The American Pharaoh:
Mayor Richard J. Daley, His Battle for Chicago and the Nation
by Adam Cohen and Elizabeth Taylor
(Little Brown and Company, 2000).
Executive Director, Chicago Semester
Historically, the choice between Democrats and Republicans were clear. Democrats were historically for labor, and for the working class, especially for immigrants such as the Irish, Poles and Italians that supported them. Republicans were historically for big business, and for the wealthier clientele. The goal for Democrats historically was to distribute resources to those most in need, especially to the coalition that supported it. The goal for Republicans was for the freedom to engage in business and in the pursuit of wealth. However, in Chicago, we find perhaps a third goal, the total control of the political process. This model is found best in the last of the big city bosses, Richard J. Daley.
In what many have described as the most "democratic of cities," residents in Chicago probably wouldn't know a Republican if they saw one. Richard James Daley, Mayor of Chicago from the year 1954, until his death in 1975, so effectively controlled the politics of the city that, on the surface, there seemed to have been scant opposition. Daley's presence was so strong, that Republicans were virtually eliminated as contenders for almost any major political office in the city. In fact, the control that Richard J. Daley had over the city was so total, that only a few "independents" it seemed, were courageous enough to challenge the Daley machine. Yet, a more careful analysis shows that Daley would not have been elected or sustained, were it not for the Black community in particular.
The newest book on the life and times of Richard J. Daley seeks to assess the impact of Chicago's most well-known mayor. However, critics are right in noting that there is little new about the Mayor as a person, but much more is described about the times that Daley ruled, especially about several significant big city issues that have been very important in Chicago's history. Arguably, these issues reflect national problems as well. Daley was far from ideological as ruler in Chicago. His regime was essentially pragmatic. As Thomas Keane, the Mayor's Aldermanic floor leader in City Council once described it: Daley spent his career pursuing power, and Keane pursued money, and both men got what they were after.
Daley ran initially "against big business" in 1954, stating that he was the candidate who stood up for the interests of the neighborhoods. However, as Daley and his friends took power, they discovered that there were larger stakes to be won. By 1959, it was clear to the "Republican" supporters of big business in the city, that Daley was on their side. From that point on, Daley became the "American Pharaoh," the big builder of cities only to be rivaled in power by perhaps Robert Moses in New York. Daley's legacy includes O'Hare Airport, the Dan Ryan Expressway, McCormick Exhibition Center and the University of Illinois at Chicago campus. He also presided over a city that built some of the largest, most massive public housing projects in the world. Many of these great public housing projects followed the destruction of formerly stable neighborhoods, and the displacement of large populations of people. Cynics believe that public housing was a way to segregate the poor, to keep them out of sight and away from white ethnic community neighborhoods such as Bridgeport, the historically American Irish neighborhood that was birthplace to a half-dozen of Chicago's most prominent mayors, including Richard J. Daley, and his son Richard M. Daley, the current mayor of the city.
Dick Daley was born Catholic and Irish. He also grew up a product of the Chicago Democratic political machine. Daley's primary loyalties were to his family, friends, and political cronies that supported him in power. Daley may have supported progressive legislation while he was a state legislator (he opposed sales taxes that would more disproportionately fall to working class populations); however, it soon became obvious that Daley's goal was really about getting power. His first elected position in Springfield, Illinois was actually as a Republican write-in, a pragmatic centrist political move if there ever was one. A fellow legislator, Benjamin Adamowski, passed a motion to allow Daley to sit on the Democratic side of the aisle.
Daley was very suspicious of those who might challenge the accepted political machinery. Hence, many troubles that the city faced were relegated to the insidious work of "outside agitators." An avowed segregationist, Daley rejected challenges to the machine or to the social order that he grew up with. Though forced out before Daley assumed the role of Mayor, he rejected the goals of housing reformers like Elizabeth Wood, former CHA director, who tried to promote open housing for poor people all over Chicago. Daley's work as Mayor sought to maintain rigid segregationist housing patterns in Chicago.
