He was the boss of the teeming 24th Ward, on Chicago's West Side. He was the ward's first Negro alderman. He wore $200 suits, and his friends called him "Duke." He held real estate valued at more than $100,000. He had just leased a shiny new political headquarters, with autographed photos of people like John F. Kennedy on the wall. That was how it was with Benjamin F. Lewis, 53. Everything was going his way. Last week he was re-elected as alderman by a pretty decisive margin—12,189 to 888. It almost seemed as though Ben Lewis had not an...
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