“Do you think we can make anything out of it?”
“It’s on everyone’s minds … I don’t know what to do with it.”
“The plane is landing, Senator,” a Reliable whispered softly.
We flew to another city, Peoria, I think, met the media at the airport, went to another rally, and did our best to fight the good fight despite the scorching heat. It was late in the afternoon when we finished. We Chicagoans expected a bit of cooling breeze from off the Lake. But we were too far from the Lake and there were no breezes off the sluggish rivers which crisscross middle western America.
“I have an idea,” I said to Tommy as we tried to sleep that night despite the noisy air conditioner in our motel room.
“We need them.”
“Does it violate our norms if we use that tape of you in front of our ruined house in which you say that you simply don’t know who was responsible and hate to think violence has become part of the American political process. Then you hug all of us as you did that day and the voice over says, ‘Who wants to keep Tom Moran out of the Senate so badly that they would kill himself and his whole family?’”
He thought for a long moment.
“Of course we know who was responsible—Bobby Bill.”
“No one else does. We have never accused anyone. You have explicitly said that you don’t believe the Senator had anything to do with it.”
“I mostly believe that anyway.”
“So you’re pointing the finger in another direction—at mysterious, conspiratorial forces who are ready to use violence to defeat candidates they don’t like.”
“I could say on camera that I have no reason to blame my opponent who is not that kind of man and talk about mysterious forces.”
“Why not?”
“Sounds good … Let me think about it … Good night my loyal love.”
He kissed me very gently.
The St. Luke–St. Vincent soccer match was Labor Day itself. Not much for the news that night. The cameras would be out in force at the park.
It was a clear and blessedly cool morning. Mary Rose promised us that they would win.
“We will totally beat those brats and I will totally score two goals!”
“Young women are taller and stronger these days, aren’t they?” Tommy said. “And far too aggressive and competitive?”
“They’ll grow up to be pushy wives and mothers.”
Our team was dressed in red and white and the bad guys in black and white because it was a Dominican parish.
“Our guys are better looking,” I announced.
“Naturally,” he agreed.
Well we did win 3-1 and our reckless young heroine, her red hair a flaming comet trailing behind her, did score two goals. I thought that the bitches from St. Vincent’s had roughed her up unnecessarily.
“Are you proud of your daughter, Tommy?” A TV woman asked.
“Frightened of her,” he murmured.
“Will you permit her to play soccer in high school and college?”
“How could I stop her if I wanted to … Which I don’t.”
“You approve then of women playing violent sports?”
“I think that crowd of amazons out there will scare away teenage boys for a long time … Which may be a very good thing.”
The camera also picked up a gloriously sweaty redheaded young woman with a huge grin.
“I told my daddy that we would win just like he will win the election.”
Then she modestly ducked away from the camera.
Could this be the little newborn babe I held in my arms only yesterday?
The next morning we met at our reconstructed office and laid out the plans for the next two months. Our experts pointed out the issues in the various county towns (as they’re always called in Chicago politics) and suburban bastions—Elmhurst, Hinsdale, LaGrange, Lisle, Naperville, Oak Brook—and the location of Mexican concentrations. We constructed a tight, tight schedule which covered white suburbs, Latino concentrations, and Black churches. We would appear in shopping malls (especially the huge one in Oak Brook). We would go on every radio or TV program that would take us. We would do band sessions anywhere and everywhere. We would issue repeated invitations to a debate in which we would tell the opponent that we would meet at a place and a time of his own choosing.
“We have to be prompt at every one of our scheduled appearances,” Dolly McCormick insisted. “My husband here is my enforcer. He is in charge of getting people to the Church on time.”
Randal McCormick, her towering bear of a man, was an investment banker with a reputation as tall as he was. He grinned happily. “I like this. I never knew politics was this much fun.”
We met that afternoon with Chucky and his friend who was doing the ads for us. They were mostly shots of my Tommy talking about his policies and convictions. They were put together either from TV tape or from shots made on the spot. He was flawless the first time around on every ad—the charming articulate witty trial lawyer, even when he made a joke about being Mr. Mom.
“Some say that only a wimp could stay in the house all day long with three little girls. Well, let me tell you, you have to be really tough to cope with three little kids of either gender. Besides they let me out of the house occasionally so long as I was home before dark.”
“How could anyone vote against him, huh, Marymarg?” my father said … “You think that’s too much of the candidate?” he hollered at Ted McManus, the PR man making the ads.
“How could there be too much of that candidate?”
“Let’s do the violence one now,” Chucky insisted, brimming with even more than his usual enthusiasm. “This one is really neat.”
“We’d say totally cool, Chucky.”
We did it and then redid it several times.
“Perfect,” Ted McManus said finally. “What do you think, Chucky?”
“What do you guys think?” he bounced the question at us.
“It was my idea, so naturally I like it.”
Tommy hesitated.
“You’re going to try it with your focus groups, Ambassador?”
“Certainly.”
“It gets by them, go with it.”
It did and we did.
