Surviving a Rough Election Year
The Time I Made My Non-Vote Count — For Nothing
I’m so glad my Dad and I got to settle our differences and heal our relationship while he was still very much alive. We had some very special moments during his final years, actually becoming the very best of friends by the time his life ended in the middle of my life. Amends had been made on both sides of that relationship, all charges had long since been dropped, and I grieved the loss of my best friend and father. I had learned so much from him in those final years. So much.
This doesn’t happen every election year, but in the ones where the stress runs especially high, like this one, the memories do come back. They don’t haunt me like they once did — but I do remember that time when the famous “Generation Gap” that nearly ripped my relationship with my father to shreds came to a fevered head.
It was election season, 1972, about a week before the election, when the candidates made their final push. That year the race was between the peace Candidate, George McGovern and his running mate Sargeant Shriver, versus Richard “Tricky Dick” Nixon and his God-awful Vice President, Spiro T. Agnew. (I once came across a book in an airport book store titled, “The Wit and Wisdom of Spiro T. Agnew”. I opened it to find 325 blank pages staring back at me — hilarious, but so true! Up until Mike “the Fly” Pence, he was the most humorless man to ever occupy that position.)
18-year-olds had the vote for the first time that year. Prior to that, they’d been old enough to die for their country in Viet Nam, but not old enough to vote, when the voting age used to be 21. It was a really big deal! I was born on November 12th, 1954. In 1972, my 18th birthday would be 5 days too late to vote in my first presidential election. I would have to wait until I was 22 to vote in my first presidential election!
I was in my freshman year of college, a reporter for my college newspaper. I had been all over the Watergate stories coming out of the Washington Post, where a couple of cub reporters, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, were making a name for themselves covering the story that would eventually bring a president down. In those days, that story was buried on page 67 of the Hartford Courant, but this reporter made it front page news of his school’s newspaper. I couldn’t get enough of that scandal, and knew for sure, even then, that the involvement went right up to the oval office. I was sure America would wake up to the truth before November 7th. I envisioned all the 18–21 year olds, voting for the first time, sweeping that corrupt, shifty politician right out of that oval office.
One day, while complaining about my lousy birthday timing and the fact that I wouldn’t be able to vote in “the most important election of the century” (aren’t they all?), one of my professors challenged me to make my “non-vote” count. “Get involved”, he’d said. “Get out there and convince all those kids to get out and make their votes count.”
He’d lit a fire under me. I walked into Democratic headquarters in Windsor, Connecticut, and met Maureen, the manager of that office. She was a lovely middle-aged red-haired beauty just brimming with passion for the Democratic candidate and his running mate. I would have done anything that lovely lady asked me to do.
She put me on the phones, then marveled at how convincing I was when talking with kids my age about the election. “Look, I can’t vote myself — my birthday is on the 12th — but you get to vote. Make it count! You need to make sure you register, then get out there and vote this fraud out of office. You know about Watergate, right?” I would proceed to tell them all about it, as I had a subscription to the Washington Post coming into the Newspaper office at school, and stayed up on all the latest developments.
I was certain that I was changing the world. Maureen promoted me to head telephone guy, and I got to train all the new volunteers on the phones. She liked my style. I kind of dug hers, as well! We were a dynamic team, Maureen and me.
I was beyond honored when she invited me to escort her to the big rally to be held in Hartford the week before the election. It was in a big square or park right near the Travelers’ Insurance Building in town, where my Dad had gotten a big promotion to regional manager, which had brought us to Connecticut from Pittsburgh. I hadn’t planned on going up to see him that day, but when events played out the way they did, I just had to go tell him all about it. I knew he would be proud of his son for getting so involved in his life.
This was the same son who had spent the previous summer in a suicidal depression. Not that he would have noticed, he was so wrapped up in his new, big important position at work. Mom had helped me when I finally broke down and told her of my plight, and sent me to a shrink, who’d helped me to climb out of that deep, dark place I’d found myself in after a couple of bad trips on organic mescaline.
Now I was back on my feet, in college and working again, and great things were happening! Not only had I made my non-vote count, but people in high places had noticed! At the rally, Maureen had personally introduced me to Sargent Shriver and his wife, John F. Kennedy’s sister Eunice. She had lit up, kissed and hugged me while she whispered in my ear, “I’ve heard great things about your work on the phones in Windsor! We need people with passion like yours to win this election. Keep up the great work, Pete!”
