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Corruption In All The King's Men

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All the King’s Men In “All the King’s Men” by Robert Warren politics corrupt the people who were once revered for their courage to speak against evils. The reason that politics corrupts is the pressure that politics places on those who take part in it and the people they interact with. Corruption is an effect of politics and all of the things that Warren shows alongside it. Warren displays how politics corrupt through Willie Stark’s alcohol abuse during prohibition, love affairs that influence his political career and transformation of Willie Stark’s beliefs from selfless to selfish tendencies. Willie Stark begins to abuse alcohol during his time as governor and this is a major factor in his corruption as it is during the prohibition …show more content…

Willie's first affair happens not to long after he gets into his position as Governor, and it is with his secretary Sadie. When this happens Sadie is very happy, but ends up feeling cheated by the other girls that Willie is with and how they get favors by Willie, through his governor status, because she had wasn’t getting the same treatment. She says that Willie is “two timing (her)”(Warren 343) and this is ironic as Stark’s wife is the one who is being two timed by these corrupt politicians. Willie wants to feel loved because his career has taken his wife's love away from him, so he is willing to commit adultery in order to get that pleasure. Willie’s affairs are well known like his other corrupt dealings, but he is getting results so people choose to ignore it. As he moves forward with his political schemes he forms a relationship with Anne Stanton. His love affair influences his decisions and this is a mark of corruption he gave Anne “state money“(398) for home for children just because he was having an affair with her. He wanted her to see him as someone who was good and not corrupt, but he makes a shady political decision in order to do it. Even if he did the right thing helping the children, it was still a corrupt deal all to help him with his affair.Tomason believes that“the most poisonous influence has not been Willie Stark's pragmatic political programs”(Tomason) but instead how he decides to make certain changes. Willie’s poisonous influence is that he decides to give favors to people he is sleeping with, even if it is for a good cause and that is why the affairs make him corrupt, because he is not making legitimate decisions based off of facts. In the end his affairs are his downfall as Sadie revealing the truth behind it led to Adam Stanton killing him

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