We got a quick reaction from Leander Schlenck
TINY TOMMY TAKES THE LOW ROAD
Even Tiny Tommy Moran can sink lower than he is. His early ads, pedestrian in every other respect, now suggest that the distinguished Senior Senator from Illinois, H. Rodgers Crispjin was behind the bombing at his campaign headquarters this summer. With his ratings in the polls falling precipitously, Tommy has forgotten about his own pledge to eschew negative ads. He is now a completely dead duck.
Dolly issued the usual “correction” that she did after every such column and after every new Crispjin ad. She sent them to all the media outlets. Sometimes the Daily News or one of the TV stations used them.
CHAPTER 13
THERE WAS a terrifying incident in Springfield at the end of September. It was Democrats’ day at the Sangamon County Fair. We had, according to the Daily News poll, come within four percentage points of our opponent, 48 percent to 44 percent. Other polls showed no change. However, the News polls were the most reputable in the State. The News, increasingly sympathetic to us, announced that my candidacy clearly had gained momentum. It added that Senator Crispjin’s mostly downstate campaign was listless and that his attack ads seemed to have little influence in the Chicago Metropolitan Area.
After that news was published—and reported on all the TV stations and in some of the national media too—my brother Tony phoned.
“I won’t take any of your time, Senator,” he said, a sneer in his voice. “I want you to know that I’m praying to Jesus and the Blessed Mother and to our own parents in heaven that for the good of the country and your own good and the good of your poor family, you’ll lose.”
He hung up before I could answer. Just as well.
However, the atmosphe
re in the County Fairgrounds in Sangamon County was heady. Sangamon has been Republican since Mr. Lincoln. However, its Democrats are tough and noisy. There probably weren’t many votes to be gained there, but I had to be present. We put on the full show, the band with trumpets and drums included. The Sangamon Democrats went wild, even those who hated immigrants sang along with us.
Johnny Dale, the bright young chairman of the Sangamon County Democrats, enveloped us in his genial smile.
“You folks sure are game,” he said, “flying all the way down here. You can see that we folks already love you.”
I noticed that even halfway down the state, there was a trace of a southern accent.
After I had finished, Johnny Dale thanked me.
“The people of Illinois will be proud of you Senator when you are sworn in on the Hill in January … Especially the people of Sangamon County.”
I waved my thanks to the ovation, and turned and shook hands with the chairman.
“Daddy,” Mary Ann shouted.
I turned to look for her just as a sharp bark came from somewhere and then immediately after a second one. Something whizzed by my head.
Behind me, Johnny Dale cried out and slumped to the ground. The Reliables and the state cops threw us all on the ground.
“Easy does it, Senator,” my Reliable said. “Everyone in the family is OK.” I didn’t believe him.
Next to me, Johnny Dale was bleeding, two state cops were bending over him, his wife was screaming. A couple of medics appeared from nowhere and bent over him. The crowd was screaming wildly.
“Tommy?” my wife cried out.
“Alive and well.”
“Kids are all OK!”
State cops and sheriff’s deputies were trying to restrain the crowd.
“We gotta get him to hospital, now!” one of the medics pleaded. “Where the hell is the fucking ambulance!”
As if in response an ambulance siren wailed as it tried to pick its way through screaming spectators.
“Please, please, make way for the ambulance!” cried someone on the public address system. “We have a wounded man up here.”
Finally two stretcher carriers and two more medics pushed their way through the crowd, which was now turning ugly. They picked up Johnny Dale and carried him through the crowd towards the ambulance, while the state cops used their nightsticks to beat the crowd out of the way and to protect Mrs. Dale.
Squad cars were now forcing their way into the arena.
“State police captain here. We ask everyone to quietly leave the grounds. We will arrest and charge with disorderly conduct anyone who does not comply.”
They just laughed.
“We’re going to bring you downstairs under the platform, Senator. We’ll be all around you. That rifle shot was aimed at you.”
“Tell me about it, Sergeant.”
Beneath the stands was our whole bedraggled gang. The Reliables were ringed around them protectively. Confused state cops were striding around, nightsticks in hand, as though they were looking for someone to belt.
I then embraced my weeping family and all my colleagues in highly emotional moments.
“Who do you think did the shooting, Mr. Moran?”
“I don’t know.”
“They were aiming at you, were they not?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you think Senator Crispjin was behind the attempted assassination?”
“Certainly not.”
“If you and your party would get into your vans, sir, we will escort you to the airport.”
I glanced at my sergeant.
“I think that would be best sir.”
“I don’t suppose you’ve apprehended the gunman, Captain?”
“I have no information about that, sir.”
“And you don’t know anything about Mr. Dale’s condition?”
“I have no information about that, sir. Now I must order you to leave these grounds. We don’t want any more assassinations here.”
I wanted to hit him. I wanted to insult him. But that would have been wrong, even if the TV camera had not been rolling.
I climbed into our armored van on which Mike Casey, the president of Reliable, had insisted and embraced my weeping wife again.
