New York City....Manhattan only or the other 4 boroughs as well?

Factual Questions
41

Lure:

The consolidation story makes for a fascinating tale. I’ll try to sort it out for you here.

The idea for consolidating NYC (essentially Manhattan) and the City of Brooklyn was an old one. The earliest attempt I found went back to 1827. Despite a few solid attempts, the proposal never gained traction due to distrust and rivalry between the two municipalities.

To understand how it finally happened, you must be familiar with the NYC political landscape at the turn of the century. There were four important political camps that played into the 1898 consolidation picture:

Tammany Democrats (like by Boss Richard Croker),
reform Democrats (like Andrew H. Green, see more below),
regular Republicans (like by Boss Thomas Platt), and
reform Republicans (like Seth Low, Teddy Roosevelt and the Citizens Union)

My personal hero, Andrew Haswell Green – who is considered the Robert Moses of his day for having steered the creation of Central Park and many other grand public works – despised and fought the Tammany wing of his party all his life. Allied to the merchant class of NYC, and a lover of honest efficient government, he resurrected the consolidation concept in earnest in the late 1880’s. His aim was to unite the port of New York – the engine that drove the economy of the whole region – under singular control. Thus he included S.I., all of the present-day Bronx, and the present-day Queens in his plan – not just Brooklyn. But, framed only in economic and social terms, Green’s plan was thwarted by Brooklyn nativists and Manhattanites who did not want to share their tax wealth with the strapped and undeveloped hinterland municipalities.

But the stalemate broke once the idea turned political. In the mid-1890’s the NYS regular Republicans had Tammany Hall on the run following an embarassing GOP-led investigation of the Tammany-controlled NYC Police Department. State GOP Party Boss Tom Platt (who wanted a slice of the big downstate patronage pie that Tammany usually controlled) and reform Republicans (who saw consolidation as a way to root out Tammany for good and bring honest government to the entire area at once) united in favor of Green’s proposal.

It took intense pressure by Platt and his upstate followers to ram the plan through the NYS legislature despite objections from Tammany Dems, elitist Brooklynites, ungenerous Manhattanites and upstaters who feared the creation of a “monster metropolis” downstate. But, by a mere 2 votes the Greater New York Bill passed the legislature in April 1896 (to take effect January 1, 1898).

The Republican triumph faded fast, however, when the alliance between the regular wing and reform wing cracked. Each faction nominated a different mayoral candidate, splitting the GOP vote. In an ironic twist, Tammany candidate Robert Van Wyck thus became the first mayor of Greater NYC.

[To read the definative account of the 1898 consolidation, see David C. Hammack’s “Power and Society: Greater New York at the Turn of the Century.” Or you can watch my documentary. (Grinning smiley here.)]

42

Thanks Stuy-where can I see your documentary?

43

Stuy, what about money?

Burrows & Wallace, in their invaluable Gotham, recount that newly-expanded Booklyn - which was still digesting its annexation of the rest of Kings County - was mortgaged to the hilt. “Brooklyn was bumping up against its debt ceiling…The problem, most agreed, was Brooklyn’s narrow revenue base.” They go on to illustrate how Brooklyn’s property taxes, while assessed at a much higher rate than New York, nevertheless produced only dramatically smaller revenues. Brooklyn had huge expenses typical of a large city, but much of its population’s economic activity took place on the wrong side of the East River.

The authors also note that Brooklyn was running out of water, whereas New York’s Croton system was a gushing superabundance. I don’t think there was much else that Brooklyn could have done to expand its water supply - especially since its finances were so tapped out. (I should have resisted. Sorry.)

[rant] Even today, my understanding is that the real estate and economic activity of Manhattan below 96th Street floats most of the rest of New York state. If NYC could keep its revenues, rather than subsidize doomed upstate ghost-towns-to-be and inept suburban Republican machines, we’d have much of our infranstructure covered in wonderful shape. Funny how local-is-best conservatives seem to supress their instincts when there’s a huge pot of cash to grab…[/rant]

n.b.: Gotham also includes an analysis of New York’s need to remain the largest city - people remembered what happened to Philadelphia when New York’s growth accelerated, especially after the Erie Canal. What had been the financial and cultural capital of the continent - no exaggeration - saw its banks, its financiers, and its influence lost to New York. Having lived by that sword, Green and co. saw no need to die by it.

44

Ah, the intricacies of NYC government.

