Ted Kennedy
From Freepedia
- This article is about the U.S. senator, for information about the ice hockey player see Ted Kennedy (hockey player).
| Office: | Senior Senator, Massachusetts |
| Political party: | Democrat |
| Term of office: | January 1963–Present |
| Preceded by: | Benjamin A. Smith II |
| Succeeded by: | Incumbent (2007) |
| Date of birth: | February 22, 1932 |
| Place of birth: | Boston, Massachusetts |
| Spouse: | (1) Virginia Joan Bennett, divorced (2) Victoria Reggie |
Edward Moore Kennedy (born February 22, 1932) is the senior U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, having served since 1963. The most prominent living member of the Kennedy family, he is the brother of assassinated President John F. Kennedy and assassinated former US Attorney General and Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
Because of Kennedy's personal prominence and his longtime advocacy of liberal principles, he is often regarded as a "lion" of the Democratic Party. Supporters admire him as a forceful and reliable advocate for liberalism, whose personal and political skills enable him to achieve some gains even in an era of conservative ascendancy; however, some Democrats see him as being too ready to compromise with Republican legislators. His critics on the right charge that he is stuck in a "big-government" ideology from the 1960s, and has not adapted to changing times. Republicans seeking to rally their supporters often invoke Kennedy as the politician who must be opposed, citing his liberal politics and what many see as failings in his personal conduct.
Contents |
Family and youth
Kennedy is the youngest of nine children of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy. He attended the Fessenden School, and later Milton Academy and entered Harvard College in 1950. He was suspended from Harvard in May 1951 after he arranged for another student to take a final examination in a Spanish class in his place. He then entered the U.S. Army for two years; he was assigned to the SHAPE headquarters in Paris. Kennedy eventually re-entered Harvard, graduating in June 1956. In the 1955 Harvard Yale football game, won by Yale 21 to 7, Kennedy caught Harvard's only touchdown pass. In 1958, he attended the Hague Academy of International Law. He earned his law degree from the University of Virginia and was admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 1959. While he was in law school, he managed his brother John's 1958 Senate re-election campaign.
His home is in Hyannis Port, Mass., where he lives with his wife Victoria Reggie Kennedy, a Washington lawyer and daughter of a Louisiana judge, and her children, Curran and Caroline. He has three grown children from his first marriage with Virginia Joan Bennett: Kara, Edward Jr., and Patrick, and four grandchildren. After his brothers John and Robert were assassinated (in 1963 and 1968, respectively), he took on the role of surrogate father for his brothers' 13 children.[1]
In 1962, Kennedy was elected to the Senate from Massachusetts in a special election to fill the seat left vacant by his oldest brother, John, upon the latter's election as President of the United States. He was elected to a full six-year term in 1964 and was reelected in 1970, 1976, 1982, 1988, 1994, and 2000.
As of 2005, Kennedy is the third-longest serving senator in U.S. history, behind only Strom Thurmond and Robert Byrd. According to NPR, Kennedy plans to run for an eighth full term (and ninth overall term) in 2006. If he wins and serves out his full six-year term, he will have served in the U.S. Senate for fifty years.
Early career
Kennedy is the senior Democratic Party member on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. He also serves on the Judiciary Committee, where he is the senior Democrat on the Immigration Subcommittee, and the Armed Services Committee, where he is the senior Democratic representaive on the Seapower Subcommittee. He is also a member of the Congressional Joint Economic Committee, a founder of the Congressional Friends of Ireland, and a trustee of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C..
Kennedy's career in the Senate attracted national attention at its inception, as it has several times since. During his 1962 campaign, he was accused by his opponents of riding on his family's name and fortune, and (having no previous experience in elected office) of not being sufficiently qualified to hold so high an office. Soon after entering office, he went through the trauma of the assassination of his brother John, an event that focused much attention on him.
In 1964, Kennedy was in a plane crash in which the pilot and one of Kennedy's aides were killed. He was pulled from the wreckage by fellow senator Birch E. Bayh II (D-Ind.) and spent weeks in hospital recovering from a severe back injury, a punctured lung, broken ribs, and internal bleeding.
