[28] Excepting some instances of private charity by Tammany leaders.
[29] Documents of the Board of Aldermen, 1836, No. 80.
[30] Documents of the Board of Aldermen, 1839, No. 29.
[31] Ibid.
[32] Documents of the Assembly, 1837, Nos. 198 and 327.
CHAPTER XIII
TAMMANY “PURIFIED”
1837-1838
One of the important changes in the composition of Tammany Hall came in 1837. The United States Bank dependents, lobbyists and supporters had left the Wigwam, as has been noted, in 1832, but the State Bank men, well satisfied with the destruction of the great rival corporation, had remained. Finding the organization no longer subservient to them they, in turn, quit Tammany during Van Buren’s administration.
This happened in the Fall of 1837. The Tammany General Committee, whose membership had recently been increased from thirty-six to fifty-one members, held a meeting on September 7, thirty-six members being present. Resolutions were offered upholding Van Buren’s scheme of placing the United States funds in sub-treasuries. This was a bitter dose to the State Bank men who, wanting to retain Government deposits, opposed the sub-treasury plan. The “bank conservatives” vainly tried to put off a vote on the resolutions, but being repeatedly outvoted, all but one of them left the room before the main question was put. Nineteen members remained. As seventeen formed a quorum, the question was put and the resolutions were adopted by a vote of 18 to 1. The bank men pretended that the resolutions were passed clandestinely, and they so deviously managed things that in a few days they regained control of the general committee, which at their behest refused to call a public meeting to act on the resolutions.