Институт президенства в США

scientific view of man and world. Jefferson rejected most religions and

metaphysical philosophies and their ideas as myths. (He especially disliked

for example Plato, St. Paul, Athanasius and Calvin.) Sometimes he viewed

them as the deliberate fabrications of priests and kings to manipulate and

control their people. Jefferson thought that man's "reason" should rule

man.

The “American Creed" and Mankind's Spiritual History

Jefferson's words came to be repeated on e. g. "Fourth of July

Celebrations" throughout America over the years and came to be a sort of

creedal statement as to what it means to be "American" - as we saw also in

the President's address in November of 1995 But in fact very few Americans

are clear about either the original context or meaning of the "American

Creed" - the "cosmos" of these words - or of Jefferson’s rejection of most

of the spiritual beliefs which many of these Americans personally hold,

commonly blended together with Jefferson's contrasting, antithetically-

conceived grand expressions! In other words, these ideas from 1776, still

alive today, are in fact only truly to be understood within a scientific-

natural view of man, nature, society. God and world. And this is so even

though the religious, spiritual and philosophical beliefs of the vast

majority of the US people - who often use them in close association with

Jefferson's phrases, when they explain and understand America and life -

were in fact rejected by Jefferson before (and after) he wrote them. His

human and social ideals were conceived within a natural cosmos of man; they

are ideals of man in this world. He had rejected a spiritual cosmos and

anthropology to man.

Jefferson would, symptomatically, at the end of his great life (devoted

largely to serving America) attempt (unsuccessfully) to exclude the

teaching of religion from the University of Virginia which he had brought

into being. Contrariwise, most Americans - in their (generally) extremely

limited knowledge of even their own nation's history-place together views

which Jefferson himself considered to be fundamentally antithetical. The

beliefs of a greater spiritual cosmos, e.g. Dante's world's, the spiritual-

metaphysical beliefs of man and world, cannot properly be fit inside of

Jefferson's world and his ideals - at least not realistically

intellectually. The cosmos of the "American Creed" has its own reality and

dignity - but it is not such that all of the ideas which Americans have

come to place inside of its famous phrases, can, truthfully and

unproblematically, be placed.

In my view - and no one who reads this great man's biography can doubt

his devotion and service to America, Jefferson was true to the history,

reality and life of mankind in his time. One of his biographers called him

"one of the most devoted disciples of the Age of Reason". (Nostalgia and

longing for the "age of faith" - like the time before the "Fall of Man" -

is understandable; but the "age of reason" was, if not an inevitability or

necessity of history, still nevertheless a new more realistic relationship

of man to nature. So that no mere easy return to the past is true or

realistic.) He was a realistic man of science; he could not and would not

rest in the "age of faith". And, as was characteristic of this and later

time, once the Bible and religion were subjected to the "age of reason",

the beliefs of the "age of faith" could never be immediately accepted

unquestioned again.

While he was close to Darwin in his scientific attitude, he would have

deeply lamented Darwin's eventual rejection both of a creator God (chance

and natural selection rather than divine design) and the view of man's

reason and conscience as special "gifts" (Jefferson) of God to man.

In fact, Darwin and Jefferson (as well as many of their contemporaries of

course), were offended by many of the same "unbelievable" aspects of

Christianity and in relationship to Jefferson's phrases as well!

Here is an aspect - perhaps even more fundamental and definitive in some

ways than the problem of the popular and noble "American Dream" - of how

Americans are unaware and unconscious of the lineage of their own spiritual

and intellectual origin and history. Very, very few even college-graduate

Americans could even begin to give a serious account of the relation-ship

between their own personal spiritual beliefs, the cosmos of their "American

Creed" and the intellectual and spiritual history of mankind (e.g. Indo-

European sources, Dionysus the Areopagite's cosmography, Dante's Comedy,

even Newton, Laplace, et al). They are simply unaware and uninformed of how

America's "ideas" acutally stand inside of not only European, but

Occidental and world intellectual and spiritual history. Indeed, I am

certain that even the current President of the USA himself- himself an

active Christian Southern Baptist believer - would find it difficult to

give such an account of the relationship of his Baptist religious beliefs,

to the natural ideas of man and cosmos in the "American Creed" which he had

cited in his November 1995 speech, in which he defined America to the

world. But American ideals - the cosmos of the American Creed-do stand

within the entire spiritual and intellectual history of Mankind - however

little this may be clearly conceived and worried by Americans themselves.

