The accession of the Livingston family had helped the society, adding the support of a considerable faction and “respectability.” The Livingstons, intent on superseding the Clintons, seized on Tammany as a good lever. Above all, it was necessary to have a full application of “respectability,” and to further that end the society put up a pretentious building--the recent _Sun_ newspaper building. In 1802 the Tammany Society had tried by subscription to build a fine Wigwam, but was unsuccessful. The unwisdom of staying in such a place as Martling’s, which subjected them to gibes, and which was described as “the Den where the Wolves and Bears and Panthers assemble and drink down large potations of beer,” was impressed upon the Sachems who, led by Jacob Barker, the largest shipbuilder in the country at the time, raised the sum of $28,000. The new Wigwam was opened in 1811, with the peculiar Indian ceremonies. Sachem Abraham M. Valentine--the same man who, for malfeasance, was afterward (May 26, 1830) removed from the office of Police Magistrate[1]--was the grand marshal of the day. From 1811 the Tammany, or Martling, men came under the general term of the Tammany Hall party or Tammany Hall; the general committee was called technically the Democratic-Republican General Committee. The Tammany Society, with its eleven hundred members, now more than ever _appeared_ distinct from the Tammany Hall political body. Though the general committee was supplied with the use of rooms and the hall in the building, it met on different nights from the society, and to all appearances acted independently of it. But the society, in fact, was and continued to be, the secret ruler of the political organization. Its Sachems were chosen yearly from the most influential of the local Tammany political leaders. De Witt Clinton aimed to be President of the United States and schemed for his nomination by the Republican Legislative caucus. Early in 1811 he sought and received from the caucus the nomination for Lieutenant-Governor. He purposed to hold both the offices of Mayor and Lieutenant-Governor, while spending as much time as he could at Albany so as to bring his direct influence to bear in person. As a State officer he could do this without loss of dignity. He would have preferred the post of State Senator, but he feared if he stood for election in New York City Tammany would defeat him. The chiefs, regarding his nomination as treachery toward Madison, immediately held a meeting and issued a notice that they ceased to consider him a member of the Republican party; that he was not only opposing Madison but was bent on establishing a pernicious family aristocracy.