The calls for Sen. Chris Dodd to step aside for another Democrat in 2010 are few, at present, but they do exist. How likely is it that Dodd will see the writing on the wall and bring his career to a graceful end?
Not likely. A look into the past suggests that a cornered, embattled Dodd may be more likely to fight for his seat than ever. Dodd’s father, the hawkish Democrat Thomas Dodd, found himself on the wrong end of a campaign finance scandal during his second term in the 1960s. He was accused of using campaign donations for personal use, and was censured by the Senate (fellow Connecticut Sen. Abraham Ribicoff was one of two senators to vote against the censure).
The elder Dodd always professed innocence, and the U.S. attorney general eventually declined to press charges. Questions about the upcoming 1970 race swirled around Dodd. Would he run? Would he step aside? A few Democrats cautiously stepped forward as 1970 approached, including State Senate Majority Leader Ed Marcus.
A search of the Hartford Courant archives turns up this fascinating tidbit from January, 1969:
Sen. Thomas J. Dodd has disclosed for the first time that he once planned to end his Senate career in 1970.
“But I must run,” said Dodd in his first public response to reports that several ranking state Democrats are eyeing his Senate seat.
And later in the same article, after explaining that after his second election in 1964 he had vowed not to run another campaign, Dodd shows his desire to go to the voters for vindication:
“I had definitely made up my mind that I wouldn’t do it a third time,” [Dodd] disclosed.
But events of the past few years have changed this decision.
Dodd says he feels he must run to prove himself in the “hard test of a campaign and an election.”
And eventually, Dodd did in fact run–though a heart attack caused him to withdraw his name from contention for the Democratic nomination. Democrats held a fiercely-contested primary between Ed Marcus and the Rev. Joe Duffey, a race the antiwar Duffey eventually won (in another interesting historical note, a young Democrat named Joe Lieberman ran for and won the state senate seat vacated by Ed Marcus). Dodd ran as an independent, and finished third behind Duffey and Republican Lowell Weicker, who would hold the seat until 1989.
Now another Dodd has his back against the wall, and rumblings about finding another Democrat to run in his place have been getting louder. Dodd so far has strongly insisted that he will in fact be running next year. “I want to win,” he told the Courant in a story published March 19th. I have to think that Dodd has 1970 on the brain at least a little bit.
Of course, there are significant differences. 1970 was a very Republican year in Connecticut as disillusionment with 1960s-era social programs set in: 2010 so far is not shaping up to be the same. Thomas Dodd also faced a Democratic Party that was divided against him (partly because of his ethical issues, but also because of his support for the war in Vietnam), Chris Dodd likely will not unless things get worse. If Dodd wants the Democatic nomination next year, Democrats will probably be more than happy to give it to him. Unlike Joe Lieberman, Chris Dodd does not have a lengthy track record of irritating his own party.
But there is a chance for a Republican to take the seat, if only because Dodd is much weakened by the events of the past year, and for the first time since Weicker himself was defeated in 1988 strong GOP contenders are emerging.
For more about this pivotal year in Connecticut politics, read my short history of the 1970 race, which I wrote in 2006 as the Lieberman-Lamont primary was heating up.
Little did I know that 1970 would have implications for 2010, as well.
Source
ROBERT WATERS Washington Correspondent. . “Dodd Announces Campaign Plans for ‘70. ” The Hartford Courant (1923-1984) [Hartford, Conn.] 26 Jan. 1969,1A1.
21 responses so far ↓
That’s rough. I did not realize Senator Thomas Dodd passed away just six months after losing the 1970 election.
In terms of this cycle, over the next 6-8 months I expect Senator Dodd to do what he can to rehabilitate himself. If his numbers don’t go up, I fully expect him to retire, and to not risk our Dem Senate seat.
What’s unusual about this situation is that both Blumenthal and Bysiewicz are waiting in the wings, with off-the-chart numbers that suggest invincibility. CT voters are getting pretty good at math, and if Dodd doesn’t rebound, there will be a clamorous groundswell calling for his retirement.
Me, I’m getting excited about what Dodd might do to restore our confidence. Maybe he decides to take on the banks and credit card industry.
Thomas Dodd was relatively young when he died (64?). Our Sen. Dodd is 64 now (he’ll turn 65 in May).