His attitude toward African-Americans in Chicago was, at best, paternalistic. For years, he supported William Dawson's "sub machine" on the South side. Dawson was an African-American Alderman who Daley could count on. Yet, when it appeared that Dawson was amassing too much power for himself, Daley turned on him, supporting a cadre of "silent six" Black Alderman who could be trusted not to challenge the mayor's power. Daley could count on the "automatic eleven" wards on the South side to support his political efforts, and these included five wards controlled formerly by Dawson. Hence, the history of race relations in the city can be epitomized by the Daley regime. As long as the Black wards supported the Mayor, they could expect some modest benefits. Of course, the biggest winners were those, not only loyal to the machine, but those who shared Daley's intimate history as Roman Catholics, white ethnics and others who controlled the political party from the top.
Daley could not accept criticism from civil rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., or from student protesters during the 1968 Democratic Convention, or from the Press. To Daley's mind, the best way to change anything was to come up through the system. Loyalty to the system meant respect for authority, and the patient hard work that would result in natural rewards. Problems in Chicago were, for Daley, caused by "outside agitators," those who did not represent the city or understand its issues.
By 1959, business leaders in Chicago discovered that Daley could be their ally. Not only did the business community in Chicago possess clout that must be respected, but they were potential supporters (funding contributors) to the political process. Daley, the American Pharaoh, began to develop alliances with the business community to help with his massive public works projects. While lands to the South and West were "urban renewed" (demolished, cleared and rebuilt) to contain mostly poor black people, the downtown area was ripe to be developed and "gentrified." Once in power, Daley abandoned the neighborhoods' agenda and began supporting a downtown development agenda, counting as allies members of the business community who controlled much of the city's economy.
In this respect, Daley's rule does not seem much different from that of a Republican mayorality. The challenge for Daley was how to gain power and economic support to stay in power. So, with the exception of loyal neighborhoods like Bridgeport, Chicago's development dollars began to be concentrated downtown and along some Lake Front wards especially on the North Side.
Even during the days of the War on Poverty, Daley worked hard to control how federal dollars were allocated and spent. Big city mayors such as Daley were suspicious of "maximum feasible participation" and sought ways to strip neighborhood groups from access to power or to economic resources from government. Today, despite the rhetoric of neighborhood participation in federal urban development programs such as President Clinton's "empowerment zones," the process is controlled in no small part by centralized political authority. This reflects the legacy of Richard J. Daley.
While the legacy of Richard J. Daley includes the slogan that Chicago was and is "the city that works;" it is clear from this biography of Daley and his times, that Chicago did not work for all or even for most Chicagoans. Richard J. Daley may have been a great builder of a big city, but there are other sad legacies as well. Daley contributed to a rigidly-divided, racially-segregated city. Contemporary sociologists have argued that Chicago may be the most segregated city in the United States, with huge poor black and Latino immigrant populations isolated from the rest of the city. The legacy of public housing in Chicago is also problematic. Massive public housing developments have served only to isolate and contain the poor, rather than finding ways to integrate them into the larger society. Chicago has remained a rigidly segregated city rather than a model for how a city can nurture its diverse population.
Politically, the mayor was able to centralize the control of the party apparatus in Chicago. He remained Chairman of the Cook County Democratic Party, which slated candidates for office, even while maintaining the job of mayor for two decades. Daley's model of political control served to frustrate the practice of democracy in Chicago. Third, Daley's partnership with business channeled development dollars to mostly affluent white communities along the Lake Front, or in the neighborhoods that most represented the Mayor's constituency. Whether unwittingly or intentionally, Richard J. Daley facilitated the goals of the downtown business community, at the expense of the neighborhoods that elected and supported him. This coalition set the stage for the downtown growth coalition that we see active in the development of Chicago's downtown 25 years after his death.