The Blue Curtain

Daniel Walker is a model of rec titude and respectability. He is a 1945 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and a former editor in chief of the North western University Law Review, who later became law clerk to U.S. Chief Justice Fred Vinson. Now, at 46, he is vice president and general counsel of Marcor Inc., the $2.3 billion parent of Montgomery Ward and the Container Corporation of America. On top of that, he is the Mafia-fighting president of Chicago's crime commission.

With this background, he was picked by the President's Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence to head a study of the clashes between cops and civilians during the Democratic Convention in Chicago last August. No one could suspect Walker of pro-hippie bias; so his report had all the more impact last week when it accused the police themselves of rioting. The report, Rights in Conflict (TIME, Dec. 6), found fault on both sides--but came down harder on Chicago's police for losing control not only of the crowds, but also of themselves.

Beautiful Cops. At first, Mayor Richard Daley had praise for the report. "Overall," said Daley, "it is an excellent study." He confined his criticism to the report's seven-page summary, which ticked off incident after incident of police near-hysteria and expressed astonishment that few policemen had been disciplined for misbehavior. Taken by itself, the summary could "mislead the public," Datey warned.

Then, at a press conference, Walker coldly demanded that Chicago's police department "root out and punish" the offending officers. "The blue curtain cannot be permitted to fall," he said. Walker blamed Daley for creating a climate of encouragement for police violence by ordering cops to "shoot to kill" arsonists after the city's ghetto riots last April. "When the police acted with restraint in April," Walker observed, "they were condemned. When they acted with violence, the city was silent."

That was too much for Daley and his men in blue. Insisted the mayor: "If you were to ask me if I support the Chicago police department and the National Guard in their actions, the answer would be an unequivocable [sic] yes." Police Superintendent James Conlisk ventured a brief statement, saying that "to speak of 'a police riot is to distort the history of those days in August. The world knows who the rioters were." Commander Ronald Nash, who headed a force of 135 police during the convention week's most violent confrontation outside the Conrad Hilton Hotel, said of his men: "They were beautiful. They conducted themselves as professional policemen."

Last Word. Walker found instant support. "It is an excellent document," said Jay Miller, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Illinois division. Wrote Chicago Daily News Columnist Mike Royko: "Those policemen who did not bash private citizens showed great restraint. Not only did they restrain themselves from hitting citizens, they also restrained themselves from restraining the policemen who hit the citizens." But William Campbell, chief judge of the U.S. district court in Chicago, suggested that Walker's staff had worked hastily, heedless of an investigation by a grand jury that he had appointed. The grand jury's report is expected in January. That, said Campbell, "will be the one correct, definitive, objective story." The Chicago Tribune charged that the Walker report had been "substantially rewritten" by the Justice Department under the direction of Attorney General Ramsey Clark. "A pure fabrication," replied Clark.

Until the grand-jury report appeared, at least, it seemed the Chicago police would have the last word. After Walker's attacks last week, Mayor Daley--flanked by smiling policemen--announced a $2,000 pay raise for the city's cops next year. Wages of a man with 42 months on the force, for example, will jump from $9,000 to $11,000 annually. The raises, boasted Daley, will "make them the highest-paid policemen in the nation."

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