I can’t believe that either of them would be willing to take him on in a primary, though. And that’s what I think it’ll come to. I think Dodd is going to fight.
Genghis, let’s say you have a DraftDick or a I-Love-Susie grassroots effort.
Subsequently Quinnipiac produces a poll showing Simmons ahead of Dodd, but losing by 15-20% to a Blumenthal or Bysiewicz.
What happens then?
But again, we are so far ahead of ourselves here.
Why don’t we sit back and watch Chris Dodd show us his best stuff? It’s not as if this state is eager to send a Republican, any Republican, to D.C.
Anderson -
It seems like your response to me acouple days ago “I’m almost with you” has come true. And since it seems like you and I may be his biggest cheerleaders on here, here’s to hoping your notion of “Dodd showing us his best stuff” is what the next year and a half have in store for us.
Scanman–
1. I’m not sure we’re going to see Dodd’s best stuff… Whose side is he on these days, the people’s, or the big corporations’?
2. I remain worried about unanswered questions surrounding”Cottage-Gate”.
That being said, I think every Democrat in Connecticut is rooting for Dodd, at least through the end of this session. Show us what you’ve got, Senator!
Outside of Connecticut Working Families Party Headquarters, William Landers owner of Ameriborn Constitution News, interviews S. Valeria McCall state chair for organizing for Connecticut (Obama). The group were getting ready to protest the home of AIG executives and then end up at AIG headquarters in Wilton, CT.
William Landers of Ameriborn News interviews Connecticut Working Families Party co-founder and union labor leader at a protest over AIG. Executive’s, bonus.
The event totaled about 40 protestors from the Connecticut Working Families Party, Acorn, and Organizing for Connecticut (Barack Obama campaign).
The press outnumbered the protestors coming from all around the globe.
The protest was put on by Connecticut Working Families Party and the Democrat Connecticut organizers.
This had to be the biggest joke on the press who swarmed to cover them, as an event just down the road protesting the unconstitutionality of the bailouts, by Dumb Dodd 2010 and Connecticut Independents drew crowds in the thousands with no Main St. Media coverage.
http://ameriborn.com/?p=1662
In 1970….I was in SDS ( the leading student group against the war) and a Duffy volunteer….where I met Lieberman and the clinton’s…my recollection was that the party bosses headed by Bailey told Dodd that winning a primary was too difficult and he used his health as an excuse not to run. Those same conservative party bosses then backed Marcus and lost in the primary….In the general election the party bosses didnt support the party nominee ( Duffy)….but ran to support Dodd….in the end Weicker won…
In Addition..A Donahue, A bailey friend, was also in the primary and lost…its fair I think to assume that both Marcus and Donahue split the mainstream dems, allowing the liberal Duffy to win the primary.
Bruce,
“In 1970….I was in SDS ( the leading student group against the war)”
Is that right Bruce? In 1970 I was at Woolsey Hall in New Haven when Mark Rudd of SDS fame, and his 8 body guards came to give us their “point of view” regarding those of us unlucky enough to have been sent to Vietnam, instead of getting a 2S deferment……
If you were there that day for that “discussion” you may recall it ended rather suddenly in a near riot when some young idiot in the audience who finally had heard enough, and who’s blood pressure was by then off the chart actually thought he could reason with Mr. Rudd using his own vocabulary which seemed limited to 4 letter words back at him…… I was that idiot.
I also gained an entirely new appreciation for the New Haven police that afternoon, as well as how fast they can appear out of nowhere.
Any idea where Mr Rudd is these days? Hopefully someplace far away.
Al….Mark Rudd…is now in New Mexico and recently retired as a teacher…he long ago repudiated his behavior in the Weathermen and now coins himself a liber democrat…I am in touch with him often and he has a new book coming out at any moment on SDS
God Bless you Al; if only someone would have beaten him within an inch of his life (give or take an inch) they would certainly be out by now!
Follow this money route:
Moscow
Havana
Mexico City
SDS
Bruce – you can bluster all you like, that is in fact how it was.
People let him near their children?
That’s simply unbelievable.
Isn’t Kevin Rennie now ghosting the Jack Anderson series of articles that reported extensively about Sen. Dodd, alleging corruption and bribery. (Anderson’s unnamed sources gave documents and were staff members within Dodd’s own office.)
