River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1892-03-24
They PAID DEARLY.
How Chicago's 4" Boodling" Aldermen
Bled Corporations Seeking Fayors.

How Chicago's " Boodling" Aldermen
Bled Corporations Seeking Favors.
CHICAGO, March 2l.-Referring to the
/ grand jury investigation of ''boodling'
methods practiced by members of the
city council. the Tribune calls atten-
4 ton to the following significant facts
which, it says, it is in a position TO
1 prove conclusively:
Fifty $1,000 bills were drawn from
the Illinois Trust and Savings bank
by manufacturing concern a few days
after the passage of the compressed air
ordinance.
/ A man interested in a street railway
/ franchise says he went to a certain
alderman to make legitimate offer of
a large sum to the city for franchise
! The alderman said he had talked it
over with the boys and that II would
cost the company SIS. 600; but that the
money must go ito the aldermen and
not to the city"
In the presence of witnesses an
alderman demanded S., 600 as the price
| of getting an ordinance out of com
mittee's pigeon-hole.
There is said to be from Si50,000 to
$3.50, 600 in certain hands to be paid
certain aldermen provided the mayor
signs the Yerl1es omnibus ordinance.
The sum of 81, $50, offered as a bride
and accepted on the advice of counsel.
has been turned over to a newspaper
/ by Alderman Roth to be used as evil
dence.
1T costs good deal of money some
times to buy the city council" said an
attorney who is closely connected with
the states attorney. The Northern
Pacific had all the worst of it in the
/ last three big deals the aldermen have
made The figures for those three
sales of city franchises are just these:
Northern racine. $500
Economic Gas ..................... 10000
compressed AIT l30,VuO
"Those are the amounts the mem
bers of the council received in those
/ three deals, and some of them will
wish soon they had never seen a cent
of it,"
A lawyer of this city when in his
cups confided to an acquaintance that
he had paid eleven $1,000 bills to as
many aldermen in connection with the
| Northern Pacific ordinance
An alderman said in committee meet
ing that an offer of $50, 900 ito the
city" for a franchise was 'perpetrat-
ing blackmail upon the aldermen"
! The principal evidence on which the
grand jury is working, and which is
expected to prove, beyond doubt that
bribery entered into the granting
of the Northern Pacific franchise,
is the allegation, and the prose-
cution has the evidence for the
/ grand jury, that on the 2Sth day of
4 July, 1891, Alderman Powers, William
O'Brien, and another one met in the
offices of the Fidelity and Casualty
bank safety deposit vaults. They
went to one of the vaults from
which the three above named took
number of envelopes on which We're
written the names of various alder
men. The envelopes, which were
| opened by the three aldermen
while in the vault, contained num-
Der of bills each. The envelopes were
taken by the three aldermen to the city
hall, where they were distributed. as
seen by the witnesses who will be
brought before the grand jury, among
the aldermen in the council chamber.
The Northern Pacific franchise had
| just been passed.