In 1968, his last surviving brother, Robert, was assassinated during his bid to be nominated as Democratic candidate for the presidency. Kennedy delivered a very emotional eulogy at Robert's funeral. After the shock from this event wore off, Ted was looked upon as a likely future presidential candidate. For about a year, the Democratic establishment began to focus attention on him as the new "carrier of the torch" for the Kennedys and the party. His eulogy showed one thing: Since his father suffered a stroke which left him invalid, he was seen by many as the family patriarch and had given such tributes for the family in times of crisis.
In October 1971 Kennedy called for the withdrawal of British troops from Northern Ireland, and for all political participants there to begin talks on creating a United Ireland. The senator has retained an interest in the Irish political situation since that time.
Chappaquiddick
It is widely believed that Sen. Kennedy would have eventually been elected to the U.S. Presidency, were it not for a fateful incident that has become known as Chappaquiddick.
On July 18, 1969, After a party at Chappaquiddick on Martha's Vineyard Ted Kennedy drove away with Mary Jo Kopechne as a passenger in his 1967 Oldsmobile Delmont 88.
- Ted Kennedy made what he claims to have been a wrong turn, onto an unlit road that led to Dike Bridge (also spelled Dyke Bridge), a wooden bridge angled obliquely to the road.
- Kennedy drove off the bridge; the car plunged into tide-swept Poucha Pond (at that location a channel) and landed upside down under the water.
- Kopechne died; according to the medical examiner, she drowned.
- Kennedy claims he tried several times to swim down to reach Kopechne, then rested on the bank for several minutes (possibly in a state of shock).
- He then returned on foot to the Lawrence Cottage where the party attended by Kopechne and other "boiler room" girls had occurred.
- His cousin, Joseph Gargan, and party co-host Paul Markham, then returned to the pond with Kennedy and tried to rescue Kopechne.
- All involved failed to use the telephone at the Lawrence Cottage to call the police for help.
When their efforts to rescue Kopechne ended in failure, Kennedy decided to return to his hotel. As the ferry had shut down for the night, Kennedy swam back to Edgartown. Some people question his description of his escape from the car, because of his back troubles, caused by the 1964 airplane accident. Though claiming to be injured, Kennedy swam a second larger body of water after the accident to return to his hotel room as the ferry was closed for the night.
- Kennedy discussed the accident with several people, including his lawyer, before he was contacted by the police.
- The next morning July 19, 1969, a science teacher and a 15 year-old boy discovered Kennedy's car. Police Chief Dominick Arena called Kennedy from the house nearest the bridge. Kennedy was given the news that his mother's car had been involved in a fatal accident. *Kopechne's body was discovered by diver John Farrar.
- Farrar observed that a large amount of air was released from the car when it was righted in the water, he also noted that the trunk when opened was remarkably dry. These observations and others have led some to believe that Mary Jo Kopechne had not drowned, but suffocated in an air pocket within the car.
The incident quickly blossomed into a scandal. Kennedy was criticized for driving drunk, for failing to come to Kopechne's aid, for failing to summon help, for contacting not the police but his lawyer first, and for failing to report the accident to the authorities. Because of a lack of evidence other than Kennedy's own word, allegations persist that he did not try to save Kopechne, and that he intentionally turned onto the road crossing the bridge going to the beach in order to engage in sexual activities.
Kennedy entered a plea of guilty to a charge of leaving the scene of an accident after causing injury. He received a sentence of two months in jail, which was suspended. An Edgartown grand jury later reopened the investigation but did not return an indictment.
Kennedy's critics and political opponents question whether justice was served in this case. Rumors periodically surface of a conspiracy by Kennedy and his family to alter his driving record to obviate charges of negligent homicide, and to influence the Edgartown grand jury.
Presidential bid
The unfavorable publicity and investigative press scrutiny surrounding the Chappaquiddick incident resulted in Kennedy's putting off any presidential aspirations at the time. However, a decade later, Kennedy decided to throw his hat in the ring for the Democratic nomination in the 1980 presidential election. He launched an insurgent campaign against Democratic incumbent Jimmy Carter. Kennedy was unafraid of criticizing the president who was mired in the Iran hostage crisis. He did, however, vow to support Carter if he were re-nominated. Despite much early support, his bid was ultimately unsuccessful, largely due to controversy surrounding the incident at Chappaquiddick. He lost substantial credibility in November 1979 during the week his campaign was officially launched when he was widely ridiculed in the press following an interview with Roger Mudd on CBS News Special Reports. When Kennedy was asked by Mudd: "Why do you want to be President?", he was unable to provide a straightforward answer. Kennedy did go on to win some primaries, even after it appeared that Carter would probably win renomination. Eventually he bowed out of the race, but delivered a rousing speech before the 1980 Democratic National Convention in New York City that many consider to be one of his finest moments.
