William A. Redmond Memoir - Illinois Digital Archives

University of Illinois at Springfield 

Norris L Brookens Library 

Archives/Special Collections 

William A. Redmond Memoir 

R248. Redmond, William A. (1908-1992) 

Interview and memoir 

30 tapes, 1260 mins., 2 vols., 300 pp., plus index 

ILLINOIS GENERAL ASSEMBLY ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM 

Redmond, Democratic member of the Illinois House of Representatives 1959-81, 

discusses his years in the Illinois General Assembly: work on conservation, mass 

transit, education, crime and corrections legislation; appropriations; various 

Illinois Governors, and his retirement. Also discusses his life before the assembly: 

family, work as a photography model, law school and practice, and Du Page 

County politics. Also recalls his work at the Prisoner Review Board and in 

DuPage County and Illinois politics after his retirement. 

Interview by Lee Nicholson, 1982 

OPEN 

See collateral file: interviewer's notes and photos. 

Archives/Special Collections LIB 144 

University of Illinois at Springfield 

One University Plaza, MS BRK 140 

Springfield IL 62703-5407 

© 1982, University of Illinois Board of Trustees

C 

1 

1 

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WILLIAM A. REDMOND 

MEMOIR VOLUME I 

I 

PREPARED FOR THE ILLINOIS LEGISLATIVE RESEARCH UNIT 

BY THE ORAL HISTORY OFFICE. LEGISLATIVE STUDIES CENTER OF SANGAMON STATE UNIVERSITY 

SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS 

1986 

William A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

JOINT COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATIVE SUPPORT SERVICES 

Sen. Philip J. Rock, Oak Park Rep. Michael J. Madigan, Chicago 

President of the Senate Speaker of the House 

Sen. James "Pate" Philip, Elmhurst Rep. Lee A. Daniels, Elmhurst 

Senate Minority Leader House Minority Leader 

LEGISLATIVE RESEARCH UNIT 

222 S. College, Third Floor, Suite A, Springfield, Illinois 62704 

Co-Chairmen 

Sen. Jack Schaffer, Crystal Lake 

Rep. Sam W. Wolf, Granite City 

Senators Representatives 

John A. D'Arco, Chicago Loleta A. Didrickson, Flossmoor 

Walter W. Dudycz, Chicago James M. Kirkland, Elgin 

William F. Mahar, Homewood Robert LeFlore, Jr., Chicago 

William A. Marovitz, Chicago Charles L. Pangle, Bradley 

George E. Sangmeister, Mokena Michael J. Tate, Decatur 

Jack Schaffer, Crystal Lake Sam W. Wolf, Granite City 

Terry Bruce, Olney 

U.S. Congressman 

19th District 


ADVISORY COMMITTEE 

Cullom Davis, Director, Oral History 

Office and Professor of History, 

Sangamon State University 

William L. Day, Former Director, 

Illinois Legislative Council; 

Editor Emeritus, Illinois Issues 

David Everson, Professor of Political Studies 

and Public Affairs, Sangamon State University 

Gerald L. Gherardini, Associate Director 

Legislative Research Unit 

Samuel K. Gove, Professor 

Institute of Government and Public Affairs, 

University of Illinois (Former Director) 

H. William Hey, Former Director 

Illinois Legislative Council; 

Sangarnon State University 

Patrick O'Grady, Executive Director 

Legislative Research Unit 

Dan Holt, Field Service Supervisor, 

State Historical Library; 

Adjunct Professor of History, 


Robert P. Howard, Former Statehouse Reporter 

for Chicago Tribune; Author, Illinois: A 

History of the Prairie State 

Margaret Munn, Former Branch Chief 

Department of Mental Health 

J. Glenn Schneider. Former State Representative 

(0-Naperville), and Social Studies Teacher, 

Naperville North High School 

Jack Van Der Slik, Director 

Legislative Studies Center and 

Professor of Political Science, 



ILLINOIS GENERAL ASSEMBLY 

ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM 

PREVIOUS TITLES IN SERIES 

Martin B. Lohmann Memoir, 1 vol. (1980) 

Bernice T. Van Der Vries Memoir, 3 vols. (1980) 

Walter J. Reum Memoir, 2 vols. (1980) 

Thomas A. McGloon Memoir, 2 vols. (1981) 

John W. Fribley Memoir, 2 vols. (1981) 

Charles W. Clabaugh Memoir, 2 vols. (1982) 

Cecil A. Partee Memoir, 2 vols. (1982) 

Elbert S. Smith Memoir, 2 vols, (1982) 

Frances L. Dawson Memoir, 2 vols. (1982) 

Robert W. McCarthy Memoir, 2 vols. (1983) 

John C. Parkhurst Memoir, 2 vols. (1984) 

Corneal A. pavis Memoir, 2 vols. (1984) 

Cumulative Index, 1980-1984 

Edward P. Saltiel Memoir, 1 vol. (1985) 


Preface 

This oral history of William A. Redmond's service in the Illinois House of Representatives 

is a product of the Illinois Legislative Research Unit's General Assembly Oral History 

Program. The oral history technique adds a distinctive new dimension to the unit's statu- 

tory responsibility for performing research and collecting information concerning the govern- 

ment of the state. 

William A. Redmond was born in Chicago, Illinois, on November 25, 1908. The story of his 

youth exemplifies near-West Side Chicago life in the early part of the 20th Century. His 

discussion of his childhood career as a photography model is most interesting. After 

completing an engineering degree at Marquette University, he attained his law degree at 

Northwestern University in 1934. 

After brief experience with a southern Illinois law firm he returned to Chicago to join the 

law firm of Loesch, Scofield, Loesch and Burke. He continued with that firm, primarily 

representing the Pennsylvania Railroad in injury cases, until enlistment in the navy duqing 

World War 11. During the period 1942 to 1945, he served first in naval intelligence and then 

as a naval security officer. Shortly after enlistment, he married Rita Riordan. 

Returning to his law career after the war, Mr. Redmond established a private law pracltice 

first in Bensan then in Bensenville. Having become a confirmed Democrat through depres- 

sion years experience, he espoused the cause of the Democrats in Du Page County. His first 

venture for office was an unsuccessful bid in 1948 for stab's attorney; his second, also unsuc- 

cessful, a bid in 1950 for county judge. He found his niche in the predominantly Republican 

county when he ran for the Illinois House of Representatives in 1958 and continued to hold 

this seat until his retirement in 1983. 

Mr. Redmond's major legislative achievements were in the fields of conservation, mass tran- 

sit, education and crime and corrections. These were attained primarily before his suoces- 

sion to the house speakership in 1971. His discussion of his experiences as Speaker for 

terms is most informative. He contiaued his public service as a member of the 

oner Review Board after his retirement from the house in 1975. The 

service bears out his continuing concern in the crime and corrections field. 

Readers of this oral history should bear in mind that it is a 

word. Its informal, conversational style represents a deliberate attempt to encourage candor 

and to tap the narrator's memory. However, persons interested in listening to the tapes 

should understand that editorial considerations produced a text that differs somewhat from 

the original recordings. Both the recordings and this transcript should be regarded as a 

primary historical source, as no effort was made to correct or challenge the narrator. 


Neither the Illinois Legislative Research Unit nor Sangamon State University is responsible 

for the factual accuracy of the memoir, nor for the views expressed therein; these are for 

the reader to judge. 

The tape recorded interviews were conducted by Lee Nicholson during the summer and fall 

of 1982. Pat Grider and Julie Allen transcribed the tapes and, after the transcriptions were 

edited by Horace Waggoner and reviewed by Mr. Redrnond, Allen prepared the 

typescript. Florence Hardin compiled the index. The Chicago Tribune provided valuable 

assistance in the research effort. 

This oral history may be read, quoted and cited freely. It may not be reproduced in whole 

or in part by any means, electronic or mechanical, without written permission from the Illi- 

nois Legislative Research Unit, Room 107, Stratton Building, Springfield, Illinois, 62706. 


Table of Contents 

Preface ................................................................................................................................................... v 

The Years Before ............................................................................................................................... 1 

Family background - Austin - Grade school - Photography model - Grade 

d~ml - High school - Marquette University - Northwestern Law School - 

Young Democrats - Law practice - U. S. Navy - Marriage - Du Page 

County politics - State's attorney race - Judgeship race 

The General Assembly Years ............*......................... . ........................................ 70 

Campaigning - Election - Getting started - Conservation legislation - Paul 

Powell - Mucation legislation - Transportation legislatiom- Civil rights 

legidation - Environmental legislation - Revenue issues - Appropriations 

procedures - Judicial reform - Reapportionment - Personalities - Richard 

Daley - Speaker - Dan Walker - Legislative reform - Crime and correc- 

tions legislation - James Thompson - retirement 

Theyears After ................................................................................................................................... 282 

Prisoner Review Board - Crime and corrections issues - Du Page County 

politics - Future of Illinois 

Index ....................................................................................................................................................... 293 

William A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS 

vii

William A. Redmond 

My mother was a beautiful woman, again a;ery gentle person. Her father was in the house- 

moving business, very prominent in the house-moving business, There was an article in one 

of the magazine sections in one of the Chicago newspapers very recently in which they 

showed moving Our Lady of Lourdes Church across Ashland Avenue. Well they didn't 

attribute that to any housemover, but that was my grandfather that was moving that. And 

it was quite a big structure and they used to always brag that they never even cracked the 

plaster in moving it across. 

He was born in Ireland . . . that is my mother's father. My mother's mother was born in 

Chicago. Her name was Barry, my mother's maiden name as I said was Crowe. And he 

worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad for a total of fifty-three years. And then I guess I 

am following in his footsteps, because when he left there he went to work for the City 

National Bank. (chuckles) And he worked another six or seven years. And I don't 

think - God, he was eighty before he actually retired, maybe a little more than that. So 

we come from a family that as long as we are able to draw a breath we like to work. 

And they had a long life together, because as I say they died within six months of each 

other in the middle 1950's. 

Q: Did you have any other brothers or sisters? 

A: I had one sister - she was nineteen months older than f am. She lived - well she 

only died here a few years back. Then I had one other sister who died in infancy. The 

sister who lived, name was Gertrude, which was my mother's name. My mother's name 

was Gertrude and the other child that - was about three when she died of scarlet fever, 

her name was Louise. She died as a young - a very young - child. 

Q: Did you know all of your grandparents? 

A: I knew my father% hother. I never knew my father's father. Her name was Mary 

Manion. She was born in Clifton, Galway, in Ireland. His father was a farmer and was 

killed when a tree fell on him. He was quite young at the time. He also was born in Ire- 

land, but I never knew him. I knew my mother's mother slightly. Her name was Maria 

Barry, but I never knew my mother's father, he was deceased. 

My father's father's name was Nicholas, which is kind of a strange name for an Irish family, 

but there evidently - I saw in the Chicago Board of Health one time there was a fellow 

sitting at the desk, John N. Redmond, and I said, "I'll bet I can tell you your middle 

name." And he said, "What is it?" And I said, "Nicholas," and it was. I don't know where 

that name came from, but it is really kind of an odd name for an Irish family, but evidently 

there was a Nicholas in there. 

My mother is a high school graduate which is quite unusual for somebody in her years. 

Q: How did she achieve that? Was her family fairly well-to-do? 

A: They were well-to-do. They had the first indoor plumbing on the near west side of 

Chicago. They lived on Grand Avenue about Laman. They were pretty-well fixed. Not, 

you know, not like the Armours, the Swifts or the Ryan O'Neilly's. But it would be coneid- 

ered, you know, middle class reasonably successful Irish family. 

Q: Did they own that house-moving business? 

A: My grandfather owned it, and then when he died two of his oldest brothers, John and 

Albert, not brothers but sons, took over the business. John and Albert Crowe and they con- 

tinued the business under the name of Crowe Brothers. It is no longer in existence. I don't 

think there is anybody left who could run the business. One of their progeny is a priest 


and.. . . two of the boys are deceased and there is nobody to run the - its defunct 

now. And I syppose like housemoving, I don't suppse there 'is that much of h 

anymore. 14:s like livery stable, I think it is all gone. (c%uckles) 

. + 

Q: Did your father talk much about his experiences of growing up in Ontario? 

A: Well not a &reat h l. You knov~, what happens awupd a farm? hlly not very mucb 

of onythiag. ,.I spent. 41 my summers as a very young boy down on my grandmother's far* 

in Canadp. &at be never said a great deal about it. Re left there pretty young, I canft 

tell you for sure how young he was, but he was pretty young. 

He had another brother by the name John Nicholas who came to Chicago ahead of him. A d 

a brother Lawrence who stayed back in Canada who also did quite young. The life. spa 

was not very old back in those days. And the oldest boy was named Thomas, See whep 

his father died why he stayed on and took care of his mother and helped raise the young* 

family, whiib ww customary in those days. He helped raise my dad and John and the 

were three girls, Mary, Bridget and Elizabeth. 9" I 

It was a 'rare household that didn't have at least two generations and many of them hi& 

three, thdy dl toDk care of their own old folks. There was no nursing homes. You 9 

care of y& people. 

I 

It was .bii - a lot of people living there. My father's uncle lived there, his name was Pat- 

ri* Redknd. He stayed there and helped his sister-in-law with the - raising the you* 

family. I knew my father's folks a lot better than I knew my mother's folks. 

Q: Beeaurie you'd spend the summers there? ! i 

A: Beeause I spent the summers there. I used to like the farm in the summertime, arld 

I used tcr 6ped the summers there, 

Q: Can y9u demibe that farm to me a little bit? 

A: Oh boy. (chuckles) By today's - by Illinois standards, .it would be pretiy 

sDdfcm&en,z, They had a lot of acreage, but it was mostly sand dunes and cedar trees. And 

d course the season in Canada was so short. You know about the only crop matured I guejs 

would be, well, hay, and oats if they were lucky. Of course a lot of it was handwork. They 

didn't have the sophistica,ted .machinery that we have May. And . . , corn wouldn't really 

ripen and they never planted wheat, I don't know why, but they didn't. Their crops were 

primarily oab and bay. And I would say that they had - I don't know why my unc e 

f I 

bought eqery-fm that - that was available. You bow, aeross the way there was a frf 

a c r e s ~ h that, ~ : asd ~ there would be another sewty-five acres - 

$: 

I think their hol - 

bg~ were probably three hundred and Afty or four hundred acres, but it was pretty 

Imd. 

They &W _probably fourteen or fifteen head of cattle by hand. They used to take tSe 

milk to the local cheese factory Wteen miles away. Ad that is where they disposed of th4r 

qilk, but I suppcwe that was probably their big cash crop. 

i'i here in SpriIlpBeld, they have the farmer's market. Well they used to have a - 

f~~mt&d go inb tawn, a little - the nearest town was I think called Prescott. I 

dwr% ~IHW? bw Mntly they'd go ia but they'd go in and sell chickens, ducks, whatever 

they might-hasye to sell, If ycm didn't Bell them all in the marketplace, why, they'd go door- 

~ ~ wthem. d l My mamother did that. She was very short but very sturdy 

becrPse & & id lot of h& work when her husband died. The main responsibility 

of raising the family was on her- 


.

She was very kindly and - you know it used to be - for instance there would be a death 

in the family, customarily the neighbors would come in and clean the house and prepare 

meals and all that, because farmers from miles around would come to attend the 

funeral. And when grandma died, she had by those standards a - this is an old Irish mea- 

surement, I guess - but a big funeral is an indication of a successful life, (chuckles) 

She was very loved. I mean she was a wonderful woman. I have pictures of her. She had 

a spinning wheel, she used to make yarn out of wool and she knit socks for all of the young 

folks and mittens for everybody. The old steel needles, you know four needles, that she 

could run up a pair of mittens without even watching. But she was bedridden for about 

twelve years. 

But those are very happy memories of the farm. 

Q: How old were you when you first started going up there? 

A: Gosh, I don't know, awfully young. 

Q: About five, six . . . 

A: Yes. I may have gone - they may have taken me down there as a smaller child. But 

five or six. My dad being a railroad man, I had passes. Of course my mother used to take 

the two of us down there. She'd spend summer with us, Well until I was in high school, 

then of course you had to get about your father's business and get jobs and that sort of 

thing. But I went down, I would say I was there at least every year until - you know 

it's hard to remember when - you know when they died. I was a pretty good sized fellow 

when my grandmother died. 

Then I still went down there pretty nearly every year to see my aunts, and I had a cousin 

who was very dear to me, her name was Mary Sweeney. (pause) I don't mean to suggest 

that I, you know, that I wasn't real friendly with my mother's people. It just happened 

that - that - you know, they had the farm and my grandmother, my maternal grand- 

mother, died when I was really very young. But I have some cousins on my mother's side 

that I have been very close to. 

Q: It's just when you spend an entire summer with somebody, you really get to know 

them . . . 

A: Well, yes, yes. See most of those people haven't been married. They were unmarried 

women and unmarried men and I was - my sister and I were really the only kids in the 

family. That wasn't the situation with my mother's people. Most of her siblings did have 

children, so it was a different kind of arrangement all together. I was really kind of a stand- 

in children for the rest of the - the rest of the Redmond clan. I mean me and my sister. 

Q: What are your earliest recollections of the Logan Square area where you grew up? 

A: Very very meager, I left there as a young kid. And then we moved back to my mother's 

home. And this is pretty skimpy, I - my guess is that we did it in order for my mother 

to take care of my grandmother. That would be - but I wasn't very old when she 

died. And that was on Grand Avenue, near Ashland. And I was still pretty young when 

we left that and went out to the Austin area. We went to the Austin area before I ever 

went to school. I started in school in Austin. And my sister, oh, she was a little - a year 

ahead of me in school, she also started to school in Austin. It was all preschool when we 

were on Grand Avenue. 

Q: When you moved to Austin, did you move to a new home or . . . 


A: Web it &s a home that had bees moved by my - my uncles. The Austin High 

was expanding and building and they had to move. They had bought the land across 

~t"reet and there was some houses on there and the home that we ultimately lived in 

moved down there by my uncles. It was quite a big home. I don't know, it had four 

rooms and stood high - high ceilings and was a very big and a very nice house. 

Q: Would that ke comidered sort of a - a step up for your family? When they 

it that way. 

5 

A: Oh yes. That was a nicer neighborhood than - than down where the house-mov/ng 

business was. That was kind of a, you know, older neighborhood. And they had, you know, 

the power was furnished by horses at that time and we had a stable and the horses in the 

stable. Oh, yes, that was a fine neighborhood. Austin, at that time was a - streets 

weren't paved. I think the sidewalks were in, but I am not sure about that. But I know 

the streets weren't paved and the alleys weren't paved. And it was really . . . kin4 of 

country. (chuckles) 

Q: So you had some open lands around you too probably? 

A: Quite a bit, quite a bit, yes. A strange thing, across the street from us there was a real 

big home. The subdivision in which we lived was known as Crafts Addition to 

Austin. Crdts was a very wealthy real estate man. And I didn't know it, obviously at %the 

time this all happened many years before that, he had also been Speaker, Democratic 

Speaker of the Illinois House. Clayton Crafts is his name. I knew him when he was quite 

an older man. Probably knew him more to see than to talk to. But that was kind of funny 

they had two Speakers living across the street from each other. Likelihood of that I think 

would be pretty . . . and I had always assumed he was Republican, because he was so 

rich. (laughter) I always thought Democrats were poor. I mean I don't remember bow 

many terms he had, but I never - you know that is long before I was involved in 

politics. And I walked into the Speaker's corridor and saw Clayton E. Crafts and then I 

remember. 

Q: Deja rm (pause) Coming from an Irish household like that, were there . . . I don't ow 

how to put the question to you exactly, but was it obvious that you were an %ah 

household? Were there any favorite words, views, or anything like that? 

A: No, my parents were, you know, remote from that. I didn't know my mother's mather 

that well to how - of course she was born in Chicago and her father was deceased, so 

I don't know. My father's mother had quite a brogue. But I only spent vacations down 

there. No we were not - you know they didn't do the jigs and they didn't, you know, sing 

all the Irish songs and. . . . One generation removed from that. 

Q: I guess I should ask you - well let me go back to my notes here. Were you baptized 

at St. Sylvester's then? 

A: Yes, St. Sylvester's. 

t 

$: Did @& fub stay with that church then as you moved or did you move into a diff rent 

pari~h? 

A: Oh no, we were in St. Columbkille's parish, which is one of the old old parishes in Chicago, 

ColumbP113le was an Irish saint. That was just incidental. (chuckles) But that church has 

since been destroyed, because the neighborhood has changed pretty significantly. 

Q: But that wasn't the Austin area? 

A: No that was Grand Avenue. 


Q: Grand Avenue. 

A: The church where I went to grammar school and - and a - was St. Thomas 

huinas. That was in Austin. 

Q: I think you mentioned right at the start about you never heard any family discord, any 

harsh words between your parents. What sort of family experiences did you have in the 

course of a routine day? Did you all take your meals together? 

A: Evening meal always together. Then of course my father would be working in the 

Loop. My sister and I used to walk home for lunch when we were in grammar school. But 

when we once got to high school, why, I went to school closer to the heart of the city. I 

went to a school called St. Ignatius High School. Which was down closer to the Loop and 

my sister went out to River Forest. So there was no lunch once we got into high 

school. But the evening meal was always together. Sunday the big meal was at 

noon. Then you know the usual holidays, Thanksgiving, Christmas and. . . . When I see 

by today's standards how we eat out so much, eating out was almost unheard of in our 

family. Every once in a while my mother used to love to eat out and get away from the 

chore of getting the meal, but we didn't do it that often. It wasn't customary then. 

Q: On those rare occasions when you did eat out, did you and your sister go with your par- 

ents? 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: Can you remember any of the places she liked to go? 

A: Not particularly, just the restaurants, no great - no gourmet places, no Bennet Cerf's, 

or any of that stuff. 

Q: Did you have a regular schedule for visiting, you know with relatives or family friends? 

A: My mother's brother used to come down. Uncle John came down very frequently. He 

lived within walking distance. And my mother always was very fond of a sister-in-law that 

lived out in St. Charles. And mother used to go out there very frequently. And we were 

quite close to the two girls that were born of that union. Lenore and Elizabeth Crowe was 

their names. We were very close. And I think - you see my Uncle John's - he had a 

boy who is now a priest and we were pretty close to him. But his elder children were quite 

a bit older than we were. But we used to go down and see John and his wife pretty often. 

Q: Did your parents have any favorite leisure time activities? 

A: Work. My dad in his later years decided to play golf. I don't think he ever played until 

he was seventy. I don't think he did anyway. And then he used to love to play golf. He 

used to play golf - I think it was every Sunday. He and another fellow that worked with 

him by the name of Ira Richie, who was about his contemporary. 

My dad liked to play cards. He . . . he played you know small stakes, nothing very 

much. And then there was an old Irish game called Forty-five. It's a strange kind of a 

game that nine people play and there's three sets of three. I mean you have - everybody 

has two partners. It's the highest in red and the lowest in black, in other words diamonds 

and hearts the high cards were high and clubs and spades the low cards were high. And 

dad used to like to play that. They played that in the church, I know, one night a week, 

Dad, he was - he really was a better cardplayer than - my mother couldn't stand it. She 

didn't object to him playing, but she didn't want to play cards. My sister was a - a better 

cardplayer, but I never cared much for it. 


But aide from dad's golf - and his gardening. He always had a garden. Probably the 

best dressed gardener - he always wore a high stiff collar, not the celluloid one, a high 

stiff collar. He never loosened his tie or anything> when he gardened. (chuckles) Very 

much the gentleman. He used to walk down the alley and look at the neighbors' gardens 

and see if they compared with his. He always - he came home on the Northwestern Rvlroad, 

which is about a five-block walk. He always looked to see how the neighbors' gardens 

were. . . . But I guess that was dad and - his cards and his golf. Mother was pretty m ch 

a home girl, she didn't, you know, she liked her family and lived for the family. ? I 

Q: Do you remember any of your dad's favorite garden crops? Anything that he was 

ularly proud of? I 

A: The usual stuff. Tomatoes I suppose, were the main thing and lettuce. Nothing exotic. 

Q: Did he dress that well around the house too, if he were going to sit down and read the 

i 

newspaper? 

i 

A: Oh yes, dzrd never loosened his collar. (chuckles) i 

Q: Well, how did you dress around the house then? I 

A: How did I? I 

Q: Yes. 

A: Well, I - I wasn't as neat as my father. I was pretty active in athletics and all @at 

sort of =tKmg, so I - I was always more comfortable in some kind of a jersey or an o n 

erhirt. 1 got a job delivering special delivery letters when I was - I think the earliest g. ou 

could get that job was when you were sixteen, and I got it pretty early and I did it ifor 

six years. And I used to deliver them by bicycle. So I worked Saturdays and 

Sundays. And then that job also gave me summer employment and employment during the 

Christmas holidays. So I was pretty busy. 

When I went away to school, being a railroad man, I had passes, you know I went to school 

at Marquette in Milwaukee, and I used to be able to come home. I could work on Saturday 

and Sunday for four years when I was in college. I made pretty good money then. Prior 

to that I - you know arr a real young kid - I used to go to a truck garden, which wasn't 

far from home, and buy vegetables and buy flowers and then go dm-to-doar and sell t em 

to - we would buy them cheap and sell them cheap. (chuckles) Never made m ch 

1: 

money. But I was alwayg working, I never had a newspaper run though. I was a1 ys 

working. 

SESSION 1, TAPE 1, SIDE 2 

Q: At what age would you have started with the flowem and vegetables door-to-door? 

A: Oh, ei@S -nine, ten, something like that, pretty young. 

Q: Now that truck gardening was in the Austin area? 

A: The Auatiq area, yes. On the south side of Madison Street at Bloomington. Long since 

built up. I. don't reinernbar - I was in grammar school when Austin High School, which 

was right dawn the block from me, had a course in agriculture, if you can believe it. 

they had some open fields about a mile and half or two miles from home. And they &: 

to have three horses that they stabled across the street from us and we used to walk gver 


4

to their farm. It was at Central and Roosevelt Road and then they would let us ride the 

horses back to the stables, back to the barn. And that was a great thrill to me. Of course 

they had all the harness and everything, you know it wasn't like riding in - its - its not 

what President Reagan did with the queen. (chuckles) But that was great excitment. We 

used to like that. 

Q: We should talk a little bit about your grade school, or elementary school, experiences. I 

don't know anything about the school you went to, the size of it, or . . . 

A: Well it was eight grades. It probably had, to the best of my memory, the sum of the 

seventh and eighth might be - together I suppose it was probably four hundred, four hun- 

dred and fifty pupils. That was a, you know, good sized Catholic school. I think my school- 

ing there was relatively uneventful. 

Q: Were there any subjects you particularly liked or disliked? 

A: I was probably better at math than I was anything else. But I was a fair student. I 

mean, you know, I . . . like most boys I guess I didn't work any harder than I had to. 

But I - I, you know, I never failed and was never held back, and I - I did pretty well, In 

the math I was better than most students. 

I didn't do an awful lot around the school itself, I lived at the extreme end of the parish 

and I used to go home. You know, I didn't play ball on the playgrounds and that sort of 

thing connected with the school. That was almost all the kids that lived right near the 

school. So I - I didn't compete or participate in any of the school athletic programs. But 

in the neighborhood I used to play. 

Q: What sort of sports did you participate in in the neighborhood? 

A: Everything in season. Football, baseball, basketball to some extent, but basketball out- 

doors is really not very good. And that's, you know, long before golf and tennis and those 

things were going strong. I would say primarily baseball and basketball. While I was in 

high school we had track there and we used to amuse ourselves by running track against 

each other, but not in competition representing the team. Then a little later, I can't just 

recall when it was, but a little bit later there was a public school about three or four blocks 

away and they had organized - there was a playground in connection with all those - and 

they had organized sixteen-inch fast-pitch softball and I played a lot of that. I probably 

played there three or four years. That was pretty good competition. 

Q: Did your parents encourage you a whole lot towards schoolwork? 

A: Yes. They did. They - my mother was very bright and had done very well in school 

herself and my father was . . . yes, they encouraged me. Then as much as my father was 

a farmboy, he had never really participated in athletics at all, so he - he didn't - he 

wasn't in a position to advise me or encourage me at all in athletics. Which got to be pretty 

important in my scheme of things. (chuckles) I suppose maybe a disproportion, remember- 

ing that I wasn't really very big I should have recognized that I had severe limitations in 

athletics. But I don't - you know, I liked it. I think I would have done differently if 

my father had been an athlete himself and had been able to, you know, guide me. But I 

didn't do too badly. 

Q: You mean he might have guided you toward different sports? 

A: Well for instance, you know, there are some things in baseball - for instance I wasted 

my time trying to pitch and catch when I didn't have the equipment. And there were some 

things that I could do better than that. And I think if somebody had recognized it, they 

could tell me to not waste my time on those things which I didn't do well. I could have 


played other positions, because I was a good hitter. You know I think if your father has 

been in athletics, he can help you. A lot more than . . . 

Q: Did you play hockey at all? 

A: No. 

Q: Did your parents have any objection to you playing in sports? 

A: Well they were always afraid you were going to get hurt, you know. (chuckles) They 

would be just as well satisified if I didn't I suppose, particularly football, because it is pretty 

rough. They didn't like me wrestling. I wrestled, in 1924 I think it was, and I won the 

city championship. It was pretty light weight, it was only a 105 pounds. I don't know how 

in the world my mother ever read it in the Sunday paper but she saw the results of the 

wrestling and she had a fit. (chuckles) I didn't say anything about it. I knew that she 

wouldn't like it. 

How in the world she ever saw it I still don't know. For her to be reading the sporting 

sheet, you know an obscure column about playground wrestling, how in the world she ever 

got that 1 don't know, but she found it. (chuckles) She didn't like that. 

And football is pretty rough you know. I played high school ball. They had a thing in 

Chicago they used to call Prairie Football, it was really a step up from high school. Seme 

of the better high school players played in it. But it was kind of unsupervised and you bow 

you didn't have good equipment and didn't have training and all that kind of stuff and you 

could get hurt in that. My father used to come and watch me play all the time. And I 

did get hurt one Sunday. He was slow in getting there and he didn't see it. I got knded 

out and I was alright by the time that he got there. (chuckles) But I think he would have 

really had a fit if he had seen that. 

Q: I don't know anything about the Prairie Football. Was that organized into leagues? 

A: Well, everybody did everything for themselves. I mean they used to get their teams and 

they would have raffles and get the - they never had full equipment but always had jerseys 

to match. And than you'd schedule games, the papers would have, you know, 

'Wanted. Game for 103-pound Team" or something. You know, you would fib a little 

bit. You'd have a pretty good-sized team and schedule the game with s 115-pound team 

and when they showed up there they were monsters. (chuckles) But they did a lot Of it 

themselves. It was pretty good football as a matter of fact. I had a lot of experiance, 

thwgbt that was great. 

Q: Were you in high school at the time you were playing with the Prairie Football? 

A: Y+ &.then d* that when I was at Marquette, I used to come home and play i . I 

don't lpm*v&athsr they ever had - I 

where are you from? 

Q: L. as w wound 

here. [Springfield, Illinois] I 

A: Did they have anything around here called Prairie Football? There wasn't a decent field 

that cEidn't have a football game on Sunday. 

Q: We had a semipro team here in Springlield for a number of years. But you are sayink - 

you weren't paid at all, right? 

A: Oh, I got paid in some of that stuff. Not a lot of money, but I - they used 

up a collection. They didn't charge any admission. You know it is hard to really be 

but I really was a pretty good football player. In spite of my siee I played fullback. 


un pretty good, I tied the city record in the fifty-yard dash. So the combination of being 

low to the ground and being fast, I wasn't a bad football - if I would have been bigger, 

I think I could probably have done something. But I wasn't big enough. 

I played basketball in high school. Never played heavyweights. I was still pretty light, 

around the one hundred and thirty's. But we won the league championship, they used to 

have weight divisions and we won the championships in two of the divisions. We had good 

teams. 

Q: You played high school football too? 

1 

A: Yes. I played - again they had a weight division - I played in the lightweights, 

because I only weighed one hundred and thirty-five pounds, but we won the championship. 

Q: Did you have any goals in mind at all? Did you think about trying to play professional 

football at all? 

A: It wasn't the thing in those days. You know people didn't do it. I wanted to go out 

for the football team at Marquette. And I went out and presented myself to the coach and 

he - he wasn't impressed with my size. I think I was a better player than he thought. I 

mean I think if he had given me a try - I - I don't know whether I would have made 

it, but I might possibly have. Marquette had some pretty good football teams. And I 

was - you know I was a little disappointed that I didn't have the opportunity, but on the 

other hand those guys were awful big. (chuckles) You know when I'd see some plays, I'd 

think, "Well maybe - maybe it's a salvation that they didn't - they didn't encourage me." 

But I was on the basketball squad at Marquette. (pause) I played against Notre Dame 

and Wisconsin. I wouldn't want to say that I was - certainly by today's standards, you 

know, all college basketball is great and of course Marquette is really way up there, I couldn't 

get a pair of shoelaces today. But it was fun, I was on the squad. And then I played profes- 

sional for the city of Milwaukee. 

Q: What position did you play? 

A: Guard. (pause) Again, bearing, you know, in mind that I was pretty short, that wasn't 

too bad. You know to get a suit in college and play proball. Then I played Knights of 

Columbus basketball which in Chicago used to be a big thing every Sunday. They had three 

divisions. One north, one south and one west, and I played in the west side. That was 

good basketball. I played with them for a couple years. Again not too sensational a league 

but enough to - to play, amuse myself. 

Then I also swam on a swimming team in high school. 

Q: Well. 

A: Just ordinary, but I got a tank suit. 

Q: So, but virtually any time during the year you were involved in some - some sporting 

activity? 

A: Yes. Some sports . . . I never could bowl. I never could play golf well. I never could 

shoot pool, terrible. k 

Q: Did all those sporting activities affect your home life at all? I mean you must have 

missed dinners for a lot of practice. 

A: Well I would, I would, but my folks were the best. You know when you're doing that 

William stuff, A. Redmond you are Memoir not in - any Archives/ mischief, Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

I've always been a great believer in athletics for kids. When my son came along, I encour- 

aged him too - he was a swimmer. He didn't do anything else, but he swam quite 

well. He swam on the high school team and he won a civic championship in his event which 

was the butterfly. Then he went down to Holy Cross and he swam for them. He swam 

againsrt MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology], Connecticut, and some of those 

others. He - as I say he wasn't you know like the swimmers at Indiana or Yale or some 

of those places, but. . . . I'm a great believer in, you know, I think it gives you confidence. 

I guess I mentioned earlier before that I wrestled at Marquette too. It was the 

intra~~urale. I had won city championship. And I used to always tease one of my pmfeswrs, 

up there about wrestling with him. And then when they put in this intramural program,-he 

said, "Well, now you've done so much talking, let's see you go in there." So . . . I 

had to go in. (chuckles) 

That'o when 1 wrestled a fellow who ultimately became famous, Joe McCarthy, the Senator 

from Wisconsin. I was a better wrestler than he was, but he was strong like a bull. Being 

a farm boy, baling hay and everything, and he really was a package. First time we wrdstled 

I - the equipment was not real good, had mats, floor mats, and they - he had us put them 

together and they could slide around a little bit and I got him in a hold and lifted hi@ up 

and normally you would slam him, and I was afraid that if I did that the mats might come 

part and he might get hurt. So the first bout was a draw. And after it was over, why, 

*e met over at the window, and he asked me, "Why didn't you slam me?" And I safd, "I 

was afraid - afraid I would have hurt you!' He said, "If I'da had you, I would :have 

slammed you." 

So the next night we had a rewrestle, and the next night I got the same hold - as I remem- 

ber I got tired out because I hadn't trained you know. (chuckles) The first time I got him 

in a hurry and then I got tired and couldn't hold him. But the next time, then pinned him 

in six seconds. I saw him with his wife one time at a football game and he introduced me 

to her. I was surprised that he turned out you know being such a curmudgeon became he 

was really a pretty nice guy in college. 

Q: Yw couldn't see any of all the fearfulness, the antagonism . . . 

A: Not as a young boy, he was nineteen or twenty at the time. He was a nice fellow. , 

1 

Q: How did you learn all these sports? Were you self-taught or you had some good co ches 

and . . . 

A: Primarily self-taught. I used to have a thing &led an Irish mail. I don't know w ther 

you ever saw om of those th'i, you'd sit on a seat, it's like, you know, you propel yourself 

by, you know, pulling back and forth on the - the same motion you would have if you were 

in a skull, Only this had four wheels and steered and I used to run that thing all over, And 

that gave me pretty big - see I've got pretty good-sized arms. And riding the bicycle as 

rnudqrrs I did, that gave me big legs. 

I - 1 dm't know. Now dm. anybody get athletic proficiency? I think you are bor with 

a cartah arrimuxrt of it. The opportunity to play I think has got a lot to do with it. $ here 

were ,kids that played basketball long before I did that really were better than I was. You 

know kids May get started pretty early. I never saw a basketbrrli until I got in high 

school. But we did everything, you know, in aeason, hardball, softball. 

I 

Q: Were there a lot of kids, you know, to do sports with . . . 

A: Oh yes. 

William A. Redmond Q: . . Memoir . in that - Archives/ Austin Special neighborhood? 

Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

A: Yes, a lot of them. Every block had a team. You know, you get your own team and 

chose up sides and challenge everybody around and there was always - that is all you had 

to do. There was no TV [television], and no radio. I can remember when automobiles were 

kind of a rarity. So that's what you did for excitment. 

It seemed to me that pretty - pretty nearly everybody participated in something. I think 

it's a great thing. I mean it gives you - even to this day I have a great interest in - not 

in competing but in watching. You know I'm interested in all of the sports, the basketball, 

football, and marvel at the skills of the current performers. It is just unbelievable they 

are so good. I think if you get that kind of an interest it is a pretty wholesome thing. I 

think you enjoy it as a spectator better if you have participated too, because I think you 

understand better. I don't see how anybody who has never played football could understand 

it. (chuckles) It's a crazy game. Did you play football? 

Q: I never played it officially for a school, just sort pf sandlot games. 

A: Well. 

Q: There is a lot of technique in this too. 

A: You played. 

Q: There are a lot of things, you know, the Dallas Cowboys do I could never . . . 

A: Well, who can? 

Q: . . . never conceive of. 

A: For instance, you know I used to go to the Bears all the time and just stand down - you 

know they played at Wrigley Field - and this guy'd throw the ball fifty and sixty yards 

and kick it a mile. Geez! They are just so great. Watch a basketball game and Dr. J and 

those guys, they're - they are just so good. 

Q: It is a marvel for sure. 

A: They really are. 

Q: Well I want to ask you a little bit more about your homelife too? Were there particular 

books or newspapers in the home that you picked up on at all? 

A: Well obviously I used to read the papers all the time. My father brought the evening 

papers, we didn't have a morning paper, he brought the evening papers home. The Daily 

News and an old favorite called the Journal that he used to always, you know - been out 

of print for a long time. And we had - we had books. I'll have to confess that I wasn't 

the most avid reader, because my spare time was you know pretty well taken up with playing 

ball and those things. But it was a very happy homelife. 

We never had any grass grow in the backyard until I was pretty well along because that - 

the foot of the stairs was homebase you know when we were little kids. And my folks 

always felt that, you know, they would rather have me playing ball with my friends and 

everything than chase me away some place and have a good lawn. So we were always wel- 

come there, and my friends were welcome there. 

And of course I had a dog, an Airedale, by the name of Tojo, named after the Emperor 

of Japan for some strange reason. 

Q: Did you pick that name yourself? 


13 

A: No, I was pretty small, somebody else did the picking. 

Q: Did you family go places together? Did you go inta the city very much to museums or 

shopping or anything like that? 

A: No, kind of homebodies. Outside of one of his odd card games, I don't ever remember 

my father going out at night. Pretty home-oriented. 

Q: (pause) Did you listen to the radio a lot or . . . i 

A: We were one of the first people with the crystal set. I'll never forget when - (here 

was a gym instructor at Austin High School, which was just down the street from me! and 

his son made crystal radios. I also had a little money of my own and I was all emited 

I wanted to buy this crystal set for five bucks. And my father poo-pooed the idea, he didn't 

think it was possible that there could be any such contraption. You know it was the cqstal 

set that k'ad the cat's whisker and you used to feel around for a spot on the crystal and 

about the only thing that was being broadcast was the opera. (chuckles) I don't know why 

we wanted a radio set to listen to the opera, but - we weren't - that w~n't 

our cubural 

taste. But my father and I bought one and we really were amazed that the thing would 

work. 

And then we used to - my mother had a cut-glass bowl and we got so - at first you know 

just had one set of earphones and only one perm could listen. So then we got a second 

set of earphones. We would put the four earphones in this - in this cut-glass bowl and 

it acted as kind of a loudspeaker. We would all just hug around and listen to "Aida" and 

"Carmen" and that's about all there was really. And then of course a little bit later "Amos 

and Andy" came on, And then all the heterodynes and the super-heterodynes and all that 

stuff came later. We were pretty early with the crystal set. 

(pause in interview to allow train to pass) 

Q: Who were some of your friends you had when you were grade school age or in early high 

~hool. 

A: Well see living as far away from the school as I did, most of my friends and assoqiates 

were not kids who went to schools with me. They were neighborhood kids who went 

local public school. There was probably one exception, there was a fellow by the name 

hely I saw here not too long ago. He lived down the block. He was a year 

I was. And then there was a kid on the next block, as it turned out he was 

name was Jack 

children. By 

boys. The .big 

had two pretty good-sized fellows, one held the incense and the other held the bowl in which 

the incease was hdd. One was Ray Landis. I can't remember the other one. 

Stanley Wden and - Ginger Golden - he and I were the little guys, the 

us& tp I d the procewion. I suppose that was - BQ and I went to high 

But t6an &re was a kid next door. a fellow named Ksssy, who turned out to be a detty 

good trackman for Austin High School, I think he won the city championship. And on the 

other side, there was some people, a family by the name of Bond who also went to the public 

schoola. Those were - then the Westerly, Don Westergreen . . . George Owens. They 

were neighborhood, There were two separate ones: there were the kids at school an4 the 

kids in the neighborhood. 

I 

Q: So that was a pretty broad background for you. You got to meet different kinds of fdks. 


1 

j

A: Oh yes. Oh yes. Most of my team stuff was done with the neighborhood, it wasn't 

done - because as I say I was fairly far from school. I didn't want to walk all the way 

home and then go back to school after school. It was too far. 

Q: We are talking about distances of several miles? 

A: Well, it's seven or eight blocks I suppose. It's not several miles, but it seemed - it 

seemed like a long walk. And then as we got a little bit older, why then, we played at the 

playground in organized softball competition. That was kind of a different group altogether 

too. We used to travel around. That was pretty well organized, the Chicago 

Playground. They played many sports. They had ice skating, racing, softball, 

horseshoes. They didn't have basketball, I suppose they do now. But that kept you pretty 

occupied. I think we had two games a week. Some of those fellows were really pretty good. 

So there was never - and then, as I got a little bit older, I had some friends that lived 

in our neighborhood and had moved out to Oak Park and River Forest. And then we used 

to meet every night. Then we had a team out there, a twelve-inch fast-pitching 

softball. And that was another organized thing. We played under the lights and it was, 

you know, well organized and sponsored by merchants, and that sort of thing, for 

uniforms. That was when I was a little bit older. I was still in high school but - you 

know you progress through all of that stuff. That was - that was pretty good, comparable 

to what they have around here now. 

Q: Were most of these kids from families who were middle-class families? 

A: Oh yes. Some of the ones in later years that went out to Oak Park and River 

Forest . . . 


A: I think his father was vice-president of . . . the sales agency of Western Electric. His 

name was Hagland, he was head of - had a good job. In fact the boy that was in that 

group is down east now for that same company. He has done very well, Temple family, 

they played with Chicago University football. He played at fullback. Jay Berwanger, the 

great football player from the University of Chicago, was our halfback and Joe played full- 

back on the team. They were better off financially than my neighborhood was. But we were 

inseparable. One of the guys on that team, a guy by the name of Ted Richard who ulti- 

mately ended up as comptroller for a motor company, he went to Michigan and the others 

went to Chicago. We're scattered all over. I went to Marquette, of course. 

But during the nights in the summer we were always together. It was a wonderful wonder- 

ful group of people. I suppose 1 am a real square but I mean the habits, nobody drank, 

nobody smoked, noboby was vulgar. You know what I mean, real fine people. I suppose 

there are people like that today, but the job I am in now, I don't remember. 

Q: Yes, (chuckles) 

A: But those - you know it is really wonderful to have a wholesome exchange of ideas and 

they are real good people and 1 was very fortunate. 

Q: Yes, I think so. I have talked to people who grew up about that same time in other 

areas, on Maxwell Street, you know where Circle Campus is now, it sounds like the conditions 

were a lot rougher. 

A: Well, I went to this high school right near Maxwell Street. In fact my old high school 

William swimming A. Redmond team Memoir swims - Archives/ at Circle Special Campus. Collections - You Norris can L Brookens throw Library a stone - University from of there Illinois to. at Springfield . . . But - UIS

I think that - I think that, you know whatever success I've had, I attribute primariJy ta 

my high school experiences. I went to a thing called - a school called St. Ignatius, it was 

taught by the Jesuit fathers. And I think that they were put on earth to educate young 

boys. Most of the - they weren't priests, they were what they called scholastics. They 

weren't really that much older than the kids in school. And you couldn't kid them, they 

were not far removed from your experiences and what you were going through theyn had 

gone through not too many years before. And their scholastic standards were very 

high. Even today, they - well I get more people call me now and asked me to - to retom- 

mend their kids to go there to school. They have twice as many applicants as they have 

vacancies. 

We took four years of Latin and two years of Greek, four years of math, and four @ars 

of English. And the discipline was really - you know, it wasn't cruel, but it was stern. So 

I never had any problem when I went to the navy, you know I was always doing what I 

was told, so I had no problem accepting their discipline. And it gave me a - I did fairly 

well scholastically there, I was on the honor roll. And I competed and - it was ju8t a aon- 

derful wonderful experience and I think that kind of set me straight. 

So if I have had any success, why, I attribute it in no small measure to my experipnce 

there. I felt so strongly about it that - there are a lot of people here - Mike Madgan 

went there, Representative Ted Meyer. At one time there were twelve fellows in the I&&- 

lature that had gone to Ignatius. But that is not true now. It was true then. They have 

probably 95 percent of their graduates go to college. 

Let's see that was high school, Susan Catania has got two daughters there. Her husband 

went there. So I, you know, I am indebted to them. I think they set my course pretty g0od. 

Q: Did your parents figure that out? Did they decide to send . . . 

A: My mother did. I don't know how she knew but she went down and registered me and 

came back and told me where I was going to school. (chuckles) 

Q: But she had it figured out, she knew what was coming, right? 

1 

A: Well of course the Catholic schools - high schools, in those days there were d l y not 

as many as there are now. And some of those that were run by the Christian Brot ers 

started out originally as commercial schools and taught shorthand, typing. Ignatius 

primary - you know the paramount school for the kind of academic classes being ta ght 

you know. Afterwards Loyola came along and that's run - that's kind of in the same 

but it's a . . . that's a little richer. Those kids have more money than the kid at 

Ignatius. Ignatius is kind of a mixture, currently there is 24 percent black. I don't remember 

what the percentage of non-Catholic, but it was a significant number. And they have 

Japanese and Chinese. And of course from there on to the present, Irish, the Italian, the 

Pole in ;Catholic ahmls. 

I 

I think those formative years for a boy are really important. And if you are fortunate 

enough to - you know, it puts you in the right environment and the right kind of peaple, 

and it is not a, you know, guarantee obviously. The Jesuits guide you, you know, they k p 

your nose, you know, where it belongs. (chuckles) 

Q: Can you remember how you felt, you know, your first few days there? 

A: Awe struck. Just, you know, here I was - you had to take three streetcars to get tbere 

William A. Redmond and away Memoir from - Archives/ home Special for the Collections first time - Norris in L Brookens my life. Library I'll - University never forget of Illinois the at Springfield first couple - UIS+ys

of school the newspapers were out taking pictures of the football players, They were having 

them in the front lawn you know and I mentioned this Golden kid that I was talking about, 

"Boy, I'd sure like to be able to play football someday." And he didn't give me much 

encouragement, because at that time I probably weighed a hundred pounds. (chuckles) But 

it was a joyful experience, I mean I had - I had pretty fair success academically. Well, 

it was alright. 

Q: Are there any particular instructors that stand out in your mind? Or people who really 

took you under their wing? 

A: Well, the one that I was closest to, as a freshman, was a scholastic by the name of 

Butler. He taught me quite a few of the classes as a freshman. And then the principal 

was a man by the name of Fr. Moore. I was very fond of him. I would think that those 

probably were two of the - you know. There was Fr. Conlon, ultimately was 

principal. And Fr. Barry who taught me English. Six or seven of my classmates entered 

the Jesuit order. (pause) I wasn't much for hanging around the teacher's desk 

though. That was kind of frowned upon at a boy's school. (chuckles) 

Q: They didn't encourage you? 

A: Oh no. That's for trying to gain favor unjustly, 

Q: Did you continue to do well in math and prefer math? 

A: Yes. I did pretty well there. I was terrible in Latin and Greek. It was 

awful. Probably should have gone and taken something else but I didn't. I studied engi- 

neering at Marquette. I did it primarily on the advice of my sister. I don't think she knew 

much more than I did about it. She said, "If you are good in math, you should study 

engineering." Well, that's only part of it, if you are poor in math you shouldn't study 

engineering. There is a lot more to engineering than just math. I never had mechanical 

drawing, you know, some of those other things. Gosh, when I got up to Marquette and we 

had kids that had gone through four years of technical high school and you know they - 

they could draw these gears and nuts in the machines and all that stuff and I was not 

really very good. But I finished and you know I got a degree in engineering. 

Well I have no regrets, I mean I might have been able to do something else better. When 

I finished engineering school, you couldn't buy a job. Fuller Brush's real silk hosiery door- 

to-door was all that was available, commission basis only, 

I was fortunate enough to have a family who would back me. I didn't want to just stand 

around street corners. So they financed me to go to law school. So I went to Northwestern 

Law School. If I didn't have family behind me, I don't know what would have 

happened. That's one reason why I've always felt that as far as my kids want to go, I'll 

back them up for education. 

And my kids are - well my oldest girl, Mary, has a - her undergraduate at Rosary's in 

French. And she had a double major, a major in music. And then she got a fellowship 

in linguistics at Yale and studied Sanskrit which, for your information, is the native lan- 

guage of five families in the world. That is something that you use every day. Then she 

left there and went to the University of Illinois and got a Masters in Music. And then went 

back to Rosary's and got masters in library science. (chuckles) So she has two masters 

degrees. 

My son went to Holy Cross and got an AB. And then when he was in the navy, he got 

an MBA with honors, And my youngest daughter has got a degree in English. I've encour- 

aged them all to go - I am encouraging her to go now and get a MBA now. Maybe that's 

run its course now. 


I think you have got to get equipped, you know, to meet life's challenges. So my folks, I 

am glad they felt that way about me and I - and backed me up, 

Q: Can we backtrack a little bit. How did you make the decision to go to Marquette? How 

did that . . . 

A: Well, it wasn't really very scientific. I - I wonder if we could turn that . . . that*air - 

it is End sf cold. Haw about you? 

. Q: Yes, it's getting there. 

(taping stopped to adjust air conditioner, then resumed) 

A: . . . very scientific. In the first place, I had had this job delivering special delivery 

letters. And I had looked around for a school that - where I could have Seurday 

off. And I looked at what is now IIT [Illinois Institute of Technology] and some of the 

others, you know, within close range and Marquette was the only one. And of course that 

normally would have been beyond my reach, but with my father with passes on the rqilroad 

I could get back and forth from - Milwaukee is not that far. 

I 

So that was - I wanted to study engineering and I wanted one where I could keqp that 

job. And not have to work on - not have to go to school on Saturdays. Marquethe was 

run.by Jesuits which is the same group that handled my high school. I guess that's - you 

know it is far away from home but at the same time it was clom enough so that. . . . I 

might have been able to go some place else. The folks might have been able to afford it 

but, you know, I was able to - to help. That job paid pretty well, you know, for a part-time 

job. So I waa able to help myself. I think those were. . . . And they had an adequab engi- 

neering school too. And they had a cooperative system, after your first two yews you 

worked two months and went to school two months, and that would also help you finance 

your way. So that - those were the decisions that. . . . And I enjoyed Marquktte, I 

thought it was . . . a middle class school, you know, people just like myself. 1 

Q: Jut a plain school. 

A: An awful lot of people earning their way, you know they get a meal job, they work two 

or &re -hours and get three meals. Big city, there was that kind of opportuniQ that 

wouldn't be in @me other places. 

Q: You were awfully busy during high school and college. I'd like to just know how an aver- 

age week or a day broke down for you timewise? I mean we should start with the high 

schooI, you know, because you were involved in all these sports and you were workillg then 

and . . . 

A: Well the paramount thing was school. I mean we used to have three hours homework 

every night. And your practice, you know, you got through school about two-thirty and 

pr- might run until five or five-fifteen, then you go home and stay - 

i 

going ou of an 

any - my night when I had school the next day was absaiutely fotbidden Well 

we had emo much homework that we couldn't. So that was your day. Your day watt mned 

for (chuckles) And whatever I did in athletics, you know, I would fit in on - o those 

schduktea. And of course nobody had a car, you know, there was no wandering around anyplace. 

&: And then on the weekends while you were still in high school you would do some of the 

letter delivery, right? 

A: I had that job, yes. That took care of me. Kept me out of mischief. 


4

Q: On your letter delivery were you a regular postal employee? 

A: Special delivery letter boy. We got paid by the piece. We used to get eight cents a - to 

begin with, a special delivery stamp was ten cents and we got eight of that. And packages 

were a little bit more. My memory is they were fifteen, twenty-five and thirty-five cents 

and we got a bigger piece of it. So on those two days, I would make probably twenty-five 

dollars which was really a lot of money then. You know I would work like hell but. . . . 

I rode my bicycle and I ruined my figure. (chuckles) You know twenty-five dollars a week, 

that's a hundred dollars a month. That was really a lot for, you know, that kind of a spare- 

time job. And then it gave me a job in the summer too and at Christmas time you would 

pick up additional money. 

Q: Yes, the Christmas season must have been good? 

A: It was good. 

1 Q: It sure is. 

Q: (pause) Then when you were at Marquette, it would be almost the same routine, 

right? Because you'd come home . . . 

A: I came home for two years . . . 

Q: . . . home for the weekends to deliver the letters? 

A: . . . the first two years, yes. I'd come home on Friday night and go back 

Sunday. Couldn't have been done without the pass, because at that time the fare was - 

would have been six dollars round trip, three dollars and six cents one-way. So, you know, 

it wouldn't have paid out if I had to pay six dollars for the train. Probably wouldn't have 

been worth it. But since I had the free pass, why . . . 

And then in the - in the co-op years I had a job in Chicago. I worked for the telephone 

company. Probably the first year or so. And then the last years I transferred up to the 

Wisconsin telephone company. So the month that I would be working, the first year in that 

was Chicago and then last years were in Milwaukee. And then we got paid for that 

too. Because by that time the special delivery letter job had petered out. See, I did that 

the first two years and - at Marquette, engineering was five years. 

Q: When you were at Marquette then the first couple of years did you stay in dormitories, 

in a private rooming house or . . . 

A: Their housing facilities were pretty inadequate up there, we used to just room in 

anyplace. I had a roommate from Blue Island by the name of James Thornton and we lived 

in - quite a nice place as a matter of fact. But all we had was a room. 

Q: Then when you were in the co-op program, you had to maintain another residence in 

Milwaukee and - I guess for one month, right? and then the next month come back to 

Chicago? 

A: No. One month we were in school in Milwaukee and the other month we would be work- 

ing in Milwaukee. The first two years, about that, I worked in Chicago for the Illinois Bell 

Telephone Company so I lived at home and then the other month I would be up at 

school, That posed some problems because I didn't have the continuity of a room. You 

know I would only need it for a month and then give up. So I wasn't all in the same 

place. That wasn't - is that rain? 

A: It wasn't entirely satisfactory, because you really weren't fish nor fowl and that is why 

William I didn't A. Redmond do it, you Memoir know, - Archives/ the last Special three Collections years. - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

But I got involved in a - I don't %n& how I did all this stuff, but I - I got involved in, 

for a while up there, in - they had well-organized municipal basketball leagues and they 

did it by age and height. They had . . . let's see, how did they start out? Unlimited age, 

unlimited height was one division. Unlimited height, less than - I think it was twentyone, 

there was mme age limit in there, so the younger tall kids. And then unlimited age, 

under 5 feet, 8 inches I think it was. Then the other one was the younger kids under 5 

feet, 8 inches. And I belonged to a team that - that was - under 5 feet, 8 inches but 

unlimited age and we won the city championship. We beat everybody in all the 

divisions. In one year we won twenty-three and lost one, and the next year we won twenty 

seven straight. We had a real good team. 

t 

Q: To get a team that good, how would it be put together? I mean . . . 

