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room. When the governor proposed a breakfast meeting the next morning at 8:30, he quickly agreed to be there. On Mondaymorning, in Dukakis’s suite at the Hyatt Regency, over a breakfast of cereal, fruit, and coffee, the two rivals got down to brass tacks. The atmosphere was decidedly uncomfortable. Dukakis griped about Jackson’s “Big House” remark, saying he did not appreciate being compared to a slaveholder. Jackson, in no uncertainwords, deplored the missed phone call. For several hours, it went back and forth. “They got it out on the table and they cleared the air,” said a Jackson associate. In the late morning, Lloyd Bentsen joined the meeting; soon afterward, the three men, wreathed in smiles, appeared together at a press conference in the hotel basement. Dukakis complimented Jackson. Jackson complimented Dukakis. Then, in a moment everyone had been waiting for, Jackson pledged his support for the Dukakis–Bentsen ticket and promised a harmonious convention. There would be no demonstrations, a minimum of dissent over the party platform, and no opposition to Bentsen’s nomination for vice-president. What had Jackson received in return for his cooperation? Precious little. Dukakis did not budge an inch when it came to issues of foreign and domestic policy, making no attempt to accommodate Jackson’s agenda. Nor did he offer Jackson a job in a Dukakis administration. All Jackson got were some changes in party rules concerning the selection of convention delegates for 1992, an assurance that members of his staff would be employed by the Dukakis campaign, and, for himself, the use of a chartered plane during the fall campaign. Seeing Dukakis and Jackson arm in armat the press conference, most Democrats breathed a sigh of relief. Their party was whole again. Among Jackson’s ardent partisans, however, the feelings were rather different. “A plane for Jesse to campaign for Dukakis. So what?” snorted a Jackson delegate fromMississippi. Hosea Williams, an old ally from the civil rights movement, sawmatters in a similar light: “Basically, Dukakis got Jesse in that meeting and told Jesse to go to hell.”

C H A P T E R 1 : R A I N B Ow E x P R E S S

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