The Kennedys

by Thomas Maier

  The Bobby Kennedy–James Baldwin encounter was recounted in several sources, including “Kennedy and Baldwin:The Gulf,” Newsweek, June 3, 1963; C. David Heymann, RFK:A Candid Biography of Robert Kennedy; James W. Hilty, Robert Kennedy, Brother Protector; Evan Thomas, Robert Kennedy: His Life; Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy; and “Mortalized,” New Yorker, February 13, 1971. Robert Kennedy’s own account, in his oral history for the JFK Presidential Library, interestingly doesn’t include the Irish-Negro analogies mentioned in other versions. RFK’s statement that in growing up the Kennedys “didn’t lie awake at nights worrying about it (civil rights)” was taken from his oral history for the JFK Presidential Library. King’s assessment of Kennedy’s personal contact with Negroes came from his oral history for the JFK Library. The 1959 Jet survey was quoted in Simeon Booker,“How JFK Surpassed Abraham Lincoln,” Ebony, February 1964. JFK’s compromise on a 1957 civil rights bill described as “a profile in cowardice” cited in James MacGregor Burns, John Kennedy:A Political Profile. King’s recollection of his father’s “holdback” and other black ministers in the South in supporting a Catholic was also recalled in King’s oral history. Slightly different versions of the same anecdote about Kennedy’s reaction to King’s father appeared in Murray Kempton,“Ashes of the Kennedy Legend,” Newsday, June 5, 1991; and Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy.Wofford’s recollections come from his 1980 book, Of Kennedys and Kings, and in an interview with the author. Further details and context were provided by Wofford and John Seigenthaler’s comments in Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy;“The Competent American,” Look, November 17, 1964; and the oral histories of Wofford, Rev. Theodore Hesburgh and Louis Martin at the JFK Presidential Library. Bobby’s recollection of Ribicoff ’s reasons for declining the attorney general position came from his oral history. JFK’s “Don’t worry about Bobby” came from Peter Collier and David Horowitz, The Kennedys: An American Drama. Alice Roosevelt Longworth’s full quote (“I see Jack in older years as the nice little rosy-faced old Irishman with the clay pipe in his mouth, a rather nice broth of a boy. Not Bobby. Bobby could have been a revolutionary priest’) was in Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy. RFK telling the Apostolic Delegate to the US that the “most racist institue in the South is my own church”was recalled by Rev. Richard McSorley in an interview with author. The reaction of white voters to Kennedy’s civil rights program was documented in “Is Kennedy in Political Trouble at Home?” U.S. News and World Report, July 8, 1963;“Politics: JFK’s Lost Votes,” Newsweek, October 21, 1963;“Now a New Worry for Kennedy:The White Vote in ‘64,” U.S. News and World Report, September 9, 1963. RFK’s conversations with his brother about whether their civil rights actions were “the right thing to do” were recalled in his oral history for the JFK Presidential Library. Further context was provided by Taylor Branch, Parting The Waters:America in the KingYears, 1954–63. After King’s speech, JFK tells him, “I have a dream” recounted in “The Competent American,” Look, November 17, 1964. Belford Lawson’s recollection was from his oral history at the JFK Library. Harry Golden’s comments were in a 1964 article, “Mr. Kennedy and the Negroes,” contained in The Kennedy Reader, edited by Jay Davis. RFK’s introductory comments were in the 1964 re-edition of John F. Kennedy, A Nation of Immigrants, contained as well in 1986 edition with John Roche’s introduction. Chilton Williamson Jr.’s comment were in Chilton Williamson Jr., The Immigration Mystique.