A: Well, I don't know, they were all sponsored, 1 had nothing to do with putting it 

together. That team was sponsored by a Ford agency. I don't know, they were local guy4 

I was one of the few out-of-towners. I don't know how they got it together, but they did. 

Q: That sounds like lightning striking to put-together. 

(taping stopped to look at storm, then resumed) 

Q: . . . to get togsther here. 

A: Well, you know, when they get - you know they've had some success, why then, thef 

are in - they are attracted to - some of the better players that want a . . . (phone 

rings) Excuse me. 

(taping stopped for telephone conversation, then resumed) 

A: . . . for the championship and we were damn good. (chuckles) I hate to put it 

modestly. We were not very big, 5 feet, 8 inches, but to beat the big guys was quite $ 

thing. And that was well organized, I mean they had - the rule up there was if you were 

a professioqal in one port, you weren't a pro in all sports. So that guys - I don't if you 

remember A1 Simmons, he used to play baseball for the Athletics, Philadelphia 

Athletics. He played on a team. He was a pro in baseball but - but npt a profession 

.Jxaketbell player. But he was a good ballplayer. And then there was a fighter by the 

Tate Ljppman. 

Well it was a - it was a real good league. It was through that that I got - I got 

for that. I wasn't suppose to but I did. Five dollars a game. (chuckles) I hope none 

my other teammates will read this thing because they will get mad because I was the 

one being paid, but . . . (laughter) 

Q: Well how did you get that worked out? 

t 

A: Well I .waap't bad. (chucklee) Yodeatly. But I really wasn't. They wanted me an 

they && ts-pay me so. , . . It wasn't a lot of money. In light of today's standards it' 

kind of laughable. 

Q: Yes, but &il there are a lot of guys playing in leagues today for free still so . . . 

A: Well +ere is, you know, I imagine that some of them in the leagues around here - say 

you take a really good pitcher, I bet you a nickel that wme of those guys get pretty - they 

gat something, I don't know how much. 

Then I went - from there I played - that was - I don't remember just all the timin 

William A. on Redmond this thing Memoir but - Archives/ I think Special it was Collections after that - Norris that L Brookens I played Library for - Marquette. University of Illinois And at Springfield then I playe - UIS 

.I 

1

I guess it was - 'cause I didn't a lot for the Milwaukee professional team, it was the 

Badger's, we took two or three road trips. And our drawing card was the White Sox' first 

baseman, a guy by the name of Art Shires. He was a lousy basketball player, but he was 

a good draw. (chuckles) And then we played up in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, we played a 

team that was a forerunner to the Globe Trotters, they called them the Chicago Hot N' Tots 

at that time. 

Q: Oh? 

A: They were really pretty good, we shouldn't have been playing them but . . . 

Q: They were almost as good as the Globe Trotters? 

A: They were pretty good. Well, not quite as good as these guys now, but they were pretty 

good, we shouldn't have been in the same league with them. But we played two games. We 

got paid for that too, not a hell-of-a-lot of money, but something. But there again Shires 

was - well this was a pro team, so - Shires was really pretty well-known - well, well- 

publicized White Sox ballplayer. He was a showboy. There was a great big football player 

by the name of George Trafton that played with the Bears. And they had a boxing match 

between Shires and Trafton out at White City, which was an amusement park, and I guess 

about the third round their arms were so tired they couldn't lift them. (chuckles) But he 

was always doing something, he - one time when he - he said that the next time he got 

on first base he was going to take a swing at Lou Gehrig, you know, the Yankee first 

baseman. He did too, he didn't hit but . . . (laughter) But he was our drawing card. But 

that was fun anyway. 

Q: Were you folks well-enough organized that you had game plans worked out and 

plays . . . 

A: Well on that amateur team that won the city championship, yes. That was a well- 

organized team. The pro's, we weren't really that good, but everybody plays fairly well, you 

know what the other guys can do. We weren't, you know by today's standards, really we 

weren't much, but we were, you know in that day, we were the only professional team in 

the city. The forerunner to the - what are they? the Milwaukee Bucks. (chuckles) We 

are not in the same league. But it was all good sport. 

Q: I'm a little bit surprised that the White Sox would let this Art Shirers get involved in 

a boxing match. I don't think that would happen today. 

A: Oh yes, he was really crazy. (laughs) His nickname was "What a Man," Art "What 

a Man" Shirers. He was pretty good ballplayer too. Oh, I suppose they would die 

today. Trafton was a great big moose, but he threw up a good fight. (laughter) 

I don't know whether kids do all that kind of stuff that I used to do, but - and I don't 

know how I got involved in all that. You know it really was kind of unusual I think, in 

a way. 

Q: Yes. Yes, there are some great opportunities there that you had, like that. 

A: Well I have been pretty lucky really. At Marquette I was - I was president of my jun- 

ior class, which was . . . I had festivities, they did a formal prom and an informal 

prom. They had three elected people in the junior class from all the various colleges, as 

junior prom king, and informal prom king, and class president. And I was president of the 

class. 

Q: Were you involved in any other types of organizations while you were in school? I mean 

were you involved in - I guess even high school? I don't know if you had class officiers. 


A: I never was involved, Not a great deal. At Marquette I belonged to the Western Society 

of Mechanical Engineers, the student chapter of it, I belonged to that. But I seemed to fall 

into things. You know when you're in college, a lot of the stuff seems to be important. I 

was chairman of the ~n~inee-rin~ 

Dance. NOW that was always considered a big - big 

deal. I was chairman of the homecoming, again 1 don't know how it happened, but that 

was always considered big stuff. I never could quite understand, you know, because I really 

wasn't very pushy, you know usually the guys that do those things are sort of pushy but 

I wasn't. I was always kind of reticent. I think I still am to some extent. 

Q: But some of the folks selected you out to be the homecoming parade . . . 

A: I can't remember what the mechanics was at the time, but - I just don't remember.. 

Q: Would they know your name, you know, from all the sports activities? 

A: I have no idea. I have no idea. I really can't remember what year that was, whether 

that was my senior year - it may have been my senior year, after I was president of the 

clasar. That's conwivable. 

Q: You mentioned being chairman of the Engineering Dance. Were you a dancer? Did you 

do a lot of dancing? 

A: I was terrible. (chuckles) I don't know how that happened but it was a good sing 

because as chairman of the dance, you could exchange tickets with . . . 


Q: I want to continue today talking little bit about your childhood and adolescence an4 col- 

lege exgerienw. One thing we didn't talk about yesterday but that you had mentiony to 

me is that you had a considerable career in - in advertisement in thd movies as a Tung 

213811- 

A: Yw, I don't recall exactly how old I was, I think it was before I started grammar school, 

but I'm not too sure. I was pretty young, when a cousin of mine - that one that I had 

mentid earlier - brother's family, the Crowe family. There had beep an ad in the gaper 

advertking for a child model, and - her name was &t@ Crowe - her mother too her 

in and #he was selected as a child model. And she teak me with her one time when,they 

were having a sitting, it was a paid sitting for them, and they took me. And as a tresult 

of that I was a photographer's model for many years. I did that all through grammar sqhool 

and even in high school. I think I was - probably as much as my senior year in-high 

school 

That led to three or four commercial motion pictures. One of them was taken in 

Milwa* That: was for the - what used to be known as the T M E R and L, The Mikau- 

. br7- Railway and Light Company. One was for the Cleveland Illuminating Corn 

w W 

ma apublic wrvice company in Cleveland. 

L 

And & firot studio that I watl in was one called the Atlas Studio, that war, in Oak. Parg In 

connection with that I don't remember - I think that was for the home-building industry, 

and there were pictures taken around in the Chicago area, and out in Glen Ellyn, some of 

the suburbs. In front of the - quite a nice home in Glen Ellyn, the first time I ever ran 

for office - the house - it brought back memories of that. (chuckles) 

And another studio was the Rothiker Film Company which - you know, the motion picture 

industry really had its origin and its development in the city of Chicago. 

William A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield That was - UISYfore 

I 

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Hollywood and before New York got to be important. Chicago was the place. And this 

Rothiker Film Studio, Charlie Chaplin worked there, Lillian Gish, Francis X. 

Bushman. Those names probably don't mean anything to you, but they were the big names 

in the early part of the motion picture industry. And I worked there for I don't remember 

how many pictures, but some three or four I suppose. And the director that I had then 

was a pretty prominent director, he had - he had directed Francis X. Bushman and Lillian 

Gish. As I say those names don't mean anything to you, but they were big in the motion 

picture industry. 

Q: Did you actually meet any of those folks? 

A: No. No, they were - they were gone at - around the time that - motion pictures 

had gone to some extent out to Hollywood by the time that I was doing it. But I think 

that studio is still there as a matter of fact. I think they make films for the TV, I think 

they do, Then that led to - probably most of the things that I did was still photography 

for the commercial photographers. 

Q: Now the Atlas Studio in Oak Park, was that a film studio, or motion picture studio? 

A: That was motion picture film studio. 

Q: The films that you mentioned, the one related to Milwaukee and the one for the Cleveland 

public utility, now were those films to promote . . . 

A: The companies. 

Q: Yes, the companies. Now when you were with Rothiker, did you make those same type 

of films or were there . . . 

A: Well, I don't know exactly what those were for. They weren't the same kind of thing 

though. I can't remember whether it was Rothiker that - that made the Milwaukee and 

the Cleveland film or whether it was Atlas. I just can't recall. It was either one or the 

other though. But some of the stuff that we did for Rothiker was - their studio was on 

Diversey which is on the north side of Chicago and they were a lot of little shorts. I don't 

know exactly what they were for quite honestly. 

And then in connection with the still photography, which I probably did more of that than 

the other, advertised a lot of national products. Probably the best known today I guess is 

Sun-Maid Raisins, another was Thomas J. Webb Coffee, I don't know if they still make that 

or not. And Quaker Oats and Shredded Wheat and one big full-page ad was for the Chicago 

Daily News classified want ads, and Puffed Wheat and Johnson Shoes. I don't know whether 

they are still in existence. 

Q: Those are some pretty big companies? 

A: Well they were big companies. As I say Chicago was the hub of that kind of 

advertising. I don't know whether it still is, but it was in those days. 

Q: What might you do in a photograph for Sun-Maid Raisins? 

A: Well the one that I - the one that was on all the billboards was the one that - picture 

of me with a rolled-collar sweater and a cap on and I had a box of Sun-Maid raisins and 

pouring them out in my hand and I think the thing said, "I spent my last 

nickel" - or - "my last dime for Sun-Maid Raisins." I think that is what it said. 

But what they used to do, there was a lot of the studios, the commercial photographers, 

would be go ahead and make pictures and then they would try to sell them to the calendar 


people. And I had one that was taken, me with a dog, and I was supposed to be a newspaper 

boy, and that was on a calendar. And one of my secretaries when I was Speaker went to 

a garage sale here in Springfield and she saw this picture and she wanted to know if it was 

me. (chuckles) And it was. I had a copy of the same thing up home, so I brought it down 

and showed it to her. But it - God knows how old that was. It had to be sixty yeah 

old I suppose, or maybe even more than that. I was pretty small at the time it was 

taken. Then there was another one that - me and a fishing pole, indicating that I had 

lost a fish that was so long and I had a pole over my shoulder. That had national 

distribution. My cousin bought that up in Ogdensburg, New York. So the calendar stuff, 

you still see them in the dime stores and those places today, that really don't seem to hare 

any relationship to any specific topic, but - but . . . that was pretty big as a matter of 

fact. 

Q: So if I understand what you are saying, someone could still be selling those photographs 

- they took of you sixty years ago? 

A: Oh, well the one that was in Springfield was within the last five years. (laughter) 

Q: Do you get any residuals or anything from them? 

A: No. We got - when I started it was two bucks an hour for the first hour and a dollar 

for the second hour, or any part thereof. And then we got a raise and it went three dollars 

for the first hour, and two dollars for the second hour. But it only took a - you know, 

very fleetingly. You get kind of artificial in that stuff. When they say, "Smile," you smile 

and then that is it. 

And then there was a time that I'd be busy, you know, probably two and three studios ,a 

night after school. My father was sick for a full year and it was, you know, a pretty 

source of income. And every once in a while one would show up someplace and the 

would ask me if it was me. 

I remember one that was in - an ad for a shower curtain, it was almost a full-page ad 

in the Chicago Tribune. A picture with me hiding - coming out from behind some curtains 

and. . . . I atill remember I was going to high school and I was sitting behind the guy that 

had the paper, and there I saw the thing in front of me. And he'was a kid from school 

and he said, "You know, that looks like you." And I said, "Oh no, that's not 

me." (chuckles) 

Every once in a while they would show up someplace, and people would asked me if it was 

me and I'd - the Encyclopedia Britannica was another one that I. . . . But you know it 

was before - you know, now it is not unusual for athletic people to - I'm not equating 

myself as a great athlete but I didn't want people to think I was a sissy, being a sissy then 

was not very commendable. I guess today they don't shy away from it like they used to 

then but - but now, you know, there is Jim Brown the football player and a lot of 

people. it's, you know, kind of a common ordinary thing. But then it was really ve 

unusual for anybody to do that. 

So I used to always deny it, I just figured that - when I went to Marquette to school, wept 

to engineering school, they had an indoctrination course and what do you suppose 

showed? It was a film - it was the picture that I had taken for Milwaukee 

Company. I didn't happen - like I had come home, it was probably on a 

I probably came home to peddle mail, so I wasn't at the showing. But 

in Monday somebody came up and they said that they had that film 

know if it was me, it looked like me and I said, "No." (chuckles) 

So . . . it always popped up, even today I met a woman in the restaurant here, she is t e 

wife of a political figure in Peoria County. She said that that story came out when I w t s 


elected Speaker. She said that they still had a copy of that - there was an article in 

People's Magazine, I don't know if that's whet she had. But every once and a while 

somebody, one of the members of the Prison Review Board, somebody was talking and they 

had mentioned that I had - you never escape your past, no matter how you - I don't mind 

about it now, it's kind of funny now. At the time it was kind of embarrassing. 

Q: Do you have credits? Are you listed in the credits of any of those movies? 

A: I don't really remember now, it was so long ago. I arranged to have a showing of the 

one in Milwaukee. As I say I went to school up there and I went down there one time and 

identified myself and that was the first time I ever saw it. I don't really recall whether 

I did or not, you know, that is a long time back. 

Q: So most of those movies you've never seen yourself then? 

A: No. 

Q: Were you at all curious as a child to see how you would look in the movies? 

A: I really didn't like it. (laughs) To tell you the honest truth, I - I - no, I didn't. I 

was embarrassed about it. If it wasn't for the fact that there was a few dollars in it, why - 

and I think I kind of evaluated myself too, you - you know, one of the worst things in 

the world is for a person to aspire to something that is beyond their capacity. And for 

me to be an actor, with my height limitation, it is pretty obvious that, unless I was a char- 

acter actor or was a comedian or something of that nature, that I certainly wasn't going 

to be the hero and the guy that got the girl and all that kind of stuff. So I kind of ruled 

myself out real early. You know you have to be tall and dark and thin and all sorts of 

things. So I didn't see that it really presented a workable future. 

And of course, you know, the movies were relatively new too. You know I don't go back 

to Max Sennett, but it wasn't like it is today, a source of great wealth. It may have been 

if - you know, like Shirley Temple, and Jackie Cooper and all those. They were - Shirley 

Temple was after me, but I was contemporary of a guy named Billy Messenger, and a little 

bit before Jackie Cooper I guess. But they did pretty well financially, and if there had been 

such a thing in - in the - they had it pretty well organized for child actors at that time 

and they had studio classrooms and all that sort of thing. None of that was available, it 

was kind of a hit and miss thing. 

And I really quite frankly didn't - I didn't care for it very much, You know, the film 

wasn't as sensitive and we used to have to apply makeup and that used to drive me crazy 

to put that grease paint - put grease paint on and then you put powder all over it and 

then you touch up your eyes, and your lips, and I about died every time that happened. So 

I was - I don't think I really could have ever succeeded quite honestly, for the limitations 

that I expressed, but . . . and I think it's just as well that I made up my mind that I couldn't 

because had I aspired to it and failed, why, you know there are an awful lot of hangers-on 

that. . . . As far as child actors are concerned, even when I was in Milwaukee, I had just 

a woman call me up and said that they have a daughter or a son or something and they 

know that they would just really be a smash hit and how do you get in and can they see 

me and all this kind of stuff. There was a piece in the Milwaukee paper, you know, recount- 

ing my experience in the movies and I guess they thought I still had some contact and so 

forth. But it wasn't a bit unusual and you know all these doting mothers would run their 

kids around trying to get them in to that stuff, by the thousands. But if they don't make 

it, you know, what a tragedy. 

Well you see now, who is it? Jackie Cooper, he was a great child star, he's awful looking 

now. (laughs) Mickey Rooney is one that managed to hang on. Of course, there again, 


he was after I was by quite a bit. He managed - he was pretty short and he manajpd 

to do it. &It he had a lot of talent, which I didn't have. 

Q: When you mentioned that mothers were calling you up in Milwaukee, was that recently? 

A: Oh no, that was when I was at Marquette. That was long time after I had been in the 

thing. Somebody discovered the story, I don't know how the hell it came out but somekdy 

had heard the story, maybe somebody that I had gone to school with in Chicago told the 

newspaper guy, and he interviewed me. And they used to have - the front page of the 

Milwaukee Journal was a green sheet and they had quite a story on that. And that got 

a lot of attention from the people that I knew and my friends. And as a result of that, 

why, doting mothers would call. I would say there were quite a few that did call. And 

then I got some calls from some of the local advertisers that wanted to know if I was sftill 

in the business. There again with the same limitations that I had in height and my - t by 

would be disappointed if I showed up, so I didn't do it. 

Q: Did you sing or dance or do anything like that at that time? 

A: No. 

Q: Did you handle your own wardrobe and makeup? 

A: I did my own makeup. Pretty limited wardrobe though, you know, just the street 

clothes. Once in a while you would dress up in overalls as a farmboy or something, but 

no, nothing very extensive. I didn't have any suit of armour or any white horse or 

anything. But I handled my own makeup. I think the indignity of having somebody apply 

that stuff to me would have been more than I could stand. That was pretty thick stuff, 

I don't know whether you have ever seen that grease paint, but it - I didn't think it was 

very much fun. 

But it really is odd how, you'know, I happen - that is just one of those things that happas 

in a lifetime. You know, I guarantee that it was unusual because not everybody did it, but 

in terms of really amounting to something, it didn't amount to a hill of beans. You knew 

it wasn't because of any quality that I had or any talent or anything. It was just one of 

those things that - what's going on there? 

Q: Hm. Looks like it's gone. 

(taping stopped to investigate event, then resumed) ! 

A: You know you might have had, you know, some academic success or you might have h$d, 

you know, wme other accomplishment and nobody says a word but every once in while this 

thing comes up like it came up today at lunch. A member of the board said that some friend 

of hers had remembered seeing the article. I don't know if it was ever in the Springfield 

paper. But had seen the - I suppose until I die it'll show up every once in a while. And 

I think I have done a lot of things in my lifetime that are really, you know, a lot more 

significant or as a result of something that I may have accomplished. 

Q: But as an experience, it was far from something glamorous or . . . I mean it was just 

wmething to make money when you were doing it. 

A: Yes. Yes, I guess I did it because my mother told me to do it. (chuckles) I suppose 

maybe she was a doting mother, although she didn't push me into it. You know, she didp't 

make a nuisance of herself and drag me around by the ear, and it was by virtue of my couiin 

that I got there in the first place. And I think maybe mother thought it was - I did phopgraph 

you know reasonably well and I suppose that she got kind of a kick out of it. With 

T 

t 

her pushing me, I don't - I'm not too sure that - because money didn't mean anythi g 


when you are a little kid. Whatever I made I gave to them, they put it in a bank account 

for me. I mean it didn't run the household, but - but, you know, what would I need money 

for. They fed me and clothed me, paid my tuition and . . . 

Q: Did your mother keep a lot of those, you know, photographs? 

A: Oh, mother kept them, that was her treasure. She kept them and she wouldn't let any- 

body look at them unless they posted a bond. And I had them - I think I still have most 

of them. But I - my youngest daughter got at them one time and kind of scattered them 

to the four winds. So they're kind of in a state of shock at the present time. But I think 

I have most of them. 

Mother is the one who accumulated them. See she used to haunt - I suppose maybe she 

was a doting mother - she used to haunt the photographers. You know they made them 

to sell and I presume that they were pretty stingy in handing them out for that reason. I 

think her greatest thrill was when they gave her one of those pictures. And she kept 

them. I wonder what I will do with them now 'cause I don't know whether anybody - after 

I die I don't know whether anybody will care anymore. (chuckles) I have three children, 

but I don't how much they care about it. 

Q: They probably have some archival value just for being so old. 

A: Possibly. 

Q: Like I say that was a special period of . . . history in Chicago. 

A: Well, as I say, the, you know, the movies really did start there. Because of better 

weather and all that sort of thing, they went out to Hollywood. Chicago winters were not 

conducive to outdoor scenes twelve months of the year. And the commercial photography, 

I don't know whether it still is, that was really big, that was the center of things. Then 

I don't think that there is any question that I probably was the most used boy model of 

that age group, in the country I mean. Well you can see from the accounts that we are 

talking about that they were national companies, they weren't just fly-by-night local 

things. (laughs) I don't know if I should mention it but I am not like the Vogue clothiers 

that advertises in Springfield TV. They were big companies. 

No, I think some of that kind of went to the west coast because of the - they thought that 

they were going to be able to get the better-looking models, maybe people who didn't quite 

make the movies, and that they would have the - I never could quite understand why they 

specialized on people who photographed well because it would seem to me that it would be 

better to have the ordinary kind of people that - there are more people with warts on their 

nose than don't have. You know, have just ordinary-lookkg people. But they always had 

the most beautiful women, the good-looking guys and all that. 

I think they thought that the overflow from the film studios was going to . . . a fellow that 

I didn't know if I would work for was a guy named Keedy and he was a very good friend 

of mine and he went out to California for that reason and set up a business out there. And 

I was out in Hollywood one time on a trip and I went in to see him. He had a big sunken 

living room and everything and they had - I think what he did is - I think he gave elocu- 

tion lessons and acting lessons and all that. I'm not too sure he was in the production 

part. But it was funny talking to all those people; you know, they're in a world of their 

own and . . . (chuckles) 

Q: (pause) Did you have a sense he was more in a world of his own out there than the 

way he had been in Chicago? 

A: Well he was always kind of an artistic fellow. But he was - more people like him out 

there. He was a wonderful man. When he didn't have modeling jobs, I used to deliver some 


of his stuff for him. I got considerably less money doing that than I did doing the 

other. But he was a good friend. I remember one time 1 was working for him, we had 

a streetcar strike in Chicago, and I had to ride my bicycle all the way from where I lived 

to where his place was and it was something more than six miles. The strike lasted at least 

a week, and I went back and forth, and that was a long way. 1 don't know if any of those 

studios are in existence now, Underwood and Underwood and Statler and Real. 

Another thing they used to do is to take pictures for the Sears Roebuck and Montgomery 

Ward catalogs. You know so many - they would have kids play with trains and kids doing 

this and kids doing that, there was a lot of that work done. I don't know what the process 

was, they may not have reproduced the pictures you know as photographs, but they ~ould 

use them in order to draw from them and some kind of a process and you could identify 

the people. There were times when I was really pretty busy. 

Q: What kind of direction would you get from the photographer? What would a session 

1 

be like then for a . . . 

A: Well, you know its like everything else, after - once you've done it, why, you know 

they - I think probably one reason that I did so much and one reason that I lasted sollong 

is that I was small for my age and I could understand and follow instructions probably htter 

than a younger kid, and that may have been the reason. You know if they told me what 

to do, I did it. And of course you would have a very artifical smile, I don't know whether 

you always have to smile, but they tell you to smile, you'd smile and then the picture was 

taken. Of course that was in the days when they had a headrest. The film wasn't fast 

enough, so you had to hold stilI for a certain measurable time. So they had a headrest. 

In some instances they had the old powdered flashlights. Do you remember those 

things? They used to put it on a long thing and they'd press it - they'd ignite itjwith 

a spark of some kind and a great big puff would go up and they had the big black thing 

that they'd put over their head and they'd look in the back of the camera and it'd turn 

inverted on the - it was a glass screen of some kind that they would see the, you know, 

the picture and they had a bulb they'd squeeze and have you look here and smile, turn. your 

head this way and that way or whatever. 

But you know a pro in that stuff, they know what, you know, what to 'do and you do it. And 

as I say I think that - the fact I was probably smaller than others my age and could fbllow 

their instructions, I think that had something to do with it. 

Q: Did anyone ever encourage you to go on stage in Chicago? 

A: Well people tried to get me to do it, but I didn't have any interest in it. When 

i 

was 

in high scbool they tried to get me to, you know, to join the dramatic club and a1 that 

kind of sM, but I never really cared for it, and I don't think I would have been ve good 

at it. So I never did it. And then there was another group that used to go around to ntertain 

at veterans hospital and they wanted me to go there, but I didn't know wh t I'd 

do. You know, I couldn't sing, and I couldn't dance, and can't recite the "Village lacksmith" 

to w bunch of wounded veterans and think they are going to get any great exci ment 

out of it. 

I enjoy it now more than I did when I was doing it. I kind of get a kick out of it now. You 

know, it is one of those unusual things that happens to you. It's kind of a conversation 

piece but . . . 

Q: (pause) You mentioned that your father was sick for a full year? 

A He was sick for a year, yes, and he wasn't able to work. He worked for the Pennsy vania 

Railroad. They kept him on the payroll. 


Q: What was his condition? 

A: I really don't know what his ailment was. You know, I was pretty small and they didn't 

discuss too much with me, just told me my father was ill. 

Q: Was he at home while he was recuperating? 

A: Yes, but he . . . 


Q: Well if he was on the payroll then it wasn't necessary for your mother to work? 

A: No. No. My mother never worked. 

Q: (pause) Did she ever exprese an interest in work? 

A: Not in those days. Women didn't work unless they had to, 

Q: (pause) Did you play any musical instruments when you were a child? 

A: I took some piano lessons from this cousin of mine in Canada, but - I thought all I 

had to do was take lessons, I didn't like that practicing stuff. So she finally said, "Well, 

this isn't very fruitful if you're not going to practice." (chuckles) So I didn't - no I 

didn't. 

After I came to Springfield, in the early days when the legislature wasn't quite so busy, 

I used to sing at the piano bars. I sang until Rollie Tipsword came to town. Representative 

Tipsword was much better than I was and he shamed me into silence, so . . . (chuckles) So 

I never sang after Rollie got here. He was pretty good. He sang with the Springfield 

Municipal - they had some kind of municipal group here, He was better, I was ashamed 

of my voice when I . . . 

Q: Well, you mean you actually sang on a somewhat regular basis? 

A: About every week we used to go someplace and sing Irish songs. Doesn't everybody sing 

Irish songs? (pause) Senator Tommy Lyons, he was another Irish singer. Senator Jim 

Donnewald is a pretty good singer. President of the senate, Phil Rock, is a pretty good 

singer. I don't know if he does it in public now that he is a - when I was elected Speaker, 

I thought - the office indicated that I should stop my public singing, so 

I . . . (chuckles) So I never sang then. But Phil Rock was - you know it is not often, 

but every once in a while legislators will get together and . . . 

A: What sort of places would you . . . 

Q: Oh, the Black Angus. (pause) They used to have a pianist there by the name of Pearl 

something or other that was a really great accompanist. You know most piano players in 

these piano bars think they are the headliner and they think that everybody comes to hear 

them, whereas most people go to hear themselves. And Pearl understood that and she head- 

lined and showcased everybody. And she would get everybody up there singing. And then 

prior to that, the Abe used to have a - they had a piano bar there. A girl by the name 

of Helen Scott, who I guess - she is from La Salle County, I understand that she is still 

up there in that area someplace in a supper club. Helen used to be out there. Well it was 

a perfectly - you know, orderly. It was no drunken brawl kind of stuff, but it - that's 

what we used to do to amuse ourselves. 


Harry Semrow, when he was a house member, Harry was quite a musician and he used to 

bring his accordian down. Art McGloon was a -. Senator McGloon, he is now an appellate 

judge, he was quite a piano player and there was a fellow by the name of Senator De Tolve 

who played the clarinet, and he used to play. (pause) Jack Williams, this is later ykars, 

he used to play some wind instrument with Paul Whiteman, I think. And then Representa- 

tive J. J. Wolfe had his own trio, and he was pretty good. 

And en& Hanson, I don't know whether you know Henry, he used to be a repor for 

the Daily News and now he writes feature articles in Chicago Magazine. Henry u d to 

sing, he was lousy but he - he used to sing "God Bless America." (chuckles) He odd 

dare God not to bless America. It was a - you know as I say it wasn't a bunch of roydies, 

it was really a lot of fun that we used to do, 

Judge Brian Duff, who is sitting on the bench now, he used to whistle. (chuckles) I'don't 

think that any of that is going on now, I think everybody is too busy going to 

committees. What the dickens was - there was another guy that - a little old Italian 

house member who sang with the San Carlo Opera Company. He used to sing. Sotne of 

them were pretty good as a matter of fact. 

Q: Would several of you decide just to go out, you know, some night and go to a piano bar? 

A: Well no, you had dinner there and then after dinner was over, why, you . . . you would 

go to the bar. Pearl is deceased. Pearl was really the focal point of a lot of them, because 

she was so good. And as I say she coaxed and showcased everybody. Everybody used to 

like to headline for Pearl. (laughs) One night - at the Angus one time was Judge - he 

was on the Supreme Court at the time - Judge Solfisburg . . . but that was the entertain- 

ment, you know. Now I guess everybody discos, I don't do that. (chuckles) 

But you know that was a way that you got to know people pretty well as a matter of 

fact. You know, the conviviality and the friendship. When you are in the legislature, you 

don't really get much opportunity to meet people during the session hours. You know you're 

at your own . . . Bill Scott from Bloornington, he is deceased many years. Congressman 

John Erlenborn, he used - he sang "Misty." (chuckles) John Parkhurst, from Peoqia, was 

really - he was good - he was a good singer and a good piano player. 

And they used to have a dinner for the Speaker - at that time the Speaker didn't get any 

additional compensation and I think the proceeds from the dinner for the Speaker I think 

had went to - I was not in on the inner workings but I think that went for additional 

compeneation for the Speaker. But we used to have a home-grown talent thing and many 

of the members would get up and entertain. And Parkhurst was the composer of - he 

used to compose the songs and the lyrics and so forth, and play. He was really pretty 

good. I can't remember some of the others but it was - every year they had - I mean 

of course we adjourned, you know, we were only in session six months. But they were really 

prtty epod. 

And some of the secretarial staff. There was a girl - I think she - I don't know who 

she works for now, I think she was maybe working for the senate. I think she was Miss 

Illinois, and was quite a talented girl. She used to always sing when the senate had their 

doings. They - you know, that is where Senator De Tolve, Art McGloon and those people, 

they would perform. Some of the talent was pretty good as a matter of fact. 

Q: Where would these talent shows be held? 

A: Well, sornetimmes at the Leland, sometimes at the St. Nick, those are two p 

I remember. They used to have a fair-sized room on the second floor at the St. 

know, for dinners of this kind. 


3 

i ?i

Q: Are we talking about the 1950's that this would have been going on? 

30 

A: Well, I came here in 1959, so it would have been 1959, 1961, 1963 . . . I don't remember 

whether it was in 1965 but in the earlier period of my service. 

Another guy that was - was a great guy was Representative Jack Cassidy out of 

Peoria. He was a real talented fellow. He used to draw cartoons and he'd make a whole 

presentation. (chuckles) He was exceptionally talented and he came here in - he was 

here in 1965, so that - we had it in 1965 as I recall. 

But that's all gone now. They are all too busy with committee meetings 

now. (chuckles) They can't. . . . But those were good - you know as I say some of the 

talent of the members was really pretty good. I almost forgot Parkhurst, he was really 

~ood. 

Q: (pause) You mentioned, I think yesterday, the gentleness of both of your parents. 

A: Yes. 

Q: What was discipline like in the home? 

A: Well, I think, you know, my father never had any occasion - neither - my mother or 

father never had any occasion to be strict disciplinarians. I think we knew what was 

expected of us and we did it pretty much. Even as very young - of course, you know, you 

lose your memory, I don't know normally how far back you can go in your memory, but 

I don't ever remember either my mother or father ever laying a hand on either my sister 

or myself. And when they told us what to do, we did it. You know we knew when - and 

of course we revered my mother and she was the queen of the household and whatever 

mother wanted my dad wanted and - it was a very happy childhood. 

Q: You mentioned your mother reading the sports section the day you won the city wrestling 

match. How would she confront you about an issue like that. What might she say to you? 

A: Well she indicated her displeasure, I don't remember whether she said, "What were you 

doing yesterday?" I still remember it was a Saturday afternoon, so it wouldn't be unusual 

for me not to be home and the thing was over relatively early. 

I still recall an incident there that - I had never wrestled in that kind of competition 

before, and I didn't really quite realize what kind of uniform you are suppose to wear. And 

I had a pair of - just a pair of pants, casual pants, with a belt with a buckle on it. And 

when the referee called us out to the center of the mat to - he'd look to see if we had 

long fingernails so we wouldn't scratch and then felt us to make sure we didn't have oil 

or grease or anything on our bodies and he made me take this belt off, for fear my buckle 

would harm my opponent. And of course gravity being what it is, why, that posed a prob- 

lem. 

And a friend of mine who I was going to high school with - I must have been in second 

year high school - was there and he had a white wash tie, used to wear those white wash 

ties. So he took his white wash tie off and that's what I used to hold up my trunks. I 

don't know whether that was an indication of things to come, but he ultimately turned out 

to be a bishop in the Roman Catholic church and he didn't need any ties, Maybe he decided 

he wouldn't have any use for the tie. Bishop Ernest J. Primeau who was the - I guess 

they call them vicar of the American College in Rome where American and Chicago priest 

would train in Rome. Well, he was what amounted to the chaplain of that group and then 

he was the bishop of the diocese of Manchester, Vermont. But it was his tie that I used 

to . . . to hold up my . . . 


But I don't know how she - whether she said, "Where were you?" or - you know, when 

she confronted me, why, I told her where I was. She wasn't a bit happy. (laughs) I don't 

know why she reacted so strongly, but she did. I think she was afraid that at first I might 

have got hurt. And f was still doing some of this modeling businea? and was afra* I 

think - she may have thought I might get cauliflo*er ears or broken nose' or 

something. Maybe that's what it was, I don't know, but I know that she was upset, 

Q: But she didn't say anything like, "You'll never wrestle again!' . 

A: Oh no. No, she - as I say I was surprised at her strong reaction, because it - I didn't 

think it was that big a thing. I mean it wasn't something where I disobeyed anybody. They 

didn't say, you know, "You can't do this." You Mow, we started - I wrestled for Emmett 

Playground and I won - I won the west side part of the thing and then the next week 

was the city thing. I don't recall whether - whether there nas anything in the paper 

abut the first one. She didn't see that anyway, she didn't know about it. Had they &solutely 

forbidden me, I don't suppose I would have done it. And I don't even know if she 

knew that I was practicing, you know that was at a local playground. 

: 

But 5 think there is always a fear on the part of parents kids are going to get hurt, bemuse 

at that time - you know everybody wrestlee today, every high school has a wrestling 

team. It's not odd, but then it was a very unusual thing for afiybody to wrestle. A lot 

of kids played baseball and played football, but hardly anybody wrestled. So I suppose pay- 

be it was kind of unknown too. 

There was a little guy by the name of Charlie Yaccino who wrestled in a different - I 4hink 

I was what they called the open division and then he was in the grammar school division, 

he wm younger than I was, and he really was a tiger. And he ultimately ended up being 

a six-day bike racer. And he continued wrestling, and he was awfully good. 

And one year when I was in college, I decided that I was going to see if I could make the 

Olympic team, and quite frankly it was an ambition that was way beyond my capacitt but 

I hadn't been wrestling at all and I really didn't know how good I was or - so had 

arranged to workout with him one time just to see how good I was. I found out I wasn't 

good enough so that ambition didn't last very long. But he was a wonderful wrestler and 

as I say he turned to be a professional six-day bike racer. 

Q: What y~rt of heros did you have when you were a child? 

A: Oh, I suppose Red Grange, Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey . . . of course you've got to remember 

that we didn't have television and we didn't have radio to the extent that we have now 

so, you know, aside from the sporting pages of the newspapers you didn't come in contact 

with them, you know. I don't think there were the - well the media wasn't, you know, 

bringing it into everybody's home. Those would be the ones and then of eourse in the local 

area,~~-was a White Sox pitcher by the name of Red Faber and - and . . . Ray chalk 

813rd DiMe KerP played for the White Sox and, you know, if you go back real - f first C icago 

Beam $aotborll game'that I ever I saw was 1%, and at that - that was still in i you 

know, asdy it waa nothing like it is now. They'd have a handful of people t the 

games. That was before they went to Wrigley Field, they played down at Soldiers Id. 

So as a real youngster, I suppose, the ones that I just mentioned would probably be the 

ones, and they were still pretty good ones. Ruth and Dempsey. . . . I was always w Cub 

fan. I don't know why. 

Q: Did you go to many Cub games? 

A: Not a great deal, no. See, they were on the north side and I was on the west. And 

my dad didn't have any great interest in them. (pause) As I got older, I got to be a great 

Bear fan, and I used to go to all their games. I 


< 1 

1 

;

Q: (pause) We haven't talked much about your relationship with your sister? Now you 

were fairly close in age. 

A: Well, I think your relationship with your sister is closer if she is younger than you are. I 

think the older brother has a tendency to be protective of the younger sister. My sister 

and I were very good friends. You know, we never had any disagreements of any kind, but 

we didn't go to the same schools. We went to the same grammar school, but she went to 

a different high school, so our paths kind of converged and diverted. She went one way 

and I went the other. 

She was a lot of things that I wasn't, she was a pretty studious girl. She loved to play 

cards, inveterate bridge player. She'd rather play bridge than eat. And quite an accom- 

plished piano player. (pause) And she was helpful when - you know, if I needed any help 

in anything. She took pretty much the same subjects that I did. It was a good relationship. 

Q: For instance would she go along on, you know, trips you may have made to the photogra- 

phers and . . . 

A: No. No, I was on my own. At a relatively early age I could find my way around Chicago 

on the streetcars and buses and I went alone. My mother only went with me when I was 

real young. I was pretty self-reliant in that respect, 

Q: What age are we talking about? That you had been finding your way around Chicago. 

A: Oh when I was in grammar school, about fifth, sixth grade maybe. Let's see I finished - 

you finish grammar school about thirteen don't you - twelve or thirteen. So I was prob- 

ably ten or eleven when I. . . . Part of it may have been necessity, that may have been 

around the time dad was home and my mother may have thought she should stay with him 

instead of going out with me. But I never had any problems finding my way around the 

city, and the city was a safe place in those days. 

Q: (pause) As a child, I guess I'm thinking up until the time you were in high school, how 

aware were you of the outside world? International issues . . . 

A: None. As I said, we had no radio and TV. Never concerned me. I remember when 

World War I - when the Armistice - there was a false armistice and we paraded down 

the street. I well remember walking down Washington Boulevard with a top of a garbage 

can and a stick, beating and celebrating the end of the war. And that was a mistake, I 

don't know how much later, maybe a week or two afterwards, that was the real armistice. 

There were two people, next-door neighbors, they had a boy that was in service and 'that 

Dr. Freeman that I mentioned, he had a couple of brothers that were in service, But it 

didn't touch every home the way World War I1 did. 

And then when the war was over, that's when they started these army surplus things. I 

remember the Boston Store, they used to sell a five-pound can of jam and jelly that had 

been prepared for the armed forces and when the war was over, we used to - we'd wait 

in line by the hour to buy that. (chuckles) I think we paid a dollar for it, something like 

that, it was a big bargain. 

But I don't remember, you know, much about the war, I remember songs like "Over There" 

and "The Yanks are coming. The Yanks are coming. We won't be home until its over over 

there," "Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" and - that was a World War I 

song. It seems to me "Tipperary" was another one, "It's a long way to Tipperary." But 

we weren't saturated with international affairs like we are today. 

Q: Did your parents talk about the war very much, the first world war or . . . 


A: I can't recall, not - not - again as I say it didn't affect - none of my family were 

in it. I was pretty small when World War I was on. Let's see, when was that 

over . . . 1916 - 1917 I guess and I was born in 1908, so I would be eight or nine years 

of age. But not having anybody in it - well when I used to go down and see my grand- 

mother, Canada was in the war before we were, I think. And them was more evidence of 

the war up there than there was here. And I remember that they used to - there'was 

a lot of evidence, a lot of the evidence, of the war in Canada. They used to refer to their 

uniforms instead of calling it khaki, they called it "karaki" up there, they spell it the ame 

way. I think that made me more aware of World War I, when I would to 

Canada. (pause) And the interrogation by the customs officials at the border was a ittle 

more intense than it is now, because of the war I suppose. 

Q: (paw) Were you at all aware of Ireland's st+le for independence? 

i 

1 

A: Not to any great extent. The one real close Irish person of course was my grandn;bther 

and she waan't a blisterer. She was no great lover of the Great Britain but she didn't; rant 

and rave. She was a kind of a gentle soul. I 

Q: How abut domestic issues, labor organization or - anything like that touch on your 

family? , f 

A: Oh my dad was, you know, in management at the railroad so he wasn't - so - ithere 

was always a great interest in politics in my family. My dad used to always listen fo the 

speeches on the radio, even that old crystal set. (pause) But he never was an active pirtici- 

pant, he never was a precinct captain or any of that stuff. I remember in the maybralty 

elections in Chicago there was a fellow named Bill Thompson, William Hale Thompso$, and 

I used to go to political meetings to hear Thompson. And at that time, of course :again 

before TV and radio was as prominent as it is, they used to have political meetings :in all 

of the schools and they would be pretty close together and I used to follow around and jlisten 

to them. Thompson was rr Republican, and Chicago was primarily Republican, the payor 

was usually a Republican. 

There was a terrible internal fight in the Republican party in one of the times that Thoppson 

was running and my memory is that one of the contestants was a man by name of . . , John 

Dale Robinson. I think that - I know he was quite a prominent Republican politician, a d 

another one was Deneen and Bill Thompson would - at the table he would have two~white 

rate in cages and he would address them by the names of these opponents, "And you, Deneen, 

and you, Robinwn . . . " (chuckles) 

And one of those times he campaigned against King George. He was going to burn all the 

school boob, ail the history books, that had any reference to England. If King George ever 

came to Chicago, why, he would bust him in his snoot, and that was his 

campaign. (chuckles) 

I 

k I don% know. It was his idea of campaigning, he thought it was germaine to the election 

of the mayor of the city of Chicago. I don't remember how many times he was mayor. My 

memory is he was mayor twice. But he was a very very prominent and popular Reprblican 

politician. But that was his campaign, chasing King George back to England. 

But I used to go to all of those things, 1'11 never forget, there was a United States Senator, 

a Democrat, by the name of 6. Ham Lewis, James Hamilton Lewis, who was a littlq bit of 

a guy. They used to call him pink whiskers, he had whiskers, and I don't know vhether 

they were pink or not, but that is what they called him. I don't think J. Ham 

five feet, five feet and one inch, something like that. And his opponent in that 

a woman who had - I think she had been a congressman, her name was 


i 

i

34 

McCormick, and she was running against Lewis for the United States senate seat, and I 

guess . . . 


A: He'd walk down the - he didn't come down the middle aisle, he'd walk down the side 

aisle and the stage was full of these prominent people and they were all spouting and then 

somebody spotted him and they mentioned that United States Senator James Hamilton Lew- 

is was entering and of course the crowd went into an uproar and he'd walked down - he 

had an opera cape and a black cane with a white ivory handle or something like that, and 

he wore gloves, gray suede gloves. So he'd walk to the middle of the stage and he very 

carefully gave his cane to somebody and took his right hand and he flipped the opera cape 

over his left shoulder and he took his left hand and he flipped it over his right 

shoulder. (chuckles) And he peeled his gloves off like you peel a banana and - very very 

slowly - and, you know, just like a Shakespearean actor. (chuckles) And I can still 

remember him - speeches - remember that his opponent was a woman. He said, "I want 

to confide in this audience tonight." He said, "I'm being pursued by a very handsome 

woman." (laughter) He never said a thing unkind or anything, he just - just oozed a 

kinda. . . . And I saw him some years later at the Chicago Bar Association and he gave 

one of his usual talks. He was a great orator. In going down the elevator a woman re- 

marked, she said "You know that was the most beautiful speech. But I can't remember a 

thing he said." (chuckles) And somebody in the elevator said, "Well, he's - Senator 

James Ham Lewis is the only living man that can walk through a field of freshly fallen 

snow and never leave a footprint." (laughter) 

And I heard him try a lawsuit once over in the federal court and he really was - I don't 

know, he might be - he might be - today somebody like that might be considered a ham, 

but in those days he really was dramatic. And he was addressing the jury and over the 

door, it was a very ornate courtroom, and over the door was some kind of a - I don't know 

who wrote it - some saying commenting on the function of a jury and a juror and saying 

that in - this is paraphrasing it, I don't remember the exact language - but he stood out 

in the middle and he pointed to it with a great flourish and, before he rested his case with 

the jury, and he quoted this thing and it said that - something to the effect that they were 

performing the functions of the creator because they are sitting in judgment of their fellow 

man. (laughs) And you could hear a pin drop. But he was one of the real , . . in spite 

of the fact that he was a little tiny guy . . . he was a real giant. "Through the freshly 

fallen snow and never leave a footprint," I thought was pretty good. He couldn't remember 

anything he said. 

So my interest in politics, as I say - my father had one - he didn't get in actively but 

it was kind of traditional. My uncle in Canada. . . . The Canadian political parties were 

liberal and conservative, Whig or Tory, and he was a liberal. Of course they never won 

up there, it was like the county that I live in. But every election day religiously he'd hitch 

his horse up and drive two or three miles to cast a ballot. Never missed an election, always 

cast a ballot, and in their local little things he was always - they used to elect a road 

commissioner and he was always it, and he was always head of the school board. None 

of them were paying anything but I mean he had an interest in that. 

My father never participated to the extent that my uncle did, but it's always been kind of 

traditional that - to have an interest in - I used to listen to political speeches and go 

to the meetings when I was pretty young. 

Q: How old do you think you might have been the first time you attended a political meeting 

like that? 


A: I was in grammar school. I would have been less than thirteen. That's pretty young. 

Of course they were great shows. I mean they had trucks and red, white and blue bunting 

and they'd have bands, and you know they'd go out in the neighborhood and pound the big 

drums and it was quite a thing, you know. Of course it was entertainment too. There was 

no tube to look at. And, oh, I'm sure it was before I finished grammar school that I went 

to them. (chuckles) They used to do some dirty tricks. Sometimes they'd get a real noisy 

band and put their opponent's name on the side &the band and then go into the residential 

neighborhood about midnight and wake everybody up . with .their 

opuses. (chuckles) They'd get so mad that they'd vote for their opponent. I've never 

known whether it worked, but they did it. (laughter) 

Q: Well did your father talk about politics quite a bit before when you would hear about 

it? 

A: Quite a bit, yes. (pause) My mother wasn't that interested, but dad was. 

Q: I almost suspected it would have been the other way around . . . that your mother, you 

know, maybe because of her family's business, you know, would have had more political inter- 

est. 

A: She was family-oriented. She didn't care much about anything but family. 

Q: What were your father's politics? 

A: Democrat. And my uncle in Canada is a liberal, which is the counterpart of a 

Democrat. I never could quite understand why dad was such a strong Democrat because 

he never had any - I'm not too sure he ever knew any political figure. He knew some 

national ones. His job on the railroad was - as district passenger agent - was t~ ~olicit 

business from convention groups and that sort of thing. And Vice-president Dawes, Charles 

Gates Dawes, was one of dad's accounts and my father was very fond of Mr. Dawas. In 

fact the Dawes people owned the City National Bank where dad went to work after he rretired 

from the railroad. He was very fond of him. 

(chuckles) He tells a funny story. One of his jobs was to greet important people that came 

to Chicago. The Papal . . . I forgot what his name was now, but the Papal Nuncio, I forget 

what was his name, came to Chicago and dad knew him. But the funny story is that when 

Max h r fought Joe Louis, and Joe Louis really did a job on him, and Baer came to Chicago 

and he had a drawing room - they used to all travel by train then, that was before the 

airlines were there - and dad knocked on the door of Max Baer's stateroom to see if he 

could be of any service to him. You know, whether he was going to transfer 

at t4is station to station - and so forth. So he handed his card in to Max 

eyes were shut and he said, "How can that be?" So he shut the door - 

he shut the door and then he opened it another place. He 

Max Baer,'' and dad said, "He thought I had gotten up at 

coma down and get his autograph." (laughter) Here was 

beat; he got pummeled pretty good." 

But, you know . . . he met some very famous people like the opera singer, ~bdame 

Schumann-Heink, she was one of dad's accounts . . . and I don't remember some of the 

others, but I do know that General Dawes was one of dad's favorites. Of course Dawes was 

a Republican. 

Q: (pause) Was your father a big Woodrow Wilson supporter then? 

A: Yes, yes. Well Wilson was quite a distinquished man, he was president of Pripceton, 

William A. Redmond very Memoir scholarly, - Archives/ at least Special as Collections far as - we Norris knew. L Brookens He Library wore - a University tall silk of Illinois hat. at (pause) Springfield - UIS 

Wwn the

Democratic convention came to Chicago in 1932, because of my father's position with the 

railroad then, he was able to get tickets to the convention. That was the year that Franklin 

D. Roosevelt was nominated and I attended many of the sessions. The big fuss that time 

was whether or not they were going to come out and repeal prohibition. And the platform 

committee was out for a long long time, trying to decide what they were going to do, I guess. 

And they had the best floor show I ever saw. People who were at the convention that - 

you know, they got them to get up on the platform and talk. Among them was Fr. 

Coughlin, the radio priest from Detroit, you know that used to raise up a rumpus. And 

Morton Downey, the Irish singer; Will Rogers. I don't remember them all, 

I'll never forget Will Rogers' opening comment. He said that he was going to do something 

very unusual at a Democratic convention. He was going to say something nice about the 

Republicans. He said that they did the best they could with what little they 

had. (laughter) But that was - you know, you'd pay a lot of money to see Will Rogers 

and all of those people at one gathering. 

And that's the first time that - it used to be customary . . . you know, to call on the presi- 

dential nominee and advise him that he had been nominated. The presidential nominee was 

not at the convention. Roosevelt in 1932 broke that tradition, and he came and addressed 

the convention. And I was there when he did that. That was really an electric night. I 

can still remember his opening statement. He hadn't yet expressed himself on prohibition 

and everybody was apprehensive, you know whether he was going to repudiate the platform 

or what he was going to do. He stood up and he was so well screened by his son that I 

didn't realize he was a cripple. I thought he walked in by himself. He said, "This conven- 

tion stands for the repeal of prohibition." Applause. He was a great craftsman, "Your 

candidate stands for the repeal . . ." (laughter) Wow! The whole place went wild. 

Dad used to listen to Roosevelt. He'd have those fireside speeches all the time. He was 

always - I don't know why it was funny but he - there was these three Republicans that 

were congressmen. One was Sam Martin. I don't remember what Barton's name was, but 

Hamilton Fish, who was the congressman from Roosevelt's congressional district up in Hyde 

Park, from a very very distinguished family, I mean in spite of his name. Once in a while 

Roosevelt would end sentences in, "Martin, Barton and Fish." Everybody would roar. I 

don't know why it was funny, but. . . . Then he was talking about somebody and he said, 

"He did a complete summersault and landed in mid-air." (laughter) Did you ever hear any 

Roosevelt stuff? Ever see him when the . . . 

Q: I've heard recordings, but I don't go back that far. 

A: He certainly was a skillful orator, incredible leader. Boy, he sure . . . he gave the nation 

a lot of confidence in a time when they didn't really have much to crow about. He did it 

with such optimism and such assurance. I don't know whether he knew whether anything 

was going to work, but, he sure . . . was a great orator. 

Q: In terms of Chicago or Cook County politics, when you were a child what did it mean 

for your father to be a Democrat? 

A: I was on the losing side. The Republicans won there. Chicago was not Democratic until 

Roosevelt. Depression is really what made it. There were two ethnic groups that were 

always traditionally Republican, one was the Italian and the other was the Black. Blacks 

were Republican, they weren't Democrat. It wasn't until Roosevelt put that coalition 

together that there were Blacks. Even the great Congressman Dawson, who was really the 

Black leader and he was Republican and he came over to Democratic. And Corneal Davis 

was a Republican. Remember you were here when he was here. Staunch Democrat 

William now. A. Redmond But that Memoir really - Archives/ was the Special change. Collections You - Norris know L every Brookens once Library in - a University while there of Illinois would at Springfield be an - UIS

odd - Willy E. Dever was elected mayor, but as a general rule it was not a Democratic 

community. 

Q: Was your father so liberal that he favored issues more liberal than the Democrats. 

A: I don't think so . . . 

Q: Public ownership of utilities . . . 

A: I wouldn't - oh, no. (chuckles) No. I don't think my father would really be consid- 

ered much of a liberal, There are an awful lot of Democrats today that are not terribly 

liberal. You know the ethnic Democrat is kind of a conservative guy, he's not a liberal 

guy. I think they go along with - because of the coalition that was put 

together. But . . . no, my father - of course, you know, he thought everybody was entitled 

to different ways, and that sort of thing. Of course I'm not too sure that there were these 

great liberal causes then, either. But I wouldn't think my father was a. . . My mather 

just - she never had much to say politically at all. I think her brothers, the house rnem- 

bers, were Republican because they were business people. I know their kin now are Repub- 

lican. 

Q: Your father was perhaps a liberal only in the sense that he was not a Republican? 

A: If being a Democrat made you a liberal, that's what he was. But he wasn't a great cru- 

sader or anything. I never could quite understand his great affiliation because he didn't pro- 

fess for the Democratic party because he wasn't, you know, an active participant. He didn't 

go to the political parties, I went. He listened on the radio all the time though, never missed 

Roosevelt's fireside talk. It may have been that when he came to Chicago from Casada, 

I think that the Democrats used to help those fellows with their naturaliz+tion 

process. They kind of followed up on them and encouraged them and told them how to go 

about it and so forth. I think that may have had something to do with it. Democrats did 

that a lot more than Republicans did for the immigrants. 

Q: What were your initial feelings about politics? When you attended these political meet- 

ings, were you interested in becoming a participant? 

A: No, I never gave much thought to running for anything. I, you know, I decided early 

that, you know, there are some things that - I think government is a pretty important 

thing, and I think it's important that it be done well, and it be done honestly, and be done, 

you know, with the public good in mind. You know you have a choice as to whether or 

not you're going to be a Rotarian or a Lion or a Kiwanae or any of those things, but you 

don't have any choice as to whether or not you're going to be subject to government, because 

you're part of it. And in order to insure that it's done well, I feel that people should 

participate. I think it's important to learn about your candidates, I think it's important 

to support, you know, the right kind of people for government. 

i 

There really isn't anything wrong that the people don't have it within their po r to 

rectify. They don't do it by not registering, and they don't do it by not voting. But i they 

I 

elect the right people, I think they can do a lot. 

And I've always had a real strong interest in government. I've . . . and I think it slould 

be done right, and it should be done well. I never looked at it as a way to make a preat 

amount of money . . . and I still feel that same way. I mean I think people who btray 

the trust are scoundrels. And we should be more careful in a lot of people we elect too. The 

best way to have good elected officials is to have good candidates from both parties and/ have 

the right kind of people elected. That goes way back. I guess that's the way my unc felt 

and that% the way my father felt. You know it wasn't a way of making money. I ever 

i 

gave much thought to running, early on. 


Q: Did you participate in any campaigns while you were going to college? 

A: We organized a thing called the Austin Civic Group that was going to study issues and 

support a candidate for alderman. We had a very good alderman there. He wasn't much 

of a mover and shaker, his name was Wiley W. Mills. We got together. He was always 

the object of the arrows and the barbs. He was a Democrat, but not a machine guy. Very, 

you know, well-thought-of man. This Austin Civic Group was a bunch of young fellows and 

we organized, we supported him for alderman. But not to the extent - I don't remember 

pushing doorbells and going door-to-door and handing out stuff, didn't know anything about 

that. That probably was my first venture into politics. It was quite a group. We had 

about fifty people, which is a lot of young guys. 

