WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden eulogized the late Ethel Kennedy in deeply personal terms at a memorial service Wednesday, hailing the wife of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy as “a hero in her own right, full of character, full of integrity and empathy" who helped him through one of the darkest periods of his life.
Biden was joined by former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton in speaking at the memorial service in Washington. All three reflected on Ethel Kennedy's humor and warmth, her work championing social causes and her unflappable resolve in the wake of tragedy.
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“We’re a better nation and a better world because of Ethel Kennedy,” Biden said.
Biden became emotional as he recalled the Kennedy family helping him cope more than 50 years ago when his wife, 30-year-old Neilia, and their 13-month-old daughter, Naomi, were killed in a car accident, broadsided by a tractor-trailer while out shopping for a Christmas tree. The couple’s two sons, Beau and Hunter, who were just about to turn 4 and 3 at the time, were also in the car and were seriously injured.
“Along with Teddy (Kennedy), she got me through a time I didn't want to stick around,” Biden said. “I wanted no part of being in the Congress, the Senate. ... The fact is like she did for the country, Ethel helped my family find a way forward with principle and purpose.”
Ethel Kennedy died on Thursday at age 96 following complications related to a stroke suffered earlier this month. She raised their 11 children after her husband was assassinated in 1968.
She was by Robert F. Kennedy’s side when he was fatally shot in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles just after winning California’s Democratic presidential primary. Her brother-in-law, President John F. Kennedy, had been assassinated in Dallas less than five years earlier.
Obama said her life was marked by more tragedy and heartbreak than most could bear.
“She would have been forgiven, I think if, at any point she had stepped away from public life or allowed bitterness to fester after all she and her family had been through,” Obama said. “But that is not what Ethel did because that is not who she was.”
Obama said she became a passionate advocate for everything from juvenile justice to civil rights to environmental protection. He described her as “a big dose in a small package.”
“Well into her 80s, she was still out there marching for something,” Obama said.
The service Wednesday was held at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle, the same church where John F. Kennedy's funeral was held in November 1963. Members of the Kennedy family gathered earlier this week to attend her private funeral.
The Kennedy matriarch was mother to Kathleen, Joseph II, Robert Jr., David, Courtney, Michael, Kerry, Christopher, Max, Douglas and Rory. She was one of the last remaining members of a family generation that included President John F. Kennedy.
Kathleen Kennedy Townsend recalled how her mother was fierce and fun-loving, rigorously faithful and reflexively dismissive of authority.
“Stop signs were always mere suggestions,” she said.
And while other mothers would take their children to the playground, she remembered her mom taking her to the Senate Rackets Committee where “daddy was investigating the mob.”
“I think my first sentence was, 'I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that it may tend to incriminate me," Kathleen Kennedy Townsend joked.
“She thought it was important that we knew what daddy was doing, and only afterwards would she take us to the botanical gardens and the natural history museum," she said.
Clinton said he was grateful that Ethel Kennedy lived to be 96.
"She was an amazing fireball of continuous energy. It was wonderful to be around her," he said.
During one of several light-hearted moments during the service, Clinton remembered her phoning him after Hillary Clinton had been elected to the Senate to the same seat that Robert Kennedy held.
“Ethel called me and said if I need any instruction in how to be a Senate spouse from New York, she'd be happy to provide it free of charge,” Clinton said.
Ethel Kennedy was a millionaire’s daughter who married the future senator and attorney general in 1950. She endured more death by the age of 40 than most people would in a lifetime.
She went on to found the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights soon after her husband’s death and advocated for causes including gun control and human rights. She rarely spoke about her husband’s assassination.
The center she founded still advances human rights through litigation, advocacy, education and inspiration, giving annual awards to journalists, authors and others who have made significant contributions to human rights. She also was active in the Coalition of Gun Control, Special Olympics, and the Earth Conservation Corps.
The memorial service featured remarks from some of her children, prayers from dozens of her grandchildren and musical performances from Kenny Chesney, Sting and Stevie Wonder.
Martin Luther King III, the son of civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr., recalled meeting her shortly after his father was assassinated in April 1968, just two months before she would lose her husband. He said it was not random luck that his father found a wife who was strong enough to endure the daunting challenges of the civil rights movement. And it was no accident that Bobby Kennedy found a wife and partner who could handle the slings and arrows that surrounded his leadership.
“One thing I learned from my mother is that beside every great leader, stands a stalwart and very strong partner who refuses to be intimidated or distracted by the many side-dramas that come with notoriety,” King said.