Corn Kings and One-Horse Thieves
Odds & ends
Illinois past and present, as seen by James Krohe Jr.
The Corn Latitudes
Politics and government
Here are articles about municipal and state government in Illinois, including the General Assembly, state agencies and state workers, history and issues of the day, and enduring controversies as published mainly in Illinois Issues and Illinois Times. Because the distinction between politics and government is a fine one at times, I list pieces on both topics here.
I grew up in the capital city because my father, from a family of Democrats, got a patronage job as a page at the Illinois State Library when he got back from the war in 1946, when Democrat Eddie Barrett ran the Secretary of State's office.
A journalist who grows up in a government town is doomed to take up government as a topic at least occasionally. Before I wrote about "the state," I wrote for the state as a contract writer and editor. I took on dozens of projects on a contract basis for the agencies responsible for public health, for education, for energy, and for the environment. The results of a few of the more interesting projects are included in this archives and are listed according to their subject matter. The work paid the bills, but more importantly it gave me an education in how both government and Illinois work.
I was fortunate. While I stumbling toward a career as a journalist, there debuted in the capital a new magazine that took government seriously in ways that the daily newspaper could not (for space) or would not (out of consideration for the tastes of the reading public). That magazine was Illinois Issues. Meanwhile the weekly Illinois Times offered me a forum for pieces of a different character on the same topics.
Looking back, I am reminded that my very first efforts in serious journalism addressed public issues. It's what I've written the most about, and while I won't say that politics and government is the subject area I know best, I concede that it is probably the area I know most.
Interested readers also should know that I devoted a chapter in my history of mid-Illinois—"Jiggery-pokery"—to politics as it affected that part of the state; see Corn Kings & One-Horse Thieves. You can find more articles about politics and government on the Chicagoland and Chicagoland history pages.
Note: I broke down this long list into several subcategories to make browsing easier.
Click on the title for the full article.
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and government" in the topics menu
Why the State of Illinois is a lousy surrogate parent
"Prejudices" Illinois Times January 9, 1981
The Prairie State Is Not Hostile to the Arts, Just Indifferent
The state of state-funded arts in Illinois
Illinois Issues December 1998
On converting Illinois corn to motor fuel
Illinois Issues January 1981
Mined Land Reclamation: Ends and Means
Healing damaged farmland in Illinois, Part 1
Illinois Issues December 1984
Illinois doesn't need fewer deal-makers, it needs better ones
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times June 6, 2013
Kirk Dillard mixes his messages about family
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times June 13, 2013
Remembering Harold
The career of Chicago's first black mayor
"Prejudices" Illinois Times December 3, 1992
Devising a decent family policy for Illinois
"Prejudices" Illinois Times March 10, 1994
Is Illinois an accessory to child murder?
“Prejudices” Illinois Times November 9, 1993
How one woman’s mistake may have doomed ERA
The Weekly (Champaign-Urbana) June 19, 1981
Dealing with the Dead
Balancing respect and learning at Dickson Mounds
"Prejudices" Illinois Times [?],1999
Chicago's Women Take Charge of Change
Another female new dawn breaks in Illinois
Chicago Enterprise May 1992
Who's Afraid of Paula Wolff?
The U of I Chicago plays find the leader
Reader May 17, 1991
Religion sneaks into Illinois schools by the back door
Illinois Issues February 2008
Searching for Leadership
Garry Wills' Certain Trumpets
lllinois Issues January 1995
The Advent of Unstate Illinois
Demographics threaten to undo Illinois
Chicago Enterprise December 1990
How Mass Transit Can Serve the Masses
Chicago thinks new thoughts about the CTA
Chicago Enterprise January 1992
Interest groups as Illinois’s fourth branch of government
Illinois Issues November 1997
Revenue & taxation
Shouldn’t profit-seeking nonprofits pay property taxes?
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times November 6, 2014
Gov. Edgar tries to make taxes fairer, confuses people
“Prejudices” Illinois Times January 24, 1991
The State of Illinois flunks its science test
“Prejudices” Illinois Times July 20, 1992
The state's sums fail to add up—again
“Prejudices” Illinois Times July 16, 1992
The interests of a City and a city often are at odds
“Prejudices” Illinois Times February 25, 1977
Illinois’s Budget Is Broken
Embracing the simple at the expense of the wise
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times November 25, 2009
Illinois's addiction to gambling
Illinois Issues May 1997
Might a graduated income tax fix a broken revenue system?
