Leland J. Kennedy Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

This is going back, and I don't have a copy of it anymore, and I think somebody found one
for me, but I didn't get it. When we went in the General Assembly, and at these, meetings
I think that the council had, we were given a hook by - it was an imaginery tale, by Itussell
Hale. And he was supposed to have been a member of the General Assembly. And it was
strictly fiction. Didn't they at one time nominate IJnited States senators at the mob convention
in Illinois in its history? And I think you'll find that that's true.
Q: I believe that's true, yes sir.
A: And he got - and of course, it's like any other convention you go to, whether it's a political
convention or a lodge convention, they generally have lobbying going on behind the
scenes. In other words, the voters didn't have the say. They sent delegates to it, and 1
suppose it was a cut-and-dried affair. I'm sure they had some deliberation.
But that book,
I'm sure that Bill Day could tell you, 1 don't know about whether Bill Hey could or not,
it was before his time, but Isakoff, he could if he was here. The llonorable Russell Halc,
I think that's what it was, and it was a book about - it was a book maybe, a hardbind
book, about that size. (Points to Blue Book) Maybe two-thirds . . .
Q: Two-thirds the size of a Rlue Rook?
A: Two-thirds the size of this particular Blue Book, they vary in size sometimes. That gave
a tremendous history of ward politics and county politics and district politics anti things
of that - a political book of Illinois. And about the mob convcntion. And he was instrumental
in getting it changed to where you had the primary elections for United States
senator. And I tried to get a copy of that, maybe even since I've left the assembly. And
someone found a copy for me down in Florida in a library down there, or some museum
of some type. The Council found - but I never did follow through on it. I don't know
why I didn't. I don't think I was even in the assembly, or I might have been working for
Redmond. I just didn't follow through, maybe sheer neglect.
But it was very interesting. It had his picture in the front. Of course it was supposed to
be his picture. Whether it really happened, whether he was a live character under an
assumed name, I think that's what I wanted to find out. But those things were quite interesting.
Q: no you have a sense or a feel as to why they finally reapportioned in 1947 after all those
years of holding it off?
A: Well I imagine that the public almost demanded it, and the press 1 imagine - I always
say the press runs the country.
Q: Oh?
A: I think maybe that they had a guilty feeling maybe, not individually but as a group of
lawmakers in the state. You were supposed to reapportion evcry ten years, and you hadn't
done it for forty years, and maybe they had a guilty feeling, not onc of crime maybe, hut
of lack of legislative decorum or duty, or things of that nature. 1 think that brings on reapportionment
all of the time, and after they do it every ten years, why, they're going to do
it, but I think that was the chief obstacle in Illinois. They were just too damned ornery
to do it I guess. I mean not ornery in the sensc that they - they just didn't do it for
lack of initiative, might be a better word to use.
Q: Did you feel an urgency at that time, that it ought to be donc?
A: Well I think that that particular session did, and I suppose it had to come from the socalled
leaders of each party, and each side of the aisle and I don't recall any particular individual
that instigated it. 1 don't recall much about it. I recall it happening now, and it