The Machine Behind the Ballot
Tacoma politics in the 1890s faced a crisis of influence, with allegations of a $30,000-a-year 'boodle' ring controlling city contracts and elections.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The row between Mayor Huson and Treasurer Boggs in Tacoma shows that the political fight is not so much for the election of a mayor as it is for placing a 'Boggs man' in the city treasurer's office and securing the three-price city printing contract. It is estimated that the treasurer's office is worth $30,000 a year, and the publication of the delinquent tax list is alone worth between $4,000 and $5,000. Anything will be resorted to to keep up these contract steals and warrant-sharing. The machinery of placing candidates is in the hands of the boodlers, making it likely a boodler may wiggle in at the Republican nomination. Councilman Caughran, while not a boodler, is described as too much of a 'cuckoo' to be a success, unable to square himself with the powerful forces of the saloons and the Municipal League.
“The machinery of placing candidates in the field is in the hands of the boodlers, therefore a boodler may wiggle in at the Republican nomination.”
The Gilded Age corruption described here—where municipal contracts served as the primary currency of political machines—echoes modern concerns about campaign financing and the influence of 'dark money' in local elections. The fear of an 'octopus' controlling city hall persists as a recurring anxiety in the growth-driven history of the Puget Sound region.
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