  Chapter Thirty-One: In the Springtime

  Dorothy Tubridy’s encounters with the Kennedys, and specifically learning of the 1963 presidential trip to Ireland,were recalled in an interview in Dublin with the author and in her earlier oral history for the JFK Library. Kennedy’s insistence on going to Ireland was recalled in Kenneth P. O’Donnell and David F. Powers, with Joe McCarthy, Johnny,We Hardly Knew Ye; Memories of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Powers recollection of JFK’s preparation for the trip were recalled in the Dave Power papers on file at the JFK Library, while his comments about Kennedy (“he’s getting so Irish, pretty soon he’ll be speaking with a brogue”) appeared in Arthur Mitchell, JFK and His Irish Heritage. “To what do you attribute your success?” recalled in author’s interview with Tubridy. McCloskey and his encounter with Mary Kennedy Ryan were recalled in Dave Powers papers at JFK Presidential Library, in author’s interview with Mary Ann Ryan, and the oral history of former New Ross Mayor Andrew Minihan at the Kennedy library. JFK’s memories of Robert Burrell and the effort to finding him in 1963 were recalled in Joseph Roddy, “Ireland:The Kennedy Cult,” Look, November 17, 1964. JFK’s “Irish Need not Apply” comment in Dunganstown recalled in Thomas Kiernan oral history for JFK Library. Further details of JFK at New Ross and Dunganstown were recorded in “President Kennedy Visits Ireland” file at the National Archives of Ireland in Dublin. Details about Mother Clement were from “Our Golden Haired Bit of Graduer,” Biatas – The Tillage Farmer, October 1988, contained in the Dave Powers papers at the JFK Presidential Library; and in “Kennedy Visits Convent to See Cousin, a Nun,” New York Times, June 28, 1963. JFK visit with cousins came from Tom Wicker,“Kennedy Sees the Cousin Who Didn’t Catch the Boat,” New York Times, June 28, 1963. De Valera’s greeting in Gaelic and his reference to JFK’s ancenrtal ties to Brian Boru and the “great Cinneide Clans of the Dal gChais”was repeated in J.F. Brennan, The Evolution of Everyman. Further details about De Valera and JFK’s visit were in Sydney Gruson, “Kennedy Praises Ireland as Model to Small Nations,” New York Times, June 29, 1963,“Ireland—Lifting the Green Curtain,” New York Times Magazine, July 12, 1963; and Sydney Gruson,“Dublin Acclaims Kennedy As One Returning Home,” New York Times, June 27, 1963.The oral histories of Amb. Thomas Kiernan and Sean Lemass at the JFK Presidential Library, as well as their notes and letters in a file about JFK visit at the National Archives of Ireland, provided many details about the various activities of the trip and the private conversations about Ireland’s partition. JFK’s reaction at Arbour Hill and other details of the trip were recalled in Joseph Roddy, “They Cried the Rain Down That Night,” Look, November 17, 1964. Also see,“President Vows a Return to Erin,” New York Times, June 30, 1963; “The Kennedy Homestead,” Newsweek, July 1, 1963; and “Kennedy’s Trip—The Mood and the Flavor,” New York Times, June 30, 1963. Mary Ann Ryan and Patrick Kennedy also shared their rememberances of JFK’s visit with the author. Further details and context were provided by Joseph Roddy,“Ireland:The Kennedy Cult,” Look, November 17, 1964; an unbylined account of JFK’s trip in the July 5, 1963, edition of Time;“Journal of a Psuedo-Event,” New Yorker, July 13, 1963;Tom Wicker,“Ireland Prepares for Kennedy Visit Thursday,” New York Times, June 23, 1963; “When Kennedy Went ‘Home’ to Ireland,” U.S. News and World Report, July 8, 1963; JFK’s remarks and speeches in Ireland recorded in Public Papers of the Presidents; Maurice N. Hennessy, I’ll Come Back in the Springtime: John F. Kennedy and the Irish; Pete Hamill,“JFK:The Real Thing,” New Yorker, November 28, 1988; Pete Hamill,“Book Review,” National Review, August 2000; “Two Presidents Greet 2,000 Guests,” Irish Press, June 28, 1963;“And President Kennedy Enjoys Every Minute,” Irish Press, June 28, 1963; “Kennedy’s Irish Kin,” Life Magazine, July 1963; Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy; and the oral history of Robert Kennedy at the JFK Library. Sen. Edward Kennedy’s recollection of his brother’s reaction to the Ireland trip was contained in written response to questions posed by the author. Amb. Jean Kennedy Smith’s recollection of her 1963 trip with JFK were recalled in a telephone conversation for this book.

