The Governor of Illinois

Well, the former Republican Governor of Illinois, George Ryan, was convicted of federal corruption charges in 2006 and is serving his sentence in a prison not far from my friends at the Carmel of Terre Haute, Indiana. He was in the news recently because he is on the list of people hoping for a presidential pardon from George Bush.

Now the Democratic Governor of Illinois, Rod Blagojevich has been arrested on federal corruption charges, including conspiring to sell the Senate seat being vacated by President-Elect Obama. Tom, who was active in Chicago politics for many years, says even for Chicago, this is bad.

You have probably heard Lord Acton's famous observation, , expressed in a letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton in 1887:

"Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

It would seem that it doesn't even need to be absolute power. Just being governor of Illinois seems to have this effect.

Dan Walker, who had been the Democratic Governor of Illinois in the 1970's, got in trouble for his activities after he left office. In the 1980s, Walker entered the private sector and in 1987 was convicted of improprieties related to the First American Savings & Loan Association of Oak Brook. Media at the time reported he received over a million dollars in fraudulent loans for his business and repairs on his yacht, the Governor's Lady. At his sentencing, U.S. District Judge Ann Williams stated, "It's clear to this court that a pattern was established and that you, Mr. Walker, thought this bank was your own personal piggy bank to bail you out whenever you got into trouble." The First American Savings & Loan Association of Oak Brook was declared insolvent with a deficit of $23 million and was later bailed out by the United States Federal government.

(Sound familiar? This was part of the same prolonged S&L collapse that snagged Neil Bush in its toils in 1988. Bush, whose father was Vice President at the time, was fined $50,000 but served no time. He was banned from future banking activities. The collapse of his S&L cost taxpayers $1.3 billion dollars. )

Walker was sentenced to seven years in federal prison, and served 18 months at a Duluth, Minnesota correctional facility. In January 2001 he requested a pardon from outgoing President Clinton, but his request was not granted.

Before that, another Democratic Governor, Otto Kerner, Jr., resigned in 1968 to become a federal judge. But then ...

In 1969, Marge Lindheimer Everett, manager of Arlington Park and Washington Park race tracks admitted bribing then Governor Otto Kerner and his Finance Director, Ted Isaacs, to gain choice racing dates and to get two expressway exits for her Arlington Park racetrack. The bribes were in the form of stock. Amazingly, the scandal came to light because Everett had deducted the value of the stock on her federal income tax returns under her own theory that bribery was an ordinary and necessary business expense in Illinois. (And you thought Texas was bad!)

Following a 1973 trial in which his prosecutor was future Illinois governor James R. Thompson (who, as far as I know, isn't in jail for anything, but his law firm is the one that represented George Ryan [above]), Kerner was convicted on 17 counts of bribery, conspiracy, perjury, and related charges. He was sentenced to three years in federal prison and fined $50,000. Faced with almost certain impeachment, he resigned his position on the federal bench on July 22, 1974.

Happy holidays!