Aldermen: by appointment of the mayor.

The news: Mayor Richard M. Daley appointed three black women in December to fill aldermanic vacancies in three predominately black wards.

Behind the news: In all, Daley has appointed 31 aldermen, 20 of whom are presently on the 50-member City Council. More than half of the appointments have been in black wards; the mayor has appointed the 8th Ward alderman three times alone.

Robert Starks, a political science professor at Northeastern Illinois University, believes that the appointments have diminished the city council's independent black voice. "Daley has them politically and economically tied to him. In addition to appointing them, he sends city employees to help get them elected," Starks said.

Daley's most recent appointments, Darcel A. Beavers, Michelle A. Harris and Lona Lane, could face crowded fields and prominent challengers in February's municipal elections. Harris had 12 challengers in the 8th Ward, the most of any incumbent alderman, Lane had seven challengers in the 18th Ward, and Beavers had six in the 7th Ward, including Sandi Jackson, wife of U.S. Rep. Jesse L. Jackson Jr.

But nearly 93 percent of appointees who sought full terms following their appointments were successful. The only people to defeat Daley appointees were 49th Ward Alderman Joe Moore, who beat Robert Clarke in 1991, and 27th Ward Alderman Walter Burnett Jr., who outpolled Dexter Watson in 1995.