Yes, there are Borough presidents, but no Borough councils. There is just the Mayor and the City Council, which govern the City in a similar fashion to most other municipalities with a mayor and a council.

Other than the Borough President, District Attorney (prosecutor) and some judicial offices, there are no other borough-wide officials.

At this point, the Borough Presidents don’t have much of a role. Or as OxyMoron pointed out above, “Borough presidents now are little more than highly-paid cheerleaders, issuing proclamations, attending ribbon-cuttings, and sloughing money around through smallish discretionary budgets. Penny-ante royalty, really - with slightly less real work and power than Mayor McCheese. (Who at least gets that stylish sash.”

Previously, they did have some significant power, however. Prior to about 15 years ago (I’m sure stuyguy has the date on the top of his head) there was a City institution called the Board of Estimate which the Borough Presidents controlled. The Board of Estimate was in many ways more important than the City Council, with responsibility for many municipal functions, including zoning and city contracting.

The Board of Estimate system was abolished after a lawsuit determined that it violated “One Person, One Vote” because the Presidents of Boroughs with vastly differing populations had equal power on the Board. After a City Charter amendment, the City Council was expanded and given most of the responsibility formerly held by the Board of Estimate.

45

Oxy, yes, money and water were two huge factors used to argue for and against consolidation. (Other issues included the need to reduce street congestion, the need to build a unified public transportation network, the need to consolidate public health and safety services, the need to create cheap housing stock for the huge crush of immigrants, and on and on and on… Trust me, every issue you could shake a stick at was dragged into the consolidation debate!)

But back to money and water. Everything you quoted from Gotham was true. I found one primary source document by the Brooklyn Comptroller that gave the total debt of his city at 72 million dollars! So, yes Brooklynites were being taxed up the wazoo – at a time when the country was going through a deep economic depression, I might add. The tax-refief issue convinced many a Brooklynite to favor consolidation.

As a curious side note, the money issue strongly influenced the opinions of residents living in the Bronx – far, far away from impoverished Brooklyn and the flush Manhattan business district. Oxy, remember how you mentioned that the Bronx joined NYC before the other boroughs (the western half in 1874 and the rest in 1895, to be exact)? Well, the residents of that Annexed District, as it was then called, fought hard to OPPOSE the 1898 consolidation. Why? Because they did not want to share Manhattan’s huge tax revenue with any other undeveloped area – like Brooklyn, S.I. or Queens. They had a good thing and did they wanted it all for themselves. They wanted all that wealth to be spent on paving only THEIR streets, building only THEIR bridges and running only THEIR sewers.

The Brooklyn water situation was dire too in the 1890’s. There were wells and reservoirs out on Long Island that Brooklyn tapped, but they were getting brackish and overused. Plus, the L.I. locals loudly resented the fact that Brooklyn was tapping their water. So yes, Brooklynites eyed NYC’s Croton supply (and the others on the drawing boards) with covetous eyes.

There are some fascinating remnants from the abandoned old Brooklyn water supply worth mentioning. One is in Freeport, Long Island. Just north of the LIRR tracks (off limits to visitors, but visible from the tracks) you can see a huge Romanesque industrial building ravaged by fire. It is the old Milburn Pumping Station. From the tracks you can read the large lettering on the building: Brooklyn Waterworks.

The other notable remnants are not nearly as recognizable. They go by the names of the Sunrise Highway, the Southern State, Meadowbrook, Wantagh and Bethpage Parkways and the Valley Stream and Hempstead Lake State Parks. Robert Moses stumbled across Brooklyn’s forgotten reserviors, watershed lands and rights-of-way in the 1920; they were still municipally owned, having passed from Brooklyn’s hands to NYC’s in 1898. Moses turned them into roads and parks (except for the Sunrise Highway which was not one of his projects.)

46

Lure wrote:

“Thanks Stuy-where can I see your documentary?”

Unfortunately it is not easily available. E-mail me and I’ll lend you a copy. (I tried to email you, but your address is not posted.)

47

Didn’t consolidation also have an element of trying to dilute the voting power of minority ethnic groups?

48

Possible, but I doubt it. Residents of the boroughs are proportionally represented in the CIty Council. Queens and Brooklyn each have more councilmen than Manhattan, though this was not the case in 1898 when hardly anyone lived in Queens. If disinfranchising minority voters was a major motivation, it wasn’t very well planned, since Brooklyn quickly overtook Manhattan in terms of population.

