No Honest Man Need Fear Cartoons Legislating Cartoon Content | ||
![]() ![]() Tweed himself was elected to the United States House of Representatives in 1852, the New York City Board of Advisors in 1856, and the New York State Senate in 1867. In 1870, Tweed secured the passage of a city charter putting the control of the city into the hands of the Tammany-picked city adminstration. He then set about to plunder the city. The total amount of money stolen was never known, but was estimated at between $30 and $200 million. Dissatisfied with the amount he received, one of Tweed's cronies gave The New York Times evidence that conclusively proved Tweed's involvement. In a subsequent interview, Tweed's only reply was, "What are you going to do about it?" However, political cartoons drawn by Thomas Nast resulted in the election of numerous opposition candidates in 1871. Tweed is attributed with exclaiming, "Stop them damned pictures. I don't care so much what the papers say about me. My constituents can't read. But, damn it, they can see pictures!" After his subsiquent arrest, trials, re-arrest and a prison sentence, Tweed escaped and fled to Spain via Cuba, where he worked as a seaman on a Spanish ship. He was purportedly recognized from one of Nast's cartoons, and was extradited to New York, where he died in debtor's prison in 1878. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. |
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