CITIES: Carl Stokes Drops Out

With Cleveland's mayoral election coming up this fall, the telegrammed invitations to dinner at Mayor Carl Stokes' were not unusual. After cocktails and a light buffet, Stokes asked his 50 guests —bankers, business executives, political intimates—into the living room. "I have a speech to make." They stood in stunned silence as Stokes announced that he would not run again. He made his decision public in a television address later that night. "I have spent the last 14 years in local government; I have been privileged to serve in high office during America's...