On the fringes of power : the life and turbulent career of Senator Stephen Wallace Dorsey

"Touted in his time as one of the 'great men of the West, ' Stephen Wallace Dorsey was a Reconstruction carpetbagger who went to Arkansas and finagled and bribed his way into getting elected to the US Senate after living only two years in the state before heading West to seek his fortune. From a fraudulent New Mexico land claim to taking up mining claims and real estate in Southern California, he used sheer cunning and guile to manipulate the system of the Gilded Age to his own ends. Dorsey was a major presence in early New Mexico--which was no-holds-barred frontier corruption--with his flair for excess. Excess is in everything he did, his manipulative 600,000-acre-land-grab, his political shenanigans, his excessive drinking, his extravagant lifestyle always on display. In his fraudulent dealings he was caught out--not by the law, but those more conniving than he was. His fantastic mansion in the middle of a still-today empty prairie in northeastern New Mexico was of state-wide historical importance before the state could no longer afford to keep it"-- From publisher's website "Touted in his time as one of the 'great men of the West,' Stephen Wallace Dorsey was a Reconstruction carpetbagger who went to Arkansas where he finagled and bribed his way into getting elected to the US Senate after living only two years in the state. From there, he headed west to seek his fortune by acquiring a fraudulent New Mexico land claim and taking up mining claims and real estate in Southern California. Dorsey was a major presence in early New Mexico--which was replete with no-holds-barred frontier corruption--and used sheer cunning and guile to manipulate the excesses of the Gilded Age to his own ends. His flair for excess was evident in everything he did, from his manipulative 600,000-acre landgrab and political shenanigans to his excessive drinking and profligate lifestyle. In his fraudulent dealings he eventually was ferreted out not by the law, but by those more conniving than he was. His extravagant mansion in the middle of what is still empty prairie in northeastern New Mexico was of statewide historical importance before even the state could no longer afford to keep it"--From publisher's website