I was flying high — a Kennedy knew my name, had praised my work on the phones, had told me I was making a difference! This was heady stuff. When the rally was over, I just had to share my moment with my father. I wanted him to see how engaged I now was in my life, making a difference and making my non-vote count. I knew he would be so pleased!
What I remember most was the look of horror on my Dad’s face at my appearance in his office, which overlooked the very square where I’d just had my big moment. He didn’t want to hear a word of what I had to say. I’d just wanted to let him know I was okay now, I was really doing life. He apparently thought I was trying to convince him to vote for McGovern! I really didn’t care who he voted for. I was working on the youth vote. That was my gig.
Our little talk quickly escalated into shouting, and he threatened to call security if I didn’t get the hell out of his office. I gave him a look of disdain and sneered, “That won’t be necessary — I’m out of here! You never gave a crap about me, and now I know that you never will. Thanks for nothing, Dad!” and stormed out of his big-shot office.
I don’t think I had another civil word, or thought, for him from that moment until I left to join the Navy six months later. He was the enemy, the establishment. I was out on the front-lines, making a difference, while he sat perched up in his office of power, appalled at my politics! I hated him, then.
The election didn’t quite go as planned. George McGovern didn’t exactly stir excitement among the masses. At the beginning of his campaign he had appeared to be a different kind of politician, a true renaissance man, doing things differently, a champion for the downtrodden and the right kind of candidate to capture the imagination of the youth vote.
Then the wheels began to spin off the wagon at the Democratic Convention that summer. There had been a back-and-forth with Teddy Kennedy about being his running mate, but Kennedy was still serious damaged goods after the Chappaquiddick incident, where he’d run his car off the road into deep water, abandoned it and swam to safety, leaving the lady he’d been partying with to drown in the sunken car.
He’d eventually chosen what was supposed to be a safe choice, Thomas Eagleton. When reports came out that Eagleton had twice been hospitalized for depression and given shock treatments, McGovern publicly announced that he stood behind his running mate “1000 percent!” Meanwhile, behind the scenes, he threw Eagleton under the bus, and quickly kicked him to the curb. Some Renaissance Man! He came out looking just like any other dirty politician.
My main attraction to him was — he wasn’t Nixon. I had such an abiding hatred for that man, I would have backed Pat Paulson against him if I’d thought he had a chance to beat him. But, when McGovern signed Sargent Shriver to his ticket, I was lured by that Kennedy charm, and got behind him. I was a dreamer then, and I dreamed of a second Camelot. I’d been 9 when JFK was shot and killed, and 13 when his brother Bobby met the same fate, on the verge of becoming the Democratic front-runner in the previous election.
Now, I was involved, and a Kennedy knew me by name! I was so hopeful going into election day. They didn’t have polling back then quite like they do know. You could go into election day with high hopes even if your candidate didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of winning.
I spent Election Day in Democratic Headquarters in Windsor with my new best friend, Maureen, excitedly awaiting the upset of the century. It never happened. The youth vote never materialized. They never put a dent in Nixon’s hold on the electorate, as McGovern lost 49 out of 50 states to Tricky Dick and his humorless running mate. Imagine that — all but McGovern’s home state of South Dakota went with the incumbents.
Crushed, Maureen wept in my arms, as a dream went up in smoke. I never felt so heart-broken for someone over 30 before in my life. She was probably the first person over 30 I’d ever trusted. I felt so bad for her. I swore to never get involved in politics again.
When the rest of the world woke up to what I already knew about Watergate, I couldn’t even muster an “I told you so.” I’d already become too disillusioned with the body politic to even care anymore. I didn’t even vote in the next presidential election. I was away in the Mediterranean on a Navy Ship and hadn’t bothered with an absentee ballot. I no longer cared. I eventually did vote, for Carter in 1980, who lost to Reagan, then for Mondale in 1984, who also lost to Reagan, then for the hapless George Dukakis, who ran against daddy Bush in 1988. Bill Clinton would be the first presidential candidate I voted for who won, in 1992, 20 long years after my first involvement in a presidential election.
Today, I sit here, Biden my time until this one gets decided. No matter how crazy an election year might get, none match that first one that I got involved in, in terms of drama and intensity. They all pale in comparison to that one. That one nearly destroyed my relationship with my father. For me, the stakes were much higher in that one. I’m just glad that relationship with my incredible father got made right, in time. That meant so much more than politics ever did, or ever will. Today, I know my Dad is proud of me — every day.