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times July 11, 2013
The Paul Findley Questionnaire
A Congressman makes his own public opinion
“Prejudices” Illinois Times July 4, 1980
Illinois tries to make itself safe from kids and vice versa
“Prejudices” Illinois Times Undated
A Park that Needs Protection from People
Springfield’s Carpenter Park under threat
Illinois Times September 15, 1978
Planning for a courts complex that won’t be built
“Prejudices” Illinois Times October 8, 1981
Rodney Davis Warns of Disaster
The congressman confronts complexity, and gets confused
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times October 3, 2013
The state can’t be both pro-family and anti-father
“Prejudices” Illinois Times June 7, 1993
Something About a Man in Uniform
Rep. Mark Kirk suffers a self-inflicted battle wound
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times June 17, 2010
Illinois institutions try to keep the heat in
“Prejudices” Illinois Times January 12, 1984
The Extinguished Senator
Are good Illinoisans wasted in the Senate?
Illinois Issues September 1995
Big Jim Thompson lives large at our expense
“Prejudices” Illinois Times November 19, 1981
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love LaRouche
Lunatics hijack a major party primary. Sound familiar?
“Prejudices” Illinois Times April 3, 1986
“A Little More Dirt in Your Lungs”
An Illinois governor preaches pollution
Illinois Times August 3, 1979
The Battles Over the Ground and Behind the Doors
Healing damaged farmland in Illinois, Part 2
Illinois Issues January 1985
Dim Reflections
Few Illinois governors write memoirs worth reading
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times November 11, 2010
Giving Immortality to Their Littleness
Gov. Thomas Ford’s diagnosis of Illinois politics
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times March 4, 2010
High public officials stoop low to raise their pay
“Prejudices” Illinois Times December 8, 1978
Getting the wrong things right at Springfield's airport
“Prejudices” Illinois Times August 19, 1982
The Catholic ascendancy in capital city politics
“Prejudices” Illinois Times February 23, 1979
Alan J. Dixon, hero of card-carrying card carriers
“Prejudices” Illinois Times August 1, 1980
Population tectonics threaten political upheaval
“Prejudices” Illinois Times September 27, 1990
A small town protects itself against an atheist plot
“Dyspepsiana” Illinois Times January 9, 2014
Some Illinois politicians want to bring back coal
“Dyspepsiana” Illinois Times December 8, 2016
When the statehouse sleeps, Springfield snores
"Prejudices" Illinois Times April 9, 1981
The settling of the Harris case settles nothing
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times July 10, 2014
Cities don’t make floods but they make them worse.
"Prejudices" Illinois Times July 21, 1993
Corruption and reform
Bad Government Is a Cultural Defect
The sociology of the Illinois Way
"Forum" Illinois Times April 1, 1976
Does geography explain corrupt statehouse politics?
“Dyspepsiana” Illinois Times August 30, 2012
Life in the Big House
Few Illinois governors seem at home at the Executive Mansion
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times September 24, 2009
The Great Tradition of Central Illinois Oratory
Lincoln and Douglas are only our most famous Ciceros
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times October 15, 2009
How might struggling toy towns like Jerome survive?
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times February 9, 2017
Illinois’s Imelda
Blago proves better at buying than selling out
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times July 15. 2010
Slower Than a Speeding Bullet
Nearly high speed rail moves down the track
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times August 5, 2010
A new approach to environmental protection
"Prejudices" Illinois Times August 27, 1992
He Dared to Speak Out
Congressman Paul Findley dies
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times December 26, 2019
Making Noises in Civic Class
Splitting Cook County from Illinois is an old bad idea
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times December 15, 2011
The CEC pushes government into the 20th century
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times April 17, 2014
Is the U.S. a nation-state or a nation of states?
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times August 20, 2015
Transportation and the Government's Uneven Hand
State intervention in the transportation marketplace
Illinois Issues October 1981
When "justice" means a fairer distribution of spoils
“Prejudices” Illinois Times January 29, 1987
Why so little public interest in serving the public interest?
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times April 4, 2013
Big Guy, Big Personality, Big Flaws
Former governor James Thompson dies
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times August 27, 2020
Criminal Injustice
The soft case for hard time for Bill Cellini
"Dyspepsiana" Illinois Times August 02, 2012
Some Books About Illinois Government
The people turn silk purses into sow's ears
See Illinois (unpublished) 2008
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SITES
OF
INTEREST
Essential for anyone interested in Illinois history and literature. Hallwas deservedly won the 2018 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Illinois State Historical Society.
One of Illinois’s best, and least-known, writers of his generation. Take note in particular of The Distancers and Road to Nowhere.
See Home Page/Learn/
Resources for a marvelous building database, architecture dictionary, even a city planning graphic novel. Handsome, useful—every Illinois culture website should be so good.
The online version of The Encyclopedia of Chicago. Crammed with thousands of topic entries, biographical sketches, maps and images, it is a reference work unmatched in Illinois.
