Chicago
By MILTON RAKOVE

Richie's rise

THE SOUND and fury of the recent March 18th primary election in Illinois is over and the voters of the state have returned to their normal activity of trying to make a living while coping with a ruinous, roaring inflation. The politicians have temporarily folded their tents and stolen away, not permanently, but temporarily, as they prepare for a new assault on the intelligence and tolerance of the citizenry in the upcoming fall election.

In Chicago, it is a time for surcease from political activity and for a reading of the tea leaves left in the cups of the winners and losers of that primary election.

Who are the political winners and losers on the local political scene after the voters spoke their piece on March 18th?

On the Republican side of the political fence the big loser, of course, is Attorney General William J. Scott, who once was able to carry Chicago against a Democratic opponent, but who barely beat an unknown downstate Republican politician, Lt. Gov. Dave O'Neal, in the city, and broke even with him in the Republican suburbs.

Gov. James R. Thompson was another big loser. He aroused the fury of Republican voters in the suburbs over his support of the blind primary delegate ballot, which made it almost impossible for staunch Republican voters to identify the Reagan delegates. At the same time, crossover Democrats were aided in identifying Anderson delegates because the Chicago Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune printed lists of those worthies and because sample ballots were passed out at suburban polling places by liberal Republican and independent Democratic Anderson supporters. That fury may come back to haunt Thompson the next time he attempts to assert leadership over his party in Cook County. And Thompson's troubles were exacerbated by the collapse of his strategy of flirting with John Connally, and then George Bush, both of whom were irrelevant to the John Anderson/Ronald Reagan major contest.

Anderson, too, was a Republican loser in Cook County, even though he carried the city heavily and the suburbs substantially over Reagan. It was clear that his major strength in Cook County came from crossover Democrats and independents who were not normally Republican voters and who would go back to their own party or independent status, after having participated in the Republican primary this year. The true believers, Republicans who supported Reagan, will not forget Anderson's appeal to those constituencies and will not forgive his attempt to corrupt their party with the unbelievers.

The Republican winners, Reagan and O'Neal, will probably wind up losers in the fall election in Chicago and its Cook County suburbs. The Democratic and independent crossovers will support Alan Dixon and President Jimmy Carter rather than O'Neal and Reagan, and Scott and Anderson Republicans will withhold support for a relatively unknown downstater (O'Neal) and a too far right Republican (Reagan), even if they cannot bring themselves to vote for Carter.

On the Democratic side of the spectrum, Sen. Edward Kennedy was a big loser in both Chicago and its Cook County suburbs. He not only lost the city by two to one to President Carter, but he proved weakest in the city's ethnic Catholic wards where his strategists had once assumed he would have a built-in power base. They did not understand that Kennedy was the wrong kind of Catholic for Chicago's conservative ethnic Catholic community — too liberal on social issues, too strong on civil rights and the benefits of the welfare state, too strong on abortion, and unable to surmount the Chappaquidick legacy. And, in Chicago and its suburbs, Jewish Democrats who were furious at Carter over the American vote in the United Nations on Israel, and liberal Democrats disillusioned with Carter, opted for Anderson rather than Kennedy, despite his liberal voting record in the Senate.

Another Democratic loser in Chicago was Alderman Edward Burke, the Democratic organization's candidate for Cook County state's attorney, who lost to state Sen. Richard M. Daley. Burke, who at age 37, has been an alderman and ward committeeman for 13 years, and a power in the city council, lost the suburbs by a seven-to-three margin to Daley and lost the city by a three-to-two margin. He carried only nine wards, including his own, a block of Northwest Side wards, and two West Side old machine wards. Burke has suffered a political body blow from which it will take him years to recover. And Burke's strongest ally, Alderman Edward Vrdolyak, could not deliver his ward for Burke and has also suffered a loss of prestige and potential power.

The biggest loser in Chicago was Mayor Jane Byrne, who forced the unwilling Democratic organization to back Kennedy against Carter, and who organized the Burke candidacy against Sen. Daley. Byrne suffered a resounding defeat with the public which bodes ill for her future ability to govern the city and control the machine. There was clearly a substantial anti-Byrne sentiment in the city (and in the suburbs) that rubbed off on both Kennedy and Burke. And Mayor Byrne compounded her political losses by denying any responsibility for the Kennedy/Burke candidacies, a move which has not slowed her continuing popularity slide.

President Carter emerged from the primary as a big winner over Kennedy, but he still has problems in Illinois. His support in Chicago and its suburbs was broad, but not deep. He can surely beat Reagan in the city and probably in the suburbs in November. But continuing inflation and possible economic recession could reduce his margin

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Richie's rise

enough to enable Reagan to carry the state in the fall election.

The big winner in Chicago and Cook County was Richard M. Daley (Richie as he is coming to be familiarly known by the public). He has clearly come out from under his father's shadow, has established his own image and political personality, a kind of Colombo-like authenticity. He projects sincerity, and a social conscience reflected in his legislative record. He is on good terms with the blacks and Latinos, acceptable to the liberals, and strongly rooted in and representative of Chicago's ethnic Catholic community. He will be a formidable opponent for Republican incumbent State's Attorney Bernard Carey and will probably beat him in November. Once in that office, he will be the focal point of the opposition to Mayor Byrne and is a likely opponent to her in the 1983 Democratic mayoral primary.

As for the Democratic machine in Cook County, it has suffered some losses, but they are generally peripheral to its major interests in the city. There are once again the pundits who claim that the machine has suffered a catastrophic defeat, but that is probably not true. It has lost a battle, not a war. The major loss was Byrne's, not the machine's. It can survive, wounded but resilient, capable of absorbing its defeats, and biding its time as Byrne's power and popularity decline and Richie Daley's increases. Forever flexible, if not opportunistic, it is ready to move in either direction and can probably sustain itself until the voters are more quiescent and have reverted to their normal apathy and acquiescence to the machine.

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