Democratic Party icon
Since his presidential bid, Kennedy has become the de facto head of the liberal wing of the Democratic party. He is one of the most recognizable and influential members of the party. In 2004, Kennedy supported the failed presidential bid of his fellow Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, speaking for Kerry multiple times and lent his chief of staff, Mary Beth Cahill, to the Kerry campaign.
Political Views
No Child Left Behind
Senator Kennedy was a major player in the bipartisan team that wrote the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, which according to both Kennedy and President Bush was a compromise, and according to both their parties conceded too much to the other side.
He then worked to get it passed in a Republican-controlled Congress, despite the opposition of conservative Republicans on states' rights grounds, and liberal Democrats opposing what was perceived as President Bush's initiative.
Four weeks after the bill's passage, Kennedy reversed his position, calling the President and Congress to account for failing to budget enough funding for programs mandated by the law. He has since opposed the law on these grounds, and has divested responsibility for the bill.
Right to abortion
Although he has been a staunch advocate of abortion rights for the past 30 years, Kennedy once expressed a strong pro-life view in accord with Catholic church doctrine, as he expressed in this letter to a constituent, dated August 3, 1971:
- "While the deep concern of a woman bearing an unwanted child merits consideration and sympathy, it is my personal feeling that the legalization of abortion on demand is not in accordance with the value which our civilization places on human life. Wanted or unwanted, I believe that human life, even at its earliest stages, has certain rights which must be recognized -- the right to be born, the right to love, the right to grow old.
- "I share the confidence of those who feel that America is working to care for its unwanted as well as wanted children, protecting particularly those who cannot protect themselves. I also share the opinions of those who do not accept abortion as a response to our society's problems -- an inadequate welfare system, unsatisfactory job training programs, and insufficient financial support for all its citizens.
- "When history looks back to this era it should recognize this generation as one which cared about human beings enough to halt the practice of war, to provide a decent living for every family and to fulfill its responsibility to its children from the very moment of conception."
This letter was written at a time when abortion was a particularly hot topic, being fought in state legislatures throughout the United States. Seventeen months later, the U.S. Supreme Court would rule in Roe v. Wade that the "right of privacy... is broad enough to encompass a woman's decision whether or not to terminate her pregnancy." Shortly after that, Kennedy reversed his position on abortion, to the point where his abortion rights advocacy soon became a source of continuing dispute between him and the Catholic Church to which he belongs.
Immigration Policy
Ted Kennedy was a strong supporter of the 1965 Hart-Celler Act which dramatically changed US immigration policy. [2] "The bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. It will not upset the ethnic mix of our society. It will not relax the standards of admission. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs." (U.S. Senate, Subcommittee on Immigration and Naturalization of the Committee on the Judiciary, Washington, D.C., Feb. 10, 1965. pp. 1-3.). Kennedy is now the ranking Democrat on the Senate Committee on Immigration, and remains a strong advocate of high levels of immigration. [3]
Alternative Energy
Ted Kennedy has maintained a strong record in favor of alternative energy sources as seen in his voting record as a senator. [4] Some people, however, see Kennedy's opposition to a wind farm within sight of his home [5] as an example of a NIMBY philosophy.
War On Terrorism
Though a supporter of the American-led 2001 overthrow of the Taliban government in Afghanistan, Senator Kennedy is a vocal critic of the American-led 2003 invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. He has also been a harsh critic of the way the war was planned and conducted by the Bush Administration.
Of particular concern to Sen. Kennedy is the U.S.A.'s treatment of the prisoners taken in the War On Terrorism. Applying standards of human rights that are available to all Americans, he believes there should be no difference between the treatment of accused terrorists and the treatment of accused criminals in the U.S.A., such as the right to a speedy trial (or the suspect should be released), and the right to legal representation (possibly at taxpayer expense).
Representative of Sen. Kennedy's positions in the War On Terror, is this speech made from the floor of the U.S. Senate on October 7, 2004, just prior to the 2004 U.S. Presidential Election between George W. Bush and John F. Kerry:
- " The defining issue today is our national security. Especially in this post-September 11 world, people have the right to ask Ronald Reagan's question in a very specific and all-important way: Are we safer today because of the policies of President Bush?
