Shortly after the funeral of President John F. Kennedy in November, 1963, Jacqueline Kennedy called the writer Theodore White and invited him to Hyannis Port to write a piece about her late husband for Life magazine. The essay based on the interview appeared in the December 6th issue. It was this essay that created the association of Camelot with the 1000-day presidency of JFK. White would later write that Camelot represented, “a magic moment in American history, when gallant men danced with beautiful women, when great deeds were done, when artists, writers, and poets met at the White House, and the barbarians beyond the walls held back.”
The Magic of Kennedy’s Camelot
According to White, Jacqueline Kennedy played the final song written by Alan Jay Lerner over and over again. It had been her husband’s favorite. The focus was on the ending lyrics: “Don’t let it be forgot, that once there was a spot, for one brief shining moment that was known as Camelot.” In the Broadway musical, King Arthur sings the lines as he is near death. Arthur’s Camelot was a place of “happy-ever-aftering.”
For the former First Lady, Camelot made sense. In her interview with White she stressed that for her husband, growing up, “history was full of heroes.” The Knights of the Roundtable, led by the idealistic Arthur, served justice, much as John Kennedy had done during his short time in the White House. Arthur M. Schlesinger would later write that John F. Kennedy was a “gallant and collected human being.”
From his first day in office, Kennedy championed justice. In his January 20th Inaugural Address, he stated that, “In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hours of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility, I welcome it.” In June 1963 President Kennedy stood at the infamous Berlin Wall, identifying in solidarity with his audience: “Ich bin ein Berliner.”
The Long Terms Goals of the Camelot Presidency
For John F. Kennedy, the Roundtable Knights were the heroes – men and women that gave of themselves to achieve social justice and enrich the lives of others. These were the people who asked not what the country could do for them, but what they could do for their country. These were the Peace Corps volunteers, the scientists and technicians at NASA that implemented Project Mercury with the ultimate goal of putting a man on the moon, and the Civil Rights advocates that fought to end segregation in the South.
Although most of the initial Civil Rights legislation would be passed under the Presidency of Lyndon Johnson, it was the JFK administration that began the initiatives to end segregation. President Kennedy ended discrimination in federal housing and appointed blacks to high government positions. In June 1963 President Kennedy challenged the nation to live up to the “Golden Rule” and the American Dream as it affected all Americans, including people of color.
“…So Let it be with Caesar…”
In Act Two of William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, Mark Antony eulogizes Caesar with the lines, “the evil that men do lives after them, the good is oft interred with their bones…” Jack Kennedy was not a perfect human being. The demythologizing of the Kennedy “mystique” has dredged up stories of womanizing (see especially The Dark Side of Camelot by Seymour Hersh).
Kennedy’s handling of foreign policy, notably the Bay of Pigs debacle and the Cuban Missile Crisis, has prompted critical response. American involvement in Vietnam was ramped up under Kennedy, who also authorized covert intelligence operations in the region. Despite these negatives, John F. Kennedy sought to promote a better world, both at home and abroad. That was his Camelot: the promotion of heroes who rode forth to ensure universal justice.
Sources:
- William A. DeGregorio, The Complete Book of U.S. Presidents From George Washington to George W. Bush (New York: Gramercy Books, 2001)
- Jon Margolis, The Last Innocent Year: America in 1964 [The Beginning of the “Sixties”] New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1999)
- Arthur M. Schlesinger, A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1965)
- Theodore White, In Search of History: A Personal Adventure (Warner Books, 1979)
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