George W. Plunkitt

The railroad is a great public institution, and I was never an enemy of public institutions. <small>p. 63</small>

I know more than one young man in past years who worked for the ticket and was just overflowin’ with patriotism, but when he was knocked out by the civil service humbug he got to hate his country and became an Anarchist. <small>p. 11</small>

How nice it is for the people to feel that they can get up in the mornin’ without bein’ afraid of seein’ in the papers that the Commissioner of Water Supply has sandbagged the Dock Commissioner, and that the Mayor and heads of the departments have been taken to the police court as witnesses! <small>p. 82</small>

This civil service law is the biggest fraud of the age. It is the curse of the nation. <small>p. 11</small>

It’s because a Brooklynite is a natural-born hayseed, and can never become a real New Yorker. <small>p. 41</small>

I rope them all in by givin’ them opportunities to show themselves off. I don’t trouble them with political arguments. I just study human nature and act accordin’. <small>p. 26</small>

Putin’ on style don’t pay in politics. <small>p. 50</small>

Richard Croker used to say that tellin’ the truth and stickin’ to his friends was the political leader’s stock in trade. <small>p. 35</small>

There’s the biggest kind of a difference between political looters and politicians who make a fortune out of politics by keepin’ their eyes wide open. The looter goes in for himself alone without considerin’ his organization or his city. The politician looks after his own interests, the organization’s interests, and the city’s interests all at the same time. See the distinction? <small>p. 29</small>

The most successful saloonkeepers don’t drink themselves and they understand that my temperance is a business proposition, just like their own. <small>p. 77</small>

Before then when a party won, its workers got everything in sight. That was somethin’ to make a man patriotic. <small>p. 14</small>

The Raines liquor law is infamous. It takes away nearly all the profits of the saloonkeepers, and then turns in a large part of the money to the State treasury to relieve the hayseeds from taxes. <small>p. 84</small>

There’s always a certain number of suckers and a certain number of men lookin’ for a chance to take them in, and the suckers are sure to be took one way or another. It’s the everlastin’ law of demand and supply. <small>p. 60</small>

Some young men think they can learn how to be successful in politics from books, and they cram their heads with all sorts of college rot. They couldn’t make a bigger mistake. <small>p. 7</small>

Once let a man grow up amidst Brooklyn’s cobblestones, with the odor of Newton Creek and Gowanus Canal ever in his nostrils, and there’s no place in the world for him except Brooklyn. <small>p. 41</small>