By CHARLES B. CLEVELAND Big Jim
Editorial director for radio station WIND,
Chicago, he was political editor of the
Chicago Daily News for twenty years and
is the author of five books. He also teaches
social science at Kendall Junior College,
Evanston.
James R. Thompson is running for governor. A Republican who has set a formidable record
as federal prosecutor for Northern Illinois, he's 'shaking every hand in sight' on the campaign trail
A FEW MONTHS AGO a friend, driving on Chicago's Near North Side, saw
an unusual tableau: Six-foot-six James
R. Thompson, then U.S. attorney for
Northern Illinois, was standing with his
hands raised like a criminal at bay; a
Chicago policeman and a squad car was
nearby with its mars light flashing. It
reprisal for Thompson's war on
crooked cops. This was at the crest of
Big Jim's war on corruption, that over
just a few years' span, had given him the
role of Mr. Clean in Chicago. According to one tabulation, he had put in jail
one former governor, seven Chicago
aldermen, two state representatives, 85
employees of the Democratic controlled
board of election commissioners. 19
employees of the Cook County Assessor's office (often considered the key to
Democratic financing of major campaigns), and 33 suburban politicians.
He had also jailed 54 Chicago police.
Small wonder then that a passerby
might fear that Thompson was in trouble, maybe even extreme danger. More
than one renegade cop had turned
murderer in the past. It turned out to be nothing so
melodramatic. Crime-fighter reputation notwithstanding, Thompson was in
trouble with the law—just like you or
me. He had made an illegal "U-turn"
and, when the cop stopped him he had
playfully raised his hands and
"surrendered" with a plea of guilty. The
policeman was less than delighted,
however. You can't win on that kind of
pinch, so he took the easy out, settled
for a "don't do it again" warning and
an admonition that if Thompson
wanted to break the law, please do it on
somebody else's beat. The picture of a crusader beating a
traffic ticket isn't the only contradiction
that will show up under the spotlight of
political scrutiny. Back in college,
Thompson was an ardent supporter of Democrat Adlai Stevenson when the
former Illinois governor ran for President against Dwight Eisenhower. Now
Thompson is a Republican candidate
for governor and, if the political winds
blow in the right direction, could
himself one day run for the Presidency.
While this earlier political excursion
may earn him the antipathy of hardshell
Republicans, it helps boost another of
his campaign basics: that he calls 'em as
he sees 'em; that neither party has a
monopoly on virtue or larceny; that, as
a federal prosecutor, he took out after
culprits in both parties. But more important than his support
of a Democrat 20 years ago is a serious
flaw in his limited political arena. He is
well known in the greater Chicago area,
but a political unknown downstate.
Moreover, as so often happens in
politics, no sooner did Thompson leave
the prosecutor's office with almost universal praise than the critics started to
pick away at that reputation. Barring a collapse of the Thompson
image or the emergence of an outstanding alternative, however, he had the
most valuable political asset of all: the
look of a potential winner. True, the
darkest days of the Watergate
Republican party are past; there are
even those who regard President Ford
as a favorite for reelection next year.
But few Illinois Republicans share such
unbridled enthusiasm. Their party is
almost nonexistent in Chicago, and
divided and defeatist in the once onesided Republican suburbs. Downstate
the party is still wobbly from the loss of
Congressional districts and seats in the
General Assembly it once had won routinely. Moreover, the one man who might have had the OOP nomination virtually
on a party platter—Attorney General
William J. Scott—took himself out of
speculation with an announcement that October 1975 / Illinois Issues / 295
Thompson was projected
into politics on his role of
Giant Killer. On
successive days his office
convicted Daley's top
two aldermen
and his press secretary
he would seek reelection to his present
post. In the early going, only a political
neophyte, Weight Watcher Executive
Richard Cooper was left as an announced candidate, although state
Comptroller George W. Lindberg let it
be known he was available as a candidate, too. Others obviously will get
into the picture at the first sign that the
Thompson boom is faltering. Thompson's entry into big time
politics was an open secret for months,
even though he managed—for the most
part—to keep the federal prosecutor's
office off limits. During that period he
had a standard answer to all speculation about his political ambitions: 'The
Republican party is in some stage of
disarray in the state of Illinois, so I
think it is natural for political writers
and columnists to cast about for alternatives: and I am a highly visible prosecutor in terms of what my office had
been doing." Thompson also showed
he had done considerable study on
the matter. He would continue: "Prosecutors in the past have gone on
to political office—Tom Dewey, Earl
Warren." Then, "I haven't discouraged political speculation; I haven't
said T wouldn't be a candidate for
political office some day." Such statements were remarkably well suited to
the situation. As a federal prosecutor,
Thompson had to stand aloof from
politics—his double negative "I haven't
said I wouldn't" was safely non-committal, but a broad enough hint to
keep political rivals from jumping into
the race. It also bought him time, time
for Scott to make his own decision
without pressure. Scott has a volatile
temper, and political niceties required
that he have first refusal on the nomination. Thompson held his political posture
for months. First there were efforts to
persuade him to run for mayor this past spring against Mayor Richard J. Daley.
