I had an opportunity to observe this transformation at first-hand, for the reason that part of the profits were at my disposal. A friend of my boyhood was founder and president of a big financial concern, which wanted to come into New York. He went to the chiefs of Tammany, and took one of them for his New York manager, and distributed generous blocks of stock to Croker and his henchmen. At once his concern became the official house for that class of business, and the word went out that every politician and every city employe must patronize it. I remember as a lad sitting at luncheon with this friend, hearing him denounce the evil-minded men who criticized our business leaders, the master minds of our country; then presently the conversation changed, and this friend told me how he had just obtained the nomination of one of his managers as state treasurer, and how much he was paying to the campaign fund of the Democratic party, expecting to get it back many times over in the form of business with the state. Today the chiefs of Tammany Hall are great financiers, and the efforts of the Republican party to win elections in New York City are largely formal. How completely the two parties are one, you realize the instant there is prospect of a Socialist candidate being elected. Immediately the leaders of the two old parties get together and agree upon a ticket, and their watchers at the polls unite to slug the “Reds” and stuff the ballot boxes. Afterwards, when the Socialists collect evidence of these crimes, the Democratic officials of the city and the Republican officials of the state unite in doing nothing about it. And so the Black Hand rules New York. CHAPTER XIV GOD AND MAMMON The education of a million children, and the control of twenty-five thousand teachers in the metropolis, is entrusted to a school board of seven people. The president of this board is a leading real estate operator; the retired president, still a member of the board, is a manufacturer of chemicals, who profiteered extensively during the World War; the next member is a manufacturer of cigars; the next is a leading real estate operator; the next is the private physician to the mayor of the city; the next is a woman of wealth and leisure, who represents the Tammany machine; the last is a lawyer. As always, you will note that there is not one educator on the board. There are few who know anything about education; but all know about business—especially those kinds of business which are transacted with school boards.