Why Chicago’s 2024 Democratic convention didn’t devolve into 1968

CHICAGO — Despite some protesters’ vows to “make it great like ’68,” history did not repeat itself, and the streets of Chicago did not descend into chaos during this year’s Democratic National Convention.

And inside the United Center, delegates cheering the presidential nomination of Vice President Kamala Harris experienced none of the turmoil that upended the 1968 convention, when security forces roughed up journalists and attacked campaign volunteers.

ALSO READ: Donald Trump exploits AP photo error for new $99 'Save America' book

Despite the parallels between opposition to the Vietnam war in 1968 and protests against U.S. support for Israel’s war in Gaza in 2024, there are some key differences that explain why the dynamic is different this time.

Most importantly, the nominees: Harris is not Hubert Humphrey.

Sure, Harris is currently the sitting vice president, as Humphrey was in 1968. But as the daughter of immigrants from India and Jamaica, and as a woman poised to become leader of the free world, she can credibly claim to be a change candidate. Humphrey, in contrast, was the embodiment of the 1960s-era Democratic Party establishment.

ALSO READ: Inside the Democratic National Convention corporate moneyfest

Harris’ campaign promises “a new way forward” — primarily from the era of Donald Trump, but also from the political style — if not entirely the policy prescriptions — of a Silent Generation politician in Joe Biden, who entered the U.S. Senate in 1973, when Harris was in grade school.

Humphrey, in contrast, represented a continuation of then-President Lyndon Johnson’s policies, including an unpopular, war and efforts to address racism and poverty that, taken together with rioting in American cities in response to the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King, prompted a backlash from white voters.

Another key difference between 2024 and 1968 is the Republican nominee. Simply stated,Trump is not Richard Nixon.

Voters and, more importantly, the Democratic Party rank-and-file, know Trump because he’s already served one term as president and has never stopped running for president since, shattering democratic legal standards and norms all the while.

Nixon, the Republican nominee, ran on the sufficiently vague promise of “peace with victory” in Vietnam that allowed him to evade scrutiny before going on to win the election and dramatically expand the war.

While Nixon would of course resign in 1974 amid nation-shaking abuses of power, neither Democrats nor Republicans in 1968 could not have predicted the events that would precede his political demise.

In contrast, Democratic Party delegates who gathered in Chicago this week are well aware that Trump intends, for one, to gut the civil service to install loyalists in the federal government. Trump’s risible efforts to distance himself notwithstanding, Project 2025, with its prescriptions for restructuring the government with authoritarian efficiency, is practically a household name among Democratic voters.

ALSO READ: ‘Stop the Steal’ organizer hired by Trump campaign for Election 2024 endgame

Thanks to the threat of Trump, Democratic Party activists are giving their nominee extraordinary leeway on policy issues. Aside from the politically perilous issue of Gaza, there was little evidence inside the United Center of factions jockeying for influence over particulars concerning environmental policy, healthcare or immigration. Many Democrats are happy to unify behind Harris with the imperative to beat Trump in November.

Another key difference between then and now is the Chicago police, who arguably bear the largest share of responsibility for the violence in 1968.

In 1968, violent skirmishes broke out between police and protesters roughly six miles from the convention center in what an independent commission later described as a “indiscriminate and unrestrained police violence.”

Protesters at the 2024 Democratic convention leaned into the legacy of 1968 in a bid to elevate the suffering in Gaza into the national discourse.

“Just like 1968, there’s nothing here to celebrate,” the protesters chanted on Wednesday, as their march idled in a residential neighborhood four blocks from the United Center. “The whole world’s watching — the bombs are dropping.”

Chicago police in riot gear — aided throughout Chicago by local and federal law enforcement officials from across the nation — held the line despite attempts by protesters throughout the week to break through security fences and access the United Center.

There were some minor skirmishes, as on Tuesday evening, when officers grabbed protest leaders out of a crowd outside the Israeli consulate, about two miles away from the United Center. The police sometimes used aggressive tactics, including trying to grab media credentials from journalists and arresting two on Tuesday. They also detained protesters in train stations near the march route, although they later released them, and in the end, the clashes didn’t amount to much.

Contrast this week’s events with the 1968 protests, as described by Peter Hayward, then a college student, to CBS News: “Cops on motorcycles — on those three-wheeled motorcycles — just driving us north. I saw some kids fall down — in a panic to see this kind of thing happening — and the National Guard just walking over them, and the motorcycle cops showing absolutely no respect for the fact that these people were lying there.”

The violence in 1968 was so horrifying and grotesque that Humphrey was forced to acknowledge it before giving his acceptance speech.

In 2024, it’s safe to say that for the vast majority of the Democrats, the joyful chaos of celebratory balloons and throngs of elated delegates chanting long after Harris left the stage left a more lasting impression than anything transpiring outside the United Center.