November 20, 1925 - June 6, 1968
Birth Place : Brookline, Massachusetts
Robert Francis "Bobby" Kennedy (November 20, 1925 – June 6, 1968), also called RFK, was one of two younger brothers of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, and served as United States Attorney General from 1961–1964. He was one of President Kennedy's most trusted advisors, and worked closely with the President during the Cuban Missile Crisis. His contribution to the African-American Civil Rights Movement is sometimes considered his greatest legacy. After his brother's assassination in late 1963, Kennedy continued as Attorney General under President Johnson for nine months. He resigned in September, 1964, and was elected to the United States Senate from New York that November. He was assassinated shortly after delivering a speech celebrating his victory in the 1968 Democratic Presidential primary of California at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California.
Career until 1960
Robert Kennedy was born on November 20, 1925, in Brookline, Massachusetts, the seventh child of Joseph P. Kennedy and Rose Kennedy. While growing up, he was raised amidst the competitive yet loyal Kennedy family culture.
Kennedy served briefly in the Navy and underwent the officer training (V-12) at Bates College, then went on to attend Harvard. He was a three-year letterman for the football team and graduated in 1948. He then enrolled at the University of Virginia School of Law, and earned his degree in 1951. Following law school, Kennedy managed his brother John's successful 1952 Senate campaign.
Kennedy started his career working for Senator Joseph McCarthy, with whom he shared hardline anti-Communist views. Kennedy served as Counsel with Roy Cohn to the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations during the McCarthy Hearings of 1953–54.
Kennedy soon made a name for himself as the chief counsel of the Senate Labor Rackets Committee hearings, which began in 1956. In a dramatic scene, Kennedy squared off against Jimmy Hoffa during the antagonistic argument that marked Hoffa's testimony. Kennedy left the Rackets Committee in 1959 in order to run his brother John's successful Presidential campaign.
Attorney general
After the 1960 election, he was appointed Attorney General by President Kennedy. As Attorney General, he continued his crusade against organized crime, often at the resistance of FBI head J. Edgar Hoover. Convictions against notorious organized crime figures rose by 800% during his term. Kennedy was relentless in his pursuit of Teamster's President James Hoffa resulting from widespread knowledge of Hoffa's corruption in financial and electoral actions, both personally and organisationally.
Kennedy also began seriously to enforce civil rights and equal opportunity for African-Americans. He expressed the Administration's commitment to civil rights during a 1961 speech at the University of Georgia Law School: "We will not stand by or be aloof. We will move. I happen to believe that the 1954 Supreme Court school desegregation decision was right. But my belief does not matter. It is the law. Some of you may believe the decision was wrong. That does not matter. It is the law."
In September 1962, he sent U.S. Marshals and troops to Oxford, Mississippi, to enforce a Federal court order admitting the first African American student, James Meredith, to the University of Mississippi. Riots ensued during the period of Meredith's admittance, which resulted in hundreds of injuries and two deaths. Yet Kennedy remained adamant concerning the rights of black students to enjoy the benefits of all levels of the educational system. The Office of Civil Rights also hired its first African American lawyer, Thelton Henderson, and began to work cautiously with leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. Robert Kennedy saw voting as the key to racial justice, and collaborated with Presidents Kennedy and Johnson to create the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, which helped bring an end to Jim Crow laws.
As his brother's confidante, Kennedy oversaw the CIA's anti-Castro activities after the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, and he also helped develop the strategy to blockade Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis instead of initiating a military air strike that might have led to nuclear war. He later negotiated with the Soviet Union to remove the missiles.
The assassination of JFK
The assassination of President Kennedy happened two days after Robert Kennedy's 38th birthday. It was a brutal shock to the world, the nation, and of course to Robert and the rest of the Kennedy family. His elder brother's death left him the de facto leader of the Kennedy family.
During the days following the assassination, but just before the funeral, Kennedy wrote to his two eldest children, Kathleen, and Joseph II, telling them about the tragedy and to follow what their uncle had started.
