economic recession and the reluctance of Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower to back the civil rights movement in the South. Black Republicans began to believe they were not well represented by that party. Shortly before the election, Howard helped to found the Chicago League of Negro Voters. The League generally opposed the Daley organization and promoted the election of black candidates in both parties. It nurtured the black independent movement of the 1960s and 1970s, which eventually propelled four of Howard's friends to higher office: Ralph Metcalfe, Charles Hayes, and Gus Savage to Congress, and Harold Washington as mayor of Chicago. In the two decades after the 1958 election, Howard had little role as a national leader, but he remained important locally. He chaired a Chicago committee in 1965 to raise money for the children of the recently assassinated black leader, Malcolm X. Later, he was an early contributor to the Chicago chapter of the SCLC's Operation Breadbasket under Jesse Jackson. In 1971, Operation PUSH was founded in Howard's Chicago home, and he chaired the organization's finance committee. Through this period, he became well known as a leading abortion provider, although the procedure was still illegal until 1973, when the Supreme Court ruled in Roe v. Wade that women had a right to this procedure. He was arrested in 1964 and 1965 for allegedly performing abortions in Chicago but was never convicted. Howard regarded this work as complementary to his earlier civil rights activism. His medical philosophy and commitment to medical equity clearly shaped his political motivations. The challenges he faced in his career are a testament to his commitment to change and fearlessness amidst a tumultuous and divided political era. Electoral history Friendship Medical Center In 1972, Howard founded the multi-million-dollar Friendship Medical Center on the South Side, the largest privately owned black clinic in Chicago. The staff of about 160 included 27 doctors in such fields as pediatrics, dental care, a pharmacy, ENT (ear, nose, and throat) care, and psychological and drug counseling. Within an hour after the decision in Roe v. Wade was announced in 1973, FMC performed the first legal abortions in Illinois. After a spate of bad publicity, "Howard stated that the FMC had performed 1,500 legal abortions thus far, more than any other Illinois provider. Given such numbers, he concluded, six major complications were not unusual." Howard also believed the various controversies were "a