George Washington Plunkitt and Jane Addams
During the major urban transformation occurring in the late 1800s and early 1900s, different individuals held widely varying views on how to handle different levels of change in cities like Chicago and New York City. Forthright to the point of offense, in Plunkitt of Tammany Hall, we get the views of ex-Senator George Washington Plunkitt on everything from the difference between honest graft and dishonest graft to hay-seeds from the Bronx being less able to acculturate to New York City than the lowliest Hottentot “Say, I’d rather take a Hottentot in hand to bring up as a good New Yorker than undertake the job with a Brooklynite. Honest, I would” (Riordon 43).
Plunkitt makes many arguments in his speeches, like the fact that he opposes civil service and he believes that Albany is a bunch of hay-seeds who pretends to know how to manage the affairs of New York City. He basically makes the argument that New York City should be self-governed and apply for statehood “The time is comin’ when New York City will break away from the State and become a state itself. It’s got to come. The feelin’ between this city and the hayseeds that make a livin’ by plunderin’ it is every bit as bitter as the feelin’ between the North and South before the war” (Riordon 65). With growing population, wealth and power, Plunkitt argues New York City’s time for statehood has emerged. He also makes the admission that any good politician involves himself in graft, but it is honest graft which should never, under any circumstances, be confused with dishonest graft. Political corruption exists and there are looters who merely seek profit for their own good, but Plunkitt says the honest graft politician takes care of himself and others simultaneously “The looter goes in for himself alone without considerin’ his organization or his city. The politician looks after his own interests, th...