At DNC 2024, history is in the making (2024)

Starting Monday, Chicago will add to the long list of historic political party conventions the city has hosted.

The 2024 Democratic National Convention will be the 26th political convention for Chicago, more than double the number of any other city. It will be historic for many reasons, including that the presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, is the first Black and South Asian woman to be nominated for the office of U. S. president.

But many of Chicago’s past political conventions also have been storied affairs.

“Just to mention the names of the nominees is to recall great moments in U.S. history,” as Craig Sautter, co-author of “Inside the Wigwam: Chicago Presidential Conventions 1860-1996,” told us. “Those moments run from Lincoln to McClellan, (Ulysses S.) Grant, (James A.) Garfield, (James G.) Blaine, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, William Jennings Bryan, Teddy Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, Charles Evans Hughes, Franklin Roosevelt, Thomas Dewey, Adlai Stevenson, (Dwight D.) Eisenhower, (Richard M.) Nixon, (Hubert) Humphrey, Bill Clinton to even (Warren G.) Harding and (Herbert) Hoover. Each name resonates with great issues, trials and triumphs. Chicago was their launching pad.”

From Monday through Thursday, the Democrats will present a parade of speakers at the United Center and update the party platform. The speakers will try to add to the momentum behind Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, her vice presidential pick.

Going into the convention, Harris pretty much had three tasks: unify the party, unite the base and reverse the slide in the polls, said U.S. Rep. Mike Quigley, D-Ill.

“She pretty much checked every box,” Quigley said.

Now, with her keynote speech, Harris — who, along with Walz, has already been nominated through an online early vote — will face the challenge of building on her early enthusiastic support by outlining policy positions with broad enough backing to give her a “bounce” in the polls and carry the ticket through the Nov. 5 election. The nonprofit GoChiLife is planning a watch party at Soldier Field for those who want to watch the speech but who can’t gain admittance to the United Center.

No more ghosts of ’68

This also might be the year when Chicago, we hope, can finally put behind it the memories of what the Walker Commission called a police riot at the 1968 convention. Plenty of protests are planned, and Chicago Police Supt. Larry Snelling reiterated recently that Chicago police will respect protesters’ rights. Snelling also vowed that police “will not allow people to come here and destroy this city,” and his tough talk drew applause from an audience of business and civic leaders. If Snelling is true to his word, and protesters make their views known peacefully, Chicago can make the right kind of history in 2024.

Although Chicago hosted the 1996 Democratic convention, it is not nearly as well-remembered as 1968, in part because the event simply renominated a sitting president and sitting vice president, Bill Clinton and Al Gore, without much controversy.

There’s no shortage of commentators who have tried to draw parallels between 1968 and 2024. Then-Vice President Hubert Humphrey in 1968 and Harris in 2024 secured Democratic nominations without running in a single primary, after Lyndon Johnson back then, and now President Joe Biden, decided not to run for reelection. In 1968, the party was split over the Vietnam War, and now it is divided over the war in Gaza. Thousands are expected to march in Chicago to protest the Israel-Hamas war.

But, as Sautter points out, there are significant differences. In 1968, both the Democrats and the nation were at war with themselves, riven by the disastrous Vietnam War. In 1968, the battle on the streets was reflected by the battle inside the convention. In 2024, the Democrats are strongly unified, and though wars rage in Ukraine, Gaza and elsewhere, the United States is at peace militarily. The demonstrators on the streets in 2024 are as passionate as 1968, but they will be met by police who are much better trained and much more restrained.

A replay of 1968’s violence would tarnish our city’s reputation. It would help the Republican ticket of former President Donald Trump and Ohio Sen. JD Vance in a year when, like 2016 and 2020, the presidential election is expected to be decided in the Electoral College by narrow margins in a small number of swing states.

Today’s conventions, at which the nominees are preordained, are often derided for lacking significance. But this coming week in Chicago could still prove to be a memorable moment.

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