Word: kerner
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...ambition to succeed his father on the federal appellate court, Kerner was obviously willing to make a lot of compromises-so many, indeed, that he lost his moral bearings. He was offended by the chummy back-room politics of ward heelers who put brilliantine in their hair, so he relied on Theodore Isaacs as a go-between with the Daley machine. Isaacs always appeared at his side, managed his election campaigns, and, as Kerner's director of state revenue, helped arrange the race-track stock deal that led to their both being convicted last week. "Kerner's unblemished...
...Otto Kerner, 64, was convicted ot bribery conspiracy, income tax evasion, mail fraud and perjury. He could receive a maximum sentence of 83 years in prison and a fine of $93,000. The verdict stemmed from a dubious race-track stock deal in which Kerner, while Governor, netted $140,000 in profits in exchange for helping a track owner obtain a longer season and permission to expand into harness racing. It represented the conviction not just of a politician...
...Otto Kerner was different-or so it seemed. Once known as "the Mr. Clean of Illinois," a man of suave courtliness, a leader of the Boy Scouts and the Red Cross, he had gone to good schools (Brown, Cambridge, Northwestern Law), and married the daughter of former Mayor Anton Cermak. Kerner's father who had worked himself up from poverty to the federal bench, beamed with pride as he swore in his son as a US attorney. Mayor Richard Daley then recruited Kerner as a blue-ribbon candidate to run for Governor in 1960 against William Stratton, whose administration...
Though many people outside Illinois viewed Kerner as a progressive, energetic Governor, he was in fact mostly good looks. His main accomplishments were getting the Atomic Energy Commission to build a multimillion-dollar atom smasher in western Du Page County and appointing a board to map long-range goals for education in Illinois He nevertheless gained such a reputation that Lyndon Johnson appointed him to head a presidential commission on civil disorders. Among the character witnesses at his trial was retired General William Westmoreland, who described him as a man of "impeccable character...
...Kerner never denied his race-track profits; he denied only that they represented a bribe. "Despite the verdict of the jurors," he said immediately after the trial, "at no time that I have held public office have I taken any advantage I have been in many battles where life itself was at stake. This battle is more important than life itself because it involves my reputation and honor which are dearer than life itself, and I intend to continue this battle...