The Senator and the Priest

by Andrew M. Greeley

  Mary Margaret told me that Tony had called several times begging her to talk me out of running again. She said that she had laughed and assured him that the decision was completely mine.

  She wouldn’t quote his words because she said she couldn’t remember them. And herself with a photographic memory.

  We had a grand time in the first session of the new Congress, beating up on the faltering and often incoherent Republicans. Indeed we took control of the Senate because of the departure of two Republicans, one to a better world and the other to become president of a college in his native state. They knew a sinking ship when they were on one. In both cases the governors appointed Democrats to replace them. I became majority whip that summer. We pushed through legislation for health insurance for children under twelve and limitations on corporate golden parachutes. The President vetoed both of them and we overrode in both Houses the health insurance veto. We were making progress towards a more just and equitable society without becoming the welfare society that had hampered economic progress in Europe. I thought that we had come a much longer way than there was any reason to expect five years ago.

  Before we left for Ireland, I met with Joe McDermott, Dolly, and Ric Sanchez.

  “What’s it going to be?” Joe demanded “You’re having too much fun to quit now that you’re ahead.”

  “I’m not sure I’m ahead,” I said cautiously.

  “Don’t believe all that junk in the Examiner. They fudged the actual numbers. You’re eight points ahead. Besides we have evidence that they’ve been faking their surveys for several years.”

  “You have a great record, Tommy,” Dolly said. “You just have to point at that. And you’ve got a lot of things for Illinois. As eventual majority leader, you can get a lot more.”

  “The Demographics have changed, Tommy, since you went away … Not only more Latinos in the state, but more citizens and a lot more registered voters. They’re solid for you all the way.”

  “I presume that Mary Margaret is not opposed,” Joe asked cautiously.

  “Hardly,” I said with my patented grin when my wife’s name came up. “She maintains complete neutrality. But she loves the job more than I do.”

  Silence all around the lunch table at the Chicago Yacht Club. Outside, the lake, the graceful boats, and the skyline against a clear blue sky looked like a retouched travel poster. This time around, if I won, I could come home more often and with my wife.

  “We’d be proud to help again,” Dolly said, breaking the silence.

  “Thanks for your patience,” I said, rising from the table, “and thanks, Ric, for the lunch. I’ll let you know right after Labor Day.”

  I was sure that all three of them would bet that I would decide to run again. Why would anyone quit when they were ahead?

  Perhaps because he really didn’t like the job. Perhaps because he was afraid of some final devastating attack.

  What could such an attack be? My personal life? Robbie? She was married and living in San Francisco with an affluent banker husband. She even sent me a Christmas card.

  I couldn’t quit because of a nameless fear, could I?

  Ireland was wonderful. Mary Margaret had been there with her parents when they were in Germany for Jack Kennedy.

  “I remember only the awful poverty,” she said. “How did it get to be one of the richest nations in the world?”

  “Hard work and good education,” I said. “I don’t know why we can’t do the same thing in America.”

  I knew why we couldn’t. That could be one of the main themes of my campaign.

  The daughters started out skeptical about Irish men, but soon found them charming, “even if they talk some strange foreign language.”

  They also thought that the young women their own age were “stuck-up” and without morals.

  I think our daughters scared the locals. They were too beautiful, too bright, too sophisticated, and too intelligent. Yanks weren’t supposed to be that way, if you take my meaning. Then the kids took over a song fest in a Galway pub and did mariachi music.

  “Would those young women,” a man asked me, “be Spanish, if you don’t mind me asking?”

  “Yanks,” I said

  “I was telling meself that, but they sing in Spanish.”

  “Mexican”

  He shook his head in bafflement.

  “Well, whatever they are, aren’t they brilliant altogether?”

  “Aren’t they now?”

  Ireland brought laughter to the four women in my family. It depressed me—too much rain, too many clouds, too many resigned sighs. I think I covered it up pretty well.

  “You’re sleeping a lot, Thomas Patrick Moran,” my wife informed me.

  “Jet lag.”

  “Fersure,” she said skeptically.

  The kids were responsible for my depression. They weren’t kids any more, they were young women—tall, smart, sophisticated, quite able to take care of themselves in almost any situation. More sophisticated than their mother was at the same age, and she was quite sophisticated. Or so it had seemed to me. What did I know? My five years in the Senate had transformed my family and I had not been there to watch them grow up.

  That wasn’t true, was it? I had been around all the time, hadn’t I? I had a good relationship with them, didn’t I? They still laughed at me and called me Mr. Mom, didn’t they?

  Six years, I told myself, were a long time in a man’s life. I was growing older, that was the problem. Did I want to give up six more years of my life to the folly of the United States Senate? What would I do instead? Write more books? That was a lot easier but often boring.

  My talk to the Dail (pronounced Doll), the Irish parliament, started out badly. They were even more hostile to the “friggin’ Yank” than I had expected. I struggled on with comic stories about how the world’s second oldest parliamentary body (a title we unjustly claim for ourselves) tied itself up in knots. There were a few weak laughs. Then I began to describe the tragicomedy of the last day before recess. I think my wife and kids started the laughter but everyone joined in. They overwhelmed me with laughter and cheers as I wound down.

