Abstract
The first test of accountability to emerge in reported American jurisprudence involved a key member of the ring that William M. Tweed assembled by the late 1860s at the heart of Tammany Hall, and led to a ruling confirming a general right of access to public records followed, peculiarly, by an almost immediate reversal. The acknowledgement and withdrawal of this right to demand an accounting foreshadows the pattern that would unfold more slowly in the decades that followed, and directs attention to the personal nature of the interaction of gadfly and official when accountability is at issue. Here, both the status of the person requesting an accounting and the ability of an official to call on support from political institutions and organizations were critical factors in first opening and then closing access to information, the first step in the process of accountability.
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Notes
- 1.
The Street Department’s most blatant dealings, including the Breakneck Hill Bridge and Tweed’s no-show job, are reported in “City Corruption,” New York Times, 11 Oct. 1866, p. 1. Henry’s lawsuit is People ex rel. Henry v. Cornell, 35 How. Pr. 31.
- 2.
William D. Murphy, Biographical Sketches of the State Officers and Members of the Legislature of the State of New York (Albany: C. van Benthuysen, 1863), pp. 62–63; Manual of the Corporation of the City of New York (New York: Common Council, 1866), pp. 58, 414.
- 3.
Edward J. McGuire, “Joseph H. Daly,” Journal of the American Irish Historical Society, Vol. 16 (1917), pp. 106–107. Richard Henry, Report of the Citizens’ Association: how our taxes may be reduced, our resources developed, and the local government improved (New York: Citizens Associations, 1867); S.C. Hutchins, Civil List and Forms of Government of the Colony and State of New York (Albany: Weed Parsons & Co., 1870), p. 443.
- 4.
Edwin Burrows and Mike Wallace, Gotham: A History of New York to 1898 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 927–928.
- 5.
“City Corruption,” New York Times, Oct. 11 1866, p. 1; “Resignation of Street Commissioner Cornell,” Ibid., Nov. 18 1866, p. 1, “Dismissal of Charges against Ex-Commissioner Cornell,” Ibid., Nov. 27 1866, p. 3; Kenneth D. Ackerman, Boss Tweed: The Rise and Fall of the Corrupt Pol Who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York (New York: Da Capo Press, 2005), p. 20.
- 6.
Henry v. Cornell, at 31, 33, 35. English common law evolved slowly from seventeenth- and eighteenth-century rulings that shareholders in a joint stock company were entitled to inspect the company’s financial records (as late at 1746, this right was still not clearly established; see Rex. v. Doctor Purnell 95 ER 595 (Court of King’s Bench, 1746)), eventually settling on a view that individuals pursuing legal action to recover or protect their property were entitled to corporate records, including records of borough corporations, in Rex v. Allgood, 101 ER 1232 (Court of King’s Bench, 1798). In Rex v. Lucas et al., 103 ER 765 (Court of King’s Bench, 1808) and Rex v. Tower, 105 ER 795 (Court of King’s Bench, 1815). In Rex v. Justices of Leicester, 107 ER 1290 (Court of King’s Bench, 1825), individuals who pay taxes (rates) to a parish for relief of the poor won the right to inspect parish financial records, but this opinion was overturned in Rex v. Vestrymen of St. Mary Le Bone, 111 ER 1166 (Court of King’s Bench, 1836) and in Rex v. Justices of Staffordshire, 112 ER 33 (Court of King’s Bench, 1837). In the Justices of Staffordshire case, the court ruled that taxpayers could not see the records because they had no interest in them, as nothing in the records could help them enforce any lawful claim. The closest American courts had come to addressing the issue was when they upheld the idea of executive privilege when presidents’ and state governors’ papers were subpoenaed; see 1 Burr’s Trial 182, 2 Burr’s Trial 535–536 and Gray v. Pentland 2 Serge & Rawle 23, a Pennsylvania Supreme Court case from 1815.
- 7.
Henry v. Cornell, at 33, 35.
- 8.
Ibid., at 36.
- 9.