Q: How old would you have been at that time? 

A: I might have even been a lawyer, I don't know. I wasn't a kid. (pause) Maybe a little 

bit younger than that. 

Q: It was real close to the time that you were in law school? 

A: Yes, I would think so. I was obviously of voting age. (pause) I guess maybe that I got 

active in - 1932 was probably the time I got most active. I think attending the Democratic 

National - that was an exciting experience. When Roosevelt came and . . . that's when 

Alfred E. Smith, who had - he had been the nominee before, he was not in favor of 

Roosevelt, and he tried to withhold the nomination from Roosevelt, My memory is that 

Roosevelt had nominated Smith as. . . . Smith was a candidate for the nomination of 1924, 

but he didn't get it, primarily I guess because of religion. 

I listened to that convention very avidly. I can still remember the role call was, 

"Alabama." "Alabama twenty-four votes for Underwood," whoever Underwood 

was. (chuckles) But William Gibbs McAdoo was - out of California - he was Smith's 

biggest opponent. But anyway he didn't get the nomination primarily over religion I guess, 

and then he was the nominee in 1928. And Smith had always been a supporter of Roosevelt, 

but he didn't want Roosevelt to be the nominee in 1932. I'm not too sure now whether Smith 

wanted to run again, or just what the story was. 

But I can still see the picture of A1 Smith taking a walk from the hall when he failed in 

that. It was really kind of sad. And it kind of teaches a lesson that politics is something 

like bananas: if you leave the bunch, you get skinned. (laughter) 

Smith never had the stay. He was the darling of the Democratic party for years. He was 

the governor of New York and came up from Fulton Fish Market, and . . . 

But anyway in 1932 I kind of got fired up. I liked the convention and I liked Roosevelt and 

I liked all of the excitement you know. It's kind of an artificial thing now. Then you know 

it wasn't sure who the nominee was going to be. They didn't have all these primaries and 

they didn't come in with all the votes in advance. It was uncertain and they would have 

the role call, you know, by alphabet. They'd take their banners and spontaneously they'd 

march around in support of the candidate. And when the name of Roosevelt went in, for 

instance, why, New York would parade and all, and the ones that were supporting him and 

all. It was a, you know, kind of a circus, a real exciting kind of thing. And I think that's 

probably what got me. 

Then I was quite active in the Cook County Young Democrats. In fact I was - I preceded 

ERA [Equal Rights Amendment]. There was a girl who worked - she then worked in the 

office of the mayor of Chicago and she still works in the office of the mayor of Chicago. 

(chuckle) Her maiden name was Helen Silhanek; her married name now is Helen 

William McNamara. A. Redmond So Memoir we decided - Archives/ that Special we Collections should - make Norris L her Brookens president Library - of University the Cook of Illinois County at Springfield Young - UIS

Democrats. And I was her campaign manager. And we imitated the national 

convention. We had the wards with their banners and all this kind of stuff. We went 

through the whole hoopla and we were going to have a parade down Michigan Boulevard 

and I got a permit from the Chicago Police Department, permitting us to have the parade 

down Michigan Boulevard. (chuckles) 

I had a call from the chief of police of the Chicago Park District. At that time they had 

their own police that patrolled the boulevards. (chuckle) And he said, "Where did you get 

your permit? How are you going to have a parade?" And I said, "Well, I got a permit 

from the Chicago Police Department." He said, "They have no jurisdiction. Nobody 

parades on Michigan Boulevard." So we changed it to make it State Street. 

You know it wasn't much of a parade, but wG got a big touring car, it was like a convertible 

only it was a big long thing, and we put her up on the back and she waved to all of her 

subjects and the convention was at the Sherman Hotel. And we had - there was one of 

the ward committeemen by the name of Hy Brody I think it was, and he had a kid's bend, 

you know $he little kids who blew horns and one thing and another and they were going 

to furnish the music. And they started at the Sherman Hotel, and because they weren't 

union, they threatened to strike the whole place. (laughter) And we had visions of the 

whole thing being attacked by police. (laughter) I don't remember exactly how we got over 

that hurdle. 

But anyway we had the thing pretty well in line and everything was going fine until the 

major political - the big wheels - decided that they couldn't take any chances in having 

a president of the Cook County Young Democrats in - possibly, I don't know whether it 

was because she was a girl or whether they were afraid they might have an utteranw it 

wasn't completely in line with something, but they sent all their precinct captains in there - 

they'd never meet an age test. They had all these guys, gray hair and everything. 

But we didn't win. A guy by the name of Tom Hanahan won, who was a member of the 

General Assembly here at one time, and who was a good friend of mine, but I wanted to 

get a woman in office back in 1932. So I was kind of active. 

Then I guess I got into the problem of earning a living, and I didn't do very much of 

anything. Of course I went away to school and a lot of things changed. 

Back in 1948 a fellow from my town was going to run for the house and I was going to 

help him. And our candidate for state's attorney at that time was a senior in law 

school. He didn't have the qualifications to be state's attorney if he would have won. So 

people in the party came to my .house and asked me if I'd run for state's attorney in 

1948. Well I didn't realize, you know, that Du Page really didn't elect many Democrats. 

I was kind of flattered. And I was at that time in the law department of the Northwe? 

Railroad. And I guess I was kind of wanting to be in private practice anyway. 

But to make a long story short, I quit my job in the law department of the railroad and 

I became a candidate for state's attorney. My opponent was the grandfather of Representa- 

tive Lee Daniels. (chuckles) His name was Lee Daniels, who afterwards was a member 

of the house also, but he was state's attorney and he was the man I ran against. 

ym: 

think - well I know this is true too - that the state chairman was a fellow by the 

of Geo~ge Kells who was an alderman in Chicago, and he told me to come down to his ffice 

one time, hefore I had decided to run, that he wanted me to meet some people. 

I 

I 


Q: You say that the people he wanted you to meet were Paul Douglas and Adlai Stevenso . 


A: Paul Douglas and Adlai Stevenson who at that time were going to run for United States 

Senate and governor of the state and they encouraged me to run for state's attorney because 

the man that we had on the ticket of course, you know, he wouldn't lend any strength. 

Of course I didn't really know what I was getting into but I think I'm still the Democrat 

who came closest to winning in Du Page County. I was beaten about three to two. Adlai 

Stevenson got more votes than I did, but I got more than Paul Douglas did. And Harry 

Truman was at the head of the ticket. I got more, a lot more, than Truman did. 

So I ran for state's attorney in 1948 and then the next episode I had was that I ran for 

county judge in 1950 and didn't make it. And although I was active in the local party up 

in my section of the county, I didn't run for anything again until . . . funny, I ran for nom- 

ination for the house in 1956, but I really didn't - you know, I didn't run that seriously 

because what I wanted to be was a delegate to the national convention. And because I 

hadn't been active in the party, why, somebody said, "Who in the hell is Redmond? He 

can't run for that!" So I guess I decided I'd run for the house instead of that. 

I came pretty close that time. I was nominated but I. . . . Then two years later for some 

reason or other the incumbent had lost a lot of the support and people came and asked me 

if I'd run. And I didn't intend to run against him because I thought that, you know, he 

had won. But it was obvious that they were going to support somebody else. 

So I ran in 1958 and was elected and then I was elected every term after that, usually without 

opposition in the primary. With the minority system, why, of course there for a while you 

decided whether you would run one, two, or three and it was customary the minority party 

would only run one so nomination was paramount to election. 

Q: That's on the cumulative voting? 

A: Well you'd only have three nominees and you'd have three jobs so . . . so you could 

decide whether you'd run - later on when you became familiar with it, it was probably 

necessary to run at least two so there was always four for three jobs. But there was a 

time when the minority only would nominate one, so whoever won the nomination in the 

primary was assured election in the fall because there were two Republicans and one Demo- 

crat or the other way around. And when Kerner was governor, he wanted to have a contest 

in each area and he encouraged everybody to run two and then it ultimately was put into 

the law that you had to run at least two. 

So for a long time I didn't have any opponent. And even with the requirement of nominat- 

ing two I didn't have any opponent most of the time. So I had kind of an easy job of getting 

elected. 

Q: You know I don't think we talked very much about your experience going to law 

school. We just - we started to talk about that last time. 

A: Well I think I probably got involved in - in, you know, quasi-political business in engi- 

neering school, in Marquette, 

Q: How so? How did you get . . . 

A: Well I was elected president of my class as a junior. That's the first year that they had 

an all-university selection. And I was elected. Customary up there is that the law school 

and the dental school and the engineering school used to have a coalition and each one of 

those colleges would nominate somebody to represent them . , . that college. Then the 

three of them would get together. The year that I was there it was the engineers' turn 

for president of the class. And I was the nominee in the engineering school. So the combi- 

William nation A. Redmond of law, medicine Memoir - Archives/ and - Special I said Collections medicine, - Norris didn't L Brookens I? Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

Q: Yes. 

A: Law, medicine and engineering had the numbers and I was elected president of the 

class. And I was active in a lot of other stuff like . . . well the homecoming stuff, I was 

involved in that. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, the student branch, I was 

active there. I was pretty active in the engineering thing. 

Oh, yes, St. Patrick was the patron saint of engineers. I don't know why he was, but on 

St. Patrick's Day they used to have a big doings and they used to have a parade on Wisqonsin 

. Avenue and they would select the St. Patrick. I don't know what the qualifications 

were. But I was elected St. Patrick. And they had a sedan chair and they carried ma down 

Wisconsin Avenue one time. I had a green robe and a crown. (chuckles) And sane of 

the Irish objected to desecrating St. Patrick in that respect, so they protested. I'm not too 

sure that they ever had St. Patrick again. (laughs) I'm sure they never had that parade 

again. 

But I was St. Patrick. (chuckles) And again I don't know what the qualifications were or 

how it happened, but it did. Well I guess among the things some people were made engi- 

neering Knights of St. Patrick and there again I don't know what the qualifications were. I 

was one of those guys. But when I was St. Patrick, I had the big sword and I - they'd 

kneel down in front of me and I then on the shoulder would tap them and say, "I dub thee 

Knight of St. Patrick." (chuckles) It was very . . . it was like Westminster Abbey. But 

the Irieh objected to it, they didn't think it was very good. 

But all of that kind of stuff. You know, active in the goings on in the engineering school 

and in my junior class. 

Q: So what year was it that you graduated from Marquette? 

A: In 1931. There w i no ~ work. Direct selling, door-to-door, was all there was. So the 

folks were willing to finance me to law school and so I went to Northwestern Law School. 

Q: Your father's job was secure during the Depression? 

A: Oh, yes. He never missed a payroll or a paycheck. 

Q: (pause) What sort of feelings do you have about the Depression? How did . . . 

A: Pretty grim. Pretty grim. (pause) They . . . they had a World's Fair in Chicago in 

1933 and that kind of gave a, you know, a shot to employment and I would say optimism 

in the Chicago area. And I got a job as a spieler on a sight-seeing bus. "Ladies and 

gedemen, you are starting a complete tour of Chicago with the idea of an organized seeing 

in a short spw of time a general view of our city. And on the corner on the right is lovely 

. . . " (chuckles) So I was a spieler on the sightseeing buses and - and . . . you know 

there was no work other than - and that didn't pay anything to speak of. 

People used to stand at the foot of the elevated stairs, it would be a block long, asking for 

a handout of the morning paper so they could look at the help wanted ads. You 

papers were only two cents so you can imagine. . . . But a lot of people slept under 

level of Wacker Drive, no place to stay. And they would cover themselves with 

they - they'd get, you know, wooden chips and that sort of thing and build a 

to keep them warm in the colder weather. Over near where the post office 


had an area that was about two blocks square, and they had a hobo village that had home- 

made little crates. You know they'd get crates and piano boxes or whatever else and make 

little shelters and stay in there, that was their home. Twenty-five percent of the people 

unemployed. Just awful. 

Q: Did you . . . 

A: My own family didn't have any hardship because dad's salary came in, but a lot of - a 

lot of hardship. 

Q: Did you feel betrayed at all? I mean here you'd been through engineering school and 

there was nothing for you? 

A: No, I didn't feel betrayed. I didn't feel it was . . . I certainly didn't think it was the 

government's fault and I - you know it's just - I think kids today are probably better 

tuned in than we were, you know, to the economics and the serious problem of making a 

living. I can remember when I was - my father used to walk me to the elevated when 

I'd go home on Sunday night and he was always telling me about how serious a job it was 

to make a living and so forth. Well I had never known any want. And up until that time, 

that was 1931, really the rigors of the Depression hadn't set in yet. And I didn't really quite 

understand what he was talking about. 

I know it now. Not that I've ever suffered myself, but I know people who have suffered 

and I realize that unless you educate yourself and train yourself that you're, you know, you're 

taking a chance that you're not going to make it. He kept insisting that, you know, it was 

a pretty grim business to make a living. And when I saw it with my own two eyes, I . . . I 

realized that it is serious business and I think that's one reason that I feel so strongly now 

when I see that - for instance in the job that I have now, all these kids that, you know, 

their education is poor, their training is poor, there's no work for them. Half of them 

unable to get any kind of employment. And, you know, you talk to them, they talk about 

a job, I'd say, "Well now, you know you go to an employer and he says 'What can you do?' 

what do you answer? You know, what specifically can you do better than anybody else?'' 

If they're not ready. . . . That's why I feel so strongly about educating and training those 

people that are not working today. That's why I think the elimination - I didn't realize 

what the CETA [Comprehensive Employment and Training Act] program - how important 

it was, but that's where a lot of the guys . . . 

(Taping stopped for telephone conversation, then resumed) 

A: I didn't realize that, you know, that that was the thing that's employed a lot of the work- 

release people and a lot of the people that you put out on parole and mandatory supervised 

release. And in pretty meaningful training sessions too, just not make work, in teaching 

them to do something. And the elimination of that I think is devastating. 

And I didn't realize it until I got on this job. I thought maybe it was just kind of a make- 

work thing that, you know, that didn't amount to anything. There may have been some 

of that, but I think it's so important. You know, you expect these kids and people when 

they go out to not get back into crime and not to come back in the penitentiaries and if 

they can't do anything, I don't how you can expect any great success. I think it's serious 

myself. That's one program that. . . . and I didn't know anything about it until I got on 

this job. 

Q: How did you decide upon law school as what you wanted to go to? 

A: Which school? 

William Q: How A. Redmond did you Memoir decide - Archives/ that was Special the Collections field to go - Norris into? L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

A: Well, I thought - I'd been told, you know, that a cdmbination of law and engineering 

is good for patent wwk and patent work was very remunerative and very interesting. And 

having a degree in engineering, I decided that that's what I was going to do. There didn't 

seem to be anything else that dovetailed with engineering. Currently it might be MBA 

[Master of business administration] or something like that. But that wasn't true when I 

was looking around. So that was what motivated me. 

1 

And I felt that I had to go to a law school that was in town. And I went to all of khem, 

I went to De Paul and hyola and Northwestern and Kent and University of Chicajgo. I 

liked Northwestern best. I think it had the prestige of a great university behind t and 

I liked the buildings, the relatively new buildings. I talked to the dean. I never was.sorry 

that I went there. I'm very proud of my. . . . When I was Speaker of the House the firet 

time, the governor and the president of the senate and the Speaker of the House ware all 

from Northwestern. (chuckles) It has fallen a little bit now, the only one that's from 

Northwestern fiow is the governor. But it was a great law school and I enjoyed it. 


Q: How was it that you happened to get involved in the Young Democrats? 

A: Well when I was in law school there were. . . . Some of my classmates. were 

involved. Governor Kerner was a classmate of mine and he was involved to. some 

extent. And I had a very dear friend by the name of George Rogers who got involved. You 

know it's pretty difficult to really exactly remember, but I'm sure it was through rqy law 

school connections. 

Q: Who was George Rogers? 

A: He was a classmate of mine, a long time - since deceased. 

Q: Did you know Otto Kerner very well? 

Q: What ssrt of a man was he? i 

A: I:thought he was a very fine man. He was - he was a - certainly, he was ve gen- 

teel, 'gracious, kind, thoughtful. He was a fine friend. i 

Q: C%I yw remember what some of his interests were back in the time that you two were 

in IMV h 1 i r 

A: His main interest really was the Black Horse group in the national guard. He joined 

the mnd guard befare we got involved in the war, and I would say that was tlJe, you 

know, his main interest other than the practice of law. 

The firm that he was in, I think his father had been in it when his father was practicing 

law. His father was an attorney general. He had been an alderman in Chicago. He was 

attorney general and he was a judge. Kerner, Jaros and Tittle was the name of the 

firm. Tittle was a first cousin of Kerner. 

But I would say that primarily the guard. He went off to the war. He was in the first 

convoy that sailed out of Norfolk, Virginia, to Africa. It was before the United iStates 

declared war, my memory of it. But he was in very very early and when he went) in he 


was a captain and I think he came out a brigadier general. But I don't think there's any 

question, the guard was his main interest. 

He wasn't particularly active in politics. Of course he married the daughter of Anton 

Cermak who had been the mayor of Chicago. 

Q: (pause) Were there any other notable people in the Young Democrats there when you 

were at Northwestern? 

A: Well, Senator Tom Keane, you know the Alderman Keane, he was active but he was kind 

of an un - he was an elected official. I mean we were just tag-alongs and he was an elected 

official. Then Adamowski, who was the major - he was the floor leader I believe when 

Henry Horner was governor, was active. Again not as much as those of us who didn't hold 

office but he was - he was - he got into a falling out with Mayor Daley and he left the 

Democratic party and he ran - he was Republican later on and he was state's attorney 

elected on the Republican ticket. 

He's deceased now, but in his later years I think - I don't know whether he voted Demo- 

cratic but he was interested in the party and recommended I think - in fact I know he 

recommended Daley's reelection the last time he ran. Let's see, who else was there? A 

fellow by the name of Tom Hanahan who was a member of the General Assembly. 

You see, most of them other than myself were active in ward organizations. They were 

really part of the big party rather than - I was just a, you know, a Democrat without - 

really without portfolio. 

We had a great time. At that time we decided to run a - I think I mentioned this - run 

a girl for president of Cook County for the Young Democrats. That was before ERA. And 

we came close to doing it, (chuckles) 

Q: I was curious about it. Did you have any idea that folks would come down as hard on 

you as they did to try to blook her election? 

A: Did what? No I didn't. No I didn't, but, you know, of course I was a neophyte. I mean 

now I can say that any major party is not ever going to take a chance on having somebody 

get control of - of a title unless they're, you know, friendly. Although the Young 

Democrats didn't have any great power, still it would be embarrassing if they would recom- 

mend the election of a Republican president. So the major parties have a tendency to want 

to control everything, both Republican and Democrat, They don't really like any of this 

independent spirit or any free spirits. They want somebody that's beholden to them. And 

that's true today the same as it was then. We can do a lot more with somebody that's on 

the payroll than you can somebody that isn't. 

Q: In the instance we're talking about though it was more an issue that it could be embar- 

rassment or it could be said they wouldn't have control of others and she would actu- 

ally . . . 

A: Well I can't tell you why they came down so hard, quite frankly, because she was an 

employee of the mayor's office in the city of Chicago, and she wae a very very close friend 

of Helen Cermak, the daughter of the Mayor Cermak. And she was as much a threat to 

any - or as little a threat. In fact she still is in the mayor's office, she's working in the 

mayor's office with Mayor Byrne today. So I don't know what got into them quite 

frankly. (chuckles) Maybe they didn't want a woman, I don't know. Maybe it's before 

they saw the light and the equal rights for women. 

But there really was no reason that they should be apprehensive about her. (chuckles) She 

worked with Mayor Kelly. She's worked with Mayor Kennelly. She worked with Mayor 

Daley. She worked with Mayor Byrne. She's still there. (chuckles) 


I never did know why they got so excited. Other than maybe we didn't ask permission, I 

don't know. It might very well have been that - I think that Kelly was the mayor at the 

time - we just did our thing. It might have been that had she sought help from Mwor 

Kelly he might have, you know, given her his benediction, it might not have ever 

happened. But we didn't, you know we were inexperienced and we didn't think we'd have 

any problem along those lines. 

Because the Young Democrats really were pretty small. You know this convention that we 

hadJ it was pretty big. (chuckles) There were a lot of people there that had never seen 

the Young Democrats. They were supposed to pay a buck for dues I guess so the ward mm- 

mittmmen could throw in fifty or a hundred dollars and get fifty or a hundred votes. I 

don't suppose we had three hundred legitimate members in the whole county. We must have 

had fifteen hundred or two thousand people at that convention: (laughter) Because they 

just inundated us. 

Q: (pause) Was the Young Democrats a recruiting grounds for, you know, the regular 

party? Ws there any particular relationship there? 

A: Well it was, you know, it redly was an adjunct to tbe regular party. There are certain 

tie-iao now. It still is true, in order to have a Young Democratic organization now you'have 

to have approval of the county chairman. I mean it's really impossible to have a rump or 

a rebel qrgmization, because they can't get a charter, they can't do anything, unless they 

meet with the approval of the senior party. And I think it was a way to give an ogpo+nity 

for people. b participate in the process because you really didn't have much voice in the 

senior party. You know those were the days of beevelt and every post a winner. They 

didn't really need anybody very bad. But it was a place to be active. And of course there's 

always been the woman's auxiliary, you know they have . . . 

Q: I think you mentioned how Roosevelt really inapired everyone and inspired you inithose 

i 

early yem. i 

A: Oh, ye^. Well of tours;! you know the Depression was awful and work was atdully 

warm. Rmmvelt was a - you know he was a beacon light that everybody kind of locked 

am&. And when you figure that he was elected four times, it was pretty unusual. And 

I danJ$ think hi popularity rerrlly diminished a great deal. Of course when he beeaihe old 

and isfirm, why, tbat changed everything. 

But I remember one year he carried everything but Maine and Vermont. (chuckles) They 

used to aay, "As Maine goes, so goes the nation." And then after that one they said, "As 

Maine so goes Vermont." (laughter) You know he murdered the opposition and car- 

ried eveqthing else with it. That was really the beginning of the Democratic party as the 

doIpiaaataat party in the city of Chicago. In my early yews Republicans were the dominant 

parby* +(pause) I suppow he was the big thing that brought the blacks over. Bla s had 

wb-, blacks and Italians. f 

Q: I dw't even know if this is a fair queation or. . . . When that happened in tde - it 

sounds like it happened fairly suddenly, you know, the city changed over. How pepared 

was the Qemueratic'party to handle that? 

A: Well don't forget that a lot of the people who had been office-holders and important in 

the Republican party were then Democrats, Like Congressman Dawson who was a 

strong congressman, he was Republican. Corneal Davis was a Republican. I 

ber all of them, but I think a lot of the, you know, a lot of the people who 

government car& over. Well it's just like now. Only there was - the other wCy - in 

g~ing through this stuff, I suppose I should have remembered - but Senatoi Strom 

Thurmond was a Democrat. Senator Jesse Helms was a Democrat. Ronald Reagan was i 

a Democrat. I don't recall some of the others. But a lot of the Reagan peojle were 

I 


I

Democrats. So they've had some political exposure before. Civil rights is what drove 

Strom Thurmond and Jesse Helms out of the party. But I was going through this stuff and 

Jesse Helms was suggesting that the conservatives ought to organize a third party, because 

they're not doing well in the Republican party. But I think they had some pretty good public 

officials. 

Of course you know, that's the joy of our system. Sometimes it can stand and prosper in 

spite of the people that are in office. You know it's. . . . Compare us with pretty nearly 

any other government, look when Kennedy happened, why, things went right along. Even 

the trauma of Truman, and Agnew survived and Ford managed to carry on 

and . . . we - we survived pretty well as a matter of fact. 

Q: Did you have any idea, or did any of your associates have any idea, what sort of programs 

Roosevelt would put into action? 

A: No idea. The first one that I remember was NRA, National Recovery Act. I don't know 

all the particulars, but I know that the courts ultimately declared it unconstitutional. But 

it - well it was a lot of things that came along in those years that addressed, you know, 

pretty serious problems. You had so many bank failures, for instance, that people had no 

confidence in banks. One of the first things - you know, you have to remember that I 

waan't really in government at the time, and I'm playing some of this by ear. The federal 

insurance of bank deposits was pretty important. You know bank after bank was folding, 

and people had no confidence. That was a very important thing. Another thing was the 

mortgage foreclosures on homes was just proliferating, so they organized the Homeowners 

Loan Corporation, the HOLC, where the government insured loans for homes. People were 

able to save their homes. 

It used to be that what they call the conventional mortgage - you'd take a mortgage for 

the full amount of the indebtedness whether it be ten or fifteen or twenty thousand dollars 

and all you'd do is you'd pay interest every six months. And then at the expiration, whether 

it be a five-year term or ten-year term or whenever the term was up, you owed the whole 

thing. You didn't have these monthly payments that reduced the balance and ultimately 

paid out. So the result is that when the term was up, you owed the entire principle arid 

if nobody loaned you the money, why, you - you know, you lost your house. The HOLC 

came in with this amortization and they put them on monthly payments so that you paid 

it over twenty or twenty-five or thirty years or whatever it was. You were never in default 

as long as you had your monthly payment. That was an extremely important . . . 

The federal deposit insurance was important; that HOLC was important. I don't know all 

of the details of the NRA but it was to try to encourage business. And I think it gave 

people a - it gave them a, you know, a feeling of confidence and security. 

You know we take a lot of stuff for granted now. There were only - there were very very 

few pension systems. Most railroads didn't have a pension system. Milwaukee Railroad 

had a fellow by the name of Soda Ash Johnny that was in his nineties and he was still 

working and there was no pension for them. So they came in and they put in the Railroad 

Retirement System to give the railroad employees a pension system. Social Security to give 

everybody something, some employment. Unemployment compensation. This wasn't all 

Roosevelt, but this was all in that whole program - Social Security, unemployment 

insurance . . . and, you know, welfare of some kind, 

I don't know how in the world people survived before because I see them in my job now 

that if they didn't have some public funds of some kind, they'd just be absolutely 

penniless. You know, no income of any kind. And I think that government can probably 

do too much in some cases. But people talk about getting government off your back, who's 

going to set standards for - for, you know, pure food and drugs, you know all sorts of 

things. Why, these guys would be running around injecting them with all sorts of 


stuff. You know there has to be some kind of government someplace. In order to keep your 

streets safe and have libraries to educate your children. Sounds god, but it really is - as 

I say there probably have been abuses but there was so much done in that time that had 

to be done that . . . 

Q: Did thorn issues get dealt out on a local . . . basis I guess? Were people campaignplg, 

you know, promising public job programs or . . . 

A: Well that was another, WPA [Works Progress Administration] was another one. WA 

and PWA [Public Works Administration], public jobs, I don't know the differebce 

but . . . (chucklg) 

Q: Would that be part of local elections, for instance for the local elections? 

A: Well Democrats of course - you know their slogan for everything, whether it was cowty 

coroner or what it wax, was "Roosevelt and Humanity." So I suppose that the answe is 

yes. I don't recall what the Republhna had - 1 

"Hoover and Ruin," ,I 

guess. (chuckles) He got blamed for everything. Like you saw in this last campaign, ou 

know, the inquiry is, "Are you better off today than you were four years ago," or someth ng; 

"Are ycm as well off?" And that slopped over and we lost the house in Springfield. Avas 

Q 

that had always given us two membere, when we had that minority member, only gav us 

one. Forty-five percent of the union people voted for Reagan. So it carried over. ou 

know. I don't know whether it got into the wards and the mayors and that sort of t I ng, 

but it wre did in state legislature. 

Q: (pause) Were - 1 

were there people in the Cook County party proposing solution to 

Depression problems, you know, ahead of Roosevelt and were there people run ing 

against . . . 

A: Not to my knowledge. There may have been, but I wasn't aware of it. 

Q: That wasn't - it was more or less riding on his coattails? 

A: I would think, I would think so. That's my memory. 

Q: As a result of your experiences in 1932, did that make you decide to become more involved 

in ward politics. 

I 

A: When I bed in the city, I never really was very active in politics. I was active in the 

Young Demmata but I was not active in my ward organization. I was never a pr and captain. I wver was active in politics, you know, as a worker until 1948, after the war $hen 

I cameIwt . . hem. 

Q: (pause) Were you reading about politics or following certain columnists at the time you 

were in laq do01 or when you were involved in the Young Democrats? 

A: I wouldn't to - you know, not a ravenous extent. I was a Democrat but I - and 

most a# my friends were. I think when I saw, you know, I saw the problems of the clpsed 

banks and I saw the problems of people losing their homes and all that - I saw hat 

1 

first-had. And unemployment. CCC, the Civilian Conservation Qrps, was another one 

that gave the youth something to do. A lot of reforestration. And I saw those things and 

they seemed to me worthwhile. I feel that the Democratic party today, in spite of aome 

of the mistakes that have been made, I think in the main they are more concerned with 

trying to help . . . you know those who really can't help themselves. Maybe the 

Republicans think they start from the top and trickle down; the Democrats think you go 

William A. Redmond from the Memoir bottom - Archives/ and Special go up. Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS 

/

And I'm not saying everything Democrats have always done is right, but I don't find very 

much fault with those things. Another one was the - the Securities Exchange 

Commission. I mean there was so many bad bond issues and stocks and bonds and that 

sort of thing. They addressed a lot of the very very, you know, serious things that would 

give people confidence and return confidence. And there aren't really too many Republicans 

that suggest that many of those things should be abolished. They were dragged kicking 

into the twentieth century but you don't hear many people suggesting those things be 

changed now. It's hard to believe that you could have virtually uncontrolled issuance of 

security, but that's about the way it was. (pause) Loans for farmers, That's another 

thing, farmers were in terrible shape. 

Q: When you were at Northwestern Law School, as they used to say, "Right at the height 

of the Depression," were there students or student organizations, you know, leaning either 

to the far right or the far left as part of same of the energy? 

A: Well one fellow that I recall, and maybe two or three of his friends, that was talking 

about the Townsend Act. And Townsend was - I don't know if Townsend was - I don't 

know whether he was extremely liberal but he was different than most of the others. He 

had some following. But other than him, Northwestern was a pretty stable community. 

You know it was. . . . The tuition there was higher than it was - maybe Chicago was equal 

to it - but it was higher than some of the others. There probably were not very many 

students there that were in want, or their families were in want. 

Another chap that was friendly with me was Judge Jarecki's son, John Jarecki. Ted Jarecki 

was county judge for so many many years. And John was a good friend of mine. He was 

involved in the Young Democrats to some extent. But he was at a higher echelon because 

his father was actually an elected official. You know we were just . . . 

Q: (pause) So you graduated from law school then in what year? 

A: In 1934. 

Q: In 1934? 

A: (Indicates affirmative) 

Q: (pause) At that time were you still thinking of patent law? 

A: Yes. 

Q: I hate to ask you to analyze yourself at that period of time, but so much of what you've 

done, you know, like you're working with people, involved with people, in the Young 

Democrats and all the sports. And patent law, it seems that wouldn't be as attractive as 

some other forms of law maybe where you'd be interacting more with the public? 

A: Well, I had an engineering degree and you know all the guidance that you'd get was that 

engineering and law was a good thing, you'd go into patent law. You know that doesn't 

necessarily hold true. I think Congressman Porter has both a law and an engineering 

degree. My memory, I think he has. Kind of an unusual combination but . . . but you 

know there was just no opportunity whatsoever. As bad as it is today, if not 

worse. (pause) So I ultimately ended up getting a job where I could. 

Q: What happened to you when you graduated then? 

A: Well the first job that I had - I can't remember, I think I went to the Bar 

Association. I think they sent me over to a fellow by the name of Sylvester Quindry. It 


was someplace in southern Illinois, I don't remember just exactly where. I think he has 

a son that's down there either practicing or maybe a judge, somewhere down in southern 

Illinois. And he was a very scholarly man. He had done a lot of writing, editing. The 

fact of the matter is he was writing for West Publishing Company and didn't spend a m at 

deal of time in the office and needed somebody to take care of the office stuff while he was 

over at the West Publishing Company. And kind of worked at - of course bankruptcy 

work was running rampant. He represented the owners of securities. I guess maybe tbt's 

one place that I saw what happened to people who bought a lot of . . . 


A: . . . to in some way protect the interest of the bond owner. They had absolutely no pro- 

tection of the stuff they bought. And that's the kind of work that Quindry did. 

I was very happy there and doing alright, but my father had been with the Pennsylvania 

Railroad for, I think, ultimately fifty-three years and one of the officers of the railmad $aid 

that they thought that his son should be with the solicitors for the railroad. So then they 

sent me in there and that's where I landed. The name of the firm was Loesch, Scofleld, 

Loesch and Burke. Mr. hsch was a very prominent lawyer in thjs area. I had again to 

try lawsuits for the railroad and I did that until I went into the service in 1942. 

Q: I'd like to back up. I don't know anything about bondholders' committees - or, Who 

is on a bondholders' committee? Someone that owns bonds? 

A: Yes, it's kind of like - you know, they'd sell these bonds and then everything is fine 

until they go sour and then - I suppose something comparable would be a condominium. I 

mean they'll have at committee to try to run the building. They all get together to try to 

protect the interest of the bondholder because no one of them had any significant intgest 

and didn't have any voice in what was going to happen. You know, if you have -, for 

instance if you have a mortgage on a piece of property and you have the mortgage all by 

yourself then you have some power and you can do something about it. But if that mortgage, 

instead of one person owning it, it was cut up into a thousand pieces, each one that 

held one of the tiny pieces couldn't do anything. So they were trying to get them together 

so that they would have some voice and have some protection and that's what they were 

doing. It was pretty treacherous business, I mean they had no control at all in what was 

issued. Of course everything went to hell. You've seen a half a dozen stories. But 

were really terrible. It was a method to try to protect these people, 

Q: (papme) ' Do you remember wny ~pecific cases of bondholders or property bankruptcy? t , 

A: I p~f~~fi't there that long really. I suppose I waa there for four or five moqths, 

something. And we represented people that held bonds on some of the, you know, big 

Wng~. Hilton Hotel, it was the Stevene at that time, and the La Salle and - practically 

all of the big buildings were finand that way. There was a congressman by the name of 

Bsgmtt O'Hsrra, who ultimately was defeated by Abner Mikva for Congress, who did L lot 

of work:in that field. I think my boss, Mr. Quindry, had some connection with Barratt 

0'Eh-a. But I have no - you know I didn't know it at thst time. But it was pretty grim 

bushes& 

-. ,) 

Q: (pmw) So you started trying cases then for the railroads? 

A: Yes. 

Q: What sort of cases would they be? 


A: Injury cases. Sometimes injured employees, sometimes injured passengers, sometimes 

grade crossing injuries. And the firm represented the American Medical Association and 

sometimes their editors in their journal would be a little critical of some practitioners or 

some people who were practicing without licenses and they would get sued for libelism. And 

the libel suits were pretty - they were really important, and expensive. And I worked, 

you know, investigating, or working with the investigator. You know a lot of things that 

you know, you know by hearsay, and if the time comes that you have to prove it you have 

to go back and dig up and. . . . And that's what I did until I went into the service. Wait 

a minute now. Yes, I went to the service from there. And then when I came back I went 

with the Northwestern law firm. 

Q: Now were you still living in the Austin neighborhood when you were . . . 

A: Yes. Yes. 

Q: Then what year was it that you went into the service? 

Q: (pause) Were you in the navy? 

A: Yes. (pause) I started out in the intelligence and then I went in what they call 

security. I ended up as a security officer for a base in Staten Island. A combination of 

security and fire protection and I handled courts martial and courts of inquiry and courts 

of investigation. 

Q: (pause) Then you got out of the service in what year was that? 

A: In 1945. (pause) It was close to four years. 

Q: (pause) How did you feel about the experience? Did you enjoy the navy or . . . 

A: Oh yes. I enjoyed it. I had a good billet. I went in lieutenant, junior grade and came 

out lieutenant commander. You know, it's pretty hard to slot a lawyer doing something that 

he's trained to do. I was one of the few lawyers that was doing something he knew what 

he was doing. 

We had probably a hundred and fifty small escort vessels that were assigned to that 

base. There wouldn't be that many there at any one time obviously, they were out escorting 

convoy. But there'd be, you know, junior officers and not really very many of them so that 

in case they had any occasion to discipline anybody they would detach them from their com- 

mand and put them on ours and then we'd handle it. The only person who can order a 

court is the commanding officer of the man involved. So in effect we handled all the courts 

of all those ships. 

And then we had . . . well I had - one time they - after Italy capitulated, they caught 

some Italian sailors. I guess they had been interned in Africa and then they decided they 

were going to bring them over here. Wait a minute, I'm thinking they were German 

sailors. But anyway they told me that I was going to have to take care of these. There 

were about four or five of them. They wanted to interrogate them and find out - 

Intelligence was going to do that. And of course I had no - really I had nobody trained 

in handling them and I didn't know - you know there's certain protocol to handling 

prisoners. You can't mistreat them, you can't do this and you can't do that, you have to 

treat them as honorable people who have served their country in time of war. You have 

some restraints so they're not going to get away but you know you can't put them in leg 

irons and that sort of thing. So, I'll never forget, I was scared to death because my kids 

were not really trained in handling prisoners. 


Of course maybe I let things bother me more than other people but the head of the fire 

department came one day and knocked on the door about four o'clock in the morning and 

he says that they shot one of the prisoners. And I had visions of international courts and 

the Geneva Convention and - you know it would be pretty hard to explain how somebody 

that'a powerless, that's in the control of - on a navy base, that somebody would shoot 

them. But my inexperienced sailor - we didn't have facilities to take care of this guy, 

these people. 

So he had to relieve himself and so he had to go from where he was sleeping over to another 

place across the pier. And this kid had a machine gun - I don't know why they ever gave 

them machine guns but they did. I took all guns away from anybody if there was anybody 

near them. They were pretty young kids you know, seventeen-year-old boys. I just gave 

them a stick and figured that the kids - they couldn't speak English, so they couldn't find 

the subway. (chuckles) So I didn't think they'd get in any trouble' but somebody gwe a 

machine gun to one. 

So when this fellow went across to go to the men's room they took the safety off the machine 

gun and he had his hand on it and when the fellow came back and went to sleep he had 

his hand on the trigger and he leaned over a water cask and his finger hit the trigger and 

it went right through the bulkhead and wounded the man in his sleep. And I thought, "Who 

will believe this?" (laughter) If he'd have died, it would have been just awful. 

Then when Germany surrendered, they captured - it was a very famous naval archqtect, 

I've forgotten what his name is now, internationally famous. And they b~ought him 

he and two others, and told me I was supposed to keep custody of them. You know 

a lot of shipbuilding around New York and New Jersey, around in there. And he 

if he could call some naval architect in New York and I said sure. You know 

emminently world famous because he had designed this ship and it was one of the, 

big famous German ships, I don't remember the name of it now. And this architecd was 

ecstatic, he wanW to take this guy out to dinner and dl this sort of stuff. Well of cdurse 

I couldn't prmit that. (laughs) 

But here's o man of international stature that I had gotten in my custody. And what they 

wanted him to do was to redesign the ship to use it as a troop carrier over to Japan. 

And one of the other fellows there - I don't know just what his job - they caught him 

in Hamburg in the shipbuilding when they overran it. He had been in this country for some 

while and he had taken out his first papers and he wanted to know if he could get his final 

papers while he was in custudy. (laughter) 

But you know you're thrown into things like that that you really don't have any training 

for. Row did I know how to take care of these fellows and what the rules are? I see the 

way thy bhave in tba Middle East, maybe there are no rules, they just go bomb eve 

and let it go at that. That isn't - I was scared. 

1 

Another time I had the duty when we had a - hurricane came up from - and it *as I 

think about six feet of water too high. Water should have been down at low tide, or: cer- 

tainly should have been down considerably, but it was way up running even wit4 the 

pier. Of course we had a lot of ships in there and the skippers were all young kids. and 

they'd come to me and they'd want to know if they had enough lines out and if they were 

safe and all that and of course I was strictly a landlubber. Theoretically I had the duty 

and I was in charge of the base, but you know you tie one of those small things up to a 

pier and you're liable to get them - you know water and the wind was liable to h at it 

up against the pier and - I'll never forget we had an old salt, dockmaster, he called me, 

said that a Dog Easy - the destroyer escort, D was for Dog and E was for Easy, Dog Easy 

was destroyer escort - said that it had hauled anchor over in Sheepshead Bay, "Whq are 

William A. Redmond your instructions?" Memoir - Archives/ Special Well what Collections do I - know? Norris L Brookens (laughter) Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

So there was some exciting times. I never shot anybody and nobody shot at me but I had 

times that I was called upon to make judgments that I hadn't really been trained to do. 

Q: Did you receive any kind of training of any kind relative to what you were doing? 

A: Not for that kind of stuff. I did for security stuff. See we used to go out - originally 

we used to go out into plants that were producing material for the navy, and to try to set 

up methods and things to safeguard the integrity of the system. And then we'd also go 

into navy bases and the ammunition depot at Bayonne, New Jersey, and those places, and 

try to set up some kind of program to prevent sabateurs. 

We had another one, they - remember they captured those sabateurs on Long 

Island. They gave those to me too, I had them for a while. And Winston Churchill came 

to that base. He didn't stay very long but that's where he landed. So it was exciting, I 

mean even though I wasn't actually in a theater of war. Responding to fires and I had train- 

ing in fire fighting. 

So I enjoyed - you know, it's hard to say that you enjoyed a wartime experience but I was 

very proud of being in the navy. I was proud of my uniform and. . . . As I say I was one 

of the few that, you know, was really doing something that was interesting and some of 

it was in the line of my training, either the legal training or the training I got in the navy. I 

gave some thought to staying in the service afterward, But the navy never bargains with 

someone, they won't tell you where they'll put you. I then had a young baby and I didn't 

want to go to Alaska or some other places, maybe the Aleutians. So I came home. 

Q: During your initial experience when you were looking over some of the war factories, 

was there much indication of sabatoge? 

A: No there wasn't. The only reason is that I don't think there was any sabateur. You 

know you get into that, you get some really funny experiences. I had to go all the way 

down to - from Cincinnati, I was stationed in Cincinnati, and I had to go down to Wheeling, 

West Virginia. Somebody had reported something very suspiciou~l in a plant that was manufacturing 

war material and when 1-got there the thing was that there was an epidemic of 

athletes foot in the drafting room. And of course you know everybody would write a letter 

and stamp it secret and you never knew what the hell was in it. That was one of them. 

Another one, I had to go - somebody had overheard in a tavern, overheard a plot to invade 

the continental United States. In a saloon some fellows were talking about anchoring of 

a ship some miles offshore and then driving some kind of tube into the bottom of the ocean 

and the tunneling and coming up in Detroit. (laughter) 

Another one, we had to go - you had to go investigate all this stuff. Another one was 

that somebody asked - they were at a dance and they asked the band to play the Star 

Spangled Banner as a dance number and because they refused, why, they were accused of 

being Nazi. The report that we got was about Nazi sympathizers. We didn't know what 

the hell it was until we got there. 

Then there was two brothers that were . . . let's see, let me get this straight. I guess they 

weren't two brothers. A Polish fellow and two German kids, of German extraction, they 

weren't German. They were at school in MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology], the 

engineering school. And the Polish kid's room was in between the two German kids' 

rooms. So before anybody got into war they had - remember all the fuss about the Sude- 

ten Land and the Polish Corrider and all that sort of stuff - the German kids announced 

that this Polish kid's room was the Polish Corrider and they were going to come and take 

it over. And they had Nazi flags and they would parade in there. And then of course when 

war broke out these guys were MIT kids and pretty well trained you know and they wanted 


to have jobs Well the qtlestions you know, "Were they didoyal on account of all thie kid 

stuff they did when they were in dlege?" (laughter) 

But I never saw anything that I thought was, you know, any indication of sabatoge. You 

know it would be pretty easy to sabatoge. Take these high tension wires-that go over a~ross 

the country and somebody get along side of one of those towers and set off a charge and 

topple it, you know. Wouldn't have to be in your main plant. Transformers, put a steel- 

piercing bullet - you know really it's a job to try to protect yourself. But it was exciting, 

you know. 

The srrhhrs came ashdre in Long Island. They weren't really very friendly. But they 

got caught right away. But I don't know why they decided I was going to take care of them 

because I didn't know . . . And then when the Ruesiana came we were going to turn'over 

some miit~pers to the Russians and we had a whole mess of Russian sailors on our 

base. They were going to learn the - you know, how to run the ship and lean the eguip- 

. ment and everything. And they wouldn't give - they stayed there for the longest time, 

It was obvious that we were a little bit suspicious because - at least somebody was, not 

me, 1 didn't have anything to do with that. They weren't prisoners, I mean they weren't 

in euotody but they didn't permit their sailors to go uptown like the others did, the British, 

the Canadians or any of the rest of them. They had freedom in New York. But the 

Russians couldn't go unless they were sccompsrnied by one of their officers. 

We wouldn't give them the charts for the mine fields so they could take these ships w t of 

the harbor. It seems strange, because they were our allies that - you know, we gave $hem 

the ships, we wouldn't let them get them out. (chuckles) They were there a long time before 

they were ready to sail. 

Then we had inqmtion on Saturday morning. We'd play the "Star Spngled Banner* and 

they'd also play their "In~rnationale" or whatever the Russian song was. 

Knowing as I did, beeause of my job, there was that little reluctance to have complete confi- 

dence in your aKa troubled me really. We were giving them a lot and at the aame, time 

we evidently weren't, even in those days, weren't really welcoming them. 

And we had another guy that I got word - the skipper called me in. He'd bad a 

problem. He got himself involved in something up in Manhattan and he was very very 

wealthy. He'd been over in England real early in the war. If he'd been married, he'd abeen 

out 'awe he had enough points, but he was a single man. See, they gave you crat for 

longevity of service and number of dependents and all that. He had the service but he didn't 

have that. Aad I don't remember exactly what it was that he did, but they couldn't rorder 

a cot@% nnmtial on him as long as he was on our base. That was kind of a harrowing thing 

there for a while, the guy w d t going any place but home. What do you do wit1 that 

kind bf a tbi? Five or six years service. (pause) 1 

So X had quite an interesting experience, as I aay I didn't shoot anybody and nobody shot 

I 

me. But it was not the usual humdrum . . . 

Q: That's for sure. I don't know if I understand the decision about why we didn't let the 

Russians out. The part about . . . 

A: I had nothing to do with it. It was the State Department. 

Q: Well, yes. Do you know why the State Department. . . 

A: Well evidently, you know, it would be a way to get in. If you can get out, you c 

i 

n get 

in. And maybe they didn't want to impart that knowledge. Maybe they thoug t the 


Russians might give it to the Germans. I don't know. I have no idea why they. . . . There 

was some reason that they didn't want to do it. You know the Canadians and the British 

had that information. 

Q: Surely it wasn't felt that the Russians had any capacity to get in even if they had the 

charts? 

A: Oh I don't think so. I think that they felt uneasy about divulging that kind of secret 

information to the Russians. Now what their reason was, I don't know. But they were 

there a long long time. Young ensign was going to take passengers. He'd report every day 

and we'd have lunch and if - the Russian sailors that we met were really very congenial 

and very nice and their deportment was excellent. You know, there was never any vandal- 

ism or anything of that nature. But this guy said all they could say was, "Good soup," and 

they would agree with each other that the soup was good every noon and every 

evening. (chuckles) No, the Russians - my experience with them was all good. 

Q: What was the psychology on Long Island when the sabateurs landed? Did people think 

there were more to come or did they start getting hysterical? 

A: Well I think that - I think that probably could be compared to our effort to rescue the 

hostages over in Iran. It was really pretty botched. I don't know what in the world they 

thought they were going to do. Put these three guys ashore on Long Island, I don't know 

what in the world they thought they were going to do. They got caught awful fast and 

I had nothing to do with the apprehension or anything, I just know that I ended up with 

them and. . . . I don't know what they - what in the world they ever put three guys ashore 

for. (chuckles) That was a - I think that was an isolated instance, I don't think they 

had any any place else. (chuckles) 

But to give you some idea, I mean our - my kids, recruits, were really poorly equipped to 

stand guard over anybody. I'll never forget one guy. Walked in a little sentry box and 

they had an electric light socket and there was no bulb in it and he had a bayonet on hie 

rifle, and for some reason or other he set the bayonet in it and blew all the 

fuses. (chuckles) I mean those were my guys that were gonna watch these 

people. (laughter) 

Q: Well approximately how many folks like that did you have? 

A: Well my entire seaman guard outfit was probably pretty close to two hundred. I mean 

the ones that were in charge were excellent, but don't forget, we'd get - they'd get three 

months in boot camp and then we'd get them. You know, it's in their beginning 

stages. The seaman guard is the lowest - it's the lowest echelon. Ultimately after they 

put them through some training and everything it was alright. But they were just raw 

recruits, (pause) They didn't have much training when they came to us. 

Q: You mentioned that you had a young daughter by the end of the war. 

A: She was born during the war. 

Q: When was she born and . . . 

Q: Oh, gosh, I don't remember. That's Mary. I don't know whether you know Mary. She's 

in the State Library down in Springfield. She's about thirty-eight now. In 1942 or 1943 

I suppose. 

Q: (pause) Did we ever talk to you about your wife yet, about when you were married? 

William A: Well A. Redmond we were Memoir married - Archives/ during Special the Collections war. - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

Q: Is this before you went in tb service or while you were in . . . 

A: NO, 17,,was in - I was in the ~rvice. We became engaged before the war was declared 

but then Pearl Harbor came alpng. 

Q: What was her maiden name? 

A: Ria*. , 

. 

Q: ~ nhow d had you met her or come . . . 

A: IntWucred. At her home. A friend of mine knew same of her family and they bad a 

i 

gathering or meaing and he took me over there. 


Q: Is she a Chicago person? 

t' 

1 

A: Yw. (pause) (phone rings) Who's that? I 


Q: If you were married then when you were in the service, did you folks set up housek+ping 

right away in Ghicago or . . . 

.a 

A: No. 'came down to join me on Staten Island. We bought furniture and had . . . our 

housekeeping quarters down there. 

..< 

Q: Can ytm hlTm a liM8 bit abont her family backgxound? 

A: We11 she,was a schwlteacher. She majored in Latin and Greek. And fell victim the 

Depreseion the same as everybody else, and people weren't looking for Latin and Greek 

teachers. They were looking for typing and shorthand and that sort of thing. So she went 

back to eiehool and learned shorthand and typing ad business mmohines. And ultimately 

her qssignrnent was teaching business. Her father had been a teacher. One of her aisters 

was 4 @tcher in the Chicergo school system. (pause) She was a lovely girl. 

Q: (pause) So you left the service in 1940 . . . 

A: Five. 

Q: Then you went back to your - to the same . . . 

A: Nb. 1 came back out and my firm had - the senior member had died. I had no place 

to gol So' 1 got a job with,tEte Veterans Administration rating disability claims. They used 

to hqve dfdility boards and .they were composed of one doctor, one lawyer and one' 

i 

occasion& 

pe&m to try b evaluate the limitation of earning capacity for war injuries. And 

I wa$' ondthPrt possibly a year. 

Then. I got a job with the law department of Northwestern Railroad, doing ewntiall what 

I ha& doae for the Pennsylvania when I went into the service. 

And h~uering was pretty scarce then. And she and the baby were living with her fol 

I ww living with my folks. And I lived in Austin and she lived in Rogers Park. 

William A. Redmond we wanted Memoir - ta Archives/ buy a Special house Collections and we finally - Norris found L Brookens a house Library out - University here in of Wood Illinois at Dale. Springfield - UIS 

t

I would like to say that every step of my life was planned but very little of it 

was. (chuckles) Naturally we had certain financial constraints. We didn't know where we 

wanted to live and I didn't know exactly what I'd be doing. So we thought that what we'd 

like to do was to have some kind of a stopgap, get a house so that when we finally knew 

what we were going to do, why, if we had to dispose of it we wouldn't lose so much. So 

we bought a little house out in Wood Dale. 

And another thing I wanted - see, my office in the Veterans Administration was right 

across from the Union Depot so I wanted to take a train and the Union Depot was the 

closest. So that's another thing that influenced me to get a - along the Milwaukee Road 

and that was the train. 

And then I, you know, I didn't feel I was very happy not practicing law. So I was offered 

a job with the Northwestern Law Department and I took it. A very good friend of mine 

had - he worked for them and he quit them and went to teach law at Loyola and he recom- 

mended me. So that's how I got that job. 

Q: (pause) Why was there such a tremendous housing shortage? 

A: Well nothing was built during the war, you know, and business hadn't been very good 

prior to the war either so there hadn't been any housing starts. And then of course a lot 

of service people got married and the need for housing was very acute. You'd see an ad 

in the paper and if it was anything that sounded good, by the time you got there in the 

afternoon, it was too late. They really went like hotcakes. 

And of course you know the financing was pretty good, GI Bill. You could get a loan guaran- 

teed for 4 percent interest. And low down payments. Ten or 20 percent down and 80 

percent - so it was relatively easy for service personnel to finance the purchase of a 

house. You know as you come around here, all of the stuff out here - this county, when 

I moved out here, this county had a hundred and three thousand people and it's now probably 

six hundred thousand, to give you an idea of the way this suburban area has developed. You 

know the federal government encouraged - with the road programs and financing and all 

the rest of it, they encouraged dispersing everybody from the central city. They shouldn't 

be surprised now that the central cities are in trouble because that was the government 

policy, to do all those things that made it possible. 

Q: So how long were you at Wood Dale then? 

A: I think I lived in Wood Dale six or seven years, I'd say. 

Q: So actually the first election that you were going to run in was . . . 

Q: In 1948. So you were running from Wood Dale? 

A: I lived in Wood Dale at that time, yes, But I had an office in Bensenville. I had quit 

my job at the railroad. And I opened up my law ofice in Bensenville. I went to the boss 

of the railroad and told him that I was contemplating running and they didn't seem to 

think they wanted a politician in their law department. So they gave me a choice, staying 

with them or running for state's attorney. Well I ran for state's attorney, little realizing 

that this county was strongly Republican. I thought I'd get - you know. I thought I was 

going to win. 

Q: That was a pretty bold decision though, at the time, to give up your job. 

A: Oh you bet. I had two kids. I should say it was. (chuckles) Sometimes I wonder how 

I did it. 


Q: (-1 The folks that asked you to run, how did they know about you, or how did. they 

eveaio&&ure that you might be available? Do you know thst? 

r , 

A: Wt@

A: He wasn't really that well known, nowhere near as well known as his son. Adlai had 

never been anything. He worked in the United Nations, he was assistant secretary of the 

navy or something during the war. He worked in Dunbarton Oaks in setting up the World 

Bank and all those things. (chuckles) On everybody's lips all the time. And because of his 

experience in the international field, they thought that he was going to run for the United 

States Senate and that Paul Douglas was going to run for governor. That was what they 

thought was going to happen. How it got switehed around I don't know. But the original 

discussion in the slating was Stevenson for U. S. Senate and Douglas for the 

governorship. He sure was unknown, Stevenson. Green was very well known. As I say 

he was county prosecutor. Who the hell did he prosecute? I don't know whether he prose- 

cuted Capone, but some one of the big guys. 

It may have been the county chairman who introduced me to George Kell; that may have 

been how it went, but anyway they did encourage me to run. I got really friendly with 

both of them, friendlier with Stevenson than with Douglas. It was Stevenson even though 

Douglas lasted longer. Stevenson only had that one term . . . and that was it. 

Q: Were you privy to any of this slate-making when they ware slating? 

A: I was never in the party inner circle. (pause) See, a lot of times Cook County people 

will slate somebody they think will help them without regard to - I remember the time 

that they slated Roman Pucinski who was a United States congressman in a very safe 

seat. They prevailed upon him to run for the Senate and he ran against Dirksen. Well 

the state black community didn't care much for the deal. He lost his congressional 

seat. But it helped them with a big strong poll and other wins. Sometimes they do 

that. They did that with - did Sidney Yates run for the United States Senate? Yates 

wouldn't have any appeal any place but in the county . . . I was never involved. 

Q: Do you think that Stevenson and Douglas received the full support of the county organiza- 

tion? 

A: You see a phenomenon now in the Democrats in the county that you never saw 

before, Mayor Byrne certainly did not support Richard Daley for state's attorney, she was 

trying to get Carey elected. Nobody would have ever thought a Democratic mayor would 

ever do that. There's a feeling now that they, some of them, are not really enthusiastic 

about Stevenson now, that they'd rather have Thompson. Evidence is in Sally Bergner who 

was - her husband is one of the recipients of favors from Mayor Byrne - she is chairman 

of fund raising things for Thompson, which never would have happened. That's just one 

instance. 