  Chapter Thirty-Two:The Ritual of Mourning

  The opening verse came from William Butler Yeats’“Under Ben Bulben.” JFK’s visits with his infirmed father were recalled in Robert Kennedy’s oral history for the JFK Presidential Library. “He’s the one who made all this possible, and look at him now” was from Kenneth P. O’Donnell and David F. Powers, with Joe McCarthy, Johnny,We
Hardly Knew Ye;Memories of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. JFK’s comment about his older brother’s death as “a completeness . . . the completeness of perfection” came from John F.Kennedy, As We Remember Joe. JFK’s instruction to “close the coffin when I die” was recalled in Francis X. Morrissey oral history for the JFK Library. Seeger’s poem was cited in Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy. Rev. Andrew Greeley’s observations on Irish fatalism were described in Andrew Greeley, The Irish Americans, and further discussed in an interview with the author. Mass cards and other correspondence with religious references following the deaths of Joe Kennedy Jr. and Kathleen Kennedy were contained in several files of the JPK papers examined at the Kennedy library. Kiernan’s gift and poem for the christening of JFK Jr. were recalled in Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy, and in Kiernan’s oral history for the JFK Library. Laura Bergquist Knebel’s remark about the “tribal” quality to JFK were in her oral history at the JFK Library. Details about Jackie’s fifth pregnancy, including an earlier miscarriage and a baby stillborn by cesarian in 1956,were reported in “Big Year for the Clan,” Time, April 26, 1963; also see, “JFK: Chipper at 46, Pointing to ‘64,” Newsweek, June 3, 1963.The death of baby Patrick Bouvier Kennedy was detailed in Time, August 16, 1963; Joseph Dever, Cushing of Boston:A Candid Portrait; John H. Fenton, Salt of the Earth: An Informal Portrait of Richard Cardinal Cushing; Christopher P. Andersen, Jackie after Jack;“Cardinal Cushing Remembers:‘Twice, I saw Jack Kennedy Cry,’” Look, November 17, 1964; John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston; Russell W. Gibbons,“The Real Christianity of John F.Kennedy,” St. Joseph Magazine,April 1965;“The Family in Mourning,” Time, December 6, 1963; and Francis X. Morrissey oral history for JFK Library. Jacqueline Kennedy’s recollection of Dallas before (“Hot, wild. . . .The sun was so strong in our faces”), during and after the assassination were recalled in Theodore H.White, In Search of History.The actions of the Dallas Morning News were discussed in “May God Forgive Dallas,” Newsweek, December 9, 1963. John Kennedy’s election brings about a “thaw” in antagonism between Protestants and Catholics according to Gallup poll just before his death and detailed in Redbook, March 1964, including comment by Rev. Eugene Carson Blake. Rev. Oscar Huber’s recollection of last rites at hospital were described in his oral history for the JFK Library. Numerous books described the Kennedy family’s reaction to the assassination, including Arthur Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy and His Times; Laurence Leamer, The Kennedy Women; Peter Collier and David Horowitz, The Kennedys:An American Drama; and William Manchester, Death of a President.The Irish-wake atmo sphere after JFK’s death was described by Chuck Spalding in Christopher P.Andersen, Jackie after Jack, which included Lawford’s comment. Jackie’s plea (“I don’t care. They can all stand in the streets”) was recalled in John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston. Bobby’s cry,“Why, God, why?” was recalled in Charles Spalding’s oral history for the JFK Library. Jackie’s awarness of the Lincoln funeral was discussed in “The Family in Mourning,” Time, December 6, 1963; the public’s own connections between Lincoln and Kennedy’s death was cited in “A Compendium of Curious Coincidences,” Time,August 21, 1964.“His last speech on race relations”was from King quoted in Claybourne Carson, ed., The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. Powers recollection of DeValera’s reaction to JFK’s death was recalled in the Dave Powers papers at the JFK Library. Frank O’Connor assessment of JFK appeared in Dublin’s Sunday Independent and was repeated in Maurice N. Hennessy, I’ll Come Back in the Springtime: John F. Kennedy and the Irish. Further details and context were provided by “In Her Time of Trial,” Newsweek, December 9, 1963; and “In their Own Words,” Dallas Morning News,November 21, 2000.

  Part V: The Emerald Thread

  St. Luke quotation is from the New Testament of the Bible. (Several slight variations of this verse can be found in different Bible translations.)

  Jean Kennedy Smith’s quote ( “Our mother taught us . . . ”) came from Laura Blumenfeld,“A Green Light at the White House,”Washington Post,March 18, 1995.

