Victor De Grazia Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

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A: 1 think he probably said, "Thank you1' to us in a very formal way. I would imagine that's what he did. I don't really remember. And then we went down and, again, the victory speech, and then up again to plan the press conference for the next day. This time, obviously, we had to have a press conference. Q: At that point what was your position vis-a-vis Daley? A: Cordial. Dan called him that evening and there was no hostility. Daley had helped a great deal financially; to my knowledge, more than he'd ever helped any candidate. Daley wanted Dan Walker to win. I don't think he wanted him to lose 'cause he wouldn't have come up with that money if he had. It's very easy to say no. Tape 3, Side 2 Q: How do you remember that time between the election and the Inaugural? A: Well, let me touch on one other thing first. Before you go into a press conference you have a briefing session. What are the tough questions that are coming up and what are you going to say and, you know, working out . . . every politician and public office holder does this. Two questions that we did not discuss came up and they became the headline story the next day. It said, I think it was the Daily News, "Walker Says Crosstown Dead--Asks Hartigan To Resign As C~rnmitteeman.~' And Hartigan was there with him and said, "No .I1 From the very beginning there was that pattern established. That Crosstown thing was amazing, incredibly important, and had an astonishing impact, and I'm sure, an impact in ways we'll never know on people, the business community. And of course it was a lousy idea. I mean the whole idea of the Crosstown was a lousy idea. But Daley never gave up on that. Never gave up on it. An amusing story--in 1976 Dan had lost the primary and there was some speculation, was he going to support Howlett? . . . And he announced he was going to support Howlett. Well, Daley had a press conference in Chicago and he praised Dan and he said, "Oh, he' d make a great senator and he's a great man, a great, great Democrat, l' went on and you know, baloney. Okay. That day Dan was campaigning in Indiana and he gets an emergency call from Daley, Now he's in Indiana. He's campaigning; I think the guy was running for governor of Indiana. And you know one of the funny things about Illinois, the governor of Illinois is very well- known in a strip along the border of Indiana because of television. And the same thing is true in Iowa and Missouri. So he can be very useful in a campaign. So, he was campaigning . . . emergency call from Daley. So he called Daley and Daley said, "~ust wanted to tell you that I held this press conference and I said what a great Democrat you were and that I thought you'd make a great United States senator." And Dan was flabbergasted and said, "Well I appreciate that Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much," you know. Then Daley said, "Now Gov, how about the Crosstown?" (laughs) This is four years later and he's still in there trying to get it.
One of the things, by the way, during the campaign--this was the Watergate era. Now, we caught a spy in our office and her boyfriend taught at some college out in DuPage. He was a former CIA guy. Q: Wait a minute. In which office? Campaign office? A: Campaign office. It wae during the Ogilvie/Walker campaign. But we caught her duplicating stuff to take out. Stuff that was none of her business. And there was also a guy who was killed in an automobile accident in Illlnois who worked for [Donald H.] Segretti, and when he was killed he was driving an automobile that belonged to one of Ogilvie's assistants. We'll never know what they did in that campaign. We know some of the things they'd do. We'd have a meeting scheduled somewhere and somebody would call the people and say he was from Walker headquarters and Walker would not be able to make it and so the meeting was canceled. So then we'd arrive and there'd be no meeting, that kind of stuff. There were a lot of dirty tricks going on and the Nixon people were all over the country assisting their Republican candidates. You asked about the period between that [the general election] and inauguration. Well, the hardest thing of course was trying to work on the cabinet and the top appointees. And a few of us went off and spent a week or so talking about it. Then I had a heart attack in December, so during that period until I came back, which was the end of January--for example, I was not at the inauguration--I was at home. I was out of the hospital but I was at home. But the putting tagether of people to try and make up the cabinet was extremely difficult, trying to balance rewarding your people -who have worked hard for you and supported you, with whether or not they could do a job in government. And you know, we made mistakes. Not anywhere near the mistakes that people think we made--not people--that media and politicians say we made, 'cause in general I think that his cabinet had better people in it than any governor in my memory, and that includes Stevenson. People have a sort of foggy idea of Stevenson and they forget that there was a great insurance scandal and the great horsemeat scandal, and he had people in his cabinet that we would neker touch in a million years. Q: Well, give me an example of a mistake. A: You mean somebody? Q: Well, I mean obviously Angelos was never actually submitted, but that was a mistake. A: Mistake. Q: Was Fogel the first director of the Department of Corrections? A: Yes. Q: Do you think of that as a mistake?
Page 1 and 2: University of Illinois at Springfie
Page 3 and 4: Readers of the oral history should
Page 5 and 6: July 8, 1981, Tape 1, Side 1 Q: I'd
Page 7 and 8: J Anyway, so I was executive direct
Page 9 and 10: should lead the discussion. When I
Page 11 and 12: Now, when Gerty and I first met we
Page 13 and 14: Q: You were at that point preparing
Page 15 and 16: elieve it. He had made the decision
Page 17 and 18: centered--there was an intellectual
Page 19 and 20: You know, as he walked he carried a
Page 21 and 22: A: Isn't it? Q: . , , but nothing i
Page 23 and 24: Foran would have wiped him out in t
Page 25 and 26: Q: Walker has said, and I believe t
Page 27 and 28: A: His whole life, yes. But I reall
Page 29 and 30: Q: What did you decide to do about
Page 31 and 32: everybody was going to have a fight
Page 33: A: Again, it's not romantic. Electi
Page 37 and 38: So you ask him to do something poli
Page 39 and 40: As you know, Dan brought in zero-ba
Page 41 and 42: Q: They had you. (laughter) A: Yes,
Page 43 and 44: Q: What was your reaction to the di
Page 45 and 46: A: Well, it's still a good idea and
Page 47 and 48: there. Ogilvie came with Tom Drenna
Page 49 and 50: house and all the old timers were p
Page 51 and 52: official, and it is. The one ingred
Page 53 and 54: Q: Is that what makes you think tha
Page 55 and 56: confrontation. I don't think I ever
Page 57 and 58: funny if it didn't have an effect o
Page 59 and 60: to be free to contribute to campaig
Page 61 and 62: Q: In June of 1973 there was what w
Page 63 and 64: governor exerts power and they say
Page 65 and 66: A: Sure, sure. Q: By just continuin
Page 67 and 68: A: Well, you know, it'd be interest
Page 69 and 70: A: That's the one magazine I would
Page 71 and 72: ight? (laughs) He was the guy that
Page 73 and 74: Q: Which committee? A: Well, we cal
Page 75 and 76: Q: At some point during the adminis
Page 77 and 78: communication with everybody would
Page 79 and 80: Q: Well, what about Walker's relati
Page 81 and 82: A: No. When we started this convers
Page 83 and 84: Q: Yes. A: Well, yes, because circu
Page 85 and 86:
Adante, Beverly, 38 Administrative
Page 87:
Miller, Jeff, 66 Mitchell, Steve, 3
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Victor De Grazia Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

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