FIRST SON

The Biography of Richard M. Daley

By KEITH KOENEMAN

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS

Copyright © 2013 Keith Koeneman
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-226-44947-0

Contents

CAST OF CHARACTERS…………………………………………………ixPrologue………………………………………………………….xvPART 1. A Kid from Bridgeport……………………………………….1. DICK DALEY……………………………………………………..32. EVERY HAPPY FAMILY IS THE SAME……………………………………203. CHICAGO VISIONS…………………………………………………33PART 2. The Second Generation……………………………………….4. FROM FATHER TO SON………………………………………………495. DARWINIAN EVOLUTION……………………………………………..626. MAYORAL ELECTION OF 1983…………………………………………87PART 3. Political Calculus………………………………………….7. ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE……………………………………………978. RESTORATION…………………………………………………….1069. CHICAGO, 1989…………………………………………………..12210. A NEW ERA……………………………………………………..127PART 4. Plugger……………………………………………………11. CRIME AND GRIME………………………………………………..14312. TAKEOVER OF CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS……………………………….155PART 5. Civilizing Richie…………………………………………..13. HAS CHICAGO HAD A SEX CHANGE?……………………………………17114. HOUSING WITHOUT HOPE……………………………………………18315. BILL DALEY…………………………………………………….197PART 6. Pride Is the First Deadly Sin………………………………..16. CROSSING THE RIVER……………………………………………..20917. THE TWO FACES OF RICHIE DALEY……………………………………21018. MILLENNIUM PARK………………………………………………..22819. CORRUPTION TAX…………………………………………………240PART 7. Legacy…………………………………………………….20. GLOBAL CITY, PAROCHIAL COUNCIL…………………………………..25521. ONE TOO MANY…………………………………………………..26822. SISYPHUS………………………………………………………28223. BLOODLINES…………………………………………………….29324. SUNRISE, NOVEMBER 29, 2011………………………………………309APPENDIX A. CHICAGO MAYORS SINCE 1900………………………………..311APPENDIX B. ELECTION RESULTS OF RICH DALEY’S POLITICAL CAMPAIGNS………..313APPENDIX C. TIMELINE OF EVENTS IN RICH DALEY’S LIFE……………………315ACKNOWLEDGMENTS……………………………………………………325NOTES…………………………………………………………….327INDEX…………………………………………………………….361

Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

DICK DALEY

Lillian Dunne Daley gave birth to Dick Daley, an Irish-Catholic kidfrom Bridgeport, on May 15, 1902, during the third term of MayorCarter H. Harrison II. During Chicago’s “age of Harrison,” the Irishquietly ascended to the top of the political ladder. For most of DickDaley’s life, the Irish would rise and rise and rise and then, finally, controlChicago politics. It was as if all of the ethnic groups in the city decidedto play a real life, twentieth-century game of king of the hill. Likekids scrambling up a snowy, icy pile on the grade school playground—pushing,kicking, punching, crawling over the backs of each other tomake it to the top—the Irish, German, Polish, and Italians, as well asa few tough blacks, struggled and struggled to overtake one another.The game would end with Dick Daley on top of the heap, surroundedby his Irish buddies. He was, at his death in 1976, king of the hill.

But that glory was far off in the future.

Turn-of-the-century Bridgeport was a gloomy, ethnic, working-classneighborhood. Industry had created its most prominent physicalfeatures: railroad tracks to the east, the Union Stock Yards to the south,and Bubbly Creek to the west. Each day, the neighborhood inhaledthe nasty smell of the stockyards. The tangy odor of blood and manureoverpowered newcomers, but many long-time residents ceased tosense it or told their children the smell was healthy. Bubbly Creek, agaseous, waste-filled section of the south branch of the Chicago River,was equally repellent. In 1906, four years after the birth of Dick Daley,Upton Sinclair’s famous expose of the stockyards, called The Jungle,described the creek as “a great open sewer.”