As a party we decided to repeal the sales tax on food and medicine, primarily for senior 

citizens. Thompson and the mayor got together and overrode the veto. We backed away, 

we didn't do it right, he had the votes. 

The trouble is that you know dependence on money from the state and other places has kind 

of destroyed the differences between parties. What really is important now is who is going 

to give you the money. Now it's your philosophy. Used to have one pie and divide it in 

five ways, now you get five pies and everybody eats pie. 

Q: Are you talking about things like the school aid or school transportation? 

A: Well roads and school aid and - you know like some this last session, they authorized 

the transfers of some state funds and transfer was forbidden before. So it was just a cash 

flow problem for the governor. Revising the Housing Authority by letting the mayor put 

two additional people on. (pause) You know instead of peeling down to the last 

dime. That's the accommodation. I heard the governor today say he was going to 

sign. Now she can't duck the responsibility - well she couldn't duck it with. . . . They 


solve their problem with schools by this Board of Education paying some pension cosblthat 

teachers normally pay. They pay everyplace else in the state. Teachers didn't get a raise, 

but' 'thw don't take' out their pension costs. You know all of those kind# of 

accommdathns. It's all money. Pressures of money. 

Q: You fkl like that really ignores the party line then? 

A: There's no question about it. I think theie's a big difference between the two parties, 

you haw, and their concerni.' Well the ERA for inabnce. I don't know - I don't &ally 

see how anybody can really quarrel with giving equality and justice to half o the 

people. Republicans, as a class they're not sympathetic, Zd percent maybe, 25 pbperwn i but 

the I& majority - the same thing's true in matters, racial matters, you kncw, medical 

mistahce, Aid h Dependent Children, any of those programs, public aesiatance. Not 

all. I think Governor Thompson is probably a compassionate man. I was going thrbugh 

asmmblyl8 ,- md.1 ran across a &ping where he recommended parole of Otto Kern 

i 

r. I 

didn't r d i that, Well, Kqner's health was bad. 1 didn't remember that. But whe you 

depend iw the other government for money, why then, you've lost all your independem and 

I 

ycmb the-two-partf systam and all that, so . . . 

1 

Q: (pause.) So 

i 

after the election was over in 1948 then you were ii private practice here 

in Bgnsenptitle. 

i 

A: I ran for the state - I - well I ran for county judge in 1950 but that wasn't1 very 

serious buslinese. That was - we had an internal problem. They were talking about iieing 

somebody and I wa trying to protect them and I just ran for county judge t@g tp 9 tect 

I him but . . . I ran for the house in 19M and that's whep we only nominated one and ? , was 

defd. And the people that supported that fellow were not going to support him id1958 

and they came to me asking me if I would run. I really dWt have any great burning desire 

to be in the how of representatives. I think I was like most everybody else, I didn't ieally 

know whst they did. And 1 sure stayed a lot longer than 1 expected. 

Q: Did you have a burning desire to have any politid dee? 

A: I think I - I don't know. When I was with the law firm we represented an insurance 

company. But there was a man by the name of Edw+rd Bmdage who was the attorney 

general of Illinois, Republican. And he had won election by the largest majority of any succewful 

cw@l&e up till that time. And then when the Republicans fell on evil ways and 

hie p&id pow- .w+ going and his fortunes were waning - he was even read out of the 

Rqwblicm p&y for some reasron, I don't know just what the hell it was, but he was found 

,dead auder? dwmbces qat indicated suicide. And I was 

and *q 1-qw.s man who had had that prominence @-.that 

his &Weal power was gone, everything was gone. I decided that 

put qpIf in a position of being solely dependent on political success fs~'my livellbood. 

i. 

I . 

And that's one reason why the house was a good thing when I went in there because was 

reallg part-time. We only worked - well six months out of the twenty-four. And t all 

of thw aix months were that much. So you could do something else. And then w en it 

ggt 80 that it was really full-time, it lost a lot of its charm for me. It isn't a go+ job 

.awl I dm't think there are many political jobs that are. But if that's all you get, 

f 

nd if 

thaifs pxw "antire liveWml, and you low, where do you go? 

So pm wked me if I aspired. I had an interest, I always had on interest but to hitch my 

wigon to that star, no. I kind of got trapped into it because when I started in the house 

it wasn't that demanding but it got that way. I might have felt differently if I was, you 

know, in the majority party or $are of sueeear). *But I had the be& job in the stxte as 

Spaaker. I mean that's better than anything that I can think of. 


Q: Why is that? 

A: Well you can do something. You know, you're in a position of power. You're not abso- 

lute power but you can do something to make things move. Just a member can't do much 

of anything. How would you like to be city treasurer or county treasurer or 

coroner? That's what I'm saying. You know, I've always done things. You know, I'm not 

like the guy climbing the Sear's Tower or anything like that but I've always had something 

that kept me interested and I'm not very interesitsd in being county treasurer. State's attor- 

ney might be interesting although I'm not too sure about that either. 

Q: What kind of law practice did you have here in Bensenville? 

A: Mostly governmental. I represented the city, or the village. They were my client for 

twenty-two years. I represented both the high school and the elementary school. And 1 

was the attorney that organized the park district and the library district. I represented 

the fire district. And I represented Wood Dale, Franklin Park, Westmont. So I guess you'd 

say that most of the work was governmental of one kind or another. 

Some trial work, not anything - no serious criminal stuff. 1 alw&s thought if somebody 

had a serious criminal matter they'd better get somebody that did that kind of stuff. The 

stakes are too high. You know, they get locked up in a penitentiary. . . . I think if I repre- 

sented somebody that got eent to the pen, I wouldn't like it very well, or to lose somebody 

to the chair or gas chamber. 


Q: You said you were in Wood Dale for five or six years? 

A: Something like that. 

Q: Then you moved to this house here? 

A: No, I had built another house in town. 

Q: (pause) So your children basically went to who01 here in Bensenville. 

A: Yes. My oldest girl started in the elementary school in Wood Dale, but in about third 

or fourth grade, why, she switched over . . . and went to the local parochial elementary 

school. Went to three different high schools. And my daughter, the oldest, went to Immac- 

ulate Conception in Elmhurst. And my youngest daughter went to Dxiscoll High School in 

Addison which was a really hot Catholic high school. And my son went to St. Ignatius in 

Chicago where the old man went. 

Q: Have you maintained contact with St. Ignatius over the years as time went on? 

A: Even to today. 

Q: In what way? 

A: Primarily financially, not a great lot of money but I always contribute. I was on the 

Board of Trustees of the Alumnae Association at one time. I was commencement speaker 

one other commmencement. And I always felt deeply that if - I'm pleased with what they 

did with my boy, so. . . . I was down there visiting not so terribly long ago. 

Q: (pause) Are there any family activities that we should go over while your kids were 

growing up? 


A: We used to have a family Fourth of July doings. 

Q: What was that a11 rtbodt? 

A: Well we'd have a pool out there. Of course, all the kids would go swimming. When 

they were real small it was quite a drawing card. We've had as many as eighty-five, that's 

a lot of them. 

Q: Is that all family? 

A: Mostly - primarily my wife's family, her si~ters and her nephews and, you know, their 

families. My family was pretty small. (pause in interview for interviewer to dust 

notes) You have to be able to read your notes? (chuckles) 

Q: Well I may do it for a key word so in case I have rough spots in the tape I can pick 

the word out then. I like to get names down, names never sound the same. (pause) I know 

very libtle about, you know, the history of suburban government. Were there key issues that 

you were working on while you were representing all the villages around here? 

A: Well of course . . . the big thing around here ww flood control. See, like TOP& the 

whole thing grew in an awful hurry. My second year, my second term, I organized a meeting 

with the Divieion of Waterways of the state at that time. John Guillou was the hdad of 

it. Arid 1 -got GoQk County and Du Page County forest gremrve and Du Page and{ Cook 

County Baards' representatives and all of the governments in Du Page County and h e - 

North Rivemide and some of those others in Cook County that were involved in thesame 

extremes that we were and we put together a flood control plan for the county whi4 was 

the first time that . . . you know the state had a plan for highways, and they too* care 

of priorities and all, but there was no such thing for - a Board of Flood Control - water 

control, water rrwsourees. You know, whoever had the strongest voice in Sprin&eld,'you'd 

run down *ere and get some money for flood control. 

i( 

Water as a reswrae, it's not necessarily something that you should try to get ridfof as 

quickly as you can because maybe you want to drink it, maybe you want to use it for Water- 

ing your lawns, maybe you want to use it to flush your mnitary waste. Now what they're 

fussing around out here is access to Lake Michigan water. 

But anyway I had this meeting. We came up with five flood plans in Du Page County.> And 

we mt out a program which has been followed pretty religiously. I think that was 3n 1961 

we did that. And that was beneficial to the entire eounty. 

In my Arst term down there, when Governor Stratton was the governor, there had been legislation 

to authorize the creation of a water commission to try to formulate plans to get Lake 

Michigan water. And there had been an amendment to the law which expanded the governing 

W d to - from three to about forty, or something. (chuckles) It wasn't intended 

for I)u Page- County, it was intended for something else, but it just kind of got caught in 

that dragnet. 

So they wanted to amend that law to bring it back down to three and I was told by Noble 

Lee, who was a member at that time, sometime way back when Horner was governor that 

there had been special sessions running concurrently and we were down there for a special 

session, which seema to me was for public aid, and Lee advised me that the governor could 

call a second special seesion to run concurrently to amend the law to provide for arqnding 

that part of the water commission thing so that it would bring the membership 

to three. 

And I went in to Governor Stratton - 1 

and 1 have to laugh now, there I was pre suring 

him. And Lee Daniels who is a colleague now - his grandfather served with me and 


John Erlenborn who is a congressman, the three of us got together, but it was my idea 

because Noble Lee had told me. But anyway Governor Stratton did call a second special 

session to run concurrently and we amended that law. 

And then Bill Clark - I don't remember - no that was in 1963 I guess. Clark was elected 

attorney general in 1960. But he filed an original action in Supreme Court to adjudicate 

the rights of access to Lake Michigan water for all of us. And all the Great Lakes states 

got involved and the Dominion of Canada and that thing has only been resolved here rela- 

tively recently. Of course it held that Du Page County is entitled to divert water from Lake 

Michigan. And the Division of Public Works and Buildings has allocated certain amount 

of water. 

So it's still in the process, but I mean I started on that way back in 1960 - well it would 

have been 1959 because Stratton was governor. I worked on that for the longest time. 

Suburban mass transportation was an important thing out here and I put in the bill that 

authorized the creation of a mass transit district. Sprin&eld Mass Transit District used 

my bill to organize and there's three in this county, the one along the Burlington and - no, 

two, one on the Burlington and one on the Milwaukee. So I was doing primarily the things 

of benefit to my own community. 

So for the most part they weren't you know that politically close. When Kerner was gover- 

nor they had five hundred acres of surplus state land, two parcels of two hundred and fifty 

that were too small for a state park and I got them conveyed to the Du Page County Forest 

Preserve District free. 

And I can't remember some of the other things, but they all had that kind of an overtone, 

carried on even - in 1963 I put in a bill to create a water reservoir thing up here in Buzzard 

Village which is up near Mt. Prospect and Arlington Heights. It's the head waters of Soft 

Creek which goes through 40 or 50 percent of our county. When Walker was governor he 

approved that. That's a magnificent, absolutely magnificent, public works up there. We got 

a reservoir down east of town here that's called the Red Mission Park. Again it was the 

same thing. 

So my stuff was not usually Republican versus Democrat. When I had twelve years of 

Democratic governors I was able to do something. 

Q: Yes, I guess that's what I was wondering, a lot of that stuff you would have become aware 

of just in practicing law here, representing - you know an attorney for the town here. 

A: Well and you know people would come to the meeting and the place would be full and 

you knew what was happening. But it was the lack of continuity you know. I was there 

a long enough time so that we had a couple of years when the Republicans had a majority, 

overwhelming majority, when Ogilvie was governor that - those were a bad four 

years. But other than that, I had good success because I - well I always got along with 

my colleagues among other things and having years in government knowing pretty much 

what was necessary. 

You know people in politics are really not very modest, but I think I do have a reputation 

of having done about as much for this county as anybody else because I was in a position 

to do it. When I was Speaker for instance I got ten million dollars for the library of the 

county of Du Page which I couldn't have gotten unless . . . that's one of the weaknesses 

of this cutback amendment, You know when you had a minority member, there was always 

a member of the governor's party in every legislative district. Now if you have a governor 

you know of the opposite party to the area, for instance Du Page County, who's going to 


argue for Du Page County with a Democratic governor? That was really important. You

lEQlPRV it TRISI&& of overlooked by a lot of people. But we wouldn't have most of that stuff 

if 1 hadn't hexi in i!h legislature, or somebody like me. 

Q: (pause) Okay, I want to get into your political career more, that is to say your career 

in the house of repretxmtatives more, in QUE msaki 1s. thwe aagtbg iibat dm covering right now that just related ta mayhe th~ n&dAM&m w thtb~qmm 

were an attorney? I,, 

A: I can't think of wry mch. Yorr kww jmst tbe ordinary country lawyer maintaini f a 

prttatica 

Q: If you don't care I'd lib to just ask you a ewple of questions that relate back ta 

childhood that we haven't covered before. Do you have any particular rnemdwa cd 

tion in the Austin neighborhood? 

A: Well 1 remember prohibition. (chuckles) You don" have to go hdc to -my 

childhood. But they didn't repal it until I was an adult. When I was in Milwaukee wing 

to school you really wouldn't know there was any prohibition. I warn% a drinker so 1 an*t 

tell you, but I know they all sold beer and the saloons were wide open, the doors were swing- 

ing out onto the street, there was no effort made to conceal it. Now that was beer, and 

I don't know about whiskey, but I know that's the way it was with beer. So there was no 

effort to - I Qn't think it was - it wasn't that open in the Chicago area. ~peakea$ies 

and - but I wasn't involved in any of that stuff so I really don't know much abut it , 

Q: We talked, or you talked, a little bit about - it must have been the election in 1820 &en 

William Hale Thompson . . . 

A: It waB bck in the 1920's sometime. 

Q: It was something like that. Do you remember any of the third or fourth party canditjates 

back than? I'm kind of interested in that period when they had - there was a Labor prty 

in ChicagoO 

A: I don't remember, All I remember is Republican and Democrat. And the succersful 

Democrat was William E. Dever. He was elected mayor. He was a judge. How many 

terms he served I really couldn't tell you. But don't forget that was before television and 

radio. Political meetings really were, you know, pretty good sized. And they'd have - in 

one ward they might have four or five the same night. You would go from one to the 

other. Brass bands and all sorts of hoopla. 

I think Governor LRn Small wa~ around in that time too, and of course he got in trouble. He 

was tried for something. I don't think he was convicted. I'm a little hazy on the results 

of the,trial but it hurt the Republican party seriously. 

Whi&gownor wu that? I think it was omond 1948. The United States Senator v 1 B C. 

7Waybd Brwks. I thii that's who Adlai Stevbnmn beat, wasn't i't? 

. - I 

Q: Was the name Curley Brooks? 

A: curl& Brooks. (groans) When you get old you get arthritic. (pause) There was 

to it than George Kells. (pause) Well I'm not sure what the story was now, but kz 

Douglas was running against Curley Brooks for United States Senate and I was called bpon 

by a fellow I went to law school with and they were - they wanted to know if I 

be intereeted in being counsel for the congresssional committee 

Court decision. It was kind of an involved decision, I don't - it was not a 

that I knew very much about but - it was a decision that I think held it 

William A. Redmond had something Memoir - Archives/ to do Special with Collections including - Norris freight L Brookens rates Library in the - University cost of of a Illinois product at Springfield - UIS 

i

would be what is comparable to conservatives in Congress today who are very dissatisfied 

with the Supreme Court and they wanted to - they were going to have a congressional 

hearing and - with the idea that perhaps even ultimately ending up trying to take away 

the power of the Supreme Court to declare laws unconstitutional, which you know this is 

part of the stuff in Congress today. And a fellow who came out to see me wanted to know 

if I'd be interested - they were already counting the election returns and they thought 

Brooks was going to win and those - it seems to me it was Senator Watson from 

Indiana. Anyway they were sure they were going to win the whole thing. And I asked, 

"Well how come me?" and they said well they wanted somebody that had some trial experi- 

ence, although they've had some political experience but not really that active 

politically. But the real clincher is that they wanted somebody that they thought would 

be amenable to suggestions as to what witnesses to call, what kind of evidence to introduce, 

what the report would contain and what recomniendations would be made to Congress. In 

other words they were looking for a stool pigeon I guess. 

And I thought, "Well this is a dangerous business." And that really is what got me - I 

mean there I thought I should do whatever I could to help Senator Douglas defeat C. Way- 

land Brooks and in some way frustrate that. I've kind of forgotten that more than any 

of the rest of the stuff. But it's the same things you're hearing now, you know to declare 

laws unconstitutional. 

One time in Springfield when Warren Wood was - he wasn't Speaker but he was there - 

they had some resolutions, amendments to the Constitution like the ERA, and one of them 

was to set up a court above the Supreme Court, and take away from the Supreme Court 

that power. So this has been a thread that has been running through for a long time. I 

had kind of forgotten about that. 

That makes more sense than this other thing. Because that really was probably the thing 

that pushed me over, I thought I should do it. I'm pretty sure that was Wayland Brooks. I 

know that that was what the plan was. 

Q: Do you remember whatever became of that plan? 

A: Well I think most of those guys were defeated. 

Q: So there's no way to even attempt an end run or anything like that? 

A: Not at that time, no. They were practically all defeated. That was a pretty good year 

for Democrats. Douglas wasn't supposed to run but he did. 


Q: I'd like to start out just by recapping what we finished up talking about last time, the 

thing that really propelled you into polities was your meeting with Brooks and some of the 

people associated with him. 

A: I didn't meet with Brooks. I met with an emissary from Brooks' office. 

Q: And to spell it out - even though you weren't involved in any way directly with Brooks 

or Douglas you wanted to run for the state's attorney position to help the ticket that Douglas 

was running on. 

A: That's right. 

Q: (pause) Was your interest in politics at all intensified by that even though you didn't 

continue running for office until the early 1950's? 


A: I would say so, I would say so. You know - that was a very successful year. It wasn't 

successful far me, but it was for President Truman and Stevenson and Douglas and they 

were the main. . . . I met Stevenson and I became very fond of him, although I wasn't 

involved in, you know, his administration or anything I was very pleased that he was 

there. And I had met Ivan Eliott, the attorney general, and my memory is that Elddy 

Barrett was the secretary of state and I had met the. . . . And I was very satisfied with 

the state officials. 

Q: Did you h q r appFe% Pad mkquent, campaign$! 

A: Every er~ft, F- 

k I think Paul Douglas probably was - well I don't think there's any question that he 

L the be& the most intellectual, public official that I've ever met. He was an absolute &ant 

In int&&. I think Dan Walker for sheer brainpower probably comes second to him but 

I thought Walker was a very very bright. . . . But Douglas, you know, he was reany a 

scholar and he was a professor. He was . . . an unusual man. He - he was a man in 

his fifties at the time that war broke out and he felt so strongly abdtlt it that he jdned 

tba mvine corps rn LEI PI^ snd insisted on getting combat duty and was injured in 

semh I mean he - unlike ao m y of us - he felt the thing s~, strongly that he was 

willing %o put his own life on the line and he was so impeccable, his inteeity, and, you know 

sa many paople in pofiticer da things for poLitid expediency. 

- * 

I'lI never forget, one time there was a - there was a mmgrts@ond inymtq@mg cmmWmb 

Kefwver, Senator Kdzmveer had it The investigating commISttee thpit was imv=@&& 

came into the Chicago area and were kind of hard on some of the Demoeratic public ofkiafs 

in Chicago. I was talking to them and I can still remember there was a school over in Elmhurst 

and there were some people who criticized them for conducting those heerrin@ in 

Chicago in an election year when Democrats might be hurt. Well Douglas said, "Well, if 

things we - are'' - I don't remember hia exact language, but if something needs to be 

inv&tigatPbd even.if it unearths something that might be harmfal, why, that's the price you 

pay. Wlt if it had to be done, well - there aren't many pnblic ofl4cials that do that and - 

well he was just outstanding in every respect. 

The only time I ever remember him doing something kind of foolish was at the time that 

he tbught that maybe President Eisenhower would be a Democrat and they tried to - he 

and the national committeeman, a fellow named Jake Army - tried to draft Eisenhower 

to run on the Democratic ticket, and Eisenhower in a month or so ran on the Republican 

ticket. (laughs) So that was kind of foolish but I guess that showed that he was human 

the sarrce os everybody- el&.- 

C& (pause) - Was Douglas well thought of in all circlesof the Ilemoeratic party here? ! 

A: I Mak sa I think so. Of co- he was not a -- yw know, he was a . . . o high-4nded 

man. He didn't gat involved in the grubby hulsim of pelities. He wdt very stropg on 

p&tMmge and he wasn't very strong on, you know, fund ~alsing and some of the mare wamy 

sides of the business. There were some that thought that he wasn't really practical but 

I think motit everybody had such admiration and respect for him. . . . I could hardly believe 

that" he wm defeated by §enator Percy because I held him in such high esteem. He probably 

ran one time too many, you know, wars getting pretty old. And those of us who knew him 

we Wt - we didn't consider him old, but my memory is that he died rather shortly after 

that election and he would not have served out that term. So maybe - maybe he wgs too 

old and maybe people ascertained that quicker than I did. 

He was a giant. He was a big man physically too but . . . 


I

Q: (pause) Would you regard him at all as a crusader? 

A: Was I? 

Q: No, would you regard him as that? 

A: I would think so. More practical than most crusaders though. You have a lot of crusad- 

ers that don't really get very far, Douglas had enough practicality about him so that he 

won. He came out of the Fifth Ward in Chicago which is around the University of Chicago, 

he was a professor at the university up there. That has been pretty well noted for crusaders 

and he - he came out of that area. 

Q: (pause) You also knew Adlai Stevenson and he was also something of an intellectual 

or he was regarded as an intellectual. 

A: Oh yes. Yes. He was an intellectual. He was an abolute delight though. I had 

dinner one night with him when he was trying to convince somebody they should run for 

the state senate and against a well-entrenched Republican woman, and - I think it was 

a Republican woman running at the time. Lottie Holman O'Neill is the one that I'm - I 

don't know whether she was the senator - she had been a house member first. The senator 

of this district was Senator Richard Barr at one time, now whether Lottie was a senator - 

but anyway, the senate was pretty overwhelmingly Republican and he was trying to get - 

well it was Judge Sam Perry, who ultimately went on the federal bench - was trying to 

get him to run for the senate, to see if he could get a Democratic seat out of here. And 

he came out and had dinner up at the Elmhurst Country Club - there were about ten or 

twelve of us - and he was such a, you know, he was as comfortable as your old slippers 

and he was funny, and he was always the butt of his own joke. Some people are funny 

because they make fun of other people, he always made fun of himself, but he was a very 

bright man. 

You know you think of some of the things that he came out with - one, he was one of 

the first that recommended a ban on the testing of atomic bombs, when people of the press 

and everybody else thought he was crazy. But it turned out that he was way ahead of his 

time, and how right he was. He was talking about the atomic fallout all over the world 

and so forth. 

And he too had very high standards in terms of integrity. He used to be the bane of - 

between Douglas and Stevenson - the bane of the existence of the ward bosses, but he 

was a very unusual man. 

Q: Can you remember any of the jokes he used to tell on himself, or how he might use his 

sense of humor? 

A: (chuckle) Well there's one that I can recall - I don't know whether it's - it's not 

really pornographic, but it's one where he - he was saying that - well he was assistant 

secretary of the navy during the war and the Russians were talking to him, trying to encour- 

age us to get into the war - at least . . . and let me get this straight. To open up a second 

front to relieve the Russians in the German situation, Germany was kind of raising cane 

with Russia at the time. You remember ultimately they ended up and they invaded at Anzio 

and down the second front, the soft underbelly of Europe. But anyway they were trying 

to get the - so, Stevenson was telling them that . . . 

(Taping stopped for introduction of Mrs. Nicholson, then resumed.) 

A: . . . the Russians that they were behind in opening up this offensive and behind in opening 

up that offensive and they were behind in doing something at Murmansk and all these 


fronts - I don't recall all of them. And he said that the Russian he told them, he said, 

"Mr. Stevenson, we came to talk about your behinds, not our behinds." (chuckles) 

That was one of the stories and then he had another one where - he was talking about 

his grandfather I think, who I believe was vice president of the United States and his name 

was Adlai alm and when he was a candidate - I think he was - I don't think he was 

talking about himself in this case, I think it was his grandfather - that there was a woman 

who was obviously expecting a child and she was at a rally. And she was carrying a gign, 

"Adlai is the one." (chuckles) 

And I don't remember some of the others but they were, you know, they - he had - I 

thought he had quite a knack to - he was a good story teller. Some others may come to 

me, but those were two that . . . 

Q: You know I've heard him spoken of as an egghead. I've heard that word used by people 

to dedbe him sometimes. I haven't heard that word used to describe Douglas. 

A: Well I think - I don't know what an egghead is, but in terms of a real professorial iatel- 

lectual guy, Douglas far more than Stevenson in my judgment. Well he was a scholartand 

he came out of Rutgers University and he taught at the University of Chicago and his ;- I 

think he was the author of the CTA [Chicago Transit Authority] Act, and I don't remember 

what else he did, but he was really a tremendous worker. 

I don't think Stevenson really had that same kind of effort. Stevenson was a relatively 

obscure lawyer in Chicago. He worked with quite a good firm but he was with the Chicago 

Council of Foreign Relations and that kind of thing but he wasn't a teacher as far as I 

know. Maybe it was because he was bald they called him that. 

Q: (chuddeer) Maybe so. 

A: But he was a schalarly guy. There's no question he had high ideals, but I don't think 

anywhere near like Paul Douglas. 

But he wars a very comfortable man to be with. I mean you didn't - you know you - 

sometimes people just ooze dignity and prestige and they make you uncomfortable and all 

that erort of thing and Adhi Stevensan did not make you uncomfortable. He was a 

warm hunun Mi. 

Q: Did yw ever we Douglas or Stevenson interact with ward politicians that might 

that they were less than victors? 

A: No, -use I would not have been in those party councils. See I was completely a stlbur- 

banite, my relationship with him was as a suburbanite. I think that the reason that the 

party ,turned to them is that they had given up on the chances of winning that 

eleetiw. Don't forget that C. Wayland Brooks was a very very prominent Republican 

senat&, And Dwight Green was - he was - I think he was a pretty well-regarded 

governor. You know there was no - I don't think that they really thought they had a 

&qce to win any of those jobs. And if they had thought so I think they might have had 

one of &e& own in there a lot more than they actually did. Not that they didn't tm to 

help them when they got in there, they did. But the dependence of the city of Chikago, 

the Democratic Chicago - and the state treasury was not as pronounced then as it was 

later so that there wasn't the, you know, the perceived need - whether it's real or fancied 

I don't know - for Chicago to have a very friendly Republican governor down there. See, 

when Stratton was governor they started the sales tax which benefited the city of Chicago 

to some extent and the income tax was Governor Ogilvie and before they gave the 

votes, why, there had to be a division of - I think it was one-twelfth of them 


municipality. And of course Mayor Byrne and Governor Thompson collaborated pretty 

closely. 

Q: You also mentioned Eddy Barrett. Did you know him very well. 

A; I wouldn't say I knew him, I met him. He was on the campaign trail and he was a very 

popular man and of course he served in World War I as my memory, and I don't know how 

he ever was elected. I think that was an accident also. I don't think anybody really 

expected Barrett to win. But he was a very popular secretary of state while he was in 

there. It's really unfortunate that he came to the end that he did. Because Eddy Barrett 

would have to go down as one of the most popular state officials I think. 

No matter what happened to other Democratic candidates, Barrett used to always survive. I 

suppose maybe a little bit like Alan Dixon, only nowhere near the - Dixon's, you know, 

really a fine speaker. Barrett was not. (chuckles) He used to read the stuff from a loose- 

leaf book. He had the pages all covered with cellophane and he used to flip the pages and 

it didn't make any difference, he was going to finish that speech no matter what. 

But I think he ran a pretty good office. I don't know how he got into trouble. You know 

a lot of people get into trouble and it's hard to explain how they do or why they do, 

but . . . I think his health failed, in fact I know it did. It seems to me that ultimately, 

after finding in the court that his health was so poor, that they wouldn't send him to any 

institution, that's my memory on that. And I think that maybe the failing health and the 

failing of his faculties may have had something to do with his poor judgment, getting 

involved in something. 

Q: You also mentioned Ivan Eliott? 

A: Yes he was the attorney general. He was from a little town called Carmi, Illinois. 

Q: Did you know him very well? 

A: Pretty well. His son is on the Board of Higher Education. I used to see him every once 

in a while when I was Speaker particularly. I used to have meetings with governing bodies 

of the universities and he was always there. I've never been to Carmi, I guess it's a tiny 

little town in the southern part of the state. There was a fellow by the name of Joe Burke 

who put his name on the ticket to run against Ivan Eliott in the primary that year and 

Burke almost won. Ivan Eliott didn't sound like a typical Democratic name. (chuckles) I 

don't think they were convinced that he was really the organization candidate for attorney 

general. (chuckles) 

He was a very fine lawyer, and very fine man. He was - I don't know what he, you know, 

what he had done before or I don't know what he did after. One of the leading legal lights 

of southern Illinois. 

You know in those days Democrats did have some pretty outstanding people from places 

other than Cook County. Scott Lucas, United States senator, was a Democratic leader in 

the Senate - he was from a little town, Havana, Illinois. And Harry Hershey was a candi- 

date for governor, he was a lawyer in Christian County . . . and was very prominent. And 

Dick Stengel came out of Rock Island. He was our candidate for United States Senate one 

time. He was in the house for many years. I think he's now retired but he was on the 

appellate bench not too long ago. And of course Paul Powell and Clyde Choate . . . and 

a fellow by the name of Clyde Lee out of Mount Vernon, member of the senate and the 

house. But then the candidates, you know the Democratic candidates seemed to ultimately 

end up in Cook County rather than all over the state. 

Now there's a newer breed coming along now. There was a fellow that was in the house, 

Roland Tipsword, who I thought had great potential. He was a lawyer, he was an honor 


student in college, state's attorney in Christian County, very articulate, bright, fine young 

man. 

A fellow by the name of Jack &aupre out of Kankakee was in the house. I guess he dropped 

out of running for the house. I guess he had a very young family, he was quite a young 

man and I guess his wife din't think it was worth separating the family. He had been 

county treasurer in Kankakee County, he was from Kankakee County. I thought he had 

the potential. There was some movement afoot to have him fill the vacancy of state 

treasurer. That wee when Alan Dixon moved in the secretary of state and they couldn't 

get together with Governor Walker. And Beaupre, if he'd have been appointed to the atate 

treasurer, he might probably still be in. He was a very high-class fellow. 

A house member by the name of Clarence Darrow out of Rock Island now is beginning to 

surge . . . running for the senate now. He aspired to be the candidate for attorney general 

this last time but he wasn't selected. A fellow by the name of Rich Brummer who is ,very 

prominent down in the Effingham area . . . he's been in the house probably four terms I 

think, bum or five. He's quite a promising man. 

So there are new ones coming up in the southern part of the state and the weqtern 

part. Didr Mulcahey out of the Roekford area is another one. 

Q: You mean to say that there was some dry spell then, there's some period of ten, fifteen 

years maybe? 

A: Yes. Well it was quite a period of time, I'd say from the time of . . . you know without 

something in front of me, but I would say from the time of . . . maybe the 1960's and 1970's, 

where the candidates for our party seemed to all be from up in here as contrasted to '+ of 

course Paul Powell makes that a lie a little bit I guess. But Alan Dixon's almost the only 

one now. But these that I'm talking about will be coming along. 

Harry Bradley out of Bloornington was a very attractive candidate who aspired to run for 

the state treasurer this last time. Of course Jim Donnewald, a candidate for the treasurer, 

state treasurer, is from Clinton County. So I see, you know, the party having more leaders 

spread throughout the state. as contrasted to a period that we've just come through for 

instance when there really weren't. 

Q: Okay, you know, if what you say is true, and if it seems to be true, you know, that - to 

kind of jog my memory, what do you think accounts for the dry spell in Democratic lkders 

from southern Illinois, or downstate Illinois I guess you'd say? 

A: I really can't explain it. I don't, you know, I don't know how it happened or why it 

happened. I know it happened but I - I don't know why. 

Rollia Tipsword for instance, I thought that he would be on the state ticket long before 

this. IWw he may have missed the brass ring. He left General Assembly because his law 

practice waa suffering tm much. Maybe he's out, but he was . . . I thought a very very 

attractive young fellow. And came from a Democratic area, Christian County and Shelby 

County, md those places are Democratic. I don't know why it did . . but it was, it was 

a dry spell. Well in Springfield they always had somebody. Don Forsythe, I think, isn't 

he on the state - on the University of Illinois? 

Q. Yes. 

A: There was always somebody out of there. But there hasn't been in recent years, I mean 

of statewide stature. And there was Allen Lucas and . , . 'course Jim Londrigan might 

have b e 

something but he went on the bench. 


Q: Have you heard other party leaders talk about that. Was that, you know, common in 

Du Page County circles or Cook County circles, that you know, they were losing people 

downstate or . . . 

A: Well there's a tendency, you know for everybody to be kind of egocentric, I suppose I 

was one of the few that strongly felt that we should have a broad-base party. And - you 

know it's hard to convince a fellow that is very successful in his own little parochial area, 

that is succeeding in doing whatever - you know either winning an election or having 

patronage jobs for his friends and whatever the perks are that go with success - well it's 

hard for them to say, "Well I should dilute this a little bit," and, "I should be broader," 

Maybe it's when you come from a losing constituency like mine that I can be a lot more 

objective than some other people. 

Q: That's an interesting observation. It may help to come from that sort of minority status 

or sort of losing status really. 

A: I think that may, I think it may. It wasn't that I was suggesting anybody had an ear 

for statewide consideration but I just thought it was a weakness of the party. It used to 

be that Cook County would give a big vote and that St. Clair and Madison and maybe Chris- 

tian and Shelby would offset Du Page and Lake County. But when Lake and Du Page got 

so big, then Madison, St. Clair and those places couldn't offset them. Du Page County is 

a mess. (chuckles) Sometimes a good Republican candidate that is acceptable to the 

Republican party out here will wipe out, you know, the successful St. Clair, Madison and 

all the rest of them and just gobble them up, take them for breakfast. That wasn't true - 

when I came out here there was only a hundred thousand people here. So they was pretty 

nearly equal. Now they're not, And I think the Democrats have to do better in these collar 

counties in order to succeed as the statewide party and to help the national party. 


Q: Let me ask you the same question from a different angle now. Do you ever recall leaders 

like Powell or Choate or other downstaters, you know, expressing concern about not bringing 

up enough people from downstate Illinois or . . . 

A: Well they had that local parochial pocket that I'm talking about. See, they were succeed- 

ing and they didn't want to dilute their strength. So they kind of enjoyed it the way it 

was. I think it probably has to be from a loser's complex that makes you concerned about 

that. (chuckles) 

Q: Have you seen comparable things happen with the Republican Party in Illinois? 

A: Oh we've seen it disappear in Chicago. You know it's not too long ago that Mayor Daley 

had a pretty tough fight on his hands. When Merriam ran against him it was, you know, 

no runaway. He won by a significant majority, but it was a fight. But there isn't a Repub- 

lican party worthy of the name in there now. I think the exodus of people into the suburbs 

many of those were Republican types. And particularly those areas that were taken over 

with minorities - for the most part minorities if they're anything, they're Democrat. 

Q: I think I'd like to skip ahead then to 1958 and maybe have you recap, you know, how 

you, briefly how you came to run in that campaign then and what that campaign consisted 

of for you. 

A: Well 1958 was the year that - I had no intention of running, I had been defeated in 

the primary in 1956. At that time the parties decided how many candidates were going 

to run and the Democrats had decided they would only run one and the Republicans two, 


and there were three to be elected so if you were nominated you were elected. The people 

who had been instrumental in defeating me in 1956 came to me and said that they decided 

they were going to switch their allegiance from Fred Anderson who had defeated me to 

me. And I called Fred on the phone - he is since deceased, he was a very capable compe- 

tent man. He was a lawyer who lived in Downers Grove. And whether they were justified 

in their reasons for switching their allegiance I don't know, but it was obvious that they 

were going to do it. So I called him on the phone and tdd him of the visit that I hadand 

told him it was obvious that they were not going to support him, and they were pretty well 

organized and they could pretty well deliver the nominition to whomever they wante4, so 

I was convinced that he was not going to be succeesful in being renominated. And Iitold 

him that under those circumstances that I had no intention of runmng and I would letkhim 

alone but as long as there was somebody else who was going to be in there that I t h~ght 

that .- I guess maybe because I had been defeated in 1956 I decided that I would adcept 

the support and I did run. I don't know whether there were any great issues quite 

frankly. ' And I was nominated. 

Now I can't recall whether he filed as an Independent after - after I defeated hi& or 

whether he did that the next year, but he did that one of the - it was either in 19% or 

1960 that he filed as an Independent. And as poor as the Democratic organization {was, 

that - you know getting significant support as an Independent candidate - was pretty 

difficult. And with the shortage of money and the lack of newspaper coverage and that: sort 

of thing, why, I'm not too sure many people knew who was running and they voted the Demo- 

cratic ticket and so I defeated him not only in the primary but also in the general eleption 

that he m in as an Independbnt. i 

And then for the longest time we only nominated the one and I didn't have opposition i aignificant 

opposition. There was one time somebody ran but he was relatively unknown. He 

was a very young, very nice fellow. His name was Baggott and he . . . currently I ieve 

is employed by Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission. I don't know what he's 7 oing 

now, at bne time he was advising governments on how you get yourself lined up for fyeral 

funds. (chuckles) Ndw that thoae may be drying up 1 don't know just what he's doi)lg. 

But he was a very nice young fellow and he did quite well in that job that he had. Iq fact 

the county was thinking of hiring somebody for that pazrpase and he was interviewe4 and 

he was recommended to take the job and then they discovered that ,he had run again& me 

and that he had been a Democrat. So they decided that they couldn't bear the thouat of 

anybody who had ever been a Democrat - so they Wa't fill the job. But, that's the fact 

of the matter. (chuckles) 1 

Q: (pause) Would you want to say who the people were that approsched you in 19&8&hen, 

or at least what their roles ware? 

A: WsU they're all deceamd for the most part. (chuckles) A fellow by the name d Joe 

Turnpack who was the county chairman, he was the main mover. And he was the main 

inst.npwat in having defeated me in 1956. If I had realized how well organized they were 

downrtbre I might not have got in the 1956 race. Because the Democratic party oub here 

is a apodic thing. Every once in a while one township will pick up and then the other 

one. . - 3 bone time this towaship had all township officials who were Democrats. That's 

not tqo hyg ago.' Now -there aren't any. Downers Grove is where they were from. They 

used ds very well in township elections. In fact they came within five votes of electing 

the assessor not too long ago. But it seems that when one township is high the other ones 

kind of slack off. And I didn't realize how well organized Downers Grove was at that 

time, A& that was - out of the nine townships I think I won seven of them but they 

really bt my brains out down there. I learned a lesson. They were better organized than 

they knew, thought. (chuckles) 

Q: Had you approached them at all about running or did you sort of spring it on them? I 


Q: Yes. 

A: No, I - it wasn't my burning ambition to be in the General Assembly. There were two 

things I guess. One is that Judge Guild who was on our appellate bench until very 

recently - he was a states attorney and he was a friend of mine, we went to law school 

together, and he said he thought that state legislature wasn't full-time in the first place 

and it was one place that you could be in politics and not put all your eggs in that one 

basket, along the line that I was talking about the other day. And it was true at that. . 

. . And he kind of encouraged me to enter into it and I guess maybe it was the Irish, stubborn 

Irish, in me that - I wanted to be a delegate to the national convention that was being 

held in Chicago that year. And this fellow that I referred to that was most instrumental 

in Anderson's success, he hadn't been in the party when I had been active back in 1948. So 

somebody said that Redrnond wanted to be a delegate to the convention. So somebody said, 

"Who the hell is Redmond?" And then they proceeded to slate without me. So I guess 

kind of in retaliation for that I thought I'd try to upset their applecart. (chuckles) Maybe 

that wasn't a good motive but . . . 

Q: Was it a pretty spirited contest? 

A: It was a pretty good - pretty good but not vicious. Fred and I were friendly and you 

know any time that two people are fighting for the same seat there's always a certain amount 

of tenseness but he never said anything unkind and I never did. It was an affirmative thing 

and - well they were better organized and he won, so. 

Q: You said the Democratic party, in mostly suburbs, was a sort of sporadic type of 

thing. Why is it sporadic? 

A: Well why do people identify with parties? Sometimes they - you know, it's power they 

want. Sometimes it's money. Sometimes it's prestige. Sometimes it's being with a 

winner. We weren't in a position to reward anybody. I mean you know we didn't win so 

if what they wanted was a job we couldn't give them a job. If what they wanted to be 

was an assistant state's attorney, those were political appointments and - it's great to come 

in second but you don't, you know. . . . To build yourself a political base, if you run for 

something, having been the assistant state's attorney is a plus. (chuckles) Having all the 

support of losers, that - you might be the greatest lawyer in the world, but that wouldn't 

do. And then you know they - maybe somebody would aspire to be a judge and that would 

be the reason for their political campaigning. Maybe somebody just liked 

government. They'd get inspired. 

I don't know whether we're going to be able to capitalize on it or not and there's always 

a danger that if you try to make political capital of something you destroy the movement 

and. . . . But right now the county particularly up on this end is in ferment over the real 

estate taxes, the application of the multiplier. Our multiplier has gone up every year for 

the last - oh I can't tell you how many years but that means that your real estate taxes 

are increasing probably a hundred, a hundred and twenty-five dollars a year every year and 

have for quite some time. There's a movement now, they had a meeting here in this town 

and had four hundred people in it. Now that's a lot of people. I mean it takes something 

like that to get them going. 

I don't know what got them going against Dwight Green when Stevenson ran before but 

there was something, I just don't remember what it was. If that feeling is universal now 

and they blame Governor Thompson for the multiplier, and they blame the local governments 

for the level of appropriations, it could possibly be that the ingredients are here for the 

Democrats to do quite well in November. 


Q: (pause) I want you to clarify a little bit what you said about if you try to capitalize 

too much on an issue or a movement . . . 

A: Well if you make it Republican-Democrat there may be a lot of Republicans that are 

more FbRepucan than they are . . . (chuckles) Well as an illustration after - what was 

it? Goldwatar - and Stevenson ran the last time, he got fewer votes than he did the time 

before that. Republicans didn't vote. The total Republican vote was down 

significantly. So they were disenchanted with their own people. But they didn't vote for 

a Democrat, they didn't vote at all. 

Now it may very well be if they see this as a taxpayer revolt against the enemy, that% - 

you know they could identify with that. But if they see it as nothing but a Demoqatic 

move to discredit Republicans they may be Republicans first and - I mean a significant 

number of them, I don't say all of them. 

So you can, you can hurt a thing and part of the problem that we always have - for 

instance I put in a bill in the legislature that permitted a merit employment in Du Page 

County and it was on the ballot and it carried, but unfortunately when the press rep~rted 

it they olways reported it as Republican-Democrat, which really wasn't the case. I wean 

I happened to be the sponsor of the bill and for the most part we did circulate the petitions 

but it wasn't a Republican-Democratic thing, League of Women Voters and a lot of ether 

people were in support of it. So the minute you identify it as Republican-Democrat, then 

you're making it a party thing and rather than voting on the issue itself, why then, they 

vote on the party that - and of course we had been a minority party. So you're liable 

to hurt something if you let it appear that that's what it is. 

Well you've got one of those things right here now for instance when they were goipg to 

expand the O'Hare field. Noise can be very bothersome in this area. Republicans try to 

blame it on Democratic Mayor Byrne of Chicago, and in the township platform and all 

thought they had something there. You know the fact of the matter is that there would be 

no expansion of that airport if President Reagan would not let money be allocated for it, He 

really had the control of it. And Senator Percy in time, and Congressman Hyde had a lot 

more to say about that than Mayor Byrne did. Because if you control the purse strings, 

why, you can insist on compromise, iou can insist on a lot of things. But we weren't able 

to, you know, to identify the thing and . . . they had it anti-Chicago anti-Democrat 

that, whereas in point of fact the real control of the thing was in Republican 

the diWeulty of explaining those issues - sometimes they're complicated and 

don't have as much press as we used to have. A lot of papers have folded 

to get your stuff in. 

Q: You mean the suburban . . . 

* 

A: Yes. .&id the metropolitan papers are too busy, they don't. . . . Town like Spriweld 

whew the Journal-Re@ster - although it's Republican I think it's possible that t 

qp&)od stg a lot bstter than the suburban paper does. The suburban paper 

+&&@did and who was born and - but they don't get into very much. 

Q: (paw) And what you're dm saying too, to kind of summarize up about the spbradic 

nature- of the Democratic party, is that in these township offices there really weren't a lot 

of jobs or anything connected to offices, there's no way you can really build on that. 

A: Well that's in essence - since they had revenue sharing of course the jobs ha 

f 

just 

rnu~tipkd. There's a lot more now than there used to be, didn't used to amo nt to 

spit. And df course you know the assessor has always been - that's a very very po erful 

job because nobody likes to pay taxes. I won't nime the name of the newspaper but, there 

was a newspaper in a county not far from here that, one year that I recall, recom ended 


I

every Republican candidate for everything except the Cook County assessor. Now that, that 

tells you a lot. 

And the control of the aseessors out in these counties is a lot. You know the only way that 

so-called - if they make a mistake, they can issue what they call a certificate of error. The 

only grounds for doing that is if there's a mistake in fact. In other words if they assess 

your house as a seven-room house and in point of fact it's a three-room cottage or if they 

make a similar factual mistake then they can have a certificate of error, not a mistake in 

judgment, but a mistake in fact. When the assessments come out and they're real high I've 

had a lot of people come and say that they went over and they bellyached to the assessor 

and he reduced them, not because of a mistake of fact but he just reduced them. Well the 

power to do that is really pretty strong. 

The power to admit old folks to the convalescent home, that rests entirely with the township 

supervisor and that's another form of power. And of course the revenue sharing is - 

they've gone crazy on that. York Township which is just south of us here had a transporta- 

tion service - they paid three hundred and thirty-eight thousand dollars a year to transport 

senior citizens. Without any showing of need or anything, why, they'd transport seniors 

to the - I guess anyplace, the doctor, the store, anyplace. (chuckles) They're sending out 

circulars and they have all these senior citizen dances and the luncheons and they have trips 

to the Playboy Club in Lake Geneva and the Water Tower Place. And of course they're 

not all free, they have them pay for some things. But that gives them the kind of activity 

that really has nothing to do with government that I can see. 

But it's currying favor and . . . . They're getting - I think in a way they're getting 

stronger. They've got a lot of teenagers who do chores for seniors and they're really dancing 

attention on the seniors. And I guess what it shows as much as anything is that there has 

been a complete breakdown in that kind of service by local governments and by local 

churches. If they had done it, maybe the, you know, revenue sharing wouldn't be used for 

these purposes. I don't think most of the senior government services really . . . . You don't 

kill the goose that's bringing you the golden egg. (chuckles) 

Q: So you think these type activities have increased politicalization here in the suburbs and 

will continue to do so? 

A: I think so. (pause) Of course the most of those seniors I suppose probably would own 

their own home. Now if the time comes that the real estate taxes are so high they may 

turn on the - on the people that they have perceived as their benefactors. Because it's 

all the same group. I mean it's the assessor and the road commissioner and it's all the 

same group. To give you an idea of how far - of course this is many years ago - but 

a fellow who had been a Republican - I think he was a committeeman - and one year 

he voted in the Democratic primary because some friend of his was running - for precinct 

committeeman I guess it was. And he was in the real estate business and the insurance 

business and he sold the bond - this is back in the days when they had constables - he 

sold the bond to the Republican constable and the premium on the bond was five dollars 

so you can imagine what his commission would be on a five dollar premium. The county 

clerk at that time refused to approve the bond because it had been sold by this guy who 

had voted Democratic in the primary. (chuckles) He came to me and complained about 

it and I went to Clarence Wagemann and bellyached about it and I don't know whether he 

ever got him to approve the bond, but that's the fact of the matter. 

Well I told you what they did on the Baggott thing they decided they weren't going to fill 

the job. When we had the merit commission Mariam Ringo, who had been director of oper- 

ations for me in Springfield and who had been Governor Kerner's director of personnel and 

Shapiro's director of perstpnel and personnel director for Mike Howlett - and it's a non- 

paying job - her name was recommended and she was turned down because she was 

too-qualified. A non-paying job. (chuckles) 


It's tight out here. And to give you some idea of, you know, the power that reposes in one 

man - Pate Philip. George Lindberg was on the appellate bench primarily because Philip 

backed him. They wouldn't dare fill the vacancy and appoint an associate judge that didn't 

meet his approval. So here's one guy that had a lot to do with the appeJIate judge - all 

the assoeiate judges I would say - without fail. He's now the minority leader in'the 

senate, and he's had a lot of state patronage. When we had Walker I never had mue of 

anything. Most that I ever had anything to do with was about forty-two jobs. He's I t ink 

probably as powerful - aside from the governor. I don't think there's anybody who's /ore 

powerful than he is. , 

(Taping stopped for telephone conversation, then resumed.) t 1 

Q: The intensity of the suburban politics you've been talking about surprisesE me 

somewhat. I guess it's, like you say, it's not particularly written up in the subujban 

papers. How does one find out about it, say a resident of these towns? 

A: Suffers thkdugh ft. (chucklee) Well you know the Du Page County &publican is a beed 

all of its o*i. You know three hundred and -- let's see, in an election year, three hundred 

and six*-four days of that year they're delightful pnple but on election day they go for 

,the jugdsr d there's just no quarter and. . . . But they're good neighbors and nice people 

but they're, you know, they're born and raised to mistrust Demokrats and their entire campaign-hers 

dways k n againat Chicago. 

And one election year a few years ago they had - of course now that Mayor Daley isn't 

anound~they don't have puite the sting that they had - but they herd an octupus and jthat 

was Mayor DaIey in Chicago reaching its tentacles out to try to grab the suburbian. me11 

aothbg couM be further from the truth because you know an axiom in politics is thaq you 

never assimilate hostile votes. (chuckles) Why would Mayor Daley want to come out here 

and - you know there was no way that he could - by persuasion or anything else, &ere 

was no way that he could convince these people that they should vote for Chicago. But a 

lot people wanted to listen to it and it has been very successful quite frankly and, you kpow, 

they just - it's a religion with them. It really is an intense thing and they go fod the 

jugular as I say, they don't fool around as far as jobs and letting anybody have any pnd 

of positian or anything. f 

Q: Let's say I were to move to one of these suburbs, you know, tomorrow. 

to talk to somebody to get my garbage picked up regularly or the streets 

of my home? 

A: No tihe garbage is a matter of local - it's village stuff and there's none of that them. I 

don't think any village rum on Republican-Democrat tickets. There have been some isolated 

ihstances in years.gone by but if there's any Republican-Democratic ticket out here I have 

no way ofhowiw I don't know of any. Now there are many many officials in some of 

thase: alabiyfssn grem,that am in fact Democrats. But they run as Good Governme t or 

Bad f&m@qnent or Citizens Group or something like that, T 

In fa& $he mayor of' this town is now and his predecessor was a Democrat. The 

of Wopd :we hras beep a Ilemocrat. Not always, I mean the one that's in there now 

is. His pmdecessor was not. The mayor of Itasca uged to be Democratic committegnan, 

very active, a fellow by the name of Wesley Usher. He wanted to run for sheriff OQ our 

tickettat gne time. He's been elected and reelected mayor of Itasca. Now if he ran ao 

bow 

the 

Democratic ticket he'd get killed since Itasca is probably as strongly Republican as any ther 

area. Addison is - the mayor and practically every member of the city counci are 

~rnqrab. Addiwylo is a pretty Dprnocratic town but they don't run as Democrats. 

thy might .be able to win as Democrats, I'm not sure there. 

i 

But you know the mayor of - going back many years, Margaret Hamilton was the 

of Wheaton and she was a very active Democrat. The mayor of Lyle, Walker Gambl 


a Democrat. Lyle at one time was a Democratic community. Westmont - a lot of 

Democrats in Westmont. 


A: The mayor of Oakwood Terrace is a Democrat. There have been mayors and city officials 

in Mill Heights for Democrats and Cairo Stream. So their personality or their appearance 

or anything is not what - their burden is that if they run as a Democrat they will - that 

party is not the dominant party in this county. 

Q: So we're really talking ,about politics at a county or a congressional or legislative district 

level because of the Republican-Democrats. 

A: Yes, but the township too. See in a lot of the natural Democratic constituencies you 

take the working men, union guy, but he's not registered to any great extent out here, 

because they take the jurors from the voters list, and if he's called to jury duty, he lo- 

a lot of money. And he can't afford it so he doesn't register to . . . because he doesn't 

want - that, you know that's a big thing. Hie wife may be on there, but he's not on. So 

you take - there's probably forty thousand, forty-five thousand union people out here. A 

significant number would probably vote Democrat if they, you know, if they were registered, 

voting at all. But they're not registered. 

At one time we had fewer than a thousand non-white and it would be some more than that 

but still not too terribly many. And those, you know, those groups that made up the Demo- 

cratic party were Jewish people for the most part. Not very many Jews out 

there. Spanish-speaking people don't register. They're normally Democrat. I saw a 

breakdown the other day that Mexicans tend to be Republicans - and Puerto Ricans - 

than to be Democrat. Why that is I don't know. (chuckles) But they don't register. 

And of course it was a German community to begin with and Germans for the most part 

are Republicans. And going way back, there was a lot of sympathizers with Germany. You 

know the America First used to meet out here and bunds and some of the others. Of course 

you know the Germans are diluted pretty much but I mean when you start out with a kind 

of a base like that and a lot of it was farmers, retired farmers, again they're Republicans 

for the most part. 

And then of course the people who come from the city that have voted Democratic, a lot 

of them don't bother to register because they don't want to be Republicans and they don't 

want to be losers. I can think of two priests, Monsignor Plunk of Elmhurst whose brothgr 

was Joe Plunk who was a Democratic Ward committeeman of the Fourth Ward in Chicago 

and Monsignor Wagner whose brother was a Democratic ward committeeman of the Forty- 

eighth Ward in Chicago. They were both Republicans out here. And one of the reasons, 

they explained that if you want to participate in the process and have a voice if you vote 

Democratic you're not voting for anybody who's liable to be in office. But if you want to 

have a voice in the selection of the ultimately successful candidates then you vote 

Republican. And they have the fear of the assessor assessing property . . . all of those 

things, you know they're factors to be considered in trying to evaluate the party. 

Q: Why haven't the villages been politicized or the village or city or town governments been 

politicized? 

A: Seems to be a gentlemen's agreement that the people don't want to politicize them. I'm 

not too sure you'd be very successful if you tried it, people, they don't like it. I don't know 

why but they don't. I think Roselle ran Republican tickets at one time but . . . they just 

don't. 


And that's another thing that happens to Democrats; if they're active in our party and they 

have some success at the village level then they tend to get away from the partisan 

politis@, They like their experience in *e village and they drop out of the partisan politics, 

like Wesley Usher in Itasca. Committeeman for many years. His wife I think had worked 

for Paul Douglas many years ago and since he's been mayor he still votes I think, but ht - 

he's net @ve,,he. . . . Yeu know he still identifies as Democrat but nothing like, nothing 

like he had been. 

And the Democratic mayors that I'm talking about. For the most part they don't, they rop 

out qf - I can think of people of West Chicago, the mayor of West Chicago who had t een 

a red g&d comniitteeman. That isn't such bad Democratic country out there, but when 

he was Mted mayor'of West Chicago, why, he dropped out of the Democratic party. And 

another by, Ton? Laurino, was an alderman. He was a good committeeman, he dropped 

out. So suscess in municipal elections weans our people away from us. 

Q: (paw) You mentioned the suburban newspapers not being . . . 

