Miami and the Siege of Chicago

[Dave Monroe]

Miami and the Siege of Chicago
By Norman Mailer
Introduction by Frank Rich

1968. The Vietnam War was raging. President Lyndon Johnson, facing a
challenge in his own Democratic Party from the maverick antiwar
candidate Eugene McCarthy, announced that he would not seek a second
term. In April, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated and riots
broke out in inner cities throughout America. Bobby Kennedy was killed
after winning the California primary in June. In August, Republicans
met in Miami, picking the little-loved Richard Nixon as their
candidate, while in September, Democrats in Chicago backed the
ineffectual vice president, Hubert Humphrey. TVs across the country
showed antiwar protesters filling the streets of Chicago and the
police running amok, beating and arresting demonstrators and delegates
alike.

In Miami and the Siege of Chicago, Norman Mailer, America's most
protean and provocative writer, brings a novelist's eye to bear on the
events of 1968, a decisive year in modern American politics, from
which today's bitterly divided country arose.

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