It was a pivotal year for both me and the nation. My father's passing the year before set the stage for my awakening to political realities other than those I was raised with.

I will always be grateful to a young Mr Kennedy for taking the time and the trouble to pitch an unpopular message to a palpably hostile crowd.

It was definitely the high point of my BYU experience.

What was his unpopular message?

LBJ's bloody mess in the 'Nam.

I wasn't there for that one. I do remember the last time he spoke though, following which he was shot by sniper Sirhan Sirhan.

That will be etched forever in my memory.

I also poignantly remember what I was doing when JFK was assassinated, albeit I was four years old. I sensed the shock of a nation watching the news from our livingroom tv set that day, even though I was too young to understand the magnitude of the event.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2017 11:50AM by Amyjo.

Maybe you can explain to us just how Sirhan Sirhan was a sniper.

I remember the shooting.

I didn't arrive until later. But I do remember Spiro Agnew's visit. I don't remember what he said. I do remember that every few words, the crowd would stand and cheer. Yes, a very welcoming crowd.

I was there.

I roomed with two guys from my high school in Calif. who were both racist right-wingers. Steve's father was a John Bircher, and the family had canvased for Goldwater. The other roommate was another racist from Kalispell MT. When Kennedy was killed a couple of months later, there was much rejoicing. (My own parents were Kennedy people.) They also rejoiced and joked when King was assassinated. I think a lot of Mormons did.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/2017 11:32AM by cludgie.

Yep, I remember the NON-grief in my household, well just from the holy penishood holder in my household, when both the Kennedys and King were gunned down. Kind of a "well someone had to do it" relief. Cause you know... Christian.

"As bloggers have pointed out in the recent discussions over the prospect of Vice-President Cheney speaking at BYU, Senator Robert F. Kennedy spoke at BYU on March 27, 1968.

"Here’s the 1968 'Dialogue' that published a transcript of Kennedy’s speech: “RFK at BYU,” Dialogue, Vol. 3:3 (Autumn, 1968), 163-167.

"Here’s a photo and the 1982 reprint of the speech from BYU’s off-campus magazine, Seventh East Press , in “RFK at BYU: The Day the Fieldhouse Rocked.” [note: link has been removed]

"Here’s a photo of the Senator signing BYU student autographs. (Thanks, Justin, at #133 on Julie’s 'Cheney at BYU,' 'Times and Seasons' blog .)

"And then, Bergera and Prides, in Brigham Young University: 'House of Faith,' discuss the RFK visit in chapter 5, “Partisan Politics & the University,” in the 'The Development of a Speakers Policy' section. It’s available online at Signature Books. Here’s an excerpt relevant to the RFK visit:

"'When television reporter Howard K. Smith, who had also been invited during [BYU Pres.] Wilkinson’s absence, spoke favorably of U.S. president Lyndon Johnson’s New Society, Wilkinson promised that Smith would not be invited again . . . .

“'Wilkinson also argued that the joint appearance of nationally syndicated columnists Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson would 'have serious repercussions with certain members of my Board of Trustees [presumably ET Benson?], who are acquainted with what they consider to be the unethical conduct of these two gentlemen' . . . .

"Following the appearance of U.S. vice-president Hubert Humphrey in October 1966, Wilkinson complained that he had been pressured by Democratic General Authorities into allowing the vice-president to speak on campus . . . He was particularly annoyed that he had not had enough time to provide an articulate Republican rebuttal. Less than two years later, Wilkinson refused to cancel classes for the campus appearance of presidential candidate and U.S. senator Robert F. Kennedy (D–Massachusetts).

"Still, more than 15,000 students packed the George Albert Smith Fieldhouse to hear the charismatic Kennedy quip, 'I had a very nice conversation with Dr. Wilkinson, and I promised him that all Democrats would be off the campus by sundown.' The next week, Republican senator Charles H. Percy (Illinois) attracted fewer than 5,000 students. In late 1970, Wilkinson accompanied Senator Barry Goldwater and Utah’s Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, Laurence J. Burton…During the late 1960s, trustees expanded the speakers’ policy to prohibit speakers who were 'engaged in programs or movements antagonistic to the church or its standards,' which Wilkinson interpreted to preclude 'atheists,' 'subversives,' 'those [having] any link with Russia or who would destroy our country,' and'those who would defame or ridicule our concept of strict morality.'"

("RFK at BYU in 1968." by "Stirling," posted at "By Common Consent," 29 March 2007, http://bycommonconsent.com/2007/03/29/rfk-at-byu-in-1968/)
_____


Below is a description on the "Signature Books" website of the context of the political environment on the BYU campus in which RFK delivered his speech to its student body in March 1968:

"During [BYU president Ernest L.] Wilkinson’s 1964 absence [when he unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate], acting president Earl Crockett approved the speaking engagements of four alleged communist sympathizers: Louis Untermeyer, a consultant in English poetry to the Library of Congress; Max Lerner, a syndicated newspaper columnist; Stringfellow Barr, a historian and political satirist; and folksinger Allan Lomax.

