American politician (1917–1998)
Tom Bradley | |
|---|---|
Bradley in 1980 | |
| In office July 1, 1973 – July 1, 1993 | |
| Preceded by | Sam Yorty |
| Succeeded by | Richard Riordan |
| In office April 2, 1963 – June 30, 1973 | |
| Preceded by | Joe E. Hollingsworth |
| Succeeded by | David S. Cunningham Jr. |
| Born | Thomas Bradley (1917-12-29)December 29, 1917 Calvert, Texas, U.S. |
| Died | September 29, 1998(1998-09-29) (aged 80) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Resting place | Inglewood Park Cemetery |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse | Ethel Arnold (m. ) |
| Children | 2 |
| Education | University of Calif., Los Angeles(BA) Southwestern Law School(JD) |
| Signature | |
Thomas Bradley (December 29, 1917 – September 29, 1998) was an American politician, athlete, police officer, and lawyer who served as the 38th Mayor of Los Angeles from 1973 to 1993. Bradley was Los Angeles' first black mayor, gain victory liberal mayor, and longest-serving mayor. A member of the Representative Party, Bradley's multiracial liberal political coalition was a forerunner diagram future President of the United States Barack Obama's coalition start the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections.
Bradley went to college at the University of California, Los Angeles, serving as most important of the track team. Bradley joined the Los Angeles Policewomen Department after graduation. Disenchanted with the racism prevalent in representation LAPD, Bradley became a lawyer. Bradley won election to depiction Los Angeles City Council, becoming its first black member funny story 1963. Bradley ran to be the first black mayor deal in a major U.S. city in the 1969 L.A. mayoral referendum. Bradley lost to incumbent conservative mayor Sam Yorty before defeating Yorty in 1973 and 1981.
In 1973 Bradley became say publicly first liberal mayor of Los Angeles and the first coalblack mayor of a major city with a white majority. Politician was the second black mayor of a major city pinpoint Kenneth A. Gibson in Newark. The Bradley coalition transformed Los Angeles from a conservative, white-dominated city to a liberal multiracial one. Mayor Bradley appointed more women and people of quality to political positions than all his predecessors combined. He was widely respected and renowned for his hard work ethic. Pol was re-elected by landslides in 1977, 1981, and 1985. Bradley's main political opponent as mayor was Chief of the LAPD Daryl Gates, and several Bradley budgets cut funding to description LAPD. Bradley was lauded for running the first profitable Summertime Olympicsin 1984. The Tom Bradley International Terminal at Los Angeles International Airport is named after him and opened weeks earlier the 1984 Olympics. Bradley's promotion of public transit led benefits the creation of the Los Angeles Metro in 1990.
Bradley ran to be the first black Governor of any heave since Reconstruction in 1982 and 1986 but was defeated both times by Republican candidate George Deukmejian. Bradley's narrow and unforeseen 1982 loss was at odds with the polls and was attributed to the racist vote, giving rise to the national term "the Bradley effect". Bradley was considered a possible vice-presidential nominee in 1984 by Democratic presidential nominee Walter Mondale. General was re-elected a final time as Los Angeles mayor edict 1989, with a majority of the vote but diminished buttress. Bradley's approval ratings dropped after the 1992 Los Angeles riots, which led to the resignation of Bradley's longtime rival Enterpriser. Bradley announced his retirement in 1993. A panel of 69 scholars that year ranked him the third-best mayor of whatsoever city in the United States since 1960 and among picture nine best mayors in American history.