  “I’m sure in this nation of distinguished poets and even more distinguished storytellers and in this august body of surely the best storytellers if not the best poets, you avoid the confusion and chaos that we suffer every day. But come to the District of Columbia and see how we just barely manage to keep democracy alive and I’ll explain to you then that ‘just barely’ is the most one can expect in democratic rule—of which as your man across the Irish Sea once remarked is the only alternative to tyranny.”

  Thunderous applause.

  The reception afterwards was great craic as the Irish would say, enlivened by the charm of my four womenfolk.

  My depression lifted for an hour or two.

  Finally, we were sitting in the Club lounge at Dublin Airport, contemplating the green grass and the blue sky from which rain clouds had just disappeared and the question surfaced.

  “Daddy,” said Marytre, “you are going to run again aren’t you?”

  There was only one possible answer.

  “You guys want me to?”

  Enthusiastic agreement from my four womenfolk, wife included.

  “That settles it.”

  They took the decision out of my hands, didn’t they?

  CHAPTER 31

  SCENE: In front of refurbished Moran home in River Forest.

  TIME: Early November, trees still red and gold.

  CANDIDATE: My family took a vote on whether I should run for reelection. The vote was four to zero with one abstention. I was the abstainer. So I will claim that I was drafted.

  In my last campaign I made promises of what I would try to achieve as a Senator, not guarantees, but promises of efforts. I will run on my record—immigration reform, pension reform, protection of private property from greedy municipalities, and tax reform which moves towards greater equality among Americans. I have obtained for Ill
inois our fair share of funding for roads and parks and especially funding for progress on the remodeling of our airport, a necessity for our city and for the whole country. I’ve also managed to win enough confidence from my colleagues in the Senate that they elected me Majority Whip, kind of an assistant Majority Leader in charge of counting the votes, something we have learned to do very carefully in Cook County. I am not so much proud of my record as reasonably satisfied with it. It represents a good beginning.

  We are in the midst now of one of those epochal swings in American political life. The Democratic party, the party of the poor, the working people, the middle class, is returning to power to replace the party of the rich and the super rich. We must improve the quality of American life by setting aside the values of greed and profit which have dominated it for the last decade and replace them with values of equality and concern. We must make it possible for all Americans to share in the good life, no matter what their income is. I am convinced that the most important concern for most American families is quality education for their children. We have had six years of No Child Left Behind and in fact there are more children left behind than ever before. If reelected I will do my best to improve the quality of American education. I will establish committees of experts and committees of parents to advise me in these efforts.

  Finally, I will keep the promises I have made about my campaign. I will not engage in negative campaigning of any sort, including attack ads. I will not ask anyone for a contribution to our campaign and I will not inquire of my campaign the names of contributors. Finally I will start my formal campaign on Labor Day. Two months is more than enough time for the people of Illinois to see my face on television. Thank you.

  REPORTER: Tommy, how can you hope to overcome Senator Crispjin’s massive lead in the polls?

  CANDIDATE: We overcame it last time and now I have a record on which to stand.

  REPORTER: Senator Crispjin is reported to have a campaign fund of fifty million dollars. How can you hope to compete with that?

  CANDIDATE: We can’t hope to compete with it.

  REPORTER: Given the record of your family in Washington, why should the people of Illinois vote for you again?

  CANDIDATE: What record?

  REPORTER: Your wife is double-dipping and your daughter stole a high school honor.

  CANDIDATE: You don’t have your facts right. When my wife works in my office she does so as a volunteer. My daughter renounced the valedictorian role because she didn’t want her academic record to be a matter of public debate. Since then there have been five court decisions that the Jesuits did not conspire to cheat the other young woman of the prize.

  REPORTER: Do you still deny that you are hoping for a draft as vice presidential candidate?

  CANDIDATE: Absolutely. I’ll quote General Sherman again. I will not run if nominated. I will not serve if elected. Every time your question is asked, I’ll give the same answer.

  REPORTER: Do you expect us to believe that?

  CANDIDATE: I hope the people of Illinois believe me.

  REPORTER: Tommy, will you make an issue of Senator Crispjin’s relationship with oil tycoon Bobby Bill Roads?

  CANDIDATE: As I said in my remarks, I will not engage in attack politics.

  REPORTER: Tommy, does your staff resent your wife’s presence in the office?

  CANDIDATE: They recruited her without telling me, not that I had any choice in the matter.

  REPORTER: You enjoy being called the Tom Cruise of the Senate?

  CANDIDATE: I’m flattered to be compared to such a handsome and skillful actor. I’m not sure he feels the same.

  REPORTER: Senator, do you resent being called Tommy when reporters always refer to your opponent as Senator Crispjin?

  CANDIDATE: No.

  (Mariachi musicians appear and sing and play two brisk and stirring songs. Then they change their ethnic group and sing “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling”)

  I restrained my eldest daughter who would have attacked the punk who accused her of cheating. Daniel Leary, who had flown to Chicago for the announcement, held her back too.

