JFK’s courageous and complex profile
Fifty-five years ago this month, the President of the United States traveled to Texas to try to mitigate Democratic Party factional strife. On Nov. 22, 1963, he was gunned down on a Dallas street. Two days later, local hustler and gangster Jack Ruby shot the alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald.
JFK’s majestic Nov. 25 funeral, planned in detail by wife Jacqueline, provided no closure. The American government had been fundamentally shaken. Oswald’s televised murder precluded a trial, and fueled conspiracy theories.
Five years ago, there were floods of books, articles and commentaries marking the half-century since JFK’s death. This year’s memories are more muted.
Kennedy’s legacy is complex. CBS commentator Eric Sevareid once noted that the principal legacy might be “an attitude,” a spirit that all things are possible for Americans.
In fact, JFK had major achievements. Nonetheless, Sevareid was perceptive in emphasizing the emotional dimensions of political leadership.
The disastrous failed invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs led to a massive U.S. effort to kill leader Fidel Castro, and encouraged Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to deploy nuclear missiles on the island. That led to the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962.
Kennedy, a World War II combat veteran, resisted powerful pressure to invade Cuba. The missiles were removed following a blockade and overt invasion preparations, combined with a secret Cuba-Turkey missile trade. Kennedy’s restraint and imagination was extremely impressive.
In the aftermath of the missile crisis, Kennedy and Khrushchev achieved a treaty banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, a breakthrough. The Senate ratified the treaty with a bipartisan vote of 80-19. JFK had other success with Congress, including negotiation authority key to important multilateral trade agreements.
Two prominent domestic issues were civil rights and organized crime, the latter an obsession of driven Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. JFK was cautious on race relations, addressing the subject actively only when pressed by a massive march on Washington.
RFK was relentless in pursuit of the mafia, while simultaneously gangsters and mercenaries were recruited to kill Castro. Dallas ended both efforts. Regarding organized crime, six years passed before the Nixon administration re-energized prosecution.
People around Robert Kennedy were puzzled by his marked disinterest in possible assassination conspiracy. In hindsight, RFK no doubt avoided that dark tangled path because he might come face to face with himself.
Sen. John Kennedy’s book “Profiles in Courage,” about U.S. Senators who put principle above political expediency, received the Pulitzer Prize. While critics cracked that President Kennedy should show less profile and more courage, he actually demonstrated considerable personal strength.
Historian Herbert Parmet has documented extraordinary health problems that plagued JFK from birth. He nearly died in infancy, and received Catholic last rites at least three times. Yet he managed to enlist in the U.S. Navy, then volunteered for hazardous PT boat duty, where he demonstrated truly exceptional courage.
Sevareid’s observation applies tangibly to the American space program. JFK’s commitment to a manned moon landing achieved success in 1969. Associated technological innovations include electronics miniaturization, essential in today’s computers and cell phones.
Sevareid was also alluding to intangible dimensions. Jacqueline and John Kennedy emphasized the arts, symbolized today by the Kennedy Center in Washington.
Before JFK was killed, his friend, Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.), who became the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, had agreed to have policy debates with him around the country.
That public style contrasts with today’s extreme political crudeness, and denigration of public service. Too bad.
Arthur I. Cyr is Clausen Distinguished Professor at Carthage College and author of the book “After the Cold War.” Contact acyr@carthage.edu.