Boss Tweed and His Men.

Southland Times, Issue 9544, 14 June 1887, Page 3

Boss Tweed and His Men.

■*» L. J. Jennings, formerly connected with the New York Times, and now a member of Parliament, recently related to a representative of the London World the story of his fight against Tammany. " Before I hid been at work very long in New York,"J aavs Mr Jennings, "it struck me us ;i curious thing that nene of the city accuiats were ever published. There was v iaw requiring them to be issued quarterly, and annually, but not a eign of them could I find anywhere, The taxation of the city amounted to L 4,000,000, 000,000 a year, and in the course of a few years a debt had been run up of over L' 20,000,000. There never was a city so badly lighted and paved. All the duties of the city government were neglected. What, then, became of all the money ? I set myself to work to find out. The city government was entirely in the hands of Boas Tweed and his merry men. They had yachts and fine carriages und fast trotters, and were diamonds in their shirt fronts almost as large Be aauc< Tß. A few years previously moat of them hid been unknown and penniless men. The police, the sheriffs, the whole control of the city, were in their hands. One day I managed to fiud out that a cum equal to L1'20,000 had been charged for carpet 6in a building known as tho Courthouse. I went over the Courthouse and had a look round. There were bo carpets there — only a little matting, which might have been bought for L2O. Little by little I got at the secrets of the city account bookß. But I had nothing which could be produced in the shape of legal proof. The bold course was the only one to take. I astonished the city one morning by coming out with an article entitled 'Two Thievap.' I denounced Tweed and his confederates as public robbers. They abused me to their hearts' content in their newspapers ; every crirao I had ever heard of was laid at my 'door. I was arrested two or three times a day as the figbr grew brisk ; but the magistrates, albeit in the ' ring,' never refused bail, and there were gentlemen of the city who stood ready day and n'ght to give bail for me to the extent of 5,000,000d01., had so much been wanted. I was 'waited for 1 as I wont home at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, but, Bomehow, my kind friends always missed me. All kinds of inducements were offered me to ' shut up ' and go away. One nigbt a man came suddenly into my room at the office, chut the door quickly, and announced that he intended to cut the heart out of me. As yon ccc, I am here, therefore it stands to reason he did not do it. Ii is needless for me to dwell on little incidents of that kind. There was a well-known man who had once held an official peeition in the Tammany organisation, but had been unfairly pushed oat or it. He had a friend in the Comptroller's office, where all the city books wer6 kept. One night he came into my room, took his hat off, and remarked that it was very hot. ' Very,' I Baid. 'You have had a hard fight,' said be encouragingly. ' Have still, I think,' replied I, as I got up to look out of the window. The truth was that I felt unusually discouraged that night. There seemed to be no end to the long roid I waa on. ' I said you have had it,' saH my acquaintance quietly, pulling out a rdl of paper from his pocket. ' Here are the proofs,' he went on, 'of all the charges you have made —exact transcripts from the Comptroller's books. The money stolen is over 20,000,000d01. Don't let the boys knew that yon have got these papers ; they would murder you in a twinkling if they as much as suspected it.' I held out my hand for the inestimable roll, ran off home with it, and sat np all night disentangling tbo figures and puzzling out the whole story. The proof was ample, but it took me some days to briDg it into a shape which would make its due impression on the public mind. The figures had been copied surreptitiously,at different times, and were all in chaos. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were charged to various persons, who, I soon found, bad do existence. A plasterer had been paid L 366.000 for plastering one building. Furnishing that building had cost L 1,500,000,, 500,000, although there were only a fe<» stools and desks in the place. I need not tell you the details : suffice it to say that we got the corrupt judgeß impeached and removed from the Bencb ; the ' boss ' and his dccomplices became fugitives, the entire ring was shattered to fragments.'