It was in Chicago, in 1999, that Rep. Charles Rangel first planted the seed - telling First Lady Hillary Clinton that "the real senators are from New York - that's where you should be running from." The following excerpts from Rangel's new book, "And I Haven't Had a Bad Day Since," tell how he worked the back channels to clear the path for her historic candidacy:
Politics has been called the art of the possible. Making consensus, creating such a political work of art, is the best way to describe my role in Hillary Clinton becoming the junior senator from New York, a platform that has put a serious run for the White House within her reach.
When I first came out for her, everyone said I was crazy, but I knew different. Not because I knew she would win in a walk, though I had every confidence in her. What I knew was that Hillary Clinton for Senate from New York wasn't about my madness, it was about her method. Whenever I think of it, I always remember that I went steady with my wife for seven years before we tied the knot, and to this day she has me convinced it was all my idea. So it was with Hillary; I knew when I drove up that she was ready to be asked to the prom. I knew my job, what we used to call "front running" back in the Harlem clubhouse days, would be to go out and get people to say which side they were on and bring the information back, the way a dutiful prom date fetches glasses of punch.
I was in Chicago, at a 1999 rally supporting the reelection of Sen. Carol Moseley Braun. Hillary Clinton was the big draw, and she was good, as she always is. Afterward, I was telling people how good she was, and someone said that she should be running for senator - from Illinois. I don't know if they were just flattering her, or if they were really afraid that Ms. Moseley Braun was going to lose, which of course she did. Whatever the case, they allowed me to believe that Hillary had political ambitions, and I immediately jumped on it.
"I hear that you're interested in running for the Senate," I said to her.
"What are you talking about?"
"Some people tell me that they were thinking about drafting you right here...that you might have a political base here."
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Well, let me just tell you this: You can be the senator from Illinois or the senator from New Hampshire or the senator from Kansas. But the real senators are from New York - that's where you should be running from."
And I could tell then, from the awkwardness of the smile on her face, that there was some interest. She was picking out a corsage for me to pin on her.
Before that rally meeting was over she made certain to turn me over to her chief of staff, who immediately began grilling me about how serious I was. "What about the New York delegation? What about fund-raising? What about labor?" Now, to be sure, I hadn't talked to anybody about Hillary Clinton for Senate at that point. Nobody. But there I was, my psychic clipboard at the ready.
"Why don't you and I start talking about all those things," I said to her, "and let me start filling you in on what's there for her."
"That would be great," she said, enthusiastically. And that's where it began.
It's a kind of political thought process and telephone tree I learned at the feet of Ray Jones in the 1960s. It's the type of thing that experience teaches you. Nothing less and nothing more. I cannot imagine a guy running a school who doesn't do this before he promotes someone to be principal, or anyone in a church making a policy move before finding out what will fly with each and every deacon. Somebody on the Hillary team would ask, "Who in the hell do you think would support the First Lady?"
"I don't know," I'd say, "but her popularity is overwhelming."
"The New York delegation, you think?"
"Yesss," I say, "the congressional delegation."
So at the next delegation meeting I'd say, "You know, if Hillary Clinton were to announce for the Senate from New York, what do you think?" And they say, "Hey, she wouldn't run...but if she did she'd be a hell of a candidate." Then, since I'm meeting with labor leaders anyway, I say to them, "Hey, if the congressional delegation came out in support of Hillary Clinton, what do you think?" Then I go to the people who always give to the Democratic Party, and I say, "If she had labor and the congressional delegation behind her, could you support her?"
And when I go back to the Hillary camp, and they ask, "What about this guy?" or "What about that guy?" I would go to that person and say, "What have you got against Hillary Clinton?" We used to call it front running; today you call it connecting the dots. And when you're a senior person in the campaign, operating from a position that can't be challenged, then people know you're not just out there taking a poll. You're authorized to ask these questions and convey the answers to the top. Some will respond, "Oh, not right now, but if you did have this one piece, or that one in place....," and I go looking for those pieces. And when I can finally make some of these endorsement statements public, knowing I can't be challenged because I talked personally with all these people, it adds up to something that's not exactly a draft but grants a minimum necessary level of comfort, an insurance policy, so that the candidate - Hillary, in this case - knows they're not about to jump into an empty pool.
You might think I was being used, but nothing could be further from the truth. It was such an exciting opportunity, a no-loser. If it turned out she didn't run, she didn't run. But I could go around and tell everybody "what if?" And they would say what I expected them to say: "Are you crazy? Do you know what you're talking about?" And then I would have the thrill of sculpting a work of political possibility from the name "Hillary Clinton." It was like someone asking Michelangelo, "What do you mean you're gonna put a masterpiece on that ceiling?"
I started on my delegation. "If you want to beat Giuliani's butt," I said, "we gotta have a superstar, and I've got one for you: the First Lady."
"Give me a break, Charlie," they said.
"All I want to know is, if we had her, would you be with her?"
"You bet your life," they said.
The union leaders loved being consulted about their support so far in advance of the politicians making the choice and presenting them with a done deal. It was the same with the progressive money men like Jonathan Tisch and Edgar Bronfman Jr.
'If you want to beat Giuliani's butt, we gotta have a superstar, and I've got one for you: the First Lady.'
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