Political Notes: Daley's Choice

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After years of dictatorial rule over Illinois' Democratic apparat, Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley faced a potential party uprising as his organization's slate-making committee gathered to select candidates for Senator and Governor in this year's elections.

Two political aristocrats, OEO Boss Sargent Shriver and Illinois State Treasurer Adlai Stevenson III, were interested in the Governor's chair that Democrat Otto Kerner is relinquishing this year. Neither was overly eager for the tougher assignment of trying to unhorse Senate Minority Leader Everett Dirksen, 72. And both were anathema to Daley's party regulars.

Shriver had often irritated local Democrats by floating the rumor that he was available for the Illinois posts; many machine loyalists regarded him as a carpetbagger whose only tie to Illinois was the room he maintained in Chicago's Drake Hotel. Adlai III also rankled the Daley regulars, especially when he appeared before their council of slatemakers and touted himself as the "strongest" candidate for Governor. He angered the committee further when he said that he might not be able to support the President's war policies in every detail. "I was disgusted," said one member. "It was typical of his way—odd, peculiar and independent."

After two committee meetings, Daley massed the faithful at a press conference in Chicago's Sherman House and introduced the candidates who were ultimately selected. Lieut. Governor Samuel Shapiro, 60, a stocky, reticent campaigner, will go for the governorship, while Attorney General William G. Clark, 43, will have the unenviable task of running against Dirksen. Why had Stevenson been overlooked? "He's already got a job," said Daley. As for Shriver, who is also fully employed running the poverty program, the Kennedy brother-in-law could console himself with reports that he too may have a new job shortly—as U.S. Ambassador to France.