  “Chill out Mary Rose. Don’t act like your mother!”

  She rested her head on my shoulders and wept bitterly.

  “Liar, liar, liar.”

  “How can they get away with it?” Dan demanded. “Isn’t there a law?”

  “Sure there is, Danny, but the Supreme Court has ruled that you have to show actual malice if you defame a public person. Alas, Maryro is a public person.”

  “I’d like to …”

  “So would we all, Danny. So would we all.”

  Rosie joined us. She had been commissioned by her magazine (The New Yorker) to write an article about Tommy’s campaign.

  “I can’t believe what I heard,” she said. “That was vicious.”

  “The adversarial media,” I replied. “They were trying to make Tommy lose his temper. They now know that the charges against me and your granddaughter can’t drive him to the edge. They’ll keep trying.”

  “Dolly can give me their names?”

  “So we get even with him, hon, in The New Yorker.”

  “He’s an illiterate dork,” Maryro grumbled. “He doesn’t read The New Yorker.”

  “I’ll send him a copy,” Rosie said.

  I was the only one who was not surprised, much less angry.

  “We can’t afford to let those buffoons make us angry,” I said to Tommy as we walked over to Petersen’s for our ice cream fix.

  “We were set up. Many of those guys were from the Examiner. They didn’t want to risk Schlenk in a head-to-head, so they sent copy boys, interns, stenographers over here to ask questions.”

  The high command gathered around a table.

  “I think we have a problem on our hands,” Tommy said.

  “We have five years of attack ads with which to deal,” Joe McDermott agreed. “And a limited budget.”

  “We could get some feature pieces on Mary Rose, if she doesn’t mind, in the papers or even the national magazines …” Dolly suggested. “I’m sure she can handle herself.”

  Tommy hesitated.

  “I don’t think I want my daughter exploited that way … Marymarg?”

  “She’d love to set the record straight,” I said. “She certainly won’t lose her cool. I could ask her.”

  “OK,” Tommy agreed. “I don’t like anything about today. They have a campaign outlined and they’re going to go after us on every possible occasion.”

  “Amigo!” exclaimed Ric Sanchez. “We will sing ‘When Irish Eyes Are Smiling’ right into their faces.”

  CHAPTER 32

  WE WENT back to Washington the day after I announced my intentions to seek reelection. I met with Manny and Chris in my office. There was no choice. I had to press ahead with all my Senate duties and responsibilities. The Republicans, faced with considerable losses, were fighting bitterly against us. The Majority Leader decided that we would do our best to create the impression that we were not being obstructionist. There was not much point in blocking most presidential appointments which would not last more than a year and a half. Even if a Republican should win the presidency he would want to put his own people in key offices. We would make trouble for some of the military appointments and block the Administration’s judicial appointments. We would substitute our own budget and our own legislation for his and on some occasions maybe even override his vetoes. At no time, however, would we be rude or discourteous or even reply in angry fashion to their accusations. Our theme song would be that we wanted to restore the old civility to the Senate relationships. There were five or six Republican Senators we could count on, many of whom would flock to our side of the aisle after the election if our margin of victory was big enough. Some of us wanted to get even quickly but most of us thought that we could afford to play a waiting game.

  “They have a campaign plan down to the last detail,” I told Chris and Manny. “They will harass and block us every inch of
the way and they know I won’t fight back in kind. It’s going to be very tricky.”

  “The Ambassador is doing his focus groups? What do they

  “In general, people don’t like Crispjin much. They think he’s a poor loser who trying to buy his way back into the Senate. They’re just not sure about me. The ads have had some impact as does the constant sniping from the Examiner. On the other hand, they are more likely to know my record than the other side thinks. We don’t have much choice to use that strategy. We will have to be prepared for disruption everywhere we turn. They’ve finally figured out that disruption is a better tactic than assassination.”

  My two colleagues were silent. They had been around long enough to know what the odds were.

  “The best polls still show that I’m ahead and that the majority of the uncertain lean in my direction.”

  “You don’t sound very optimistic,” Chris said cautiously.

  “I’m not. I never thought it would be a cakewalk. They will try to find more ways to attack my family. And they have unlimited funds to do so.”

  “This is not the best time to do so, but you’d better look at. ‘Under the Dome’ for today.”

  TOMMY LIES AT ANNOUNCEMENT

  Cute little Tommy Moran, the pathetic excuse Illinois has for a junior Senator, deliberately fibbed at the “announcement” yesterday of his alleged decision to run for reelection to the Senate seat that many think he stole from Senator H. Rodgers Crispjin. He flatly denied that he would accept a draft to run for the vice-presidency. Everyone knows that Tommy, a failure in the Senate, has little chance to defeat Senator Crispjin. Everyone knows that the offer of a shot at the vice presidency would appear to be an “honorable” way out. The next president may well be a Democrat. He may think that Tommy would help him carry Illinois, always a swing state. Tommy would then be only a single heartbeat away from the presidency. That’s scary.