Thompson could have had the nomination for the asking; it eventually wound
up going to Alderman John J. Hoellen
who didn't want to run but who refused
to let the election go by default. Thompson took a more realistic view. He knew
Daley had a lock on many of the
Republican money raisers as well as an
army of precinct captains, while the
GOP ward organizations hardly
qualified even as paper party warriors.
Moreover, except for some stirrings in
the Chicago newspapers in behalf of
maverick Democrat William Singer,
there was no reason to believe any anti-Daley effort would succeed. Thompson
declined to become a political
kamikase; the hopelessness of the case
was so apparent that Thompson took
no flak for his decision to live to fight
politically another day. That day came on Wednesday, July
2. A day earlier Thompson had resigned as U.S. attorney; now, in a press
conference in the San Juan room of the
Sheraton-Chicago hotel in downtown
Chicago, Thompson made it official—he was a candidate for governor
of Illinois. He followed up his Chicago
press conference with a chartered flight
to eight other Illinois cities as a kickoff
for his campaign. The giant killer There were others. Otto Kerner, a
former governor and U. S. Appeals Court judge, was convicted in 1973 of
bribery, conspiracy, mail fraud, income
tax evasion and perjury in connection
with allotment of race track dates while
he was governor. Convicted with him
was Theodore J. Isaacs, close political
friend and director of revenue under
Kerner. Another veteran politician,
Edward J. Barrett, one time Illinois
secretary of state, was convicted of
bribery, mail fraud and income tax evasion for accepting $180,000 in bribes
from a voting machine company while
serving as Cook County clerk. In
separate trials a number of Chicago
aldermen were found guilty of bribery
in connection with zoning matters. The rediscovered statutes In the case of the Keane conviction,
Thompson's office developed a
theory—unique in this jurisdiction—that hidden conflicts of interest,
hidden from their fellows and from the
public and which enrich them personally, 296 / Illinois Issues / October 1975
Thompson was projected into politics
on his role of Giant Killer. On
successive days his office convicted
Alderman Thomas Keane (next to
Mayor Daley the ranking Democrat in
Chicago), Alderman Paul T. Wigoda,
No. 2 man in Chicago's city council,
and Mayor Daley's press secretary,
Earl Bush. Keane was convicted on 17
counts of mail fraud and one of conspiracy to misuse his influence in the
purchase and resale of land. Wigoda
was nailed for failing to report a
$50,000 payoff on his income tax. Bush
was found guilty of 11 counts of mail
fraud in connection with his secret
ownership of Dell Airport Advertising,
Inc., which held contracts at Chicago's
giant O'Hare airport. These were no
political palookas. Keane and Wigoda
were both brilliant lawyers; Keane in
particular had ruled Chicago's city
council with an iron hand for years. He
had been the target of rumors and investigations, but was seemingly invincible until Thompson took him to trial.
In a city where conviction of well established political figures is almost unprecedented, this rundown of court victories gave Chicago an unaccustomed air of reform. It also raised the question of just what "magic" Thompson had uncovered. In reality he hadn't discovered anything new, he rediscovered
four laws on the federal statute books.
Thompson explained it this way: "We
decided several years ago that there
were some laws available to federal
prosecutors that might not be available
to local prosecutors and that might be
effectively used in official corruption
cases. One was the Hobbs Act passed
by Congress 30 or 40 years ago to deal
with interstate extortion. At the time it
was designed to stop extortion of
truckers doing business in interstate
commerce. The second was the mail
fraud statute that predates the turn of
the century and was originally designed
by Congress to ban lotteries from the
mails. But it was so broadly drafted that
the courts have held that any sort of
fraud offends the statute. The third was
a relatively recently passed statute
passed as part of the anticrime legislation back in the 1960's. It forbids the
use of interstate facilities to promote
local offenses; in many of our cases that
meant corruption. The fourth is one
which has always been in some use
against the official corruption
cases—the tax statutes—because people
who take bribes or extort money rarely
report them on their income tax."
are a fraud upon the citizenry. Further, that if a mailing were used in support of that fraud that it was a viola- lion of the mail fraud statute.
