[2] These details are of the greatest importance as revealing the methods by which the society asserted its absolute ascendency over the organization. They proved the absurdity of the claim that the two bodies were distinct and separate from each other. [3] The _New Yorker_ (magazine), January 13, 1838. This journal was edited and published by Horace Greeley. [4] January 11, 1838. The credit for this temporary purification must in considerable measure be given to the _Evening Post’s_ editors, William Cullen Bryant and William Leggett. CHAPTER XIV WHIG FAILURE RESTORES TAMMANY TO POWER 1838-1840 The course of the Whig city administration served only to strengthen Tammany and was responsible for the conviction, which later so often prevailed, that if Tammany Hall was bad the Whigs were no better, and were perhaps worse. At this time of general distress complaints were numerous that the sum of $1,300,000 was exacted from the rentpayers in a single year. In the early part of 1838 one-third of all the persons in New York City who subsisted by manual labor was substantially or wholly without employment.[1] Not less than 10,000 persons were in utter poverty and had no other means of surviving the Winter than those afforded by the charity of neighbors. The Almshouse and all charitable institutions were full to overflowing; the usual agencies of charity were exhausted or insufficient, and 10,000 sufferers were still uncared for. The great panic of 1837 had cut down the city’s trade one-half. Notwithstanding the fall of prices, the rents for tenements in New York were greater than were paid in any other city or village upon the globe.[2] So exorbitant were the demands of the landlords that the tenants found it impossible to meet them. The landowners were the backbone of the Whig party; it was not unnatural, therefore, that their rapacity developed among the people at large a profound distrust of Whig men and principles. The Whig officials, so far as can be discovered, took no adequate steps to relieve the widespread suffering. The Tammany ward committees, on the other hand, were active in relief work. This was another of the secrets of Tammany Hall’s usual success in holding the body of voters. The Whigs made fine speeches over champagne banquets, but kept at a distance from the poor, among whom the Wigwam workers mingled, and distributed clothing, fuel and food and often money. The leaders set the example. One of these was John M. Bloodgood,[3] who frequently went among the charitable citizens, collecting, in a large basket, cakes, pies, meat and other eatables, and distributing them among the needy.