  Chapter Thirty-Three: A Living Wound

  The scenes of tennis and conversation between Jacqueline Kennedy and Rev. Richard McSorley, S.J., are based primarily on the author’s interviews with McSorley, Kennedy’s correspondence with McSorley, and McSorley’s own diary notes contained in his unprocessed papers at the Georgetown University Library, Special Collections Division. These papers were made available to the author with McSorley’s expressed permission. Rose Kennedy’s letter to McSorley is in the same personal McSorley papers. Other background material included Richard T. McSorley, The More, the Merrier:The Story of a Mother of Fifteen Children;Arthur Jones,“McSorley and His Famous Friend Go Way Back; Georgetown University’s Richard McSorley,” National Catholic Reporter, July 28, 1995; Colman McCarthy,“The McSorley Connection,”Washington Post, October 16, 1992; James Di Liberto,“Civil Disobedience,” Hoya of Georgetown University, Jnauary 21, 2000; Mary Jordan,“Minister Waging War for Peace and Justice,”Washington Post, January 7, 1991.“I am a living wound” comes from Jacqueline Kennedy interview in Laura Bergquist, Look, November 17, 1964; also, Jacqueline Kennedy, “The Words JFK Loved Best,” Look, November 17, 1964. Jackie’s “rage at God” was described in Murray Kempton,“A Rage Greater Than Grief,” Atlantic Monthly,May 1967. Jackie enrolling Caroline at the Convent of the Sacred Heart School on East 91st Street was reported in “Caroline Enters a School in City,” New York Times, September 16, 1964. Bobby’s urging to “cheer up” at the Justice Department was described in “The Family in Mourning,” Time, December 6, 1963. Jacqueline Kennedy’s undated poem “Meanwhile in Massachusetts Jack Kennedy dreamed . . .”was contained in the JPK papers at the JFK Presidential Library. Jacqueline Kennedy’s 1967 letter to Mary Ryan about visiting the Kennedy Homestead was provided to the author for review by Patrick Grennan and Mary Ann Ryan during interviews with them. Jackie’s marriage to Onassis and the church’s reaction was discussed in Christopher P. Andersen, Jackie after Jack; David E. Koskoff, Joseph P. Kennedy: A Life and Times; and John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston.

  Chapter Thirty-Four: The Awful Grace of God

  Robert Kennedy’s 1964 speech to the Friendly Sons of Ireland, including the recitation of the poem about Owen Roe O’Neill, was recalled in Edwin O.Guthman, We Band of Brothers; Edwin Guthman and Jeffrey Shulman, eds., Robert Kennedy: In His Own Words; and in author’s interview with Guthman. Manchester’s anecdote about the poem was described in William R. Manchester, One Brief Shining Moment: Remembering Kennedy. RFK escorting Jackie to his brother’s graveside where she leaves a sprig of shamrocks was described in “Shamrock Left at Kennedy Grave,” New York Times,March 18, 1964. LBJ’s speech to the Friendly Sons in New York was reported in Felix Belair Jr.,“President Addresses Friendly Sons of St. Patrick,” New York Times, March 18, 1964.The racist response to a NAACP float in Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day parade was also recorded in the same issue of the Times. Robert Kennedy’s request to his older children to express the significance of their uncle’s death to the United States was recalled by Michael Kennedy in “Robert Kennedy—Tribute,” People, June 6, 1988, as were quotes in this chapter from Adam Walinsky, Anthony Lewis and Michael Novak. William vanden Heuval’s quote came from Robert S. Bird, “At Home with the Heir Apparent,” Saturday Evening Post, August 25, 1967. Pierre Salinger’s recollection of the Florida football game was in Tom Mathews,“Remembering Bobby,” Newsweek, May 9, 1988. RFK as “too Catholic, too physical, too combative” came from Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy—A Memoir. Roy Cohn’s near fisticuffs with RFK on the McCarthy Senate Committee was recounted in Roy Cohn, McCarthy, 1968. RFK’s claim that his brother told Jackie that “Lyndon Johnson was incapable of telling the truth” came from RFK’s oral history at the Kennedy library, as did the long exchange about LBJ’s alleged theories of “divine retribution” at play in the JFK assassination. In the 1964 Senate election, the opposition of James Baldwin, I.F. Stone and Gore Vidal regarding Kennedy and his c
haracterization as an “Irish Roy Cohn” was reported in Jack Newfield, “The Bobby Phenomenon,” Nation, November 14, 1966. The observations of Jimmy Breslin and John V. Lindsay were recorded in Jimmy Breslin,“The Music Is Different,” New York Herald Tribune, October 18, 1964. RFK’s “kind of moral righteousness, rooted in a primitive Catholicism”was recalled in Richard Goodwin, Remembering America, Boston: Little,Brown, 1988. The comment of Herman Badillo and Manfred Ohrenstein came from C. David Heymann, RFK: A Candid Biography of Robert F. Kennedy. RFK as a “tribune for the underclass” was described in Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Robert Kennedy and His Times.The Kennedys tracing “the same narrative arc as their church” came from James Carroll, “The Catholic Side of Camelot,” Boston Globe, December 30, 1997. Guthman’s recollections were from interview with author as were those expressed by Joe Gargan and Kathleen Kennedy Townsend. RFK description as “so pure Irish” came from Murray Kempton,“Pure Irish—Robert F.Kennedy,” New Republic, February 15, 1964, while Kempton’s “piece of faith” comment was quoted in Schlesinger’s Robert Kennedy and His Times. RFK’s quote about “the innocent suffer—how can that be possible and God be just” was mentioned in Evan Thomas, Robert Kennedy: His Life. RFK’s view of liberals as “too soft” was described in David Halberstam, “Ask Not What Ted Sorensen Can Do for You,” Harper’s, November 1969. RFK’s comment about the Times (“their idea of a good story is ‘More nuns leave convents than ever before.’”) was quoted in Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy:A Memoir.

