Is Nithya Raman L.A.’s next revolutionary mayor? What history has to say
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Taking the stage Tuesday night, Nithya Raman described a city whose government was slowly strangling it. A City Hall so inept and unable to solve problems that residents felt hopeless.
“That’s the cynicism that started to take over this city, that started to make us believe that L.A.’s problems weren’t just bad, but they were permanent,” she said.
Is this the battle cry for a new political revolution in Los Angeles?
Raman swept into the mayor’s office with a wave of support from young progressives and other voters fed up with the state of the city.
This is not the first time Los Angeles finds itself at a political crossroads, where voters opt for a radical change of the status quo as their only hope for survival.
At four moments in the last century, bold politicians turned upset elections into new political eras. Raman faces her own formidable agenda, from reducing homelessness and building more housing to proving to Angelenos that City Hall actually can solve basic problems. Raman, who ran as a Democratic socialist, inherits a divided city, with some demanding radical changes and other deeply afraid of what that means.
Here is what history tells us:
1938: The corruption bomb
Los Angeles in the 1930s was a profoundly corrupt place. Bribery was the only way to get anything done at 200 N. Spring St., and Mayor Frank Shaw always got his cut. The corruption spread through most of the city’s institutions. The police conspired with the mob. City contracts went to the highest bribe. The underworld seemed to run the city.
Reformers began to expose the graft, only to experience the wrath of the police “red squad.”
The crisis hit its zenith when the LAPD bombed the home of one crusader and the car of another. This was enough for even the city’s elite, who backed the recall of Shaw and the election of Fletcher Bowron.
Bowron worked to clean up City Hall, with sweeping reforms to the civil service.
But some of those changes had unintended consequences that would haunt the city. The LAPD under Bowron’s Police Chief William Parker weeded out the mob but was marked by racism and brutality. As Patt Morrison noted, “he hired ex-military men accustomed to following orders and doing battle with an ‘enemy.’” Bowron was also a cheerleader of Japanese internment, which left its own dark legacy.
1961: The suburbs strike back
At the dawn of the 1960s, the wealthy titans of Los Angeles were sitting pretty. The city they built through brute force and a bit of graft was the fastest-growing in the nation and widely seen as America’s post-war ideal. They grabbed the water, which allowed the suburbs to spread far and wide.
But Los Angeles was now a sprawling city, and the far-flung subdivisions began to resent what the downtown power brokers were up to. Sam Yorty, the man from the San Fernando Valley, rose to challenge what he called “the downtown machine.” He faulted City Hall for ignoring the suburbs, failing to curb smog and being out of touch.
Few pundits thought he could win when he took on Mayor Norris Poulson, the establishment’s man at City Hall and a favorite of the elites (including the owners of the Los Angeles Times.)
But Yorty pioneered the use of television to keep the attention of voters and stumbled upon an unexpected issue that galvanized his base. The City Council had passed an ordinance requiring citizens to separate tin cans from the rest of the family garbage, which then would be collected once a month. He railed against this, calling it “coercion against the housewives of this city” and championing the cause of a once-a-week, combined trash collection.
It worked. But as the years went on, Yorty’s suburban warrior took on a dark, often racist tone. His style came to symbolize the politics of white resentment that some say would influence Donald Trump. This would set up another epic realignment that would change Los Angeles politics for a generation.
1973: The global city
By the 1970s, many in L.A. were tired of Yorty’s antics.
He faced an opponent the likes of which the city had never seen before: Tom Bradley. A well-regarded police lieutenant and councilman, Bradley sought to become the first Black mayor of Los Angeles by building a coalition not centered in the suburbs but widely across the city that included Blacks, Latinos, Jews, labor and even parts of big business.
Yorty defeated Bradley in 1969, in a campaign that seized on fears of a Black mayor. But Bradley won in a 1973 rematch.
It marked a new era as Los Angeles grew into a global city. Immigration profoundly changed the region, with growing Latino and Asian populations that joined the Bradley coalition. It was also a time of major growth marked by a dramatic expansion of downtown’s skyline, an expanded port that made L.A. a global trade hub, the beginning of a new rail network and greater diversity at City Hall.
The Bradley era hit its apex with the 1984 Olympics, such a feel-good event that L.A. even could boast of conquering traffic (for two weeks, at least).
Bradley stayed in office for five terms, and the last one was miserable. The Rodney King beating and L.A. riots underscored dysfunction at City Hall and blew apart any fantasies of L.A. finding some major racial understanding under Bradley’s leadership.
2005: Latino Power!
By the new millennium, Latinos made up nearly half of L.A.’s population but still were struggling to gain a sizable voice in local government.
That’s what made Antonio Villaraigosa’s election as mayor national news, hoisting him to the cover of Newsweek magazine under the headline “Latino Power!” But Villaraigosa’s win also was symbolic of a larger political transformation that would change City Hall in profound ways.
Villaraigosa first ran for mayor in 2001 but lost to James Hahn. The two traditional candidates did not dramatically vary on the big issues. But Hahn’s tenure was marked by a series of controversies, including scandals at City Hall and his decision to fire Black police chief Bernard Parks.
In their rematch, Villaraigosa pulled together a formable coalition of Latinos, Blacks, Jews and even a majority of the vote in the San Fernando Valley. It was enough to trounce Hahn.
As The Times reported: “When Villaraigosa takes office Friday, Latinos will hold the positions of mayor of Los Angeles, president of its City Council, Los Angeles city attorney, president of the Los Angeles school board, chairwoman of the county Board of Supervisors, county sheriff and chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.”
Latino political power in Los Angeles has only grown since then, become a topic of the infamous racist City Hall leak, altering the political fortunes of other groups and likely playing a major role in Raman’s victory,
Raman takes office Dec. 14. Let’s see how history unfolds.
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Commentary and opinion
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Today’s recipe
It’s been a long day, and you’ve stumbled into the grocery store without the faintest idea of what to put on the table. Suddenly, the tempting whiff of a freshly roasted chicken puts everything into perspective. Try one of these 5 ways to make a great meal from a rotisserie chicken.
Question for you
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Have a great day, from the Essential California team
Jack Dolan, investigative reporter
Hugo Martín, assistant editor, Fast Break desk
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Andrew Campa, weekend writer
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