What he meant is that electing officials to high office is serious business, in which hardballs are thrown, blood is shed and little quarter given to the opposition.
But Mr. Washington was wise enough to know the limits that civility and humanity dictate -- even in the nasty business of politics. And I think he'd frown at the kind of stunts his African-American would-be successors pulled over the holidays.
What happened is that, with public and private arm twisting, Chicago's black political leadership finally got what it wanted: a narrowing down of the mayoral field to just one major African-American contender, former U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley Braun. But to get there, it had to play a blatant race card, the kind that would have been condemned had it been played by, say, Edward Vrdolyak in the name of white unity.
That's just wrong -- ethically, morally and perhaps politically, too.
I understand why leaders concluded that they had to get out two of the three prominent blacks who were running: Ms. Braun, Congressman Danny Davis and state Sen. James Meeks.
All successful political candidates start by unifying their natural political base, and that hadn't happened in the African-American community with all three in the contest. As a result, candidate Rahm Emanuel has continued to run away with the contest, as I talk about in my column in this week's issue of Crain's, which was written before Mr. Davis dropped out a few hours before the New Year.
But seeking to unify your base is one thing. Saying that only a candidate from one ethnic or racial group deserves to be mayor is another.
It's bad enough that a committee of African-American religious, community and political leaders spent weeks during the fall trying to select one, and just one, black candidate to present to black voters for rubber stamp ratification.
Imagine the reaction if a bunch of white ward bosses had met with the stated goal of selecting one white candidate.
The committee failed. All three filed petitions to run, with Mr. Meeks saying he wasn't going to be the black candidate but a candidate for all. He even signed up a prominent Republican as his finance co-chairman: former state GOP chairman Andy McKenna Jr.
But on he eve of Christmas Eve, he changed his mind, declaring that what's really important is to a unify behind the black candidate, because Chicago needs a black mayor -- not a qualified mayor, or a schools-savvy mayor, or a sensitive mayor (at least not according to what he said) but a mayor of one particular race.
A couple of days later, Rahm Emanuel's campaign let it out that former President Bill Clinton -- for whom Mr. Emanuel served as chief fundraiser and a top White House policy aide -- would come here to campaign for him.
Mr. Davis and Ms. Braun could hardly contain themselves.
Mr. Clinton is trying to "thwart the legitimate political aspirations of Chicago's black community," Mr. Davis declared. Campaigning for Rahm would be a "gaffe, Ms. Braun said. "I think he'd be more sensitive...given the support that (the African-American) community has given him in he past."
Heaven knows what they'll say if President Barack Obama offers anything more about how Rahm Emanuel did a great job as chief of staff for America's first African-American president.
Finally, after insisting he was in the race to stay, Mr. Davis pulled the plug and endorsed Ms. Braun. "In unity there is strength. In strength there is success," he said.
Or, as Mr. Meeks not-so-subtly phrased it, "Unity is something our community desperately needs."
It could work. Depending on how quickly Ms. Braun moves to reach out to voters, how non-African-American voters respond and whether Mr. Emanuel steps it up after returning from what, frankly, was an ill-timed two-week family vacation in far-away Thailand.
But the events of the past two weeks could backfire, too.
The "it's our turn" rhetoric echoes Mr. Vrdolyak's appeal to voters in 1983 to back an unknown Republican over Mr. Washington "before it's too late." The moral high ground now has been lost -- even if some black leaders now say that, of course, the next mayor will serve all of Chicago, not just African-Americans. Given recent events, many voters will be skeptical.
The pity is, it didn't have to be this way.
Mr. Obama didn't get to be our senator or president by running as the black candidate, but by running as the best candidate -- who happened to be an African-American. Neither did Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, who easily won a Democratic primary race filled with other blacks, and just one white, because she was the best candidate of any race.
Chicago, black voters and white voters alike, has grown beyond enmity. We've shown that another way is possible.
Now, some are trying to pull us back to the bad old days, the days when desperate politicians used race as a weapon, regardless of the damage it did and could do to Chicago -- blacks, white, Latinos and Asians alike.
It's ironic, because although Mr. Washington had extraordinary support from black voters, he became mayor because he brought liberal lakefront whites and Latinos into his coalition, too.
Harold Washington was a smart man, a good mayor who was just hitting his stride when he died. Too bad too many people out there have forgotten his message that "unity" means everybody.
Greg Hinz