Despite this tough environment, Dick Daley experienced manypositive influences in his childhood, including good parents. His mom,Lillian Daley, was thirty years old when she gave birth to her first andonly child. She always dressed her son in fancy clothes, an unusual luxuryin working-class Bridgeport. Like many only children, throughouthis life Dick Daley retained an inner sense of his own specialness, animmutable feeling that he probably intuited from his mother’s great joyat his very existence. Even as a mature adult, he delighted in celebratinghis own birthday, along with family, friends, and his city hall employees.Like many firstborn children, young Dick Daley was a “striver.”He showed up on time, worked hard, respected authority. Accordingto his grade school teacher, the nun Sister Gabriel, “[Dick Daley] wasa very serious boy. A very studious boy. He played when he played. Heworked when he worked. And he prayed when he prayed.”

Daley’s mom was the dominant personality in their household.She was a high-energy woman, possessed a good sense of humor, anddisplayed more charisma and aggressiveness than most women in theearly twentieth century. On St. Patrick’s Day, Daley’s mom joked withher young son that she needed to go down to city hall to have her “behindpainted green.” Lillian Daley also regularly marched in paradesfor women’s right to vote, sometimes bringing her son with her. TheNineteenth Amendment to the US Constitution granted this right towomen in 1920, when Dick Daley was eighteen years old. His momalso was tough on him, letting her son know that she had high expectationsfor his career.

Daley’s dad, Mike Daley, was a quiet and reserved man whoworked as a business agent for the sheet metal workers union. Thougha man of few noteworthy accomplishments, he was even tempered anda good listener. His son, who had fond memories of his father, wouldlater emulate Mike Daley’s reserve and ability to listen without voicinghis own views. These traits—along with the energy, sense of humor,and charismatic aggressiveness he inherited from his mother—servedDick Daley well when he entered his career in Chicago politics.

The Bridgeport of Dick Daley’s youth was an ethnic enclave, anIrish-Catholic village in the midst of a great, unforgiving city. Thiscommunity had its own churches, schools, stores, and saloons. Likeother of the city’s south-side neighborhoods, Bridgeport was a miniatureworld of its own. As Daley aged, he learned that the Irish portionof Bridgeport contained a trustworthy clan: a small group of friendsand relatives whom he always depended on for the support he needed.These people—the Irish-Catholics of Bridgeport—became Daley’stribe. He would never leave them.

Daley’s family attended mass at Nativity of Our Lord parish, wherehe was also a student and an altar boy. An early photo showed him inhis white vestments, with hands crossed and Bible between his thumbs.Young Daley had a round face, a serious look, and a disciplined stancebut did not appear exceptional.

For most ethnic Catholic families of the time, the local parish representedboth the religious and cultural center of the neighborhood,and the Daley family was no different in this respect. Between 1900and 1930, student enrollment at Catholic elementary schools in Chicagotripled, surging from approximately fifty thousand to more than145,000, as first-and second-generation ethnic Chicagoans registeredtheir children. These parents looked to parishes such as Nativity ofOur Lord primarily to train their kids in Catholic morality and propersocial conduct. The second major attraction of parish schools for Catholicparents such as the Daleys was the schools’ ability to transmit aspecific ethnic culture. Nativity of Our Lord, which was founded bythe Irish-born Father Michael Lyons, was an Irish-Catholic institutionthat sought to preserve the cultural heritage brought over from Ireland.The curriculum, which focused on penmanship, memorization, androte learning, was of tertiary importance for many parents.

After graduating from Nativity of Our Lord, Dick Daley attendedDe La Salle Institute, a Catholic high school run by the ChristianBrothers. De La Salle provided a solid, practical education that emphasizedbusiness courses, such as bookkeeping, business law, andtyping. De La Salle was an all-boys, all-white, largely Irish schooljust east of Comiskey Park, home of Dick Daley’s beloved ChicagoWhite Sox baseball team. Like most of the other all-boys Catholic highschools at the time, De La Salle emphasized discipline, and the black-robedChristian Brothers who ran the school did not hesitate to puncha teenager who acted up.

