Choosing Sides
The newspaper’s reputation grew in 1870 and 1871 when it published a series of ‘exposés on William Tweed,’ leader of the city’s Democratic Party — popularly known as “Tammany Hall” — that led to the end of the Tweed Ring’s domination of New York’s City Hall. 5 million dollars were offered to the New York Times not to publish the story, and this was the breakthrough in the history of the New York Times. However, The New York times gradually transitioned from supporting Republican Party Candidates in its editorials to becoming more politically independent and analytical.
Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., The New York Times Publisher and The New York Times Company Chairman, speaks onstage at The New York Times New Work Summit on March 1, 2016, in Half Moon Bay, California. (Photo by Kimberly White/Getty Images for New York Times)
In 1884, the paper supported Democrat Grover Cleveland in his first presidential campaign. While this move cost The New York Times a portion of its readership among its more progressive and Republican readers because their revenue declined from $188,000 to $56,000, but the paper eventually regained most of its lost ground within a few years.