49

I had a wonderfully written reply to acsenray’s question but, of course, it got eaten by the board. Arrrrgh.

Let’s try again.

I assume you mean the Irish, German, Italian, etc. immigrants when you say “minority ethnic groups.”

These groups were successully courted by Tammany Hall, and there was a lot of anti-Tammany sentiment floating around the middle and upper classes of the Greater NY region. But how much of the anti-Tammany talk was just thinly disguised ethnic bigotry is hard to say; Tammany did enough shady stuff to attract lots of enemies for all sorts of reasons. (Of course there was a significant amount of undisguised anti-immigrant talk among Protestant Brooklynites, but they fell into the anti-consolidation camp.)

When Platt entered the picture (see my post above for a description of Platt’s strategy), he naturally did so with an anti-Tammany – or really, pro-Republican – motives. But that was probably because Tammany represented the opposition party, not because they represented ethnic minority groups.

50

Stuyguy:
Before the Bronx was annexed, wasn’t it part of Westchester county?
If so, how was the northern border established, and was there ever any plan to annex everything all the way up to the Connecticut state line?

51

Since stuyguy hasn’t come back…

In answer to your second question: Gotham summarizes Green’s plan (dating from 1868) as including only “a part of Westchester County.” I don’t think there was ever a serious move after consolidation to extend NYC’s reach even further.

Flipping to the Encyclopedia of New York City, we find that the initial 1874 annexation “included the towns of Morisania, West Farms and Kingsbridge”, which all lay west of the Bronx River. Kingsbridge appears to have been the most northerly, so I’m guessing its northern border determined the line.

The 1895 annexation is murkier, but provides clues. Wakefield, which is the little lump that sticks up oddly, was included in its entirety - but only “parts of” Pelham and Eastchester, where the border is a suspiciously straight line. Given that much of the area around the border was pretty rural, it may have been pretty easy to just draw a line.

Stuyguy?

52

Arlington, VA. No part of Arlington is incorporated, so all its mail is properly addressed as “Arlington”.

There are areas of Arlington that might deserve differentiation (Crystal City, Rosslyn, Clarendon, Ballston), but they still get their mail as Arlington.

53

Just to add to the discussion, I work at Columbia University on 168th St in Manhattan (the medical campus). Last night, we decided to talk shop at a restaurant, and decided rather than go somewhere local, we should go to “the city”, which meant somewhere midtown or below. So, my point is, that it depends on context. If you live in Idaho, NYC is probably all of the boroughs. If you live in Long Island, it’s probably Manhattan. If you live in Manhattan, it’s probably only lower Manhattan.

54

Meet me at La Guili, we can sit and have a Spumoni and talk geography, then head down to Hell’s Gate Park for a bit of river watching. :smiley:

I miss that area, I lived in Upper Astoria for something like 7 years.

And yep, to my ear, going to the City is Manhatten only. I’m driving to the Dr. today, and I am saying I’m going to The Bronx.

Cartooniverse

55

I just want to point out that postal addresses, as assigned by the U.S. Postal Service, don’t necessarily have anything to do with actual jurisdictions as defined by state governments. The post office will assign an address to an area that seems to need or wants to have its own postal designation, whether or not it constitutes a jurisdictional entity in and of itself. Jurisdictional boundaries and entities occasionally change, but that doesn’t mean that the postal designation changes with it.

As far as New York is concerned, the U.S. Postal Service assigns “New York” to all addresses in Manhattan, but not to any addresses elsewhere in the City of New York only because when the postal designation was first assigned, it made sense to do so, and since the change, the Postal Service has not been persuaded to change it, because it is seen as unnecessary, or because nobody cares, or for some other (non-)reason.

56

Stormfield asked:

“Before the Bronx was annexed, wasn’t it part of Westchester county?
If so, how was the northern border established, and was there ever any plan to annex everything all the way up to the Connecticut state line?”

As Oxy posted (thanks bud), the territory of the 1874 annexation was of three entire Westchester County towns west of the Bronx River. The northernmost was Kingsbridge, so that’s where the northern border fell.

I consulted one of my sources to learn that the circumstances of the 1874 move was a bit more intriguing than the description that Oxy related from Gotham and the EoNYC.

