ALBANY, N.Y.—The conviction of former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has shaken New York politics down to the granite foundations of the state Capitol, provoking fresh calls to overhaul a system that has stubbornly clung to its long history of corruption.
A jury convicted the 71-year-old Manhattan Democrat on Monday on charges that he traded favors for $4 million in kickbacks from a cancer researcher and real estate developers.
The rapid downfall was as shocking to lawmakers as it was troubling to longtime observers of New York politics.
The bell could not be ringing louder for real reform in Albany than it is right now