“Someone tried to kill you, Tommy.”
“They would have if Mary Ann hadn’t warned me.”
“It smelled terrible out there,” she wailed.
The state police cars ahead of us turned on their sirens. We emerged from the arena to find people milling about.
“Are you in communication with those idiots in front of us?”
“Yes, Senator.”
“Warn them that I don’t want them to run over anybody and tell them that’s for the record.”
“Yes sir, Senator!”
He passed the message on.
“They’re not bad guys, Senator.”
“Ask them where Mr. Dale is … Mary Margaret, did you call your mother and father?”
“Of course, dear.”
“Good! Call Dolly and tell her to issue a statement …”
“Senator, Mr. Dale is in Sangamon General and his condition is critical.”
At the airport I made a decision.
“All of you get on the plane and fly back to Midway. Joe, make sure that Commissioner Riley has vans there too. Then bring the plane back here. I’m going to the hospital. Don’t argue with me, anyone. That’s what I’m going to do.”
“Sir,” said the state cop in the lead car, “you should be on that plane!”
“No, I shouldn’t. I should be in the hospital with Mr. Dale and that’s where I’m going. If you want to escort us fine … But I’m going there anyhow. Understand?”
“But, sir …”
“And if any asshole tells you that I can’t do that you tell them they’ll have to arrest me to stop me.”
“Better do it, officer,” said my Sergeant Reliable.
“Yes, sir.”
So, sirens blaring we barreled into the emergency entrance of Sangamon General. Two state cops and a doctor were waiting for me.
“Good news, Senator,” the doctor said. “We haven’t upgraded from critical yet, but he’s going to make it.”
“Thanks be to God!”
“Amen to that, Senator.”
The MD was clearly both a Catholic and a Democrat.
“Mrs. Dale knew you were coming. She wants you to go up to him so that they can all pray over him.”
“Certainly.”
Johnny Dale was a man in his early forties, handsome, a lawyer with clear gray eyes. His wife Hannah was blond, perhaps real blond. Her careful make-up was stained with tears. There were four kids, a couple of them teens, looking helpless and distraught.
Hannah embraced me.
“It was so good of you to come, Senator. You shouldn’t have. That crazy man might still be around …”
Johnny Dale opened his eyes.
“Hey, Tommy. I’m glad it was me not you!”
“You know who that’s from?”
“Sure, Chicago’s Mayor Anton Cermak when a crazy man aimed at Roosevelt and hit him instead.”
“Only he died and you won’t.”
“Thank God for antibiotics,” he smiled wanly.
“We have to get to know each other better, Johnny Dale!”
“You’ll never see the end of me at Capitol Hill.”
“Will you pray with us, Senator?” Hannah asked.
This was a Christian situation. I didn’t know what to do, so I followed the safe route.
“Let us join hands and pray as the Lord taught us to pray and remember especially the part about forgiving those who sin against us.”
I had lifted it all from Jimmy O’Malley.
Then I decided that I liked the priest role and would try some more.
“Heavenly father, who gives us life and hope, look down on this brave family which has just endured a shattering experience. Strengthen their hope and
bring peace and forgiveness into their souls and take good care of them for their long lives. We ask this in the name of the Father who created and Son who saved and the Spirit who inspires. Amen.”
“Now I gotta get back home and calm my own family down. We’ll be seeing you, Johnny Dale!”
Hannah and two girl kids kissed me, the boy kids shook hands vigorously.
“God bless you, Senator,” said the little girl.
“Amen,” they all responded.
I choked up as I thanked them.
The doctor walked me back down to the emergency entrance.
“We’ve upgraded him to ‘serious’ and we’re saying that we expect him to recover. Will you tell the media outside?”
I walked out and encountered a horde of questions.
I held up my hand for silence.
“The doctors have asked me to announce that they have upgraded Johnny Dale to ‘serious’ and they expect him to recover.”
There were some cheers from the bystanders.
“Did you see him, Tommy?”
“I did. He was conscious and, astonishingly in good humor. I joined the family in praying over him.”
“Did he know you were the target?”
“I think so. He quoted the mayor of Chicago who was shot by someone who was aiming at Franklin D. Roosevelt. As you know Mr. Dale is very interested in political history … Now I have to get home to calm down my family.”
I jumped quickly into my armored van, just in case the shooter was hanging around.
“Mrs. Moran is on the phone, Senator. Calling from the plane.”
“Marymarg, I’m all right.”
“Rosie said it’s all live on television and they just had a picture of you going into the hospital.”
“They probably will have one of my coming out by now.”
“How is the poor dear man, Tommy?”
“They’ve upgraded him to serious and expect him to live.”
“Thanks be to God!”
“Amen … How is your crowd?”
“Traumatized, Tommy, especially the little girls. They’re still crying. We’re landing now. The plane will come back for you. Be careful.”
“Count on it.”
When I arrived back on Lathrop Avenue, all the lights in our restored residence were out. But the media were waiting outside.
The Senator and the Priest Page 10