Kennedy was due to give a speech prior to the showing of a memorial film dedicated to the late President at the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey. As he was introduced, tens of thousands of Democratic delegates, Democratic party workers, young members of the Democratic party, and others broke into thunderous applause and an outroar of support for Kennedy. He broke down and began to cry. The audience did not stop their display of support for their candidate, and the applause continued for about 22 minutes — despite repeated appeals by him and the chairman of the convention.
It has been noted in the succeeding years that Robert Kennedy did not discuss with the Warren Commission the history of plans, considered by the CIA, to assassinate foreign leaders. Yet such ideas date back as far as 1957 (prior to the Kennedy administration) when the U.S. Ambassador to Cuba, Arthur Gardner, suggested such a plan (to murder Fidel Castro) to Batista, who thoroughly rejected the suggestion. In December 1959, J. C. King, chief of the CIA's Western Hemisphere Division, recommended that "thorough consideration be given to the elimination of Fidel Castro". Both Allen W. Dulles of the CIA and E. Howard Hunt approved of such plans, but chose never to reveal their consideration at Cabinet meetings during the Kennedy administration. No source relating to such operational considerations make more than passing mention to Attorney General Kennedy (Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with respect to Intelligence Activities - 94 Cong., I Sess. 1975)
Senator for New York
Soon after President John F. Kennedy's assassination, Robert Kennedy left the Cabinet to run for a seat in the United States Senate, representing New York.
President Johnson and Robert Kennedy were often at severe odds with each other, both politically and personally, yet Johnson gave considerable support to RFK's campaign, as he was later to recall in his memoir of the White House years.
His opponent in the 1964 race was Republican incumbent Kenneth Keating, who attempted to portray Kennedy as an arrogant carpetbagger. Kennedy emerged victorious in the November election, helped in part by LBJ's huge victory margin in New York.
During his three and a half years as a U.S. Senator, Kennedy visited apartheid-ruled South Africa, helped to start a successful redevelopment project in poverty-stricken Bedford-Stuyvesant in New York City, visited the Mississippi Delta as a member of the Senate committee reviewing the effectiveness of 'War on Poverty' programs and, reversing his prior stance, called for a halt in further escalation of the Vietnam War.
As Senator, Robert endeared himself to African Americans, and other minorities such as Native Americans and immigrant groups. He spoke forcefully in favor of what he called the "disaffected," the impoverished, and "the excluded," thereby aligning himself with leaders of the civil rights struggle and social justice campaigners, leading the Democratic party in a pursuit of a more aggressive agenda to eliminate perceived discrimination on all levels. Kennedy supported busing, integration of all public facilities, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and anti-poverty social programs to increase education, offer opportunities for employment, and provide health care for African-Americans.
Kennedy's presidential campaign was powered by an aggressive vision for civil freedom and justice, the expansion of social development programs beyond Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society programs, active minority participation in American politics, and outright opposition to serious social problems such as poverty, corruption in the judiciary, and racism.
Here Kennedy was a remarkable contrast to his brother. JFK had been thwarted in his effort to persuade the politicians of the Southern states to accept civil rights legislation, and had been unwilling to appear arrogant to Southerners. JFK had introduced a major tax-cut legislation to propel the economy, and had trimmed and transformed the workings of the U.S. government. RFK's dedication to a major expansion of government-funded welfare institutions and social development and justice initiatives exceeded, and expanded upon, the undertaking's of John F. Kennedy's New Frontier.
The administration of President Kennedy had backed U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia and other parts of the world, in response to Soviet-sponsored Communist aggression. Robert Kennedy vigorously supported President Kennedy's earlier efforts, yet ultimately committed himself against the war in Vietnam — even though President Kennedy had increased military support for South Vietnam, and had envisioned a major U.S. commitment to defending Southeast Asia and the Indochina region from Communist aggression. Many critics alleged that Kennedy's switch in position was to reap advantage during the hotly contested Democratic primaries. His supporters responded that Kennedy had long opposed the escalation of military activities in Southeast Asia.