- Any honest assessment can lead to only one answer and that answer is an emphatic no. President Bush is dead wrong and John Kerry is absolutely right: We are not safer today.
- The reason we are not safer is because of President Bush's misguided war in Iraq. The President's handling of the war has been a toxic mix of ignorance, arrogance, and stubborn ideology. No amount of Presidential rhetoric or preposterous campaign spin can conceal the truth about the steady downward spiral in our national security since President Bush made the decision to go to war in Iraq.
- President Bush keeps saying that America and the world are safer and better off today because Saddam Hussein is gone. No matter how many rhetorical, double-twisting back flips President Bush performs, his disingenuous claim that the war has made America safer is wrong--and may be catastrophically wrong.
- There were no weapons of mass destruction.
- Across the country we see the newspapers with headlines like this morning's Washington Post headline: ``U.S. `Almost All Wrong' on Weapons. There were no weapons. Here it is in the New York Times this morning: ``U.S. Report Finds Iraqis Eliminated Illicit Arms in 90's. ``Weapons Capability Had Eroded Before War, Inspector Says.
- Here is the recent report, just released yesterday, by the inspector general, who is over there, Charles Duelfer, who followed Dr. Kay. Very professional individuals with strong teams have spent up to $900 million. This is the central conclusion on page 7: Iraq did not possess a nuclear device, nor had it tried to reconstitute a capability to produce nuclear weapons after 1991.
- Again, in a New York Times editorial this morning entitled ``The Verdict Is In: Since any objective observer should by now have digested the idea that Iraq posed no immediate threat to anyone, let alone the United States, it was disturbing to hear President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney continue to try to justify the invasion this week on the grounds that after Sept. 11, 2001, Iraq was clearly the most likely place for terrorists to get illicit weapons. Even if Mr. Hussein had wanted to arm groups he could not control--a very dubious notion--he had nothing to give them.
- Those are the facts, Mr. President. And it is important for the administration to finally admit them. Saddam had no nuclear program. He had no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. The Iraq Survey Group basically nailed the door shut on the administration's justification for the war. But the President won't hear it. He stubbornly clings to his fiction that ``there was a real risk that Saddam Hussein would pass weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks.
- President Bush says John Kerry ``would weaken America and make the world more dangerous. In fact, it is President Bush who has weakened America and made the world more dangerous. Let's count the ways George Bush's war has not made America safer.
- No. 1, Iraq has been a constant perilous distraction from the real war on terrorism. There was no persuasive link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida. We should have finished the job in Afghanistan, finished the job on al-Qaida, and finished the job on Osama bin Laden.
- No. 2, the mismanagement of the war in Iraq has created a fertile, new, and very dangerous breeding ground for terrorists in Iraq and a powerful recruiting tool for al-Qaida that did not exist before the war. We cannot go a day now without hearing of attacks in Iraq by insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists, and our troops are in far greater danger because of it.
- Only this week, Ambassador Paul Bremer specifically stated that the Bush administration erred in not deploying enough troops in Iraq and not containing the violence and looting immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein. About the looting, he said: We paid a big price for not stopping it because it established an atmosphere of lawlessness.
- He said: We never had enough troops on the ground.
- No. 3, Saddam may be behind bars, and that is a plus for America and the world, as President Bush says. But the war in Iraq has clearly distracted us from putting Osama bin Laden behind bars, and that is a huge minus.
- No. 4, because of the war in Iraq, the danger of terrorist attacks against America itself has become far greater. Our preoccupation with Iraq has given al-Qaida more than 2 full years to regroup and plan murderous new assaults against us. And we know that al-Qaida will try to attack America again and again here at home, if it possibly can. Yet instead of staying focused on the real war on terror, President Bush rushed headlong into an unnecessary war in Iraq.
- No. 5, and most ominously, the Bush administration's focus on Iraq has left us needlessly more vulnerable to an al-Qaida attack with a nuclear weapon. The greatest threat of all to our homeland is a nuclear attack. A mushroom cloud over any American city is the ultimate nightmare, and the risk is all too great. Osama bin Laden calls the acquisition of a nuclear device a ``religious duty. Documents captured from a key al-Qaida aide 3 years ago revealed plans even then to smuggle high-grade radioactive materials into the United States in shipping containers.
