Word: daleyisms
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...mayor died on December 20 and the city had a problem. Wilson Frost, the black president pro tem of the City Council who had presided in Daley's absence, told reporters, "I am acting mayor." But the city's corporation counsel, William Quinlin, said there was no acting mayor until the City Council met the following week to select...
...Daley's other powerful post, as chairman of the Cook County Democratic Central Committee (party boss), was also vacant. The ten days between Hizzoner's death and the filling of those positions truly "shook Chicago," as the city's Sun-Times put it, but the power plays and deals cut would no doubt have made the old man proud...
What may not have made Daley happy was to see the city break up along ethnic lines, something his presence always prevented. The blacks caucused to support Frost in his bid for the acting mayor spot--a position much of Chicago thought he deserved. The Poles met too and a couple of Jewish aldermen claimed Polish grandmothers to get in on the conference...
Meanwhile the big boys, those closest to the late mayor, were also meeting behind closed doors. They decided to divide up the pie among themselves and leave the blacks and Poles out of it. Alderman Michael Bilandic of Daley's own 11th Ward would get their backing for acting mayor on the condition he would not run in the special mayoral election to be held this spring. Ald. Edward Vrdolyak was supposed to get the powerful finance committee chairmanship Bilandic had held...
That set the stage for the spring primary and election to determine who will serve out Daley's term. Slowly a whole generation of grown men are finding themselves, realizing for the first time in their lives that they don't have to take orders from anyone. Mayor Daley so dominated local politics that few others received any exposure. Not one in fifty Chicagoans could have identified Wilson Frost or Michael Bilandic before last month...