A: ~ hat l the time there was Paddock Press had papers here in town. There waa the 

Berknville Register and the Wood Dale ReRister, Du Page County Register for, the 

northern . . . they don't circulate here at all now. They had that Herald which was dp in 

Arlington Heights, that's the outfit that - but they - they're not in this county. Fbllow 

by the name of Lloyd Weston in Addison had papers that blanketed this whole area. !And 

he failed and his papers, they were the leader papers, I think, they were throw-away6 but 

at least they were door-to-door and every house had one. And they're gone. The press 

Publications which is probably the largest single in this northern part, they're still $oing 

fairly strong but they don't come up into this area except - 1'11 bet you the local newsstands 

if they had twenty-five of the papers for each edition that would be a lot, You've & the 

insert of the m, in the Tribune and then once a week the Sun-Times haa a suburban issue 

that comes out. 

It's a little better over in the center of this county. The Wheaton Journal isr over 

there, 'Downers Grove has the Downers Grove Report&r that has been in existence for a 

long time alid has a pretty good circulation. Suburhn Life comes out of La Grange or gome- 

thing qtnd that's for the south end of the eounty. (pause) Glen Ellyn hae a paper of some 

kind but . . . you know it's a hard business. 

And it's a hard business if you're going to be critical of the guy that can put in the legal 

advertising. See the asswar will publish all the assessments and all that kind of 

stuff. The girl who is John Erlenborn's administrative assistant - that's a congressman - 

she used to run a paper in Naperville and she criticized some of the Republican 

people. And she was a Republican. Her mother was a recorder of deeds one time. They 

got ~ grp 

with her and didn't give her the usual legal . . . and she said that was ten thou- 

eand40lkm for that one issue. Well you take that kind of money away from. . . . Hipsdale 

DOi~ilp(qg-a 

pmtty-good paper that's having financial problems now. ; 

At one tima I issued a press release and the guy called me and he said, "Boy, I eait use 

tbis,.but 1'11 put it in as a paid political ad and not charge you." Well that took all the 

stet& aWy from it, If it came in as something the paper was publishing, why, it might 

have some impact but you put a "paid ad," on it, why it doesn't amount to spit. 

.~ - 

So, and the TV never cwd - or the radio. You know, everything - you see ayor 

Bym~yar don% aa anything about suburbia. 1.11 pant you that re don9t hare afbodbody 

I 

quite a% axciting as she is, (chuckles) 

&tt that's one of the big problems, trying to get your message disseminated without aving 

to pay for it. You know legal advertising is awful expensive and you try to niak these 

handouts and that sort of thing - my god, the distribution alone is extremely COB g. If 


you're going to send it out by first-class mail, that's twenty cents a copy. I don't know how 

many stops there are in this county but there are a lot of them. You know, you could spend 

a hundred thousand dollars out here easily. You know you would be wasting too much and 

we don't have that kind of money. 

Q: Well how are messages best communicated out here then? How can you best get points 

across? 

A: Well we do the best we can with the papers and word of mouth and we do have some 

literature that we distribute as best we can. Word of mouth is probably the best. If we 

had six hundred good committeemen, why, I think we could make quite a showing. Doing 

work in a precinct the way the precinct captain in Chicago works it. If they would do that, 

why, we'd do pretty well. 

Q: Like now, just approximately how many committeemen do you think you have? 

A: Two hundred. Two hundred, and maybe fifty of them are any good door-to-door 

people. To give you an idea of the difference, we had one place where there was a lot of 

action in the precinct and they had 181 Democratic votes in the primary. Now that's a lot 

of primary votes. Things went to sleep and we should have had three judges and a com- 

mitteeman and a spouse. Now that's four, that's eight people that are, you know wedded 

to the party. And they only had six primary votes the next election. To give you an idea 

of the difference between a place where there's some action and when it just falls off. 

(chuckles) It went from 181 to six. 

Q: (pause) Does the Republican party in this county then have that kind of 

organization? Do they have the committee people? 

A: Better than we are but not that good. See, they've got a natural 

constituency. (pause) And I think most of the loyalty is . . . probably national loyalty 

rather than local but it's easier to vote a straight ticket. You know they liked Herbert Hoo- 

ver and they liked Gal Coolidge and William McKinley. In fact some of them still think 

McKinley is president. (chuckles) But you know this is the wealthiest county in the state, 

highest average wage . . . very high education level and the incidence of relief is relatively 

low. 

And a lot of the relief comes from the township which is strictly a - you know there are 

no rules or guidelines, it's just if the supervisor thinks you need something. You use it so 

you can make a lot of favors. You want to get in the convalescent home, you ask 

the . . . supervisor approves. So they're in a position to do those kinds of things. 

The only two people that ever carried this county was Alan Dixon - one time by 65 percent 

and another time by 51 percent. He carried it 65 percent when he ran for United States 

Senate and 51 percent when he ran for secretary of state against Sharon Sharp. But 

Roosevelt never carried it, Kennedy didn't carry it. Well nobody, except Dixon. 

Q: What is Dixon's appeal then? 

A: I don't know, I don't know. It's hard to say. (pause) He didn't do that well . . . wait 

a minute, no I was wrong, it was 65 percent for secretary of state and 51 percent for 

treasurer. He didn't do that well for United States Senate but he didn't carry it for United 

States Senate but he still did pretty well. 

Now Adlai Stevenson has always done well up here. His father before him and Paul 

Douglas always did well. See if you carry 34 or 35 percent of Du Page County, you're going 

to carry the state. We've got our own built-in computer and that's the way it works. 


Q: (pause) Maybe we should go back a little bit to your campaign - is there anything else 

we should cover about the way suburban politics . . . 

A: No I think that kind of in general is . . . 

Q: I think we'll come back to it later in some of your official roles in De Kalb. How did 

your family feel about you running? 

A: My wife was never very pleased with it, she'd rather have me home. Of course in the 

early days we weren't gone that much but in the late years, in 1969 we were gone a lot. And 

she would have rather had me home. And I think my children would have preferred - I 

missed some things, I missed my son's high school graduation, and I missed his college grad- 

uation for that matter. So there's some sacrifice that you make. 

I enjoyed being in the legislature and I enjoyed governmental work but more than that it 

was really kind of a way of making - you know I came out here unknown, completely 

unknown, and left the law department of the Northwestern Railroad and set up my law office 

and this is one way that I could become known as a lawyer. And I thought it had some 

benefit to my law practice. Now looking back I'm not too sure that it did have because when 

you're in the - particularly when you represent the minority party, all the malcontents 

kind of flock to you. (chuckles) The fat cats tend to go someplace else. But everybody 

that's got a grievance and thinks the world is against them, you get a lot of those. You 

get a lot of people who want some political intervention of some kind, so I really can't say 

whether it did or not. 

Some of the governmental work that I represented paid fairly well, some didn't pay very 

well at all. The Republican county chairman once told me that if I'd spend as much $me 

on my law business as I did on politics - not only me but everybody - that we'd be further 

ahead financially. And I think that probably is true. But I was in a pretty small town 

to have a real flourishing law business. And part of the problem too is that I had some 

business in Cook County and some out here and every time I was - not every time, but 

frequently - when I was due in court in Wheaton I'd get a notice that I had me a job . . . 

(chuckles) You can't spread yourself like that, you know avail yourself of the maximum 

opportunity. 

Q: What did - what did your parents .think about . . . 

A: Kind of a mixed feeling I think. I think when I won I think that my parents were p4oud 

that I won. I don't think they particularly wanted me to be in the political atena 

though. Being in politics is hard life, you're. . . . You know in the early days I was gone 

at night so very much of the time, away from your family and your wife sacrifices a lot 

to tolerate you and as I say when I won I think my folks - mother particularly was pleased 

but if she had survived, when I was elected Speaker I think she probably would have blown 

up and. exploded. None of them were particularly excited. It was my evaluation of what 

was h$t far me, you know in order to help me raise my family, that was . . . 

Q: (pause) You said you hadn't harbored any great burning desire to be in the legislature. 

When yw decided that you were going to be a candidate - I guess in either election, you 

may have to answer for both of them - did you do a quick study on the legislature? 

A: Most people up in this neck of the woods at that time didn't know much about the 

legidature. Now they may know more now than they did. We're not Springfield oriented 

up here, we're Chicago oriented. See I was born and raised in Chicago. The first time I 

ever went to Sprin&eld was when I was sworn in to practice law. Never had bee to 

Sprindeld before. The second time was when I went down to file my oominfng 

papers. So . . . (chuckles) And I think that's true with most people up in this area. ow 


it may very well be that there's more publicity and more people know about it now than 

they did at that time. But I was pretty raw when I went in there, 

You know, the state taxes were really pretty small. About all you - the only contact you 

had, you got your license plates and your driver's license there. But I remember when the 

driver's license came in, You know, that's within my lifetime. So if you didn't even have 

that, why, you know you buy a vehicle license plate. There was no state income tax, there 

was no state sales tax, Criminal justice, the administration of justice in the courts and 

all that was a state function but most people never came into contact with that. 

Your schools were local. When I went to Springfield the total amount of money that they 

used to support secondary and elementary education in Illinois was three hundred and sixty- 

five million dollars - the grand total. And that would be for a two-year period. And now 

it's over two billion a year. I mean state participation in schools is significant now but you 

know it wasn't when I was. . . . So, you know Springfield really wasn't really on my front 

burner. 

Q: Then folks weren't going to impress you on - you know, too much - on what you were 

going to do in Springfield because they really didn't know what you could do in Springfield. 

A: That's right. Everybody ran against - I can still see ads - Mike Zlatnik who is now 

I believe a judge - he was minority member from up in Rogers Park area, I can still see 

his ads against the income tax. (chuckles) Nobody was suggesting that we were going to 

propose one but he was running against it. (laughter) 

Q: You're talking about back in the 1950'8, right? 

A: Yes, yes. Sure, everybody was against it, but nobody was for it. But that was, I can 

still see his ad on the El [Elevated railway] platform. (laughter) 

But we were in session so little, we didn't do very much. Inspecting of meat and poultry 

and . . . some regulation of agriculture . . . pretty hard to think of very many things where 

the state did impinge on your life, your daily life. I mean criminal justice aside, most 

everybody thinks that's local function anyway. If you're in Chicago, why, it's the police, 

it's not, you know . . . they're the ones that arrest you. People don't stop to realize that 

these criminal statutes are state statutes and you're violating the state. You think in terms 

of your sheriff and that's all a local thing. And of course your library's another one, the 

state function with libraries is pretty minimal. 

Q: So when you were elected you really didn't - you didn't have a big agenda or you 

didn't . . . 

A: Well before - 1'11 never forget the - before I was sworn in, I think it was Senator 

Sprague from La Grange contacted all the senators and representative elects in the basin 

that was drained by Salt Creek and we had a meeting over in Riverside. He had a bill 

in there, he was going to introduce a bill for some flood control in Salt Creek. That was 

in 1959. And they're still talking about Salt Creek, I don't know whether you noticed it, 

here just the other day that the governor approved two million dollars to do something with 

Salt Creek. But a lot of the stuff that I did had to do with flood control as I told you the 

other day and I hadn't realized that that was a state - you know, a state function and 

it was. I did a lot of work on that. 

I was absolutely amazed though when I - you know I thought I went down there reasonably 

well-equipped. I had an engineering degree and a law degree and I'd practiced law and I 

was with a good firm and I represented, you know, some significant corporations and indi- 

viduals and I had some pretty good lawsuits. And on top of that I did work for local munici- 

palities and local governments and when I got down there and I saw the broad range of 


matters that were before - you take agriculture for instance. You know, coming from here 

I didn't - what's brucellosis and what do you do about it and so forth. 

I really was struck with admiration for the members of the General Assembly who seemed 

to have a grasp of all this stuff that - you know coming out of the city of Chicago, you 

know, we never thought much of anything except the local traffic or something of that 

nature. And then I've gone further than that too realizing the complexity of the spectrum 

that a member of Congress has to have if he's good you know, if he does his job. They 

have all the internal stuff, the economic stuff, foreign relations, national defense, you know, 

tremendous things. So as I say I really admired the members of the legislature doing things 

about things about which I had no knowledge. As I say I thought I came in fairly well- 

equipped but I found out there was a lot I didn't know. 

Q: Were there legislators down there that you first saw that really impressed you because 

of their knowledge and . . . experience. 

A: Well yes. There was Abner Mikva who is now a federal judge, Tony Scariano practicing 

law up in the Chicago area, Paul Simon who is now a congressman - and he met and court- 

ed and married a member by the name of Jeanne Hurley who was a representative from 

Evanston. She was exceptionally good. There was a Republican woman from Evanston by 

the name of Frances Dawson who had been a schoolteacher and she was absolutely elegant, 

just - I always thought that she would rate as one of the best members of the General 

Assembly of either party of either sex that I ever knew. 

And one of the things that struck me too, you know I came from a lily-white area and live 

in one now and really didn't have very much to do with black people. And to have to be 

in daily contact with people who said, "My grandfather was a slave" - well slavery, was 

something I read about. I didn't - you know, those weren't people, those were - but here 

these are my colleagues whose grandparents were slaves and they knew them and they knew 

about them. And when I saw the, you know, the caliber of the black member . . . Cecil 

Partee, who is now the' city treasurer in Chicago; Kenny Wilson, a member of the appellate 

court; Charlie Armstrong, who is now deceased; Bill Robinson, who I believe is also deceased; 

Corneal Davis, who is a member of the election commission in Chicago now, served many 

many years. He was, I think he was the first black man who was elected to the house of 

representatives. When he went down there - he used to recount his tales - no hotel or 

restaurant would serve him. He had to sleep on the bench in the railroad station. I mean 

we don't think of those things today, we just think of public accommodations and that you 

go to a hotel and you do anything you want to do. But a guy that I worked with experienced 

that kind of prejudice and discrimination. 

I think my experience with the blacks probably changed my life almost more than 

anything. I'm not trying to pretend that I'm a long-haired liberal by any stretch of the 

imagination but 1 do - I learned an awful lot. I learned that, you know, that they had 

the same desires for their family that I had for mine and they wanted their children to 

be well educated and they didn't like to live in those neighborhoods where everybody was 

in terror and it taught me an awful lot. I think that probably was one of the biggest 

changes that came over my lie that I can think of. 


A:. . . completely exclusive or a complete list. But there's a lot more than that, Gene 

Barnes who is chairman of CTA, Harold Washington was a member of Congress. When 

I was Speaker I had five black chairmen of committees. And they had never had that before 

and they all served with great honor and distinction. 


I - 

Q: (pause) Did that experience cause you to sort of step back and you know think about 

your perspective on a lot of different issues. 

A: Oh yes. I voted for - you know one of the hot issues of the time was Fair Employment 

Practices Act. You know we take it all for granted now but it was a hot issue then. And 

I voted for that, I voted for open occupancy. I was pretty good on the social issues. And 

I was completely ignorant of the problems, I never could quite understand, I wasn't aware 

of their difficulties, you know, that blacks had. Well I just didn't know anything about them 

quite frankly and I don't think most suburbanites do now today. They're immune from 

them. If they were with me every day on my job I think they'd have a different idea. 

I had a kid today, twenty-three, a three-time loser, family of eight, didn't know his father, 

his three sisters slept in one bedroom and they made a bedroom for he and his three brothers 

out of the front room. His mother and father slept. . . . That's all they had, a tiny little 

place. No money for education, no money for food, or not really very much, Not to, you 

know, forgive what he did, pretty serious offenses, but we just don't know their lifestyle. I 

think if more people made an effort to find out about it we'd be better off but . . . not only 

find out, but do something about it. 

Q: (pause) Did you seek out the black representatives and other folks different from 

yourself in order to learn from them? 

A: I don't think so. See, at that time we were on four committees and the Democrats had 

the majority my first two years down there and most blacks were Democrats and I'd be 

serving with many blacks in the four commmittees that I was on, and . . . I sat way in 

back of the room, I didn't sit near any blacks. But I just - you know I was friendly with 

them and that was my observation as I saw it. 

Q: (pause) I don't know too much about the fair employment practices legislation. It 

seems to me though from what I've read it was batted around for twenty or thirty years. I 

mean it had a long . . . 

A: Till it finally passed, yes. It was as bad as the ERA [Equal Rights Amendment] 

then. You know the people who were opposed to it thought it was going to be the end of 

the world if it passed. I'm not too sure that it had that much of an impact when you get 

right down to it. Like open occupancy, I don't think that that's made that much 

difference. We always expect things are going to be a lot worse off, a lot worse than they 

are. 

Q: (pause) That was a real watershed period for civil rights too. Did you become involved 

in the national movement or were you were aware of the national movement? 

A: No, no. I wasn't very militant, I'm still not. (chuckles) I'm not the guy who's out 

there in the front with the torches and so forth. I suppose maybe not enough so, but no 

I was not active in any of that stuff. 

You know certain things shock you as you go through life. I went down south one time 

when I was relatively young and I was surprised to see the drinking fountains that would 

say, "White Only" and "Colored Only.'' And the toilet facilities were separated, white and 

colored. I don't remember whether it was white women, colored women and I don't know 

whether the sexes were separated. 

It's not really so terribly many years ago that I was down in Florida and a bus came to 

the end of the route and turned around and they had moveable signs you know on the backs 

and the blacks had to sit in back of the bus and if - I can still remember one time that 

a white man moved the sign and made a black kid get out and get in back of the bus. And 


you know all whites would sit even if the blacks were overcrowded. I mean they'd move 

the sign so that the black would have to get up and stand and the white guy sit down, 

You know I was an adult, I was married, that can't be so terribly many years ago. My 

son is thirty-four and one time we were in Ft. Pierce, Florida, and we were at Mass in a 

Catholic church and the priest announced that Mass in the colored church would be at such 

and such a time. That's thirty years ago probably. 

You know part of Illinois was that way too. They had separated schools in Edwardsville 

and they'd have Crispus Attucks schools, separate schools, in some of those places down in 

Harrisburg and Carbondale. They don't now but they did then. 

So a lot of this stuff is relatively recent. I suppose, well I was in Florida when Brown vs 

Board of Education was passed. That knocked down the equal but separate facilitiee for 

black students. That would have been in the 1950's I guess. 

Well I remember that - you know restrictive covenants, when I was practicing you could 

restrict the sale of a house to gentile only, restrictive covenant against Jews. (chucklea) I 

mean, it's hard to believe but that's a fact. I don't know when those were struck down but 

since I've been practicing law. Of course I was admitted in 1934 so that's some time - but 

even so, you know I was an adult when those things in many sections - when you go over 

to Michigan, over to Benton Harbor and that area in the summer resorts, they'd have signs 

in all the boarding houses, "Gentile Only." (pause) So there's been a lot of, you know, a 

lot of changes since I've been. . . . It's hard for you to believe I suppose, you never saw 

it. 

Q: No, that - it's tough to accept that that was, you know, going on so recently you know. 

A: Well that's not ancient history, you know that's today really. Well a lot of the dubs 

for instance were restricted, not only black and white, but also gentile and Jew. Tbat's 

where the Standard Club and Covenant Club came from, those are Jewish clubs because gen- 

tiles, you know, wouldn't permit them in the Union League or University or Chicago Athletic 

or any of those places. That wasn't - that wasn't Nazi Germany, that was Chicago. 

Q: You mentioned the - I forget the gentleman's name now who had the meeting in River- 

side about Salt Creek legislation before you were even . . . 

A: Senator Sprague. 

Q: Senator Sprague before . . . 

A: Arthur Sprague. 

Q: . . . before - yes, that was before you were even sworn in. 

A: Yes. 

Q: Did other folks contact you at all before you went down to Springfield and . . . 

A: That's the only one I can recall. Lee Daniels - a fellow who's down there now - his 

grandfather was my colleague in this district and he was active in that Salt Creek 

thing. We got to be very good friends but other than that I can't remember. Wed the 

retail merchants used to have a - Joe Meek was the executive secretary, I guess 

was, and they used to have a legislative dinner for everybody who was elec 

November. They would have that in the Merchandise Mart during the Ch 

vacation. Everybody would get together and many people came from downstate 

William A. Redmond tainly Memoir everybody - Archives/ up Special in this Collections area went - Norris too. L Brookens That Library was a - University big social of Illinois event at Springfield of the Chrietmas 

- UIS

season. They don't do that anymore. They haven't done that for quite some time although 

that organization is still going. Joe Meek is deceased. He used to amaze everybody because 

he would get up and call them all by name, even the new ones, he could call them, 

Q: So you went to that dinner right after your election in November? 

A: Yes. Yes. 

Q: But the county chairman, or, you know, no one like that, said they wanted to meet with 

you and, you know, "Here is what we want to do." 

A: We didn't, we never had an agenda till I got down there, I don't think the previous 

county chairmen identified with county needs because they weren't in a position to do any- 

thing about it. See my predecessor, Fred Anderson, was the first Du Page 

representative. We used to be in a bigger district and the Democrat always came from Will 

County or from Kane County, he never came from Du Page. Anderson was the first 

one, See, those were - well they were able to elect the Democrat over and above the base 

people, 


Q: One thing I want to pick up on from last night's discussion is - you mentioned Joe 

Meek's Retail Merchants Association big Christmas dinner. And I don't know if I really 

let you give an adequate description of the event. Maybe I'll have you just recap that. 

A: Well it was a sit-down dinner preceded by the usual cocktail party and it was in a restau- 

rant with the dining facilities in one of the upper floors at the - it was the Furniture Mart, 

it wasn't the Merchandise Mart, it was the Furniture Mart. It was on Lake Shore Drive 

and Ohio or somewhere over in that area. I think it's still the Furniture Mart. 

Q: Who all attended this event? 

A: Well all of the people that were, all of the members of the General Assembly were invited, 

senate and house, Republican and Democrat. And of course because it was - it was 

attended mostly by the people in the northern part of the state, there probably wouldn't 

be so terribly many from way down south. 

But my first term was the time that the Democrats had the majority and Mayor Daley was 

advancing Joe De La Cour for Speaker and Paul Powell wanted to be Speaker. And Powell 

and some of his southern Illinois people were at the dinner that night and I think that's 

almost the only time that I can remember that they, southern Illinois people, were up 

there. I don't know where Paul had been, I suppose he had been to see Mayor Daley and 

of course he was romancing all the - all the . . . you know, the elected members of the 

House from up in this section. That was almost the only time that there was any real elec- 

tric political overtones to the meeting. 

Joe Meek was - I don't know whether you recall Joe, but he was the . . . Republican candi- 

date for United States Senate at one time. Probably ran against Douglas. (chuckles) I 

guess everybody did for a while. 

There were no long speeches, just a night of, you know, fellowship that legislators are very 

adept at. (chuckles) And as I say the Powell thing kind of - was kind of an undercurrent 

that night. But Joe would get up and he would introduce everybody by name which was 

quite a chore, even the new people. But you know there would be 177 house members and 

William fifty-nine A. Redmond senators Memoir - Archives/ and Joe Special knew Collections them all. - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

Q: Were wives at this? 

A: No, just members. It was quite a nice affair. I mean it wasn't a - it was well done, 

well managed, no excesses of any kind, either libations or oratorical excesses. Very well 

done. I don't know why they discontinued and I can't tell you when they did discontinue 

but it had been traditional for a long time. 

Q: We'll probably get into the election of Powell as Speaker a little bit later, but what was 

his relationship then to the Chicago Democrats at the time of that dinner? Was he making 

any headway at that time? 

A: Oh yes. I don't know how much headway he had made but I think he had announced 

that he was going to run. And it was commmon knowledge, whether it was in the press 

or whether it was in the person-to-person, he said that he didn't think that Mayor Daley 

had all the political brains in the Democratic party, He thought that he had some and that 

there were other members that - of course here I was, a complete stranger to this thing, 

and I wasn't used to this but you know I read in the paper about things. But there 

weren't - as a general rule there weren't - these defections particularly by people in high 

places. 

You know Powell was Speaker when Adlai Stevenson was governor. And Powell had a 

pretty prominent part in the Democratic party throughout the years, So he was a high offi- 

cial in the party and he was quite a compatriot of John Stelle. When Henry Horner died, 

Stelle took over - I think Stelle was lieutenent governor and he had a seventy or eighty 

or ninety days, something like that, but he was governor. Paul was a great buddy of John 

Stelle. He was - well he was very prominent, more than that I can't say, he was at least 

as prominent then as he was here in later years. 

And there were some people that thought if they had selected someone other than Joe De 

La Cour that maybe Paul wouldn't have been as successful. I know nothing about De La 

Cour but there were some who felt that if the choice had been other than him that - you 

see there was a lot of people that went for Powell that normally wouldn't have been consid- 

ered in his camp. Alan Dixon went for Powell. In fact Dixon was the - he was kind of 

the chairperson of a committee - they called themselves the Committee for a Democratic 

House. And Paul Simon voted for Powell. And in fact there were only five downstate or 

independent Democrats that stayed with De La Cour. One was Governor Shapiro, one was 

Paul Rink who subsequently was a judge out in Rock Island, a fellow by the name of Bill 

Harbeck who was from the La Salle-Peru area, there was Jack Bairstow from Lake County, 

Francis Loughran from Will County and your humble servant - that makes six I guess, 

doesn't it? But those were the only six that stayed with De La Cour. All the others, the 

people who subsequently - like Paul Simon, Alan Dixon, Clyde Choate, all the downstate 

guys - they all went with Powell and Jack Hill from Kane County went with Powell, Joe 

Stremlau from La Salle County. These were kind of party warhorses but they still went 

with Powell. 

I don't know all the, you know, the problems involved but those six that I enumerate were 

the only ones that stayed with the Chicago, with the - see, they had a caucus and 1 e La 

Cour was chosen as the caucus chairman. There may have been a - maybe they had a 

Cook County group meet independently of the downstate group, I don't - I'm net too 

sure. Somewhere along the line De La Cour had announced that there would be a meeting 

of the Cook County Democrats and I guess that infuriated some of the dowpstate 

people. Now whether that was a previous session or just when that was I wasn't bware 

of that but that mistake was never made later. (chuckles) Anytime there was a 

i 

gaucus 

it was all Democrats. Now some may choose not to go but it was a caucus of Cook ounty 

Democrats somewhere along the line and De La Cour. . . . He had been the leader yo know 

when we were in the minority, he had been minority leader. And he was from what s now 

George Dunne's area. George Dunne was his colleague as a matter of fact. 


1

Q: Now this caucus of Cook County Democrats, would that have taken place before this 

dinner . . . 

A: I'm a little hazy about it. You know I was - I was a - the selection of De La Cour, 

I hadn't - I was never at any meeting where that took place prior to us meeting the night 

before we were sworn in. 

Q: Okay. 

A: Where that choice was made I don't know. Whether Mayor Daley just did it or what 

the story was I don't know but we had a meeting. Traditionally the meeting to select a 

candidate for Speaker is at the - is the night before he's sworn in. And this Committee 

for a Democratic House, chaired by Alan Dixon, had a meeting that same night. Their 

meeting was at the Supper Club. The other one, the so-called regular one was at the St. 

Nicholas Hotel. 

And quite a number of people who subsequently supported Powell came to the meeting at 

the St. Nick. And I don't remember everybody that was there. My memory is that Paul 

Simon was there, One that I well recall was Ed Ebersbacher who was from Shelby County 

who subsequently went to the senate and then he was an appellate court judge. He had 

been a state's attorney down there, a very prominent downstate guy. And they wanted 

someone other than De La Cour and when that assurance wasn't forthcoming they walked 

out of the meeting. They did not attend that conference. 

And Paul's people were romancing Governor Stratton's people to - this was about as 

involved an election for Speaker as you've ever seen. And of course for one party to elect 

a Speaker of the other party is really kind of unusual in Illinois politics. It happened in 

my first term as Speaker. Some Republicans voted for me but it wasn't the usual thing. 

And I was sitting in a table in the Glade [Room] at the St. Nick and my memory is that 

Bill Clark who is now on the Supreme Court, I think he was at the table and Joe De La 

Cour was there I know, and Senator Bill Connors who was ward committeeman in De La 

Cour's ward, and who himself was a leader in the Democratic faction of the senate was sit- 

ting there. And somewhere along the evening, maybe ten or eleven o'clock, De La Cour went 

to the phone and, I don't know, he placed a call or he answered a call and the word came 

out that the Stratton people were going to support Powell and De La Cour came and sat 

down and announced it to the group. 

Now how a freshman happened to be sitting with those people I still don't know, but I 

was. And they were kind of despondent because they didn't think that that was going to 

happen but I suppose you know the governor wanted to be sure that he didn't have too un- 

kind of a Speaker. 

And I don't recall the other - Bill Clark was going to be the nominee for majority leader 

from the so-called regular Democratic faction and at that time you only had Speaker, major- 

ity leader and majority whip. You didn't have all the leadership we've got 

now. (chuckles) And the Republican side, the minority side would be minority leader and 

minority whip, But they were going to elect a Democratic Speaker but the majority leader 

would be a Democrat. They weren't going to take any split with the Republicans, and the 

chairmen of the committees and everything were all going to be Democrats. 

And Bill Clark was the candidate for the majority leader and I can't recall what was - I 

have the handbook someplace and I can find that out if it's important. But at that table 

all of a sudden De La Cour realized that not only was he not going to be Speaker but he 

was not going to be majority leader either because Clark was going to be the majority 

leader. (chuckles) And they were wondering if, you know, if there had been some kind 

William of A. a Redmond deal to Memoir ostensibly - Archives/ support Special De Collections La Cour - Norris but L in Brookens fact figure Library out - University some of way Illinois that at Springfield they could - UIS

appear to be supporting De La Cour and what was more important, Bill Connors - because 

Connors was, you know, he was a pretty important guy - and, you know, going with his 

guy and knowing full well that he wouldn't make it anyway. And then all of a sudden De 

La Cour realized that he wasn't going to have any leadership position. (chuckles) Whether 

that suspicion was justified I would have no way of knowing. 

Q: But the suspicion was that somebody had made a deal with Powell or there was someone 

that . . . 

A: Some Democrats were not that upset about Powell being Speaker, that they had theoreti- 

cally supported De La Cour knowing full well that they were not going to be able to elect 

him. And it dawned on De La Cour at that table that maybe he'd been 

had. (chuckles) Because he ended up just the same as I was, membership down on the 

floor and Bill Clark was the majority leader. 

Q: Well did he express that feeling outright? 

A: That doubt, he mentioned that doubt orally, vocally. 

Q: Can you remember what he said or how he handled that? 

A: Well just about, you know, you know he was wondering, he said, "How about majority 

leader?" Then it dawned on him. (chuckles) 

Q: Then he was thinking aloud? 

A: Yes. That if he couldn't be Speaker he probably would have liked to have been majority 

leader, but he wasn't going to be able to. 

Q: Oh. 

A: Now whether that was true or not I don't know. It never really came out. You know, 

seeing the close relationship between the mayor of Chicago and the governor's office. There 

were some people who felt that Stratton wouldn't take that serious of a step, or make that 

serious of a step unless there was some previous arrangement. To incur the animosity of 

the mayor of Chicago - that it might not have been worth that. I don't really know 

whether there was any truth to it or not but that doubt did linger in De La Cour's mind. 

Q: At that table I guess with the exception of De La Cour, was there a lot of hostility toward 

Stratton and the Republicans for that move, or shock? 

A: I think shock and there was - there was - see, there had been pretty good cooperation 

from the Chicago Democrats and these were Chicago people. Bill Connors was a 

powerful - you know, an important guy and when Adlai Stevenson was governor, Connors 

was t4e lder of the Democrats in the senate and they only had a handful but he carried 

the mail for Governor Stevenson and they used to turn over, you know, they always delivered 

big votes. So he was a very important member of the Democratic Central Committee. Now 

whether there was any justification for that - I don't know whether there's anybody alive 

today that would ever be able to. . . . And I don't know if you know Jim Ronan who was 

the state chairman at that time - is deceased. Of course Daley is deceased, De La Cour's 

deceased; Connor's deceased. Bill Clark of course is alive but I - Bill - I don't think Bill 

was at the table at the time that De La Cour advanced that - that, you know, that doubt 

in his mind. But I don't think Clark would have known because during the thing he said 

that he was the only majority leader without a majority. 

Powell and Choate, those two walked out of a Democratic caucus at one time. How many 

others were with them I don't know. I can't remember that, but I know they walked out 


Q: That very night? 

A: Oh no, no, no. When the session - he was sworn in and he was Speaker and everything 

else and he had a Democratic caucus. I think it had to do with sales tax, something that 

Stratton wanted and Stratton wanted to increase the sales tax during that session and the 

same Democrats who voted for Powell for Speaker voted for the sales tax increase, So that 

may have been the deal too. 

Q: But then there was some Democratic caucus on the sales tax issue itself? 

A: That's my memory on it, yes. Whether it was for something else and that came up - I 

know that there were some pretty harsh words there and Powell would - should have 

walked out. 

(taping stopped to answer door, then resumed) 

A: The procedure for electing Powell Speaker really was pretty interesting. Powell had it 

researched pretty well and it required - my memory is that we had eighty-nine votes, just 

exactly what it took him, and the Republicans had eighty-eight. But it took eighty-nine 

votes to have a quorum to do anything. If you didn't have a quorum you couldn't do 

anything. It didn't take eighty-nine votes to elect somebody, it took eighty-nine votes to 

do something. So the Republicans elected not to come. And Charlie Carpentier was 

presiding. He was the secretary of state. The Constitution provided that he be the presid- 

ing officer. But there were no Republicans but one - one - Babe McAvoy, He was sitting 

at his desk. He was the only Republican there. So the eighty-eight Democrats and the 

one Republican was a quorum so that there could be some business. 

Carpentier, I don't know where he heard the motion to adjourn but he heard a motion to 

adjourn from these mysterious places. It may have been there was some Republicans in 

there that walked out later or something of that nature to make that motion. But anyway 

he heard it and he put the question and the question carried and he walked off the 

podium. He said that the meeting was adjourned and nothing had happened. 

I can't remember who took over to preside, that's a little fuzzy in my memory but somebody 

took over to preside. And they called the roll and of course eighty-eight Democrats and 

Bave McAvoy, the Republican - I don't know whether he responded or whether they just 

identified him as sitting out there and they declared a quorum was present. And then they 

proceeded to nominate - wait a minute now, I got myself mixed up. This was in 1961 that 

I'm talking about. Forget all about the McAvoy business, That was in 1961. 

No, the Republicans were all there except three. Well that was 1961 too. The Republicans 

were there. And there were three nominees, Joe De La Cour, Paul Powell and Warren 

Wood. And Bill Pollack was the leader of the Republicans and as the roll call was 

announced, he had a chart in front of him and he would stand up and if his thumb was 

up that meant that the Republicans should vote for Warren Wood who had been a four-time 

Republican Speaker and if he went thumbs down that meant - had some other 

connotation. Some of them voted for Powell. 


Q: So we were talking about the election of Powell as Speaker in 1959. You were talking 

about Bill Pollack giving a thumb up or thumb down . . . 

A: Thumb up and thumbs down to make sure that - because of the division between Wood 

and Powell and De La Cour, they didn't want to have Warren Wood getting enough votes 

so that he'd be Speaker. They wanted to be sure that Powell would be the Speaker. 


Q: So he was signalling individual Republicans on whether or not to go over to Powell? 

A: That's right. 

Q: Or stay with Wood? 

A: That's right. And then Powell was declared the winner by whoever the presiding officer 

was - I can't recall what his name was now but I know who swore him in - Alan Diron, 

as a notary public I guess he swore Powell in as Speaker. And then my memory is the 

governor was supposed to address the General Assembly pretty close to the time of the 

swearing in. And Governor Stratton came to the meeting and again my memory is that 

they kind of did the Powell thing over again just to make sure it had been done right. And 

I well remember when Stratton - walking down the middle aisle to Bill Pollack the Repub- 

lican leader, who had a seat about halfway down and on the aisle, he was very upset because 

Governor Stratton came in and he said that Carpentier would live for the ages and Stratton 

would live for the Democrats. (laughter) 

Q: Was he more upset about the fact that Powell was Speaker or the fact that it would 

appear like Stratton, if Stratton showed up, that Stratton had really made Powell the 

Speaker? 

A: I think quite frankly that Pollack - I was at a very small meeting. It was an uncer- 

tainty as to who had the majority. I think this was in 1959 and I think that - no, that 

was 1961. I don't know why he was disappointed. I suppose he thought maybe it would 

be easier to get some Democrats and maybe he might have been Speaker. I don't 

know. But I think his chagrin was really intense. I think - you know that's a long time 

ago and some of, you know, some of it's a little bit hazy but I do remember that Carpeptier 

adjourned the session. I know he walked off the platform, I know that Stratton cante in 

at some very early date and I know that Pollack was very upset and I know that he'd rertrem- 

ber that he said that. 

Q: If I could backtrack a little bit, I seem to recall you said that there was some implication 

that some candidate other than De La Cour might have been able to defeat Powell. 

Ai If the Republicans would not have come over, somebody else . . . 

Q: Okay. Was there an implication in that that Daley or someone in the Democratic party 

selected a weak candidate? 

A: I don't know. That's what I'm talking about when I - it dawned on De La Cour that 

he wasn't even going to be the leader. 

Q: So maybe that there was a deal between Powell and Daley at an earlier date? 

A: Conceivable. And Stratton. 

Q: At lwt that was the feeling that people had. 

A: De La Cour had it. And I think Senator Connors had it, although I don't know whether 

anybody else had it. I don't know. I don't think Bill Clark knew anything about it if that 

was true. Because I think he was genuinely disappointed that De La Cour wasn't electad. 

Q: You mentioned the Committee for the Democratic House with Dixon and Simon aqd the 

folks who would meet down at the Supper Club. Was that a common thing for them to 

separate themselves out from the group or was it quite extraordinary? 

A: Very unusual. I think - don't forget this was only my first term. 


I

Q: Was there a lot of fear among Democrats that the party might come apart or might be 

seriously torn asunder by what was going on that night? 

A: There was considerable fear. Considerable fear. You know committee chairmanships, 

legislative programs, primarily the city of Chicago of course. They always had a legislative 

program. If this fear about some kind of collusion was unwarranted, why, of course they 

might have been in a bad situation. As I remember the big issue was sales tax, the increase 

of the sales tax. Stratton wanted it and needed it. By putting Powell in there with what- 

ever else he had - I don't think there's any of those guys - I know none of them are in 

the house anymore. But most of them probably would be deceased. Paul Simon would 

know. Alan Dixon would know because he was right in the forefront. Everybody thought 

that he had ruined his career and here, now, he's a United States senator. So they forgot 

pretty fast, forgot and forgave. (chuckles) 

Q: Back then it was - or anyone would have thought that Dixon, Simon and Powell were 

strange bedfellows, right? 

A: And Ebersbacher too. There was only a real small handful that would normally be 

considered the real strong Powell people. Allen Lucas from Springfield, Choate, Ed Haag, 

from - I think he's from Clinton County. 

Q: Was their support probably more a rejection of De La Cour or . . . 

A: In certain circles. You have to remember that Paul Powell had some friends that I think 

would walk over burning coals for him. They really loved him. Well he was a very affable 

gregarious likeable guy. So it was a lot very strong Powell support - Carl Wittmond from 

Calhoun County was another one. Some of it was anti-De La Cour too, possibly anti- 

Chicago. 

Q: Were there accusations or feelings against De La Cour that went beyond his association 

with the Chicago machine? 

A: I'm not aware of any. He was a very well-liked fellow. His wife was from Cobden way 

downstate someplace. I remember when they had a team in the state tournament, they 

called them the Apple Knockers. De La Cour was a very likeable fellow. And he had been 

there a long time. I mean I have twelve terms which currently is a lot, but I'm sure De 

La Cour had more than that. A lot of people have a lot of terms. Choate had twenty-eight 

years at that time. 

Q: That's fourteen. 

A: Fourteen terms and there were quite a few in the twenties. Powell was in the 

twenties. Jimmy Ryan, Clyde Lee, a lot of them. Lee was a very strong politician. 

Q: Was there a lot of awareness of the sales tax issue . . . 

A: I think so. 

Q: . . . as the speakership race was starting up? 

A: I think there was. Again I'm a little on fuzzy ground but I think there was. 

Q: For instance like we assume like Dixon and Simon knew about the sales tax, where any 

Powell supporter would probably know which way he was leaning? 

A: I'm not too sure about Dixon and Simon in that respect but I'm pretty sure about some 

of the other ones. The next year in 1961 the Republicans had the majority. I think they 


had eighty-nine and we had eighty-eight. That's my memory on that one. And this is the 

one where I was sitting with Bill Pollack someplace and there was an uncertainty as to who 

had the majority and when it came in that the Republicans had the majority, Pollack 

announced to whoever was there that he had a chance to be Speaker. 

And that's the time that in spite of the Republican majority Powell was able to be elected 

and that was the time that McAvoy sat and gave the eighty-ninth vote. We had eighty- 

eight, that's my memory. And there were three very strategic absentees. There was a 

fellow by the name of Augie Ruf who was a newspaper man from one of the suburban news- 

papers in the south part of the county, Cook County. Pete Miller who had been a state 

senator and he was a member of the house and currently had been lobbyist for the 

Teamsters. Augie Ruf, Pete Miller. (pause) Judge Mike Zlatnik, he wasn't on the 

floor. So that brought the Republican strength down to less than the Democrats had. And 

Babe McAvoy who was sitting there, he was a body out there that give them the eighty-ninth 

vote. 

I'm not too sure about that Carpentier walking off the thing, it may have been in 1961 that 

Carpentier walked off 'cause they. . . . He would have been part of the Stratton thing in 

1959. I think it was in 1961 that he walked off. And then Powell proceeded with qhe 

election. He had eighty-eight votes and MacAvoy did not vote for him but he was we 

eighty-ninth body out there and that was the year that Alan Dixon swore Pomll 

in. Because the other time that would have been - you know, the powers that be had gone 

along with Powell's selection. 

But that was - you know, Pete Miller was in the hospital. I can still see the press going 

up and taking pictures of him in his hospital bed. 

Q: Because they didn't believe he was really ill? 

A: Well it was possible that maybe the absentees were - in order to bring or reduce the 

Republican attendance down so it would be possible for them to elect anybody. 

Q: Well what - why would the Republicans want Powell in then? 

A: Well they didn't want him in 1961. They wanted him in 1959 when Stratton was 

governor. They didn't want him in 1961. 

Q: Well why, I guess I say, why was McAvoy switching over? 

A: The best person to answer that question would be McAvoy. Peter Miller and Augie Ruf 

and Judge Watnik - they could tell you why. Maybe they were genuinely sick, I don't 

know. Augie had the miseries, he couldn't make it. I don't know why they couldn't make 

It but they Wt make it. But that was a strange thing, Here Powell had been a vill 

to Chicago in 1959 and he was their savior in 1961. (chuckles) 

Q: Were folks really surprised at what happened, or did they see that coming? 

A: Well I think the press saw it coming. Powell was a pretty wily guy. He had it all well 

orchestrated. One time I had gotten reprints of the papers about all this stuff and I +ad 

it in my file and then I decided that maybe I should lighten my load and I threw a 

it away. So I'm talking - here I'm talking memory. But I talked about 1961, I 

Carpentier walking off - that would have been 1961 instead of 1959. (pause) 

Pollack aspired to the speakership at that time. He had been part of the 

Powell in in 1959 and he was frustrated in 1961. And he was a great friend of Powell. 

Q: Did they remain friends after this? 


A: I couldn't tell you, I don't know, I wasn't that close to either of them. I was fairly 

friendly with Bill Pollack but - I was never unfriendly with Paul Powell but I was never 

part of the inner circle. I'm not too sure he ever quite forgave me for staying with the 

caucus choice and that in - there wasn't a hell of a lot he could do for me. You know 

I didn't - I didn't want anything. But so many people with so much seniority that chances 

of ever being important in the early stages . . . 


A: Powell's memory they say was pretty long. Maybe he never forgave me, I don't know, 

but we were friendly enough. But I was never part of his inner circle. 


Q: I think we talked a little bit last time about some of your first experiences in Springfield, 

the speakership, your introduction to the wide range of issues and the broad spectrum of 

people down in Springfield. I guess my first question to you would be: based on that experi- 

ence would you prepare yourself any differently for the legislature? In retrospect is there 

anything you would have done between the time you were elected and the time you went 

down? 

A: I don't think so. I think having a broad experience in local government, I think it put 

me pretty well. You know I was aware of the financial needs, requirements and problems 

of local government pretty much. So I think I was pretty well equipped quite frankly. Of 

course obviously I knew nothing about agriculture. Aviation I did know something 

about. But no one person can know everything. You're lucky if you have, you know, a wide 

part of the spectrum you know pretty well. I think I had that. 

Q: I guess I want to talk a little bit about your very first experiences in Springfield, How 

did you get down there for the opening session? 

A: What do you mean, how did I get there? 

Q: Did you drive, fly? (chuckles) 

A: Oh, I drove. I drove. The first time I drove and I drove with my family and I had two 

children at that time - no, I had three. My wife and three children and I drove down. I 

was very excited. It was big stuff you know to be sworn in. I can't remember where we 

stayed. I'm sure it was a motel. I know I didn't stay at a hotel, I stayed at a motel. And 

I was very excited about it. Of course it was an off-year so there was no gubernatorial inau- 

gural. 

Q: Were there functions for your family to attend? 

A: Not very much. My wife and I attended one. I'll never forget, there was the omnipres- 

ent cocktail parties and things for members of the legislature. I think the first that I - I 

think it was a realtors', and I was pretty disappointed because Lieutenant Governor 

Chapman was the speaker and he gave a real thumping Republican campaign speech and 

I thought that was out of place because I thought the election was over and I thought 

everybody was going to be sworn in. His talk left me down because he was almost the first 

state official I ever heard give a speech and I expected more. (chuckles) I think it was 

a realtors', I know that's the first one. I was disappointed in the quality of that presenta- 

tion. 

Q: Did you feel like he was still campaigning to the realtors? 


A: Well I don't quite understand why he, you know, why he gave the kind of talk he did 

becaum you know the campaign was over and he was - of course he was Governor 

Stratton's lieutenant governor and he hadn't even been campaigning with him. And gener- 

ally speaking those things - you know unless it's prior to a campaign and people are listen- 

ing, seeking votes, why, they're, you know, pretty general and pretty kind, But this 

was - this was a flamethrower. I think the hosts were kind of embarrassed. I don't think 

they expected that from him because you know the Democrats had the majority of the heuse 

and there was no point getting into something that like, you know, ruffled some feathers. It 

looked like whoever it was that was sponsoring that affair - and that was memory of who 

it was - if they'd start right out getting in trouble with the majority party in the hsuse 

that wouldn't make any sense, so I think they were embarrassed too. But the off-year, I 

mean the year that the governor doesn't come in, it's pretty tame. 

Q: Well do you think there was any design to Chapman's remarks or did . . . 

A: Not particularly. I just think it was not very discrete on his part. That was the reaction 

I had. My wife was very offended. Oh I see no reason why he would do it because 

as I say it served no purpose. I suppose you feel that whoever is sponsoring an affair is 

in some way implicitly giving their approval for the speaker and the subject matter and 

after elections they want to curry favor on both sides, you know not choose up sides, and 

I think they were probably embarrassed by it, and it w a d a good quality speech anyway. I 

suppose you should be careful what you say about people but . . . he was the fellow that 

wanted to know that if when the governor, Governor Stratton, left the state if he should 

move into the Mansion. (laughter) That might give you some idea. (laughter) It seems 

to me that - didn't we elect Joe Lohman treasurer that time? 

Q: I think we did. 

A: It seems to me there was one other statewide official elected. I don't recall though, I 

know two years from then in the 1960 election - that's when we elected Kerner and qark 

and Shapiro and Beau Crowley. 

Q: Was it superinteadent of public instruction? 

A: It could have been. I guess maybe it was. It was George Wilkins probably from cbwn 

in Madison County, that may be who it was. 

Q: Was there any office or any person that you checked in with when you first got down, 

when you arrived in the motel? How would you start getting yourself involved in . . . 

A: Well the Democratic Central Committee had traditionally held a dinner the night More 

the election, I mean the night before the swearing-in for all of the members of the house- 

and senateelect. And that was presided over by the state chairman. It probably was Jim 

Ronan, that's the best of my memory now. And the senate was permitted to - they left 

the room and they were permitted to elect their own officers without the supervision of the 

state committee. But the election of candidates for Speaker and all the rest of them was 

hand14 by the State Central Committee. All the motions were all typed and 

ww pgepared to present them and second them and the Chicago guys were bigger t 

were and they occupied the middle chairs. They cams and they plunked 

in the middle of the room. 

And as I told you before that was the time when there was a fight between Powell and Joe 

De La Cour. Some of the people who supported Powell came to that meeting. The one that 

I can remember being there was Ed Ebersbacher. He went on to the senate and then he 

went on to appellate court, he was at the meeting. And I think Paul Simon was there. 

And there was some - of course I was new and there was some preliminary discugsion 

about whether or not there'd be any possible alternatives to Mr. De La Cour. Whatpver 


the exchange was wasn't satisfactory to them and they walked out. They went to their 

meeting at the Supper Club. 

Q: Simon and Ebersbacher? 

A: Yes. And I think Alan Dixon was in that group although I'm not too sure if he was 

there. I know that he was in the group that met at the Supper Club but whether he was - 

I'm not too sure that he would have been willing to accept somebody other than De La 

Cour. I think he was a Powell man from the beginning. Coming from the southern part 

of the state I think he almost had to be. That's my memory on it. 

Q: Do you remember who initiated that discussion as to whether or not there was an alterna- 

tive to De La Cour? 

A: Ebersbacher. (pause) He was my seatmate during the session, (pause) I didn't know 

him of course and it was all new to me. I didn't know who any of these fellows 

were. About the only member that I knew I think was Kenny Wendt. I had gone to Mar- 

quette with Kenny. I think he was the only one I knew. 

Q: (pause) So when you came down you knew there'd be this dinner the night before the 

swearing in? 

A: Yes. 

Q: That's what you focused on? 

A: Well that's right and that was the thing that was the prelude to this meeting down in 

the Glade [Room] when De La Cour went to the phone and found out that Stratton's people 

were going to support Powell. 

Q: Now the cocktail parties that took place at that time, were they before the dinner? 

A: Before, yes, St. Nick's, I think the second floor in the St, Nicholas, they had a pretty 

good-sized dining room and that's where - the senate left and went some place else to their 

own room and we stayed in the big room. (pause) That really was a tough thing too 

because some of the old party stalwarts went with Powell. Joe Stremlau, who I think had 

been sheriff of La Salle County, he was probably - had been a county chairman. Certainly 

Paul Simon and Alan Dixon. And Choate had been very active in the party. He went with 

Powell. Some of the others weren't quite so active but . . . Ed Haag . . . and Clyde Lee 

was quite a prominent man, he had been a state senator for quite some time. It seems to 

me that his service may have been interrupted when he went into the armed forces or 

something. I may be wrong on that but he was very prominent in downstate politics. 

And they weren't - you know, there's always a certain number of flame-throwers, but these 

guys were not. I mean they were part of us. They must have felt pretty strongly about 

the whole thing, maybe they had that kind of affection for Powell. I think some of them 

had that kind of affection for Powell but I think others would have preferred some candidate 

other than De La Cour. I think there was a divided reason why they . . . I'm sure 

Ebersbacher and Simon probably would have preferred somebody else. Simon never became 

Powell's guy. 

Q: (pause) What sort of response did they get when Ebersbacher raised the question about 

it, was there any debate? 

A: There was not much debate. (chuckles) I mean it ended in a hurry. I don't think they 


were there more than fifteen minutes at the most. So you know it was pretty uncertain,

we didn't know what was going to happen. Obviously they knew and I didn't know what 

in the world to expect. 

Q: (pause) Why were the senate people allowed to leave the room and pick their own 

leaders? 

A: They've always done that. Well there were two separate elections. They all ate 

together - and cocktail parties together - but they, you know, they elected their peo~le, 

we elected ours. So. And they always let them do it themselves. I don't know why. But 

since that time the house is a little better organized than it was. The house has a caups 

leader and so forth. The state committee doesn't do it any more. 

Q: (pause) So maybe then it was just that the senate was better organized? 

A: Yes. See they had four-year terms and there was probably more continuity. And a 

smaller body and probably not so many new people and things like this. See there would 

be some continuing officers there with a four-year term probably too, although they ran - 

they ran two and two, they had staggered - there was always some senator running. But 

there were some that were on the second two years of their term whereas the house members 

were all coming in to a new term. I don't know why they did, or how they, you know, how 

they arrived at that but that's the way it was. 

Q: When you came down did you have any members of the house in mind that you wmld 

seek out for explanation or advice? I guess even at that time . . . 

A: The only one I knew was Kenny Wendt. Well I guess I had Paul Jack Bairstow to ask 

his advice on the Speaker vote. And I called . . . Sam Shapiro, later governor, to ask his 

advice and Francis Loughran who came out of Will County. I called the collar county 

guys. The only cme of the collar county people who went with Powell was Jerry Hill of 

Aurora. The other collar county people all voted with the regular party. And I never knew 

what that was, what relationship, because Jack was a freshman. I don't think he klcew 

Powell. (pause) Jack's the mayor of Aurora now. 

Q: Did he later become close to Powell and that group of people? 

A: Well not to my knowledge. Later on his clo~st associate was probably Toby Barry who 

is now an appellate court judge. They lived together. I don't think Jack was ever &at 

close. 

Q: (pause) You mentioned that Representative Ebersbscher was your seatmate. How was 

the seating determined? 

A: By seniority. They send everybody out and call them in in terms of seniority and you 

pick out a seat. You get what's left. Obviously being one of the last ones, why, there wasn't 

an awful lot of choice. But I never did want to sit down front. I always sat in the rear 

in all my years in the General Assembly. And I think another reason is that although I 

was always reasonably friendly with the Chicago people I never really felt like I was art 

of it. And they had many people there with extremely long terms and they always sat d ! wn 

together toward the front of the hail. And the downstaters would kind of scatter around 

more. I wanted to sit with the downstaters. 

Ebersbacher, I kind of picked him out because he seemed to be kind of a leader of the thing 

and I thought maybe I could learn something from him. You know aside from that 

rumpus about Powell and De La Cour I had a lot of regard and respect for him. He 

to know his business. It turned out I was right. He was one of the leading 

the mnate and now ha's on the appellate caurt. He had been state's 

Shelbyville. He was a very outstanding legislator. 


Q: (pause) Were there any things that you felt like you wanted to steer clear of when you 

came down or any things that you feared when you first came down here? 

A: No. No, nothing. I just wanted to - I wanted to be on the best - you know on the 

committees that I thought would be most helpful. And as I say although there was only 

a handful of committees at that time - my memory is that there were only eight - I 

wanted to be on Judiciary, which most lawyers want to be on. And that was a hard commit- 

tee to get on when you were a Democrat because there were more Democratic lawyers than 

there were Republican lawyers at that time. See, a lot of the Republicans would be farmers, 

downstate people. And whereas most of the lawyers - there were many of them - were 

Democrats and from up in this section. So it was kind of hard for a freshman to get 

on. And I wanted that Judiciary, Education - Municipalities at that time included all local 

government except schools - cities, villages, townships, counties. They've got it broken 

down now but then that included all of them. And then the fourth was the one that I 

wasn't particularly interested in, those three I was. The fourth I was on was Personnel 

and Pensions. 

And of course the big problem was how do you get on the committee when the committee 

assignments are made by the man that you voted against and how much influence the major- 

ity leader would have when he was opposed to the Speaker was the problem. So I didn't 

take any chances. I requested my assignment posts from Bill Clark who was majority leader 

and also Bill Pollack who was a friend of mine from law school who helped engineer the 

Apollo thing. So I asked both of them to ask Powell to put me on. And I was put on both 

of them. Now whose intervention was most effective I don't know. But I know I was put 

on and I enjoyed them. You know they were three of the hardest - well four of the 

hardest-working committees in the house. 

Q: When you requested those committees did you have an idea in your mind at that time 

about the issues that would be dealt with in that session? 

A: No, no. See, now there are two judiciary committees, one criminal, one civil - at that 

time there was only one - and I thought as a lawyer that that was the best committee 

to keep me abreast of anything in - pretty nearly anything that involved the legal profes- 

sion would come in there, whether it was probate or civil practice or criminal justice. You 

know, those things that are the lawyer's concern, it was like a post-graduate course in 

law. That was far and again the best committee for a lawyer to be on. 

And it was a wonderful committee. Some of the members - I don't happen to have my 

handbook here, I have one someplace - but really some of the best members, throughout 

those early years when there was only the one commmittee, some of the brightest lawyers 

in the house were in it. Abner Mikva; Tony Scariano; Paul Rink, who later was a judge 

out in Rock Island; Jeanne Hurley, who married Paul Simon, she was a very bright lawyer; 

Bernie McDevitt, a Republican who later chaired that committee when they had the majority, 

a very bright lawyer. I don't remember, I get all mixed up in sessions, but Dick Elrod who 

is a sheriff from Cook County was in there. Bob Mann, a famous member of the house; 

Bob Marks; Noble Lee, the dean of John Marshall Law School. Really an outstanding 

membership, and really was a veritable course of instruction. 