The cosmos of the "American Creed" is a natural, not a spiritual one. The

failure to recognize and understand this clearly cannot be of spiritual and

intellectual hope, health and help to Mankind. If America is now in many

ways leading the world, it should, presumably, know and understand more

deeply and clearly what America and her ideals are actually about.

Jacksonian Democracy

Andrew Jackson became the U. S. President in 1828. For weeks thousands of

people had been coming to Washington, D. C. to see his inauguration.

Jackson was the hero of common people. He was truly a President of the

people.

Jackson was a fighter. He took part in the Revolutionary War. His

soldiers called him "Old Hickory" because hickory wood was the toughest

thing they knew. When he had moved to Tennessee he served its people as a

lawyer, judge, Congressman and senator. But he won his greatest fame as a

soldier. Because of his activities in Florida, the U. S. was able to take

control of that area from Spain.

Jackson believed in people who loved him. He felt that common people

could run the government. This idea has come to be called Jacksonian

democracy. These people elected him as their President. He gave them their

first chance to really have a part in government.

Not everyone benefited while Jackson was President- Women, black and

Native Americans were not able to take part in gov_ernment. In fact, in

some cases, the government worked against them.

The Cherokee nation serves as an example of what happened to many Native

American tribes and people in Jackson's times. The Cherokees had a great

deal of land in Georgia and Alabama. They were farmers. They had roads and

lived in houses. They had a written language and a weekly newspaper. Their

government was democratic. But white settlers wanted their land.

The land was promised to the Cherokee nation by treaty. Missionaries,

Congressman Henry Clay, and the Supreme Court all said that the Cherokees

had rights to their claims. Even so, the Cherokees were thrown off their

land. They were told to go to Oklahoma. With soldiers watching them, they

had little choice but to obey.

This journey lasted several months. Disease, hunger and cold brought

death to many. Over 4,000 Cherokees Were buried along the Trial of Tears

which stretched from Georgia to Oklahoma.

Jackson said that their removal was necessary. Without it, he said, the

Cherokees all would have been killed by white settlers looking for more

land. Jackson did agreat deal to make people feel a part of government. But

he was not ready to give equality to Native Americans. A slave holder, all

his life Jackson did not believe in equality for blacks either.

Yet in Jackson's time, some people were starting to oppose slavery. These

people were called abolitionists.

Jonh F. Kennedy

For many Americans the election of John Fitzgerald Kennedy as the 35th

President of the United States in 1960 marked the beginning of a new era in

this country's political history. Kennedy was the first Roman Catholic and

the youngest man ever chosen Chief Executive. He was also the first person

bom in the 20th century to hold the nation's highest office.

Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, on May 29. 1917, Kennedy was

descended from two politically conscious, Irish-American families that had

emigrated from Ireland to Boston shortly after potato blight and economic

upheavals had struck their homeland in the 1840s. Kennedy's grandfathers,

Patrick J. Kennedy and John F. ("Honey Fitz") Fitzgerald, became closely

associated with the local Democratic Party; Kennedy served in the

Massachusetts legislature, and Fitzgerald won election as mayor of Boston.

In 1914 the marriage of Joseph P. Kennedy and Rose Fitzgerald united the

two families. John Fitzgerald Kennedy was the second eldest of Joseph and

Rose Kennedy's four sons and five daughters.

Joseph P. Kennedy was an extraordinarily successful businessman.

Despite the relatively modest means of his family, Kennedy attended Harvard

College, and upon graduation in 1912 began a career in banking. During the

1920s he amassed a substantial fortune from his investments in motion

pictures, real estate, and other enterprises, and unlike many magnates of

his era he escaped unscathed from the stock market crash of 1929. Joseph

Kennedy himself was never a candidate for elective office, but he was

deeply interested in the Democratic Party. He made large contributions to

the presidential campaign of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932; in return,

Roosevelt appointed him chairman of the recently established Securities and

Exchange Commission, where his business expertise proved especially helpful

in drafting legislation designed to regulate the stock market. In 1937

Roosevelt named Kennedy US ambassador to Great Britain.

Despite his wealth and political influence, the Democratic Irish-

Catholic Joseph Kennedy never won the acceptance of Boston's Protestant

elite. He deeply resented this, and determined that his sons' achievements

would equal, if not excel, those of their Brahmin counter-parts. Toward

this end he modeled their lives and education after those enjoyed by the

Yankee upper class.