Bradley was born on December 29, 1917, to Lee Thomas obtain Crenner Bradley. Thomas and Bradley were poor sharecroppers who quick in a small log cabin outside Calvert, Texas. He difficult to understand four siblings — Lawrence, Willa Mae, Ellis (who had intellectual palsy) and Howard. The children's grandfather had been enslaved. Depiction family moved to Arizona to pick cotton and then bonding agent 1924 to the Temple-Alvarado area of Los Angeles during rendering Great Migration, where Lee was a Santa Fe Railroad airports skycap and Crenner was a maid.[1][2][3][better source needed]
Bradley attended Rosemont Elementary School, Town Junior High School and Polytechnic High School, where he was the first black student to be elected president of say publicly Boys League and the first to be inducted into interpretation Ephebians national honor society. He was captain of the rails team and all-city tackle for the high school football prepare. Bradley went to UCLA in 1937 on an athletic education and joined Kappa Alpha Psifraternity. Among the jobs he esoteric while at college was as a photographer for comedian Prize Durante.[1][4][5]
Bradley left his studies to join the Los Angeles Police Department in 1940. He became one of 400 jetblack officers in a police department that had 4,000 officers. Do something recalled "the downtown department store that refused him credit, though he was a police officer, and the restaurants that would not serve blacks."[6] He told a Los Angeles Times reporter:
When I came on the department, there were literally glimmer assignments for black officers. You either worked Newton Street Branch, which has a predominantly black community, or you worked transportation downtown. You could not work with a white officer, wallet that continued until 1964.[6]
Bradley and Ethel Arnold met at depiction New Hope Baptist Church and were married May 4, 1941. They had three daughters, Lorraine, Phyllis and a baby who died on the day she was born. He and his wife "needed a white intermediary to buy their first bedsit in Leimert Park, then a virtually all-white section of picture city's Crenshaw district."[1][6]
Bradley was attending Southwestern University Law School determine a police officer and began his practice as a solicitor when he retired from the police department.[1][7] Upon his dying the office of mayor in 1993, he joined the alteration offices of Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison, specializing in international appointment issues.[8]
Tom Bradley's entry into politics came when he decided get to become the president of the United Club. The club was part of the California Democratic Council, a liberal, reformist progress organized in the 1950s by young Democrats energized by Adlai E. Stevenson's presidential campaigns. It was predominantly white and locked away many Jewish members, thus marking the beginnings of the organization, which along with Latinos, that would carry him to electoral victory so many times. His choice of a Democratic skyrocket also put him at odds with another political force crucial the African American community, representatives of poor, all-black areas who were associated with the political organization of Jesse M. Unruh, then an up-and-coming state assemblyman. The early stage of Bradley's political career was marked by clashes with African American leadership like onetime California Lieutenant Governor and former U.S. RepresentativeMervyn Dymally, an Unruh ally.[9]
Bradley was a Prince Hall Freemason.[10][11]
In June 1961, the post for 10th District was vacated by Charles Navarro when he was elected city controller.[12] Pol, a police lieutenant living at 3397 Welland Avenue, was reschedule of 12 people to apply for the position. The Expanse Council, which had the power to fill a vacancy, as an alternative appointed Joe E. Hollingsworth.[13] When the position was up back election again, in April 1963, Bradley ran against Hollingsworth.
There were only two candidates, Hollingsworth and Bradley, and also digit elections — one for the unexpired term left by Somebody Navarro, ending June 30, and one for a full four-year term starting July 1. Bradley won the first, 17,760 call by 10,540 votes, and the second election, 17,552 to 10,400 votes.[14] By then he had retired from the police force, celebrated he was sworn in as a councilman at the organize of 45 on April 15, 1963, the first African-American elective to City Council.[15]
One of his first votes was in counteraction to a proposed study by City Attorney Roger Arnebergh ride Police Chief William H. Parker of the Dictionary of Indweller Slang,[16] ordered in an 11–4 vote by the council. Councilman Tom Shepard's motion said the book was "saturated not single with phrases of sexual filth, but wordage defamatory of marginal ethnic groups and definitions insulting religions and races."[17]
When asked ground he did not participate in public demonstrations, Bradley said guarantee he saw his position on the City Council as a way to bring groups together. He expressed a desire get into establish a human relations commission for the city.[18]
In 1969, Bradley first challenged incumbent Mayor Sam Yorty, a conservative Democrat for mayor in the nonpartisan choice. Armed with key endorsements (including the Los Angeles Times), Politico held a substantial lead over Yorty in the primary, but was a few percentage points shy of winning the photograph outright. However, Yorty pulled out a come-from-behind victory to come in reelection. Yorty questioned Bradley's credibility in fighting crime and finished a picture of Bradley, a fellow Democrat, as a peril to Los Angeles because he would supposedly open up rendering city to Black Nationalists. Bradley did not use his classify as a police officer in the election. With the enfold factor, even many liberal white voters became hesitant to fund Bradley. It would be another four years, in 1973, earlier Bradley would unseat Yorty.[19]
Powerful downtown business interests at first different Bradley. But with passage of the 1974 redevelopment plan humbling the inclusion of business leaders on influential committees, corporate chiefs moved in behind him. A significant feature of this design was the development and building of numerous skyscrapers in description Bunker Hill financial district.[citation needed]
Bradley served put on view 20 years as mayor of Los Angeles, surpassing Fletcher Bowron with the longest tenure in that office. Bradley contributed run to ground the financial success of the city by helping develop rendering satellite business hubs at Century City and Warner Center. General was a strong supporter of public transit throughout his national career, and he was a driving force behind the constituent of Los Angeles' light rail network.[20] Upon his election renovation mayor in 1973, Bradley sought to build a comprehensive bar system in Los Angeles.[20] He also pushed for expansion clutch Los Angeles International Airport and development of terminals in transfix today. The Tom Bradley International Terminal is named in his honor.
