In the early 1980s, Representative Harold Washington
of Illinois served slightly more than one term in the U.S.
House of Representatives before winning election as the
first African-American mayor of Chicago. On Capitol
Hill, Washington represented a South Side district with a
celebrated history of electing Black lawmakers to Congress.
Washington confronted the powerful party machines that
for years had dictated the rhythms of Chicago politics. In
the House, Washington worked to protect and open access
to federal aid programs, and used his seat on the powerful
Judiciary Committee to advance the cause of civil rights.
“The reason my face and my name are known all over is
because of the history of the Chicago political machine
and the movement that brought it down,” Washington
remarked. “I just happened to be there at the right time to
capitalize on it.”1
Harold Washington was born on April 15, 1922,
in Chicago, Illinois, to Bertha, an amateur singer and
domestic worker, and Roy Lee Washington, a minister and
lawyer. After his parents divorced in 1928, Washington
lived with his father, who married Arlene Jackson, a local
schoolteacher, in 1935. Washington’s father was active in
Chicago politics, serving as a precinct captain in the city’s predominantly Black South Side. Washington accompanied
his father to rallies and meetings and learned the intricacies
of the political machine that dominated Chicago politics
by observing future Representatives Arthur W. Mitchell,
William L. Dawson, and Ralph H. Metcalfe. Washington
attended Forrestville School and DuSable High School in
Chicago before dropping out to work in a meatpacking
factory and compete as an amateur boxer and a hurdler. In
1941, Washington married Dorothy Finch. The couple
divorced in 1951. Drafted into the military in 1942,
Washington served with the U.S. Army Air Corps unit of
engineers in the Pacific until 1946. After World War II, he
attended Roosevelt University in Chicago and served as class
president during his senior year. After earning a bachelor’s
degree in political science in 1949, he went on to receive a
law degree from Northwestern University’s School of Law in
1952, joining his father in private law practice in Chicago
after he passed the bar in 1953.2
When his father died in 1953, Washington succeeded him
as a precinct captain in the third ward regular Democratic
organization. Washington joined the city corporation
counsel’s office as an assistant prosecutor from 1954 to 1958,
and in 1960, he started a four-year stint as an arbitrator for the Illinois industrial commission. Washington served in
the Illinois state house of representatives from 1965 to 1976
and in the Illinois state senate from 1976 to 1980. Although
he was closely aligned with the city’s political machine and
often followed its “idiot card”—the derogatory name for
the voting instructions assembled for machine candidates—Washington defied organization leaders on occasion, such
as his votes for the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), a fair
housing code, and the establishment of a statewide holiday
honoring civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. Despite
facing some legal issues—Washington spent a month in jail
on a 1971 conviction for failure to file income tax returns—he maintained support among his constituents.3
In 1977, following the sudden death of the powerful
Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley, Washington ran to fill
the vacancy. Washington had grown frustrated with the
local Democratic organization, which he believed stifled
Black politicians like himself who refused to fall into
line on every issue, and challenged the machine-backed
candidate, Michael Bilandic, for the Democratic mayoral
nomination. As he struggled to raise campaign funds, he
focused much of his attention on Chicago’s South Side.
During the campaign, he likened the city’s Black population
to a “sleeping giant,” predicting that if “the potential black
vote ever woke up, we’d control the city.” In a field of four
contenders, Washington finished third with 11 percent of
the vote. Afterward, he promised voters that his split with
the machine was permanent. “I’m going to do that which
maybe I should have done 10 or 12 years ago,” Washington
exclaimed. “I’m going to stay outside that damned
Democratic Party and give it hell.”4
Three years later, Washington challenged first-term
Representative Bennett M. Stewart, the machine’s
incumbent, in the 1980 Democratic primary for Chicago’s
South Side seat in the House. Washington was well known
in the majority-Black district, which included middleclass
and poor neighborhoods running south along Lake
Michigan as well as Chicago’s downtown commercial
Loop. His earlier mayoral run had won him support among
independent voters, and he benefited from local discontent
with the city’s political machine which, two years earlier,
had all but handpicked Stewart to replace Representative
Ralph Metcalfe in the House after his sudden death in
1978. In the 1980 primary, Washington garnered nearly 50
percent of the vote to defeat Stewart, who placed third in
a field of four candidates that included Ralph Metcalfe Jr., the son of the late Representative. In the November general
election, Washington trounced his Republican opponent,
George Williams, securing 95 percent of the vote to earn a
seat in the 97th Congress (1981–1983).5
Sworn in on January 3, 1981, Washington received
assignments on three committees: Education and Labor;
Judiciary; and Government Operations. Washington was
the sixth consecutive African-American Representative from
Chicago’s South Side, a line of succession which began with
Oscar De Priest’s election to the House in 1928. Unlike his
predecessors, however, Washington lacked the backing of
the Chicago political establishment, and he continued his
anti-machine posture on Capitol Hill.
