Cecil A. Partee Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield
Cecil A. Partee Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield Cecil A. Partee Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield
A: He was a very fine man, a very knowledgeable, enlightened, bright, articulate man. I enjoyed knowlng him. I learned a lot from him. He believed in democracy being spread throughout and he obtained a lot of jobs for people and tried to move people up into the mainstream of American life. A fine gentleman, I enjoyed meeting him. He was a nice man. Q: Who else was involved with that ward at that time? A: Well, Dawson was the colmnltteeman and Ciongressman and had a fellow by the name of Harvey who was his alderman; William Harvey was his alderman. I knew him, too. Q: What kind of person was he? A: A very fine man; a very, very fine man. He had been a fireman and Dawson picked him because he had integrity and he had forthrightness and made a good alderman. Q: Were you living in the ward? A: No, I was not living in the 2nd ward. That's the 2nd ward. My office was in the 2nd ward, law office, but I was living in the 20th ward. Q: When you first started your precinct work, how did you go about becoming acquainted with these 500 people? A: Well, my committeeman was a fellow named Kenneth Campbell and he was the committeeman of the 20th ward and he had precinct schools where he taught you the rudiments of being a precinct cornitteeman. How to meet people and how to discuss the issues with them and all. And so, you didn't just go out barehanded, you went out with some pre-knowledge as to how to approach them, how to sell your candidates and things of that sort, And how to give service to people so that when you did come to ask them to support you, you came into people who had a posture of willingness, you see, Q: Yes. What were some of the more important lessons they taught you when you went out? A: Well, one of the important lessons was that--thfs sounds very trite but one of the things I learned is, if you smoked, you never walk in anyone's house with a cigarette in your hand or your mouth. Maybe they didn't smoke or maybe it's inconvenient. Maybe they didn't have an ashtray. It was just a basic kind of thing. And general courtesy and respecting people's opinions. You could walk into a place to talk to someone and they could be absolutely opposed to what you were selling--how to respectfully disagree without being disagreeable. A lot of people don't know that, how to disagree without being disagreeable. It's very important. And you let people talk out their frustrations and then supply them with facts and figures and hopefully persuade them to your way of life. I can remember one of my first elections was when Harry Truman ran and this
old fellow told me that he's from the South and Truman's fxom the South and he said, "I don't want no Southerners with all their prejudice," nor this not that and all and I said, 'Well, let's just take a look at what this man has done and what he says he's going to do. He's desegregated the Army*" I said, "Roosevelt never did that." He said, "He's from New York." I said, "Just because a man comes from the South--first of all, if a Southerner decides he wants to do something that's right on a racial subject, he's more likely to do it, absolutely do it, than a Northerner." So I carried that precinct for Truman and that precinct had been Republican before that. Q: Oh.? A: Yes. A lot of black people for a long time were very motivated by Abraham Lincoln and--Republican and people would say, "Well, my daddy would turn over in his grave if I voted for a Democrat," and all that, you know. But we would turn it around and made it very strongly Democratic. Those are some of the things that I learned through that process. Just how to get along with people and--you go into a place, you know--the husband maybe thinks one thing and the wife thinks another. When you walk out of there, you want to he friends with both of them. 9: (pause) Who were some of the people that helped you in this precinct work, that worked for you? A: No, I really don't: think of any names, really. I really did it myself. Oh, you know, you would hire somebody from time-to-time to pass out literature or something of that sort but I mean the philosophy, the philosophical part of it, I handled myself, I handled it myself. I got to know people and sometimes someone would come in and they would say, "Oh, by the way, my daughter needs 11 a divorce," or, "We would like to get a will drawn. You know, it helps you, starts to help you develop your business, too. Q: Yes, sir. (pause) Let's see, now, this was the 20th ward. You say William Harvey, or was it Kenneth Campbell that was the . . . A: Kenneth Campbell was the committeeman of the 20th ward. Q: What type of help did he give you in your precinct work? A: Well, as 1 say, he had a precinct school. And he taught you the fundamentals of canvassing, how to canvass, haw to talk to people, haw to organize your precinct. His motto was "Organize, Deputize, and Supervise." And you would get people within your framework of your precinct to do various thlngs for you. But you were the person most responsible, I had about four hundred and fifty people in my precinct, five hundred, and I knew them all by their first name, and intimately. I knew about them. Every once in awhile, you would run into somebody who was a friend of somebody else you knew and that gave you another kind of meeting ground. Or somebody in their family went to school with you or something and--so it always made for little tight paints of friendship, you see.
- Page 21 and 22: So the whole family relationship an
- Page 23 and 24: a tie-in between that and what we c
- Page 25 and 26: A: And my grandmother. My grandmoth
- Page 27 and 28: But I think it was more or less a S
- Page 29 and 30: a debate on , "What is most destruc
- Page 31 and 32: somebody or something foul. So, had
- Page 33 and 34: when prohibition was over and they
- Page 35 and 36: A: Mixed crews, yes. Q: Do you reme
- Page 37 and 38: to her for fear she wouldn't pay me
- Page 39 and 40: lawyer who became a judge there. He
- Page 41 and 42: A: (pause) I don't know. I think pr
- Page 43 and 44: CHARLES CECIL AND BESSIE DUPREE PAR
- Page 45 and 46: COURTESV OF BESSIE D. IVY CECIL PAR
- Page 47 and 48: CORNEAL DAVIS (L) AND CEClL PARTEE.
