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Ellen Belcher is the Dayton Daily News opinion pages editor. She writes about state government, education, the environment, higher education and all things Dayton.
Martin Gottlieb is an editorial writer and columnist for the Dayton Daily News opinion pages. He focuses on the political process itself and does such national issues as war, the economy, taxes and Social Security, as well as a hodge-podge of local and state issues.Home > Blogs > A Matter of Opinion > Archives > 2009 > September > 25 > Entry
Martin Gottlieb: Sully symbolized politics for many who loved it
I think I heard of Sully in my first week in Dayton, in 1984 — and then heard his name a half dozen more times in a couple of months. By the time I met him, I felt I knew him. He turned out to be just as I imagined.
It’s not that James E.P. (Sully) Sullivan — as the ritual newspaper ID goes — was such a great power. He was known during that particular passage as the right-hand man of Joe Shump, the chairman of the Democratic Party. Shump was the power, Sully the sidekick.
I think he got talked about so much because Dayton politicos enjoyed having a Sully around. He made politics politics, as the term was understood in certain times and places. You could imagine Damon Runyon writing about him, or Jimmy Breslin.
He could be a character in “The Last Hurrah,” an iconic novel about big-city politics in the early 20th century.
He was the behind-the-scenes guy who was always there, always kibitzing, helping, doing whatever. He was characterized by fierce loyalty to his boss and party and a strong belief in the human element — the human touch — in politics, as opposed to ideology and all that.
And he simply loved politics — not only the game, but the game’s connection with doing good things. He was a sentimentalist about it all, as shown by his collection of memorabilia. He loved to talk politics.
“So, who do think is the best (politician) to come out of here in your time?” was a question he put to a newspaper guy visiting him on other business.
At a big event for the party, he might be a greeter, trying to make you feel welcome, like an old friend.
He could schmooze with the best, having some old, reliable lines. What did the E.P. in his name stand for? Elvis Presley.
When Chairman Shump became the victim of an internal party uprising, Sully lost his position as a precinct captain. Specifically, a supporter of the uprising ran against him in the precinct, because the precinct captains elect the county chairman. Sully said he felt like the victim of a drive-by shooting.
But incoming Chairman Dennis Lieberman recognized him as a party institution and kept him involved. A whole new generation of activists and journalists came to know him.
I had grown up in Chicago in mid-century, the heyday of the Daley Machine. The Machine was built around the human element. The party wanted somebody in every precinct tending to the needs of the people, whether the need in question was for work done by the city, or for a job for a family member (that is, a job with the city or with somebody who wanted to stay on the city’s good side), or whether the need was just for condolences or congratulations.
Sully, who died Wednesday, Sept. 23, at 89, could also have been a figure in a Mike Royko column about Chicago.
When I started in newspapers, I expected to come across more people like him than there turned out to be. He was of his times, and the times were changing. I suppose that’s another reason people felt such affection for him.
I don’t claim to have known him well. I couldn’t tell you, for example, just exactly what he did for Joe Shump, aside from his official jobs with, say, the elections board. Was he a “ward healer,” the guy who tried to keep peace in the party? Or was the idea more to just be there as somebody for Shump to talk to, and to handle details?
But like everybody who knew him at all, I knew there was a lot more there than a fun personality. Famously, he made a trek up Mount Kilimanjaro to find the remains of his son, after training for a year and a half. The character with character, as somebody characterized him on an Internet site for grievers.
Sully saw politics change a lot on his watch. In his later years, he used to tell people how, when he and the eventually legendary state Rep. C. J. McLin started out, when they showed up at a meeting, somebody would tell them how they were voting.
He went with change — including the uprising against Shump in favor of a more democratic Democratic Party — as well as anybody. He didn’t turn sour, as so many do. He left people from several generations — including people far younger than I — remembering him fondly.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Post your comment | Categories: Columns, Martin Gottlieb, Miami Valley Politics
Comments
By honored
September 25, 2009 11:27 AM | Link to this
I knew Sully and he always took the time to make you feel welcome and comfortable, I can still hear him calling me “kid” a term he used freely for nearly all the people he worked around, because we were kids, in a sense. He and Mr Shump were icons, never to be replaced and no one, no chairman, can ever hold a candle to what these folks meant to the Democratic Party. The conducted party business with a certain class that has not been matched since. RIP Sully.