Political corruption and Chicago have been synonymous since the middle of the 19th century with the manipulation of elections and organized crime payoffs to the police. Recent federal investigations into the Richard M. Daley administration have proven that this corruption stands strong today. These investigations led to indictments, trials and convictions caused by the skimming of city contracts, using political work as a basis for awarding jobs and promotions in city departments, and manipulating real estate markets. As Mayor, Richard M. Daley has stepped into his father’s shoes and has established himself as one of the most powerful and influential big-city mayors.
Richard J. Daley was notorious for being the boss of Chicago when he was mayor from 1955-1976. He was responsible for massive downtown development in an attempt to maintain Chicago’s power on a national economic position. In his first year in office he built the Prudential Building, which provided residents with jobs and the city with tourists. This appealed to investors and developers. This would mark the beginning of the revitalization of the city since the Great Depression. Daley faced the challenge of suburbanization and what was called “white flight” as mentioned in the Jane Jacobs reading. Chicago was viewed as a city surrounded by affliction. The dismantling of this blight would call for the mass razing of neighborhoods, land clearance, and displacement of people and marked the beginning of class, racial, and political upheaval.
Up until the University of Illinois, a four-year college didn’t exist in Chicago or in Cook County. Daley chose the University of Illinois location. He stood against residential opposition who felt that they were promised more housing. Much like Jane Jacobs' fight against Robert Moses in her attempt to save Washington Square Park, resident Florence Scala led most of the protesting but to no avail. She did, however, persuade university trustees to preserve the Jane Addams Hull House.
Florence Scala speaking in the garden of the Jane Addams Hull House Settlement, 1963.
Clearing of the University of Illinois site, 1963.
This decision was monumentally historic as the affects of it were still being felt in the late 1990’s and today. When the university was built, a retail market thrived on adjacent Maxwell Street. This market was the largest open-air market, known as the Ellis Island of the Midwest and the birthplace of Chicago Blues. University officials decided against keeping local businesses and slowly began expanding south, buying land in the Maxwell area, and demolishing buildings. Residents petitioned to make the Maxwell area a historic district but Daley ultimately turned down their petitions. This proves to be another seminal example of how Daley Jr. implemented the work of his father.
Sign indicating that the fight for Maxwell Street will continue, with activists signatures. Photo Credit: Steve Balkin, 2000,
Young boy with sign protesting the destruction of Maxwell Street. Photo Credit: Steve Balkin, 2000.
According to the reading, To Collect Photographs is to Collect the World, Richard Nickel refused to lecture on the demise of architectural art because he felt that it wouldn’t be worthwhile. He said, “Everything good and decent will have been wiped out by the shysters, hucksters, and money grubbers.” I suggest instead the production of a short film, the most cutting, sarcastic production imaginable to show what a bunch of clods and gangsters and twaddlers run this town.” The destruction of the Maxwell area is an example of the mass destruction of the architectural masterpieces Nickel was photographically documenting. He fully understood what he was photographing by researching perspective of the ideas behind the buildings and photographing them over and over again. He discovered the character of the buildings he photographed by being objective. He attempted to show what people were ignoring about the magnificent architecture surrounding them. He witnessed their destruction and felt a responsibility to watch and record what he saw. The demolition of historical buildings has always been and remains a topic of discourse within the city of Chicago. A sentence within the Nickel reading reverberates; “Money built these buildings and money will destroy them.” The following video provides a historical summary of Daley, the University of Illinois in conjunction with the Urban Renewal Act, and the effects on Maxwell Street.
During the 1950’s, the automobile changed the face of the city. The prospect of connecting cities with super highways and improving conventional roads gave way to trucks competing with trains and local business owners competing with roads, facing the demolition of entire neighborhoods to make way for the new highway system. The highway construction cut across neighborhoods claiming slum removal, creating a mainline linkage to the coasts and provided a major economic bounty. Jacobs called the automobile the, “erosion of cities.” These highways left large holes in neighborhoods and dislocated people, businesses and institutions. Automobiles were paramount in the readings from last week, as well, specifically in addressing Los Angeles as a car city.
http://americanhistory.si.edu/onthemove/exhibition/exhibition_15_4.html
Chicago is also synonymous with racial inequality. Established immigrants fighting for their territory and political stance caused the race riots of 1919. Race riots occurred yet again during the 1950’s. The city decided to redevelop the Black Belt, which made the problem worse by causing friction. Race has always been an impetus for political appeal and power, as well. With regards to public housing, racial segregation was the guiding principle of the federal government and city planners. The Chicago Housing Authority was struggling with the difficulties of Depression Era housing. Public housing historically represents the failure of the city’s attempt to solve these problems. The multiple examples listed in the Pacyga reading further reinforce the severity the publicly funded, postwar urban renewal systems had on the land and the residents of the city. Often these public housing complexes were placed in desolate places without any neighborhood institutions. This calls attention to the issues Jane Jacobs addressed in her book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Jacobs believed that public housing developers possessed a meaner quality, “and this meaner quality is the dishonest mask of pretend order achieved by ignoring or suppressing the real order that is struggling to exist and to be served.”
As the only sanctioned place where Chicago's black citizens could live or own property, the Black Belt became overcrowded with apartments like these, from a 1941 photo, that were eventually torn down as slums. Photo credit: Library of Congress.
During the 1960’s, race was at the fore with the issue of school integration. This issue is yet another example of how political power was the decisive proponent on any issue within the city. In regards to Chicago, Martin Luther King stated, “I have never seen such hate, not in Mississippi or Alabama, as I see here in Chicago.” Public policy, race relations, and political power were tantamount during Daley’s reign and continue to be discordant issues in Chicago.
The 1968 Democratic Convention and the King Riots changed the face of Chicago forever. Daley ordered the police to “shoot to kill” arsonists and to “shoot to maim” looters. This decision attracted national attention. According to the Pacyga reading, Daley was seen by the media as a “rampant reactionary.” The convention produced several nights of protests and violent confrontations with the police. The results of this historical event forever changed the Chicago Police Department, as well.
Police and demonstrators clash during the Chicago Democratic Convention, 1968. Photo Credit: Les Sintay
The Chicago machine quickly lost national power and influence. However, Daley Sr. remained in power while his allies were indicted on corruption charges. Based on recent events, Richard M. Daley has mirrored his father, choosing the same paths his father walked over 30 years ago. Placing “big brother” cameras on various street corners and making city assets privatized, like the parking meters, have enraged voters and lessened the power Daley has maintained over the city for years.
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