  Chapter Thirty-Five: The Politics of Outsiders

  Robert Kennedy’s trip to South Africa and his reaction to it was described in Evan Thomas, Robert Kennedy: His Life;Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Robert Kennedy and His Times; John Henry Cutler, Cardinal Cushing of Boston;“Robert Kennedy Recalled,” National Catholic Reporter, July 3, 1998; and commented upon in “Scaling Mt. Kennedy,” Hendrik Hertzberg, NewYorker,November 20, 2000.The letter-writer questioning the often-told “No Irish need Apply” anecdote used by the Kennedys was detailed in James W. Hilty, Robert Kennedy, Brother Protector. RFK reinventing the JFK legacy into “the buried spirit of radical discontent” was from Murray Kempton, “The Emperor’s Kid Brother,” Esquire, July 1968. RFK’s efforts with Chavez and the farm workers were described in Jack Newfield,“The Bobby Phenomenon,” Nation, November 14, 1966;“Kennedy on Latin America,” Commonweal, June 3, 1966; Murray Kempton,“His Catholic Conscience,” Newsday, June 3, 1993; and the oral history of Cesar Chavez for the Kennedy library. The Times’s 1964 review of A Nation of Immigrants noting that “John Kennedy was always aware that he was part of the migration” came from “Books of the Times,” New York Times, October 8, 1964. RFK raising the immigration issue in the 1964 Senate campaign was detailed in C.P.Trussell,“New Alien Quotas,” New York Times, July 23, 1964; “Kennedy Pledges Aid to Northeast,” New York Times, September 16, 1964; “Kennedy Assails Immigration Curb,” New York Times, October 6, 1964; and “Goldwater Scored on Minority Attack,” New York Times, October 10, 1964.The effort by the surviving Kennedy brothers to pass the 1965 Immigration Act was recorded in “President Ask Ending of Quotas for Immigrants,” New York Times, January 14, 1965, an editorial “I lift My Lamp,” New York Times, January 14, 1965;“Kennedy Predicts Approval,” New York Times, June 11, 1965;“Immigration Law Praised by DAR,” New York Times, September 15, 1964;“Kennedy Backs Immigration Bill,” New York Times, September 21, 1965; and Cabell Phillips,“Immigration Bill Passes Senate...,” New York Times, September 23, 1965.The long-term consequences of the 1965 bill were discussed in “Out of Control Immigration,” Foreign Affairs, Sept–Oct 2000. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy’s comments about the 1965 immigration legislation and its impact were in written response to the author’s questions to him. Nicholas De B. Katzenbach’s exchange with Sen. Sam Erving was described in Andrew Kopkind,“New Immigration Policy,” New Republic, February 27, 1965. “Nativism is far from dead in the United States” was cited in Robert H. Amundson, “Breakthrough in Immigration,” America, January 29, 1966; and Ernest Van Den Haag’s comments were in “More Immigration?” National Review, September 21, 1965. RFK’s attendance at Cardinal Spellman’s funeral and his remark (“all the way up to Absalom, Absalom”) was recalled in Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy:A Memoir. Spellman’s reference to the Vietnam conflict as “Christ’s war” was cited in “Spellman’s View on War Called Outrageous...,” New York Times, February 5, 1967.The church’s Declaration on Religious Liberty as well as the twenty-six representatives from American Catholic universities issuing a 1967 “declaration of independence” from the American hierarchy were described in Eric O. Hanson, Catholic Church in World Politics.RFK’s admission regarding fault about Vietnam was repeated in Ronald Steel, In Love with Night.RFK’s speech at Marymount concerning bombing of North Vietnam was recalled in Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy: A Memoir. RFK’s biblical reference “To the Vietmanese, however, it must often seem the fulfillment of the prophecy of Saint John the Divine” was recorded in Douglas Ross, Robert F. Kennedy: Apostle of Change. RFK writing down remark by Camus about