Former Senator Eugene McCarthy died today. He died in his sleep, a peaceful passing. He ran for President in 1968 with one issue, basically - stop the war in Vietnam. He attracted all of us who needed a unifying voice.
I became a worker bee, answering phones, mailings, talking to volunteers. My Dad was a judge and well-known Democrat. He subsidized the lunches and the rides home so that I could work for "Gene". I was fifteen. I talked to my Dad constantly about McCarthy (He would have said I talked at him, because he never got a word in edgewise.)
There's more...
I never had to get "Clean for Gene" - but a lot of people shaved their beards and cut their hair and found clothes they hadn't seen in awhile so that they could go door-to-door.
My father thought it was a passing phase, until we were watching the news and Johnson announced he was not going to run for a second term. He looked at me and said "What are you kids DOING?" I told him that people were sick of this war, and McCarthy was going to win. We had just taken in a stray dog, so he became known as "Lucky Lyndon" for getting out of the race.
Bobby Kennedy tossed his hat in the ring. I was pissed off. It seemed to me that Kennedy had waited for McCarthy to take a courageous stance and then jumped in the race. I was still loyal to McCarthy. My family worshiped the Kennedys, and my Dad tried to explain to me that it was just politics.
But it wasn't. Events took a terrible turn. First, Martin Luther King was assassinated, then Kennedy. What had seemed like the birth of being in politics to do good turned into some terrible nightmare. I pleaded with my Dad to let me go to the Convention in Chicago, but he was firm. He knew Daley, and he was afraid people would get hurt.
In those days, they actually covered the convention every night, gavel to gavel. So Dad and I watched. There are several moments I will never forget. Sen. Ribicoff trying to tell the Convention what was happening outside with protestors and police - and Daley shutting off his microphone. Dan Rather getting "handled" by "thugs"- and Walter Cronkite reporting it. Outside in the streets, people getting beaten mercilessly by cops. All so we could "pretend" that our real nominee was Hubert Humphrey, who had not been in a single primary - the "machine" candidate.
So Humphrey was the candidate. Dad had met Humphrey, and kept telling me that he was not such a bad guy. But I couldn't hear that. Up until then, I had been a virgin in politics, just working for my Dad, and people I knew. But now I knew what happened if you chose the wrong guy in the race.
That feeling lasted for a long time.
But I was at lunch with my 17-year-old niece last year, when she asked her father if she could go to another state and work for Howard Dean. I saw myself many years ago. My brother said he would think about it. Then he looked at me, and we both smiled.