Thompson also took a fresh look at an old Chicago custom—policemen shaking down taverns, it's been going on in big cities since the first cop took an apple off a peddler's cart without paying for it; over the years it's become big business. The traditional view of shakedowns was that the cop was taking a bribe from the tavernkeeper. From a prosecution standpoint the bribe-giver is just as guilty as the bribetaker. Thompson took another tack; that the bribe was usually not voluntary; that the cop really was extorting the money from the tavernkeeper. From a prosecutor's standpoint, this is a new ball game. Now the bribe-giver is the victim of extortion, not a party to the crime. With that tactic, Thompson's office persuaded many tavernkeepers to testify against crooked policemen and convicted dozens, up to one of the highest ranks in the department. A similar approach was successful in persuading real estate developers to testify against city aldermen in zoning case shakedowns.
The immunity question
"It was inevitable after Watergate and after vigorous action by prosecutors against official corruption across the country that people would start inquiring into legal techniques they had never heard about before. Before Watergate the only people who knew what immunity was were prosecutors and defense lawyers; in fact, many lawyers don't know what immunity truly is."
It is, of course, simply a system under which a prosecutor asks the court to grant immunity to a key witness in return for his testimony. It gets ticklish in that the key witness, if he or she has any value, is usually also guilty but his or her testimony helps convict somebody else while the witness goes free. Such testimony is often indispensible, particularly in conspiracy cases in which there are no neutral witnesses; but it also carries the potential for abuse.
The statistics of Thompson
While the statistics of Thompson's office will play a role in the campaign, the statistics that count in politics are the ability of a candidate to draw votes. Political realities came quickly to Thompson in the days following his announcement. In the first two weeks contributions totaled $5,000 in a campaign some experts say may cost upward to $2 million. He found a headquarters at 110 S. Dearborn, a block from his old office in the Dirksen Federal Building. He located—and lost—a businessman as campaign manager and signed on Tribune reporter Dave Gilbert as press aide. In time Thompson expects to add a second news person, probably with downstate experience.
I caught up, by phone, with Thompson during those early hectic days. He had assigned his top priorities. One was to get u scheduler to handle the myriad details of a candidate getting acquainted in a hurry. Second was to assemble a working staff. Third was to get acquainted with the public generally; party leaders specifically.
"I've been going downstate and shaking every hand in sight," Thompson said. "I spent eight hours in Ottawa on Sunday: I'm going to Galesburg tonight: got three county fairs next week. I've been to Effingham, I've been to Flora, I've got engagements upcoming in Belleville, Peoria, all over downstate."
Like many politicians, Thompson intermixes "I" and "we." "We've been talking a lot by phone with the county chairmen, central committeemen and political leaders down there (downstate) before we go into an area. They brief us. That's doing it by the seat of your pants, but, at the moment, we don't have much other choice. Eventually we'll have a regional analysis of issues, but at this time it's more important for the research people to be first educating me about issues other than the criminal justice system (his old job) so I know what the hell they're talking about (downstaters) and they know what I'm talking about. Then, after I'm educated, for them to present me with a series of alternatives on what a program should be. Then, when I make my choice, for the staff to research and put me into. the best position to present it publicly. That's on statewide issues; once we go through the three phase stage on statewide issues, we'll turn to special regional issues."
The vulnerability of Walker
October 1975 / Illinois Issues / 297
Thompson also hopes to solve a problem that has bedeviled most Republican candidates in the past: how to balance a citizens' group with the regular party
they like politicians or not, they certainly don't like people who claim to be one
thing and turn out to be another. And
that's a recurring theme I hear
downstate, especially among young
people." While the big theme is Dan Walker,
it is the little themes which get a politician off the ground, and Thompson—a
neophyte at the game—proved a quick
study. At the Jerseyville Merchants'
parade he was put in a station wagon
where, as he put it, "all the people could
see was an arm waving." Thompson got
out and walked, in plain view of the
crowd. Thompson also got a tip from a
county fair goer: "This one fellow took
pity on me and said I should chat more,
ask people their names, take a little
time with them. I did and I found out
that they enjoyed it more and so did I." The political game Aside from his on-the-job learning,
Thompson has tackled other realities of
politics, among them money. "Putting a
staff together means we've got to start
on fund raising, so we've got the money
in the bank to pay them. We're not going to run a deficit campaign. We're going to try every known fund raising approach: two major dinners, one in
November, one in March of next year.
