|
TED KENNEDY'S EULOGY FOR HIS BROTHER
BOBBY KENNEDY - 1968
Tribute to Robert F. Kennedy
It follows the full text transcript of
Edward M. Kennedy's Tribute to Robert F.
Kennedy, delivered at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York,
N.Y. - June 8, 1968.
 |
Your Eminences,
Your Excellencies, Mr. President: |
On behalf of Mrs. Kennedy, her children, the
parents and sisters of Robert Kennedy, I want to
express what we feel to those who mourn with us
today in this Cathedral and around the world.
We loved him as a brother, and as a father, and
as a son. From his parents, and from his older
brothers and sisters -- Joe and Kathleen and
Jack -- he received an inspiration which he
passed on to all of us. He gave us strength in
time of trouble, wisdom in time of uncertainty,
and sharing in time of happiness. He will always
be by our side.
Love is not an easy feeling to put into words.
Nor is loyalty, or trust, or joy. But he was all
of these. He loved life completely and he lived
it intensely.
A few years back, Robert Kennedy wrote some
words about his own father which expresses the
way we in his family felt about him. He said of
what his father meant to him, and I quote:
"What it
really all adds up to is love -- not love as
it is described with such facility in
popular magazines, but the kind of love that
is affection and respect, order and
encouragement, and support. Our awareness of
this was an incalculable source of strength,
and because real love is something unselfish
and involves sacrifice and giving, we could
not help but profit from it."
And he continued,
"Beneath it
all, he has tried to engender a social
conscience. There were wrongs which needed
attention. There were people who were poor
and needed help. And we have a
responsibility to them and to this country.
Through no virtues and accomplishments of
our own, we have been fortunate enough to be
born in the United States under the most
comfortable conditions. We, therefore, have
a responsibility to others who are less well
off."
That is what Robert Kennedy was given. What he
leaves to us is what he said, what he did, and
what he stood for.
A speech he made
to the young people of South Africa on their Day
of Affirmation in 1966 sums it up the best, and
I would like to read it now:
"There is
discrimination in this world and slavery and
slaughter and starvation. Governments
repress their people; millions are trapped
in poverty while the nation grows rich and
wealth is lavished on armaments everywhere.
These are differing evils, but they are the
common works of man. They reflect the
imperfection of human justice, the
inadequacy of human compassion, our lack of
sensibility towards the suffering of our
fellows.
"But we can
perhaps remember -- even if only for a time
-- that those who live with us are our
brothers; that they share with us the same
short moment of life; that they seek -- as
we do -- nothing but the chance to live out
their lives in purpose and happiness,
winning what satisfaction and fulfillment
they can.
"Surely, this bond of common faith, this
bond of common goal, can begin to teach us
something. Surely, we can learn, at least,
to look at those around us as fellow men.
And surely we can begin to work a little
harder to bind up the wounds among us and to
become in our own hearts brothers and
countrymen once again. The answer is to rely
on youth -- not a time of life but a state
of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of
imagination, a predominance of courage over
timidity, of the appetite for adventure over
the love of ease.
"The cruelties
and obstacles of this swiftly changing
planet will not yield to the obsolete dogmas
and outworn slogans. They cannot be moved by
those who cling to a present that is already
dying, who prefer the illusion of security
to the excitement and danger that come with
even the most peaceful progress.
"It is a revolutionary world we live in, and
this generation at home and around the world
has had thrust upon it a greater burden of
responsibility than any generation that has
ever lived. Some believe there is nothing
one man or one woman can do against the
enormous array of the world's ills.
"Yet many of
the world's great movements, of thought and
action, have flowed from the work of a
single man. A young monk began the
Protestant reformation; a young general
extended an empire from Macedonia to the
borders of the earth; a young woman
reclaimed the territory of France; and it
was a young Italian explorer who discovered
the New World, and the 32 year-old Thomas
Jefferson who proclaimed that "all men are
created equal."
These men moved the world, and so can we
all.
"Few will have
the greatness to bend history itself, but
each of us can work to change a small
portion of events, and in the total of all
those acts will be written the history of
this generation. It is from numberless
diverse acts of courage and belief that
human history is shaped.
"Each time a
man stands up for an ideal, or acts to
improve the lot of others, or strikes out
against injustice, he sends forth a tiny
ripple of hope, and crossing each other from
a million different centers of energy and
daring, those ripples build a current that
can sweep down the mightiest walls of
oppression and resistance.
"Few are willing to brave the disapproval of
their fellows, the censure of their
colleagues, the wrath of their society.
Moral courage is a rarer commodity than
bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet
it is the one essential, vital quality for
those who seek to change a world that yields
most painfully to change. And I believe that
in this generation those with the courage to
enter the moral conflict will find
themselves with companions in every corner
of the globe.
"For the fortunate among us, there is the
temptation to follow the easy and familiar
paths of personal ambition and financial
success so grandly spread before those who
enjoy the privilege of education. But that
is not the road history has marked out for
us.
"Like it or
not, we live in times of danger and
uncertainty. But they are also more open to
the creative energy of men than any other
time in history. All of us will ultimately
be judged, and as the years pass we will
surely judge ourselves on the effort we have
contributed to building a new world society
and the extent to which our ideals and goals
have shaped that event.
"The future does not belong to those who are
content with today, apathetic toward common
problems and their fellow man alike, timid
and fearful in the face of new ideas and
bold projects. Rather it will belong to
those who can blend vision, reason and
courage in a personal commitment to the
ideals and great enterprises of American
Society.
"Our future
may lie beyond our vision, but it is not
completely beyond our control. It is the
shaping impulse of America that neither fate
nor nature nor the irresistible tides of
history, but the work of our own hands,
matched to reason and principle, that will
determine our destiny. There is pride in
that, even arrogance, but there is also
experience and truth. In any event, it is
the only way we can live."
That is the way he lived. That is what he leaves
us.
My brother need not be idealized, 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.
Those of us who loved him and who take him to
his rest today, pray that what he was to us and
what he wished for others will some day come to
pass for all the world.
As he said many times, in many parts of this
nation, to those he touched and who sought to
touch him:
"Some men see
things as they are and say why.
I dream things that never were and say why not."
More History
|
