#4: My Great-Granduncle Shmoo 👪
Chicago’s Machine beat its life expectancy by 40+ years because it loved family.
In the early 1930s, Democratic machines across the US faced imminent collapse. Robert Caro details the end of New York’s Tammany Hall in "The Power Broker," for example. Yet, following Mayor Cermak’s assassination, a handful of men, namely Jacob Arvey, saved Chicago's Machine from the same fate.
Uncle Shmoo* was one of Arvey’s men. A great storyteller with a huge schnoz and a cigar always hanging out the side of his mouth, neighborhood children would run to greet Shmoo’s car. He always brought gifts - usually cash, but sometimes tickets to the circus to give parents on Chicago's Jewish West Side a night off.
A man of faith, Shmoo’s religion was Judaism — and the Democratic Party. In 1933, he helped Arvey deliver 95% of Chicago’s Jewish West Side for Franklin D. Roosevelt. The margin of victory - the largest of any census tract nationwide - entitled Shmoo to life-time job security. He could choose any patronage job he wanted, from revenue collector to the City Hall first-floor help desk, as long as the Democrats remained in power. In fact, no one in my family even realized that Shmoo was on the City payroll. But come election time, Shmoo and his two brothers knocked on doors at all hours to rally Lawndale’s 110,000 Jews** to vote Democrat.
The grassroots success of men like Shmoo allowed Arvey to position himself as the State’s power broker. Upon return from WWII, the Democratic Party asked Arvey to become Cook County Democratic Party Chairman. In other words, the Democrat who decides which politicians get placed on the Statewide, Countywide, and Citywide ballot. Big macher.
Chairman Arvey, an unnamed actress, and Jimmy “the schnozzola” Durante
Chairman Arvey made a series of brilliant maneuvers. First, he swapped out a corrupt Irish mayor for a honest but “not very bright” Irish mayor. Names unimportant.
Next, his masterstroke. Arvey slated two “do-gooder liberals” on the Democratic ticket for the 1948 general election:
Paul Douglas for US Senate. A University of Chicago economist who had proposed progressive legislation as a City Councilman.
Adlai Stevenson II for Governor. A WWII undersecretary of the Navy. Adlai’s grandfather, Adlai Stevenson I, was Vice President*** under Grover Cleveland.
Arvey’s gambit paid off. The ticket bolstered President Truman’s returns in Illinois, allowing him to narrowly win re-election. At the apex of his power, he didn’t take time to savor the triumph. Instead, Arvey turned his attention to 1950, the election that would be his undoing.
But that’s for next week.
Be kind to each other.
Ari
*I have sworn to my Nana that I will not use Uncle Shmoo’s real name. Stay tuned for the reason.
**Of the total, 36% were Yiddish speaking, first-generation immigrants. Shmoo spoke fluent Yiddish, as did many children in the neighborhood, including my Nana.
***Stevenson was only Vice President during Cleveland’s second term, 1893 to 1897.