We'll do direct mail, newspaper
solicitation. I'll attend fund raising breakfasts, lunches, cocktail parties,
direct mail to people in the business
community." Thompson also hopes to solve a
problem that has bedeviled most
Republican candidates in the past: how
to balance a citizens' group with the
regular party organization. In Cook
County, that balancing-act may be essential; among the persons indicted by
Thompson before he quit was Floyd
Fulle, the GOP county chairman in
Cook County. And while Thompson
says one of the reasons he is running is
to help rebuild the Republican party, he
built his successful prosecutor's staff on
nonpartisan grounds—a followup,
Thompson acknowledges, to a start by
his Democratic predecessor, Tom
Foran. As a result Thompson, as a
prosecutor, had fiercely loyal assistants
with both Republican and Democratic
credentials; whether that loyalty will
spill over into a partisan election only
the campaign will reveal. The background of the man Thompson joined the staff of Attorney General William J. Scott as chief
of law enforcement in 1969, a year and
a half later moved to the U. S. district
attorney's office as aide to Judge Bauer.
It was during this period that Thompson's interest in antiques was rekindled, primarily because of his vacation trips to a home he has about 30 miles north of Portage, Wisconsin. His
parents, Dr. J. Robert, a physician, and
Agnes, have another home nearby. (Jim
is the oldest of four children, born and
raised on Chicago's West Side.) Thompson has written a number of
articles and four textbooks in the legal-law enforcement field, and he keeps up
with literature in the field. For relaxation, however, he's more likely to pick
up a paperback novel. Before his
schedule became so crowded, he used to
go to New York City several times a
year on vacation and he'd pack in a full
schedule of movies and stage plays.
Thompson has a tendency toward informality. He's likely to put his feet up on
the desk while talking; he'll take an occasional Scotch whisky; drives a
Mercedes-Benz. The big question Can Thompson defeat Walker? Thompson is organizing his campaign on the theory that Walker will be
his opponent; that the incumbent can
beat off any challenge by State
Treasurer Alan Dixon, Lt. Gov. Neil
Hartigan or any other candidate supported by Mayor Daley. Walker has
been under considerable fire from
Daley, many members of the legislature
and the press. His vetoes also stepped
on many toes in recent months. But
Walker has long since proved himself a
resourceful candidate, capable of turning opposition from Daley and the news.
media to his own advantage. It is also
worth noting that Walker won the
original primary in 1972 under similar
circumstances—Daley and much of the
press favored then Lt. Gov. Paul Simon
(now a congressman) and himself considered a liberal, independent politician.
Walker wound up winning the nomination by some 40,000 votes. Walker then
went on to beat incumbent Republican
Gov. Richard B. Ogilvie by 77,000 votes
while U. S. Senator Charles H. Percy, a
Republican, was carrying the state by
more than one million votes, Atty. Gen.
Scott by even more and Richard Nixon
by 874,000 votes—clearly a Democratic
and personal victory for Walker against
the GOP landslide. Does Walker retain that kind of popularity? Can the big man from Chicago
win at the ballot box as he has before
the jury box? That's going to be the
story of 1976 in Illinois. 298 / Illinois Issues / October 1975
He also learned a political lesson that
few candidates from the Chicago area
seem to absorb: an ability to place cities
and counties together. He rattles off
places he's been without error. That can
be quite a trick even for a seasoned pro.
For example, he knows the town of
Effingham would like to develop Lake
Louisville; even more important to
downstaters he knows the lake's name is
pronounced "Lewis-ville," not as the
Derby town in Kentucky is pronounced.
At first glance six-foot-six Jim
Thompson looks like a man who should
have played football, but much of his
growth came while he was in school
(Washington University, followed by
Northwestern University law school).
When he gets a chance, which isn't
often, he plays golf, but with a duffer's
status. He lives in an old Victorian
house which includes a white piano (he
used to be pretty good and still can play
a few songs from memory). His big
hobby is antiques. He was bitten by the
bug back in college days when a friend's
father introduced him to the hobby; it
got lost during Thompson's days as a
member of the Northwestern University law faculty and a stint as an assistant
state's attorney in Chicago.
Several tests lie ahead for Thompson.
He has a tendency to be candid in his
comments and less guarded in his dealings with the press than many
politicians. It isn't clear, until tested,
how he will react to the bitter infighting of politics, particularly when he
comes up against Dan Walker, an acknowledged master battler.