John F. Kennedy Essay -- essays research papers

John F. Kennedy John Fitzgerald Kennedy was born on May 29, 1917 in the Boston suburb of Brookline. Kennedy was the son of Joseph P. Kennedy a formerambassador to Great Britain. Kennedy was much like his father, possesing a delightful sense of humor, a strong family loyalty, a concern for the state of the nation, endless vitality and a constant air of confidence no matter how dire the situation In 1946, Kennedy ran successfully for a Boston-based seat in the U.S. House of Representatives; he was reelected in 1948 and 1950. As a congressman he backed social legislation that benefited his working-class constituents. Although generally supporting President Harry S. Truman's foreign policies, he criticized what he considered the administration's weak stand against the Communist Chinese. Kennedy continued to advocate a strong, anti-Communist foreign policy throughout his career. Restless in the House, Kennedy challenged incumbent Republican senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., in 1952. Although the Republican presidential candidate, Dwight D. Eisenhower, won in Massachusetts as well as the country as a whole, Kennedy showed his remarkable vote-getting appeal by defeating Lodge. A year later, on Sept. 12, 1953, Kennedy married Jacqueline Bouvier. The couple had three children: Caroline Bouvier (b. Nov. 27, 1957), John Fitzgerald, Jr. (b. Nov. 25, 1960), and a second son who died in infancy in August 1963. Kennedy was a relatively ineffectual senator. During parts of 1954 and 1955 he was seriously ill with back ailments and was therefore unable to play an important role in government. Critics observed that he made no effort to oppose the anti-civil libertarian excesses of Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy of Wisconsin. His friends later argued, not entirely persuasively, that he would have voted to censure McCarthy if he had not been hospitalized at the time. During his illness Kennedy worked on a book of biographical studies of American political heroes. Published in 1956 under the title Profiles in Courage, it won a Pulitzer Prize for biography in 1957. Like his earlier book on English foreign policy, it revealed his admiration for forceful political figures. This faith in activism was to become a hallmark of his presidency. In 1956, Kennedy bid unsuccessfully for the Democratic vice-presidential nomination. Thereafter, he set his sights on the presidency, especially after his... ... by at least conniving at the overthrow of Dinh Diem in November 1963. On November 21, 1963, President Kennedy flew to Texas to give several political speeches. The next day, as his car drove slowly past cheering crowds in Dallas, shots rang out. Kennedy was seriously wounded and died a short time later. Within two hours of the shooting, police arrested Lee Harvey Oswald and charged him with the murder. On November 24, a Dallas man, Jack Ruby, shot and killed Oswald before there was a chance to put him on trial. Although Oswald denied that he shot Kennedy, most of the evidence indicates that he really did. To this day, however, many people disagree about the facts of JFK's assassination. Some people insist that there was a second gunman firing at Kennedy, and that he and Ruby were part of a conspiracy. None of these theories has ever been proven. President Kennedy's death caused enormous sadness and grief among all Americans. Most people still remember exactly where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news of the murder. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered in Washington for the President's funeral, and millions throughout the world watched it on television.