By these comparisons, it is easier to portray Robert Kennedy, instead of John F. Kennedy, as a truer icon of American liberalism and the modern political ideals of the Democratic Party. It is worth mentioning, however, that circumstances had changed in the time between the brothers' assassinations; civil rights legislation had passed through Congress, the Vietnam War had escalated with dubious success, and Johnson had implemented the Great Society programs.
Presidential candidacy and assassination
Originally, Kennedy had denied speculation that he was going to run for the Democratic nomination in 1968 against President Lyndon Johnson (the 22nd Amendment didn't disqualify LBJ from running for a second term because he served less than half of JFK's four-year term). Kennedy doubted his ability to win the nomination, and he also feared that his candidacy would appear to be a product of a personal feud with Johnson. Johnson won only a very narrow victory in the New Hampshire primary on March 12, 1968 against Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota, an anti-war candidate, so Kennedy declared his own candidacy for the Presidency on March 16 stating, "I do not run for the Presidency merely to oppose any man but to propose new policies. I run because I am convinced that this country is on a perilous course and because I have such strong feelings about what must be done, and I feel that I'm obliged to do all I can."
McCarthy supporters angrily denounced Kennedy as an opportunist. On March 31, Johnson appeared on television to state that he was no longer a candidate for re-election.
On April 4, during a campaign stop in Indianapolis, Kennedy learned of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. During a heartfelt, impromptu speech in Indianapolis' inner city, Kennedy called for a reconciliation between the races. He challenged students on the "hypocrisy" of draft deferments, visited numerous small towns, and made himself available to the masses, by participating in long motorcades and street-corner stump speeches (often in troubled inner-cities). Kennedy made urban poverty a chief concern of his campaign, which in part led to enormous crowds that would attend his events in poor urban areas or rural parts of Appalachia.
Tired, but still intense in the last days before his Oregon defeat, RFK speaks from the platform of a campaign train.
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Tired, but still intense in the last days before his Oregon defeat, RFK speaks from the platform of a campaign train.
Kennedy won the Indiana and Nebraska Democratic primaries, but lost the Oregon primary.
Assassination
On June 4, 1968, Kennedy scored a major victory in his drive toward the Democratic presidential nomination when he won primaries in South Dakota and in California. He addressed his supporters in the early morning hours of June 5 in a ballroom at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. He left the ballroom through a service area to greet supporters working in the hotel's kitchen. In a crowded kitchen passageway, Sirhan B. Sirhan, a 24-year-old Palestinian, fired a .22 caliber revolver directly into the crowd surrounding Kennedy. Six people were wounded, including Kennedy, who was shot in the head at close range.
After being wounded, Kennedy remained conscious for about 20 minutes. During that time, he was heard to say, "Is everybody all right?" He was taken to Central Receiving Hospital and then Good Samaritan Hospital for emergency brain surgery. He died there, at the age of 42, in the early morning hours of June 6, 1968.
A funeral mass was held at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City on June 8. His brother, U.S. Senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), eulogized him with the words, "My brother need not be idolized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it."
Senator Kennedy (D-MA) concluded his eulogy, paraphrasing his deceased brother Robert, by quoting George Bernard Shaw: "Some men see things as they are and say 'Why?' I dream things that never were and say, 'Why not?'"
Immediately following the mass, Kennedy's body was transported by special train to Washington, D.C. Thousands crowded the Penn Central tracks and stations, a situation which led to two deaths and several injuries at Elizabeth, New Jersey.
Kennedy was buried near his brother, John, in Arlington National Cemetery. He had always maintained that he wished to be buried in Massachusetts, but his family believed that, since the brothers had been so close in life, they should be near each other in death. His wish was met that his grave be marked with a simple, white wooden cross and his name, date of birth, and date of death. In accordance with his wishes, Kennedy was buried with the bare minimum military escort and ceremony.
Robert Kennedy's burial at Arlington National Cemetery was the only one to ever take place at night.