Thompson v. German Valley Railroad 22 N.J. Eq. R. 111 (New Jersey Court of Chancery 1871).
- 10.
Henry v. Cornell, at 36.
- 11.
Edgar A. Werner, Civil List and Constitutional History of the Colony and State of New York (Albany: Weed Parsons & Co., 1884), p. 373. Charges Against Justice Albert Cardozo and Testimony Thereunder before the Judiciary Committee of the Assembly (Albany: New York State Assembly, 1872), pp. 3–8, 8–12, 14. “Tweed Found Guilty,” New York Tribune, Nov. 20, 1873, p. 1.
- 12.
Burrows and Wallace, Gotham, A History of New York, pp. 1003–1008; Michael A. Gordon, The Orange Riots, Irish Political Violence in New York City, 1870 and 1871 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993), pp. 188–218.
- 13.
Henry v. Cornell is cited as a precedent for release of records in Wells v. Lewis, Auditor, 12 Ohio Dec. 170 (Superior Court of Cincinnati, 1901) and Wellford v. Williams 110 Tenn 549 (Tennessee Supreme Court, 1903). The basic handbook on municipal law of the day, John Forrest Dillon’s Treatise on the Law of Municipal Corporations (New York: James Cockcroft and Co., 1873) p. 266n, also cites Henry v. Cornell as upholding a broader right of access than the English cases.
References
Aaron Burr Trial Record: 1 and 2 Burr’s Trial.
Gray v. Pentland, 2 Serge & Rawle 23 (Pennsylvania Supreme Court, 1815).
In re Freeman, 75 N.J.L. 331 (New Jersey Supreme Court, 1907).
People ex rel. Henry v. Cornell, 35 How. Pr. 31 (New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, 1868).
Rex v. Allgood, 101 ER 1232 (Court of King’s Bench, 1798).
Rex v. Lucas et al., 103 ER 765 (Court of King’s Bench, 1808).
Rex v. Tower, 105 ER 795 (Court of King’s Bench, 1815).
Rex v. Justices of Leicester, 107 ER 1290 (Court of King’s Bench, 1825).
Rex v. Vestrymen of St. Mary Le Bone, 111 ER 1166 (Court of King’s Bench, 1836).
Rex v. Justices of Staffordshire, 112 ER 33 (Court of King’s Bench, 1837).
Wellford v. Williams, 110 Tenn 549 (Tennessee Supreme Court, 1903).
Wells v. Lewis, Auditor, 12 Ohio Dec. 170 (Superior Court of Cincinnati, 1901).
Charges Against Justice Albert Cardozo and Testimony Thereunder before the Judiciary Committee of the Assembly. Albany: New York State Assembly, 1872.
Manual of the Corporation of the City of New York. New York: Common Council, 1866.
Ackerman, Kenneth D. Boss Tweed: The Rise and Fall of the Corrupt Pol Who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York. New York: Da Capo Press, 2005.
Burrows, Edwin, and Wallace, Mike. Gotham: A History of New York to 1898. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Dillon, John F. Treatise on the Law of Municipal Corporations. New York: James Cockcroft and Co., 1873.
Gordon, Michael A. The Orange Riots, Irish Political Violence in New York City, 1870 and 1871. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993.
Henry, Richard. Report of the Citizens’ Association: How Our Taxes May Be Reduced, Our Resources Developed, and the Local Government Improved. New York: Citizens Association, 1867.
Hutchins, S.C. Civil List and Forms of Government of the Colony and State of New York. Albany: Weed Parsons & Co., 1870.
McGuire, Edward J. Joseph H. Daly. Journal of the American Irish Historical Society 16 (1917): 106–107.
Murphy, William D. Biographical Sketches of the State Officers and Members of the Legislature of the State of New York. Albany: C. van Benthuysen, 1863.
Werner, Edgar A. Civil List and Constitutional History of the Colony and State of New York. Albany: Weed Parsons & Co., 1884.
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Ress, D. (2018). The Streets Commissioner’s Records. In: Municipal Accountability in the American Age of Reform. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-68258-7_2
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