- Page 49 and 50: A: Beautiful. I stayed in the dormi
- Page 51 and 52: A: I didn't know any of them until
- Page 53 and 54: A: Well, just like going out for th
- Page 55 and 56: 4 1 SESSION 3, TAPE 3, SIDE 1 Q: I
- Page 57 and 58: yourself and so forth. Whereas, in
- Page 59 and 60: A: Yes, I remember a fellow by the
- Page 61 and 62: six inches, into my leg. And just m
- Page 63 and 64: Q: And you're still in touch with t
- Page 65 and 66: A: But they said, "You can go somew
- Page 67 and 68: Q: How did you get back and forth?
- Page 69 and 70: just on the weekend which was a lot
- Page 71: A: Well, I was there for about a ye
- Page 75 and 76: We tried to get a decision between
- Page 77 and 78: 63 Abraham Lincoln Hotel and we wer
- Page 79 and 80: Q: That had already finished? A: No
- Page 81 and 82: legislation, I think one day what I
- Page 83 and 84: A: No, that was about two years bef
- Page 85 and 86: A: Yes. q: Did she continue active
- Page 87 and 88: Q: Was this in replacement of Mr. C
- Page 89 and 90: Filipino or some man may be married
- Page 91 and 92: deal of controversy about them. Q:
- Page 93 and 94: well paying jobs but they had to do
- Page 95 and 96: joined other organizations for the
- Page 97 and 98: A: Generally just before an electio
- Page 99 and 100: A: No, I don't think we had opposit
- Page 101 and 102: where they paid you far two years t
- Page 103 and 104: BLACK DEMOCRATS IN THE 77TH ILLINOI
- Page 105 and 106: CECIL PARTEE AT WORK IN THE SENATE
- Page 107 and 108: A: No, it was the Legislative Refer
- Page 109 and 110: Q: Well! (laughter) A: Yes, didn't
- Page 111 and 112: esearch if you needed it? A: Bill I
- Page 113 and 114: started from nothing. Q: Did that o
- Page 115 and 116: A: Well, not specifically as to the
- Page 117 and 118: for that. About 1968, Chicago start
- Page 119 and 120: he was there. We joined him in 1967
- Page 121 and 122: years and for many many years it fa
A: He was a very fine man, a very knowledgeable, enlightened, bright,<br />
articulate man. I enjoyed knowlng him. I learned a lot from him. He<br />
believed in democracy being spread throughout and he obtained a lot <strong>of</strong> jobs<br />
for people and tried to move people up into the mainstream <strong>of</strong> American life.<br />
A fine gentleman, I enjoyed meeting him. He was a nice man.<br />
Q: Who else was involved with that ward at that time?<br />
A: Well, Dawson was the colmnltteeman and Ciongressman and had a fellow by the<br />
name <strong>of</strong> Harvey who was his alderman; William Harvey was his alderman. I<br />
knew him, too.<br />
Q: What kind <strong>of</strong> person was he?<br />
A: A very fine man; a very, very fine man. He had been a fireman and Dawson<br />
picked him because he had integrity and he had forthrightness and made a good<br />
alderman.<br />
Q: Were you living in the ward?<br />
A: No, I was not living in the 2nd ward. That's the 2nd ward. My <strong>of</strong>fice was<br />
in the 2nd ward, law <strong>of</strong>fice, but I was living in the 20th ward.<br />
Q: When you first started your precinct work, how did you go about becoming<br />
acquainted with these 500 people?<br />
A: Well, my committeeman was a fellow named Kenneth Campbell and he was the<br />
committeeman <strong>of</strong> the 20th ward and he had precinct schools where he taught you<br />
the rudiments <strong>of</strong> being a precinct cornitteeman. How to meet people and how<br />
to discuss the issues with them and all. And so, you didn't just go out<br />
barehanded, you went out with some pre-knowledge as to how to approach them,<br />
how to sell your candidates and things <strong>of</strong> that sort, And how to give service<br />
to people so that when you did come to ask them to support you, you came into<br />
people who had a posture <strong>of</strong> willingness, you see,<br />
Q: Yes. What were some <strong>of</strong> the more important lessons they taught you when you<br />
went out?<br />
A: Well, one <strong>of</strong> the important lessons was that--thfs sounds very trite but<br />
one <strong>of</strong> the things I learned is, if you smoked, you never walk in anyone's<br />
house with a cigarette in your hand or your mouth. Maybe they didn't smoke or<br />
maybe it's inconvenient. Maybe they didn't have an ashtray. It was just a<br />
basic kind <strong>of</strong> thing. And general courtesy and respecting people's opinions.<br />
You could walk into a place to talk to someone and they could be absolutely<br />
opposed to what you were selling--how to respectfully disagree without being<br />
disagreeable. A lot <strong>of</strong> people don't know that, how to disagree without being<br />
disagreeable. It's very important. And you let people talk out their frustrations<br />
and then supply them with facts and figures and hopefully persuade them<br />
to your way <strong>of</strong> life.<br />
I can remember one <strong>of</strong> my first elections was when Harry Truman ran and this
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