupation of

'City Mission and Tract Society Reports, 1865, p. 132.

'Ibid.; from police investigations and medical testimony it was calculated that there were 7,500 prostitutes and 2,500 other women who frequented houses of ill fame. Hence a mean total of 10,000.

'Ibid.; allowing for a natural prejudice, these reports are considered fairly accurate.

northern manufacturers in making war supplies to be used at home, and a lack of faith in American financial integrity on the part of foreign markets induced by the stress of war. The American shipping of the Port of New York, used in connection with the foreign trade, declined from 1,618,258 tons in 1861 to 774,459 tons in 1865. The movement in New York reflected the larger movement throughout the country between the years 1861 to 1865. For the United States the aggregate tonnage, inclusive of steam vessels, was 5,539,813 tons in 1861. This was reduced in 1865 to 4,986,813 tons.3 The tonnage in use for foreign trade dropped from 2,642,000 tons in 1860, to 1,092,000 tons in 1865. This equals a reduction of sixty per cent. The gross annual value of exports and imoprts illustrates the same movement. 1861, the total value of the exports from the United States was $410,856,818, while that of imports was $352,075,535. We find them reduced in 1865 to $336,697,123 for the exports and to $234,339,810 for the imports. Strikingly contrasted with its decline in shipping, the agriculture of New York flourished throughout the Rebel

1Appleton's Annual Cyclopedia, 1865, p. 183.

5

In

2 Ibid., p. 183. A comparative summary of the clearances from the port of New York during the year 1865 shows:

Many vessels arrive from foreign ports which clear for a coastwise port. Hence, the clearances for foreign ports are generally fewer than the direct arrivals.

'Executive Documents, 1st Session, 39th Congress, Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, 1865, p. 1-146, etc.

4 Ibid.

'Chamber of Commerce, N. Y., Annual Report, 1864-5, part ii, p. 121.

lion in spite of the large recruitment from the State.' This was accounted for by the introduction of laborsaving machinery which compensated for the lack of men. With the exception of an unusual drought here and there through the summer of 1865 the year was favorable to crops. Peace immediately gave a new impulse to commerce in all sections of the country but especially in New York. With the growth in commerce came a like expansion in manufactures and agriculture.

The New York State Treasury receipts during the fiscal year which ended on September 30, 1865, including all funds except the canal fund, were $16,273,665.3 The payments made on the account of all funds except the canal fund were $16,183,095.98. Hence, there was a

balance in the treasury at the end of the fiscal year of $90,569.78. The actual receipts from all sources were $11,912,936.48; the actual payments, which included the deficiency from the previous year, were $13,012,330.54. This left a shortage on September 30, 1865, of $1,179,394.06. Had the City of New York paid its taxes before the end of the fiscal year, to the amount of $2,667,437.04,

1

Census of the State of New York, 1865, F. B. Hugh. The total assessed value of real estate in New York State in 1865 was $1,160,848,745. Appleton's Ann. Cyclopedia, 1865, p. 3. The New York wheat crop was larger than that of 1864. In rye, the State was second to Pennsylvania in order of production. The barley crop (11,391,286 bushels) was nearly two-fifths of the entire crop produced in the United States. New York State led in hay and oats. The hop crop of which New York contributed nine-tenths of the total yield, was small owing to lice.

'Messages from the Governors, Fenton, 1865, vol. v, p. 595.

'New York State Comptroller's Report, January 2, 1866, from which all the following figures are taken.

4 $863,814.67.

'The reason for New York City's delay in the payment of taxes due, arose from the fact that they were not collected until in the fall, which was nearly a year later than in the other counties.