After Kennedy's assassination, the mandate of the Secret Service was altered to include protection of presidential candidates.
Personal life
In 1950, he married Ethel Skakel, who would eventually give birth to 11 children:
* Kathleen Hartington (b.1951)
* Joseph Patrick II (b.1952)
* Robert Francis, Jr. (b.1954)
* David Anthony (1955-1984)
* Mary Courtney (b.1956)
* Michael LeMoyne (1958-1997)
* Mary Kerry (b.1959)
* Christopher George (b.1963)
* Matthew Maxwell Taylor (b.1965)
* Douglas Harriman (b.1967)
* Rory Elizabeth Katherine (b.1968)
The last child, Rory, was born several months after her father's assassination.
Kennedy was a loyal son, brother, and family man. Despite the fact that his father's most ambitious dreams centered around his elder brothers, Robert was fiercely loyal to Joseph, Joe Jr. and John. His competitiveness was admired by his father and elder brothers, while his loyalty bound them more affectionately closer to each other than most brothers are. Robert bore the brunt of his father's dominating temperament and was often the target of the patriarch's oppressive lectures.
Working on the campaigns of John Kennedy, Robert was more involved, passionate and tenacious than the candidate himself, obsessed with every detail, fighting out every battle and taking workers to task.
Central to Kennedy's politics and personal attitude to life, and its purpose, remained the heritage of Kennedy's Catholicism. Throughout his life, he made constant reference to his faith having informed every area of his life and having given him the strength to re-enter the political landscape following the assassination of his elder brother. Yet his was by no means an unresponsive and staid faith, but rather the faith of a Catholic Radical — perhaps the first successful Catholic Radical in American political history.
Following the assassination of JFK in 1963, he took Jackie, Caroline, and John Jr. under his wing, treating them as if they were his own.
Kennedy was easily the most religious of his brothers. Whereas John F. Kennedy maintained an aloof sense of his faith Robert Kennedy approached his duties to mankind through the looking glass of his Catholicism. In the last years of his life, he found great solace in the metaphysical poets of ancient Greece, most especially in the writings of Aeschylus. At his announcement of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Kennedy quoted these lines from Aeschylus in a speech which was to become one of his most memorable moments:
"He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep, pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart. And in our own despair, and against our will, comes Wisdom by the awful Grace of God".
Kennedy owned a home at the well-known Kennedy Compound in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts on Cape Cod, but spent most of his time at his estate in Virginia, known as Hickory Hill, located just outside Washington, D.C. His widow, Ethel, and his children continued to live at Hickory Hill after his death in 1968. Ethel Kennedy now lives full time at the family's vacation home in Hyannis Port.
His pallbearers included Robert McNamara, John Glenn, Averell Harriman, C. Douglas Dillon, Kirk Lemoyne Billings (schoolmate of John F. Kennedy), Stephen Smith (husband to Jean Ann Kennedy), David Hackett, Jim Whittaker, John Seigenthaler Sr., and Lord Harlech.
Honors
D.C. Stadium in Washington, D.C. was renamed Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1969.
In 1978, the United States Congress posthumously awarded Kennedy its Gold Medal of Honor. In 1998, the United States Mint released a special dollar coin that featured Kennedy on the obverse and the emblems of the United States Department of Justice and the United States Senate on the reverse.
In Washington, D.C. on November 20, 2001, U.S President George W. Bush and Attorney General John Ashcroft dedicated the Department of Justice headquarters building as the Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building, honoring RFK on what would have been his 76th birthday. They both spoke during the ceremony, as did Kennedy's eldest son, Joseph II.
Numerous roads, public schools and other facilities across the United States were named in memory of Robert F. Kennedy in the months and years after his death. The Robert F. Kennedy Memorial organization was founded in 1968, with an international award program to recognize human rights activists. In a further effort to not just remember the late Senator, but continue his work helping disadvantaged, a small group of private citizens launched the Robert F. Kennedy Children's Action Corps in 1969, which today helps more than 800 abused and neglected children each year.
Articles source : WikiPedia
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