And I may say that politics certainly was at the very minimum in there. Hardly anything 

had a political flavor. You know there's no Republican or Democratic way to probate an 

estate. There's no Democratic or Republican way to amend a criminal code I would 

say. Very very rarely would there be any political intrusion. Competent, professional, fine 

committee. 

And I think I could say pretty much the same thing for Education, a lot of people in there 

that were as interested in education. I was the attorney for the school districts up 

here. There were a lot of people who were interested in education. And of course you know 


state support for local schools wasn't the big issue that it is now. See, you didn't have all 

that hassling about a formula and all that good stuff. When the municipalities came in 

that was a different story, that was kind of partisan. 

But I think it's safe to say that of all the bills to go through there there can't be more 

than 3 or 4 percent that are really political. I mean they're the ones that, you know, the 

press emphasizes the politics but it's a practical proposition. There aren't that many palit- 

ical bills even today. 

I'd forgot on that Judiciary Committee I think John Erlenborn, who was my congressman 

here for many years, wart on it. Lee Daniels who was my colleague from this district, I'm 

sure he was on it. Francis Loughran out of Will County. 

Q: That's all on that Judiciary . . . 

A: Yes. 

Q: Because those committees, Judiciary and Fducation, weren't as political perhaps as the 

others such as Municipalities, did they function differently? 

A: Well I think it was safe to say they functioned very professionally. I mean they - tfiey 

did a superb job you know considering the subject matter that came before them. 'Ilhey 

had a -wide range of stuff obviously. There was really hardly any political overtone8 in 

there. I can't remember anything that came up that really was in those two 

committees. Of course Municipality's different but it is funny how you - 1 went to a wake 

the other night. Alderman Casey of Chicago who wa8 alderman in my old ward, and dfith 

whom I had played ball when we were kids, was there, he was a big wig. And one of the 

people that came to the wake wzm a judge, who is now retired, his name is Iseberg, who 

had been from my old neighborhood in the city. And I remembered ibill that he was lobby- 

ing for before he was on the bench, but I reminded him of it. It had to do with when1 the 

license wasl revoked for the liquor store they would go in suspension and they wouldn't: get 

their license back until after the thing had been determined. And of course that might be 

months or six weeks or two months. In the meantime you know their rent went on and 

the help, payroll and all the reet of it. So the bill that they were interested in was to let 

them stay open until final determination. And I remember - that was in the Municipality 

Committee - he was amazed that I recalled it but that was a kind of a political thing 

because Mayor Daley wanted it and the Republicans didn't want him to have it. But you 

wouldn't run into that in those other two that I'm talking about. At that time Education 

got a little more political when the state support was changed, the state aid formula.and 

all that stuff. 


Q: Thgm wars ewkin changing over right when you started out in the legislature on the 

st& $it bo sch*, waan't it? I mean that was . . . 

1 A: I'm a Wtle fuzzy about that. I don't think it d l y got to be really big st& unti the 

income terx came out because I don't think there was that much money and of course that 

came with Ogilvie. I don't think there was that much money and I don't think that it was 

that big of a thing. 

Q: I guess what I was wondering is that you know sometimes I hear horror stories the pay, 

you know, some committees always operated in the past, you know meetings called on &ort 

notice and folks not really having adequate time to see what they'd be voting on an did 

they have to . . . 


4 

i

A: That wouldn't be, that, not so much in committee. I mean that stuff happens toward 

the end of the session when they have - they got into the habit and I can't tell you when 

it was, it was something that I didn't approve of you know. It's like being - you know 

there are some things you can do and some things you can't do. They had these so-called 

"shell bills" that they used to put in and the only purpose of them was to use them as a 

vehicle to later on amend. So the things that you'd vote on that you didn't know what was 

in would probably be those shell bills when they would be amended or they might amend 

something over in the second chamber and send it back with a current amendment and there 

had never been any committee hearings. I didn't like that and I don't like that now. 

And I did make some significant changes on that. Conference committee reports for 

instance, they used to just be - well they were - I don't know whether it was secret or 

not, they were worse than secret. Sometimes they'd prepare the report in advance and just 

take it around and have some dead people sign, have the majority sign it. Many times 

committees never even met. But when I was Speaker, we changed that and we had a posting 

requirement that you had to get - I've forgotten - at the time it seems to me six hours 

or something like that - but it got a little bit shorter as it got closer because you know 

if that thing came up with only two hours to go until adjournment, why, you know you 

couldn't have a six-hour requirement. But . . . and they were posted and they were held 

in public and everybody was there and there was regular input and I had a policy that the 

chairman of the committee where the bill went through would be on it. And the sponsor 

of the bill would be on the conference committee. And I'm happy to say that from all I've 

heard I think that condition still prevails. I think that old idea that they used to do, I think 

that's a thing of the past and I don't think they'll ever go back. 

I still don't like this last minute business of amending, that's not right in my judgment. I 

seriously question whether it meets the constitutional requirement. You know reading it 

three times and having public hearings and so forth. But it's a design that - it's grown 

up throughout the years. That process is not intended to advise or illuminate or . . . but 

anyway it's intended to . . . well it's intended to compromise at the last minute and do the 

best you can and I don't think that - probably there would only be a handful of members 

that really know what's in that stuff. I never did like that. I did the best I could to stop 

it. 

The conference committee, that's a great improvement. See, I would like to have it so that 

if anything was in a bill that died that that bill could no longer show up as an amendment 

on something else. (chuckles) You have to be vigilant, you never know when it's going to 

show up. (chuckles) It's like, who was it? St. George who slew the dragon, every time he 

cut off the - was he the one that would cut off one head and two would grow in the same 

place? Well that's the way some of those dang things were. (chuckles) 

Probably one of the . . . experiences that I had, I think this was in my second session - 

there used to always be a threat, maybe it was real, that federal money for highways would 

be withheld, or more would be available if there was a prohibition about advertising, 

commercial advertising, the signs along the highways. And they were always trying to get 

some kind of a bill prohibiting the, you know, these billboards along the highways. And 

the signboard lobby, the advertising lobby, was really powerful in those days. 

And I don't know who the devil gave me the bill but I had a bill that I had put in that 

what it did, it said that a sign, any sign, that would be posted along the right of way would 

have to conform to the standards set up by the Division of Highways. And I don't know 

who gave it to me but somebody gave it to me and I called - my memory is that Mr. 

Bartelsmeyer, whose son is now in the legislature, who was the head of either the Highway 

Department or the Public Works and Buildings - and I didn't want to have a bill 

that. . . . See, he was a carry-over in the early stages of Kerner I think, and it must have 

been my second year when Kerner was governor, I can't imagine that I would have had a 

bill like that when Stratton was governor. 


But anyway they wanted to know if I would let them amend that bill to put in the ban 

against the billboards. The representation is that there would be a lot of federal momy 

available if that bill would pass. So I talked to Mr. Bartelsmeyer to see if it would meet 

with his approval because it was his bill and he said it was alright with him. So then I 

talked to Jack Bairstow who had always been . . . you know pretty well thought of and was 

always working on highways and stuff, and he prepared the amendment. It was primarily 

why - I know who came to me about the amendment, it was a fellow,who is now a judge - 

I think he's still with the East - Marion Burks and he and Bairstow had always worbd 

on this thing ahd they thought this bill of mine could be amended, the amendment would 

be germaine. 

So the amendment was put on and here was the ban on the billboard bill. It was on the 

third reading in the house. And then somebody discovered it and all hell brake 

loose. (chuckles) Every conceivable effort was made to - that I would not call that 

bill. So every morning I would very religiously go up to Mr. Powell, the Speaker, and in 

writing I would say "Please call House Bill such and such today." And it was called with 

about five hours left in the session. (chuckles) It was called so late it was pretty impossible 

to do anything. 

But that was kind of exciting for, you know, a beginner. I'm pretty sure it was my sopbo- 

more year but even then I was still pretty young in the business and that was always gne 

that, you know, the press was always after. 

Q: Why is the press always after an issue like that? 

A: Well they thought that the special interests of the outdoor advertising companies, the 

signboard and billboard people, was too great. It actually cost the state money, at least 

that was the representation, whether it's true or not I don't know. You know people make 

a lot of representations and we don't know whether they're right or not. But that was 

a . . . that was a hot one. 

Q: Was that your first significant contact with the press down there? 

A: I would think so. They used to come to me every day and ask me if it had been 

called. And every day I had to take my note up to Powell. (chuckles) 5 think that's the 

first thing that I had that elicited a lot of concern there, Of course I didn't know the history 

of the thing, you know, that had been a running battle for a long time. I didn't know 

it. (chuckles) And I just accidently happened to have that bill. You know the one for the 

Highway Department in its original form was pretty inmous. 

See, there's mr tendency - I'm trying to think, it must have been when Kerner 

governor - there's a tendency to parcel the administration stuff out to the members 

govern+ party, So that's why you'd end up with ,that stuff. Later on Frank 

don't how when kenz was down in Public Works. f don't remember when he 

have h&l . . , Pqwtment of Public Works and Buildings, &t that time that 

what i@ now the' Department of Transportion. You sae Highways was in 

well. ~ r mwa~1 z tbe dimtnr then. I think he was, f think he was appointed fairly f4 e rly 

and I Mi. Bartelsmeyer conthued on as head of the Division of Highways a 

while. :He was a Stratton appointee and he carried . . . a very fine gentleman. 

It's funlyr, you know one of the things that happened, I think it was - well I know it was 

in 1859 Ssbn. I think - did I tell you about the water commission and how their bmrd 

of director8 had inadvertently been - the law had been amended so they'd end up with 

thirty on the board or something like that. There was supposed to be - yes, I think I told 

you about that, didn't I? 

Q: Yes. 


A: That was something though for a freshman. And they're still fussing about the water 

commission now. They haven't resolved it yet. The county board just authorized putting 

on the ballot a referendum to issue federal money, seven hundred and seventy-five million 

dollars worth of bonds, to buy water, to construct the pipelines so the Chicago water will 

be available. 

Q: When you were handling more controversial pieces of legislation, did folks tell you in 

advance, you know, "Hey, you're getting involved in something pretty hot," 

A: Another one that I had fairly early was the one that said that a teacher stood in loco 

parentis, in place of the parents, at a school affair, either on school grounds or off school 

grounds at a school sponsored thing. So Norty Kay who at that time was political editor 

or a reporter for the Chicago American and he called it the "teacher-spanking bill" because 

it authorized the teachers to spank the kids. And that isn't really what it was supposed 

to be, but that's what he called it. And that thing got a lot of fire, a lot of fire. People 

didn't want the teachers to spank their kids, 

Q: Where did that bill come from? Did that come out of . . . 

A: Teachers union, teachers union, a guy named Oscar Weil is still lobbying for it. He's 

from down around East St. Louis someplace. He gave it to me but I didn't know it was 

going to draw all that fire. Part of the trouble there that if the Teachers Federation wants 

something, the Illinois Education Association doesn't want it, it doesn't make any difference 

what it is. They, and if the IEA wants it then the Federation has to oppose it. That's 

almost routine. 

Q: So you're going to catch it one way or another? 

A: Well yes. 

Q: On things like that? 

A: Yes on that kind of a thing. I think one that I got, probably drew more fire on was 

one that - that I got from the IEA, this is before the IEA got as militant as they are 

now and the IEA probably represented the longtime teacher, and maybe the principals and 

those people. And the teachers pension system at that time rewarded early retirement 

instead of rewarding longevity of service. There was, if you stayed on for any period of 

time, there was a penalty, it would cost you. You were better off to quit early and so 

forth. And everybody had criticized that function of the downstate - this was the 

downstate teachers system, it wasn't the Chicago teaching system. I think the Chicago 

system did not have that weakness in them - from a purely pension point of view. 

So the IEA gave me the bill and asked me if I'd sponsor it and I did. And of course it 

was good for the long-time, long-tenured teacher and it was a very sound bill as far as - 

you know from an actuarial point of view but for the younger teacher - so many of whom 

figured that they weren't going to be in the business very long and that they were going 

to work a short period of time and quit, they liked that, that premium for early 

retirement. So they were opposed to it and there were probably more younger teachers than 

there were older teachers so I found myself in the eye of a storm on the thing. 

It wouldn't be unusual for me to get six and seven hundred letters a week, fairly well divided 

I'd say, kind of slanted toward . . . in opposition and I resolved that, then and there, when 

I saw what they went through in the past, and it was signed. 

I think they had been nibbling away at it ever since. I think it's been changed from that 

form but that made a good pension system out of the downstate teachers pension. 


C

See, there's always efforts to increase benefits and reduce contributions and so 

forth. (chuckles) If you don't watch the pensions and things pretty carefully, why, the 

representatives and participants will put something in there that really aren't very 

sound. But I resolved that I wasn't going to get into any pension litigation. Why in the 

world should I make enemies out of people that - what you're trying to do is to protect 

the system and protect either annuitants or widows or children of them and all they do is 

get mad at you. Why should I take that burden on? I mean if they're satisfied to have 

the frail pension system, why, I don't think God put me on earth to protect them from their 

own weaknesses. 

So that taught me a lesson too that I learned early in the game, ypu 

know. (chuckles) You're not ordained by God to protect people from their own folly. 

Some of those pension systems in downstate - each - of course the teachers pension 

downstate was all pretty well organized and manipulated but a lot of the downstate - 1%. 

forgotten how many different systems there were but each police department in Illinois and 

each fire department and some of those things would only have 7 percent funding. So if 

you had, you know, let's say you'd have a small number of participants in the system and 

you let them get seriously disabled, you know, going to a fire or responding to a police all 

and have four or five of them get themselves hurt pretty badly or killed, you know, it might 

deplete that fund. Although there were certain statutory requirements to do this and do 

that, why, the fact of the matter is that very few of them were funded adequately. But 

I learned my lesson on that teacher's pension plan, never to get involved in those 

things. (chuckles) 

Then in 1959 I thought I was going to - we had an old interurban railroad out here, the 

Aurora-Elgin Railroad which was an electric line which used to run out pretty neqly 

through the middle of the county, and it served Elmhurst, Lombard, Villa Park and so fo?th, 

and it ended up out west someplace and one branch went up north to Elgin and the other 

one went south to Aurora. And in the construction of the Eisenhower Expressway they 

spent a lot of money on highways and what it did was that it really pretty nearly put that 

whole thing out of business. 

So 1 was going to resurrect it and I put in a bill to authorize the creation of the Local adass 

Transit District by referendum. They, the individual governments participating, whether 

it be cities or township or county, whatever they were, called a referendum and put it to 

the people to authorize the imposition of quite a small real estate tax. And Congressman 

Erlenborn, who was then in the house, he was the cosponsor of it, and that was the Orst 

heal ma%s transit pasd in Illinois. 

And in that aame semion I passed a bill that authorized any government that was partidpating 

in that local mass transit district to convert motor fuel tax funds. That was in 

1959. And Bill 

f 

Clark came to me a couple of days later and he said, "Do you know 

you passed the other day, converting motor gas tax to support mass transit?" And I aid 

yes. r/nd ,he said, *You know, we've been trying to do that for yearn and we never c Id 

get it I don't bow whether people didn-oa what was in it or what the s ry 

-w& .But tW's hen tw the bmh since 1969 au- the use of the gsrs tax for hat 

puqme. That is, one of the governm~nt's, you how, let's say the city governments pa icipatmi, 

they could convert some of their gas tax. It didn*t impose an additional gas tax. But 

there's fourteen mass transit districts throughout the state that use that, . . . And a lot 

of money has come in, federal subsidies for mass transportation, I can't tell you how duch 

but quite a bit. 

Every taro years we kept amending it. The most significant amendment - originally in 

order t~ cmab it it took a referendum - but the most significant amendment was either 

in 1965 ctt. 1967 when we authorized it to be creatd by ordinance not referendum. But 

before you can impose a real estate tax, it required a referendum so that let them set up 


1 

i

a legal entity that was in a position to apply for and receive federal funds for the mass 

transit funds. I don't think that there has been any real estate taxes imposed, in fact I 

know there hasn't been at least up in this area. Springfield Mass Transit used to be under 

that act. 

Q: Had you done work with transportation before this time? I mean is that something 

that . . . 

A: Well I was a railroad man, my father was a railroad man. And the first job that I had 

was as a district solicitor for the Pennsylvania Railroad and I used to be a trial lawyer. And 

I just was convinced then you know and I haven't changed my conviction of it, that we need 

mass transportation in this congested area. I didn't think that it was possible to run them 

out of the farebox because the history of mass transportation in this country shows, you 

know, they all went in bankruptcy, all over the country, every place. Until you get the 

government in it, why, they couldn't survive, most of them. 

Years and years ago in Chicago they had a lot of separate little surface lines. I don't know 

how many companies but there would be a lot of them and they all went you know to the 

wall, So ultimately we had Chicago Surface Lines which was a combination of all these 

separate things. And then along came the CTA [Chicago Transit Authority] which was 

going to resurrect everything. The CTA - at one time the elevateds were separate, it was 

only the surface, the streetcars, the elevateds were separate, and the buses were altogether 

separate. So then along comes the CTA which incorporates all of the buses and all of the 

elevated lines. And then we get the RTA [Regional Transit Authority] which brings in the 

suburban railroad commuter lines. 

So that's been a constant - I mean when the airlines - you know, without significant 

government subsidies they couldn't. . . So I've always been, you know, a strong advocate and 

I still am. 

Q: How did you go about creating that legislation? Had you met with the folks from the, 

I forget the name, the Elgin Electrified? 

A: No, well they're really in terrible shape. (pause) Well when I was with the 

Northwestern Western Railroad I knew what their problems were, commuter lines. And 

they had some monies owed them by the Aurora-Elgin Railroad at the time and I saw the 

shape of their finances and I just decided that, you know, they were authorized to either 

enter into a contract with an existing line or to buy the line. What I probably visualized 

at first was some kind of a contract with the Aurora-Elgin Railroad and let them run 

it. Probably support it with some kind of a small real estate tax. Because I felt that, and 

I still feel that these surburban areas, their houses would depreciate in value if there is 

no transportation, no public transportation. 


Q: I think you were saying that at first you had envisioned some sort of contract with the 

railroads still . . . 

A: Probably, yes. (pause) See, we put that together pretty much by ourselves. I mean 

we had the Reference Bureau do it but we didn't have any great staff or anything. As we 

saw weaknesses every session we would do something with it. For instance when the 

Aurora-Elgin right-of-way - I was thinking of the Aurora-Elgin primarily, well the first 

one that used it was South Cook County. The South Cook County - I don't know what 

the name of the thing is but it is South Cook County Mass Transit District. They were 

the first ones that used it. I had intended it, you know, for out here. You know I'd have 

to say I probably was surprised to find out that it had application in places other than in 


my own backyard. I hadn't visualized that. But ultimately they took up the right-of-way- 

. They took up the rails on the Aurora-Elgin Railroad. 

And we did all mrts of things. We passed a bill that authorized the Mass Transit District 

to enter into a contract with the county for the operation of mass transit as long as the 

county owned right-of-ways - see the county bought that road, now they call it Prairie 

Path, but Du Page County bought it. 

And then we thought that - that - you know the schools were transporting kids. They 

had a lot of buses that they'd use a couple of hours a day and they'd sit on the school grounds 

Saturday and Sunday and most of the time. So we had an amendment to authorize any 

local mass transit district to enter into a contract with a school district for transportation 

purposes, either to use the school buses - it was fairly broad. And every time something 

would change, why, we'd amend the thing. Quite frankly I think it's in pretty good shape 

now yet. I didn't think there was any necessity for the RTA in it. I think they could have 

used this one, maybe it would have taken some amendments but as I say we kept amending 

it every two years. 

Q: How did you go about getting that passed? What sort of folks did you need to talk 

to? What kind of arguments did you encounter? 

A: I really don't know. I mean of course the first time that the congressman, Erlenbofn, 

was able to get a lot of Republican support and I was able to - I think having stayed with 

the regular party gave me a leg up on getting some significant Democratic votes. Seq I 

never was known as a - well I wouldn't say never, but in the early days I wasn't - ylou 

know, I could always depend on the Chicago votes. And I didn't have - well I did pretty 

well with the Democrats and be did pretty well with the Republicans, I guess that's bhe 

answer to it. And as time went on I got, you know, pretty friendly with most !of 

them. Unless you get ywrgelf into a real political hassle - a bunch of that, why, you knpw 

no matter who you are, you can't do much. j 


A: Then w h yw have mnething that really that's of, let's say, of parochial interestit0 

your o m way mogt people don't pick on you anyway. If you start to infringe on them they 

will. See:, this really didn't offend anybody. 

I 

Q: Thei-4 wam't axry opposition to the idea of making it possible for diatrid to be set p 

that colzfd b y a tax if lbre were taxpayer groups? 

A: Oh y q there was some, but it was a referendum. You know when you provide fo3 a 

~eferencbn, that destroys a lot of the opposition. If people want it, why - so that part 

of it took. And the red estate tax, of course that got the Taxpayers Federation and some 

others but it was such a small fax and as I say it was subject to referendum anyway so 

it wid& . . . that big a thing. And I think a lot d people realize that transportation is 

pretty important. 

Q: (pause) I take it then that Erlenborn also worked with the governor's people to get his 

approval. - 

A: WeU I would assume that he had been chairman of a - I think he was chairman - in 

1957 they 'had a commission appointed to study the mass transit. They had to report on 

some things . . . so he was really two years ahead of me on that. In fact I think he 

a little provoked that I got in on that thing, but I think he thought that he was the 


promoter on the thing. (chuckles) But you know it had been an interest of mine for a

time. But I don't remember exactly when he went to Congress but since that time I - the 

first thing that you always are worried about is that somebody is going to amend it on you, 

take care of a local situation there that may louse you up. So you always have to be vigilant 

to make sure that what amendments go on there are not going to hurt your situation. I 

remember J. David Jones had some amendment to take care of a situation down in 

Springfield. Exactly what it did I don't know, I can't remember now but I know I watched 

it pretty carefully to make sure it didn't result in damage to us. Which it didn't. 

Q: (pause) Did you do any local follow-up with that bill then? Did you attempt to do any- 

thing to get the mass transit district started here in this county? 

A: No I just cooperated with the - I'm not too sure whether the railroads were in complete 

accord early in that. They ultimately embraced it. I can't remember whether that was the 

case. This fellow Schussler that - what's his name, the one that was the executive director 

of the CTA - he was with the Burlington at one time and I worked with him on that. Then 

there was a fellow in Milwaukee, the Northwestern Railroad never did a thing, they never 

organized a district in the middle of the county, but they did along the Milwaukee Road 

and along the Q [Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad]. And the railroads were in 

accord there. My memory is that they were lukewarm to begin with, they may have thought 

it was a threat to them, but I'm guessing on that, I'm not sure. (pause) In later sessions 

I got prolific about it. (chuckles) 

Q: Well when you came down here for the swearing-in, did you have bills on your mind? 

A: No, no. I didn't know what a bill was. I didn't have the slightest idea how - at that 

time Noble Lee - who was as I said the dean of John Marshall Law School - undertook 

to have a course of instruction for all freshmen. Now they have - it's put on by the Legis- 

lative Council, it's a regular organized thing - in which they advise the - you know, about 

the facilities that are available and so forth. But Noble Lee was our instructor. They didn't 

tell us a great deal. It's a lot different now, I mean they're really pretty well organized 

now. 

Q: Well maybe in the case of this mass transit district bill can you remember when it first 

occurred to you that you might be able to get that, get it through, written and through 

or, +. 

A: Well that was what I ran on when I campaigned. "Send a man to Springfield and get 

things moving," that was the theme. I was going to revive the Aurora-Elgin Railroad. So 

that was the entire campaign in 1958. As I say I think I kind of offended John Erlenborn 

because he thought he had the only motorman hat out here. My memory is that he was 

the principal sponsor and I think I and Lee Daniels and - my memory is that that's the 

way it was. I know that I was the sponsor on the conversion of the gas tax. I don't know 

whether John was on that at all but I know I was the principal sponsor on that. 

Q: Did you run into any opposition on that, folks who didn't want that tax converted? 

A: I don't think people knew what I was doing. (chuckles) I think they fell asleep on that 

one. I don't know why or how but I think they did. I think that came along quite a bit 

later than the original bill. It was the same session but they weren't companion bills going 

through together, 

Q: (pause) They did that as a sort of an open-ended thing, people could divert part of the 

tax, they didn't say you had to divert it, so . . . 

A: It didn't increase any tax. If they wanted to they could divert some of their taxes to 

mass transit district so a certain amount of money goes to all of the local governments from 

motor fuel taxes. I guess none of them have enough to satisfy themselves that they wouldn't 


have the authority without that bill. I still thought that if somebody wanted to synchronize 

all of the efforts of transporting the kids and everything that they could do a lot better 

job than they're doing now. 

You know the kids in Cook County for instance, they get - at least they did, I don't kn~w 

how it ie now - they got a reduced fare on the CTA, they used existing transportation. I 

could see how, by utilizing the buses that are already here and have them go on regular 

established runs to be used like the CTA is - not only for school kids but for everybody - 

they could have been utilized for that purpose. But it - you know there was an awful 

lot of money - I at one time had these figures but I don't now - a lot of money that is 

used to transport school kids. And if that could be worked together with some kind of mass 

transit operation, particularly in the, I'd say the eastern two-thirds of the county that's 

pretty populous - get out in the western part, maybe it wouldn't work - but I think it 

would work good. But nobody ever really concerned themself with it. I just see that there's 

vast possibilities on mass transportation. 

Many of the railroads for instance that go through the areas of high unemployment in 

Chicago, there's a lot of jobs out here that you know people can't get to because they can't - 

they don't drive, they don't have cars. 

At least there were, I don't know how they are right at the present time, in many of the 

railroad stations are - in those areas - for instance it is not generally known but the IC 

[Illinois Central] Railroad comes to Addison and of course they at one time were down at 

Twelfth - I don't know how they are now but they were down at Twelfth and Michigan 

and they went right through all of that area. Great Western is another one and Milwaukee 

Road. I can visualize that as a way of transporting - you know, a workable way to trans- 

port - those people out here where the jobs are. But it would require somebody who was 

really - you know was concerned and interested and wanted to do it. It never materjal- 

ized. 

But for every school district to have their own buses to run the kids around . . . and to 

have them stand-ing idle so much of the time, I thought was a terrible waste. Maybe the 

way to do it was for the RTA to have the buses, to let the kids board the buses on those 

regular~reutes. Maybe that would have been - certainly high school kids, And you don't 

have ta take them to the ~~hool door. They don't take them to the door in Chicago, they 

let them walk a couple of blocks, that wouldn't hurt them. Transportation has been very 

wasteful in my opinion. And it's still a big thing. 

I would think that and flood control probably are the two biggest things that concerned me 

in my earlier days and you know to some extent throughout my entire legislative career, I 

slowed down in the days when - in the four years of Governor Ogilvie because we didn't - 

the Democrats were not in the majority. And of course without having the governor of 

my party, it made - I was less, far less, effective in those four years than I was all of 

the rest of the time. 

Q: (pause) It sounds like the Democrats weren't all that ineffective under Stratton, t 

last t~ gears of his administration. Is that correct? 

A: No. I don't - I would think that could be right. Well of course they wanted ;the 

income tax too and that was Ogilvie's thing. Some things were done in Ogilvie's administra- 

tion tbt the Democrats didn't want. They combined the guard role with the sheriff's office 

for instance. Democrats thought that the guard role was a patronage thing, you know that 

was under the city of Chicago, whereas the sheriff was under the county. What they waqted 

to do was to transfer the guards and the employment and whatever it was from the Mu~ici- 

pal House of Corrections to the county and it was - I think the sheriff then was Joe Woods 

from down in Springfield. I don't know whether it was good government or bad govern 

the guise was good government but the obvious thing is that it was taking some 


jobs and taking them away from the Democratic city administration and putting them with 

the Republican sheriff's administration. Since that time I've been in the county jail and 

I don't think they're much. There are no plums as far as I'm concerned. 

Q: I copied down out of the [Legislative] Synopsis and Digest some of the bills that your 

name was on. One thing was for an Equality of Employment Opportunity Commission. 

A: Fair employment, yes. I wasn't the prime sponsor on that, my memory would be that 

was either Corneal Davis or Cecil Partee. But I was a sponsor. When was that, 1961? 

Q: I had it down as in 1950 - probably both sessions - I'd have to look, I think it was 

kicked around . . . 

A: Well that was a pretty bold thing for back in lily-white Du Page County . . . although 

some of our Republican colleagues - Joe Morgan for instance, who was a pretty moderate 

guy - of course that was - he came later than that. I don't know whether Erlenborn 

would have been on any of those things. It was Erlenborn and Daniels in those early days. 

Q: How did you happen to get on that bill though? Were you approached to be on it? 

A: I was asked to be on it, yes. Well I just - you know I happened to think it's fair too 

so. . . . I've always felt and I still feel - and this job that I've got now fortifies my feeling 

that it's impossible to expect to have a prosperous orderly society when you exclude such 

a large segment of them, they are not to participate in the whole process. You can't have 

25 percent of your adults out of work and you can't have 50 percent of your teenage kids 

out of work. And you can't have youngsters, you know, born into squalor and the most ter- 

rible home conditions and that sort of thing and not expect that you will have discord and 

crime. So it's something that I feel very strongly. It's like your own family. If you had 

a family of four and half of them were not productive, why, you wouldn't, couldn't get along. 

I think that was kind of a Democratic issue too, I think most of the sponsors on that would 

be Democrats. There might be a handful of Republicans but there wouldn't be very many 

I don't think. 

Q: Can you remember any of the, let's say any of the work done around that to get it? 

A: No I didn't have the leading part in that. I was only there, you know, in my early 

days. I don't remember when it ultimately passed. When was it? 1961, or was it later than 

that? 

Q: Sometime then in the early 1960's. I'm vague on that . . . 

A: It didn't pass in my first term I'm sure. But that work was all done by the prime spon- 

sors. 

Q: There was also a bill that you were on that created a State Board of Education? 

A: I can't remember that one. Who else was on it, do you know? 

Q: Let me check my notes here and see. (pause) It seems like Saperstein and Robinson, 

Mikva, Dawson, McCorrnick, Zlatnik, some others. 

A: Well those are, you know Saperstein and Dawson and Mikva, that's the bluebloods. That 

must have been a gaod government thing. What year was that? Was that on . . . 

Q: That was in 1959, 


A: In 1969? 

Q: No. 1959. 

107 

A: That would be my first year then. I don't know where it came from but that's pretty 

close sponsorship. Who was the lead sponsor there? 

Q: I don't know, let me see if I've got a Xerox copy of that one here. 

(taping stopped to search in notes, then resumed) 

Q: So your feeling is that was a more or less a good government type of issue and it wasn't 

aimed in anybody's political . . . 

A: No, no. 

Q: What sort of success would bills like that have? If they weren't political in orientation 

what would really determine whether or not they passed? Because obviously going through 

the records some of the things passed and some of them didn't. 

A; Well there's aemething - for instance now having an elective Commerce Commission, 

I don't think that has any political overtones particularly. I mean right at the moment the 

governor appointa the members and from that point of view. But I'm not too sure asge 

you know; system. 

So those kinds of considerations. . . . Another thing is ceilings on taxes, there are some 

people who feel that that's a bad thing. You know, you have an artificial ceiling on it aad 

don't give any discretion or any authority to the elected oficids. . . . Those are not 

hpubli~ag-~emocrat, I mean those are theories of government. A lot of times the - well 

quite fruy, like President Reagan, you know in spite of the fact that the exigencies of 

n were such that he felt that his budget had to have a horrendous balance, he's 

ng about having a constitutional amendment to balance the budget when 

a m his budget now. Well if that was in &ect now, where wdd he be? He 

operate. So it's pretty obvious that he ray can't - he either dwn't kww 

ge's doing or he can't Wsincere about it because when he was given the oppodty 

could not come up with il balanced budget 

There's some theorim of government, for instan* like Adai Stevenson suggeskd 

should take away s lot of the mandatory subjects in schools and give more 

boards of education. There's one school of thought that thida that yau should d e 

subjd betaught. There's ahother group - all the phy~ial ed teacheriii 

physical ed mandatory because it preserves their joba There are 

responsibility of the curriculum ought to be the, you know, the local 

universities, 

You always have somebody coming in there wanting to mandate this and mandate 

that. There's different theories of government. So it won't be Republican-Democrat for the 

most part. It's just how you feel about those things. 

Another one is elect the - what's his title now? It used to be the superintendent of 

William A. Redmond instruction? Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS 

ce

Q: Superintendent of public instruction? 

A: Yes. Some downstate people particularly want to elect them all the time. They used 

to be elected. I know Ray Page was elected and George Wilkins was elected. Along came 

a different thinking that maybe they should be appointed but I don't think there's a session 

that somebody doesn't come in and provide for an election of superintendent of public 

instruction. Different theories. You know, how best to operate, to do things that are not 

Republican-Democrat? 

Regionalize the Chicago Board of Education. Instead of having the central board, try to 

have people elected from various districts. That's promoted mostly by people that are terri- 

fied of busing. They feel that if they have control of the district that they can prevent that, 

or I suppose in some cases promote it. I mean it all depends how they look at the possible 

results. Not everything has a political overtone. 

I don't think that you can really evaluate what the political consequences are going to be 

with any great accuracy anyway. Maybe in raising taxes, maybe that. Maybe they're 

always mad at people who raise taxes but I'm not too sure of that because if ,that was true 

no congressman would have been returned because their income taxes have certainly been 

going crazy, I'm not too sure - they say that Governor Ogilvie was defeated over the 

income tax, I'm not too sure that's right. I think that particularly downstate - I think 

opposition to the Environmental Protection Agency was stronger than the income tax. You 

know, prohibited open burning and - you know you used to be able to get rid of your 

leaves . . . and trying to control the toilet habits of livestock out in the fields so that their 

effluent didn't go in the streams. A lot of opposition to the environmental protection thing. 

Well you see it now. I mean you see the way industry is rebelling. They want to loosen, 

you know, the requirements about the air pollution, the water pollution. I don't think that's 

Republican-Democrat. In that case it's certain industries that feel that the restrictions 

under which they are operating are so restrictive that they can't succeed. 

I heard on the radio broadcast the other day that - it was talking about the requirement 

of having scrubbers to try to get rid of the high sulphur in the high sulphur coal. Well 

this was somebody from the utility company saying that the cost of this would make it abso- 

lutely prohibitive and it was cheaper to get low sulphur coal from Colorado. And here you 

have people down in the coal country that are interested in the - you know their area is 

kind of depressed and they want to sell the coal and they like to have relaxation of these 

requirements. So there's always that tug and pull. 

And then as I say it really isn't always that - I think in the minority of the cases would 

it be Republican versus Democrat. There's some effort made to eliminate the fifty-five mile 

an hour speed limit. That was put in by a Republican. My guess would be that Democrats 

in that same area probably would be supportive because they don't have a lot of traffic, they 

don't think that the speed limit is necessary. The state police that are theoretically under 

the governor come in and testify against it showing that the lower speed limit has resulted 

in fewer accidents and saving of life. So there you have one group of Republicans that are 

for it and the administration that's against it. If it was a Democratic governor that same 

guy would be testifying, the state police, so . . . it's too simple to say that it's one party 

versus another one. 

Q: Are there other natural groupings that occur on some of those issues more or less regu- 

larly, or I should say were there during the times that we're talking about? 

A: Well farmer versus industry, that would be particularly true on the environmental 

matters. And for some reason farmer versus union. I don't see union versus farmer so 

much but I saw farmer versus union. 


Q: I don't get - I don't understand? 

A: I didn't understand it, but I see it. 

109 

Q: Can you remember any specific instances that might illustrate that? 

A: Oh it's hard to point it out. You know I know that it's true and I saw it but I caq't 

tell you - it probably would be such things as minimum wage and, you know, that kipd 

of thing. Things which the farmer might think made it more expensive for them to do buhi- 

ness and more expensive for them to buy farm equipment, that kind of thing. 

Well another one, you try to put the farmer and farmer's help under workman's comp or 

unemployment service and see where you are. (chuckles) Every other employee in the 

state - I'm a little hazy whether they're under - now I don't think they are, for the long- 

est time they weren't - but almost any of those things that had to do with protecting 

employees always excluded the farmer. Try to convince the farmer that his help should be 

controlled by a forty-hour week and you know how it is. (chuckles) You get up early and 

you stay late and do what you have to do. And I'm not saying that, you know, that it should 

be applied but I just say that those are areas where there is a natural . . . 


A: You know, it's hard to say - most everybody doesn't really quite understand how much 

of a financial contribution they make to state government. In one of my early sessions I 

was getting gas at a gas station in Pontiac, in Livingston County, which is one of the more 

affluent counties but even so thi~ guy was talking about Chicago and the people up here apd 

saying they were taking their money to spend it up in the northern part of the state apd 

they didn't think it was fair for the northern part of the state - particularly Cqok 

County - to be draining Livingston County. The fact of the matter is at that time we bad 

a bill in there that increased sales tax and they had studies that the only two countiewin 

the stah th& got less back than they paid in were Cook and Peoria. All the other count$es 

got far more in terms of state money than they paid in. So here was Livingston County - 

and I'm sure that this fellow was - he was sincere, he thought he was right. I 

Now what the story would be today I don't know. I'm sure that my county, Du Page - dell 

I'm wive it's one of the donor counties because of the high level of assessment for real 

estate taxes and because this is the highest income of any county of the state. So our 

income tax payment would be high and our real estate taxes are supporting our own local 

school and everything that we've got. So I'm sure that Du Page would, you know, would 

fit in with Peoria and Cook, and I would imagine that Lake would and so forth. But some 

of the counties that raised the biggest rumpus, the ones that used to call themselves 

"Forgobnia" over at Adamsville there at the western part of the state. (chuckles) Doug 

Kane, &pettentative Kane, had a Master's or a Doetor's in that. He studied that and 

was his th&s and that's available and it's really very interesting to show the couaties 

you Baaw Wly profit from the skate as compared to . . . 

It's pretty obvious that in gasoline taxes the county must be pouring it in there when the 

distributions, you know, cities and villages and townships. Nobody can tell me that some 

of those tiny little townships down in the southern part of the state don't get significantly 

more back in motor fueI tax than they pay out. 

But all of those built-in ideas that we have - there's a lot of feeling in this county agaibst 

Cook County. Actually I think a lot of it is unnecessary. I don't happen to like the +ay 

the RTA is operating now and I don't - I think we're getting the dirty end of the s 

on that. But I think it could be worked out better if people would sit down and try to 


it out. I thought that was one advantage that I had, you know, being part of the Democratic 

party and coming from suburbia that I would be able to, you know, to try to throw a little 

oil on those troubled waters. It worked in some cases, not upstate. 

Part of the trouble is that you don't have enough continuity. You know what I'm talking - 

installments of eight years or ten years, you know. It's hard to get programs going because 

you have a change in guys so much, A change from Mayor Daley to Mayor Bilandic to 

Mayor Byrne made a lot of difference. If it had always been the same one in there to do 

business with it would have been easier. 

Q: Had you built up some pretty steady working relationships with some of Daley's people 

then? 

A: Not particularly. They kind of went their own way and . . . you know they developed 

their own programs. I never was part, I never felt that that was my job, I thought it was 

up to them to have their people with their program and that's where the majority leader 

came in. He was - in both cases, Madigan and Shea, they really represented Cook County 

and it was up to them to develop their program, it wasn't up to me as Speaker. And 

that's . . . 

Q: Were there any other cleavages you perceived occurred in the legislature. You mentioned 

the farming industry, farmer versus union? 

A: Well upstate-downstate, suburban-Chicago. (pause) Republican-Democrat. (chuckles) 

Q: Was there something . . . 

A: Well one that - when Governor Ogilvie came in he was going to have some kind of sup- 

port for private schools like President Reagan's talking about now. That, and with that the 

last session I was there was some kind of reimbursement for transportation of kids who 

go to nonpublic schools. That's another cleavage, I don't know - and the purchase of text- 

books for kids in nonpublic schools. That's been kind of a cleavage. (pause) I can't off- 

hand think of any others. 

Q: Was there enough of a group, the people that served on good government, you'd say there 

was a good government sort of - government sub-rosa division? 

A: I think so, yes. It depends on what year you're talking about. My first year as Speaker 

when we had a hundred and nine there was a lot of them. A lot of them. Primarily the 

group that supported me for Speaker I guess independently of Chicago would probably be 

the ones that - some of those were Chicago people, 

Q: How about back like in 1959 or even in the early 1960's when there were . . . 

A: There were always some you know, they had Mikva, Scariano, Simon, Jeanne Hurley, 

Frances Dawson, Noble Lee, there were always some. 

Q: Let me ask you a question about divisions within the state in a different way. Do you 

think that the political parties missed a vote sometimes by not capitalizing on some of these 

sort of natural divisions? 

A: It's pretty hard, It's pretty hard because of - you know, the art of politics is to survive 

and aside from, you know, the Chicago Democrats and a handful of Republicans that I think 

probably could vote for smallpox and get reelected, most of the people there have to be 

careful. And the cleavage I think that you would tend to be with was your normal constitu- 

ency whatever it was. I mean if you were - if you were a farmer in a farm community 


that would be attendant, so you'd be very careful about not doing something that would irri- 

tate the farmer. The same thing would be true now if your constituency is labor, you've 

got to be careful there. I think it's pretty hard, it's not homogeneous, it's all mixed up. 

That is one of the values actually of the minority representation because you could represat 

what amounted to a party constituency and not incur the wrath of, you know, people in the 

other party. Well for instance the labor issue - there's a large significant labor vote in 

this county but it's not the dominant vote. On strictly labor business in this county my 

feeling is that the labor guy would lose every time and although they might represent 40 

percent and they're entitled to some representation, they'd end up with zero. When you 

don't have that protection that you had by being able to support your own constituency, l&e 

a minority stockholder, they have. . . . The theory now is that the majority doesn't mean 

that ~ Q can U be a despotic arbitrary fool. The same thing is true I think in the goveanmental 

process. I think that's another thing about losing the minority representation, labor 

in this county probably will be voiceless in the legislature although they are a significant 

number of people. They won't have any more voice here than they have over in the county 

board and that's not much. And they have legitimate concerns you know. 

Q: (pause) One of the things I have to ask you about for your first session, that was the 

year that the State Historical Library was funded. Being a history man myself that's - 

was that a significant issue? 

A: No. It doesn't come to my mind. Of course I wasn't - you have no idea how unimpor- 

tant a freshman would be back in those days. They got to be more important when there 

were more of them. When they amounted to a third of the body then they got important 

but they weren't very many, and a freshman really didn't weigh very heavily in Paul Powell's 

scheme of things. 

Q: Did he court favor with you, freshman and all? 

A: Did he what? 

Q: Did he court favor? Did he try to bring you into his fold? 

A: Well I will have to say that, although I didn't vote for him and that 1,never was in his 

inner circle, that I don't ever remember him abusing me, never remember him abusing 

me. See Paul was a consummate politician. I mean he realized that what took place thn, 

there's no way to relive it and why carry on and carry on and cause a breach there that 

you never could bridge over. And you know that's kind of a thing that you learn in the 

General Awmbly, that when something's over, it's over. You know, you don't - what the 

terminology they usled to use then was that "You don't keep book." You know there's no 

way that you can undo what happened. Paul was a great advocate of that 

He mas have had something in the back of his head but I don't remember anything in all 

the that I served with him that Paul Powell was anything except, you know, 

friendly. I guess I limited my requests pretty much knowing if it was a contest between 

me and one d his real close friends, why, I wouldn't be the winner. 

But that's the idea of a successful politician that - you know, you build up all these animos- 

ities and the first thing you know you're out there all by yourself. Paul didn't do that. And 

I think I knew better than to, you know, ask him to cut my head off. 

There were some people in that session that kept reminding him that he, you know, that 

he was elected with Republican votes and that he didn't represent a majority of 

Democrats. He walked out of a Democratic caucus one time. I never took part in any of 

those things. I figured, you know, he'd been elected in January and I couldn't undo that 


but. . . . Not that I agreed with what was done but it was done.

Q: (pause) One of the bills that your name was on and I think - let me find my notes 

here - I think had lot of big government people on it, it dealt with - oh, the actions, meet- 

ings, any type of debate in public committees had to be open to the public? 

A: Open meetings. Yes, that was Scariano's bill. That probably was 1961 wasn't it? 

Q: There was one, it was vetoed after the 1959 session and probably passed in 1961 I think. 

A: Well I believe that. I mean I think it's public business. There are problems with it 

obviously that, you know, if you're just talking and you pose a rhetorical question and you're 

quoted, you know, that this is your opinion rather than your posing the question - I can 

well remember one instance of that when we were having a meeting here in the village of 

Bensenville. It was a very small meeting. I don't remember if it was all the entire board 

or who it was but there was a newspaper guy there. And there was a discussion about buy- 

ing some land for a site for the village hall. And there were differences of opinion. I 

personally thought it should be in that part of town that's across from where my office is 

now. I didn't think it should be where they ultimately went. I thought in terms of trying 

to preserve the central part of town that that would be the better place. And one of the 

sites that was discussed was a home that was owned by my secretary. And when the paper 

came out they indicated that it was going to be at that site and all - it was just a round- 

table discussion. Well my goodness she just hit the ceiling. She quit her job and she never 

really has been friendly to me since. 

And that site was discussed but not - so if that's the result of it - you know, there's a 

lot of harm. If you don't have a press that's - that's, you know, responsible and will, you 

know, represent and respect your confidences a lot of damage can be done. But I guess what 

I'm talking about is responsible press you know. Most newspaper people will, if you tell 

them that it's - you know, what the story is. 

But this idea of considering that what's done at an official meeting is none of the concern 

of the public, I never agreed with that. I think that's wrong. This is the Open Meetings 

Act and they amended it - I think they amended it two years ago, didn't they? To try 

to broaden it or something? I had no problem with it, thought it advisable then and I think 

it's advisable now. 

Every time I did anything when I was Speaker I used to send out a press release. I didn't 

want the press to root around and think they made some great discovery. If I hired 

somebody, I told them. If I gave somebody a raise, I told them. I never had any trouble 

with them that I can remember. 

So that was a big bill I guess. I never could understand it. Representing local government 

I didn't see why they didn't want people to know it. I can still remember the hearing 

though, it was on two and a half, where the press is now I guess. Where you go in there 

used to be a big double-room and that's where the hearing was. I think it was in Judiciary 

Committee, I'm not sure but I think that's what it was. But I can still see Scariano just 

frantic. (chuckle) I never could understand why it was that big of a thing. 

Q: What was the nature of the opposition that it had? 

A: I can't tell you. (pause) Couldn't tell you. Maybe the city of Chicago, I don't 

know. Maybe schoolboards, maybe - you know a lot of people think that, you know, that 

what happens is not the public's business until they finally are ready to let the public 

know. So as I say there's the problem of when you're just discussing things of having some- 

thing come out as being accomplished when it really isn't and it may have a tendency to 

stifle conversation. Because if you can't pose a rhetorical question, if you can't get conversa- 

tion, discussion, flowing without somebody quoting you that this is the way you feel, you 

may be silent when you may not want that. But government shouldn't have to be secret, 


the better off you are the more you tell them I think. I can't remember who was oppoaed 

to it, but I know there was opposition. Being pushed by the newspapers was no small mea- 

sure. 

Q: Was he aiming it at all at state government itself? 

A: I don't think so because I think the state government is pretty much exempt. Committee 

meetinga have always been open ever since I was down there. I don't know of anything 

in the legislature that - where the press or the public is excluded. I can't remember any- 

thing in all the years I was there. It seems to me that the language of the thing excludes 

the General Assembly, I think it does. So there was nobody there that felt that what we 

did should not be questioned in any kind of way. 

Q: It was aimed more or less at local governments? 

A: Local government primarily. 

Q: One of the things that we haven't talked about too much from that session is the sides 

tax itself, how that all got accomplished. 

A: I wish I could tell you how it got accomplished, I think it was accomplished the nibht 

that Powell was elected Speaker. Because the ones who supported Powell were the ones who 

voted with the governor in the main, now there may have been a few others. But as a paty 

we stood against it but there were these "leakers" they called them. 

Q: What did they call them? 

A: A "leaker," you know. (chuckles) You know, from Watergate leaks. They were in the 

main. Now I think I'm right on this, I think George Dunne voted for it. I think George 

told me that the state needed the money and he didn't see why that should have been a 

party thing. I think that's what George said. It might be interesting to look at that toll 

call and see if I'm right. But he obviously was not part of the Powell thing. But he was 

a pretty - well he was a damned honorable guy. If he felt that the responsible vote was 

that way, I'm sure he'd do it. He wouldn't bankrupt the state for the Democratic party. 

But I didn't think - I was pretty naive, I didn't think it was going to get the votes. I 

thought that, you know, the Democrats had the majority and I thought there would be 

enough &gnblicane who wouldn't vote for it. 

There was a girl by the name of Bernadine Martin who was a reporter from Peoria. We 

were driving home and she was in the car next to us. I think I was with Lee Daniels - 

that is the grandfather of the present Daniels - and Bill Harris who - I think he's di ec- 

tor of - is it financial institutions now? He was in the house at that time then he 

to the senate and was Republican leader in the senate. I think the three of us *: 

driving. And I told Bernadine that I didn't think that Stratton was going to get the vdtes 

and she said, "Do you want to bet?" And I thought she was foolish at that time. Of co+e 

you how I was new, I didn't know. But he got them. 

It's dmogt impossible to hold party lines on that stuff. A few years later when Kerner 

wanted ta increase the sales tax they got Republican votes, they got Republican votes from 

the aenatom in whose districts there were universities because universities needed 

money. And that wa5 the ones from - you know, where Northern is, Southern, Western, 

those senatom were the ones who gave the Democrats the votes. And I suppose they had 

the univermty people aak them. So there's always something like that lurking around some- 

place. 

William A. Redmond Q: (pause) Memoir Is - Archives/ there anything Special Collections else we - need Norris L to Brookens cover about Library your - University first of session Illinois at down Springfield there? - UIS

A: Well I think we talked about Salt Creek, that drainage thing, that wasn't mine originally, 

it was put out by the Division of Waterways which was - I don't recall whether it was 

under Public Works and Buildings or whether it was separate by itself. But they had put 

together these studies and Senator Sprague from La Grange was the principal 

sponsor. That's the one I told you about where all the people in the watershed met over 

at Louie's Restaurant. That gave me my first interest in that subject matter. So I pursued 

it all the way through my legislative period with a four-year hiatus in which I didn't have 

many - see, what had happened is that you'd do something and the Republicans would grab 

it. (chuckles) 

Q: Do you mean under Ogilvie? 

A: Yes. Well the house was - they had ninety-some odd when we were down there in 

1970. So you couldn't get anything out of committee. You couldn't . . . Carl Klein who went 

to the federal government in some kind of capacity, he got to be an expert, they used to 

call him Clean Water Klein and with their majority, why, there wasn't anything you could 

do. You had a lot of that stuff. 

See, while they had a Democratic governor it went alright. I think that it's going to be 

pretty difficult for districts represented by people that are in the minority too. In some 

place, you take in Texas for instance, they won't let a Republican - you know a Republican's 

bill never gets called in committee. You know, that's just one side of a lopsided 

thing. Here in Illinois, Republicans and Democrats alike were treated pretty well. You 

know, there'd be a handful of things where they wouldn't but they could each represent their 

constituency. 

I see - well like this last session Ryan bottled every Democratic bill up in Rules, nothing 

came out. I can see that as a rule of thumb. You know, in order to try to set up for the 

next election so a guy can't go home and say, "I did this and I did that." He goes home 

and says, "I couldn't do anything." I see a lot more of that now. The only exception that 

I see is where they may have some little compromise, you know. But a member of the 

minority party is going to not have much success. At least that's what it looks like to me. 

Q: Do you see that as a direct result of the cutback in the size of the legislature? 

A: I think so, sure. See there was no reason that Hoffman and Daniels and I shouldn't 

get along in there. They were my two colleagues and of course we were all going to win 

anyway and that was true when, you know, when Walker was governor too. I helped them 

as much as - and they helped me too. But if I was running against - oh I'm not too 

sure. (chuckles) 


Q: There are those people that argue that you save a whole lot of money? I guess the argu- 

ment could be applied that if there aren't members of the other party helping each other 

out, there won't be so much spent, you know, there won't be so much done. 

A: Well I think - I think a perfect iliustration is who's going to represent the labor con- 

stituency in Du Page county? And it's a significant part of the area. I mean if their only 

solution is to go over and be Republicans you're destroying the two-party system . . . which 

I have a feeling is going to happen. 

Q: Do you think there will be any decrease in cost in running the legislature itself? 

A: No. The cost of running a legislature I don't think is the result of the size of it. One 

of the reasons for the increased cost is the staffing in the head offices. They have telephones 


and they have all sorts of things they didn't used to have. When I went there we got -- let 

me get this thing straight now, I wonder - I think we got ten cents a mile. We didn't 

get any reimbursement for meals, no reimbursement for hotel room. (chuckles) I'd get 

forty dollars a week. Whether I went down there one day, two days, five days, I got forty 

dollars. That wit@ my allowance. We got fifty dollars for all our expenses for two years. I 

mean that was stationery, stamps, whatever - fifty bucks for two years. 

So you see they've changed that now, they reimburse them thirty-six dollars a day per 

diem. I think that the mileage - that they will reimburse you the actual cost of the train 

or an airplane or - my memory is that the - I think it's forty dollars one way, I think 

it's twenty cents a mile. 

So my point is a lot of the increased cost is because of those kinds of allowances. And we 

had eight secretaries for the Republicans and eight secretaries for Democrats and now *any 

of them have a wcretary of their own and some there's one secretary. And of course thy've 

got all of the offices just so, they've got telephones. And of course the sdary is a little 

bit higher. 

But you know the difference between . . . you know the old size and the new is not what's 

going to cost the money in my opinion. And I predict that there'll be an increase in pay. I 

wouldn't be surprised if an increase was voted this fall, Well they'll all be 

elected. (chuckles) 

We got fifty bucks for two years and the first thing we got two thousand dollars, I don't 

know - was that a year or two years? And now it's seventeen thousand dollars a 

year? Very expensive. 

Q: Back when you were getting fifty bucks, what were your actual expenses? 

A: Forty dollars. 

Q: Forty dollars? What were your actual expenses. 

A: Well it was always more than forty. We would have three meals a day and I don't suppose 

you ever got - I suppose, it probably cost you fifteen dollars a day to eat in 

general. It probably cost you twelve to fifteen dollars a day for your room. I supp~se it 

would cost you twenty-five or thirty dollars a day. It was a losing proposition. And they 

criticized you if you let a lobbyist buy your meal. 

You know the cheapest thing would be to abolish the legislature and let the governor run 

it. If the only consideration was what it costs, why, that would be cheaper. Let's have 

a king. 

Q (pmse) Can you remember the first issue you spoke on on the floor of the house? 

A: I didn't say much, I never said much. (chuckles) (pause) That isn't where your work 

was done. Your work was done in committees, it was done on a person-to-person request, 

visit them at their desk, in the evening. (pause) But I don't think the oratory ever swayed 

very many people. I'd question that. 

Q: Well what do people think? They need to get up there to be heard? 

i 

A: Well there are some who feel that way. Of course maybe I was motivated by th fact 

that I wasn't really a very good speaker. You know I used to admhe guys like Alben I3 kley 

who was a real polished speaker, I used to think . . . I didn't have that gift. An then 

kind of a feeling that that really wasn't the way you succeeded anyway. Of course youlknow 

we're our own best authorities but I think I had about as much success in the legislature, 


particularly before I got into the position of Speaker - I mean it's no test when you're a 

leader because it's a lot easier, you know as Speaker I could do things that I couldn't do. But 

before I was in leadership I - you know that mass transit and all that flood control. I 

can't remember all the other things, but throughout the years there was a lot of stuff and 

most of it had a lot of meat on its bones. It's true it wasn't quarrelsome or argumentative, 

it wasn't against anybody but I think I had about as successful nonleadership legislative 

career as anybody. 

And I don't think that I would have been able to if I had annoyed everybody with getting 

up there every few minutes lecturing. I just didn't think that was the way to do it. Some 

of the best - well Frances Dawson was one of the best that I saw - she spoke every once 

in a while, but she wasn't up all the time. Will Scott from Bloomington was a very fine 

legislator and he rarely spoke. But he was beloved, respected. I think if you get a reputa- 

tion that, you know, that you're not so incourteous to members so that they don't have to 

worry about going back and having the newspaper find something in the bill that's really 

very harmful or something, I think that's good. If you have that reputation I think it's 

helpful to you. 

