By Paul Carrier
It was Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona who once described Kennedy as “the last lion of the Senate” because he was, in McCain’s view “the single most effective member of the Senate if you want to get results.”
The title of Last Lion is derived from McCain’s assessment, but the subtitle - The Fall and Rise of Ted Kennedy - is equally telling, focusing as it does on Kennedy’s reputation as a freewheeling, sometimes reckless, bon vivant who eventually matured into a respected legislator and devoted husband.
Heavily anecdotal, in the best tradition of solid journalism, Last Lion was written by a team of Boston Globe reporters and editors whose final product has a seamless feel rather than the choppy, disjointed style that might be expected in a book cobbled together by a committee.
More importantly, Last Lion is replete with telling details and offers a well-rounded picture of the last of the Kennedy brothers.
Any reader who assumes that the Globe staffers who collaborated on the book glossed over Kennedy’s shortcomings in deference to a prominent hometown boy should recall that this is the same newspaper that won a Pulitzer Prize for exposing the child-abuse scandal in the Catholic Archdiocese of Boston. So much for boosterism.
Kennedy was the youngest of nine children whose ranks included older brothers who were more heroic (Joe Jr.) more cerebral (Jack) and more ambitious (Bobby). The runt of the litter initially was viewed within the family as the handsome, jocular and good-natured kid who somehow didn’t quite make the grade.
In JFK’s 1960 presidential bid, for example, Ted was placed in charge of several western states, most of which ultimately voted for Richard Nixon. And when Ted was being groomed to run for Jack’s vacated U.S. Senate seat in 1962, there was some fear within the Kennedy circle that he might blow the election, thereby tarnishing the new president’s image and reputation.
But Kennedy won that special election, launching a decades-long Senate career. The assassination of his brother Bobby followed in 1968. And it was only a year later that Kennedy, then viewed as the leading contender for the 1972 Democratic presidential nomination, drove his car off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, killing his lone passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne.
Last Lion takes Kennedy to task for his behavior the night of the accident, noting that he waited 10 hours before reporting it to the police, among other examples of inexcusably poor judgment. The authors do not give short shrift to the tragedy; some 35 pages of their 409-page biography are devoted to the Chappaquiddick saga.
Kennedy’s mountain of legislative accomplishments, and his tireless championing of universal health care, are well-documented here. So are his devotion to his fatherless nieces and nephews, his tumultuous 1980 presidential bid, the embarrassing years of womanizing and binge drinking, the deterioration of his first marriage and the stability he finally achieved with his 1992 marriage to Vicki Reggie, an accomplished lawyer and divorced mother of two.
Several recurring themes tie the narrative together, including Kennedy’s gregariousness, his towering presence in the Senate and his disappointing years as an overgrown adolescent. The Kennedy clan’s seemingly endless string of family tragedies are a constant presence as well.
Once it became clear that Bobby Kennedy would not survive the 1968 assassination attempt, for example, his spokesman, Frank Mankiewicz, recalls spotting Ted Kennedy leaning on a sink in a hotel bathroom. “I have never, ever, nor do I expect ever, to see a face more in grief,” Mankiewicz is quoted as saying. “It was beyond grief and agony.”
Last Lion continually refers to Kennedy in the first person as “Ted,” which can be off-putting. Perhaps the authors took that approach to more easily differentiate Kennedy from other members of his family, without using full names in each case.
It’s a small complaint about a highly readable and informative book that chronicles the life of a political giant whose like we will not see again. Although there are no startling revelations here, Last Lion offers a comprehensive look at a remarkable life that played itself out on a roller coaster of tragedy and triumph, excess and redemption.
