Santa Fe Ring

The Santa Fe Ring was a group of powerful attorneys and land speculators in the United States during the late 19th century and into the early 20th century. It amassed a fortune through political corruption and fraudulent land deals. Many prominent people in New Mexico Territory including future Senator and Secretary of War Stephen Benton Elkins were implicated. The ring figured into the Lincoln County War and the Colfax County War, which involved a dispute over evicting squatters on the Maxwell Land Grant.

The ring name was applied to almost all Republican state politicians in the state capital in Santa Fe, New Mexico, who had near total control of the state during the late 19th and early 20th centuries and were said to turn a blind eye to or be actively involved in corruption. The most infamous period involving the ring was in the 1870s, when ownership of huge Spanish land grants was sorted out.

Members were accused of selling to farmers new to the area land that in fact was not owned by the sellers. They were said to obtain government contracts to supply beef to American Indians on reservations, obtaining the contracts through corrupt political contacts, but with them supplying either less beef than the contract called for, or a poor quality of meat, often spoiled.

Businessman and former soldier Lawrence Murphy became a key figure in the ring during the 1860s, alongside partner Emil Fritz, forming "L.G. Murphy & Co." in 1866.

Murphy and Fritz were able to obtain false deeds to land, then sold that land, not actually owned by them, to newly arriving farmers and ranchers. When payments were missed, Murphy and Fritz would foreclose on the land, cattle, or crops. Within a very short time they were wealthy men. During that same period they acquired government contracts to supply beef and vegetables to Apache Indians living on the reservation, which they typically did not supply, at least not in the quantities called for in the contracts. However, as they were protected by their political contacts who also were tied into the ring, complaints by the Indians went with little notice or attention.

...
Wikipedia