Editing Political machine (section)

===1930s to 1970s===

In the 1930s, [[James A. Farley]] was the chief dispenser of the Democratic Party's patronage system through the [[United States Post Office Department|Post Office]] and the [[Works Progress Administration]] (WPA) which eventually nationalized many of the job benefits machines provided. The [[New Deal]] allowed machines to recruit for the WPA and [[Civilian Conservation Corps]], making Farley's machine the most powerful. All patronage was screened through Farley, including presidential appointments. The [[New Deal]] machine fell apart after he left the administration over [[Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution#Background|the third term issue in 1940]]. Those agencies were, for the most part, abolished in 1943, and the machines suddenly lost much of their patronage. The formerly poor immigrants who had benefited under Farley's national machine had become assimilated and prosperous, and no longer needed the informal or extralegal aides provided by machines.<ref name=sv;av /> In the 1940s most of the big city machines collapsed, with the exception of Chicago.<ref name=sv;av>{{citation | title = Political Machines | url = http://autocww.colorado.edu/~toldy2/E64ContentFiles/PoliticsAndGovernment/PoliticalMachines.htm | publisher = University of Colorado, Boulder | access-date = 2012-02-18 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20091208011342/http://autocww.colorado.edu/~toldy2/E64ContentFiles/PoliticsAndGovernment/PoliticalMachines.htm | archive-date = 2009-12-08 | url-status = dead }}</ref>

A local political machine in [[Tennessee]] in the 1930s and 1940s was forcibly removed in what was known as the [[Battle of Athens (1946)|1946 Battle of Athens]].
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Smaller communities such as [[Parma, Ohio]], in the post–Cold War era under Prosecutor Bill Mason's "Good Old Boys" and especially communities in the Deep South, where small-town machine politics are relatively common, also feature what might be classified as political machines, although these organizations do not have the power and influence of the larger boss networks listed in this article. For example, the "[[Cracker Party]]" was a Democratic Party political machine that dominated city politics in [[Augusta, Georgia]], for over half of the 20th century.<ref>{{cite news | url = http://chronicle.augusta.com/stories/110799/opi_124-1871.shtml | title = Newspapers helped end long rule of corrupt Cracker Party | date = August 29, 2010 | newspaper = The Augusta Chronicle}}</ref><!--Search results are not reliable sources because of their volatility: <ref>{{cite news | url = http://search.augusta.com/fast-elements.php?type=standard&profile=augustachronicle&querystring=%22cracker+party%22&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go | title = Search results for 'Cracker Party' | access-date = 13 November 2012 | newspaper = The Augusta Chronicle | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20141023200014/http://search.augusta.com/fast-elements.php?type=standard&profile=augustachronicle&querystring=%22cracker+party%22&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Go | archive-date = 23 October 2014 | url-status = dead }}</ref>--><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.augusta.com/leaders/slideshow_local/slide14.html |title=Picture Story: William Morris |work=The Augusta Chronicle |access-date=March 11, 2007 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050212142225/http://www.augusta.com/leaders/slideshow_local/slide14.html |archive-date=February 12, 2005 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-955 | title = Cites & Counties: Augusta | publisher = The New Georgia Encyclopedia | first = Edward J. |last = Cashin | date = 2007-02-19}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.augusta.com/leaders/slideshow_local/slide10.html |title=Picture Story: Roy V. Harris |work=The Augusta Chronicle |access-date=March 11, 2007 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050324073605/http://www.augusta.com/leaders/slideshow_local/slide10.html |archive-date=March 24, 2005 }}</ref> Political machines also thrive on Native American reservations, where tribal sovereignty is used as a shield against federal and state laws against the practice.<ref name=bbf926>{{cite news |last=Fink |first=James |date=September 26, 2016 |url=http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/news/2016/09/26/gates-overtakes-snyder-r-in-seneca-nation-vote.html?ana=twt |title=Gates overtakes Snyder in Seneca nation vote |work=Business First |access-date=September 26, 2016}}</ref>

In the 1960s and 1970s, [[Edward Costikyan]], [[Ed Koch]], [[Eleanor Roosevelt]], and other reformers worked to do away with Tammany Hall of [[New York County]]. To a lesser degree, the Democratic Party machines in Kings, Bronx, and Queens counties continued until the end of the 1980s.{{citation needed|date=March 2024}}