Neighborhood News: Both Sides now … Chicago’s Political Convention History
The 2024 Democratic National Convention ends tonight at the United Center with Vice President Kamala Harris’ historic official acceptance of her nomination for President of the United States.
As noted by the Chicago History Museum, Chicago has been the nation’s most popular political convention city, in part because of its geographic centrality. Between 1860 and 1996, Chicago has hosted 14 Republican National Conventions and 12 Democratic National Conventions, including the 2024 convention.
Why are Conventions held?
Conventions are held every four years to select the party’s nominee for U.S. president in the popular election. The party also adopts a statement of party principles and goals known as the party platform.
According to the DNC website, Chicago was chosen because “It’s a union city that sits at the heart of the Midwest, and it’s a Democratic stronghold that was part of the “blue wall” crucial to the Biden-Harris victory in 2020 and will be for a Harris-Walz victory in November. Across the city and entire region, Midwesterners are seeing the progress that is possible under Democratic leadership, including a manufacturing boom that has created good-paying jobs and uplifted communities who have been left behind.”
Convention highlights through the years
While all conventions have been consequential in their own way, the 1860 Republican National Convention was the first that Chicago hosted.
With the nation dividing into factions over slavery, according to WTTW News, Republicans chose a young Illinois lawyer named Abraham Lincoln to be their standard bearer.
The convention was held in the “ Wigwam,” according to the Encyclopedia of Chicago History, a temporary two-story wooden structure. They say that “last-minute backroom deals, plus a successful scheme to pack the galleries with holders of counterfeit tickets, brought unexpected victory to Abraham Lincoln.”
Democrats convened for the first time in Chicago in 1864, when they nominated General George B. McClellan and passed an antiwar platform.
Republicans returned to Chicago in 1868 to unanimously nominate, at the Crosby Opera House, the victorious general Ulysses S. Grant.
As told by the Encyclopedia of Chicago History, the 1896 Democratic convention, held in Chicago’s first Coliseum on 63rd Street, was the most unpredictable of the nineteenth century, next to Lincoln’s. William Jennings Bryan, just 36 years old, captured the hearts of delegates with his spellbinding “Cross of Gold” speech and won the nomination on the fifth ballot. He lost a dramatic election to business-oriented William McKinley.
Chicago hosted both the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in 1932. First, Republicans glumly gathered in the new Chicago Stadium during the depths of Great Depression to renominate President Herbert C. Hoover. Two weeks later, Democrats gathered in the same hall and selected Franklin D. Roosevelt on the fourth ballot. Roosevelt flew to Chicago to deliver the first-ever convention acceptance speech. In 1940 and 1944, Roosevelt was renominated for his third and fourth terms in the Stadium. Republicans challenged him in 1944 with New York governor Thomas E. Dewey, also nominated in the Stadium.
1968 Democratic National Convention
Chicago still lives in the shadows of the 1968 DNC. As told by Chicagohistory.org, Illinois was a competitive swing state in presidential elections, having gone for the winning candidate in every election since 1920. Chicago mayor Richard J. Daley and the national Democratic party hoped that by hosting their political convention in Chicago, they could win the state and the reelection for President Lyndon Johnson in 1968.
As the war in Vietnam became unpopular and unrest gripped the nation, Johnson surprised everyone by dropping out of the race in March. A spirited primary campaign saw New York senator Robert F. Kennedy emerge as the popular choice, only to be killed after winning the California primary on June 5. None of the remaining candidates captured the popular imagination quite like Kennedy. Dissatisfaction with the war effort, the perceived ineffectiveness of civil rights legislation, and the despair over the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr. in April and Kennedy in June made Chicago a powder keg by August.
As the convention began on Monday, August 26, at the International Amphitheatre, protestors congregated in Lincoln Park on the North Side and Grant Park downtown, outside the Conrad Hilton Hotel. Groups such as the Youth International Party, National Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam, Students for a Democratic Society, as well as local activist organizations all participated in demonstrations. With each passing day and night, the crowds grew and violence ensued.
Instead of sympathizing with the bloodied youths, Americans faulted the protestors for the chaos and respected the police and Daley for asserting order in the streets. The Republican candidate, former vice president Richard M. Nixon, positioned himself as the “law and order” candidate, carried Illinois and won the presidency.
Aftermath
It took 28 years for another political convention to come to Chicago in 1996. Ahead of the convention, in order to project a positive image of the city, Mayor Richard M. Daley, according to Wikipedia sources, dedicated funding toward beautifying the West Loop area and the brand-new United Center, where the convention was held, as well as the city’s downtown. President Bill Clinton was nominated unanimously for a second term and Vice President Al Gore by voice vote. Chicago’s performance as a convention host city was regarded to have been successful.
Alison Moran-Powers and Dean’s Team Chicago