Q: (pause) The mass transit was probably your biggest accomplishment then in that first 

session? 

A: I would think so. 

Q: That's a big accomplishment for a career, you know. 

A: Oh yes, oh yes. I mean all the ramifications of it are still breathing and still living. I 

don't think there's any question about that, 

Q: Is there anything you could single out as your worst experience? Was there anything 

you felt like you learned from? 

A: Well I learned from that teachers' pension fund. You've got to be careful of those things. 

Q: (pause) One of the things we didn't talk about from your first session there was some 

emergency legislation concerning motorcycle licensing, 

A: Well yes, that bill was one that was put in to repeal a bill or a portion of a bill that 

had been passed in the previous session. Inadvertently they passed a bill which would 

authorize - I think it was people fourteen years of age and upward to operate a motorcycle 

or motorbike or some motor-driven two-wheel gadget without a license. And after it had 

been passed and the legislature had gone home it was discovered in a great uproar. I think 

there was as much uproar then as there was over the invasion of the Faukland 

Islands. Everybody in the General Assembly had to be identified with repealing it, whatever 

was done in 1957 was so offensive. So I was just one of those - quite frankly I really didn't 

really know too much about what they did in 1957 because I wasn't there. But I know there 

was a lot of scurrying around and scrambling to undo the harm. 

That happens every once in a while. The same thing happened in this last session. I 

can't - right now I can't remember what in the dickens the bill was but . . . you know, 

virtue just finally completely overcomes them. They have to be identified. I don't know 

what the corollary is, I guess it's, "Marry in haste and repent in leisure." Whatever you 

do in a hurry, why, you probably live to regret it. 

(chuckles) That was - I had kind of forgotten about that one. 



Q: You had more information that you wanted to record about the election of Powell fbr 

Speaker in 1959. 

A: Yes. According to to the newspaper account that I have here, it says there were five 

Democrats who went to the regular caucus and then walked out of the caucus. And I was 

in error when I mentioned the names the last time. The names that they have here we 

Representative Ferne Carter Pierce of Malta, Clyde Lee of Mt. Vernon, Edward Ebersbacbr 

of Shelbpille, Robert MacCarthy of Lincoln, and William Hollerich of Spripg 

Valley. Having read this I remember the - I question whether they're correct on Holleri~h 

but the other names are correct and there wasn't twelve there was only a small handfbl 

of them, there was four or five. I question that this is accurate because Hollerich did vate 

for, my memory is that Hollerich voted for Joe De La Cour. So I was in error, T had fqr- 

gotten the McCarthy. He was one of them. I'd forgotten about him and I'd forgotten that 

Lee was there too but now that I've refreshed my recollection that is correct. ! 

Q: And what you're saying is that these folks walked out of the dinner and they would5't 

join the pup that was meeting at the Supper Club? 

A: Yes. I assume that's where they went. I didn't go with them so I don't know but'it 

was a s yll group that, thinking back - incidentally do you want a cup of coffee? 

Q: I'll take a cup of coffee. 

A: Anything in it? 

Q: Just straight, 

A: That's. my kind of man. But I don't think Hollerich was there. As I said I know tbat 

he voted for De La Cour. He did vote for De La Cour. 

1 

Q: I think we finished up your term pretty well last t im~ Now I'd like to talk a little bit 

about the Kwner years. Were you involved in the nomination of Otto Kerner or any of 

the state officials in 1960? 

A: No I wouldn't think so other than that I was supportive. My memory is that there were 

three candidates for nomination in 1960. I think Joe bhman, who had been the sheriff of 

Cook County and state treasurer, I think he was a candidate. Steve Mitchell who was the 

forerunner of- the Independent movement, they used to have Democratic club8 throughout 

IUinois camposed of people who for some reason didn't want to identify with the regular 

party but they were Democrats and Mitchell was big in that movement. My memory is that 

he ww a candidate for the nomination, And of course Otto Kerner. 

And I was a classmate of Kerner's in law school and a pretty good friend of his so I was - 

you know the other two were quite nice, there was - you know it was a pretty good field 

as a matter0ffa&, there were three pretty capable people. I was very pled was tb&o&iee. ht in spite of my friendship throughout law school I 

ha-t in the, you know, in the Kerner administration. He was very 

nggds of h Page County and you know when I cam C there with 

pretty weU with it But I wasn't part of the thing. 

Kerner was really not a terribly political governor. I think he left the politics to the party 

otgmiaation. He contented himself with being governor. He was really pretty low key.$ I 

don" know whether the times were different than they qe today but he used to go w rk 

out in the YMCA [Young Mens Christian Association] and walk over there by 

himself. There was no big body guards and armed guards and all the rest of this stuff. 9 

William A. Redmond Q: Oh. Memoir Was it - Archives/ expected Special when Collections he was - nominated Norris L Brookens that Library he wouldn't - University be of so Illinois political? at Springfield - UIS

A: Why of course during the campaign the usual thing was that he'd be the tool of Daley 

and all that, you know that was said, But I don't know whether people really anticipated 

that he would be as apolitical as he turned out to be. You know you see all sorts of things 

now. For instance the president of the United States makes a big fuss on the steps of the 

Capitol and he's going to have a constitutional amendment to require the balancing of the 

budget. Well I think that was best explained in the editorial in this morning's Tribune that 

it obviously was show business, he couldn't possibly mean it. And there is other posturing 

that we've seen. I think that Governor Thompson on his proposition, Thompson Proposition, 

is another public demonstration. You know he made a big fuss about putting something 

on the ballot and all that. 


A: The Thompson Proposition, I mean that obviously was just a histrionics and I think 

that - quite frankly I think Class X falls in the same category. I can't think of any - of 

any other - I think Attorney General Scott when he was in there did quite a bit of it on 

pollution, you know a lot of posturing on that. Kerner didn't do any of that, you know, 

he was all business. 

I don't think the governor ought to be doing this either. As I recall he was pretty much 

of a you know matter-of-fact down-to-business guy. For instance now you see big fusses 

that the governor may, you know, trim originally two hundred million off the budget. Now 

he's going to wait twenty-four hours and then it's going - you know, it's all this stuff that 

leads, you know, to the perception that there's great economy, great study, great 

thought. He probably had it all figured out a long time ago. None of that was Kerner. He 

just ran the office and . . . 

Q: Do you believe that there were Democrats - or maybe that Daley wanted Kerner to do 

more posturing? 

A: No. I think Daley was perfectly satisfied to let it go the way he did. You know in any 

political party they'll worry about playing king of the hill. You know, who's going to be 

top dog. I think that may have been one problem with Dan Walker is that Daley perceived 

him as being a possibly a rival for the leading Democrat in the state. And I think that's 

one reason that they never got along. There may have been a certain element of truth to 

it, I don't really know I wasn't in on that. But I think it was perceived that way. 

But I think Kerner was a - you know in his way he was quite a political force, I don't 

think any governor, certainly no governor that I've seen has been accepted in the Springfield 

community more than Governor Kerner was. He was considered to be part of 

Springfield. The rest of them are only, you know, temporarily there, itinerant. And I think 

Kerner was pretty well thought of downstate too. So from that point of view he was a polit- 

ical force. People didn't fear him. 

Q: How did you see him being accepted into the Springfield community? 

A: Well word of mouth I think as much as anything. Then after he had that unfortunate 

experience with the law, the Springfield community rallied and they had some kind of a testi- 

monial dinner after he was out. And in my discussions with Springfield people - and I 

think even the Springfield newspaper kind of indicated a fondness for him. 

Q: Back in 1960 when he was ripe for the nomination, what kind of an organization was 

behind him? 

A: Well of course I wasn't really, you know, that active at the time. There was no indication 

William of any A. Redmond kind that Memoir he - Archives/ had less Special than Collections the full - support Norris L Brookens of the Library Democratic - University party. of Illinois Not at Springfield like you - UIS

hear now, you hear some question as to, you know, whether Mayor Byrne may not like Gover- 

nor Thompson better than Adlai Stevenson. I don't know whether that's true or not but 

there never was any such suggestion. That I think is something that came into when yo 

get local governments so dependent on other governments for financing. There isn't an 

Republican-Democratic dollar bill, they're all the same. 

Don't forget with the Ogilvie - well going back there was a history of legislative politic8 

that indicated the combination of a Democratic mayor and a Republican governor. That's 

where the sales tax came from and that was where the income tax came from was Governor 

Ogilvie. On a straight party vote, you know if all of the Republicans - the Republican8 

never could have passed the income tax without some Democratic support. And of course 

the price of it was that one-twelfth of the proceeds of the sales tax would go to the municiq 

palities, and Chicago. If we could have had a Democrat instead of Governor Ogilvie and 

all that voted on it was Democrats there wouldn't have been enough to pass that. It did 

take that combination of Republican and Democrats and the same thing was true with - 1 

guess that asales tax - that was before my day but . . . 

Q: (pause) Well at least - and then the 1959 session you were in, it was a combination 

like that then with the increase in the sales tax? 

A: I don't remember whether that was 1959 or 1960 or whether - it was a little later I 

think. No wait a minute that was six . . . that was Stratton. And there was an increase 

under Kerner too but the Republican support on that came from the senators that lived iq 

the districts that had institutions of higher education. That's where the Republican support 

came from. And that was kind of independent I think of the regular Republican party 

because they didn't have - we had those five, all the constitutional officers were 

Democrats. So there wasn't any you know real head of the Republican party through whoq 

we could work. Arrington probably was the leading Republican. I think - I may bq 

wrong but I think it was his bill that they amended and put the increase in the sales ta 

and I don't thipk Senator Arrington was in favor of it. (chuckles) I think he rebelled. 

course that happened in the senate and I still was fairly new in there so I wasn't involve 

in any of it. 

Q: Could you hlk some about the various tax increases that occurred during the initial pard 

of your career? Maybe you should sketch out for us just a little bit the financial situationi 

in the state in those early years in the 1960's. As I recall there was a lot of financial crises. 

A: Well there was. During the war years of course the state piled up quite a bit of money 

because it was impossible to - you couldn't have any road construction and everything went 

for the war effort. And then when Stratton was governor I think construction programs 

went on and when you got all through with it, why, there really wasn't very much money 

left. One of those years there had to be a transfer from one fund to the other because of 

a shortage of money. As I say I was pretty new and I can't remember all the details but; 

there was a borrowing from one fund to support - it seems to me that the general fund 

was way down and I think they got it from the road fund, that's my memory. See the road 

fund had a lot because they couldn't go in with this construction and the general fund was 

down and they borrowed from the road fund. Again my memory may be playing tricks on 

me, it seems to me that it was a modest amount. I think it was sixteen million dollars, 

which by today's standards doesn't sound like much. (chuckles) But that 'was paid back 

but there was a big hue and cry about borrowing that money. 

Q: One of the things that I've read about from that period, I'm not sure exactly how they 

operate, but there were some objections to the deficiency appropriations at the start of ses- 

sions and $omretimes for public assistance they'd be so much money in arrears they'd havei 

to paw somethi&g to make the . . . 

A: Well if what you're talking about is Stratton, Stratton's program always was - he'd 

never appropriate as much money as was necessary. I think he worked on the theory that 


if you have a lot of money that somehow you're going to spend it so he never - you've 

got to remember that I wasn't part of those negotiations but, my memory is that one of 

the very first things that would happen would be deficiency appropriations to make up for - 

and most of the time that would have been welfare too I think. But I think that was the 

way that Governor Stratton decided it was better to operate, to, you know, not have a lot 

of money laying around as a temptation for people to have to spend. (chuckles) I think 

that's the way he operated. 

Q: Did that change at all with the Kerner administration? Was there a different sort of 

budgeting going on do you recall? 

A: I don't remember Kerner coming in with all the deficiencies. Again I may be in error 

but I just - I don't recall that. I remembered the Stratton term because it struck me at 

the time that you know the very first thing that we had to do was come in on deficien~ 

appropriations. And it was all very new to me obviously. And I had discussed it once since 

with Governor Stratton and although he didn't say it I had a feeling that that was his 

method of controlling spending, was not to have too much surplus hanging around. 

See, you've seen the course of inflation and it may not be fair to compare today with those 

days but it used to be a pretty good state job that would pay sixteen or seventeen thousand 

dollars a year. I mean assistant directors in some of the departments and that sort of thing 

had to be the salary and as soon as the income tax came in those things were kicked way 

up to thirty and - I don't know where they are now but - but they went up almost 

double. Which seems to give a little credence to what I observed the Stratton policy to 

be. I think a lot of times people felt that if they got the experience in those high level 

jobs that it would stand them in good stead to - they never thought in terms of the career 

in government, it was a way to get experience and training and so forth and then when 

their term was over, why, they were better equipped to earn a living, to hold some important 

job instead of thinking in terms of this being the ultimate employer. That's the way it 

looked to me. 

Q: Okay. Maybe to spell that out a little bit to make sure I understand it: A governor that 

was going to operate by appropriating less money than what he really needed . . . 

A: Well I don't say he intentionally appropriated less than he needed but he didn't over- 

exaggerate his needs. 

Q: Okay. 

A: I mean I think he probably felt that this was enough money and then when things would 

come along - the tendency has been of recent years I think is to have an awful lot of 

money, probably anticipating demands on it. Where Stratton, I think he made a conser- 

vative estimate of what he thought would be enough. I don't think he, you know, inhntion- 

ally underestimated it. He certainly didn't. He didn't want to have a lot of money around 

to be temptation to . . . 

Q: He didn't anticipate increased demand in other words? 

A: That would be my analysis of it. 

Q: Did you have any sense that he was attempting to maintain a surplus in the general 

fund for a certain period of time or I guess I'd say he knew that he would have revenues 

that would cover him, the deficiency appropriations if it was necessary to go to that? 

A: I couldn't really say. I think he just ran what he considered to be a frugal operation. I 

don't think he wanted a lot of surplus money because the temptation would be there to 

increase expenditures, increase demands. 


Q: One of the things that in looking over some of the bills from the early sixties it seems 

like there was some sentiment among Democratic legislators to increase the corporate fran- 

chise tax as opposed to other taxes, Do you remember that being an issue at all? 

A: Well yes, the Democrats seemed to think that the way to finance government was, you 

know, to increase the taxes on corporations because I think it was pretty obvious to the 

people in the know that we're going to arrive at the time when we need more money. And 

they felt that it was less painful to take it from the corporations than it was from individual 

people. Clyde Choate was always - my memory is that he always had something in there 

going after the corporations and I think you'll find that bills that were in were probably 

in his name, I don't know. 

Q: Do you have any . . . 

A: You see that different philosophy in the income tax the way it is now where you've got 

a, you know, the built-in percentage of corporation as compared to individual's taxes. And 

of course one of the big differences, the corporations can take a lot of deductions which indi- 

viduals can't. So in point of fact, I don't know which is right and which is wrong quite 

honestly but some people feel the corporations are not paying their share and that individu- 

als are paying too much. 

Of course a lot of the pressure there was more money for schools. That I think - there 

was a great reluctance to increase real estate taxes. I mean what has happened to the real 

estate taxes in recent years is really amazing to me. Because I remember well - my son 

went to school at the same high school where Mayor Daley's son went and they had a break- 

fast down there, a father and son's breakfast. And Mayor Daley was the guest of honor 

and the rumblings at the tables that were near me were that Daley had increased their real 

estate tax, and those increases would have been pretty modest but the Chicago people wer4 

very very sensitive to increases in real estate taxes. So I don't think there's any questiod 

that in the Constitution of 1970, that part that's in there and trying to set out the role oi 

the state in financing education, that was put in there primarily at the request of the ernerg? 

ing Chicago Democrats because they wanted to avoid real estate taxes, increases in real 

estate taxes at all costs. And in my own humble judgment that, that . . . theory of getting 

money for local governments from some other governments is something that has kind of 

torn down, broken down the two-party system because instead of having one pie divided 

among five, why, now you have five pies. But it did accomplish the result at least in there 

of keeping real estate taxes down to some extent. 

And of course the other built-in restrictions about rate limitations and that sort of thing 

had the effect of curtailing the real estate taxes in other places too. But you had the ten- 

dency when the state money is available - of course there has been state money for quite 

some time but not in the percentages that it was recently. There was a tendency on the 

part of local officials to levy as little as they could and to get as much from the state as 

they could. So in order to try to make sure that there was some equity there they passed 

laws which required a certain qualifying rate, that is if a school district didn't levy a certai 

amount, why, they didn't qualify. And then because of the difference in evaluations the 

they got this multiplier thing. Theoretically they're all supposed to be assessing at the sam 

1 

level of assasaments. Now it's supposed to be a third. And that was because some woul 

levy at 10 percent and assess at ten. And some - in the more zrffiuent, they were a littli 

bit higher. But there was one school district up in Barrington that was in parts of four 

counties and they had different methods but it was all in the same school district. An4 

people in the same district, depending on what county they lived in, they paid different. 

of course my feeling is that whole thing is almost an impossible hodgepodge because eac 

Ani 

school district is on its own to - of course the biggest expenses are salaries and employeest 

particularly teachers, so down in southern Illinois they didn't pay their teachers very mucQ 

whereas in other places - suburban area for instance - they pay them pretty well. $4 

i 

we had different bases you know, (chuckles) 


!

Now you have the Chicago system. Downstate the teachers pay a certain percentage - I 

believe they pay a certain percentage of what it comes to. This most recent session author- 

ized the Chicago board to pay the teacher's part of the pension so there again you're throw- 

ing the thing out of gear because of a different formula of one place as contrasted to another 

one someplace else. 

One method of measuring the quality of education is how much money you spend. Well 

when you're coming from an area that's impoverished naturally you're spending less money 

and some place where money is not quite so tight, you're spending a lot more money. So 

the one's spending the least - that was that California case - Sorrento I think it was - 

they were trying to measure the quality of education by the money that was spent so that's 

always been quite a . . . you know hullabaloo on that. 

Q: Yes, I've read back and I've tried to go through some of the bills and some of the school 

aid formulas are so complex. 

A: They're complicated. You can't - see, another thing that happened back in those 

days - and I can't tell you exactly when it was - at one time theoretically they assessed 

it at full fair cash market value. Theoretically they were supposed to. And then of course 

when you change from that to a third, why, theoretically you restrict the revenue by - you 

only get a third of the revenue. So they got all sorts of complicated formulas to try to 

compensate for those changes in the level of assessment. And then there was a time I think 

that they - when they went into the full fair cash value. That would have increased a 

lot of them beyond comprehension. So then they put in certain restrictions and certain em- 

pirical formulas that - it takes a Rhodes Scholar to try to figure out what those formulas 

were. The only ones that I ever knew that really understood them I think were some of 

the people from the Taxpayers Federation. Velma Crain was a woman that used to work 

for them and when she'd recite the iormula it was like talking Greek. (chuckles) I don't 

think very many people understood it. 

But in a way the sessions were a lot simpler because we didn't have the, you know, the 

intense fight for money - well there wasn't that much money - and you know the fright- 

ful fights now on school aid formula, well I think that probably is more intense recently 

than it was when I went in there first. 

Q: Did it become more intense each session as you were down there or was there . . . 

A: I think so. 

Q: (pause) What would be the role of the superintendent of public instruction and people - 

I guess staff members of the state - what would be their involvement with these 

formulas? Were they aiming at simplification or trying to maximize the amount of money? 

A: I would think probably trying to maximize the amount of money as best - the first one 

that I remember in there was the old basketball coach, what was his name? 

Q: Ray Page? 

A: Ray Page. He was there - I think he was there when I went there. And George Wil- 

kina was there. He went in. But they were trying to . . . 


A: There was a big row by the Chicago Board of Education, Willis was there, Redrnond, 

Cannon, and some of the members of the board unless my memory is playing tricks it seems 

to me that Sargent Shriver was president of the Chicago board at one time and he used 

to come down there. You see Chicago had a - you know they had a legitimate gripe 


ecause certainly a lot of the money that went to Springfield came out of Chicago and Cook 

County and they felt that they weren't getting their fair share and of course - as I think 

I explained to you before, when the increase in the sales tax was contemplated it was &a- 

closed that Cook County and Peoria County were the only two that didn't get more out than 

they put in. You saw that evidence in a lot of things, for instance in motor fuel taxes, 

another one. There was a lot of that money and most of it would have been generated by 

Chicago and Cook County. And the distribution would go every way but there. They'd get 

some obviously but local little townships would get some and local little road districts would 

get some and municipalities would get some and so Chicago was always in there trying to 

fight for - and that's one rewon why Chicago always had pretty big vehicle stickers em- 

pared to the rest of the state because all that money would stay in locally. Rather than 

pay it in gas tax it would be distributed according to the formula that was slantea a ay 

1 

from Cook County. So they always had, I think, it seems to me it was thirty-five doll rs 

when some -of the others didn't have any, or if they had it would be pretty small, T at 

was one of their ways of getting around it. And I always felt that they had a legitimate 

gripe on some of that stuff. 

Q: (pause) So they were increasing the pressure then to get more money from the state 

for the schools, there's a constant battle . . . 

A: There's always a battle, that and roads. I think they were probably the two big 

things. Of course another thing too - for instance in the agricultural premium fund, 

which was something that was raised at the race tracks, sincg most of the money for +at 

c 

would be generated up here - part of that money was used to support county fairs all 

the state, even in areas that didn't have any horse racing. So that was always a fuss. S e 

of the monies from that fund went to McCormick Place, I can't tell you whether it wasjall 

or part, but I know - I know that - and there was a big fuss downstate on that. They 

didn't think McCormick Place looked like a county falr in any way so they didn't think 

that - so that was in there. And that's - it seems to me in this last session - of coqrse 

I wasn't there - but it seems to me that there was an appropriation for some of the mopey 

from that fund to support Chicago Fsst. 

But that agricultural premium fund I think was a creature of Paul Powell and t 

$ 

se 

fellows. They ware very interested in horse racing and in county fairs too. County f irs 

are evidently big stuff or at least they were back in those days. They don't amount to ry 

much up here but Du Page County has one. You know although the county has turned friom 

a rural county to an urban one, why, they still have a county fair and they make a big fuss 

over it. Ad they get some money from that agriculture premium fund. You try to put 

a race track in Du Page County and they cut your head off. 

Q: I can't figure wt why the county fairs were so important to Powell and so many other 

folks downstate. I can't imagine it, you know, having great political significance to them. 

A: Well the State Fair is important to them too. Part of that is patronage. Part of it was 

having a, you know, a friendly concessionaire, maybe you'd sell a lot of hotdogs down at 

the State Mr. But many of the concessionaires would be friendly. You know that's a 

~ltf811@ world up here. We don't think of that but there's a lot of people in Sprin 

who think af the State Fair. I. never could get that excited about it but, you know, I $"" 1 ed 

the State Fair down in Du Quoin, I used to go down to that all the time. They didn't reblly 

have a great deal but it was. . . . And the State Fair in Springfield, the livestock you kpow 

they have them the Arst or second day and they're gone. 

And up here we used to have the International Stoek Show that really was big. 

I was a kid my father used to take me to it, so my early memories go back to 

national Stock Show. Compared to that, why, the county fairs and the State Fair 

William A. Redmond mount Memoir to anything. - Archives/ Special But it Collections was big - for, Norris you L Brookens know, those Library - people. University There's of Illinois at a Springfield - UIS

was a business manager for our local schools who's from Springfield and his fondest memo- 

ries are of the State Fair in Springfield. I guess when he was a kid they'd have the ferris 

wheel and all that stuff. But in today's market with, you know, so many other competing 

things. . . . They bring in some pretty good shows that play at the grandstand. I guess 

they have auto races and that sort of thing. But I don't really think it's much of a fair 

as contrasted to, you know, that international fair that they used to have here which they 

abandoned too. But those were sacred. Were you from Springfield to begin with? 

Q: Yes. I worked at a State Fair for a few years as a young man. It was an 

event! (laughter) 

A: Well you know what I mean. I suppose it may have been a source of political power, 

you know, if you can give favors to people. I never can quite understand though, you see 

people in trailers that, you know, they're huddled together a foot apart and some kind of 

a charcoal grill and all they'd seem to do is belch out smoke and if you don't get your own 

smoke you're going to get your neighbor's smoke and they're brewing stuff on that and it's 

hot and no shade. (laughter) I just - you know where that campground thing is out on 

the side of the hill there. (chuckles) But down in Du Quoin, you know, they do have a - 

there's still a lot of that kind of thing but they're kind of out in places where there's trees 

and there's some shade and . . . 

Q: It doesn't look like disaster relief so much? 

A: No. See, I don't know why I have a weird attraction to the State Fair in Du Quoin but 

I do, I like to go down there. (chuckles) 

Q: Would you take your family down there? 

A: I did, yes. My wife and my children and well I always had a - you know they always 

had a cocktail party on the grounds and Mr. Hayes - it was absolutely beautiful and it 

seems to me that everybody and his brother was there. And of course when they had the 

Hamiltonian it was kind of - it had an international flavor. And every time I was there 

the weather was nice. Everybody was in a jovial kind of a carnival spirit and it was kind 

of fun, The fact of the matter is I may go down this year. I've been invited down there. I 

may go down. My daughter that lives in New York is inquiring when it is 

so . . . (chuckles) Probably bitten by it. Of course I've always enjoyed southern Illinois 

anyway. 

Q: What sort of spots in southern Illinois have you been attracted to? 

A: Well I've been down in Shawnee National Forest, Shawneetown where they had the first 

chartered bank in Illinois. That was a financial center of the state before Chicago. Fort 

de Chartres where the French flag flew, the old courthouse in Vandalia. I tried to find the 

first capitol in Kaskaskia but it's under water. (chuckles) The course of the river changed 

and you can't find it. And there's an old courthouse in Cahokia. I guess I've been around 

Pierre Marquette State Park and White Pines State Park, Salem of course. I've covered 

the state pretty well. 

Q: Now most of this you did after you'd been elected to the legislature, right? 

A: Oh yes, yes. I'd never done it before. And I think most of it probably was after I was 

elected Speaker too. 

Q: Why do you think that was? 

A: Well I felt that I should know more about my state, See, when you come from up here, 

William why, A. Redmond you think Memoir this - is Archives/ the - Special I never Collections had been - Norris in L Brookens Springfield Library until - University I went of down Illinois at to Springfield be sworn - UIS

into the bar. (pause) Then I felt that I should - I'd be invited by the Chamber of Com- 

merce and you know a lot of the local organizations and of courrre the occupant of the 

Speaker's ofice isn't important but the title is and I just felt it was the fair thing to 

do. They couldn't get the governor and they couldn't get the important guys so I used to 

go down. . 

Q: I see. So at that point yet you were actually, you know, representing the whole strte 

in that way? 

A: Yes. I thought it was the right thing to do. 

Q: (pause) Do you remember the first speech that you gave in downstate Illinois? I guess 

I'm thinking maybe further southern Illinois. Did you know what to expect from the crowd? 

A: Well they're extremely friendly people. Talk about people that are so proud of their 

area, anybody from southern Illinois always refers to it as God's country. (chuckles) They 

really are .proud of their country and they're very - well they're just very warm friendly 

people. They're so proud they want to show you everything. (chuckles) I remember the 

first time I took a tour of SIU [Southern Illinois University] in Carbondale. They had a 

tour - this was way back when I was in - they had a tour for members of the 

legislature. And they were so scared that they weren't going to show you every point of 

interest that they wouldn't even give you time to get off the bus to go to the washroom, 

and that's not a - that's a fact. (laughter) 

That first hime we went through all of that, the Ozarks or someplace down there where tbey 

closed the road off in the spring to let the turtles and the snakes go across the road ubtil 

they were - I do& remember where it is now. Some of those, you know, those river tobs 

way down there are really pretty small. I guess they've been losing population. And I Was 

over in the eastern part of the state too. I went around Edgar County, Paris, over in 

there. I think I blanketed the state pretty well. 

Q: How did you fsel about the development of downslate Illinois. I always think of, you 

know, what Powell and C. L. McCormick and every - Choate and all of them getting state 

institutione and things in southern Illinois. Did you feel that that was the correct way to 

approach it? How would you see southern Illinois developed? 

A: Well it's hard to say. I don't know what the potential of the area is. I think that with 

modern methods I think that what has been very poor farm land probably is capable of being 

pretty good. I know we had a member, Bill O'Daniel - I don't remember exactly what 

town he wm from but he was in the district that included Effingham and around in 

there. He aocumuIated a lot of land after the war and I gathered that, you know, it was 

pretty cheap and he made it into quite an operation. He told me that one year his seed 

bill was two hundred thousand dollars. Well you've got quite an operation when you s 

that much poney for treed. So evidently they have taken land that wasn't very produ 

and dona pretty well with it with modern methods and so forth. 

IOU 

I don't hagpen to think that the system of putting ped institutions in thw places m kes 

much enere. I mean I think that penal institutions should be located closer to where the 

people are eome from because - you know where you have better educational facilities and 

betbr medical facilities and more important where you have the families available. 

know you take somebody in Vienna for instance, in order for the family to go and see him, 

that cwts as much as a summer vacation. Somebody told me that, you know, with no public 

tramportation into the community itself and some of these people don't have automobiles, 

you've immunized the residenb and made it impossible for the their family to come and 

see them. I think that's a mistake, I always thought that was a mistake. I didn't think 

those things should have been built in Hillsboro and Centralia. I don't think it makeslany 

sense to scatter them around like that. It shouldn't be for economic reasons, because it will 


furnish a market or give somebody a job. That's not what the penal system is for. That's 

my judgment anyway. 

And I think it's unfortunate that that's the way that southern Illinois has developed. Maybe 

they couldn't do anything else, I don't know. But to have mental hospitals for instance 

down, all the way down in Anna and Centralia, Mt. Vernon, I would hope it could have been 

done better, because it was a drag on the economy of the state. 

But as I said I have one illustration of O'Daniel, and I guess the guy that was director of 

agriculture under Dan Walker, Cliff Williams, I guess he has rather extensive influence on 

it, so I guess it's possible you know, some people come out of there extremely wealthy, very 

very wealthy. I mean I could see the way they'd spend money on a campaign for instance 

compared to what we did up here. But that was the way it was done and I think it's - I 

would have hoped that it could have been done differently. Of course most of the - you 

know, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, originally it was a teacher's college and I 

don't think educationally it was really that good back in the early days. It's quite good 

now. It's, you know, it's got a medical school and a law school and I don't know what the 

student body is but it's big and of course it really has made Carbondale quite a 

community. The infusion of money in there must just be - I don't know what Carbondale 

would have been without it. Another one, Edwardsville, that facility - I don't know how 

many acres they have but it's big. That's I think a good university but I think originally 

it was as a way of employment. You know, to bring money into the area rather than to 

satisfy a need for education. 

Q: Was that ever stated overtly? I mean when folks looked at some issue like, you know, 

"Let's give a such and such school, astronomy school or something, to Southern Illinois Uni- 

versity," did folks say, "Well this will bring some employment into the area?" 

A: Well in the early days down there there was no mistaking that, you know, they needed 

it for the economy of the area. Now I think that when the medical school and the law school 

came on it seems to me that the argument was that those areas needed doctors and they 

needed lawyers and the theory was that you'd educate the local people and if they stayed 

in the community then it would satisfy a need for that kind of service. Now what the results 

have been I don't know. I don't know whether they are staying there or whether they're 

going other places to more fertile fields. I don't really think that you can find any more 

pleasant place to live than southern Illinois. Now whether it's that rewarding financially 

I would have no way of knowing but they seem to, you know, they seem to like each other. 

And of course the coal mining has gone down so badly too. I thought when the energy 

crunch came on the coal mining was going to pick up but evidently our coal has got such 

high sulphur content that it hasn't developed and whether it will some day I don't 

know. Evidently it's cheaper to take coal from Wyoming and transport it all the way across 

the country than it is to try to clean up Illinois coal. But when you go and you see the, 

you know, places - well even Springfield, Springfield is mining country. All that area down 

there. I mean you know I don't think there's a mining - I doubt that there's anything 

in Springfield, is there? I doubt that they have anything in Sangamon County. 

Q: I think Virden is about as close as we get for production you know. 

A: Is that Sangamon or is that Macoupin? 

Q: My geography is so bad - it's close to the line. I know there's some close but there's - 

I don't think there are any profitable mines working in the county right now. 

A: Macoupin County I guess has mines but . . . 

William A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - Q: Yes most of those aren't operating at full force I don't think. They're University cut of Illinois back. at Springfield - UIS

' 

A: And then of course without - that's another place that I went, I went to the coal mine 

country, I went down to Randolph County. And those were big open-pit mines. I've never 

been down - I haven't - I didn't get myself around to going down in a coal mine. But 

they, you know, they ruined an awful lot of the countryside when there were no regulatims 

on mining. You see all these lakes that look like they're full of acid and piles of - I guess 

they're slate, I don't know what they are - and then when it rains, why, it runs off and 

takes the foul stuff from this and puts it in the streams and they've done an awful lot of 

damage do- there. I don't know whether it ever was really productive but what theyire 

trying to do now is they have requirements that you take the topsoil and set it aside abd 

then they take the mine and then they put the topsoil back. It makes it pretty expensive 

but down in Randolph County they have some pretty nice-looking fields and they have pas- 

ture and they have cattle and . . . 

Q: When would some of those - the land reclamation bills and things - when would that 

tuff have been corning through the legislature? 

A: 1 can't tell you that, I don't remember. You know that was before I had ever been down 

there, you know, I wasn't as familiar with the need - although you go down Highway-55 

and just outside of Joliet you see some lakes and things that's pretty close to - and I guess 

out west there's some new ores and mines out there. I guess Illinois. . . . But they thought 

that, you know, that coal was going to - Illinois coal was going to satisfy the energy 

needs - I guess we have more coal than the Arabs have oil - but they haven't figured 

out some way to use it. 

Q: Was that becoming an issue while you were Speaker, the use of Illinois coal? 

A: Always trying to do - yes - always trying to figure out some way that we could c i- 

Wize on that. Fellowe from the coal mining area would always be sponsoring some 711 

for severance tax and trying to return some tax money to the counties where the - t at 

would have been local tax for the most part. And the utilities that would be using cbal 

used to fuss with it. They said that made the western coal cheaper than Illinois coal and 

it would have the adverse eikt as far as making it possible for them to use Illinois 

coal. There's hardly any isme that comes up that doesn't have two sides to it. 

Q: Mayb we,cwld get back to the sehools before we get too much farther ahead. Ap I 

look bat& on that period I get the feeling that Borne Stratton years, the K4rner years 

into ogilvie's administration there wmed to be a lot of folks working on school 

problems - is it School Problems Commission? 

A: Probably pne of the biggwt - School Problems Commission - 

* 

that probably was 

of the biggest ism= that we had and I think it probably was to try to keep the real es 

taxes down. I think that was the real motivation behind it. 

f 

Q: Was there-any way that they eould at all avoid that . . . 

A: '&They m. terrified of an increase in real esbts taxes. When you sss wh~t h.-s 

with m- &ate tax-, mayb they' didn't have to be quite ss wred, but they 

were. And- titen of eo~trse~the inequities, you know ther bdeney -of one area to raia as 

little as thay could so they got more from the state. A lot of the stuff that was done was 

to try to overcome that tendency. AB I say there was a qualifying rate for one thing md 

and the other one wa.s to try to figure out the multiplier, some way to equalize the 

assessment. And if they were d l doing it the same you'd look on the charts and rou 

wouldn't see any of the multipliers, they'd all be one. But very few of them were one. Tbey 

all vary, which is an indication of the variance of the assessment and I think that that pplio- 

ably was one of the biggest things in all those years. It may not have been for e*ry 

1 

member, you see, but it certainly was for leadership. 


It all depends on where you come from, I mean if you come from one place - I'll never 

forget that after I was elected, one of the very first things that I got was a letter urging 

me either to save the mourning doves or to let the mourning doves be gamebirds. Now I 

didn't know there was such a thing as a mourning dove. And morning to me at that time 

was M-0-R-N-I-N-G and this was M-0-U-R-N-I-N-G. So evidently it's a name that this dove 

does have a pretty mournful call and there's always been that fight among, you know, 

conservationists. Some think that the mourning dove - that you should be able to shoot 

it and hunt it, and some people think that it's so small that it should be protected. You 

know, they'll kill each other for stuff like that from certain parts of the 

state. (chuckles) Up here it didn't mean a thing. 

So the interest that we're talking about was not - you know, it depends on where a person 

came from. If they came from an agricultural area where agricultural interests are domi- 

nant then they're concerned with the, you know, agriculture. Of recent years the agricul- 

tural interests were fussing and rebelling about the environmental protection. And they 

were trying to get - my memory is that some of the members would try to get the Depart- 

ment of Agriculture to have jurisdiction of certain things instead of the Environmental Pro- 

tection Agency [EPA] figuring that those that are geared to the farmers would be less 

demanding. Now exactly what the environmental protection people were demanding that 

irritated the farmers I would have no way of knowing. 

That was another thing, I don't know whether that's still true but when Webber Borchers 

was there he was always after the EPA. (pause) Certain inspections, you know meat 

inspections and that sort of thing, livestock inspection - not that the farmers, you know, 

didn't want any regulations of any kind but sometimes they would be rebelling at the type 

of regulations. Take somebody out of Bloornington or State Farm or that insurance interest 

group, they were always very susceptible to, you know, interests of the insurance interests 

and of course the Farm Bureau used to be there too so they - they were big in that 

area. It depends on where you're from as to what your concern is. 

Take down in Madison County, now in that area where they had all big heavy industry their 

labor issues would be one of our - down on the front down there. And the fuss between - 

you mentioned the corporate franchise tax - the fuss between the business interests and 

the nonbusiness interests was always lurking around in there someplace. 

Q: This whole school issue, it did seem to involve a lot of folks. That was almost, it was 

a state-wide . . . 

A: Yes, it still is. 

Q: How did that debate come about? Who were the parties in the debate? There was the 

School Problems Commission and they were debating it . . . 

A: I think the School Problems Commission tried as best they could to . . . 


A: You had other local situations that - for instance again I think it was the capital stock 

tax that Illinois Power Company - I think they were big in Montgomery County down in 

Hillsboro and those areas. Also over in Adams County near Quincy there's some utility 

company there. They don't levy much of a real estate tax because of the funds that the 

local school districts get from resources. So any time that you try to do something to in 

any way curtail that and take that support away from the local schools for instance and 

put it - let's say you were going to put it in the state, then they all go up in flames. Their 

William real A. estate Redmond taxes Memoir are - Archives/ relatively Special low Collections because - Norris of the L Brookens support Library which - University they get of Illinois from at Springfield those big - UIS

utility companies that they have down there. I had put in a bill once that was going to 

disturb that. (laughs) I'll never forget Mike McClain's father was there and he came and 

told me what that would have done to Adam County. (laughter) I don't remember who 

was from the Sangamon and Montgomery County area but somebody else that - you know, 

it's amazing, you know, the special interests and the things that you really don't know and 

you don't - as long as everything is going along on an even keel, but you put something 

in.. . 

It used to always be thought for instance that all these special funds, these earmarkings 

of funds, was wrong, that it would be better to put it all in a common pot and then let 

the state appropriate from that pot. I put in a bill one time or cosponsored the bill to elimi- 

nate the earmarked funds and I think there were eighty-two separate entities that - of 

all such things as the Red Cross and - you know, all of them that had an interest in some 

little fund that - and you - it's like putting water in a gopher hole I mean and then watch 

and see where the water comes up. (laughter) You don't really know. 

And that was the thing - this has nothing to do with me serving in Springfield but - that 

was the amazing thing about the Reagan administration is they must have had a think tank 

or they must have had something because the things that they came in with shortly after 

their - they sure knew a lot of all these things . . . programs . . . 

(pause to allow aircraft noise to die down) 

Q: How do you mean? What would be an example of how they . . . 

A: Well I don't know, for instance the school lunches and all these things. They seemed 

to know - they - it was - it was mmething that they must have put together a l$ng 

time ago and then setting it off. How in the damned blazes did they know, you know, t at 

there was support here and support there and support someplace and even the C &A 

[Comprehensive Employment Training Act] programs and you know all those things have 

been building up throughout the years but they were zeroed in pretty well on them. I dqn't 

say that I agreed with a lot of the things that they did but they probably didn't have as 

many surprises as I had when I used to put some of this stuff up and find out where - @at 

I was treading on =me toes that I didn't realize. 

Probably the mast thoughtful study of the Illinois revenue was back in 1963 when they put 

out a h k and it really was superb and I think it still could be used as a bible and that's 

where I used to get some of my stuff and, you know, why in the world because some public 

utility company happens to be located in - you know, in a particular area - why should 

that support all be there instead of being available to the general distribution throughout 

the state? 

I'm not tm sure - and I don't think you could ever do it - I'm not too sure that as long 

aa the,&& hae got a serious responsibility to support the schools that they shouldn't have 

a littlb bit lpore to say about how the money is going to be spent. It doesn't really make 

sense Qor you to give me your checkbook and you make all the deposits and I decide 

f- 

ow 

Pm going to spend. I mean that's the way it really is with the schools because all t ese 

varbuo &ool districb . . . and that's big money, they all make their own decisions 

that soFt of thing and then come to the state and the state has no control over it. 

Well let's say teachers' contracts. I mean why shouldn't they all be the same? As long 

as there's, you know, state support there should be some control over them I would think. I 

think that makes sense but I don't think you could ever get it done. Even the local school 

district that would profit from something like that would complain about lack of local 

control. Try to combine schools sometime and find out. (laughter) 

Q: Yes I've read some of the hue and cry over that and folks say they want that sc ool 

i 

close to home and they want it, you know, under their control. 


b

A: And they don't ever pay any attention to it, they never go to a board meeting, they don't 

know really what amounts to operating it, they don't know much about it. But you talk 

about combining it and you really have trouble. I don't know how many school districts 

we have in this county. I don't really see - it's kind of a homogeneous county, there's no 

reason why you couldn't have all the same in Du Page County. Why one contract for teach- 

ers here and - see, now we have, here we have School District 2, the Elementary School 

District 7 and you join the town and the two of them together and make School District 

100 the high school district. The contracts for the teachers in 7 are altogether different 

than for the teachers in 2. The curriculum, the course of studies and all that sort of 

thing. Quite frankly probably originally because this was a larger community it was geared 

to the curriculum in this community. So when the kids from the Wood Dale area came 

maybe they didn't have the prerequisites that if - it would have made some sense to have 

them all together and have - you know. But you never can do it. They had a referendum 

and they almost have a fit. (chuckle) 

But school is the big thing. You know, on some of the things that attracted - one of the 

bills that was in fairly early in the game was one to determine whether or not a child is 

eligible to go to school, the birth date - that they had to be six, I believe by December 

the first. And studies, pretty serious studies, indicated that the kids who came in early had 

problems that didn't show up until the fourth or fifth grade. So they recommended, you 

see some kids on that December first, some of them would be quite a bit younger, possibly 

as much as a year or certainly s half a year younger than a lot of their schoolmates. So 

they wanted to change that and say that you had to be that age September first instead 

of December the first. Holy suffering cats, that really caused a - you know, people whose 

children would miss that September first and then wouldn't be able to go to school for 

another full year. Their children were all exceptional and . . . I don't think we had any- 

thing that brought as much fuss as that did. And it seemed to have a scientific reasonable 

background, I mean it didn't come in from any partisan stuff or anything else. Whether 

it was the School Problems Commission or which one it was I don't know but I know it 

was so hot it was almost impossible to vote on it. 

Q: Was it organized outrage or was it just individual parents? 

A: I don't think so, I don't think so. That would be one to try to organize and combine 

the schools even though the school would be tiny and not have enough finances to support 

them, This feeling of, you know, importance for the local community is really tense. There 

are some counties that are always - you know, they're practically bankrupt, they can't 

afford to pay the salaries to the county officials. You talk about combining. . . . And terri- 

torially you know there was a time that, you know, transportation was by horseback or walk 

or something of that nature so there was a reason why they did use separate little - I 

think in particular in the southern part of the state where there are some really pretty tiny 

counties that don't have very many people that have been unable to support, you know, courts 

or support the pay for the sheriff or that sort of thing. You talk about putting them 

together sometime. They'd hang you. (chuckles) 

There's this intense feeling that we have about my county or my school district. A perfect 

illustration is Champaign-Urbana. The economies that they could have there if they would 

put the two of them together. See, they have separate police, separate fire and all this kind 

of stuff. And separate councils and a separate mayor and the two of them together really 

are not that big. One of the arguments against it - every time they try to put them 

together it starts it over - one of the arguments that crime is more rampant in larger 

communities and if the two of them were together it would be a larger community and there- 

fore there would be more crime. Now how in the world could you expect that kind of an 

argument where you have one of the great universities of the world. (laughter) You know. 

It's really funny and that's the problem of a man in the legislature or a woman in the legis- 


lature is that you get catapulted into these things where there's this strong intense feeling

that people have and education or lack of it doesn't seem to have any relevance to the stropg 

feeling which they have. 

i 

I 

We have so many governments in this state. Jack Knuepfer and I were cochairmen o a 

commission to study some way of trying to either consolidate or if we couldn't do anyth' g I 

else to prevent creation of new ones and we didn't have much luck. 

Q: What commission was that? 

A: Intergovernmental Relations Commission I think was the title of it. My memory is that 

it was in 1965. I still think that it was one of the best reports that I've ever seen frem 

a commission. One of the things - I think I mentioned it to you - that we recommended 

is that no government should be able to levy more than 105 percent of its previous year's 

levy without referendum or without something else. If we'd been able to put that in there 

we wouldn't have all these real estate taxes going crazy. 

But the governing bodies don't want any curtailment of any of this. I mean they want to 

be able to do what they want to do. They want as much money as they can get. They 

don't really practice economy at the top. It used to be, find out what you're - like when 

we were in grammar school and we would look in the back of the book and we'd get the 

answers and then we'd work backwards - a lot of them keep calling the county clerk and 

find out what the assessed evaluation is going to be so they can figure out what they win 

put in, in the way of other appropriation, other levy, be sure they don't miss anything. 

Q: It seems that, it seems to me - and my experience is very limited - that there y e 

more local divisions now or else there are more local divisions doing more things - though 

I can remember in my childhood - I guess I'm thinking in terms of community mental 

health districts and township recreation and things like that. Has that been a trend or do 

you think . . . 

A: Well one of the reasons of course is that we have the limitation on - rate limitatiens 

for one thing and the limitation on bonding was another, not only bonds but 

indebtedness. And now you take a municipality for instance. If the municipality, if the 

village of Bensenville for instance, operated its own disposal facilities then the maximum 

that they could levy that they couldn't have had prior to the 1970 Constitution - they 

couldn't have had indebtedness in excess of 5 percent of the assessed evaluation to include 

all of them thing^. Whereas if they went off and created a sanitary district, that new dia- 

trict would have that 5 percent see and it wouldn't be included so. That was part of the 

reason, is becaruse of the limitation on the debt-incurring when you get into an area like 

this that went from - when I moved out here it was 103,000 and now there are probably 

close to 700poO0. It's pretty obvious with the needs of that expanded population that you 

just c0Wt ba restricted to . . . it happens at Bensenville. Their disposal facilities are 

included but that isn't true every place, there's a lot . . . 

So that's one reason why you created all these districts, is in order to get away from that 

limitation both of rate. . . . We11 for instance the libraries, I don't remember how many 

of thase, probably five or six different kinds of library districts, When I first got interested 

in the library here we organized a separate library district because if it had been within 

the village - the village could have had a library, but in the first place it would be territo- 

rial limib, it wouldn't encompass the entire community and you know the village couldn't 

collect taxes on anything outside of their own limits for libraries or anything else for that 

matter. So it would impose territorial limits and it also would impose financial limits. At 

that time the limit for the tax was .06 percent which I think - my memory is that it wwld 

have returned probably fourteen, fifteen, sixteen thousand dollars to run a library. yell 

how can you run a library on that? So you have another library district. You mak 


a little bit broader, wider, and then you're not quite as restricted in what you can do.

course what they did is they went in - and I had something to do with it - and increased 

the rate from .06 to .12. I don't know what it is right at the present time. 

But those were some of the reasons. And then of course if you had any capital improvement 

and you had to build something, if this library here would have been restricted to the village, 

5 percent of assessed evaluation, why, that would further restrict you. And it just didn't 

work that well and that was one reason that a lot of these districts were . . . 

And on some it was political, I mean if you want to control, you know, the development 

of your area, you don't want to reach out and take in a lot of hostile people because the 

people around the periphery of a municipality generally are not very friendly to the 

municipality. I think that's probably true. I think that's true in Springfield, I think that's 

true every place and in order not to have so many unfriendly voices, why, sometimes they 

prefer not to expand and take them in and that's where you get another reason for these 

separate districts of their own. There's a lot of different reasons for it, 

Sometimes - well there was one area where I was an attorney and I tried to convince them 

that they should broaden the base and the engineering and the legal and the financial control 

of the - you know, the larger part of the thing was different than the controlling 

municipality. And the people who had the control outside didn't want to be bound by the 

municipality's regulations. Zoning would be another thing. You know, you'd be subject - 

if you're in a municipality you'd be subject to municipal zoning. Maybe they would prefer 

not to be under those fetters but to be under county zoning or something. 

There's a lot of different reasons for all that stuff but the result of the whole thing is, I 

think, is too bad. We did have some recommendations, particularly in creation of the new 

districts. The requirement that you had to, before you could go out and have a new district, 

you had to ascertain whether that service was available from an existing district. I'm think- 

ing in terms of sewer and water and local existing district which could serve the area, organ- 

ize the district in which they exist. We had a formula we set up that I think had some - I 

think it would have been a good thing. It didn't work. (chuckles) Maybe if Du Page 

County had had a Mayor Daley. You know, somebody who was really dominant in control 

of the political setup maybe it . . . maybe Mayor Daley is the wrong figurehead to take but 

somebody who really had political control and didn't have any censorship, a guy out here. 

Q: So folks basically just wanted to protect their own areas? 

A: Pretty much, yes. But why in the world do you have all the police departments we have 

in Du Page County is a mystery. But you try to tell them that you should combine 

them! (laughter) 

Q: In retrospect do you think that there's anything that can be done in one or two fell 

swoops? 

A: Ultimately there'll be some changes. I mean these conditions were true in the Miami 

area, they had - Dade County I guess is furnishing a lot of the services we were talking 

about. It was true in Toronto and Toronto has got some kind of a metropolitan thing. I'm 

not that familiar with other places but I think that ultimately something will be done. But 

you've got to have a strong, you know, a strong leader to go out and do. I guess maybe 

we don't want to be dictated to and we'd like to have something to say. I think it's turned 

out to be extremely costly. 

And you know so much of your expenditure goes for police protection, You know, local 

police and sheriffs, between the two of them it's really something, And for the most part 

it's pretty inadequate, You know the sheriff only patrols the unincorporated area. And 

since most of the county is - at least in this area - is incorporated you know these little 


spots that - it's crazy that there isn't - I don't know whether it ought to be a township - 

you know maybe they're scared to death of giving the sheriff too much authority. I 

wouldn't be afraid of it but maybe that's the thing. Maybe it ought to be township. There 

ought to be some way to have all of these various ones studied. 

The same thing waa true with roads. You know you have county roads, you have township 

roads and municipal roads. (chuckles) I used to have the map and you know it would be 

a township for a short while and then a county for a short while and then a municipality 

and then township again. (chuckles) Very very costly money. Maybe when the real estate 

taxes really do get burdensome, maybe that's what it's going to take to . . . 

I used to really be interested in all that stuff. I still am to some extent. Real estate tares 

are far higher than they need to be if you'd combine some of that stuff. 

Q: Well, looking back through the record of some of those years, there were a tremendeus 

number of bills, you know, on the municipalities . . . 

A: Well I had a lot of them too. (chuckles) 

Q: Boy, now you were involved in many of them. I mean, you know, like they say, it's got 

to be done. 

A: Well I was going to remake the thing. (chuckles) I think the worst thing that happened 

to me was the four years under Ogilvie because the Republicans had such a majority in the 

house and senate that my program was pretty well scuttled. It got pretty political an4 it 

was impossible to - I think that most of the stuff I put in I think should have been done. 

I had a bill for instance to make it easier to decide whether you wanted to continue lith 

the township form of government. To have a township government with the money that 

they can spqnd in the eadern part of our county is crazy. The western part of the coupty 

they may serve some functions but they sure don't - why in the world we have nine asses- 

sors for instance instead of a county assessor just boggles my mind because there's a difter- 

ent level of assessment in each one of them. They could each one of them have a 

multiplier. And if - you know, it just doesn't make any sense, 

In order to establish a township form of government it only takes fifty signatures to put 

it on the ballot. To get rid of it, to give the people a vote as to whether or not they want 

to get rid of it, it's a certain percentage, so it seems to me that the number that wquld 

have to be on .a petition here would be almost impossible to get. So I had a bill in there 

that wouldmake it easier. You know, to have 2,000 signatures or something like that. 

And &

A: What do you mean? For flood control? 

Q: Or for - I guess just for - it would be about governmental reorganization or you 

had . . . 

A: Well there's a report on that. I can't remember all of the things that we had in there 

now. There was a lot of different things. Jack Knuepfer, he's now the chairman of the 

county board. I know one of them was, you know, you couldn't create any new district if 

there was an existing district that could render the service. That would have been impor- 

tant in this county because - and then there were methods of combining, 

consolidating. You see the trouble is that if you want to do it by referendum you've got 

a certain percentage of people that when you get a county that has grown like ours that 

the number of signatures required is something just astronomical and . . . you know, you 

can organize it, set up a township form of government with fifty signatures and if it takes 

you 75,000 to put on to get rid of it, why, that doesn't make any sense. 

But I think the townships' assessors ought to go, I think that the township board commis- 

sioners ought to go, In areas like ours - I'm not - you know downstate I guess the board 

of commissioners is a different ball game. Certainly up here there's no point to it. The 

assessors really should be county though. There's no reason for a township assessor. And 

for some reason or other they're always the best fundraisers. 

I'll never forget the time that - there's a newspaper, that we'll let be nameless, up in this 

area but in their endorsements endorsed every Republican candidate for county office in Cook 

County except the assessor. And the assessor was an incumbent and had been in office for 

a long time. So that told the whole lot of us the power of the assessor. 

I had bills in there to - my very first - they're having a big fuss now about the 

multiplier. In my first term down there - Ed Ebersbacher was my seatmate - and they 

were trying to get Governor Stratton to divulge the method whereby they arrived at the 

equalizer. And something was put in in 1959 to try to force that disclosure. So this thing 

that you see currently is nothing new. It's always been thought that the governor, doesn't 

matter who he was, could control the level of state expenditures. I had bills and I don't 

remember how many, but I had bills that would take that away from the governor and put 

it in some kind of independent body so that the, you know, the governor wouldn't be able 

to control it. But of course you know it didn't get anyplace. So this is really no new 

fight. This is an old one. 

Q: I'm starting to think back. There was during the Kerner administration - it was like 

1960 through 1965 - he did appoint some type of citizens' budgetary group or like business 

and professional people to look over the budget and there was all that controversery around 

the Budgetary Comrnmission I think. 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: Everett Peters was thrown off of that and replaced by William Murphy and . . . 

A: Budgetary Commission used to really be the - that really had control of the budgetary 

process. And I'm not - I wasn't involved. If you notice the stuff that I put in, I wasn't 

really that much involved in the budget and the revenue and that stuff. I was involved in 

stuff that had to do with my own county, its governmental structures and that sort of thing. 

But the most powerful position in the legislature was budgetary commissioner and some 

people used it, you know they used it to make sure that enough came to their district. Some 

of their people were hired on the payroll. At that time we didn't have the secretary of 

transportation. That department was Public Works and Buildings, and highways was part 

William of that. A. Redmond So if Memoir I was - Archives/ on the Special Budgetary Collections Commission - Norris L Brookens and I Library thought - University that Irving of Illinois Park at Springfield should - UIS

e four-lime, then approval of the request by the Department of Public Works and Buildings 

might in some way be related to whether or not they were going to make Irving Park four- 

laned. 

So that was the kind of power that they had and there was always. . . . Nub Peters who 

came from Champaign-Urbana area - I don't remember who all the other people were who 

were on it but . . . but John Lewis - it seems to me that Lewis was the Speaker, and I 

think we got through early, and they made the mistake of having the Budgetary Commission 

meet before we adjourned. And Murphy replaced Peters as the chairman of the Budgetary 

Commission and all hell broke loose. That was a fight, you know, that was higher than 

me, I wasn't involved in any of that stuff. 