- No. 6, the war in Iraq has provided a powerful new worldwide recruiting tool for al-Qaida. We know al-Qaida is getting stronger, because its attacks in other parts of the world are increasing.
- No. 7, because of the war, Afghanistan itself is still unstable. Taliban and al-Qaida elements continue to attack our forces regularly. President Hamid Karzai is frequently forced to negotiate with warlords who control private armies in the tens of thousands. Opium production is at a record level, and is being used to finance terrorism and fund private militias. Our troops there are in greater danger.
- No. 8, we have alienated long-time friends and leaders in other nations we heavily depend on for intelligence, for apprehending terrorists, for shutting off funds to al-Qaida, and for many other types of support in the ongoing war against international terrorism. Mistrust of America has soared throughout the world. We are especially hated in the Muslim world. In parts of it, the bottom has fallen out.
- Sadly, we remember the goodwill that flowed to America in the aftermath of September 11, and we know we should never have squandered it.
- No. 9, our overall military forces are stretched to the breaking point because of the war in Iraq. As the Defense Science Board recently told Secretary Rumsfeld:
- Current and projected force structure will not sustain our current and projected global stabilization commitments.
- LTG John Riggs said it clearly: I have been in the Army 39 years, and I've never seen the Army as stretched in that 39 years as I have today.
- And as our colleague Senator McCain warned last month, if we have a problem in some other flash point in the world: It's clear, at least to most observers, that we don't have sufficient personnel.
- No. 10, the war in Iraq has undermined the basic rule of international law that protects captured Americans. The Geneva Conventions are supposed to protect our forces, but the brutal interrogation techniques used at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq have lowered the bar for treatment of POWs and endangered our soldiers throughout the world.
- No. 11, while President Bush has been preoccupied with Iraq, not just one but two serious nuclear threats have been rising: North Korea and Iran. Four years ago, North Korea's plutonium program was inactive. Its nuclear rods were under seal. Two years ago, as the Iraq debate became intense, North Korea expelled the international inspectors and began turning its fuel rods into nuclear weapons. At the beginning of the Bush administration, North Korea was already thought to have two such weapons. Now they may have eight, and the danger is greater.
- Iran too is now on a faster track that could produce nuclear weapons. The international community might be more willing to act if President Bush had not abused the U.N. resolution on Iraq 2 years ago, when he took the words ``serious consequences as a license for launching his unilateral war in Iraq.
- No. 12, while we focused on the nonexistent nuclear threat from Saddam, we have not done enough to safeguard the vast amounts of unsecured nuclear materials elsewhere in the world. According to a joint report by the Nuclear Threat Initiative and Harvard's Managing the Atom Project, ``scores of nuclear terrorist opportunities lie in wait in countries all around the world, especially at sites in the former Soviet Union. How loudly does the alarm bell have to ring before President Bush wakes up?
- No. 13, the neglect of the Bush administration on all aspects of homeland security because of the war is frightening. We are pouring nearly $5 billion a month into Iraq, yet we are grossly shortchanging the urgent needs to strengthen our ability to prevent terrorist attacks here at home and to strengthen our preparedness should they occur.
- As former Republican Senator Warren Rudman, chairman of the Independent Task Force on Emergency Responders, said recently: Homeland security is terribly under-funded, and we cannot allow that to continue.
- You cannot pack all these reasons why America is not safer into a 30-second television response ad or a news story or an editorial. But as anyone who cares about the issue can quickly learn, our President has utterly no credibility when he keeps telling us that America and the world are safer because he went to war in Iraq and rid us of Saddam.
- President Bush's record on Iraq is clearly costing American lives and endangering America and the world. Our President will not change or even admit how wrong he has been and still is. Despite the long line of mistakes and blunders and outright deception, there has been no accountability. As election day grows closer, the buck is circling more and more closely over 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Only a new President can right the extraordinary wrongs of the Bush administration on our foreign policy and national security.
- On November 2, when we ask ourselves the fundamental question whether President Bush has made us safer, there can be only one answer: No, he has not. That is why America needs new leadership. We could have been, and should have been, much safer than we are today.
- We cannot afford to stay this very dangerous course. As I have said before, the only thing America has to fear is 4 more years of George Bush.