Though De La Salle only opened its doors to white Catholics, theschool stood in an impoverished neighborhood on the “wrong” side ofthe street that separated Bridgeport from the black neighborhoods to theeast. This quirk of fate—in a city such as Chicago where nearly all theneighborhoods were ethnically and racially divided—unsettled DeLa Salle’s teachers, students, and parents. According to an authorizedschool history, “The school was surrounded by tenements and by lowlife. It was a white school as an island surrounded by a black sea.” By1920, the neighborhood encircling De La Salle on the south side of Chicagowould contain nearly 85 percent of the city’s black population.

This sea of African-Americans in Chicago would grow larger andlarger throughout Dick Daley’s lifetime. Starting during World War I,blacks living in the Southern United States left their rural homes andheaded for big Northern cities such as Chicago to escape Southernhostility and to look for jobs. Due to surging wartime production and alack of new immigrants from Europe, Chicago factories hired blacks aspermanent employees for the first time. This Great Migration of blacksin the United States lasted from 1916 until 1970, with its two strongestphases starting during the two world wars. Partly due to the availabilityof industrial jobs in areas such as the Union Stock Yards, the African-Americanpopulation in Chicago surged from 2 percent of Chicagoansin 1915 to 38 percent by 1975.

The historical record indicates that Dick Daley found this demographicchange deeply unsettling. Later in life he reportedly triedto use his political power to preserve a city where whites and blackseach stayed in their own neighborhoods. Seven years after his death,blacks interviewed in focus groups during a Chicago mayoral electionexpressed the view that Dick Daley used his power to create unjustpolicies because he “hated the goddamn niggers.” That type of openracial controversy was far off in the future, however, from his De LaSalle days.

In addition to attending school and working at part-time jobs, duringhis teenage years, young Dick Daley joined the Hamburg AthleticClub, only a short walk from his Bridgeport home. The HamburgClub, like other such groups throughout the city, organized social activitiesand sporting events. At the club, Daley developed a reputationas a serious and competent manager of the baseball teams. He set upthe matches, determined lineups, and coached the teams during thegames. Club members apparently noticed Daley’s skill and conscientiousness,electing him president of the organization in 1924, a positionhe held for the next fifteen years.

In addition to organizing sporting and social events, the HamburgAthletic Club actively supported local politicians during campaigns,as well as functioning like a tough, turf-protecting local street gang.The club had an illustrious history as a training ground for successfulEleventh Ward Irish politicians such as Tommy Doyle and Joseph McDonough.Young, testosterone-filled club members were often willingto get out the vote during Chicago elections, applying physical force ifnecessary. Members of the Hamburg Club also used violence to enforceunwritten ethnic and racial boundaries, especially against blacks.This type of extreme parochialism likely contributed to the race riots of1919, the worst such unrest in Chicago’s history.

The race riots that summer started when a black kid in LakeMichigan made the mistake of swimming across an invisible racialbarrier at the Twenty-Ninth Street Beach. Whites stoned him and hedrowned, setting off intense racial street battles. Beatings, shootings,and arson raged for seven days on the south side, with Irish-Americangangs playing a central role. The Eleventh Ward politician JosephMcDonough—patron of the Hamburg Athletic Club and soon to beDick Daley’s political mentor—actively inflamed the fears and angersof his Bridgeport neighborhood during the riots. The Irish-dominatedChicago police force, sympathizing with the whites, held back andlet the racial battle rage, leaving thirty-eight dead and more than fivehundred injured. For the rest of his life, Dick Daley—disciplined asever—remained silent on what occurred in summer of 1919 when hewas seventeen years old.

Dick Daley started at the bottom when he began in politics in 1919.His first position in Chicago’s Democratic Party was as an EleventhWard precinct captain in the upcoming mayoral election. Like all precinctcaptains, the Democratic Party assigned Daley the responsibilityof personally getting out the vote for approximately five hundred voterson specific city blocks in his neighborhood.

