Digital Edition
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
FREE August 27-September 2, 2020 • Vol. 46, No. 6 Fall Guide August 27-September 2, 2020 | Illinois Times | 1 2 | www.illinoistimes.com | August 27-September 2, 2020 OPINION Big guy, big personality, big flaws Former governor James Thompson dies DYSPEPSIANA | James Krohe Jr. James R. Thompson, the biggest (six feet six) had his virtues as a chief executive. Not until and longest (14 years in office) governor Illinois the election of JB Pritzker has Illinois seen a ever had, died on Aug. 14, 2020, in Chicago at governor of Thompson’s intelligence (although 84. His rise as a politician coincided with that Pritzker came into office with a better education of this newspaper, and to those of us working at and broader experience). He was a quick study Illinois Times in those days he was a familiar, if and he realized that legislative politics was a often exasperating, character. matter of getting things done, not striking poses. Senate President Don Harmon observed, He saved the Dana-Thomas House for the “No one enjoyed being governor more.” public and saved the governorship for Jim Edgar, Certainly, no modern governor did. Inside the whom he hand-groomed for the job. big man was a little boy with a sweet tooth Unfortunately, he never dared enough to who in January 1977 found himself in his become one of Illinois’s great governors in the own candy shop. He ate it all up – the corn mold of Lowden or Horner or Ogilvie. Maybe dogs, the applause, the press attention, the that was just because he wasn’t interested enough chauffeured rides. in government. Not for him the Obama-ish Thompson was a better politician than he mastering of every brief. He preferred to hire was a governor because his were a politician’s smart people and let them do the thinking. Remote is the virtues. Likeable himself, he genuinely liked This worked well enough when it came to people and people knew that. He was endlessly the mundane matters of governance, but on right decision fascinated by Illinois’ many tribes. He mimicked substantial issues on which Illinois needed their ways and their speech while he was with leadership, he drew a too-convenient line them. This was not affectation or pandering, or between views of Thompson the citizen and for District 186 at least not only affectation and pandering. He Former Illinois Gov. James Thompson. those of Thompson the governor. lusted to be part of every crowd, not merely be CHUCK BERMAN/CHICAGO TRIBUNE/TNS This was glaringly evident when it came to Every home should have among it, and fell naturally into the cadences women’s rights. Thompson was for the ERA, access to the internet and intonation of his hosts. At a black church he JRT, Stevenson was beaten by Lyndon LaRouche but he refused to risk his standing with the felt the spirit; at the county fair, he went down when the Democratic ticket was highjacked by right wing of his own party to push to get it GUESTWORK | Sherry Frachey home; at a football game he led the cheers. his followers, forcing Stevenson onto a third- passed. The governor’s trick back seemed to His zest for campaigning was legendary. party ballot and out of contention. give out every time an ERA vote approached, Thank you for your comprehensive He won every time he ran but he was lucky. Thompson’s vanities were small and harmless, so reliably that some reporters used the state of and balanced Aug. 20 cover story, Campaigning was as distasteful to the patrician although his complaints about what he saw the governor’s back to predict such votes the “Schools shapeshift,” by Rachel Adlai Stevenson III, our Knight of the Doleful as the poor pay and perks offered governors way some people forecast a storm when their Otwell. Countenance, as it was fun to Thompson. were the least attractive thing about him. His big toes throb. That reticence was a big reason On Friday, March 13, I left my Nonetheless, Stevenson very nearly beat him pretensions were almost endearing (among them the amendment failed in Illinois, and thus in school in Springfield District 186 for in 1982 in a nasty campaign. (Stevenson said his boyhood dream to someday be president). the U.S. the last time. I didn’t know it then, during that campaign that if he was elected Alas, he never had the national career he Thompson’s career out of office was but it became increasingly evident governor he would name the new state building dreamed of. He was a pragmatic and moderate undistinguished. As the rainmaker for one of as time went by we would not be in Chicago after Thompson, because “it’s big, it’s Republican at a time when moderation no Chicago’s top law firms, he made himself rich returning for the remainder of the ugly and it doesn’t work.”) Stevenson that year longer was respected. Perhaps more decisively, he as he always wanted, so presumably he died a year. It was gut-wrenching to say the was beaten not by Thompson but by the Illinois seemed to strike national party elders as callow. happy man. But that career was blighted by least. Supreme Court, which refused his request for It’s been nearly 30 years since JRT left his derelict performance as a board member I am now retired after 43 years in a recount; in 1986, when he again ran against the mansion. Was he any good? Certainly he of Hollinger International while Canadian the teaching profession. I wore many billionaire Conrad Black looted the firm – a hats in my position, but one of my reminder that to a Republican, law-and-order jobs was to help children in crisis. I applies to the streets but not to the corporate dealt with everything from divorce Editor’s note board rooms. of parents, to death in the family, Did anybody wince with me when Joe Biden, asked what he would do if scientists advised him to For all his faults, Thompson was remembered to poverty, chemical dependence, to shut down the economy over coronavirus concerns, quickly replied, “I would shut it down”? Might fondly by party officials and colleagues. He was students who needed mental health he at least have prefaced, “I hope it doesn’t come to that,” to offer some assurance that he won’t probably as good a governor as he could have help. So, I have seen and heard it all, act rashly? It still seems wrong that a president can decide, without having to ask anybody, to shut been and maybe slightly better than Illinois so to speak. I have talked to students down the economy. In 1963 John F. Kennedy voiced a more thoughtful approach: “Scientists alone deserved; a great governor can only be produced about storms, fire drills and active can establish the objectives of their research, but society, in extending support to science, must by a great state. shooter drills. Now, this! take into account its own needs.” –Fletcher Farrar, editor and CEO The decision to begin the James Krohe Jr. is a long-time contributor to year remotely is complicated and Cover photo by Keshia Barbee. She is a family and newborn photographer and owner of Barbee Illinois Times. Many of his columns and articles for many-faceted. Major kudos to our Dream Photos in Springfield. Cailin, age 3, was photographed at Lincoln Memorial Garden. IT can be found at The Corn Latitudes, his archive of his Illinois work at www.jameskrohejr.com. continued on page 7 August 27-September 2, 2020 | Illinois Times | 3 4 | www.illinoistimes.com | August 27-September 2, 2020 OPINION Remembering Jim Thompson POLITICS | Rich Miller The late Jim Thompson was just 40 years Madigan, Thompson would straighten things Thompson was a lover of art, a lover of old when he was first elected governor of out. When Senate Minority Leader Pate knowledge and a lover of people. Illinois in 1976. Rod Blagojevich was called a Philip wouldn’t take his calls, he physically All that being said, some of Thompson’s youthful politician, but he was 45 on the day barreled past Philip’s chief of staff and actions created a burdensome legacy for he was elected governor. Jim Edgar was 44 in marched into the Leader’s office and cleared Illinois. Back in the 1970s, state retirees November of 1990. the air. The man knew how to handle people who’d worked for decades were stuck with After serving 14 years as governor, and he knew how to pass a bill. And when tiny pensions that couldn’t possibly keep longer than anyone else in Illinois history, he decided that he wanted to be endorsed by up with rampant inflation. Thompson Thompson was still just 54 years old the day both the AFL-CIO and the Illinois Chamber eventually pushed through a compounded he left office. in his final reelection bid, he made it happen. annual cost of living pension increase that has Thompson could’ve coasted on his Gov. Richard Ogilvie helped move Illinois since driven the state’s finances into a deep reputation and lived a charmed life as a law into modern times with a state income tax, pit because the benefit increases were never firm rainmaker. Instead, he became chairman but Thompson accelerated the process with properly funded. of Winston & Strawn and transformed it into his massive state building and construction And during his years in office, the state the international legal powerhouse it is today.