As I write this, the Democrats are having a rare old time in Chicago. The national convention is in full swing: a big party for a big party. There are speakers. There is entertainment. And the speeches go on long into the night. Since they're on Central Daylight Time, they're keeping those of us in the eastern part of the country up way too late (yawn). But I'm glad to see them enjoying themselves. It occurred to me that the rest of the world is probably wondering what brought all this on.

Imagine this: You want to run for president against an aggressive, violent incumbent who (in your opinion) is wreaking havoc with the nation. One whose followers have the reputation of being poorly-educated, intolerant yahoos. A president who threatened to hang his vice president. A president with sex scandals. One who not only bragged that he could shoot someone in broad daylight and get away with it, but had.

I am talking, of course, about Andrew Jackson. (Nihil sub sole novum when it comes to this continent.) Mr Henry Clay wanted to beat Old Hickory (so-called because he got into random fights and used his walking stick) in the 1832 election. The National Republicans went all-out: they staged a national convention. In a saloon. In Baltimore. In December of 1831. The next year, Clay's campaign was supported by enthusiastic young people, known as 'Clay's Infant School.'

Unfortunately, they lost. Andrew Jackson continued to be president for another term – with a different vice president. During that time, he engineered a massive act of ethnic cleansing by driving Native Americans out of the Southeast. He also destroyed the National Bank. Jackson's policies, and the fact that he was succeeded by his former vice president, Martin van Buren, who kept them up, even drove some people to leave the country. They didn't have as far to go back then, although transportation was slower.

So you can see that, what with history repeating itself – or, as somebody said, rhyming – the 'get-out-the-vote' crowd really pulls out all the stops to do just that. They get celebrity endorsements. They put on a big show and brag about their crowd sizes. They travel extensively and press the flesh. Harry Truman beat the odds in 1948 by assiduous whistle-stop campaigning against Thomas Dewey. Truman, although the incumbent president, was the underdog. But that dog was scrappy.

The 1948 conventions were interesting: people were still kind of broke after the Second World War. So when the Republicans had their convention in Philadelphia, they left some of their decorations up – flags and bunting, etc – for the Democrats to use later. They were all in Philly because the Municipal Auditorium had tv camera setups.

When I was a kid, watching conventions on tv was exciting. For one thing, they actually decided things at the convention. You didn't necessarily know ahead of time who would be running. Also, state delegations would break out into what David Brinkley called 'spontaneous demonstrations of support' by marching around the convention floor, waving banners and singing. It was highly entertaining.

David Brinkley rolled his eyes when he said that. He and Chet Huntley, of the Huntley/Brinkley Report, were our eyes and ears at those conventions. Brinkley was the one with the dry wit, while Huntley was more of the straight man. They always ended with the Second Movement of Beethoven's Ninth. They were classy but entertaining, and I counted on them to explain politics to me even before my age was in double digits.

In the 21st Century, party conventions have become infomercials, most of the time. Nothing exciting happens. Last night, for instance, they spent an hour or so nominating the candidate, as usual. Everybody knew it was a done deal, but each state delegation has to get its two minutes of fame where it brags on its state and announces 'proudly' – they're always 'proud' – their support for the agreed-upon candidates. This year the Democrats hit upon a way to make this process almost pleasurable: they hired a deejay. He mixed in appropriate music, starting with 'Sweet Home Alabama' (they go alphabetically). I just went away for an hour.

I haven't watched all the speeches – they're stirring and all, but even someone inured to Baptist revivals has limits – so I don't know how many balloon drops they've done. I do know they ran on so long the first night that they had to cut James Taylor's scheduled performance of 'You've Got a Friend'. I consider that to be a loss because I'm very fond of James Taylor's music. Campaign songs are another fruitful topic, but I'll get to that one in another column.

The slogans, phone calls, and yard signs will continue until early November – our long campaign season is probably a legacy of olden times, when we didn't have the internet. Think about it: in 1831, they didn't even have the telegraph. Now, of course, we can watch all the soundbites on Youtube. And this clip of the West Virginia delegation strutting their stuff.

Dmitri Gheorgheni

02.09.24 Front Page

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