Of course, you can root out corruption as part of the system; you need to change the system as happened in NYC. It didn’t hurt when Carmine DeSapio (head of Tammany) left all that cash in a paper bag in a taxi by mistake. The Imelda’s shoes moment in NYC politics.
But let’s not forget Fiorello! As Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock put it in Fiorello!
And it mounted up, your Honor, bit by bit.
CHORUS
Up you honor bit by bit
It was not the end of corruption, but it was the end of the mass corruption of Tammany Hall, which never existed in Buffalo or Syracuse. It’s a relic that has little relevance today, and never on a statewide level.
This is how states flip from one party to the other.
One party gets near absolute power, they keep it for a decade or more, they start to abuse said power, suddenly scandals break, a lot of the politicians land in jail, and the other party gets a toehold into the power structure of the state (or even total control depending on how bad the corruption was).
Hoping that’s not the way it goes down in NY. Hoping that’s the way it DOES go down here in TX. 
I’m not from NY so perhaps someone can explain the point about “three men in a room?” Why is decision making in Albany so centralized? How did this come about?
I think every majority leader in every Leg in the country would like to have that kind of power, but that certainly isn’t the case in my state (WA). What’s special about NY?
Raises, oh Raises! R - a - i - s - e - s! R to the Ai to the Ses!
Like the dog at the fire hydrant: raises.
Like Reagan, with the debt ceiling: raises.
Like Jesus, with Lazarus: raises.
NOT begs.
How many state legislatures have term limits? Term limits probably to limit the competence of the legislators, but it is a reasonably good way to eliminate this kind of corruption.
I’m from Illinois. Thanks New York for taking the title of the most corrupt state away from us.
We already have term limits. It’s called an election.