"Upon his return, Wilkinson immediately cancelled the contracts of both Barr and Lomax (Wilkinson to Bernhard; Wilkinson to Bateman). When television reporter Howard K. Smith, who had also been invited during Wilkinson’s absence, spoke favorably of U.S. president Lyndon Johnson’s New Society, Wilkinson promised that Smith would not be invited again (Wilkinson to Horton; Wilkinson to Stafford).

"Wilkinson also argued that the joint appearance of nationally syndicated columnists Drew Pearson and Jack Anderson would “have serious repercussions with certain members of my Board of Trustees, who are acquainted with what they consider to be the unethical conduct of these two gentlemen” (Wilkinson to Taylor).

"Following the appearance of U.S. vice-president Hubert Humphrey in October 1966, Wilkinson complained that he had been pressured by Democratic General Authorities into allowing the vice-president to speak on campus (Wilkinson Journal). He was particularly annoyed that he had not had enough time to provide an articulate Republican rebuttal.

"Less than two years later, Wilkinson refused to cancel classes for the campus appearance of presidential candidate and U.S. senator Robert F. Kennedy (D–Massachusetts). Still, more than 15,000 students packed the George Albert Smith Fieldhouse to hear the charismatic Kennedy quip, 'I had a very nice conversation with Dr. Wilkinson, and I promised him that all Democrats would be off the campus by sundown.'

"The next week, Republican senator Charles H. Percy (Illinois) attracted fewer than 5,000 students. In late 1970, Wilkinson accompanied Senator Barry Goldwater and Utah’s Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, Laurence J. Burton, to the school’s Homecoming Assembly. Despite the protests of surprised ASBYU student body officers, Wilkinson invited Senator Goldwater, who had not been cleared by the Speakers Committee, to address the captive audience."

("Brigham Young University: A House of Faith, " by Gary James Bergera and Ronald Prides. Chapter 5: "Partisan Politics & the University--Responses to War and the Military," under the subtile, "THJe Development of a Speakers' Policy" {Salt Lake City, Utah: Signature Books, 1985]. p. 199,http://signaturebookslibrary.org/responses-to-war-and-the-military/)


NOTE: Robert F. Kennedy's 27 March 1968 speech at BYU's Joseph Smith Fieldhouse is not listed in its archives of speeches for that year: https://speeches.byu.edu/archive/1968/; nor is the name, "Robert F. Kennedy"/"Robert Kennedy," found in those same archives as a BYU speaker: https://speeches.byu.edu/google-cse/?q=Robert+F.+Kennedy&submit=Search#gsc.tab=0&gsc.q=Robert%20F.%20Kennedy&gsc.page=7

**********


Below is an introduction about, and the transcribed text of, Robert F. Kennedy's speech at the BYU Joseph Smith Fieldhouse on 27 March 1968, entitled, "RFK AT BYU":

INTRODUCTION

"This speech by the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy was delivered at the Smith Fieldhouse at Brigham Young University, March 27, 1968, at a noon rally. Mr. Robert K. Reeve, the B.Y.U. student who transcribed the speech from a tape, reports that approximately 15,000 people were present, the 'largest crowd ever to tuitnessan event of any kind in the fieldhouse.'"


TEXT

"Thank you very much. Thank you. I appreciate very much being here . . . I understand that this is a campus made up of all political persuasions. I had a very nice conversation with Dr. Wilkinson [laughter] . . . and I prom- ised him that all Democrats would be off the campus by sundown[applause]. But I feel very close to this state. Not only did part of my wife's family live in the state of Utah for a long period of time, I traveled down your Green River . . . spent part of the time in the water . . . [laughter] and then I spent part of my honeymoon here and I've had ten children since then, so I have learned something from the Mormons [laughter]. I think that we still have a great deal in common, and [in common] with the man this university honors. For I too have a large family [laughter],I too have settled in many states [laughter]. And now I too know how it is to take on Johnson's army [laughter and applause].

"So I am delighted to be with you. I am going to speak relatively briefly, but then I'd be glad to answer any questions you might have about any of the matters I do not cover. I am not going to speak in any detail today . . . about Vietnam. But I would be glad to answer any questions about my position on that subject, or really any other subject, at the question period.
Many people have asked me--and again I apologize for my voice (I lost it somewhere between Portland and Seattle), but I'll do the best that I can--many people have asked me why I entered the race for the presidency.

"This is what Parley Pratt, one of Utah's great pioneers, wrote describing the winter of 1848:

"'My family and myself in common with many of the camp suffered much from lack of food. Myself and some of them were compelled to go with bare feet for several months. We toiled hard and lived on a few greens and on thistle and other roots.
For myself, I have been eating regularly. I wear shoes. I haven't had a meal of thistles lately. But running for the presidency,'

"I know exactly how Parley Pratt felt. But he won his fight to found a great state, and I hope that I am as fortunate in this struggle. Parley Pratt also wrote that year of the mood of the new settlement: 'All is quiet. All is stillness,' he said. 'No elections, no police reports, no murders, no wars in our little world. It is a dream of the poets actually fulfilled.'