John Kennedy, like his brothers and sisters, grew up in comfortable

homes and attended some of the nation's most prestigious preparatory

schools and colleges. He was enrolled at the age of 13 at Canterbury, a

Catholic preparatory school staffed by laymen, but transferred after a year

to the nonsectarian Choate School, where he completed his secondary

education before entering Princeton University. Illness forced him to leave

the college before the end of Ins freshman year. but the following'. autumn

he resumed his studies, at Hanard.

Kennedy's college years coincided with a time of world crisis 'The

future President had unusual opportunities to combine know ledge gained in

the classroom with his own firsthand observations. As a government major at

Harvard he benefited from the teachings of some of the nation's most

prominent political scientists and historians. men who in the late 1930s

were acutely aware of the growing menace of Nazism. Moreover, in 1938

Kennedy spent six months in London assisting his father. who was then

serving as US ambassador. "This slay in England gave the young student an

excellent opportunity to witness for himself the British response to the

Nazi aggression of the 1930s, and he used the insight gained from the

experience in writing his senior thesis. This thesis, in which Kennedy

attempted to explain England's hesitant reaction to German rearmament, was

extremely perceptive. and in 1940 it was published in expanded form in the

United States and 6reat Britain under the title Why England Slept.

After receiving his B.S. degree cum laude from Harvard in 1940, Kennedy

briefly attended ihe Stanford University Graduate School ot Business, and

then spent several months traveling through South America. Late in 1941,

when the United States' entry into World War II seemed imminent. Kennedy

joined the US Navy. As an officer he served in the South Pacific Theater,

where he commanded one of the small PT or torpedo boats that patrolled off

the Solomon Islands.

On April 25. 1943, Kennedy assumed command of P 1 -109, the vessel on

which, only a little more than four months later, his courage and strength

were put to their first serious test. On the night of August 2, 1943, the

Japanese destroyer Amagiri rammed PT-109. The force of the destroyer sliced

the American craft in half and plunged its 11 -man crew into the waters of

Ferguson Passage. Burning gasoline spewed forth from the wrecked torpedo

boat, setting the waters of the passage aflame: but Lieutenant Kennedy

retained his composure, directed the rescue of his crew, and personally

saved the lives of three of the men. Kennedy and the other survivors found

refuge on a small unoccupied island, and during the days that followed he

swam long distances to obtain food and aid for his men. Finally, on the

sixth day of the ordeal the crew was rescued.

Kennedy's bravery did not go unnoticed. For his deeds in August 1943 he

subsequently received the Purple Heart and the Navy and Marine Corps Medal.

Injuries sustained during his courageous exploits and an attack of malaria

ended Kennedy's active military service, however. Later in 1943 he returned

to the United States, and in 1945 he was honorably discharged from the

navy.

After leaving the navy, Kennedy, like many other young men who had

served their country during World War II. had to make a decision about his

literature career. At Harvard he had become increasingly interested in

government. but he did hot originally plan to seek public office. Members

of the Kennedy family had expected that the eldest son. navy pilot Joseph

P. Kennedy Jr., would enter politics - a hope cut short when he was killed

in a plane crash during the war Deeply affected by his older brother's

death. Jonh Kennedy in 1945 compiled a memorial volume. As We Remember Joe.

which was privately printed. Shortly afterwards he determined to pursue the

career that had been the choice of his late brother

Appropriately. Kennedy sought his first elective office in Easl Boston,

the low-income area with a large immigrant population that several decades

before had been the scene of both his grandfathers political activities.

Announcing his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for the US House of

Representatives in the 11th Congressional District early in 1946, Kennedy,

with the assistance of his family and friends, campaigned hard and long

against several of the party's veterans and won the primary. Since the

district was overwhelmingly Democratic, Kennedy's victory in the primary

virtually guaranteed his election in the November contest. As expected, on

November 5, 1946, he easily defeated his Republican rival and at the age of

29 began his political career as a member of the House of Representatives.

East Boston voters returned Kennedy to Congress in 1948 and 1950, and

for the six years he represented the 11th District he continuously worked

to expand federal programs, such as public housing, social security, and

minimum wage laws. that benefited his constituents. However, in 1952 the

young politician decided against running for another term In the House.

Instead he sought the Senate seat held by the Republican Henry Cabot Lodge.

