compassion towards one another .” H u m a n i t i e s

John F. Kennedy, the youngest man to ever be elected president, was advised not to try to grapple with Civil Rights as it was seen as an issue not tangibly solvable which could only alienate Southern Democrats. But after seeing the violence surrounding black students being denied physical admittance to the University of Mississippi and the University of Alabama, the president was so incensed he told his advisors he would not wait one more day to speak out and on June 11, 1963, he demanded television airtime to address the nation and, very quickly was speaking to a national audience without actually having finished writing the speech he was delivering. The link below the picture of John Kennedy with civil rights leaders (including Martin Luther King and John Lewis) will take you to some excerpts from that speech. A little over five months later JFK was cut down by an assassin’s bullet in Dallas, Texas, leaving it to his vice-president, Lyndon Johnson, to carry out the work of passing civil rights legislation.

In 1968 his younger brother, and his Attorney General when he was president, Bobby Kennedy, was himself campaigning for the Democratic nomination for President when, after arriving in Indianapolis, Indiana, to deliver a campaign speech, was told Martin Luther King had been assassinated. As he was about to address a largely black, urban audience, he was advised to cancel the speech. Instead, he insisted on delivering the news to a crowd unaware of the events. The footage of that powerful five-minute speech is also below.

In this discussion, provide at least two of what you consider to be the most powerful and/or effective quotes from each speech, three adjectives (descriptive words) that you believe captures the tone or sentiment of each speech, and a sentence or two of your personal impressions of the Kennedy brothers based on these two speeches. Then comment on at least two other classmates’ remarks. Post your remarks as soon as possible to allow time to respond to other’s comments.