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JAIL TIME
Mike Salter did earn a place in history. He is written up in Jay Robert Nash’s “World Encyclopedia of Organized Crime,” and appears in an article in the New York Times, May 27, 1910, edition:
Salter Back to Surrender: “Nigger Mike,” Accused of Election Fraud in 1907, Returns from Canada — Michael Salter, more familiarly known as “Nigger Mike,” surrendered himself yesterday at the Criminal Court Building. He flourished as a Pell Street saloonkeeper and was a force in Chinatown when he was arrested in the Fall of 1907 on charges of illegal registration that year in the first election district of the Eight Assembly District.
A $1,000 bail bond was gravely furnished at that time and that was the last seen of Salter until yesterday. Another bond, this time for $2,000, was given immediately by Eugene Driscoll when Salter was arraigned yesterday before Judge Crain in General Business.
BALLOTS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE EAST RIVER
Mike Salter was an active member of Tammany Hall, the great Democratic organization that ran New York. In 1905, when newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst made a bid for mayor of New York, he promised to drive Tammany Hall out of politics. Mike and his buddies knew just what to do. On election day, he and other loyal democrats made certain that thousands of uncounted pro- Hearst ballots found their way to the bottom of the East River.