The incumbent Lodge was well known and popular throughout

Massachusetts; in contrast, Kennedy had almost no following outside of

Boston. But from the moment he announced his candidacy for the Senate,

Kennedy, assisted by his family, friends, and thousands of volunteers,

conducted a massive and intense grassroots campaign. This hard work brought

results: on November 4, 1952, when the landslide presidential victory of

Dwight D. Eisenhower carried hundreds of other Republican candidates into

local, state, and federal offices throughout the nation, the Democratic

Kennedy defeated Lodge by a narrow margin to become the junior senator from

Massachusetts.

On September 12,1953, Kennedy married the beautiful and socially

prominent Jacqueline Lee Bouvier, who was 12 years his junior. Shortly

after their marriage, Kennedy became increasingly disabled by an old spinal

injury, and in October 1954 and again in February 1955 he underwent serious

surgery. A product of the months of convalescence that followed was his

Profiles in Courage, a study of American statesmen who had risked their

political careers for what they believed to be the needs of their nation.

Published in 1956, Profiles in Courage immediately became a bestseller, and

in May 1957 it won for its author the Pulitzer Prize for biography.

During his years in the House and for the first half of his Senate

term, Kennedy concerned himself primarily with the issues that particularly

interested or affected his Massachusetts constituents. However, when he

resumed his congressional duties alter Ins prolonged convalescence,

national rather than local or state affairs primarily attracted his

attention.

His determination to run for higher office became evident at the

Democratic National Convention in 1956. Adam Stevenson, the party's

presidential nominee, declined to name a running male. and instead left the

choice of a vice presidential candidate to a vote of the delegates. Seizing

this opportunity. Kennedy mounted a strong, if last-minute, campaign lorshe

nomination in which he was narrowly defeated by Senator Lstes Kefauver of

Tennessee Kennedy's efforts were no entirely unrewarded however. He proved

himself to be a formidable contender and. perhaps more important, lie came

to the attention of the millions of television viewers across the nation

who watched; the eonvention proceeding. He was redeemed to the US Senate in

1958.

Shortly after defeat of Stevenson in 1956. Kennedy launched a

nationwide campaign to gain the 1960 Democratic presidential nomination.

During the tour intervening years, ihe Massachusetts senator developed the

organisation that would help him win his goal. Through his personal

appearances, ami writings, he also made himself known to the voters ol the

United Stales. Kennedy's tactics were successful He won all the state

primaries he entered in 1960 including a critical contest in West

Virginia, where an overwhelmingly Protestant electorate dispelled the

notion that a Catholic candidate could not be victorious - and he also

earned the endorsement of a number of state party conventions.

The Democratic National Convention of 1960 selected Kennedy as its

presidential candidate on the first ballot. Then, to the surprise of many,

Kennedy asked Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas, who had himself aspired

to the first place on the ticket, to be his running mate. Johnson agreed,

and the Demoeralic slate was complete. For its ticket, the Republican

National Convention in I960 chose Vice President Richard Millions Nixon and

Kennedy's earlier political rival. Henry Cabot Lodge.

Throughout the fall of 1960, Kennedy and Nixon waged tireless campaigns

to win popular support. Kennedy drew strength from the organization he had

put together and from the fact that registered Democratic voters

outnumbered their Republican counterparts. Nixon's strength stemmed from

his close association with the popular President Eisenhower and from his

own experience as Vice President, which suggested an ability to hold his

own with. representatives of the Soviet Union in foreign affairs. The

turning point of the 1960 presidential race, however, may have been the

series of four televised debates between the candidates, which gave voters

an opportunity to assess their positions on important issues, and

unintentionally also tested each man's television "presence." Kennedy

excelled in the latter area and political experts have since claimed that

his ability to exploit the mass media may have been a significant factor in

the outcome of the election.

On November 8, I960, the voters of the United States cast a record 68.8

million ballots, and selected Kcnnedy over Nixon by the narrow margin of

fewer than 120,000 votes in the closest popular vote in the nation's

history. In the Electoral College the tally was 303 votes to 21 John

Fitzgerald Kennedy took the oath of office as the 35th President of the

United States on January 20, 1961. A number of notable Americans

participated in the ceremonies: Richard Cardinal Gushing of Boston offered

the invocation, Marian Anderson sang the national anthem, and Robert Frost

read one of his poems. Kennedy's inaugural address, urging Americans to

"ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your

country," was memorable. The new Chief Executive also asserted, "Now the

trumpet summons us again ... to bear the burden of a long twilight

struggle... against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease

and war itself."

Both challenges were in keeping with what observers would later mark as

Kennedy's greatest contribution: a quality of leadership that extracted

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