Thus far some of the smaller grafters have been convicted and sentenced to jail, but the really powerful politicians involved have not suffered. After two months’ consideration of the charges of graft and official misconduct brought against C. Gordon Reel, State Engineer John A. Bensel, Duncan W. Peck, State Superintendent of Public Works--the three officials forming the highways Commission under the régime of which, it was charged, the large grafting had been going on--the Albany County Grand Jury, on April 28, 1914, reported that no indictments had been found against any of these men, nor against Charles A. Foley, Deputy Superintendent of Highways. According to facts disclosed by Mr. Osborne’s investigation, many of the 318 repair contracts let by Foley and passed by Reel, Bensel and Peck, were awarded only after contractors had contributed to the Democratic campaign fund. Numerous of the roads covered by these contracts were so badly constructed that they went to pieces within a year; and the State, so Mr. Osborne charged, thereby lost hundreds of thousands of dollars. FOOTNOTES [1] _Final Report of the Joint Legislative Committee Appointed to Investigate the Public Service Commissions_, March, 1917, p. 67. [2] _Ibid._, p. 68. CHAPTER XXXVII TAMMANY’S PRESENT STATUS 1914-1917 Upon the removal of Governor Sulzer from office, Martin Glynn, as has already been noted, had become Governor of New York State. A Democrat, he consequently appointed men of the party to which he belonged to various offices. Tammany and its auxiliaries now had control of the Public Service Commission, First District. But this control was abruptly ended by the effect of the disclosures made in the testimony before the (Thompson) Joint Legislative Committee probing into the affairs of the Public Service Commissions. Mr. Glynn was succeeded as Governor by Charles S. Whitman who had done such notable service as District Attorney of New York County. During 1915 the Joint Legislative Committee held many hearings at which much testimony of an upheaving nature was given. One result of this inquiry was a series of grave charges against Edward E. McCall, Chairman of the Public Service Commission, First District, and, as we have seen, recent candidate of Tammany Hall for Mayor. Accompanied, by a request for Mr. McCall’s removal from office, these charges were made to Governor Whitman by the Joint Legislative Committee on December 12, 1915, and were supplemented by a bill of particulars, specifying twenty charges, formally filed ten days later.