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Concept
Jesse M. Unruh
Summary
Jesse Marvin Unruh (ˈʌnru, ; September 30, 1922 – August 4, 1987), also known as Big Daddy Unruh, was an American politician who served as speaker of the California State Assembly and as the California State Treasurer.
Born 1922 in Newton, Kansas, Unruh served in the United States Navy during World War II. After the war, he enrolled at the University of Southern California, receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science and journalism in 1948.
Unruh's political career began as an unsuccessful candidate for the California State Assembly in 1950 and 1952. He was elected as a member of the Assembly on his third attempt in 1954. In 1956, he was an unsuccessful candidate for Presidential elector for California as a Democrat. In 1959, he wrote California's Unruh Civil Rights Act, which outlawed discrimination by businesses that offer services to the public and was a model for later reforms enacted nationally in the 1960s and 1970s. Unruh was Speaker of the California State Assembly from 1961 to 1969 and a delegate to Democratic National Convention from California in 1960 and 1968.
As a national official of the Democratic Party, he often feuded with Governor of California Pat Brown (1959–67), a fellow Democrat, and was a case-study of James Q. Wilson's treatise on machine politics, The Amateur Democrat.
Unruh was California campaign manager for John F. Kennedy in 1960 and a close Kennedy associate throughout his presidency. He helped convince Senator Robert F. Kennedy to enter the 1968 presidential race and managed his California campaign. Kennedy won the California primary, but was assassinated shortly after his victory speech at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.
U.S. President Lyndon Johnson once described Unruh as "probably one of the most selfish men" he had met in politics.
After an unsuccessful effort, managed by Unruh and Mayor Richard J. Daley of Chicago, to draft Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Unruh released California delegates to vote their conscience and announced that he would support Eugene McCarthy at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
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