The Tweed Ring was only a small part of the history of Tammany Hall. The Hall was actually founded around 1800 as a social club, named after St. Tammany – a misspelling of a Delaware Indian leader, supposedly the one who sold Manhattan to Peter Minuet. The facts were wrong – “Tammany” was a misspelling of an Indian involved with a land sale in the Philadelphia area, and, of course, he was not a saint.
Aaron Burr is usually credited with the idea of turning Tammany into a political force. By the 1840s, they were the major political force in NYC politics.
Tweed went for the money. He blatantly stole from the city, demanding kickbacks, and providing kickbacks to the contractors involved. If a job would normally cost, say $1000, Tweed would pay the contractor $2000, keep $500, and give him $500 off the top. It was a great deal for everyone except the taxpayers.
The Tweed Ring fell apart when their treasurer died in a carriage accident. The new guy sent information to the NY Times, and the ring collapsed.
But Tweed was replaced by John Kelley, who moved to a more sophisticated form of corruption. The Tammany Tiger appointed all city positions, and all city workers were expected to donate to to Tammany Hall. If you wanted a promotion – well, your “donation” was expected to be much more generous.
At the same time, Tammany was involved in controlling the elections to remain in power. Part of this was by giving voters what they wanted – the poor got coal in the winter, everyone was given free picnics in the summer, etc. If you needed a job, Tammany would find one for you (even if it was busy work on the city payroll). That meant a lot in the days when there was no unemployment insurance. So the corruption was not necessarily a bad thing for many New Yorkers.
Part was satisfying the various ethnic groups in the city (for much of its power, Tammany was primarily Irish, but knew the importance of pleasing various ethnic groups). Candidates were chosen with the right ethnic mix,* ensuring the vote from the various ethnic groups in the city. Tammany bigwigs would show up at funerals and weddings and be generous in their gifts.
They also owned Tammany Hall – the only gathering place in the city for political meetings – and managed to shut down several attempts at reform by merely turning off the lights or locking the doors.
There also was voter fraud – Tammany would hire people to vote multiple times for their candidates.
Kelly was succeeded by Richard Croker and later Charles Murphy, both of whom were hard-nosed about keeping Tammany’s power intact. During Murphy’s reign, he was powerful enough to get the governor of New York impeached.
However, after Murphy’s death, Tammany began to slowly decline. The corruption began to be dealt with, the Seabury Commission getting Tammany Mayor Jimmy Walker kicked out of office. By the time LaGuardia became mayor in 1933, Tammany was no longer the only power in NYC politics. The civil service laws took away their ability to control patronage, and better voter registration laws made the vote fraud much more difficult.
Tammany remained active, though, and their support was important for anyone running for mayor. They became a powerful special interest, though still within the law. And outside the law, their interests in prostitution and other illegal activities brought them in contact with organized crime, though they worked to eliminate that tie by the 50s.
Carmine Di Sapio became its leader in the 50s (a major change – Tammany was traditionaly Irish-based, and hated Italians). Di Sapio was honest enough, though his physical appearance hurt (he always wore sunglasses due to an eye condition, which made him come off as shifty). In addition, he made some bad choices and pissed off some Democratic candidates for governor, cutting off his power in the state (In one case, he refused to give his support to Averil Harriman, who got elected dispite him – not a good thing for the Hall). Finally, Democrats began to run against Tammany; it actually became a burden to have their endorsement by the 60s.
I’m not sure if they still exist; the last Tammany Hall building is now an arts center. There’s probably a group of people somewhere meeting under the banner of Tammany, but they no longer have any influence in the city.
*Harry Golden tells the story of one person being elected judge because they wanted a Jewish candidate and all the ones they were considering couldn’t make it to the meeting when the candidates were announced due to bad weather. Finally, one of the Tammany people asked those attending, “Are there any Jewish lawyers in the audience?” There was, he volunteered and was elected.