The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-05-23
HOW NEW YORK IS
 RUN BY CRIMINALS
Tammany Has Held Sway for
 Years With Repeaters
OUTLOOK FOR UPHEAvAl
Even Now, However, There Is Said 10 Be a Plan Under Way to Split Anti-T ammany Vote With
 Two Candidates.

Extract from article by George Kibbe
 Turner in the June McClures.
 From 1870 to 1890 the democratic party
 was in absolute and natural control of
 New York city. By reason of great
 changes in the population it's natural pop
 ular majority left it. From 1894 to the
 present day-15 years-it has been in
 charge of New York two-thirds of the
 time. In all of that period, with one
 doubtful exception it has never had one majority of the popular vote at a city
 election that was not obtained through the votes of trained bands of 'repeaters'
 composed largely of professional crim-
 inals.
 In 1894 catastrophe overlook the dem ocratic party of New York For the
 first time since the civil war the city elected a republican mayor. The over turn was attributed directly to the dis closures of police scandals by the Lex
 ow investigation. But the real underly- ing cause was a deeper thing-a great
 racial change in the population of the
 city. From 1870 to 1890 two-thirds of the voters of New York city were Irish and
 German peasants and their sons. The | chief social centers of these two peo-
 pies were liquor saloons; and the own CTS of these saloons. who handled their Yotes-first for American manipulators
 and political criminals-lilke Tweed, and
 later for themselves-delivered them in
 mass to the democratic party. That party
 could split in two in the '70s and sos and still carry the city.
 But beginning with the sos the great Jewish and Italian immigration, which has overwhelmed the two earlier races, began to pour into the city. These peo- pie, especially the acute and intelligent Jew, could not be handled by the brutal, s old time, saloon-keeping Irish politi- | elan. The natural rule of the democratic party in New York had come to an end.
 In the middle of the 90's the Bowery | had organized politically. This organiza- l tion was in two main divisions. The head l gamblers and the merchants of prosdtu- | tion, then, as now, were election district captains who brought out the vote; and the Vagrants, minor gamblers and thieves furnished the voting 'repeaters." The Bowery assembly district was very soon the banner democratic district of New York
 About the same time another popula- | tion of criminals was learning the les son of political self-government. The stream of Jewish immigration, which | started in the sos, had concentrated | itself upon the district just east of the | Bowery driving first the German and l then the Irish inhabitants before it. This so-called Red Light district brought a
 
 | itician into New York-the retailer of l women. The active Tammany managers l of this-the Eighth-district were large l operators in the sale of prostitution. An | organization of criminals like that in the l Bowery district conducted athe repeat | ing and intimidation of voters at the polls.
 The two new political criminal dis Itricts were made nursuries in crime for 1 the children of the two new races of immigrants-the Eighth for the Jews, and the Bowery district for the Italians The young children of these | peoples were given primary criminal | instruction, in many cases by the old | Irish criminal. Little boys of 10 and 12 were carefully trained as pic1pockets in | the Jewish district, and little girls of 13 1 and 15 started as prostitutes. Out of this | training developed the two racial gangs | of professional criminals that have re- placed the earlier Irish type-the great | Eastside band of Jewish pimps and | thieves and pickpockets and the great | Italian band of cutthroats and pimps | who have their headquarters today in 1 Chatham Square and in Harlem. Out of | these two poiitical-criminal gangs, with | the various members of others races that | have been absorbed by them, comes two | thirds of the professional crime that has | so alarmed the city of New York. These two great tribes of criminals furnish the nucleus for the gangs Of l trained "repeaters" with which the ele- l ment now ruling Tammany Hall con I trols the city of New York. Tbe two- | thirds of a million registered votse of l the city are divided so closely along | conventional party lines that only a slight | balance Is needed to secure control of | the government. This balance is fur nished by these organized criminals, | trained to manufacture fraudulent votes | at elections and primaries. And by this | means not only the city but the party | organization Is held in absolute control. Prostitution, the prevent mainstay ot | the criminal class in New York, is now | almost entirely a political business; that is it's affairs are conducted almost ex- 1 clusively by men who are active lieuten- I ants or ''repeaters' at the polls for the | democratic organization. This crime Is | now pract1caly nceHSeu III NeW IoliN l by the payment, two or three times a l year, of a fine of something less than | one nights earnings. Only once in seven | times did the woman arrested receive | the only punishment that seriously an- | noys her-that of going to the work | house; and only once in 50 did she serve | a sentence of over five days duration.
 The disposition of all cases against | Iiouor dealers has long been familiar as one of the most notorious perversions of | justice ia the city In 1907, out of 2S57 | arrests under the excise law, only five, or less than one-fifth of 1 per cent re- ceived any punishment of the slightest | consequence The system of criminal I courts has proved itself utterly useless
 in dealing with dsorderly political sa- looms, and the police and state officials | have been driven to a legal subterfuge
 in another court in order to maintain de- 1 cent conditions in New York city. | During the past four years alone the l number of persons convicted for violent | assault, burglary and larceny, who have | been released on suspended sentence, has | trebled In 1908 one person out Of ev@y l three who were convicted for those | crimes, was released on suspended sem