Machine Made

Tammany Hall and the Creation of Modern American Politics

By: Terry Golway

Narrated by: Adam Grupper

Length: 13 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's Summary

A major, surprising new history of New York's most famous political machine - Tammany Hall - revealing, beyond the vice and corruption, a birthplace of progressive urban politics.

For decades, history has considered Tammany Hall, New York's famous political machine, shorthand for the worst of urban politics: graft, crime, and patronage personified by notoriously corrupt characters. Infamous crooks like William "Boss" Tweed dominate traditional histories of Tammany, distorting our understanding of a critical chapter of American political history.

In Machine Made, historian and New York City journalist Terry Golway convincingly dismantles these stereotypes; Tammany's corruption was real, but so was its heretofore forgotten role in protecting marginalized and maligned immigrants in desperate need of a political voice. Irish immigrants arriving in New York during the 19th century faced an unrelenting onslaught of hyperbolic, nativist propaganda. They were voiceless in a city that proved, time and again, that real power remained in the hands of the mercantile elite, not with a crush of ragged newcomers flooding its streets. Haunted by fresh memories of the horrific Irish potato famine in the old country, Irish immigrants had already learned an indelible lesson about the dire consequences of political helplessness. Tammany Hall emerged as a distinct force to support the city's Catholic newcomers, courting their votes while acting as a powerful intermediary between them and the Anglo-Saxon Protestant ruling class.

In a city that had yet to develop the social services we now expect, Tammany often functioned as a rudimentary public welfare system and a champion of crucial social reforms benefiting its constituency, including workers' compensation, prohibitions against child labor, and public pensions for widows with children. Tammany figures also fought against attempts to limit immigration and to strip the poor of the only power they had - the vote.

©2014 Terry Golway (P)2014 Audible Inc.

A missed opportunity

If you're looking for a triumphal revisionist account of the link between Tammany Hall and the Irish-American vote in the 19tg and early 20th centuries, then this is the book for you. Unfortunately, that wasn't was I was looking for and so it was something of a disappointment. Not that I was looking for yet another diatribe about Tammany corruption. Instead, I was hoping for a more nuts and bolts look at how the machine operated--similar to the sort of study of the accumulation, use and loss of power that Robert Caro did so successfully in his studies of Robert Moses and Lyndon Johnson. Hopefully this author or someone else will get there.

Wonderfully written and performed

Wow this was written beautifully! At times it becomes scattered in the way of timeline, but I found myself not caring too much about it. It does help if you have at least a basic understanding of Tammany Hall first, but it isn’t necessary.
Mainly, what I loved about this book was the revisionist, yet honest, look at 19th and turn of the 20th century politics in a way that points out historical hypocrisy without excusing the sins of the proverbial father.
If you like history and are curious about why we are the way we are politically today, it’s a great read.

Golway is obsessed with the Irish

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

A more balance and focused treatment of the topic.

What do you think your next listen will be?

The Norman conquest

What about Adam Grupper’s performance did you like?

Well modulated voice and a nice rhythm. Couldn't decide how to consistently pronounce some names, though.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

It did cover the topic, barely.

Any additional comments?

Terry Golway is obsessed with Irish Catholics. The story of Tammany couldn't be written without discussing the Irish Catholic immigration of course, but a good third or more of this book is about Ireland itself, and lengthy homilies about Catholic experiences permeate the rest. He spends so much time casting stones at the wealthy, Protestants, Republicans, upstate and Albany politicians, reformers, and Anglo-Saxons that his subject matter disappears in the avalanche. This is poor scholarship. I had expected a balanced treatment; but a glance at his body of work shows he is really just a one-trick pony.

Colorful history of Tammany, NYC & 19th C America!

I picked up this book, expecting to learn more about the mechanisms of machine politics. I was not disappointed on this front, but I was surprised to learn about Tammany's role in the broader historic tides of 19th Century America.

Machine Made situates Tammany into the histories of Irish immigration, the Irish Potato Famine and British imperialism, slavery in America and the US Civil War, and progressive reform era politics which culminated in the New Deal.

The book also weaves into these major historical trends the personalities and relationships between Tammany affiliates from Bishop "Dagger" John Hughes and Boss Tweed to Al Smith and FDR. The Tammany wards of lower Manhattan also emerge as colorful characters in their own right.

A great read!

an irish catholic reader

an irish catholic reader, St. Tammany is great & Tammany Hall is inspiring. The reader does sound Grumpy.

Great book, well performed!

Great for history buffs and political addicts. The names can be hard to keep track of, but the book is thorough and well researched.

Scued but not completely unfair

Terry Golway identifies with his subject absolutely. The poverty stricken poor of New York. The nice thing about his book is that he's fairly honest about the shortcomings of his hero, Tamany Hall. There is a lot of need to know history in this book so I would recommend listening.