A couple of paragraphs from an op-ed piece in the Chicago Tribune written by former Dan Walker and Mike Madigan staffer Greg Bailey might re-enforce negative opinions people have about State Representatives.
He doesn’t mention the room in the basement where members gambled.
One member, Sparky Garmisa, was on the floor so rarely, that I thought hew was a lobbyist, until he ended up sponsoring the Regional Transportation Authority bill. (At least that’s the bill I remember. I have no knowledge what he was doing while not on the House floor.)
As far as drinks on the House floor go, one Democrat, John Fary, whom I was told ran a speakeasy during prohibition, kept a drawer full of little bottles of liquor.
He became the first Mayor Daley’s Member of Congress.
When the night sessions got tedious, he’d give me a bottle of rum, which I would mix with my Tab.
Sounds like the scene of the ‘reconstructed’ SC state legislature in session under the thumb of federal occupiers in the the flick ‘Birth if a Nation..”
Take a look:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8uuCMA-yE64
Now that’s quite a clip.
Looks like Chicongo city council.
Sort of like the Candy Desk in the House.
And from today’s perspective, kinder and gentler times.
✌️😎🥃🤌
Cal:
You were in the House when it took 89 ballots to elect a Speaker of the House?
How about When Roscoe Cunningham accused Majority Leader Jerry Shea a member of the Chicago mafia?
I’m 75 and I can remember those days clearly—-but yesterday not sure what I did.
Ah. A note from the man from far, far Southern Illinois whose ad was so memorable:
“Bob Winchester – Single Shot from Souther Illinois” followed by the sound of a rifle being discharged.
That was in the days of cumulative or, as it is called now, rank order voting.
Wait till hot dog boy gets his boot, you will start to hear way more coming out from down there…