In the days leading up to the Democratic National Convention, authorities became increasingly concerned about possibilities for violence. The Chicago Police and the FBI collected information about radical groups and their intentions in Chicago. The following list includes examples of the inflammatory intelligence collected before the convention.
Question to Consider
How does the list below help explain the reaction of the police during the convention?
Document
Reports that black power groups were allegedly meeting to discuss the convention and the assassination of leading political figures.
Unnamed black militant groups in the East were reported to have discussed renting apartments near the Amphitheatre for use as sniping posts.
An organization was reportedly organized to secure weapons and explosives and to plan a revolution to coincide with the convention.
A report that the National Mobilization Committee intended to prevent Vice President Humphrey from utilizing surface transportation to reach the convention.
An allegation from militant white racists to the effect that black militants intended to invade white Chicago neighborhoods and "lay siege" to the city.
Reports that black gangs were allegedly accumulations weapons to attack the police precinct stations in order to draw police forces away from the convention.
Reports that black nationalists in California were alleged to have devised a plot to assassinate certain prominent Negroes in Chicago in order to create disputation throughout the city.
Reports that weapons had been sent to Chicago to be used to assassinate one of the presidential candidates.
Reports that various organizations planned to put LSD into the Chicago water supply.
Source:
Daniel Walker, "How the City Prepared," Rights in Conflict: Chicago's 7 Brutal Days, a report submitted by Daniel Walker, Director of the Chicago Study Team, to the National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, 1968), 58.
