Tammany Hall

noun

1. a Democratic political organization in New York City, founded in 1789 as a fraternal benevolent society Tammany Society and associated especially in the late 1800s and early 1900s with corruption and abuse of power.

2. the building in which the Tammany organization had its headquarters.

Tammany Hall

/ ˈtæmənɪ /

noun

1. Also called: Tammany. politics the central organization of the Democratic Party in New York county. Originally founded as a benevolent society ( Tammany Society ) in 1789, Tammany Hall was notorious for the corruption in city and state politics that it fostered in the 19th and early 20th centuries

Other Word Forms

• Tammanyite noun
• Tammanyism noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of Tammany Hall¹

Named after Tammany (variant of Tamanen, Tammenund ), 17th-century Delaware Indian chief, later facetiously canonized as patron saint of U.S.

Example Sentences

Democrats, Steel said, have been effectively engaging in minority communities since New York City’s Tammany Hall more than two centuries ago.

Read more on Seattle Times

The media has obsessed over political corruption in immigrant and ethnic communities since the days of Tammany Hall in New York.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

One candidate referred to City Hall as L.A.'s “Tammany Hall,” a reference to the New York Democratic group that was synonymous with corruption.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Yet Crumb is perhaps most directly indebted to the 19th-century political cartoonist Thomas Nast, who helped bring down Tammany Hall and New York’s Boss Tweed political machine.

Read more on New York Times

Goldmacher points out, however, that while Tammany Hall kept its grip on power by doling out patronage, Trump isn't spending much of his massive war chest at all.

Read more on Salon