New-York tribune., 1873-06-14
An AUDACIOUS RING.

judge Alexander McCue, Senator Henry G..
Murphy, and Controller Schroeder of Brooklyn
seem to think they can juggle with the people
of that Ring oppressed city forever without
fear of public indignation. The Ring which
We Of this city lately consigned to political
pcrdition was hardly less reckless and audacious
than that which is fast coming to rum III
Brooklyn. month ago, before The TRIBUNE
had fairly undermined it and exposed It's
Iottenness, it plotted still to accomplish Its
ends and carried its measures triumphantly
through a corrupt Legislature. But to-day
the very men we have named who planned
I, those very measures we have Indicated are
repudating them aud their former confed-
crates, and are hunting their way back into
the ranks Of honest reformers.
1t will not be amiss just now to utter few
plain words about the Brooklyn Bridge Ring,
which may be called the central organization
of the Brooklyn Ring, for in it are associated
the worst of the Sewer, Park, Street, Ju-
dietary, and Contractors Rings-and these are
terms whose meaning Brooklyn taxpayers
have only too good reason to recognize and
to regard with indignation. The Bridge which
this Ring, or rather this combination OF
Rings, has been managing for two years was
seized upon by the chief managers as a means
Of enriching themselves. Henry c. Murphy,
J. s. Il. Stranahan, Alexander McCue, and
William c. Kingsley of Brooklyn, deliberately
combined with Peter b. Swecny Richard b.
Connolly, Hugh Smith, and William NJ.
Tweed, TO make money out Of an
enterprise which was popular from Its
inception, and which their common
sense told them the mutual interests
of the two cities would eventually make sue
cessful. They organized a company which
they could themselves control as subscribers
Of a majority of unpaid for private stock,
and dictated and secured the municipal lcgis-
lation which gave into their hands four and
a half million of dollars to be expended as
they chose. They have never in reality sub
scrihed single penny to the work, and
never intended to- Mr. StraRahan admitted to IA
responsible person who lately made the fact
public that lie has never paid for the stock he
claims to own. Mr.. Kingsley admits he paid
the instalments of the New-YOrk thieves who
loaned their tainted names and corrupt intiu-
enoe to the conspiracy. For himself aud part
ner Mr.. Kingsley, according to his own fig
ures, has paid in $j8,O00 of stock and drawn
out as salary $12J,OOO. Mr.. McCue, we venture
to say, has received as profits from his lum-
Der contracts with the Bridge Company ten
fold all the money he has put into the con-
cern. And so it is with the rest.
Thus fraudulently organized this Ring went
fraudulently to work. They voted their Ring
master-NIr. Kingsley, who is the Tweed of
Brooklyn, and shrewder than his prototype
a percentage on the expenditures for the Bridge
which would have paid for all the private
stock in a year and left large profit over,
had exposure not frustrated the swindle.
BaiIled in this, they next attempted to make
an immense profit on the work by paying Mr..
Kingsley, the agent and the stakeholder of
the Ring, S42 per square foot for work which
was subsequently proved to have cost only
$50, and which we are assured response
BILE companies are prepared to do at S13,
and then clear one hundred and fifty
per cent on the contract. Exposure of
this design also bafiled it, and finally,
driven from every position in which they
could hope to make money, the Ring came to
tho conclusion that they bad better abandon
an enterprise in which there was no longer
profit or honor to be had. In the mean time
they had drawn the Reform Controller Of
Brooklyn into their meshes by specious prom
ises of political preferment. He was induced
to illegally issue tho bonds of Brooklyn
to supply them with money He also
became alarmed at the position in which he
found himself, but having once stepped in he
was easily induced TO continue in project
which promised to relieve him of responsible
ity and return the others the money they pro-
fessed to have put in the enterprise. To ac-
complsh this end n bill was drawn up by
Judge McCue, approved and supported at AL
bany by Controller Schroeder, and secretly
manipulated in Legislative Committee by Sen
ator Henry C.. Murphy, whose boast it is that
no legislation for Kings County can be passed
without his approval.
This bill, in its original shape, was defeated
by the exposure of Its purpose in this paper.
All Brooklyn was aroused in opposition to 80
impudent q scheme to let the plunderers of
the Bridge escape, not only with the profits
of their contracts, but the very bait, in the
shape Of private subscriptions, with which
they had allured the two cities to subscribe
$4,5O0,000. Driven temporarily from their pur-
pose, they concOcted another bill. which
was fathered by the same worthy three Ring
men, and which finally slipped through the
Legislature in It's closing hours in modified
form. The agitation in Brooklyn which has
since followed frightened the Ring still more.
and after enticng two or three shallow Re-
formers into their scheme as a cover for
themselves, these chiefs Of the Ring
whom we havo named, on Thurs
day last, abandoned the scheme and de-
nounoed their eOnfederates. Judge McCue,
who ,yaa tba reaI author ~ tha hin IN