Thomas Dodd’s refusal to judge the public impact of Anderson’s reporting and the censure by a Democratic Senate gave rise to the challenges by factions within the democratic party, but his continued candidacy split the election and gave Weicker his statewide political opportunity.
Bruce,
“Mark Rudd…is now in New Mexico and recently retired as a teacher…he long ago repudiated his behavior in the Weathermen and now coins himself a liber democrat…I am in touch with him often and he has a new book coming out at any moment on SDS”
Wow now that is interesting……….Wasn’t he once on the FBI’s 10 most wanted list? In any case he like Jane Fonda he can repudiate his/her behavior back then all he/she wants. He can also coin himself anything he feels like these days. As far as I am concerned we were all: “so much older then, we’re younger than that now”……..But what can not ever be taken back are some of the really hateful words spoken about so many young men who never got to be any older………
Glad he is in New Mexico, enjoy his new….book.
My Liberterian friend ACR…..when i was in SDS….and later The Weathermen…..we got no money from Moscow,Havanna or as you wrote Mexico City….we were completely self funded….thats not to say we werent sympathetic to Cuba…we did send delegations….A standing joke agmonst us at the time was that in order to be a radical SDS leader your parents should be at least making $50,000. a year…taking you out of the working class no doubt…then again I like so many others was 18…
Al….come on now…Rudd and others were like 18 years old then….alot of stupid stuff was said and done at that age and time….Rudd like so many others repudiated all that as an adult and led an exemplery life….and is now a liberal democrat. If God can forgive and if a person can redeem themselves…perhaps you should forgive him also
No discussion of Thomas Dodd should end without noting that he was the lead prosecutor for the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials against the Nazis after World War II. It sickens me to watch Republicans at this site pretend as if Thomas Dodd were some sort of scoundrel, rather than the great figure in world history that he actually was.
Now those Republicans would hound Chris Dodd out of office…for what? For receiving “VIP” treatment in taking out a mortgage loan, treatment that even the recently released Republican Congressional report notes Dodd was completely unaware that he was receiving. For that?
Let me remind you Republicans of a basic fact: you all supported George Bush for years, a man who most certainly will face prosecution for war crimes if he ever steps foot outside of North America. Indeed, though the current prime minister in Canada gave him a pass when he delivered a speech north of the border recently, a future prime minister might not be permitted to ignore Canadian law and permit in or permit to leave a man suspected of having committed war crimes, especially Bush, who we know for certain is guilty of crimes against humanity for his ordering torture to be used in Guantanamo Bay.
You looked the other way- no, you cheered that war criminal on in his destruction of the constitution. And the American people and the people of Connecticut rightly and soundly threw Republicans out of control of virtually all legislative and executive positions, except white-dominated states in the South or Mormon states in the Mountain West. Those are the only places that still suffer Republicans to govern them. Rell? She is only permitted to stay in power because she virtually never contradicts the Democratic lawmakers.
You are a tiny and discredited minority that we all hope will be kept from the controls of power for decades to come.
Bruce,
Well first of all I am not God, I am just a human being like the rest of us here, filled with all the flaws that come with the territory. Having said that I have no idea how you know God has forgiven him for anything, but I’ll assume you know what your talking about.
From my simple human perspective if he next repudiates being a liberal Democrat along with all the other stupid stuff he did, and said, 40 years ago your argument might be more convincing………:-)
I saw Rudd speak a few years ago in Boston. My father was a NYC cop during the Columbia uprising Rudd led and took part in re-taking of campus. When I told Rudd my dad had been involved in the police response, he said “tell him I said thanks for beating me with a club.”
I have respect for Tom Hayden and some other people in the original SDS but none whatsoever for the Weathermen. Hayden realized that mainstream politics was the only way to achieve meaningful social change and, unlike Rudd and Ayers, did not resort to domestic terrorism to achieve “participatory democracy.”
Where apparently he came across the Nazi’s gun control laws that had been implemented prior to rounding up the Jews.
(It’s always bad when the victims can shoot back you know.)
And brought them here, virtually word for word and slide them into play in 1968 when right after 2 assassinations back to back the nation was in the “right mood” for their implementation.
Yeah, fabulous guy; copied Nazi laws and brought them to America!
That’s what you might have thought.
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