Bobby Kennedy has been in the news lately, and will be again in a few days when the 40th anniversary of his death comes around.I got this magazine at an antique store a couple years ago. At first glance, you'd think it was prepared for the 1968 campaign. But the term of office it predicts for him starts in 1973, and he will succeed President Johnson. So what is the copyright date? 1965. The publisher, M.H. Weston and the G.C. London Publishing Corp., of New York, was out there way ahead. At 50 cents a copy they were looking to make some money. The text was written by Bob Waters.
What follows is the main text from the last page, page 66:
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JFK 'lit a torch that spread across the world. We must keep that torch glowing . . .
As surely as this motion moved Bobby to his brother's side while Jack was President, as surely and securely as it moved him to the side of Jack's widow, and as surely as it moved Bobby to the Senate, that motion — the irresistible force — is moving him to the White House. All that remains is whether his foes in both parties can erect an opposition that will prove to be an immovable object for that irresistible force.
The 1972 campaign has begun. It is a strong, well-balanced and keenly-planned campaign. It must be strong enough to carry Bobby back into the Senate in the 1970 elections and keep his head high in the political heavens until the 1972 convention. But it has begun. The Kennedy touch is illustrated daily in New York's newspapers and wire service reports that touch across the land. There is Bob Kennedy with a son skating in Rockefeller Plaza (he's a very good skater), there is Bob Kennedy throwing snowballs, Bob Kennedy visiting a hospital for children and then one for the aged. Bob Kennedy is on the move and his moves are calculated and are being chronicled.
But the real ammunition for the campaign is still in the Kennedy armory. That will be used gradually but always effectively while he is in the Senate.
Every time Kennedy gets to his feet in that chamber it will be to add another plank to the platform he will present to that 1972 convention. Bobby will be 46 then. He won't be a callow rich kid running on his father's money and his brother's name. By 1972, the name "Kennedy" will be synonymous with blunt, aggressive, fearless utterances the world and nation will be familiar with. The legislation he will champion and fight doggedly for will endear him to minorities, working men and small businessmen. The word "Liberal," when applied to Bob Kennedy, will be spelled with a small "l." The Gore Vidals of the Liberals (capital L) will continue to dislike and distrust him. Bobby will want it that way. The plan says that the confidence of the people does not lie in either extreme, but the middle can be as wide as he wants it.
In his tribute to his brother which appears in the posthumous edition of Profiles in Courage, Bobby points out: "...There will be future Cubas. There will be future crises. We have the problems of the hungry, the neglected, the poor and the downtrodden. They must receive more help. And just as solutions had to be found in October of 1962, answers must be found for these other problems that still face us. So that wisdom (President Kennedy's) is needed still."
Kennedy's record in the Senate — the one he'll bring to the convention — will be punctuated with Civil Rights — his main course. He will strive for legislation to bolster both physical and moral strength, especially among the nation's young. Kennedy will champion the need of preserving natural resources and wealth — other nations will earn any U. S. dollar giveaways.
Bobby Kennedy already has a slogan. It was delivered by his brother Jack:
"We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the word go forth from this time and place to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans — born in this [century], tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage — and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world."
Bobby says, "What happens to this country, to the world, depends on what we do with what others have left us."
And Ethel says, "He's a doer."
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Note: In the quote from President Kennedy the magazine had it "born in this country" instead of "this century." And "Everytime" was printed as one word.
