This year marks the sad 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States of America. Considering this epic event, and many other monumental events to take place in the 1960’s, being born in 1965, I feel as though I walked in on the middle of a movie. Missing the beginning of the film, I feel as though I have to keep leaning over to my older friend sitting next to me in the theater and ask a million questions. A screenplay writer or novelist could never have written a more dramatic script like the events that occurred in the decade of the 1960’s. The Bay of Pigs Invasion, British/Beatle Mania, President Johnson’s “Great Society,” the Vietnam War, Armstrong’s moonwalk and the proliferation of “The Pill” and the consequences it had on society as it ushered in the Sexual Revolution, all impacted who we are and how we live our lives in this present day. A society before the 1960’s that was tightly wrapped, family, faith-based and orderly, unraveled like a spool of yarn on a spindle. How society became undone is a tragic tale.
The decade of the 1960’s began with such optimism and enthusiasm. The torch had just been passed to a new generation who understood well the mishaps that took place at the beginning of the 20th century, and were determined not to let history repeat itself. America seemed to be heading in a prosperous direction. Our nation emerged after World War II as a global World Power and led the way in industry and good old fashioned know-how. America had at its core the principles of ingenuity and Liberty, wanted to embrace Freedom and Justice for all, and wanted to share that freedom with others around the globe. There was a strong sense of American exceptionalism. The United States had just finished a decade of unprecedented and unparalleled economic growth. Under the Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the economics of a Free Market elevated whole groups of people from poverty to the middle class by rewarding ingenuity and hard work. A Small Federal Government philosophy that promoted businesses elevated a middle class to achieve fortunes beyond comprehension. When one boat in the dock was raised, all the other smaller boats in the dock were elevated with it. That’s how a Free Market economy works. A decade after World War II, as the 1960’s was ushered in, Capitalism was tried and proven triumphant. In this year as well, the United States elected the first Catholic President, John F. Kennedy, who was a Hawk with a heart. JFK elevated hearts and minds as an orator, while using his gift of charm and persuasion to promote pragmatic change. His philosophy of “Ask not what your country can do for you, but rather ask what you can do for your country,” was not a separation from the past policies of Truman and Eisenhower, but was a rally cry that Americans should not expect wealth to be redistributed to them, but rather to achieve prosperity through one’s own initiatives. Our nation had a young beautiful First Lady and for the first time in 60 years a baby was born into the First Family. On November 22, 1963, a day that will live in infamy, an assassin’s bullets changed America and changed the the way we live forever. Not only was a president dead, but also what died with him were the hopes and aspirations of the 1960’s being an even better decade than the 1950’s. After Kennedy’s assassination, it seemed the whole world changed and began to collapse. As the picture tube of television sets began to change from black and white, it seemed so did America’s understanding of Right and Wrong go from black and white to shades of gray. Due to injustices that existed during the 1960’s, America may have had to change the bath water, but along with the bath water, after Kennedy’s assassination, went the baby.
One event can cause a chain reaction, which I believe happened when Kennedy was shot. Arguably, if JFK was able to finish his first term and be re-elected, Johnson would have never been president and the war in Vietnam would never have escalated. President Kennedy was against sending troops to Vietnam and would never have instituted a draft. If the Vietnam War did not take place, the radical movements America experienced would have been minimized and the needed societal changes would have occurred, but slowly and more tactfully and calmly. Discrimination of Blacks under Kennedy’s administration would have ended, I believe, but without all the social unrest, riots and upheaval. Tensions were elevated and radical polices were enacted due to the far Left taking control of the Democratic Party after Kennedy’s death. As a result social unrest escalated and fueled chaos and calamity. Kennedy was forward thinking, passionate about his views, but was no Liberal nor a reactionary. Unlike his brother Ted or his cohorts like Humphrey, McGovern and Carter, he did not have a Communist-like philosophy and would not have led the Democratic party on the radical crash course that has come into fruition under the Clinton and the Obama Administrations. Admittedly, this is speculation, but I believe grounded in historical truths.
50 years after President Kennedy’s death, we will never know what the world would have been like if he wasn’t assassinated. We can’t change the past, but we can do two things, learn from history and try to make the future brighter. The way to solve our personal problems and the problems of a nation is to turn to Jesus Christ. We know we will have a brighter future if we garner the spirit we had in the 1950’s and early 1960’s and truly once again be, “One Nation Under God.”