[10] In a signed statement in the New York _Evening Call_, February 27, 1909, Col. Amory declared that when this matter was originally exposed in the hearing before the Public Service Commission, the full facts were not brought out; that one of the ten original owners had recently informed him (Amory) that the price paid by Ryan and Brady was in reality only $25,000. [11] See _Investigation of the Interborough Metropolitan Company, etc., 1907, Public Service Commission, First District_, Vol. IV, pp. 1613-1618, etc. [12] _Ibid._ [13] After this company had been forced into bankruptcy in 1908, the above sum was the estimate as stated by Receiver Whitridge. See also Col. Amory’s remarks, June 29, 1910, _Third Avenue Company--Plan of Reorganization, Public Service Commission, First District, Stenographic Minutes_, p. 2417. [14] _Investigation of Interborough Metropolitan Company, etc., 1907, Public Service Commission, First District_, Vol. II, pp. 774-775. D. C. Moorehead, Secretary and Treasurer of the Metropolitan Street Railway Company, further testified that District Attorney Jerome had investigated these books in 1903, and that they were disposed of in 1905 for $117 or so; they were sold, Mr. Moorehead testified, “because of lack of store room.” No litigation, he said, was in progress at the time they were sold. [15] _Investigation of Interborough Metropolitan Company_, etc., 1907, Vol. III, p. 1395, etc. [16] _Truth About Metropolitan_, p. 2. [17] _Report of the Joint Committee of the Senate and Assembly of the State of New York, Appointed to Investigate the Finances of the State of New York. March 1, 1909_, p. 10. [18] _Ibid._, p. 11. [19] _Ibid._ [20] _Ibid._ [21] _Ibid._ [22] _Ibid._, p. 13. [23] _Ibid._, p. 13. [24] _Ibid._, p. 14-15. [25] _Ibid._, p. 16. [26] _Ibid._, p. 26. [27] _Ibid._, p. 28. [28] _Ibid._ [29] _Ibid._, p. 115. [30] _Ibid._ pp. 112-113. [31] _Why I Was Removed_, by Theodore A. Bingham, _Van Norden’s Magazine_, September, 1909. CHAPTER XXXIV ANOTHER ERA OF LEGISLATIVE CORRUPTION 1910-1911 It was only a few months after this election that the investigations of William H. Hotchkiss, State Superintendent of Insurance, followed by that of a New York Legislative committee into the matter of legislative graft, revealed the extensive and variegated corruption of both political parties. An examination by Mr. Hotchkiss, in October, 1909, of the affairs of the Phœnix Insurance Company of Brooklyn had brought to light a mass of correspondence apparently disclosing an intimate connection between the president of that company and legislative measures, introduced from 1900 to 1910, affecting fire insurance companies. The materials thus unearthed caused Superintendent Hotchkiss to order a full examination of the books and records of other fire insurance companies, which examination was begun in January, 1910.