The reformers who denounced political corruption and fraud when shown at the expense of their own candidates by machine ward heelers of a low type hysterically applauded similar corrupt trickery when practiced by these same politicians against men with whose political and industrial programme the reformers were not in sympathy. I had always been instinctively and by nature a democrat, but if I had needed conversion to the democratic ideal here in America the stimulus would have been supplied by what I saw of the attitude, not merely of the bulk of the men of greatest wealth, but of the bulk of the men who most prided themselves upon their education and culture, when we began in good faith to grapple with the wrong and injustice of our social and industrial system, and to hit at the men responsible for the wrong, no matter how high they stood in business or in politics, at the bar or on the bench. It was while I was Governor, and especially in connection with the franchise tax legislation, that I first became thoroughly aware of the real causes of this attitude among the men of great wealth and among the men who took their tone from the men of great wealth.
Very soon after my victory in the race for Governor I had one or two experiences with Senator Platt which showed in amusing fashion how absolute the rule of the boss was in the politics of that day. Senator Platt, who was always most kind and friendly in his personal relations with me, asked me in one day to talk over what was to be done at Albany. He had the two or three nominal heads of the organization with him. They were his lieutenants, who counseled and influenced him, whose advice he often followed, but who, when he had finally made up his mind, merely registered and carried out his decrees. After a little conversation the Senator asked if I had any member of the Assembly whom I wished to have put on any committee, explaining that the committees were being arranged. I answered no, and expressed my surprise at what he had said, because I had not understood the Speaker who appointed the committees had himself been agreed upon by the members-elect. "Oh!" responded the Senator, with a tolerant smile, "He has not been chosen yet, but of course whoever we choose as Speaker will agree beforehand to make the appointments we wish." I made a mental note to the effect that if they attempted the same process with the Governor-elect they would find themselves mistaken.
In a few days the opportunity to prove this arrived. Under the preceding Administration there had been grave scandals about the Erie Canal, the trans-State Canal, and these scandals had been one of the chief issues in the campaign for the Governorship. The construction of this work was under the control of the Superintendent of Public Works. In the actual state of affairs his office was by far the most important office under me, and I intended to appoint to it some man of high character and capacity who could be trusted to do the work not merely honestly and efficiently, but without regard to politics. A week or so after the Speakership incident Senator Platt asked me to come and see him (he was an old and physically feeble man, able to move about only with extreme difficulty).
On arrival I found the Lieutenant-Governor elect, Mr. Woodruff, who had also been asked to come. The Senator informed me that he was glad to say that I would have a most admirable man as Superintendent of Public Works, as he had just received a telegram from a certain gentleman, whom he named, saying that he would accept the position! He handed me the telegram. The man in question was a man I liked; later I appointed him to an important office in which he did well. But he came from a city along the line of the canal, so that I did not think it best that he should be appointed anyhow; and, moreover, what was far more important, it was necessary to have it understood at the very outset that the Administration was my Administration and was no one else's but mine. So I told the Senator very politely that I was sorry, but that I could not appoint his man. This produced an explosion, but I declined to lose my temper, merely repeating that I must decline to accept any man chosen for me, and that I must choose the man myself. Although I was very polite, I was also very firm, and Mr. Platt and his friends finally abandoned their position.
I appointed an engineer from Brooklyn, a veteran of the Civil War, Colonel Partridge, who had served in Mayor Low's administration. He was an excellent man in every way. He chose as his assistant, actively to superintend the work, a Cornell graduate named Elon Hooker, a man with no political backing at all, picked simply because he was the best equipped man for the place. The office, the most important office under me, was run in admirable fashion throughout my Administration; I doubt if there ever was an important department of the New York State Government run with a higher standard of efficiency and integrity.
But this was not all that had to be done about the canals. Evidently the whole policy hitherto pursued had been foolish and inadequate. I appointed a first-class non-partisan commission of business men and expert engineers who went into the matter exhaustively, and their report served as the basis upon which our entire present canal system is based. There remained the question of determining whether the canal officials who were in office before I became Governor, and whom I had declined to reappoint, had been guilty of any action because of which it would be possible to proceed against them criminally or otherwise under the law. Such criminal action had been freely charged against them during the campaign by the Democratic (including the so-called mugwump) press. To determine this matter I appointed two Democratic lawyers, Messrs. Fox and MacFarlane (the latter Federal District Attorney for New York under President Cleveland), and put the whole investigation in their hands. These gentlemen made an exhaustive investigation lasting several months. They reported that there had been grave delinquency in the prosecution of the work, delinquency which justified public condemnation of those responsible for it (who were out of office), but that there was no ground for criminal prosecution. I laid their report before the Legislature with a message in which I said: "There is probably no lawyer of high standing in the State who, after studying the report of counsel in this case and the testimony taken by the investigating commission, would disagree with them as to the impracticability of a successful prosecution. Under such circumstances the one remedy was a thorough change in the methods and management. This change has been made."
When my successor in the Governorship took office, Colonel Partridge retired, and Elon Hooker, finding that he could no longer act with entire disregard of politics and with an eye single to the efficiency of the work, also left. A dozen years later—having in the meantime made a marked success in a business career—he became the Treasurer of the National Progressive party.
My action in regard to the canals, and the management of his office, the most important office under me, by Colonel Partridge, established my relations with Mr. Platt from the outset on pretty nearly the right basis. But, besides various small difficulties, we had one or two serious bits of trouble before my duties as Governor ceased. It must be remembered that Mr. Platt was to all intents and purposes a large part of, and sometimes a majority of, the Legislature. There were a few entirely independent men such as Nathaniel Elsberg, Regis Post, and Alford Cooley, in each of the two houses; the remainder were under the control of the Republican and Democratic bosses, but could also be more or less influenced by an aroused public opinion. The two machines were apt to make common cause if their vital interests were touched. It was my business to devise methods by which either the two machines could be kept apart or else overthrown if they came together.
My desire was to achieve results, and not merely to issue manifestoes of virtue. It is very easy to be efficient if the efficiency is based on unscrupulousness, and it is still easier to be virtuous if one is content with the purely negative virtue which consists in not doing anything wrong, but being wholly unable to accomplish anything positive