The Tammany Society of New York City was founded in the 1780s. The name "Tammany" comes from Tamanend, a Native American leader of the Lenape. The society adopted many Native American words and customs, going so far as to call its hall a wigwam. By 1798, however, the Society's activities had grown increasingly politicized and eventually Tammany, led by Aaron Burr, emerged as the center for Jeffersonian Democratic-Republican politics in the city. Burr built the Tammany society into a political machine for his election of 1800, in which he was elected Vice President. Without Tammany, historians believe, President John Adams might have won New York state's electoral votes and won reelection. Parmet and Hecht 149-50)

After 1839, Tammany became the city affiliate of the Democratic Party, emerging as the controlling interest in New York City elections after Andrew Jackson's. In the 1830s the Loco-Focos comprised a democratic, anti-monopoly faction that appealed to workingmen. Throughout the 1830s and 1840s the Society expanded its political control even further by earning the loyalty of the city's ever-expanding immigrant community, a task that was accomplished by helping newly-arrived foreigners obtain jobs, a place to live, and even citizenship so that they could vote for Tammany candidates in city and state elections. The mass immigrant constituency primarily functioned as a base of political capital. The "ward boss" served as the local vote gatherer and provider of patronage. New York City used the designation "ward" for its smallest political units from 1686-1938.

Tammany is forever linked with the rise of the Irish in American politics. Beginning in 1846, large numbers of Irish Catholics began arriving in New York. Equipped with a knowledge of English, very tight loyalties, a genius for politics, and what critics said was a propensity to use violence to control the polls, the Irish quickly dominated Tammany. In exchange for votes, they provided money and food. From 1872 onward, Tammany had an Irish "boss." They played an increasingly important role in state politics, supporting one candidate and feuding with another. The greatest success came in 1928 when a Tammany hero, New York Governor Al Smith, won the Democratic presidential nomination.

Despite occasional defeats, Tammany was consistently able to survive and, indeed, prosper and continued to dominate city and even state politics. Under leaders like John Kelly and Richard Croker, it controlled Democratic politics in the city. Tammany opposed William Jennings Bryan in 1896.

In 1901, the anti-Tammany forces elected reformer Seth Low, a Republican as mayor. From 1902 until his death in 1924, Charles F. Murphy was the boss. In 1932, the machine suffered a dual setback when Mayor James Walker was forced from office because of corruption and opponent Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president. He stripped Tammany of its federal patronage -- much expanded because of the New Deal -- and handed city patronage to Ed Flynn, boss of the Bronx. Roosevelt helped Republican Fiorello LaGuardia become mayor on a Fusion ticket, thus removing even more patronage from Tammany's control.

Tammany never recovered, but it staged a small scale come-back in the early 1950s under the leadership of Carmine DeSapio, who succeeded in engineering the elections of Robert Wagner, Jr. as Mayor in 1953 and Averill Harriman as state governor in 1954, while simultaneously blocking his enemies, especially Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. in the 1954 race for state Attorney General.



Eleanor Roosevelt organized a counterattack with Herbert Lehman and Thomas Finletter to form the New York Committee for Democratic Voters, a group dedicated to fighting Tammany. In 1961, the group helped remove DeSapio from power. The once mighty Tammany political machine, now deprived of its leadership, quickly faded from political importance and by the mid-1960s had ceased to exist. The last building to serve as the physical Tammany Hall, in Union Square, is now home to the New York Film Academy.