William A. Redmond Memoir - Illinois Digital Archives

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
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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
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after the election was over in 1948 then you were ii private practice here
in Bgnsenptitle.
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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.
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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.
William A. Redmond Memoir - Archives/ Special Collections - Norris L Brookens Library - University of Illinois at Springfield - UIS