Willie Stark: Corruption=Success?

Today in class, we were having an intellectual discussion on the novel All the King's Men, and were discussing the characteristics of some of the major characters. During this discussion, one particular question on a particular character caught my mind. The question was regarding Willie Stark's success as a person and politician. Throughout the novel, the character progression of Willie Stark is shown through a series of flashbacks and events as well as through his reactions to these said events. Although the events are shown and explained, the question of how Willie became such a success begs to be answered.

It can easily be said that Willie's claim to fame was the incident with the fire escape. Willie, sensing corruption in the Mason City politics, motioned to hire a group of black men to build the local schoolhouse. In a bout of racial anger, the city hierarchy campaigned to take Willie out of his office of Treasurer and replaced him with a sheep that would do their will. The construction firm the city ended up hiring turned out to build the schoolhouse in such a way that it needed repairs before it was even finished. As a result, when a fire drill was done a few weeks later, the fire escape fell killing three students instantly boosting Willie into the spotlight. At this time, he was considered an honest man having never been corrupted politically or morally due to the fact that he did not drink or have affairs. Despite the fact that this event did cause Willie to be nominated to run for governor, even though he was a dummy, and gave Willie a good deal of political fame, Warren doesn't seem to intend for this particular event to be Willie's defining moment. Earlier in the novel, Jack Burden stated that people like Willie didn't get lucky, but instead created their own luck, and the scene described above seemed awfully like luck.

Later on in the novel, Willie Stark undergoes a major character shift and Warren seems to intend this event to be the one that changes Willie and lead him towards success. As previously said, Willie was nominated as a gubernatorial candidate, but only to serve as a dummy who could take votes away from another candidate. For a good bit of the campaign, Willie had no idea that he was being setup and as a result was extremely boring and bland in his speeches and campaigning. But, when Sadie Burke, his later assistant, told him about what was happening to him, he exploded in a burst of uncharacteristic action. He got extremely drunk and then next day, attended a picnic and gave an extremely emotional and savage speech. It seemed at this point that Willie became a true politician and molded his way to success creating his own luck. He essentially became corrupt, but not in a political sense. His drinking indicated a moral corruption that would later morph into a political corruption that would show through his actions. After this event, Willie showed the signs of a true politician, going on with a chameleon-like persona molding to whatever the audience wanted to see. When talking to the public and giving a speech, he used raw emotions and passion, and when talking to government peers, he was able to use an academic voice. It was almost as if Warren mandated it necessary for corruption to go along with political success, a success that Willie Stark definitely achieved.