By CHARLES B. CLEVELAND

Chicago

Chicago
Daley not unique in city's history; 'Big Bill' and Cermak dominant bosses

WHEN Richard J. Daley collapsed and died just before last Christmas, it had a special impact on the people of Chicago. Many had known no other man as mayor during their lifetime. The 1968 national convention and Mike Royko's book had placed a special stamp on "Da Mare" — Boss of Chicago,

It took most people some time to accustom to the fact that there was no longer a Mayor Daley — just as many of us keep right on using the old year's number well into the following year. But, as the scramble for Daley's two jobs — chairman of the Cook County Democratic party and mayor of Chicago — began, so did perspective. Mayor Daley had been unique in terms of years — he served longer (1955 to 1976) as mayor than any man before (or probably in the future).

But he was not the first boss of Chicago and, it can be argued, he may not have been the most powerful. In fact throughout its history, Chicago has always had political bosses. Roger Sullivan came into prominence in the 1880's and was a big wheel until 1920 when he died; George Brennan followed him but it was a Republican — Big Bill Thompson — who ran the city in the 1920's with an assist from Gangster Al Capone.

The first boss, in the sense of dominating both politics and the city, was Anton J. Cermak, father-in-law of the late Gov. Otto Kerner. Cermak was a Bohemian, born in Kladno, a small town about 50 miles from Prague. When he was a year old his parents moved to Illinois and his father became a coal miner in Braidwood, a town about 45 miles southwest of Chicago.

George Brennan, a Democratic leader, had been a school teacher in Cermak's downstate hometown of Braidwood and political mythology had Cermak one of his students. In reality Cermak got into politics by his ability to organize his Bohemian neighbors into a potent political force.

He had a shaky start. At a district convention he won nomination by a single vote, but then he was on his way. He was elected a member of the Illinois General Assembly and for the next 16 years climbed the political ladder as alderman and bailiff of the Municipal Court.

He organized the first Tammany Hall type organization of its kind in Chicago — the Bailiffs' Benevolent Association. In the hard times of 1912 and 1913 Cermak's job as bailiff was to evict families for failure to pay rent. He did, but through his association, he usually quickly found them another apartment (and another family vote was assured for the next election).

In those days there was a major debate over the sale of liquor. Cermak was an out-and-out "wet" — a champion of the right to drink in beer gardens. His views were popular among foreign born to whom the right to drink beer was traditional. When the "drys" succeeded in passing a national act prohibiting the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages in 1920, Cermak gained even more favor among those who sought to repeal this unpopular law.

In 1918 Cermak lost his first election; he was beaten for sheriff by a mere 1,300 votes. (By a coincidence Mayor Daley's only personal defeat was for sheriff and he too had his political start in Springfield with the state legislature.)

Cermak got back into political power without much delay; a year later he was back in Chicago's City Council and in 1922 was elected president of the Cook County Board of Commissioners. (This is the job from which George Dunne operated to succeed Daley as party chairman.) It was also the job which was Cermak's power base to become party boss on the death of George Brennan.

Cook County is managed by a group of commissioners, some elected from the city of Chicago only, the balance from the suburban area around the city. Its president is elected countywide and has great powers and control over extensive jobs and contracts; but the county presidency has always been overshadowed in the minds of the public by the office of mayor.

Chicago's City Hall and Cook County's County Building are a single structure with the city offices occupying the west portion, the county the east. At the time Cermak, a Democrat, headed the county government, it was Thompson, a Republican, who ran the city.

It was Thompson who gave Chicago its reputation as a wide open town. He campaigned by threatening to punch King George of England "in the snoot" and warned he'd fire any policeman caught doing his job of searching a citizen for an illegal bottle of whisky.

Thompson's was one of three pictures that hung on the Lexington Hotel wall of the headquarters of Al Capone and his thugs, who helped Thompson more than once win elections and control the city's politics.

But, in 1931, the public got tired of Thompson and the Republican party. It was just before the big political upheaval of the 1930's which put Republicans out of office across the country and produced the landslide victories of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Democratic party. Cermak was just ahead of that sweep — he was mayor of Chicago, leader of the Democratic party, and the city's first all powerful boss. But he made a mistake when he backed the wrong man for the Democratic nomination for President.

Read next month's column for more on Chicago's bosses.

30 / March 1977 / Illinois Issues


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