On Refugees: Remembering The Legacy Of John F. Kennedy
John A. Gronbeck-Tedesco
February 8, 2017 8:03 am
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In the current climate, one would do well to dwell on the words and actions of John F. Kennedy regarding refugees. Kennedy won the 1960 election, in part, because he ably portrayed himself the more muscular and hawkish anticommunist. The Massachusetts senator had to convince America that he could prevent the spread of communism and ensure the nation’s superiority over the Soviet Union better than his opponent, Vice President Richard Nixon, the man who had served eight years alongside the inestimable Dwight Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander during World War II.
But when he entered office, Kennedy showed an additional side to the world’s desperate populations. In 1961, he wrote a letter to the president of the senate, Vice President Lyndon Johnson, and Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn, urging them to pass legislation appropriating more financial assistance to refugees. In its entirety, the letter is another illustration of Kennedy’s eloquent and pragmatic compassion. One excerpt follows thusly:
Kennedy’s vision led to the Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1962, which drastically expanded resources and assistances for refugees. The chief beneficiaries of this measure were Cubans fleeing Castro, whose numbers grew to 250,000 between 1959 and 1962. At a time when McCarthyism, though its namesake by now dead and largely discredited, still held sway, this group could easily have been turned away for fear of possible “bad ones.” The vetting process in those days was nothing like it is today.
But Kennedy’s America estimated that the country derived more benefit domestically and internationally by keeping faithful to its long-held promises of liberty and prosperity rather than give into isolationist forces of exclusion. In many respects, yesterday’s communism is today’s terrorism with respect to the fear each has bred in the American psyche. But that fear need not drive the country to abandon its valuable and enviable commitment to freedom and sanctuary.
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http://www.nationalmemo.com/refugees-remembering-jfk/