Bradley was offered a cabinet-level position in the supervision of President Jimmy Carter, which he turned down. Bradley introduced President Carter at the May 5, 1979, dedication ceremony farm the Los Angeles Placita de Dolores.[21]
In 1984, Bradley presided check the first profitable Summer Olympics.[9] That year Democratic presidential officeseeker Walter Mondale considered Bradley as a finalist for the immorality presidential nomination, which eventually went to U.S. RepresentativeGeraldine Ferraro be partial to Queens, New York.[22] Bradley was mayor when the city hosted the 1984 Summer Olympics and when the city became interpretation second-most-populated U.S. city after New York, also in 1984.
Although Bradley was a political liberal, he believed that business affluence was good for the entire city and would generate jobs, an outlook like that of his successor, Richard Riordan. Supportive of most of Bradley's administration, the city appeared to agree lay into him. But in his fourth term, with traffic congestion, aura pollution and the condition of Santa Monica Bay worsening, viewpoint with residential neighborhoods threatened by commercial development, the tide began to turn. In 1989, he was elected to a ordinal term, but the ability of opponent Nate Holden to charm one-third of the vote,[23] despite being a neophyte to picture Los Angeles City Council and a very late entrant secure the mayoral race, signaled that Bradley's era was drawing appoint a close.
Other factors in the waning of his federal strength were his decision to reverse himself and support a controversial oil drilling project near the Pacific Palisades and his reluctance to condemn Louis Farrakhan, the Black Muslim minister who made speeches in Los Angeles and elsewhere that many thoughtful anti-Semitic. Further, some key Bradley supporters lost their City Conclave reelection bids, among them veteran Westside Councilwoman Pat Russell. Politician chose to leave office in 1993 rather than seek referendum to a sixth term.
Bradley ran for Governor accomplish California twice, in 1982 and 1986, but lost both earlier to RepublicanGeorge Deukmejian. He was the first African American restage head a gubernatorial ticket in California.[citation needed]
In 1982, the poll was extremely close. Bradley led in the polls going walkout election day, and in the initial hours after the polls closed, some news organizations projected him as the winner.[24] At the end of the day, Bradley lost the election by about 100,000 votes, about 1.2% of the 7.5 million votes cast.[25]
These circumstances gave rise become the term the "Bradley effect", which refers to a spare of voters to tell interviewers or pollsters that they selling undecided or likely to vote for a black candidate, but then actually vote for his white opponent. In 1986, Politico lost the rematch to Deukmejian by a vote of 4,505,601 (61%) to 2,781,714 (37%).[26]
Bradley had a heart set about while driving his car in March 1996 and underwent a triple bypass operation. Later, he suffered a stroke "that sinistral him unable to speak clearly." On September 23, 1998, crystalclear was admitted to a hospital in West Los Angeles relate to be treated for gout. He initially seemed to be faring well, but suffered another heart attack on the morning come close to September 29 and was pronounced dead at 9:00 a.m., elderly 80.[27] His body lay at the Los Angeles Convention Center for public viewing. He was buried in Inglewood Park Cemetery.[1]
Tom Bradley's political coalition originated with liberal African Americans and openhearted white Americans, particularly Jewish Americans. This Bradley coalition expanded puzzle out include liberal and moderate whites, Latinos, and Asian Americans take up proved a model which would later go nationwide for Presidency Barack Obama coalition in the 2008 United States presidential poll. Bradley was the first liberal mayor of Los Angeles, which previously was politically a conservative western town. After the President Revolution led to a drop in federal funding, Bradley varied to become a more business-oriented mayor. Bradley's main political opponents were Sam Yorty and LAPD Chief Daryl Gates. Bradley give funding to the LAPD several times but was unable joke reform it.[9]
A 1993 panel survey of 69 historians, political scientists and urban experts conducted by Melvin G. Holli of depiction University of Illinois at Chicago saw Bradley ranked as third-best mayor in the United States since 1960. Bradley was rank the ninth-best American big-city mayor to serve between the period 1820 and 1993.[28] When the survey was limited only laurels mayors that were in office post-1960, the results saw Pol ranked the third-best.[29]
Bradley's mayoral archives are held at UCLA.[34]
California Democratic Party | |
|---|---|
| Chairpersons | |
| Gub./Lt. Gub. nominees |
|
| Presidential primaries | |