From “The Public Career of Andrew Haswell Green,” an unpublished Ph.D. dissertation by George A. Mazaraki (1966):

“Consolidation moved a giant step closer to realization in 1874 with the expansion of New York into lower Westchester County. Though the area’s geographical proximity to New York had long been apparent, it was Green’s 1868 report and the street planning activities of the Central Park Commission [which Green headed] that spurred the municipal authorities to action. As it turned out, Boss Tweed played the decisive role in setting the stage for annexation. Sentiment in the Westchester towns had long been in favor of annexation, but not until the late 1860’s, when Tweed saw the possibility of inaugurating a program of public works in the region, was legislative action begun. Once begun, the movement for annexation acquired a life of its own, and in 1873 a bill calling for a referendum on the question was adopted by the State Legislature. The referendum was held at the regular November election in 1873. The vote was overwhelmingly in favor of annexation. On January 1, 1874 that area south of Yonkers and west of the Bronx River became the 23rd and 24th wards of the city.”

Now let’s talk about the 1895 annexation (and that Connecticut line).

As Oxy said, Green had mentioned annexing lower Westchester as early as 1868. While he had no active role in the 1874 annexation, once it happened he reiterated the need to annex the eastern portion too. (Quoting again: “The existing boundary, running along the Bronx River, omitted the entire drainage basin of that river and made the problems of sewage disposal and water supply infinately difficult. Expecting a heavy influx of people into the new area, Green argued that such problems could be resolved only by broad-scale planning, and this, he insisted, required further territorial expansion.”)

Fast forward to 1889: Green convinced the legistlature to establish a commission to explore consolidating territory all around NY harbor into one municipality. The following year, as head of the commission, he drew up a map of the territory he proposed be joined to NYC; it included most of what we call the 5 boroughs today. The map drew a straight line along the existing northern border of the Annexed District due east to the water. You must remember that Green’s original vision for Greater New York essentially included all the territory that was part of the port of NY. And in those days of horses and trolleycars it would have been hard to argue including anything above Pelham Bay.

In the midst of the 6-year public debate that raged over Green’s big-picture consolidation plan, prominent residents of the area east of the Bronx River and south of Green’s proposed boundary line petitioned the governor to annex thier territory to NYC regardless of the final outcomes in Brooklyn, Queens and SI. Even though some of the affected residents were strongly opposed, the governor backed the idea, as did the mayor of NYC. The measure passed the legislature in 1895.

There is evidence that some cosopolitan-minded Westchesterites may have given thought to expanding the northern border above Green’s proposed line (though not quite to CT!). In 1894 the legislature authorized a non-binding referendum regarding the consolidation question to weigh the opinions of all the affected territories.

Naturally, the towns of Eastchester and Pelham, whose southern tips would be nipped off by Green’s line, were included in the vote. But more curiously, the Town of Mt. Vernon – which was entirely situated north of the proposed border and was originally not included in the referendum – specifically asked the legislature to participate in the voting. (Their residents voted against consolidation, incidentally.)

When the consolidation topic came up on the SDMB a few months ago, someone (was it you Oxy?) posted a great link that I’ll pass along here. The site does a good job of illustrating the various annexations (except for the Queen County vs. Queens Borough mess that resulted from the 1898 consolidation – but that’s a whole other nightmare that I won’t get into unless someone asks).

http://www.nygbs.org/info/articles/five_boroughs.html

57

My, that’s embarrassing. I completely forgot about that link. Com-pletely. And I even have it bookmarked! I think I found it in a google search.

Oh dear, what the hell will I be like at 80? :smiley:

58

Denver, Colorado.
Broomfield, Colorado.
Many Virginia counties.
New York boroughs.
Much of unincorporated Los Angeles County, California.
San Francisco, California.

59

Regarding San Francisco being called “The City”…

The Golden State Warriors NBA team used to be known as the San Francisco Warriors. In the late 60s/early 70s, the lettering on the front of their jerseys read, you guessed it…“The City.” The jersey design was actually quite interesting, with the Golden Gate Bridge on the front and a SF cable car on the back with the player’s number on it.

60

Its interesting how so many people who live within 75 miles or so from the boundaries of San Francisco say: “We live in San Francisco” …proud to be associated with that beautiful city.

On the other hand there are so many of us living in the LA area who prefer to say: We live one hour south of Santa Barbara or "We live in in Southern California. Los Angeles is not led by a Guiliani or a Daly but by corrupt political leadership just for starters. Even when I lived in one of the incorporated cities in Los Angeles County, we prefered Not to say we were from Los Angeles. New York is a great city and if I were from one of the 5 boroughs I’d be proud to say I’m from New York City and specify which part after.