A Liberal Icon and a Legendary Legislator: A Five Decade Senate Legacy

>>>He was known across the nation as an emphatic and tireless advocate of progressive causes for nearly half a century, and even more than that as the patriarch of America’s most storied Democratic political dynasty. At the Capitol, however, Edward M. Kennedy will be remembered as something quite different — perhaps the most effectively pragmatic dealmaker in modern times, someone who was as eager as he was skilled at working with almost anyone to get things done.

Although Kennedy was an anchor of his party’s liberal base, no one was too conservative to be ruled out as a potential legislative partner during the 46 years he spent in the Senate. Not George W. Bush in this decade or Orrin G. Hatch in the 1990s. Not Alan K. Simpson or Dan Quayle in the 1980s. Not even Strom Thurmond in the 1970s or James O. Eastland in the 1960s. This willingness to stride across party lines — and then look purposefully past the deepest ideological disagreements — in order to get negotiations going is a principal reason why Kennedy kept advancing his priorities, no matter which party controlled the Senate or who lived in the White House.


Long before he died Tuesday at age 77, Kennedy had written for himself one of the most impressive legislative résumés in American history. The products of his bipartisan work include many of the landmark social policy changes enshrined in law during the past half-century: expanding access to health care, aiding the disabled, diversifying the ranks of immigrants and ensuring expanded civil rights for Americans long denied them.

In the end, his influence on the way the United States lives its collective life in the 21st century may well exceed the imprint left by his two even more famous older brothers, President John F. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy. “For more than four decades in the Senate, Teddy has led the fight on the most important issues of our time: civil rights, social justice and economic opportunity,” his niece Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of John F. Kennedy, said in 2008. “I know his brothers would be so proud of him.”>>>>

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