Unbought and Unbossed

by Shirley Chisholm

I was well on the way to forming my present attitude to- ward politics as it is practiced in the United States: it is a beautiful fraud that has been imposed on the people for years, whose practitioners exchange gilded promises for the most valuable thing their victims own, their votes. And who benefits most? The lawyers. This is true on any level, but at the district politics plane one sees it clearest. There are a few menial jobs for the doorbell ringers, the envelope stuffers, the petition carriers, and the car pool drivers who make the machine go. Some of them get to be chairwomen in govern- ment buildings, or process servers, or guards. But without a legal background, the real patronage is out of their reach. The people are beginning to see through the cheat now. The ones in party work wised up first. They delivered the vote, and then some lawyer, with his shirt and tie, too proud to tramp up and down tenement stairs, got the gravy. That's why black people are apt to laugh when one talks about patronage.