Ted Kennedy: A Life and Legacy in Boldface

2 years ago

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Mary C. Curtis

National Correspondent

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In a time when so many public figures are small, Ted Kennedy was big. I know that's an opening for jokes that have the late senator's girth as a punch line. But the thing is, Kennedy would probably be the first one to laugh.

Americans are torn. We'd like to think we are a country of the "everyman." Yet we are fascinated by celebrity. In a country without class lines, class counts. In place of the royalty our founders rebelled against, we elevate dynasties based on bloodlines and wealth. The Kennedys had both. Their triumphs were big; so, too, their sins. Some will never forgive them for the latter. My mother-in-law, for one, can't say the name Kennedy without a sneer. And she's Catholic and half-Irish.

But even she begrudgingly gives Ted Kennedy his due for believing in big issues: universal health care, civil rights, education, and immigration reform.

The Kennedys could have spent their lives accumulating wealth, spending some and hoarding the rest. They turned to public service. Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who died just two weeks ago, changed the lens through which the world viewed the disabled.

Still grieving for his brother John, Ted praised him as the first president to say publically that "segregation was morally wrong," and then proceeded to use a nation's emotion and goodwill to help raise support for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His role in passing the Voting Rights Act of 1965 (and later resisting Reagan-era efforts to weaken it), the Fair Housing law of 1968, and the Americans with Disabilities Act speaks to Kennedy's civil rights commitment.

After a plane crash in 1964 left him with devastating injuries, Ted Kennedy benefited from the care of the best specialists money could buy. The experience made him wonder about the fate of someone less privileged in the same circumstance, and led him to what he called the "cause of my life": affordable health care. As town halls descend into "got mine" free-for-alls and opposing politicians feast on the turmoil stoked by distortions about proposed health-care reforms, Kennedy looks bigger than ever.

You have to wonder if a healthy Kennedy could have made a difference in these last few months. Senators who financed campaigns with money they raised by demonizing the liberal lion are mourning him as a friend. Leave it to Vice President Joe Biden to explain that even Kennedy's foes realized "he made them bigger." After hard-fought battles, these same adversaries often cooperated with the Massachusetts senator to pass legislation. Kennedy, who knew how to compromise without abandoning principle, could get things done.

In a statement, President Obama expressed his gratitude to the man he called "a colleague, a counselor, and a friend."

His ideas and ideals are stamped on scores of laws and reflected in millions of lives -- in seniors who know new dignity, in families that know new opportunity, in children who know education's promise, and in all who can pursue their dream in an America that is more equal and more just -- including myself.

Obama, no stranger to star power, was happy to have Kennedy's endorsement during a contentious presidential primary campaign.

The complicated, larger-than-life Kennedy brand still means something.

Filed Under: Senate, Democrats, Republicans, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Obits, Health Care, Race Issues, Ted Kennedy, Obama Administration, Woman Up

Tagged: remembering senator kennedy, RememberingSenatorKennedy

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