Grounded by terror watch list
During a congressional hearing on homeland security in August 2004, Kennedy revealed that he had been stopped from boarding airlines on multiple occasions because his name or a similar name had appeared on a terror watch list. Homeland Security officials later apologized and corrected the mistake.
Political Resurrection
The accident at Chappaquiddick, along with continuing allegations of heavy drinking, drug use, and womanizing have haunted Kennedy's reputation and hampered his political career through the decades since it transpired. He withdrew in 1974 from the 1976 presidential race and failed in a 1980 primary challenge to Jimmy Carter. Critics have specifically pointed to allegations that he and fellow Senator Christopher Dodd sexually harassed a waitress at Washington DC's La Brasserie restaurant in 1985 and a night of barhopping in 1991 with his nephew William Kennedy Smith which culminated in Smith's trial and acquital for rape.
In 1991, during the Clarence Thomas hearings, Kennedy's career reached what has been called a low ebb. Journalist Anna Quindlen wrote that he "let us down because he had to; he was muzzled by the facts of his life." The Boston Globe, editorialized that his "reputation as a womanizer made him an inappropriate and non-credible" critic of Thomas.
According to a 2002 article in The Nation by Jack Newfield, that year also appears to represent a turning point. His good friend, Republican Senator Orrin Hatch confronted him about his drinking and then he "met Vicki Reggie and ended his partying." After his marriage in 1992, he faced a tough challenger, Mitt Romney, for re-election in 1994. Some of Romney’s supporters criticized Kennedy for statements he had made about the exclusionary policies of the LDS church, in which Romney held a leadership role [6]. Kennedy defeated Romney with 58 percent of the vote. According to Newfield, Kennedy's family and friends believe that campaign "allowed him to reconnect with his reasons for believing in public service."
Newfield states that "In making the physical and emotional sacrifices necessary to win an exhausting campaign, Kennedy recovered his dedication to remain in the Senate, and he focused all his energies on the job"; he goes on to call him "the best and most effective senator of the past hundred years." "Because of his tragic experience", says Newfield, he is often found serving as "America's national grief counselor." Despite his liberal views, "The key to Kennedy's effectiveness has been his remarkable capacity to form warm, genuine friendships—more than mere working alliances—with GOP senators." [7]
Further reading
Burke, Richard E. (1993). The Senator: My Ten Years With Ted Kennedy. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0312951337.
External links
- Congressional biography
- Campaign homepage
- Senate homepage
- Robert Kennedy's eulogy read by Ted Kennedy
- Webcast of Kennedy at a Jan. 21, 2003 National Press Club event, via NPR Provides corroboration for 2006 re-election run.
- Ted Kennedy's 1980 Democratic National Convention Address
- Committee for a Democratic Majority
- Ted Kennedy's Driving Record - List of Traffic Offenses
- Chappaquiddick: A Profile in Cowardice
- FBI FOIA Investigation on Chappaquiddick
- Terror List Snag Nearly Grounded Ted Kennedy (USA Today article)
- Both sides fault lack of funding for No Child Left Behind
| Preceded by: Benjamin A. Smith II | U.S. Senator from Massachusetts 1962–present Served alongside: Leverett Saltonstall, Edward Brooke, Paul Tsongas, John Kerry | Succeeded by: Incumbent |
| Preceded by: James O. Eastland | Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman 1978-1987 | Succeeded by: J. Strom Thurmond |
| Image:Massachusetts state flag.png | Massachusetts Congressional Delegation serving in the 109th United States Congress |
|---|---|
| Senators | Edward Kennedy (D), John Kerry (D) |
| Representative(s) | John Olver (D), Richard Neal (D), Jim McGovern (D), Barney Frank (D), Marty Meehan (D), John F. Tierney (D), Ed Markey (D), Mike Capuano (D), Stephen Lynch (D), Bill Delahunt (D) |
|
Current Delegations by State: AL AK AZ AR CA CO CT DE FL GA HI ID IL IN IA KS KY LA ME MD MA MI MN MS MO MT NE NV NH NJ NM NY NC ND OH OK OR PA RI SC SD TN TX UT VT VA WA WV WI WY | AS DC GU PR VI | |
Categories: United States Senators from Massachusetts | United States presidential candidates | Kennedy family | 1932 births | American lawyers | Harvard alumni | Irish-American politicians | Massachusetts politicians | Roman Catholic politicians | U.S. Army officers | University of Virginia
