As of midnight on Wednesday morning, most of the aldermanic results are in, barring legal challenges. The biggest news is probably out of the 32nd Ward, where challenger Scott Waguespack has (apparently) brought an end to decades of rule by the organization Dan Rostenkowski and Theris Gabinski. If the result holds and Waguespack is declared the winner, by a razor-thin 122 or so votes, then the jury should no longer be out on the Regular Democratic Organization: it's more or less over, unless they seriously analyze how they do business.
Waguespack had serious organized support from labor and a handful of independent pols, but was otherwise left to fend for himself. Labor especially was busy foot-soldier wise elsewhere. So yesterday it was one savvy campaigner versus much of the city's establishment Democratic organizations — including several from neighboring wards — and they couldn't pull it out. They spent obscenely on signs and ads, and brought in canvassers from far and wide, including legendary precinct workers from the Southwest Side, but ultimately they couldn't keep the anti-establishment wave in the ward down: now perhaps that doesn't have as much to do with Waguespack's campaign as it does with Matlak's aldermanship, but that's semantic.
The problem with the so-called "Machine" is not that they were a well-organized and incentivized political operation — in that way, they were like pretty much every good political organizations — it was that, as times changed, they allowed the thing the urban Democratic Parties were organized to resist — the complete control of the political process by big business at the dawn of the twentieth century — to come to dominate their own party. Urban Democratic organizations in Chicago, New York, Kansas City, Boston and other towns were born in the streets, by tough kids with thick-necked dads and sometimes thicker-necked moms who worked hard for their money. They were a way to tip control of government back towards the regular people, rather than the big men in the big buildings downtown. That's why the feds have gone after these organizations with such reckless passion for nearly a century while leaving the major business cartels untouched — in fact, with Ronald Reagan (our second worst President), beginning to allow business to actually write our laws.
But, like with most things, they went bad. They started to look a lot like the corporate behemoths they were designed to fight. In the case of Chicago and the HDO, our political machine was even partially privatized. While a hard core of precinct captains and street soldiers remained, as the city administration drifted towards privileging big business and real estate developers over working men and women who wanted a piece of the pie, it became difficult to keep the loyalty of the average voter. And if you think about it, where is that shift more obvious than in the 32nd Ward? On the south end of the ward, Polish and Ukrainian families have been pushed out as developers court young professionals; the north end of the ward, even the run-of-the-mill yuppies can't afford it any longer. The working class families left a long time ago. So what good is "the Machine" then? For the greater glory of a mayor who vetoes living wage laws? For loyalty to a ward committeeman who can't force his alderman to pick up a phone? With overcrowded streets, raucous neighbors, constant development, and breakneck stripmalling, why show any loyalty at all?
The Machine forgot the streets where it was born and, through pain and trials, hardened into the fighting force that made average guys like Tony Cermak and Dick Daley into kingmakers who got presidents elected. Once upon a time, no less than Jimmy Carter and Ted Kennedy came pleading not just to the Mayor but to individual ward committeeman for their support. Now they can't keep one of their own in office in a run-off against a kid who says things like, "Who knows? Maybe we'll stop some of that government waste."
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Elsewhere, Toni Foulkes, on whom I obviously have a political crush, won a resounding victory in the ACORN and SEIU stronghold of the 15th Ward, Englewood. This is the second alderman ACORN has gotten elected in the 15th — this time, at no small cost, as SEIU and UFCW spent approaching half a million dollars on her campaign. With a Regular Democratic Organization that has proved barely a shadow of its former self, Foulkes has little to fear. She has everything to gain by being as independent and outspoken as she knows how to be (which is quite a bit). Foulkes comes to the Council straight from a Jewel-Osco bakery. How can she not take it to powers that be, knowing how hard it is for a working family in Chicago?
As of now, Joe Moore seems to have eked out a 50 vote victory in the 49th Ward, what would have been a major black eye for labor. Their great progress as of the February primaries could have been, symbolically anyway, wiped out if the champion of the Big Box Ordinance that sparked this whole debate would have been knocked off. Especially considering union-endorsed candidates Leroy Jones, Jr. and Michael Chandler both lost badly, and Naisy Dolar, who was endorsed over Bernie Stone, was defeated by a surprising six point margin.
JP Paulus / April 18, 2007 5:51 AM
i think Naisy Dolar lost because of the negativity that surrounded her campaign in the primary -- look at places lke Aldertrack, and her supporters were ripping on GREG BREWER instead of Berne Stone. They also left Salman Aftab in the cold too. Had all 3 united, Bernie Stone would be gone.
Also, if Joe Moore wins, the "Broken Heart of Rogers Park" will need some serious intervention, as they might push him over the edge