A: There was an awful lot of bad blood over that, control of the Budgetary 

Commission. And I think Choate was always on that and Powell was always on that, and 

that had a lot to do with the development of southern Illinois too I think. (chuckles) And 

I don't remember exactly when that was done away with. It may - was that done with 

the new Constitution, they did away with the Budgetary Commission or was it prior to that? 

Q: I think it was - with my limited knowledge, I think it was under Ogilvie and I think 

he may have-done tbat;before the new Constitution. He just . . . 

A: That was a good government thing. It was a recommendation that the governor have 

control of the budget instead of the Budgetary Commission. I think that would be like merit 

selection of judges and, you know, all these good government things. I think that's wkre 

that came from. 

Q: Now back in the days you're talking about when the governor would not even divulge 

what the multiplier wae going to be - now he would keep that away from the Budgetary 

Commission or are you talking more about . . . 

A: Well the Budgetary Commislsion concerned itself with state revenues. The multiplier has 

concerned it& with the school aid, which was the main function of it. 

Q: Okay, sa they were two separate issues? 

A: Yes, ht to give you some idea of the intensity of the arguing over the school, 

Ebersbacker wasl from Shelby County and he was - I didn't even know what he was talking 

about but he was talking about this multiplier and the equalizer and there was this animosity 

and, '?&die sure that my county doesn't get cheated," and so forth. And that goes 

4; 

bprck 

to 19&l:and probably preceded that too. There were the Butler Bills and the Hodge qills 

and all-tiat kind of stuff. There was . . . trying to establish the - I think the Butler nd 

the Ho&e bd1e came in when they had different methods of evaluation. You know, he 

asseed &ti@ of praperty, that if you go along at a high level and all of a su 

you decree that it has to be lower all of a sudden they don't have enough money. You 

you automatically restrict them, or if you go - a low level, you go to a high one, al* of 

a sudden they have too much money. So all these formulas that they had to try to level 

that stuff out. 

Q: Did the programs come under the bailiwick of the Education Committee or was . . . 

A: I think that's where they were, yes. 

$ Okay. Now one of the first memoirs that I read, and I can't remember whose meioir 

it is now, that we did on one of the retired legislators. 

i 

I 


A: Clabaugh? 

Q: It could be Clabaugh. 

A: Clabaugh. 

Q: The accusation was made that Kerner somehow politicized this School Problems Commis- 

sion by appointing only Democrats to it, or there was some outrage expressed about what 

happened there, Do you remember anything happening in that regard? 

A: Well the makeup of that I thought was always a certain number appointed by the leader- 

ship of both the senate and the house and maybe the governor had some appointees, isn't 

that the way it went? 

Q: Yes, I think the expectation was that he'd put forth - you know, appoint three 

Democrats and two Republicans or, you know, some balance like that instead of five 

Democrats or people aligned with that. 

A: I can't remember that one. They say that you can tell from the stuff I had in that 

revenue and that sort of thing was not that high on my agenda. 

Q: Some of that stuff is very particular too, you know school aid formulas , . . 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: The books have followed that. 

A: Well aside from the ones that were doing it all the time most of the membership wouldn't 

know, I'll bet you that if you ask most of the members now about the formula they wouldn't 

be able to explain it to you. Very very few that could tell you anything about it. I don't 

know whether there's anybody today that has Clabough's position - Gene Hoffmann prob- 

ably would know. I think Hoffmann would know, I think Glenn Schneider would probably 

know. And I don't know who in the senate, possibly Art Berman. 

But then there was clearly defined people that - for instance like Peters in the University 

of Illinois and Crisenberry for Southern Illinois and Powell and Choate - Choate to a lesser 

degree. He wasn't really that important until later years. After Powell was gone, then 

Choate came to the fore. But prior to that time he was pretty much in Powell's 

shadow. Crisenberry represented that district down there. And of course the giant in the 

whole process was - was Arrington. He really was bright. (pause) Violently violently 

partisan in my early years but it seems that he mellowed to some extent later on. 

But you know sometimes they expect people to do things which would be their funeral 

services. There was some racial bill that Arrington doggone near lost his - it may have 

been open occupancy or fair employment or some one of those things which was quarrelsome 

in those days, that stirred up revolt in the Republican senate. I don't know, I wasn't in 

the caucus myself but Arrington had great difficulty. Oh, another thing that Arrington 

did - for instance on gun control, he was the fellow, he came from Macoupin County, he 

came from Gillespie and a coal-mining area and it's kind of hard to think of the courtly 

gentlemanly Arrington as coming out of the coal mines. But on gun control, that was pretty 

big in one of those sessions and Arrington came up with the idea of having some kind of 

a licensure of the owner, the thing that's a law today. And that was a very tough thing 

for him to do, very tough. 

In some ways he was like Dirksen. You know Dirksen did a lot, and in some of the social 

legislation, in the Senate of the United States that I'm sure was the statesman-like thing 

to do, probably would have been pretty unpopular with some of those people. Arrington 


did that and some of the - gun control is one I can think of and the other one was one 

of the racial things. 

Q: But basically these few people would be the folks that really understood the whole thing? 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: And were on top of it. You could pretty well tell from what they were saying what the 

facts were? 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: And how things were going to be? You mentioned Ebersbacher identified the problem 

to you, at least to make sure you weren't cheated on the multiplier? 

A: Oh yes. 

Q: Did he give you more guidance on that issue? 

A: No. No, I was a freshman so he'd say good morning and goodbye and he'd been there 

for a while. He was pretty prominent. He'd been state's attorney in Shelby County and 

I don't know how many terms he'd served but he'd served some and he was one of the more 

important members of the house. And then he went over to the senate and he ultimately 

was in the appellate court. Last time I saw him he retired from the court. I think his 

son is a ~tate's attorney down there now. Another big thing we had down there was the 

elimination of capital punishment. That was in the early days. That really - that was 

Bob McCarthy that I mentioned that walked out of that meeting - he was the sponsor of 

that. That drew a lot of fire. I ean't tell you how it turned out. 

Q: Was that so much a political issue? 

A: I don't think so. I don't know why Bob took it on because he came, at that time, he 

came from LincoIn which is in - well anyway, it's jugt - what is it? 

Q: Ch@ian County? 

A: No, it's $ I just north of Springfdd. Logan. 

Q: bgm County, that's it. 

A: Yes. And my guess would be that capital puniehment probably would be popular 

there. The only place the abolition is popular I think is around the University of Chicago 

and some of those places that may be - you know, some religious areas. But for the most 

part I #&kk most everybody thinlcs capital punishment is a good thing. And how 

into it&kt$t know. He did a superlative job on it. But that was a big thing, 

bmv E mnid more over that vote I think than my vote that I. . . . I didn't 

wal rQ,ht sad what was wrong. And then like EK) many things throughout the 

every My first term that was one of the red biggies. 

Q: Do you -member how you decided that the first time? 

A: No. I checked with the Chicago Crime Commission and the Encyclopedia Brittanica had 

a new wries and they made - they had - they'd make studies of various topic8 for you 

and I &ed them to research that for me. And I don't remember what else I did but I 

know I did a lot of independent research on the thing. Because I felt that, you know, if 

I threw the switch that that might be the one to turn on the juice and - you know, I dm 't 

realize all these delays and everything. P 


J

Somewhere along the line John Bowan who is now the judge of the circuit court was the 

state's attorney in Du Page County and he lobbied me to retain it, not that it was used 

so much but that it was a tool for plea-bargaining, the state's attorneys, that if the accused 

didn't have anything to lose, why, he might be inclined to take a gamble on a trial. So 

we thought that - not that they felt that they would abuse but it would be a way of getting 

a guilty plea from a guilty man if you had that specter of the chair in front of them. That 

was one of the times, now whether it was my first term or whether it was later on I don't 

know. 

And the irony of that was that he ultimately was a circuit judge and he was sent to Will 

County to hear a murder trial. A guard had been murdered by an inmate in the Joliet 

penitentiary and the jury recommended that sentence and John, he couldn't give it to him, 

which I thought was funny in the light of his lobbying me to retain the death penalty. But 

when the time came, he couldn't do it. (laughter) 

Q: It is a tough issue. Were you approached by a lot of different constituents about the 

issue? 

A: I would think so, not so much physical personal approach but a lot of mail. That was 

a hot issue. And it's a hard thing to do. You know some of the crimes people commit are 

just absolutely awful. My memory is that Ben Adamowski was the state's attorney in Cook 

County at the time and he was opposed to the abolition and he sent a resume - I believe 

it was the Chessman file. Chessman was a fellow out in California that I think had commit- 

ted quite a few murders and they were all just absolutely terrible, brutal, just awful 

stuff. And he included transcripts of some of the proceedings of the Chessman trial to con- 

vince us that we shouldn't vote to abolish it. 

Nobody can really prove anything. You don't know, you talk about whether it's a deterrent, 

I'm not too sure that's the test that you ought to have. But if it deterred, murder would 

never have been committed so you really wouldn't know. There'd be really no way of know- 

ing whether it did deter. But there's a kind of a tendency now that - you know, it used 

to be that murder was death, the ultimate punishment. But now I saw in the paper today, 

I don't remember where it was but in some murders that the suggested punishment was 

that they shouldn't be able to go for parole for ten years. So you run from one where you 

surrender your life and now ten years seems to be long enough. (chuckles) You know, what 

is the right sentence? Should you say ten years, should you make it fifty, twenty, keep them 

till they're sixty and then put them out and put them on social security? I don't know what 

the answer is. It certainly would be difficult to be gainfully emplayed if they keep them 

till they're, you know, in their sixties or seventies. 

Q: Have you changed? Have your feelings changed at all on the basis of your present 

experience? 

A: No. I - of late years I have not voted for the death penalty. I vote against it and 

I think I would persist in that. Some of these people it's pretty hard to find any redeeming 

features, but on the other hand - again it's dangerous to generalize - but from what I 

see it's either alcohol, dope or some kind of mental problem, deficiency. It's very rare when 

a perfectly normal person would commit murder. They might in a, you know, a triangular 

kind of fashion or something of that nature, but I mean there's always something else 

involved in the thing. And that being the case - not that you absolve a person if they 

voluntarily make themselves - you know, submit themselves to the addiction or dope or 

liquor. You can't forgive them completely but it's a little different category I think than 

the person who actually in coldblood will go up and put a pistol to someone's head and shoot 

him. But there are those infirmities in most of these crimes that I see. I'm not excusing 

it but that's the fact of the matter. 

Q: We talked quite a bit about taxes earlier and we talked about, you know, what the diffi- 

culty anyone would have in attempting to, you know, promote increases in the real estate 


tax. One of the things then that we talked about, Democrats from Chicago at least being 

in favor of, was increasing the corporate taxes. 

A: Well it wouldn't only be Chicago. I mean this is a party - the Democrats leaned more 

toward taxiqg business and not to tax individuals. 

Q: How would Mayor Daley for instance or someone in the Cook County party that d~es 

have some ties to business at least - I mean I know there are other ties but there's a lot 

of business support for the Chicago area . . . 

A: Well of course Mayor Daley rarely ever told us as a group what he wanted. I mean yop'd 

just see, you know, what his leaders in the legislature did. A lot of times it was hard to 

tell what people really did want because sometimes they'd say one thing but then when you'd 

see the results you'd kind of wonder. I think a perfect illustration of that is that we always 

had in our platform collective bargaining for public employees. But for some mysterious 

reason we never seemed to make it. And I'm not too sure that - before the Shakman case 

and before patronage and before, you know, the courts intervened, I'm not too sure that 

Mayor Daley really wanted that. I think he'd rather have the patronage system so that 

he could build his political party. And I think, you know, that the Republican counterparts 

are the same way, that Republicans out here don't want any part of that but that it was 

always in the platform and there was always a certain number of people who felt they meant 

it and they'd vote for it. But it just didn't seem to make it. As you say there are some 

very close ties with the Chicago Democrats by business. Town mayors out here with us 

and I think we're going to - one illustration of somebody that was friendly. But most of 

the time those things didn't happen. You know, you're just talking about them. 

Q: So those were proposals only. You know, they were never intended? 

A: Well I think it's like President Reagan's constitutional amendment to balance his 

budget. I think a lot of it's for public consumption. Probably Governor Thompson's atti- 

tude toward ERA, I'm sure it wasn't the be-all and end-all in his life. I think he probably 

would have voted for it but I didn't see any indication that he was going to break anybody's 

arm. It was always funny too, when they voted them up you'd see certain people 

missing. (chuckles) That used to tell the story. That was something that always kind of 

bothered me though. I just didn't feel that that was the desirable thing. 

Q: Do you mean strategic absences? 

A: Yes or, you know, voting something and telling someone else to vote no. And I thought 

you should be honest. You know, open and above-board and say what your position vyas 

and let it go at that. I've been naive in that respect. I could never tell anybody tha I 

was gob to do something and then work against it or the other way around. 

b r I 

Q: Did t&$:&rike any other leglslstors as increduloue -- I mean at first - of Uing that 

kind of @witi~g? 

A: I sup-, I suppose. It's always hard to prove that kind of thing. 

Q: (pauas) Well it seems to have served you well though. I mean the reputation you built 

up over the years. I mean, you know, you were able to get along with a great number of 

people and were very successful. 

A: Well I hope that they - you know, I'm not going to double-cross them. I think th&'s 

important. You may not prosper in the process but you at least prosper in yourself wh* h 

is important. I think I would just wither away if when they wrote about me they sai 

f 

I 

was a wheeler and dealer and I was slick and I was this and I was that. I wouldn't 1 e 

that. I 


I frankly think it's unnecessary. I just don't think that you have to do that. I think you 

unduly complicate the whole thing when you do that. Because the roads have a way of turn- 

ing, I mean it may succeed in one but it will catch you in something else. One of the best 

things in the world they have in the legislature is that you keep your word. The two recom- 

mendations is "Keep your word" and the other one is "Don't keep any books." Don't remem- 

ber too much about people and try to get even, that's a bad thing. Those are probably the 

two cardinal rules - at least it was that way, you know, starting early and I don't know 

whether it's still that way. I think it is to some extent. I see some forces in there now 

that are different than they used to be. How long they're going to last I don't know. 

Q: Who were some of the people that you knew would really keep their word to you on an 

issue in the house? 

A: I think most of them. I think most of the people are pretty slow to commit 

themselves. But once they committed themselves I think they - of course I went pretty 

slow in trying to exact promises too. Ekcause the kind of stuff that I had usually wasn't - 

you know, it wasn't the kind that would bother anybody else. You know I never had any- 

thing involved in currency exchanges or any of that stuff. 1 stayed away from all those 

commercial things. So that the stuff that I had - the only opponent for the most part 

would probably be - you know, it might be a Republican politician that was interested in 

preserving the township government or something of that nature. But I never had anybody 

that - you know, whether you should have the corporate income tax or that - you know, 

there was never any financial interest in anything that I ever had so I wouldn't run into 

tough lobbyists. You know, you try to do anything in the insurance industry for instance 

or the banks or farmers or labor or any of those people, you'd have a hell of a time. 

I never had any of that stuff, probably the closest thing I came is that one that changed 

the teachers' pension when I - but that was an innocent mistake on my part. I thought 

that, you know, that all teachers were all in accord on something. I didn't realize the differ- 

ence between the younger and the older teacher. 


Q: We talked a lot about some of the different taxes in this morning's session. I wonder 

if we could start just talking about the history of the income tax in Illinois; when you first 

heard the idea bandied about and discussed and what happened from then on. 

A: Well of course there was rumors that the state was needing additional revenue and it 

seems to me that every election that everybody was running against the income tax even 

though there had never - well there wasn't anything pending but they still were against 

it. And I don't remember who it was now, my memory is that I sponsored the income tax 

bill in the house. It was - I think Terrel Clarke was in the senate and I think he had 

one. It was - I don't remember who put it together, it may have been the Chamber of 

Commerce but I'm not sure. But I was on the bill. And there had been other attempts. It 

seems to me that John Morris from Chadwick, I think he sponsored the income tax at one 

time. So there were thoughts that, you know, that the revenue that we were raising was 

inadequate for the purposes. 

And I think quite frankly if it hadn't been for the need for additional revenue, primarily 

for schools to hold the real estate taxes down, I don't think there would have ever been a 

Constitutional Convention. Because the Supreme Court opinions up until that time had indi- 

cated that an income tax was unconstitutional, and in order to circumvent that 

unconstitutionality I believe is the reason that there was pressure for the Constitutional 

Convention. That and out of respect for a Republican woman by the name of Marjorie 


Pebworth who was a representative from the south part of Cook County who put in the reao- 

lution calling for the Constitutional Convention. And she died during the session and I 

think a lot of people - a combination of the concern about the income tax and Marjorie's 

death - she was a very elegant woman - I think were the reasons that the resolution 

passed. 

And strange as it may seem the Supreme Court did validate an income tax before the conven- 

tion so although they thought that they might have needed one they probably wouldn't have 

needed a convention. I question whether there would have been the convention if, you know, 

if that decision had been up, you know, a year or so before. 

And then it's funny the things that you think are going to happen . . . 

1 

not only for inco e 

tax purposes - to eliminate that 5 percent restriction on the ability to incur indebtedn ss 

on local governments. The limitation on the state's ability to issue bonds without referen a, 

that was another restriction that they wanted to get rid of. And as far as I person ly 

was concerned granting home rule was pretty important to me because I thought t 5 at 

Chicago, as big as it was, should have more freedom in how it was going to gov&rn 

itself. And I didn't happen to like the home rule thing the way it came out because it 

applied to municipalities of 25,000 or more which I thought was too small. I mean I was 

a village attorney and I thought I knew a little something about local government and I 

was much in favor of home rule for the large communities but I had reservations about the 

smaller ones, at least as small as 25,000. 

Q: What were your reservations about that? 

A: Well I, you know, I'm not too sure that government should be unbridled. I think if you 

don't have some checks and balances built in, why, people in power sometimes abuse their 

authority. That's the way I feel. Once they've done it, it's pretty hard to do anything abput 

it. And mind you I had represented villages off and on, probably a total of six and I $till 

had those reservations. And I still have them today. (chuckles) 

People don't pay that much attention to government, Maybe the fault isn't the 

system. Maybe the fault's in the people, but they really don't as a matter of fact. And 

I think the restraints are kind of justifiable. You have better restraints in a big city because 

you've got the metropolitan press. In these areas you don't have much of anything. The 

isn't really a local paper in this town. And I don't know how anybody would know what 

went on. You're certainly not going to have everybody in town go to the meeting. So if 

you don't have those safeguards - why, maybe it's recognizing the inattentive electorate 

but that's the way I feel about it. 

I thought that - you know, there was a necessity for the city of Chicago to come to the 

legislabure to get permission to do even the most minute things. To change the color of 

&e 8qw.d ear from rd to blue they bad to come to the legislature. And that seemed 

to me. And then I thought we'd get a lot df Chicago's business away from us 

would $hen ~pend our time on state business. But of wurse in the meantime you 

incomq tax :with everybody wambling for money. It didn't work out exactly 

thought it was going to work out. 

Q: (pause) What kind of limits would you put on home rule? 

A: Well grant them pretty good authority. There was a lot of restrictions that vere 

silly. For instance now a municipality could license a barber but not a beauty parlor. They 

could only license those things which were specifically enumerated in statute and when you 

have a change of economy and different occupations and everything, why, there was no way 

that - you know that the law has accommodated that. That's one thing that I can think 

of. 


The 5 percent limitation on indebtedness was unduly restrictive because what it did - as 

we had discussed a little bit earlier - it - I think it was one of the reasons why you had 

a proliferation of local governments. In order to get away from that restriction, why, you 

had to have a park district and they'd have a fire protection district and a library district 

and a river conservancy district and a drainage district. You can have districts on end 

and - better latitude, you know, along those lines and if you would have assumed the posi- 

tional function, why then, have some latitude on. . . 

(taping stopped to greet visitor, then resumed) 

Q: Okay, you just mentioned that eliminating the 5 percent limit on indebtedness? 

A: That was one of them and you know a little better licensure authority. They were really 

pretty restrictive on what you could do. 

Q: Did you envision home rule for cities the size of Peoria let's say? 

A: Possibly. 

Q: Or Springfield. 

A: Yes, yes. See the way it is now it could be 25,000. That's a fairly small town and by 

referendum something smaller than that. So even the tiny little hamlet, if they could pass 

it, could have had home rule and I thought that was too small. I'm not too sure I would 

have been so upset about 25,000. I guess probably the referendum provision for something 

smaller would probably have got me bothered as much as anything. But I thought for the 

large communities it was fine. 

See, it, you know, it's - there are so many illustrations of what you're supposed to do in 

the law and what they don't do. It would be nice if - for instance let's take a look at 

pensions for and firemen. Theoretically they're supposed to adequately fund 

them. Traditionally they don't do it. Well it's just like the state, I mean the state pension 

systems are grossly inadequately funded. The city of Peoria, at one time their police and 

fire and police pension systems, two separate ones, were only 7 percent funded. If they'd 

have had the right combination of beneficiaries - let's say that they had five or six or seven 

people killed in some kind of a catastrophy and their families all go on it, it would have 

bankrupted that system. The law tells them what to do but there's really no punishment 

if they don't do it. 

The same thing is true of, you know, the certain limitations on our appropriations. Time 

after time after time they'll go ahead and they'll over-appropriate and if people don't object 

to it they'll collect it. And when you get in local government, and I suppose it's true of 

state government, people think of the government as being the important thing instead of 

the service it's rendering to its citizens and they take offense at anybody who questions them 

because what they're doing is good for the government and what's good for the government 

is good for everybody. My idea of government is merely as a tool to, you know, render the 

service to the people and that the government entity in itself is not that, not the important 

thing. Well you see that in Springfield. For instance so frequently if you're a county 

person or a township person or a municipal person, why, that's the entity that you concern 

yourself with, I 

Q: Yes. (pause) Did you have much contact with the Constitutional Convention or with 

the . . . 

A: Not a great deal, not a great deal. See, we were in session part of the time when they 

were in session. But we didn't have much to do. They didn't - they looked down their 

long nose at us and I think for the most part they didn't think much of the legislature and 


could hardly wait till they could go home and run for it. (chuckles) There were a lqt of 

delegates to the convention that ultimately ended up in the legislature. 

Q: In my notes here I think I jotted down that you did introduce a flat-rate income tax bill 

in 1965. That would have been about the right time. 

A: Is that when it was? And I think Terrell Clarke had one that same year. 

Q: Yes. I think there was even one in maybe 1963, I'm not sure it was the same type of 

thing, if it was a flat-rate or not. What was your opinion at that time in 1965? Did you 

hi~k you were in bounds of the Constitution or was there some question in your mind 

that it may end up going to the Supreme Court? 

A: Well I thought - you know the court's decisions tend to change with the times and I 

had a feeling that as times evolved - and it was pretty obvious that, you know, sometbing 

additional was needed. I thought that the time - well it's like the equal but separate 

facilities you know, Brown vs Board of Education. For years and years and years the courts 

had held that it was alright if you have equal but separate facilities. Now all of a sudden, 

with no legislation, really not significant change, then they change their mind. They tend 

to go with the times and to accommodate the needs of the time. So I thought that that 

was probably going to happen. 

And I can't remember where that came from. My memory is that it was a Chamber of 

Commerce bill but it was pretty well put together. It wasn't just some wild thing that I 

took off the top of my hat. I don't know yet why - Terrell Clarke was the guiding light 

on the thing and why he asked me to handle it I don't know but he did. I don't remember, 

I don't think we got very far with it, I think everybody ran. (chuckles) But my melnory 

is that John Morris also had one at one time. He was always the spokesman and the head 

of the Revenue Committee when he was there. 

Q: Did you get much flak for introducing the bill or did people? 

A: I don't think so, I don't think so. 

Q: At that time folks in the Kerner administration were still indicating they didn't think 

income tax was necessary, right? 

A: Probably. 

Q: (pause) I don't have in my notes here whether your bill made it to the floor or not. Did 

it? 

A: I cqn't recall now. I would have my doubts. It wasn't very popular. (chuckles) But 

I tb&k&-was -- and of course I - 

Lo 

you know the thing that I was concerned about as 

the 4 wste taxes. And I couldn't see how we could persist until - you know, keep 1 ading 

tha d &tab taxes. I did & support the Ogilvie income tax because there w 

restructuring of the underlying. . . . There was no way that it would insure any kind of 

cap or ceiling on the real estate taxes and I think I was proven to be right on that one 

h u they've ~ both gone right ahead. 

Q: So your idea back there in the mid-1960's was, you know, seal the real estate taxes. 

A: I was hopeful that we'd be able to get that done. 

Q: Did you have a vision of part of the income tax being earmarked for the schools? 

A: No. I assumed that that's what would happen but I didn't visualize it that way. I pn't 


tell you for sure now, I don't know how those things - I was a little bit, a few years back

I would be a little bit more accurate but. . . . I - what was I going to say? I was very 

very concerned about the real estate taxes, put it that way, because - well you take out 

here for instance. We have a significant number of our people that are senior citizens, some 

of them living on pretty niodest social security. And with the real estate taxes keeping 

going up, I don't know how in the world they keep their home. That didn't seem fair to 

me. It seemed to me that taxes should be borne by those best able to pay it and not, you 

know, push somebody to the wall and in many cases for services that they're not going to 

need. So many people that have a real burden on their real estate taxes and don't have 

anybody in school now. That was really an overriding concern that I had. 

(taping stopped, then resumed) 

Q: We were talking some about the income tax. It seems in my reading that I recall that 

even in the year that Ogilvie got the tax through that Clyde Choate preceeded him with 

a bill on the income tax? 

A: I think you're right. I don't know what was the difference between that one and the 

one that ultimately passed. 

Q: What was the strategy? Or can you . . . 

A: I really don't know. You see the thing is that there was - quite honestly there was 

a rumpus among the downstate Democrats and the Chicago Democrats. The Chicago 

Democrats wanted the income tax because they were going to get one-twelfth of the income 

for municipalities and that would give them, you know, funds without raising the real estate 

taxes. And the Democrats downstate thought that in as much as it was a Republican mea- 

sure with Ogilvie - I don't remember who the sponsor was, my memory is John Conolly 

in the senate and Ed Madigan the house, I think that's who it was - but in as much as 

it was a Republican measure they wanted Republicans to vote for it. They didn't think that 

the Democrats should be on it in any great number and then let downstate Republicans vote 

no and then go out and campaign against Democrats and say, "I voted against the income 

tax.'' They thought as long as it was their party position that their party ought to be the 

ones on it and there was really a big rumpus on it. 

Do you suppose we could turn some of this on, would that louse it up? (indicates air condi- 

tioner) 

Q: Yes, let's give it a try, see what happens. 

A: So they, you know some of them didn't want the income tax but in the main they thought 

that as long as that was the governor's program that, you know, that downstate Republicans 

should not be permitted to vote no and then parade around and say that, "I voted against 

the income tax." For instance, Senator Knuepfer, the senator from - what was it? this 

district at that time, he voted no, And I don't remember the other Republican senators 

that voted no but there was a big fuss about that - a real donnybrook. 

And originally the bill in its original form did not have that differential between corporations 

and individuals and in its final form they had the differential. I think Choate was the one 

who put that amendment on but some of the Democrats who were in favor of the income 

tax, you know, threw out their chests about the fact that they got the differential between 

corporations and the individuals, 

But that wasn't the real fight. The real fight was, you know, "Make those Republicans get 

on there. Don't let them vote no and have half of the Democrats go on the thing." So 

that was, there was really a lot of hard feelings over it. Choate was in leadership and, you 

know, whether his was an independent voyage of his own or whether it was part of the whole 

thing I really don't know. 


Q: What sort of incentive might have been offered to get the downstate Republicans to go 

on that wrt of thing? 

A: Well it was their governor. They got - they had the roads, they had the patronage, 

they had whatever goes with having the administration you know. If your party has a 

position - if it was the other way around, if my party was putting it on I would have gone 

on it. I wouldn't have expected the Republicans to vote for it. But there was a real fght 

over that thing and there was a lot of hard feelings, real bitterness, on it. Of course there 

aren't many people left that remember all that now so that probably has subsided but there 

for a while it was . . . 

Q: Do you remember what some of those hard feelings were or specifically how it progressed? 

A: Well I guess they thought as long as it was a Republican measure that Republicans should 

be on that bill voting yes. And they shouldn't permit them to vote no and then pafade 

around and say, "I voted against the income tax" when it was their party that really did 

it. You know when your party asks for control of the state government, that carries with 

it the responsibility of financing it. Not to the entire exclusion of Democrats. Those fellows 

that came out of Chicago that had a safe district - instead of making it possible for a 

downstate Democrat to win the senate. I don't remember all the ramifications now. I know 

that we had a big meeting over at the State House Inn. Some of the members of the Con- 

stitutional Convention stayed there and they had a - I think it was a meeting between some 

of the Chicago Democrats who were with the convention and downstate Democrats and 

raising fuss and rumpus. Jack Hill who is now the mayor of Aurora probably was the 

leading spokesman of that thing. He was very incensed. 

But you change personnel and you change the times and - you know, it's like the Pmell 

thing, he was bad paper in 1959 and he was a party nominee in 1961. Dixon led the fight 

in 1959 to - you know against De La (=our and he ends up giving - you know, he got in 

leadership in the senate and then he was the party nominee for the state senate and secre- 

tary of state and ultimately a United States senator. So those things have a way of you 

know fading off into the horizon. Bitterness was expressed against Powell in 1959. Nobody 

in their right mind would say that in 1961, two years later, he'd be a party choice. They 

wouldn't believe you. But I suppose they were afraid he'd do the same thing in 1961. 

Q: Yes. 

A: Or:maybe they felt he was the only one that could - I'm not too sure the Dem rats 

sbwl4-bv1 gone after the speakership when they were in the minority. I'm inclin to 

think that was the wrong thing to do. 

C& why do you aid that? 1 

A: Well when you've got the majority it's your responsibility, I think you should 

organize The way we've done it in Illinois is that we've observed those lines pretty 

well. Of course that's funny for me to say I guess when I was a ben&chy of some Republican 

emsetover but it was obviw~ then that that was juat a - you know somebody's pose 

was ~t of joint. They weren't really serious of winning that particular battle, so I did have 

Reprrki#km~ support. Raditiondly the minority party doesn't try to take the speakership. I 

don't know whether it was ever done in Illinois other than that time. 

Q: hck there in 1969 were the Republicans considering any other type of a tax measure 

other than the income tax or was that pretty much decreed by what Ogilvie said? 

A: I think that was it, I think that was it. See, Governor Ogilvie didn't indicate any intqrest 

in income tax. I still remember that he came out of his stone cottage in Rushville 

William A. Redmond there at Memoir 83 and - Archives/ North Special Avenue Collections and somebody - Norris L Brookens was asking Library him - University whether of Illinois or not at Springfield he was - in UIS

of income tax. This was before the election. And I can see him casting his eyes heaven- 

ward saying that, "I see no necessity for it." I don't think he was responsible for it but 

it certainly wasn't very long - whether he spoke without thinking prior to the election or 

whether he really didn't know I don't really know. Maybe he didn't know the real fact. 

Well for instance today you know the finances of the state must really be pretty acute or 

the governor wouldn't be suggesting that state employees curtail their - what does he want, 

4 percent? I don't remember now whether it's a reduction or whether he wants them to 

work five days for nothing. Something like that, some sacrifice on the part of the state 

employees. It must be a lot more acute than what they tell unless that's just a political ploy 

to make everybody think that he's Scrooge as far as the state employees are concerned. I 

think that most people feel that government employees don't work very hard anyway, that 

they're probably overpaid, and have too many. My experience is that there's been - there's 

more dedicated hard-working state employees than there are the other kind. I know when 

I was Speaker the people who were working - Speaker's staff and Speaker's office - you 

couldn't ask for anything any better than they were. 

Q: (pause) Once the income tax passed what sort of reaction was there among the 

members? Was there relief? Was there still that bitterness? What did folks think? 

A: I think the bitterness persisted because as I say - of course it gave the Democrats an 

issue against Governor Ogilvie I guess, but more importantly, as far as individual members 

were concerned, it took away a possible campaign issue in their next race against Republican 

opponents. I think that persisted for quite some time. And a lot of stress was laid on the 

fact that there was that differential between the corporation and the individual. That didn't 

really sooth anybody. The guy they were going to run against, they wanted him to have 

voted yes. (chuckles) 

Q: As the income tax passed was there a sudden flood of money that nobody knew what 

to do with coming in or was it pretty well gone after . . , 

A: Well I think it was a billion dollars of new money. I think that's what it was and I 

don't think they had it earmarked. I don't think it was a question of setting out all your 

expenses and saying in order to get this much money we have to do this. I think the decision 

was made to levy the income tax at whatever rate they had decided and I don't think it 

was in response to those, you know, the accumulation of all the appropriations that are each 

department's. And when you saw the way that, you know, everybody's salary went up 

and - I can well remember the assistant director that would have been ecstatic to have 

got an appointment at $16,000 and it went up to $30,000 is my memory. Sixteen probably 

was low, wasn't it? 

Q: Probably. 

A: I don't know about that but . . . 

Q: Back in that year $30,000 was pretty much too. 

A: What? 

Q: Back in that year $30,000 was pretty much. 

A: Oh yes. I don't know how long it took before it ate it all up but - of course then when 

inflation came and wages went up, why then, the revenues were increased pretty 

significantly. You know you can say that you didn't raise taxes but if you benefited by the 

bracket creep, you know, in effect you really have raised them I think. 

William Q: Yes. A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

A: Even beyond that point. 

Q: Yes. So after the income tax was passed were there attempts then to reduce the real 

estate tax or . . . 

A: Not that I'm aware of. Nothing from the kind of power that it would take in order to 

do it. Isolated . . . 


A: If the mayor is not going to work with it, it automatically pretty nearly reduces it to 

below the required vote. Or if the governor's against it. My experience is that it's very 

very dicult - with the makeup the way it is and the control the way it is - very difficult 

to ever reduce the tax revenues, very difficult. Unless it would be just so, you know, so m- 

popular that there was almost an open revolution. They respond to the threat of open revo- 

lution pretty well. (chuckles) 

Q: One of the things that happened - maybe before we get into Ogilvie's administration 

too much I'd like to go back to the Ketner administration. One of the things that happened 

during those years was the creation of the Department of Public Aid. I think it was Harold 

Swank who was the first director? 

A: Yee, yes. My memory with Harold Swank is that he worked for the county public aid 

and I think he was generally well respected in that field. I think he really waa a 

profesaiwal. I don't know that - I hesitate to say, "tainted with politics", because politics 

is the way we run our government - but there never was any suggestion of any impropriety 

or political decidon as far as he was concerned as far as I know. He was very well regarded 

by both Republicans and Democrats. I had no idea what his party was. I assumed it was 

Democrat but I don't know. Well there again that probably was going to be - I don't know 

about that, I - that again was pretty early in my term. 

Du Page County had the lowest incidence of welfare of any county in the state so public 

aid and welfare was really not big with us. It was handled by township supervisors and 

whatever aid there was was handled by the local township supervisors. 1, guess the reaaon 

for doing it was in order to shift the burden to the state and away from the local - I guess 

it was the county that had it before. I think that's what the motivation was. But there 

again it wasn't something that, you know, concerned Du Page County that much. 

I had kind of forgotten about that, that did happen there. 

Of mume I think the Kerner administration was very big on creation of a junior college 

system, my memory is that Representative Jeannie Chapman was the house sponsor of 

that. &&J I don't know whether that was because of response to studies that had 

&Wid wdm Strasttoa w. just where it all came from but I know that all these commu ty 

edlw mm aa r mu1t of the K m r work. T" 

Q: Well you were involved in that pretty much. Weren't you on that legislation too? 

A: I mafihave been on it, yes. But Jeannie was the one who carried the ball. It certainly 

h been a big expansion of higher education that started in the Keraer 

administration. Whether we're equal to the California system I don't know. 

Q: What was some of the motivation for that? 

A: Well the only education that was available in Illinois at that time was 

t 

either priv te 

education in Chicago, De Paul, Loyola or go to the University of Illinois or something to 

I 


get away from home. And I think they felt that if they didn't put it within the financial 

reach of more people - if they could go at home, stay home and go to the community col- 

leges for the first couple of years and then complete their education someplace else - in 

addition to that it probably was felt that - well that it afforded higher education to more 

people and it may have weeded out those who probably shouldn't have gone. There's a lot 

of failures at the University of Illinois, particularly in English, the first year. They thought 

that maybe community colleges would weed those people out. I think those were the two 

points but primarily to expand the opportunity for education for more people at a price that 

they could afford to pay. I know going to the University of Illinois was pretty expensive, 

or any of the others where you had to board. 

Q: Were there folks opposed to that Junior College Act? 

A: I can't remember. I suppose there was. 

Q: It wasn't a thing where there was a great private school lobby or even a parochial school 

lobby? 

A: I don't think, I don't think. I'm not aware of any great objections from them. Of course 

you see that the burden of higher education really - the metropolitan area in Chicago was 

carried on almost exclusively by private schools until the Circle Campus came in. I can't 

tell you when Circle Campus was. I don't remember whether that was under Kerner or - 

you know what education there was was either the normal schools or the private 

schools. And that was throughout. For instance in this county we had Wayne College, 

North Central College, George Williams which is - I think it's YMCA - and Elmhurst 

College. Those were church-oriented private schools. 

Q: So to your knowledge those schools didn't really feel threatened by that type of an act? 

A: I wasn't aware of any opposition from them. The opposition usually comes the other 

way, the public institutions feel threatened by the private and any effort to have any kind 

of tuition credits or any scholarships or anything of that nature is resisted very strongly 

by the public institution. But I haven't been aware of it in the reverse, You know in 

Chicago in addition to De Paul and Loyola there was North Park which was a denominational 

school. I think Governor Thompson went there, I'm not sure about that. The Rosary Col- 

lege in River Forest and Mundelein up around Rogers Park, San Xavior on the south side, 

YMCA College. Roosevelt University, I don't just remember when that came in. Eleanor 

Roosevelt was instrumental there so that probably was - I just can't remember. But 

Chicago, as big as it was, was practically all private schools. 

Q: (pause) There was also . . . 

A: Medical was Loyola, Rush Medical, Chicago Medical College, the University of Illinois had 

something. What were you saying? 

Q: There was also considerable increases during the Kerner administration in tax on gasoline 

and on cigarettes and some sales tax increases. Do you remember any of those contro- 

versies? 

A: I don't remember them being - you know, nothing like some of the controversies I've 

seen down there. I think what I said about lack of surpluses and shortage of money about 

roads probably was the reason for the increase in gas tax. During the war years there were 

no road constructions and then all of a sudden there was a lot of construction and then 

the money was gone. But somewhere in there there was enough money in the road fund 

to borrow from and put in the corporate fund. But it was still a small amount of money. I 

can't remember when the Kerner gas tax increase came but I don't think it was in his first 

or second year as governor. 


I've never been able to understand that. You know I think there should have been a gas 

tax, in fact I had a bill in in this session and I think I may have had one in three years 

ago. I thought that additional money was needed for the roads and I don't think that the 

public is - that they're complete fools. And I didn't think there would be that kind of 

resistance if you increased the driver's license and you increased the license plate fees and 

have some kind of an increase. You know it's not too long ago that you paid thirty cents 

for gas and now we're paying what? a dollar and forty and we're still buying it. I think 

they would have recognized it. I think people - you know, they underestimate the int li- 

gence of people. The public body thinks you're going to get in trouble for that. I d t n't 

think you d. That's a difference in philosophy. I've always felt that - you know, if tou 

have a good case and you make your case and you tell everybody - that you don't h ve 

that much to worry about. 

Q: Well a lot of folks are fearful of that sort of thing, even at a cent a gallon or something, 

A: No, I never was, I never was. I did what I thought was right. I never had too moch 

trouble getting returned, I know I never ran one-on-one, I never you know. I might have 

felt differently if I had but I jurjt felt that, you know, you do what's right and you have 

to aseume that the people are not fools. I blame the press to some extent for 

emphasizing - when it's obviously a need it seems to me the press perform a disservice 

when they keep harping on it. I think when there's a need there's a responsibility on the 

press to lay off you know. (chuckles) They keep insisting that the income tax did Ogihie 

in, I'm not too sure that's my thought. 

Q: Was it sometime during the Kerner administration that you were a member of the 

Committee on Rods and Bridges? 

A: I don't recall that I was ever on that. Was I? 

Q: It seems like I had you marked down for one term on that but maybe I'm - maybe I 

misread that, 

A: I don't think I was ever on that. I was on Education, Municipalities, Judiciary and Per- 

sonnel and Pensions for several terms in there. And then one time I got hblic Utilities 

much ta my chagrin. I didn't like that one very well. 

Q: How did you happen to get on that? 

A: I don't know. (chuckles) I don't know but I didn't think much of it. That may have 

been during Ogilvie'e term when the Republicans had control. 

Q: Oh. 

A: Job Ccgmally.was chairman of it one time and Dave McAvoy wars &airman. I d 

4 

n't 

know m!bthr I was ever on Iwurance. I don't think I wes. But the utility cornpan - 

when the RepuMcans had control the utility company really ran the show on at 

one. Them wtrsll't much mint in wasting everybody's the on that. ! 

I note that you were the vice-chairman of the Judiciary Committee then? 

&: A h 

A: That was when Mikva was chairman. That was in sixty-, was that 1965? 

Q !That's what I had, yes. 

A: Yes. 

Q: What sort of things did you do in that capacity? 


e 

! 

i 

!

A: Pray that Mikva wouldn't show up so I could chair it. But he came all the time so it 

wasn't that important. (chuckles) Of course he was a pretty bright guy. Those are non- 

political committees, that Judiciary is really pretty much nonpolitical. I think I told you 

earlier that I really enjoyed membership on that thing. It's not quite as good now that 

they've separated them into criminal and civil. Then we used to do everything. 

Q: Yes. I've actually noticed your name on a number of bills. I mean those were criminal, 

civil law. Your name may not be sponsor but it would be on there. 

A: That was a very enjoyable committee, that was a great membership to have. Bernie 

McDevitt - I don't recall all of them but some of the best brains in the house were on 

that. (pause) You didn't know what to expect in the way of a bill there, sometimes they 

could knock your hat off. 

Q: I guess those early Kerner years were some years when it's identified that the court 

system in Illinois was somewhat modernized? 

A: It seems to me that, yes, that we did away with the JP's [Justice of the Peace] and the 

magistrates, didn't we? 

Q: Yes. 

A: Yes, we set up unification of the court system. The person who had the most to do with 

that in my memory was Alan Dixon. He was the senate sponsor of that. And that was 

going to be the panacea, I voted for it I think. I'm not too sure that it was right looking 

back now because we have - the last time I looked at the report we had three and a half 

million cases filed in the court system, of which two and a half million were traffic cases 

and I'm not convinced that we have to have all of the court of record and the whole rigama- 

role for speeding, you know, and all. I think that had we improved the quality of the magis- 

trates and JP's that that probably would have been all that we would have had to do. And 

the court system is like other things. The court system is running away with itself costwise. 

The worst thing with the JP system is the lack of qualifications of magistrates and 

justices. Looking back now I think I would - in my judgment there should be some change 

in handling of traffic court because, you know, how much judicial determination do you have 

to make if a fellow's going sixty-two in a fifty-five mile zone you know? (chuckles) There 

is an awful lot of that - improper lane usage and all. So as I say, the last time I looked 

there was two and a half million cases in traffic court. You don't need to be involved with 

the judicial system to take care of that in my opinion. 

Q: The changes that were made, were they really the lines of least resistance with the JP's 

and magistrates who really resisted upgrading? 

A: I don't really know. There was a lot of criticism of the JP system. And in some places 

of course it probably was pretty bad. In some places it wasn't that bad. We had some 

good JP's in this county. We had some horrible ones but we had some good ones too. I 

think if they'd have made the requirement that they were - you know, should be lawyers, 

and have some kind of restriction on other activities perhaps. Also furnish them some kind 

of courtroom facilities. You know a lot of them were at their home - you know, in their 

barn and sort of strange places. And there was a tendency - let me see if I can get this 

right. It should have been flat filing fees in that kind of a thing, court costs. They got 

paid out of the fines and costs assessed. I'm not too sure about the fines but they were 

paid out of the costs of the system so there were places where the JP would enter into 

cahoots with his officers, split with policemen all fees they'd get and all that kind of 

stuff. Now how prevalent that was I don't know but it was prevalent to some extent and 

that caused a lot of hard feelings and criticism. There could have been things like that 

done probably that - I don't - there's no way that you can ever turn it back though 


cause the judges have got such power for some reason or other. They'll never turn it 

back now. 

Q: You say they've got such power for some reason or another . . . 

A: Well take a look at what happened to the pay raises you know. It went right 

through. That's the only office that I know where you could increase - there's a prohibi- 

tion about increasing salary during a term except for judges. You can increase theirs during 

the term. 

Q: What is the source of a judge's influence? Is it their power within the party, local par- 

ties? 

A: The power in court decides. You know, who decides whether laws are 

constitutional? Who decides whether . . . you know there are some political decisions but 

I think . . . you know, they don't want to have the judges - who can really have a strangle- 

hold on the governmental process - they don't want them to be angry. 

Q: I think I also recall there were some changes in juvenile law and juvenile court during 

those years but I don't have it right in front of me. I'm not sure what those were? 

A: I couldn't tell you too much about that. I do remember that reorganization of the court 

and judiciary though and I remember that Alan Dixon was the principal sponsor of 

that. He had a lot of trouble with that because that was another one that - you knopr, 

the political setup in Illinois is divided pretty much into Cook County and maybe a few biggp 

counties and then the downstate, particularly the rural southern part. And those JP's $or 

the most part I'd wager were practically a11 Republican and those that weren't Republican 

or - you bow, they would not be eligible to be judges under the new system so they had 

a certain amount of political power. And it was quite a testimonial to Alan's - he tried - 

my memory is that he tried that several times before he finally got it through - and,it 

was a testimonial to his ability and tenaciousness. 

As I lodt bsrek at it now there were parts of it that I think it was wrong. And I think 

it's unnemwry and those two and a half million traEc tickets I just can't believe that we 

need. . . . That would be the opposition from the, you know, the old-line politician, both 

Republican and Democrat, but it didn't affect the Cook County Democrats to the same extent 

keause there were no JP's in Cook County, I don't think, I may be right on that. 

Q: Do you know how nixon went about orchestrating all of that? 

$ 

A: I don't know. I well remember him working the floor in the house. My memory is 

he only got the bare minimum that it required to put it on the ballot. He did it the w y 

everybody lobbies. He cajoled and coaxed and entreated. When Alan Dixon got his te h 

into something it was a real strong personal feeling and he was into this one, he really wqs, 

more than anything I ever remember him being interested in. And in a way it was 

of odd because he was from St. Clair County and the JP's and the magistrates and all th 

people - and that's a strong Demoeratic area - I'm sure that they didn't want it. 

prabab1y:put a lot of his friends out of business. 

Q: Do you know why he was into it so much? 

A: I think that Alan was a - he's a very good lawyer - and I think that he felt that pdo- 

fessiogally that the system, you know, was not compatible with the admiriistration of justice 

and he just felt strongly. I don't see any personal - nothing personal in it for him. You 

know sometimes you see a fellow who might agitate to increase the number of judges a d 

then the first thing you know you find that he's on the bench. Well that wasn't the & 

with Alan with this ease, it didn't do him any good. That was a long time ago. In f* 

I 


it might have hurt him politically. He's had pretty good political success. It seems 

unlikely. (pause) I don't remember many things that he sponsored but I do know that one 

and I think most of his sponsorship was on stuff that really, you know, it was not Mickey 

Mouse. 

Q: That was a major change? 

A: Yes. 

Q: 1'11 give you one final judiciary question. I notice there are a lot of amendments to 

divorce law and things like that, those kinds of elements of the civil law. Was there any 

reason for that? Were our laws really archaic during that period? 

A: Well I don't remember exactly what they were. I know that sometimes there would be 

efforts made to expand the grounds on which divorce would be granted. I don't know 

whether it was during the Kerner years. One thing that was done was to make mental 

cruelty a ground. It used to be Illinois was a relatively tough state to get a divorce in, as 

far as the printed - you know the grounds that were set forth in the statute. You know, 

extreme and repeated cruelty. Well I'm not too sure that there are that many instances 

where a husband actually beats a wife physically. I think it's as many - I have a feeling 

that because of the tightness of the grounds, it didn't really keep people together but it might 

have been an instrument for perjury and that sort of thing. And there were some people 

that were practicing matrimonial law that felt that these changes were necessary. I don't 

recall now but in some states the only grounds was adultry. So what happened, people 

would go someplace else and get a divorce. 

There was no policy as far as Kerner himself was concerned. He didn't do anything. It 

seems to me - wasn't there quite a violent change in the adoption law during Kerner's 

administration? And my memory is that Senator Bill Harris probably was behind that and 

Harris had a deep abiding interest in the adoption law. Now just why I don't know, whether 

there was a history of adoption in his family or he was an adopted child or just what it 

was but he was strong on that, very strong. And he had been on some commission that 

was studying the adoption laws and some thought that maybe babies were being sold and 

all that sort of thing. 

And Kerner had said - he was a county judge where adoptions came up - and he had 

adopted, what? his daughter. I don't know whether he had adopted her and then when she 

was married and had two children then the two Kerner children now that you hear about, 

those were actually his - he adopted them - his wife's grandchildren. But Kerner 

always sat on the adoption thing himself. I mean he had such a strong personal empathy. 

There were two cases, two types of cases that Kerner always heard. One was they used 

to have hearings and psychiatric hearings out at the psychiatric hospital. Kerner always 

took care of those himself. And he always took care of the adoptions. When I say always, 

well there might be an odd case here and there but he was, you know, he was a warm kind 

of person, 

He had an interest in - he and Harris I think were on the commission that studied the 

adoption laws. Do you remember there was The Cradle in Evanston that was - you don't 

have much in the way of adoptions now but there was some criticism. Whether it was well- 

founded or not I really don't know. I'm thinking here, I'm pretty sure that that was during 

the Kerner years that there was the amendment to the adoption law. 

Q: Yes. Are there any other judicial-type issues we should look at for a minute here? 

William A: A. Offhand Redmond I Memoir can't remember - Archives/ Special any. Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS

Q: Well I feel like we've, you know, made a good start in covering - one that we haven't 

talked too much about is the reapportionment struggles and I don't know where to begin 

with that issue but that was a large bout. 

A: Most everybody was not really involved in those thinffs. You know the first time that 

I came woes that wss in 1964 in that at-large election. Remember the Constitution pm- 

vided then that 3 they didn't come to an agreement and set up a map that each party woyld 

put up 118 and they'd run at-large and I would have thought - you know naive that I am - 

that it wasn't to the best interest of either party to take a chance on the other side havibg 

118. 1 would have thought that some kind of compromise is better than that because the 

Chicago people - if you had 118 Republican house members, there were times that there 

were as few as seventeen . . . 


A: They wouldn't compromise nor would the Republicans so as a result we had to - you 

know they had an at-large election and the Republicans headed their ticket up with President 

Eisenhower's brother, Earl Eisenhower, and we headed ours up with Adlai Stevenson. And 

the Demowats, you know, they were correct, we had the 118. But I wasn't aware of - you 

see, it wasn't that big of a thing out here. 

Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that they would ever cut the legislative distritts 

up the way they have, with parts of this county and parts of that county. You know 'in 

my judgment regardless of party I think the political boundaries should be honored whateder 

that may do as far as parties are concerned. But we have - I'm not too sure of alljof 

the boundary lines now, they're so - you know, we have so many districts and they're so 

wild. But at one time we had a district here that had part of Du Page, part of Lake, part 

of Kane, part of Cbok. Well the thing is, when you fragment them like that, that - p u 

know, that no constituency really has much voice. Give me a district where 25 percent is 

divided up into four counties and I don't really have to worry too much about two of thgse 

counties. And 1 think it's terrible, I think this map that the court gave us is just absolutely 

awful. The same thing is true with congressional maps but it never occurred to me that 

the second largest county in the state would ever, that they'd ever do to it what they did. 

So I didn't get involved. It didn't make any difference to me what they did as long as I 

thought that Du Page would be taken care of alright. It wasn't until this last one that 

it was really a monstrosity. 

Q: Were there folks in Du Page that were extremely concerned about it? 

A: I'm not too sure the average person cares. The ones that are most concerned are the 

ones Wt want to run and think that they will end up with a district that they can't win 

in or mm&ing like that. I don't know. You don't find that great an indignation on the 

part of &he people. I don't think most of them know what the state legislature doea. My 

first term down there some young girl, probably high school age, leaned over the railing and 

said, "What state are you from?" She thought she was in Congress. (laughter) So I ddpl't 

think tbt the average rank and file has the slightest idea of what the state legielature does. 

Q: Well the other legislators that you sat with there, was the reapportionment on 

everybody's mind at the time? 

A: Years ago? 

Q: Yes, in 1964 or whenever it was? 


A: Not until - not in this county, not in this county. Because you see we used to be 

part - at one time we were part of - this was before my day - but I think we were part 

of Kane and Du Page. And then we were - I know that a couple of years before I ran 

that it was Will County and Du Page County but they never cut the counties up in little 

slivers. We never had that. Of course the one man, one vote may have had something to 

do with that and they tried to work it within such. . . . I think those narrow little popu- 

lation guidelines are not very feasible. I think the underlying political entities are of more 

importance to the population. I think that Du Page County should have its legislative dele- 

gation, should be, you know, pretty homogenous and shouldn't be part of Kane and part of 

this and part of that. In one way out west one time we had a tiny little sliver of Du Page 

County was in one that had part of Kane and part of Kendall so those people would never 

pay any attention to them. It never had any real weight. I just never thought they'd ever 

do what they did. It just never occurred to me. 

Q: Would you look at what was done as being a fairly malicious act? Do you think folks 

were actually saying, "Let's carve up Du Page?" 

A: On thinking, I don't think they really - they didn't do it out of malice. 

Q: They just thought, you know, some of those suburban people can be cut up any way, you 

know, and put with any other? 

A: Oh I don't think there was any malice involved. Don't forget, you know, part of the thing 

is that they wanted to give weight to the minorities so there's one district over there, I don't 

, remember the number of it, it was 65 percent black and they nominated a white candidate 

for themselves. How do you explain that? Part of the map was put together in order to 

take care of that minority over there and then they didn't commit themselves. I think that 

had a lot to do with the way the map came out, to try to do something for the Latinos 

and to try to do something for the blacks, And I don't know whether any Latino was nomi- 

nated but there have been districts where the Latinos had a pretty strong voice and they 

still didn't assert themselves. So you can do all the theorizing you want but if the people 

in the area don't want to bring it to fruition, why, it's not going to happen that way. 

So how can you, you know, stand off and objectively make some kind of analysis? this is 

what's going to happen, that's going to, I'd rather have a far bigger variance in the number 

of people in a district providing it isn't completely ridiculous than to came up, you know, 

political subdivisions like municipalities and counties and that sort of thing and carve them 

up the way they did. Elmhurst, really a big city, they lost practically everybody that was 

in the legislature. They put them in with Cook County. (chuckles) From a party point 

of view I don't think it makes sense because you know, it's said, "Well it's the Democrats 

that did it." And the people - although the general average main run person doesn't get 

that involved. Some of the people in government don't like it. And for the little gain that 

you get out of it I don't think it's worth incurring animosity. I have a different theory than 

most people and they have all been a lot more successful than me so they're probably right 

and I'm probably wrong. 

Q: Well I can't imagine you, if you were on that committee back there in the mid-1960's 

to work out reapportionment, that you couldn't have come to agreement with somebody on 

it. I mean there was . . . 

A: Well I think I would have, I certainly would have made a great effort. I'd never let it 

go to 118 of one party if I could help it. But they did. 

Q: Do you think that folks on both sides approached it seriously or do you think there 

was . . . 

A: I don't know, I wasn't involved in it so it's pretty hard to say. But I just can't believe - 


it was pretty obvious that one was going to guess and it was Republicans obviously that

guessed wrong. (chuckles) The Republicans guessed wrong again this last time. I don't 

know who wouldn't compromise but there should have been a way to get it together. 

Q: How do you feel about the whole reapportionment process? You know, it's done so . . . 

A: I don't think the legislature ought to do it. You know, to have those that have the vested 

interest in the thing doing it is kind of folly. I don't know what they do other 

places. Maybe I'm asking, you know, for something that's impossible. I think it would be 

better to have some kind of bipartisan involvement perhaps, but I haven't been imprersed 

with the quality of the work that the legislature has done with it because they go in looking 

for an edge. If you go in looking for an edge, why - you should go in looking for fairness, 

that's one thing. But this cutting up of municipalities and countiee and that sort of thing, 

it's just awful. 

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