evil and comparison to St. Augustine was mentioned in Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Robert Kennedy and His Times. Goodwin’s observation of Eugene McCarthy as “a reverential Catholic but not in the way most Irish are Catholic” appeared in Richard Goodwin, Remembering America. RFK’s dislike of Gene McCarthy ( who “felt he should have been the first Catholic President just because he knew more St. Thomas Aquinas than my brother”) was recalled in Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy:A Memoir. McCarthy’s reaction to RFK’s entry into 1968 race was in Tom Wicker,“Kennedy to Make 3 Primary Races; Attacks Johnson,” New York Times, March 17, 1968. Michael Novak’s noticed differences between Bobby Kennedy and Gene McCarthy were described in Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy.“Bobby had an inferiority complex” came from author’s interview with McCarthy. RFK’s view of himself as “pure Shanty Irish” comes from Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy:A Memoir.The angry response at the St. Patrick Day parade among some Irish to RFK’s candidacy was in Murray Schumach,“Kennedy Parades to Mixed Chorus,” New York Times, March 17, 1968. Kempton’s telegram to Ted Kennedy was recalled in Richard Goodwin, Remembering America. POAU’s criticism of RFK and McCarthy on their failure to take an “unequivocal” stand on separation of church and state was recalled in John Tracy Ellis, American Catholicism. Against Nixon in a proposed 1968 race, the Harris poll says Bobby only gets 42 percent of the Protestant vote as reported by Jack Newfield,“The Bobby Phenomenon,” Nation, November 14, 1966. RFK’s comment “The deprived if you like, they are for me”was recorded in Murray Kempton,“The Emperor’s Kid Brother,” Esquire, July 1968.Arthur M. Schlesinger recalls Jackie’s fear that “they’ll do to him what they did to Jack”was in Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy. RFK’s view that “Tragedy is a tool for the living to gain wisdom, not a guide by which to live” comes from his speech at Kansas State University as recalled in “Robert Kennedy Recalled,” National Catholic Reporter, July 3, 1998.The racial and ethnic breakdown of the 1968 California primary results were in Lawrence E. Davies,“New Yorker Captures Lead Over McCarthy in Late Tabulation,” New York Times, June 5, 1968, a story eclipsed by news of RFK’s assassination in the same late editions. Romain Gary’s recollection of RFK conversation appeared in Associated Press,“French Writer Recalls Kennedy Premonition,” New York Times, June 6, 1968. Hosea Williams’s comment came from Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy. RFK’s comment “that fellow Harvey Lee...Lee Harvey; he set something loose in this country” was reported in Jeff Greenfield, “RFK:The Politics That Might Have Been,” New Yorker, June 5, 1978.The scene inside the hotel after RFK was shot was described in Jack Newfield, Robert Kennedy:A Memoir.Archbishop Terence J. Cooke’s eulogy for RFK was quoted in Conrad Cherry, “Two American Sacred Ceremonies: Their Implications for the Study of Religion in America,” American Quarterly,Winter 1969;“the terrible
culminating hour of all the dreaded apprehensions of almost five years” was in Norman Cousins, “Impression’s At St. Patrick’s,”Saturday Review, June 22, 1968. Ethel Kennedy’s instructions about the Mass were recorded in Jean Stein and George Plimpton, American Journey:The Times of Robert Kennedy, which also included the recollections of Frank Mankiewicz, Michael Harrington, Geraldine Brooks Joseph Alsop of the funeral train ride.“Family was clearly the leit-motif ” came from “Saturday June 8 in Manhattan . . . ,” America, June 22, 1968. Calls for Teddy to assume his brother’s mantle in the 1968 campaign included an editorial in the Nation, June 17, 1968.Tom Hayden’s thoughts of the stigmata were in “Robert Kennedy— Tribute,” People, June 6, 1988.