Though the Democrats lost this race to the Republican candidateBig Bill Thompson, during the 1920s young Dick Daley began his slow,steady rise in politics. When he became an Eleventh Ward precinctcaptain, he joined the Democratic Party of Cook County, which insiderscalled “the organization” and everyone else called “the machine.”The Chicago machine was a political organization with a shared ethosthat focused on winning political elections and maintaining the group’sown power. In the machine, precinct captains reported to ward committeemen,who reported to the chairman of the Cook County DemocraticParty. Despite this focus on hierarchy, within the machine therewere many differences of opinion and personal feuds. These disputestypically were handled behind closed doors by pragmatic, nonideologicalmen who focused overridingly on preserving their own power.

Dick Daley intuitively understood the way the machine functioned,and he quickly aligned himself with big Joe McDonough, the threehundred pound Eleventh Ward political boss from Bridgeport. McDonough,a colorful alderman in the Chicago tradition, was an outgoingman known for his large appetites and authentic concern for hisconstituents. Though he was an elected official and ran a real estate firmand a saloon, McDonough was not known as detail oriented. Savvyand street smart, the Bridgeport politician therefore made Dick Daleyhis personal assistant. As boss of the Eleventh Ward, McDonoughcould have picked nearly any young Irish Democrat he wanted, but bigJoe must have seen qualities in Daley that eventually made the youngerpolitician’s reputation inside the machine: an ability to master detail,faithfully follow orders, keep his mouth shut, and work, work, work.

McDonough rose through the ranks of the Democratic Party andDaley rose with him. Daley’s first job downtown was working in theChicago City Council where he reviewed proposed bills and budgetsfor McDonough and other aldermen while also attending night school.In this position, Daley not only learned how the city council workedbut also developed his lifelong low opinion of the ethics and talentsof most Chicago aldermen. According to one neighborhood friend, “Ialways went out dancing every night, but Dick went home to study lawbooks. He would never stop in the saloon and have a drink.”

Though he avoided paperwork and most managerial decisions,big Joe McDonough made shrewd political alliances. The most importantpartnership was with Anton Cermak, the clever, deeply ambitiousCzechoslovakian politician. Cermak became president of theCook County Board in 1922, chairman of the Democratic Party in1928, and mayor of Chicago in 1931. Though mean tempered and apoor public speaker, Cermak had the genius to build a disciplined,multiethnic political party. He started by organizing saloon owners andalcohol drinkers, most of whom were first- or second-generation Catholicimmigrants from Europe. After earning the nickname “wettestman in Chicago,” Cermak reached out to key Irish, German, Polish,and Jewish politicians to create a multiethnic coalition as his politicalarmy. Cermak also wrapped himself in the mantle of blue-ribbon goodgovernment reform and gradually instilled a results-oriented disciplinein the Chicago machine. His favorite saying was “Only lazy precinctcaptains steal votes.”

In 1930, Cermak’s political organization backed McDonough forcounty-wide office as treasurer. Daley, along with the party’s other precinctcaptains, worked for the team and got out the vote for big Joe McDonough.The potential election of his mentor meant more to Daleythan the other political workers and he was known to lead campaignersin song, using his strong Irish voice.

McDonough won and brought Daley along with him as his deputyin the treasurer’s office. In his new position, Dick Daley—conscientiousand hard-working as ever—began mastering budgeting and municipalfinance, as well as learning about the tight relationship betweenpatronage hiring, campaign contributions, and running municipalgovernment. McDonough did not frequent the treasurer’s office—preferringthe saloon and the racetrack—and Daley inherited significantresponsibility.

In 1934, big Joe McDonough developed pneumonia and died. Atthe age of thirty-two, Daley had lost his key mentor in politics. Manyattended McDonough’s funeral at Nativity of Our Lord Church inBridgeport even though his own obituary admitted that McDonoughwas no angel. McDonough’s death, along with the assassination a yearearlier of Mayor Anton Cermak, left Dick Daley’s career prospectsexposed. Apparently, Mayor Cermak was not angelic himself; nearly$1.5 million in cash was found in one of his safe deposit boxes afterhis death.

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(Continues…)Excerpted from FIRST SON by KEITH KOENEMAN. Copyright © 2013 by Keith Koeneman. Excerpted by permission of The University of Chicago Press.
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