The Illinois chapter of the American Institute of Architects in 2018 selected 200 Great Places in Illinois that illustrate our shared architectural culture across the entire period of human settlement in Illinois.
A nationally accredited, award-winning project of the McLean County Historical Society whose holdings include more than 20,000 objects, more than 15,000 books on local history and genealogy, and boxes and boxes of historical papers and images.
Mr. Lincoln, Route 66, and Other Highlights of Lincoln, Illinois
Every Illinois town ought to have a chronicler like D. Leigh Henson, Ph.D. Not only Lincoln and the Mother road—the author’s curiosity ranges from cattle baron John Dean Gillett to novelist William Maxwell. An Illinois State Historical Society "Best Web Site of the Year."
Created in 2000, the IDA is a repository for the digital collections of the Illinois State Library and other Illinois libraries and cultural institutions. The holdings include photographs, slides, and glass negatives, oral histories, newspapers, maps, and documents from manuscripts and letters to postcards, posters, and videos.
The people's museum is a treasure house of science and the arts. A research institution of national reputation, the museum maintains four facilities across the state. Their collections in anthropology, fine and decorative arts, botany, zoology, geology, and history are described here. A few museum publications can be obtained here.
“Chronicling Illinois” showcases some of the collections—mostly some 6,000 photographs—from the Illinois history holdings of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library.
I will leave it to the authors of this interesting site to describe it. "Chicagology is a study of Chicago history with a focus on the period prior to the Second World War. The purpose of the site is to document common and not so common stories about the City of Chicago as they are discovered."
Illinois Labor History Society
The Illinois Labor History Society seeks to encourage the preservation and study of labor history materials of the Illinois region, and to arouse public interest in the profound significance of the past to the present. Offers books reviews, podcasts, research guides, and the like.
Illinois Migration History 1850-2017
The University of Washington’s America’s Great Migrations Project has compiled migration histories (mostly from the published and unpublished work by UW Professor of History James Gregory) for several states, including Illinois. The site also includes maps and charts and essays about the Great Migration of African Americans to the north, in which Illinois figured importantly.
An interesting resource about the history of one of Illinois’s more interesting places, the Fox Valley of Kendall County. History on the Fox is the work of Roger Matile, an amateur historian of the best sort. Matile’s site is a couple of cuts above the typical buff’s blog. (An entry on the French attempt to cash in on the trade in bison pelts runs more than
2,000 words.)
BOOKS
OF INTEREST
Southern Illinois University Press 2017
A work of solid history, entertainingly told.
Michael Burlingame,
author of Abraham
Lincoln: A Life
One of the ten best books on Illinois history I have read in a decade.
Superior Achievement Award citation, ISHS Awards, 2018
A lively and engaging study . . . an enthralling narrative.
James Edstrom
The Annals of Iowa
A book that merits the attention of all Illinois historians
as well as local historians generally.
John Hoffman
Journal of Illinois HIstory
A model for the kind of detailed and honest history other states and regions could use.
Harold Henderson
Midwestern Microhistory
A fine example of a resurgence of Midwest historical scholarship.
Greg Hall
Journal of the Illinois
State Historical Society
Click here
to buy the book
Southern Illinois University Press
SIU Press is one of the four major university publishing houses in Illinois. Its catalog offers much of local interest, including biographies of Illinois political figures, the history (human and natural) and folklore of southern Illinois, the Civil War and Lincoln, and quality reprints in the Shawnee Classics series.
The U of I Press was founded in 1918. A search of the online catalog (Books/Browse by subject/Illinois) will reveal more than 150 Illinois titles, books on history mostly but also butteflies, nature , painting, poetry and fiction, and more. Of particular note are its Prairie State Books, quality new paperback editions of worthy titles about all parts of Illinois, augmented with scholarly introductions.
The U of C publishing operation is the oldest (1891) and largest university press in Illinois. Its reach is international, but it has not neglected its own neighborhood. Any good Illinois library will include dozens of titles about Chicago and Illinois from Fort Dearborn to
Vivian Maier.
Northern Illinois University Press
The newest (1965) and the smallest of the university presses with an interest in Illinois, Northern Illinois University Press gave us important titles such as the standard one-volume history of the state (Biles' Illinois:
A History of the Land and Its People) and contributions to the history of Chicago, Illinois transportation, and the Civil War. Now an imprint of Cornell University Press.
Reviews and significant mentions by James Krohe Jr. of more than 50 Illinois books, arranged in alphabetical order
by book title.
Run by the Illinois State Library, The Center promotes reading, writing and author programs meant to honor the state's rich literary heritage. An affiliate of the Library of Congress’s Center for the Book, the site offers award competitions, a directory of Illinois authors, literary landmarks, and reading programs.
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