The politics of abandoned cars

When 44th Ward Ald. Dick Simpson ran for re-election in 1975, the City of Chicago stopped removing abandoned cars from the streets in his ward. It hoped voters would blame Simpson, not Mayor Daley, for the presence of those derelict vehicles.

Well, the Simpson campaign got its hands on a bunch of Mayor Daley’s re-election signs (Daley was running for Mayor at the same time Simpson was running for Alderman) and placed them conspicuously on all the abandoned autos in the ward.

The City swiftly removed all those cars from neighborhood streets.