Cecil A. Partee Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

Q: Was this in replacement of Mr. Campbell?
A: No, Mr. Campbell--when I became committeeman?
Q: Yes.
A: Yes, Mr. Campbell died in December of 1970. December 31, 1970. And I was
made acting ward committeeman as of the eighth or tenth of January.
A: Yes.
Q: So, president of the organization, how does that relate to the committeeman
position?
A: Well, the president of the organization is in charge of the programs as they
develop within the ward. When the candidates would come out, I would have the
opportunity to introduce them, to talk to the ward about various kinds of
current events to keep them informed so they could talk to their peaple from
a vantage point of knowledge and understanding of the issues which arose on a
day-to-day basis. So whenever we had the meetings, I would call the meeting
to order and discuss various things and, of course, the committeeman would
come out and he would discuss them also. But: I was sort of preliminary,
Q: How often did you have these meetings?
A: Well, we usually met a couple of times a month. There was about two meetings
a month. In election time, perhaps, sometimes even more often.
Q: And where were these meetings held?
A: We had a ward headquarters. Initially, it was at 59th and State Street
and then we later moved over to 32% East Garfield Boulevard at a storefront
that was. fixed up for an office for the committeeman and a meeting hall for
the precinct committeemen, or captains as we call them in Chicago.
Q: Did you have an office in . . .
A: Never did have an office in there, no.
Q: So you operated somewhat out of your own office then, your law office?
A: No, I operated out of that headquarters but I didn't have any specific
office assigned to me there. There were always a couple of offices that anybody
could use in case they wanted to have meetings or something of that sort.
But I didn't have a specific office where I went there every day.
Q: When you first started out as a precinct committeeman, how closely did you
work with the other precinct captains?