The Savannah morning news., 1902-03-30
AL ADAMS, POLICY KING.
HE IS SOMETIMES CALLED THE
MEANEST MAN IN NEW YORK.


MEANEST MAN IN NEW YORK.
His Scheme of Fleeing the Poor
How Policy Was First Systemized
in New York in the Old Tweed
Days by Zachariah simmons OF
Whom Adams as a Runner Learn
ed the Business-His Personal Am
billions Are Nothing, but He Has
Tried in Vain 10 Make His Wealth
a stepping stone to Social Position
for His FamiIy-HOvv His Sons Had
to Leave College as Soon Their
Something About the Playing of
Policy.
New York. March 2S.-If Al Adams.
the notorious Policy King, escapes
prison as the result of his indictment
as the head of the policy system in the
city of New York, it will be because the
most perfectly organized prosecution
that has ever been prepared against
one man in this country breaks down.
The cry of District Attorney Jerome.
of Capt. F. Norton Goddard and all the
others who have made the breaking
up of the policy game in New York,
their principal work during the past
few years is: "Al Adams must go to
jail"
Adams will doubtless pass into the
history of criminal prosecution as one
of the most sensational on record. For
his defense he brings forward millions
in money, and the greatest amount Of
police influence ever held by one man
in the city. Against him is arraigned
District Attorney Jerome himself as
prosecutor, and a staggering bulk of
evidence of the Policy Kings opera
tons There seems to be no loophole
of escape for him, unless some judge
dares to defy public sentiment and
give him the benefit of a fine without
Imprisonment, providing he is proved
guilty. He scarcely hopes for aequit-
tai. The policy paraphernalia found
in his possession when arrested is suf-
ficient under the Anti-Policy law to
send a hundred men to jail.
But he does hope to escape with
fine, and in support of his claim to this
consideration he will make mis- familiar
ola excuse IIaI ne Is out Oh the DuSl-
ness and his Imprisonment now would
lose the moral effect it might have as
an example otherwise. Judge Foster re-
Gently discharged a policy man on the
amazing ground that it had not been
proved that he was not a public officer,
and so exempt from punishment for
having policy slips in his possession.
If such a distinction were made in the
case of Al Adams it might save him,
but the men who have given the last
five years and large part of their pri-
vate fortunes to bringing Adams to the
bar scarcely believe that such a con-
dition of affairs will ever obtain in this
case.
How ''POIicy" Originated.
While William M. Tweed and his
friends were looting the public treas
ury and licensing the promoters of
every form of vice to operate, with the
city of New York as a field, it occurred
to an Industrious Yankee named
Zachariah Simmons that a fortune was
to be made in a short time by any man
smart enough to devise a way to rob
the poor of the cents, nickels and
dimes, which represented to them the
amount over their earnings, but neces-
sary for the expense of bare existence
Simmons saw that the gambling field
proper was we'll covered, and that there
was little room for a new conner who
must have the patronage of the man
with a dollar to risk.
So he turned to the poor man and
provided him with something he had
always lacked, a gambling game sutfi-
GENTLY exciting to induce him to risk,
not only his nickels and his dimes, but
the very coppers in his pocket, and not
only once but twice a day. He intro
duced the poor of the East Side of New
York to the game of policy, and at the
same time he laid the foundations of
the fortune of at least $S,000,000 and
maybe 81, 900, which the notorious
AL Adams, the present policy king. is
possessed of to-day.
Zachariah Simmons didn't know
what he was doing for Albert j.
Adams when he began hiring men to
write policy in the cigar shops, candy
stores and saloons of the East Side.
He made a vast sum of money HIM
self, and SO did his two brothers, who
later on were his partners, but the to-
tai earnings of the three were insig-
nificant compared to what AL Adams
has made.
There is no comparing Al Adams
with Zachariah Simmons, or with any
other gambler for that matter, because
IA CAc HiS1OAS u @NS" va IiSAN nae
only been one Al Adams. Other men
have conducted policy games, even
during the time that AL Adams was the
king of the game, but policy as Al
Adams has conducted it has been a
form of llrceny so mean and despicable
that those engaged in it are held in a
kind of contempt by other gamblers.
Al Adams had builded his fortune. not
alone on the small change of poor men,
but on the nickels and dimes of work.
ing women and the miserable coppers
of children as well. He has absorbed
their homes. and in some cases the
very clothing off of their backs, but
worse than all, he has created verit-
able. army of gambling crazy men,
women and children. The term policy
1end" does not exist only in the minds
of writers and reformers. 1t very apt