This article is the second installment of an HPR series exploring President Kennedy’s legacy as we reflect on the 50th anniversary of his assassination.
Friday, November 22, 1963. Like the day of Lincoln’s assassination, the day of Pearl Harbor, and more recently, 9/11, it seemed like a perfectly normal day. Then Walter Cronkite appeared on TV, visibly moved, and removed his glasses and opened his mouth to speak. At his words, workplaces closed early, schools dismissed their students, and Americans gathered around their small television sets, captivated by a single news story as it unfolded. Time stood still, as the announcement shook the nation and reverberated across the world.
These Americans were black, white, Hispanic, Asian, men, women, white collar, blue collar, rich, poor. They were Republicans and Democrats, civil rights supporters and civil rights opponents, Kennedy fans and Kennedy deriders. Above all, they were mourning.
Combined, the major news broadcasts covering the Kennedy assassination enjoyed viewership in 93 percent of American households. Over 50 percent of those households watched for at least 13 consecutive hours. The Monday after the assassination was declared a national day of mourning. Roughly 800,000 Americans attended John Fitzgerald Kennedy’s funeral procession, and another 175 million watched the funeral on TV. Americans were shocked, outraged, and distraught by their president’s assassination.
National tragedies historically unite Americans, especially when invoked by human hands. Yet there must have been more to the immediate, knee-jerk mourning that tore at the American soul. The grief that swallowed the nation was not collective; it was personal. Americans mourned not because a tragedy had occurred but because it had taken a man that each had, on some individual level, deeply admired.
Kennedy’s presidency was a tumultuous time. The 1960s are characterized by controversial social movements, intense riots and violence, and other cultural clashes signaling a growing number of societal rifts. Even so, President Kennedy’s approval ratings while in office typically hovered around the 70 to 80 percent range. At his lowest approval levels, JFK was still viewed positively by 58 percent of Americans. Subsequent presidents have failed to match this popularity during their terms in office.
JFK’s approval ratings when Americans consider his presidency in retrospect are even higher. A November 2013 Gallup poll found that 74 percent of Americans believe that JFK will go down in history as an outstanding or above average president; only 3 percent believe he will be viewed as below average or poor. No other American president since Kennedy has ever been so popular.
It is clear that both during and after President Kennedy’s life, innumerable diverse groups in America have profoundly admired him. As evidenced by his massive and, for the past half century, unparalleled popularity, JFK seemed to transcend politics during turbulent times. He knew how to communicate, how to be simultaneously charismatic and human, how to unite a diverse America. In this age of dangerous political polarization, it is especially important to remember the legacy of a young man killed tragically in the prime of his life and presidency half a century ago.
No president since Kennedy has had the vision to so effectively pull together this changing American landscape. As speculation about the 2016 presidential election approaches, it seems unlikely that one will anytime soon. Yet Kennedy’s “torch” of leadership and service will soon be handed to yet another “new generation of Americans.” The responsibility and the right to revitalize the American unity that died when John F. Kennedy died fifty years ago will soon rest in the hands of these young Americans. We are ready for the challenge.