National Reports
VOTAW, ALBERT N.
National Reports Rival Tickets Set in Illinois By Albert N. Votaw For the second time in as many years, Republicans here picked a rebel Democrat to head their local ticket. This and the defeat of...
...Sachs, who has a boundless enthusiasm for his newfound avocation of office holding, first entered the lists on the Kennelly slate in last year's primary...
...He is known downstate for his work on truck-licensing bills during Stevenson's term as Governor--an issue which has always been of importance in that area--but lacks a really wide following...
...This and the defeat of a comeback attempt by former Senator Scott Lucas highlighted a feverish week of slatemaking...
...The slatemaking over, candidates must now turn to the primaries...
...Once in office, he proceded alternately to horrify and amuse everyone by tiring patronage employes and getting embroiled in all sorts of political disputes with his erstwhile Democratic mentors...
...In doing this, the Republicans followed the precedent set last year, when Alderman Robert Merriam from the University of Chicago district was nominated for Mayor...
...The other serious possibility, Congressman Melvin Price of East St...
...GOP strategists, headed by Stratton, figure that Adamowski, with strong support in traditionally Democratic Polish sections, will do better because of the heavy GOP vote which candidates for county office can pick up in the suburbs...
...Adamowski ran third in that bitterly fought primary, behind Daley and Kennelly...
...Running with Stengel as head of the Democratic state ticket will be Cook County Treasurer Herbert C. Paschen...
...Actually, he appears to have been chosen chiefly because labor would not swallow Lucas...
...Louis, refused to give up his sure district, and with it his House seniority and place on the Atomic Energy Committee, for the somewhat dubious race against Dirksen...
...Strongest spot on the local ticket is the post of Cook County State's Attorney (the equivalent of district attorney...
...Democrats, however, must still deal with effervescent Morris B. Sachs, the merchant turned city treasurer, who has announced that he will file for the Gubernatorial nomination and, if defeated, run as an independent in the fall...
...After the slatemaking, Lucas blasted Daley and announced his retirement...
...Lucas, former Senate Democratic leader, was making a determined bid for renomination to the seat he lost so resoundingly to Everett Dirksen six years ago...
...But weighing in the balance against him were his bad defeat in 1950, the fact that since then he had served as a lobbyist in Washington, and the combined opposition of the state's labor leaders and Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley...
...Paschen, who ran for Lieutenant Governor in the Democratic debacle of 1952, will be trying to upset Governor William G. Stratton, one of the GOP's most successful votegetters, now finishing his first term in the Executive Mansion...
...On the other hand, the Republican organization is more than adequately endowed with persons who would rather lose with a safely Old Guard candidate than win with a liberal...
...The GOP still faces the prospect that State Treasurer Warren E. Wright may run against Stratton, but this candidacy, if it materializes, promises to have little but nuisance value...
...And it has been many, many years since the GOP elected a state's attorney in Cook County...
...Sachs went on to pile up an astounding vote in this, his first try for public office, leading the ticket...
...He did so well that the regular Democratic organization promptly offered him the nomination to his current post, their victorious primary candidate having been persuaded to resign...
...Here, the Democrats renominated John Gutknecht, who was elected in the face of the GOP landslide four years ago...
...A veteran state legislator, Adamowski also served as attorney for the election commission and as corporation counsel under ex-Mayor Martin Kennelly, who was dumped by the Democrats last year...
...He has declined to spell out the line his campaign will take, but it is almost certain he will raise the old cry of "machine domination" and charge Gutknecht with failure to uncover or prosecute official malfeasance in Democratic Chicago...
...He was reportedly supported by many downstate leaders as well as such Cook County stalwarts as Al Horan and National Committeeman Jake Arvey...
...Merriam threw a scare into the Democrats, but lost by some 126,000 votes...
...To run against Dirksen, the Democrats picked State Representative Richard Stengel of Rock Island, reportedly the choice of Adlai Stevenson...
...The GOP, rebuffed by the men it originally hoped would run, picked a rebel Democrat, Benjamin S. Adamowski...
Vol. 39 • January 1956 • No. 4
