George Barnsedale Cox was born on April 29, 1853 in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. He was the son of George Barnsdale Cox, and of a daughter of James Stitt, a Canadian customs official. His father, an Englishman who came to this country in 1847, died penniless when the boy was eight years old and to support his mother Cox left school.
At his teens Cox was as a newsboy, bootblack, butcher boy, wagon driver, tobacco salesman, bartender, and ultimately proprietor of a saloon. At eighteen he entered the Republican party as a challenger at the polls because, as he later declared, “my father had been a Republican”.
At twenty-four he was elected to the city council, the only public office he held with the exception of that of state inspector of oil to which he was appointed in 1888. He was, however, twice a candidate for county clerk but in each case was defeated. In 1881 he sold his saloon and devoted his time to real estate and local politics.
By 1884 his prominence as a ward politician caused him to be elected chairman of the Republican County Congressional Committee. The success of his candidates in the October election brought his appointment as chairman of the Blaine campaign in Hamilton County. Blaine carried Cincinnati and the county by a large majority, and this further enhanced Cox’s prestige. The following year Joseph B. Foraker was elected governor, and it was during his administration that the foundation of the Republican machine was laid through the efforts of Dr. Thomas Graydon; R. K. Hynicka, Cox’s secretary; August Hermann; and Cox. The Ohio legislature was induced to pass a law replacing the elective Cincinnati Board of Public Works by a Board of Public Affairs appointed by the governor. The new Board proceeded to dismiss all Democratic office-holders, and Cox was given the power to appoint Republicans.
By a judicious method of scattering his appointments over all the wards his own power was increased. From 1888 to 1910 “no man had a chance to get on the Republican ticket without the approval of Cox”; and the organization he erected was “in its way, more complete, more exacting, and under more rigid discipline than Tammany Hall”. To learn the essentials of boss rule, Cox visited New York and studied the Tammany machine; but his success lay largely in the apathy of the individual voter and the press (with the exception of the Cincinnati Times-Star) in the early eighties, the inefficiency of the reformers when in office, the decimating of the ranks of his opponents by offers of lucrative positions, his shrewdness in confusing the public by placing “third tickets” in the field, his close association with the corporate interests, his loyalty to his supporters, and the faith they had in his skill. There was always, however, a minority in his party who resented his rule; and this group, combined with the Democrats, frequently attempted to dethrone him. They failed to do so in 1894 but in 1897 the fusionists were triumphant.
Cox published a letter of resignation, but the “call of the people” caused his return and in 1899 he elected his full slate. Beaten again in 1905, he regained control in 1907, even though the Drake Committee, appointed by a Democratic state legislature in 1906, had brought out the fact “that various banks had for years been paying interest on vast sums” which had not been paid into the treasury. This disclosure caused the return of $214, 998. 76 to the treasury. In 1911 the district attorney obtained an indictment against Cox on the ground that he had perjured himself in testifying that he had never received any of this money. These indictments were finally quashed on the ground that Cox had been subpoenaed before the grand jury while under investigation and that “under the constitution of Ohio and the constitution of the United States no one can be compelled to be a witness against himself”.
With the closing of this case Cox retired from active politics and during the remainder of his life devoted his time to his large theatrical and other business enterprises.
George Cox became known as the undisputed leader in Cincinnati politics. He acquired political control of the city in 1886 and held power till 1911, except for defeats in 1897 and 1905. He made some improvements to the crowding city life during a period of heavy immigration and population boom. He cleaned and paved streets, built sewer lines, and kept taxes low.
In a personal interview to the New York World, May 15, 1911, Cox gave his own views on bosses and politics. He acknowledged the title given him, claimed the boss was a product of American political life, and with due modesty declared that he had evolved into a boss “because of my peculiar fitness. ” To him politics was a game. “I like it because I am successful. One usually likes to play the game in which one is successful. ” Yet at the same time he strenuously “advised young men not to enter politics. . .. In the first place there is no money in it for the honest man and in the second place there is only abuse whether you are successful or unsuccessful”.
Cox was physically a large man, fearless in the face of danger. methodical in his habits, a man of few intimate friends, reticent in speech and devoted to his family.
Cox was married to Caroline, daughter of Samuel Shields.