Washington refused for weeks to resign from his seat
in the statehouse to deny Mayor Jane Byrne, who had
inherited Chicago’s machine after Daley’s death, the ability
to replace him in Springfield with a party regular from her
personal staff. Though Washington did not accept his salary
during the standoff, state Democrats threatened lawsuits,
and House Minority Leader Robert Henry Michel of
Illinois discussed a formal motion declaring Washington’s
seat vacant before the Congressman ultimately relented.6
Elected to office at the same time as President Ronald
Reagan, Washington spent much of his time on Capitol
Hill criticizing the President’s proposals to cut taxes and
slash spending on federal aid programs. He criticized the
President’s agenda for favoring wealthy Americans while
simultaneously trying “to balance the budget on the
backs of the poor,” including his constituents in Chicago.
Washington said cuts to federal assistance programs, such
as college financial aid, were “unfairly targeted” at districts
like his, and said limiting access to college education would
have a detrimental effect on the economy. Washington
also disagreed with much of the President’s foreign policy,
especially the increased production of nuclear weapons,
the emphasis on defense spending, and U.S. military
intervention in Central America.7
Washington’s most enduring influence as a Representative
was his commitment to civil rights. From his seat on
the Judiciary Committee in 1982, Washington helped
negotiate an extension of sections of the Voting Rights
Act that prevented localities with a history of voting
rights abuses from using “bail-out” provisions to avoid
federal supervision. Washington’s efforts during seven
weeks of lengthy hearings before the Subcommittee on
Civil and Constitutional Rights drew praise from civil rights leaders. The Congressional Black Caucus, which
Washington labeled “the one forum by which black leaders
can speak to the nation,” chose the Illinois Representative
to help manage the bill during debate on the House Floor.
In this role, Washington led the opposition to several
amendments that sought to weaken the bill by allowing
local officials, rather than federal courts, to review requests
to skirt federal oversight.8
During his House career, Washington denounced
proposals to weaken the enforcement of affirmative action
and endorsed the ERA. After the ERA failed to secure
ratification by the 1982 deadline, he expressed regret
and blamed the Reagan administration for its failure.
“To me, the ERA is a nondebatable issue,” Washington
noted. “Black people have suffered from discrimination,
degradation, and inequality in all areas of life. So, on
this issue of peoples’ rights, it is easy to identify with the
inequities women are facing.”9
Concerned that Mayor Byrne and other Chicago
machine leaders would launch a challenge to his re-election,
Washington spent considerable time campaigning back
home during his first term. Despite his apprehension, he
ran unopposed in the Democratic primary and easily won a
second term in the House, garnering 97 percent of the vote
in the general election.10
Shortly after his victory in November 1982, Washington
announced his candidacy for mayor of Chicago. Approached
by several African-American groups interested in fielding
a strong Black candidate to oppose Byrne, Washington
agreed to run only after a campaign to register more than
100,000 African-American voters in Chicago. Throughout
the Democratic primary, Washington used a grassroots
approach, emphasizing his anti-machine record, especially
when courting Black voters. “It’s our turn,” Washington said
repeatedly. “We’re not going to apologize for it and we’re
not going to waste a lot of time explaining it. It’s our turn—that’s all.” Drastically outspent by his opponents in a closely
watched race, Washington nonetheless won the February
Democratic nomination; the primary boasted the largest
voter turnout in 25 years. In the April general election,
Washington narrowly defeated former Illinois state legislator
Republican Bernard Epton to become Chicago’s first African-American mayor. On April 30, 1983, a little more than two
weeks after the election, he resigned his House seat.11
As mayor, Washington struggled to reform the Chicago
political scene, but he did weaken the power of the machine. Seven months after winning election to a second mayoral
term, Washington died of a heart attack on November 25,
1987. “Losing our mayor is like losing a black folk hero,”
noted a Chicago constituent. Even the Chicago Tribune,
which had at times criticized Washington, observed that few
people “have made quite so powerful an impact” on the city.
During a salute to his former colleague on the House Floor,
Mervyn M. Dymally of California recognized Washington’s
political legacy: “He was purposeful and constantly focused,
for his battle did not begin and end with the roll call, but
extended into a crusade to heal the cancerous lesions of race
hatred and generations of divisive political warfare.”12
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