BOSTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama hailed Senator Edward Kennedy as the “greatest legislator of our time” at the funeral yesterday of the towering patriarch of the pre-eminent American political family.
The emotional sendoff at a Roman Catholic church preceded his burial set for later yesterday at Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington where he would be laid to rest near the graves of his brothers, President John F. Kennedy and Senator Robert Kennedy, assassinated in 1963 and 1968.
“Ted Kennedy’s life’s work was not to champion those with wealth or power or special connections. It was to give a voice to those who were not heard,” Obama told members of the US political elite who packed a 130-year-old basilica in a working-class neighbourhood of Boston.
Obama lost an important ally for his push to overhaul US healthcare in Kennedy, a leading liberal who the president called the “soul of the Democratic Party.”
Kennedy was a senator under 10 presidents over 47 years, championing causes from civil rights, immigration and healthcare to the end of apartheid in South Africa, opposition to the war in Iraq and peace in Northern Ireland.
He could charm Republicans into backroom deals even while conservatives ridiculed him as a hopeless lover of big government.
Since Kennedy died on Tuesday of brain cancer at age 77, Americans have held a series of memorials for the last of the Kennedy brothers.
Police said 50,000 people came to a two-day public viewing of his casket at the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum.
“Where would I be as a black man without the Kennedys?” said Clint Haymon, one of hundreds of mourners gathered outside the church in pouring rain. “They believe in civil rights and that’s why I am here to honour this great man.”
Lion Of The Senate
Mourners from Hollywood star Jack Nicholson to Irish Prime Minister Brian Cowen crowded the Our Lady of Perpetual Help Basilica as cellist Yo-Yo Ma played and tenor Placido Domingo sang. Readings came from several generations of Kennedys.
Obama and former presidents Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton sat at the front with their wives.
After his eulogy, Obama hugged Kennedy’s tearful widow, Victoria, with one of his hands on the casket.
Obama said Kennedy was the product of an age when political differences did not prevent cooperation and mutual respect between adversaries who saw each other as patriots. “And that’s how Ted Kennedy became the greatest legislator of our time.”
Loved by liberals, Kennedy was both respected and reviled by conservatives, many of whom never forgave him for the Chappaquiddick car accident in 1969 when he drove off a bridge, escaping while a woman who was with him died. He did not call police for nine hours, and the incident may have ended any chance he had of becoming president.
Obama recalled the many tragedies the senator lived through, calling them “a string of events that would have broken a lesser man.”
With Kennedy’s death, Obama lost a crucial ally in his struggle to overhaul the $2.5 trillion US healthcare system in which nearly 46 million people go uninsured. Kennedy, a consummate dealmaker, could have helped Obama through what has become a contentious debate across the country.
At the Mass, Kennedy’s grandson Max Allen, 12, touched on the political issue of the day, saying that ensuring every American access to healthcare was “what my grandpa called the cause of his life.”
