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194 21. Riverboats and Governor Edgar I wasn’t particularly enthused about riverboat gambling, but one of my members really wanted it, and so I believed that I had to support it. Ifelt good as we rolled into 1990, when the biggest news would be about all the statewide elections. An issue that became urgent for a few of my members resulted from action in Iowa just across the Mississippi River from Rock Island and Moline, Illinois. The news came out in 1989 that Davenport, Iowa, was going to launch a casino riverboat in 1991. Senator Denny Jacobs of East Moline told us how terrible that would be for the Illinois side of the Quad Cities. He said the Iowa boat was going to eat up all the money up and down the river, and Illinoisans would go across the river and spend their money in Iowa. Jacobs wanted to make his Illinois communities competitive . In the House, Representative E. J. “Zeke” Giorgi, a Democrat from Rockford and known as the “father of the state lottery,” was also pushing for riverboat casinos in Illinois. Jacobs’s first attempt at passing riverboat gambling had not been successful in 1989, so that summer, he conducted some hearings about the issue. That’s another strategy commonly used: if at first you don’t succeed, raise awareness of your cause with public hearings sanctioned by the legislature. I did not have strong feelings about riverboat gambling, but I was not particularly enthused about it. However, it was in fact a Democratic initiative that was urgently wanted by one of my members, for good reason, and as the Democratic leader of the Senate, I didn’t believe I could be against it, even if I was so disposed. It was just too important to some of my members and to some of the House Democrats, too. Giorgi really wanted it. Jacobs was passionate, saying things like, “Our bill could make the Quad Cities one of the tourism capitals of the world.”1 riverboats and governor edgar 195 Giorgi and Jacobs understood what not too many people in the general public understand: that there are three critical times to try to pass a major initiative. The first is in the spring of every year, usually near adjournment of the session. The second is during the “veto session” in October or November. The General Assembly returns for two or three weeks with the assumption that it will consider vetoes sent to members by the governor over the summer. But frankly, the veto session is a time to slip something in or deal with something postponed in the spring. The third and final time is in early January, when legislators always come back for a few days to wrap up the work of the previous year. Riverboat gambling proponents couldn’t get a bill passed in the spring or fall of 1989, so they were ready with the Riverboat Gambling Act when we returned to Springfield after the new year in 1990. Republicans, with the exception of Governor Thompson, were lining up against it, many of them on moral grounds. Speaker Madigan wasn’t too thrilled about it, either, but said he would support it as an economic development plan.2 Madigan also reminded Republican legislators that their Republican governor believed the boats were good for the northwestern region of Illinois (namely, Galena), the East St. Louis area, and maybe Peoria or even Beardstown, which is a really small Illinois River town. The initial riverboat gambling bill said four licenses could be issued on the Mississippi River and one on the Illinois River by January 1, 1991, which would beat Iowa by three or four months. The bill also said the new Illinois Gaming Board could issue another five licenses on any navigable stream outside of Cook County after March 1992. I was disappointed that both Mayor Daley and Cook County chairman George Dunne told us to take Chicago and Cook County out of the sweepstakes for a license. I said to them, “We ought to leave it in, even if we don’t use it, because someday, some years from now, future leaders will want gambling in Cook County. It will cost them an arm and a leg to get it twenty years from now, if they get it at all. Right now you can have it for nothing. Just tag on to what the people in the Quad Cities and Joliet want.” But I never really...

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