The Nation - News from Jan. 26, 1987

Chicago Mayor Harold Washington and former Mayor Jane M. Byrne, his opponent in the city’s Feb. 24 Democratic mayoral primary, are running neck-and-neck, according to a Chicago Sun-Times/WLS-TV poll. The poll also found the two candidates’ support split along racial lines, a development that 33 religious leaders, including Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, warned against in a letter urging citizens to vote based on candidates’ experience and stands on issues, not race. Washington, the city’s first black mayor, would get 43% of the Democratic vote and Byrne 44% if the primary were today, according to the poll.