Why did Irish immigrants embrace machine politics in the cities where they settled?

Answer 1

The fact that "Machine Politics" existed at all in these cities is very likely to be a result of the massive growth the cities were experiencing due to Immigration. There was a massive influx of poor immigrants, mostly from Ireland at that time and there was not the infrastructure to support the massive influx.

As a result, there were massive building programs, mostly by private landlords and then massive public works programs to support the additional inhabitants of the cities in question.

As there was basically full employment, skilled workers rose quickly to the top of the organisations trying to employ as many construction, transport and basic manual labouring workers as possible. These were naturally drawn from the pool of new immigrants.

So, when the workforce began to become organised and eventually unionised, it was natural that these "employers" would be favoured by their pool of workers. This gave the leaders of these organisations bargaining power with the authorities, which in turn improved the lot of the workers. The cycle continued, with leaders of unions also becoming politicians and continuing their support of "their people" in that capacity.

Unfortunately, over time, it became a power grab for the people at the top of these organisations, with the workers now favouring their leaders in order to keep the status quo and their jobs, rather than to improve the lot of poor immigrants.

However, this eventually left a vacuum in the power structure which was filled and exploited by more self interested and sometimes criminal elements and led to the organised crime takeover of many of the unions.