Teenagers in politics

I had just started college when a group of us volunteered in the 1970 state senate campaign for Alon Jeffrey.

The guy was soundly defeated and on election night our teenage brains told us it would be a cool thing to drive to the home of his opponent, Ben Palmer, and paste a Jeffrey bumper sticker on his front steps.

As I was doing that, Palmer came out of the house, complimented us for working so hard against him, and pinched my cheek, just like an old uncle would have.

I belatedly realized that what we were doing was wrong. But Palmer didn’t act as if he was bothered by it.

Of course, I never did that again.