"Utah is very different today and so is the United States. There is a war, there are murders, there are police reports, and there is an election. It is an election which will tell us what kind of country we will have and what kind of a country we will make for our children, and really, what kind of men we will be. It is of this election and, more importantly, what lies beyond it that I wish to speak with you today. In the last week I have met with your col- leagues across the United States--in Kansas, in Tennessee, in Alabama, in Watts, in Oregon, and New York. I've asked of them what I now ask of all of you--your help in the struggle for new leadership here in the United States of America, a new leadership around the rest of the world. I found in this past week a new sense of possibility. Not so much for my candidacy but for the principle that we remain the masters, not servants, of our own political life. And I think that's what's at stake in this election year[applause].

"I think that there is a stirring abroad in this land. I think we have come to realize not simply that our course must be changed, but that this course can be changed, and that it can be changed this year [applause]. And I believe we can and that we will win the nomination in Chicago in August and that we can win the election in November. But I ask for your help in making that possible. And you who will give your help, I believe, will offer it not merely to win an electoral victory. I think that we have to seek a victory of purpose. It's more than just an election of an individual; it's more than just a change in leadership. It's the direction in which we want the United States--our own country--to proceed. Our country needs what our own conscience demands a new dedication, a new commitment to its service, the realization that all across the country we must have a special mission and a special calling.

"For there should be no mistake: I think the next President of the United States must offer the people of this country not comfort, but challenge. He must respond to your concerns and he must demand in return that you fulfill your own spirit of concern with action for the betterment of our fellow citizens and for the betterment of our country. And that is what I intend to do.

"What are the tasks that we can do? What is this special mission of this generation of Americans? We've heard much debate in the past few years over the question of national service, but much of this debate in my judgment misses the point. We are a great and a generous nation and we are a great and generous people, but much still needs to be done within our own country. What we require is the commitment of this American generation to accept the burden of change across the whole range of conditions which are this nation's failures. I think you are willing to make that commitment. It can and it must be made, it seems to me, in some of the following ways:

"First, your help is needed in a forgotten place in this nation where there is committed every day the most terrible, terrible of crimes--the breaking of a child's spirit. I have seen these children starving in the state of Mississippi, in the Delta of Mississippi. Here we are in the United States with the gross national product of $800,000,000,000 and we have little children who are slowly starving to death, whose minds will never be the same because we haven't provided them even enough to eat. I have seen others surrendering their lives to despair in the ghettos of our great cities, watching their proud fathers reduced to the idle indignity of welfare. And I've seen this happen also in the ravished lands of eastern Kentucky. These and many more are the scars of the body of this nation, and they must be changed. And we must change them. And they can be changed. And they will be if our generation is willing to make that commitment to America, and if America will help you make it. There is much we can do together. [America needs] your commit- ment, your talent, your energy, your compassion, and your feeling, put to- gether with the great need of those who are less well off.

"Second, you must look beyond the problems of material poverty to the many kinds of poverty which afflict us all. All over this nation there are places where the air is polluted and the rivers are dying. Everywhere parks and open lands which afford us our essential cleansing contact with nature are being eroded by neglect, trampled by growth, and ripped and scarred by careless and selfish use. All this is something that you--all of you--can help to change. And it is something that we can commit ourselves to change.

"Third, you must take the lead in the creation and the organization of new organizations, new groups of concern and of action, to deal with the many problems of the day. Financial resources are only a part of what we need. We also need new kinds of organizations, small in size and scale, working in neighborhoods, able to establish the sense of personal contact and cooperation that we have lost all too often with the growth of our federal government. Kinds of organizations are diverse: they may be neighborhood help centers; they may be community job centers; they may be neighborhood assemblies where members of a real community meet formally and informally to debate issues of common concern and to develop a sense of identity in that neighborhood, one person with the other. In short, they are as varied and as different as the needs of the society. And I think all of us need to be a part of that venture.

"Fourth, your work is needed in the renewal of political institutions, broad- ening their base to engage a far greater proportion of the American people in the debate and the decison and the issues which finally affect their lives. Above all, I want us in government to understand that this kind of commitment is the greatest contribution that your generation of Americans can ren- der to this country. And I believe we could recognize this contribution by altering the laws of military service accordingly [applause]. I believe that if the difficulties could be resolved, this government ought to discharge young men from their military obligations if they have given a different but equally valuable kind of service to their country[applause].

"Let me be clear: I do not come here promising to develop a system of alternative service to the draft. There are serious difficulties involved in such an attempt.

"First, it could only work in peacetime, for nothing is comparable to the risks of combat, and those burdens must btmet by all of our citizens [applause].

"Second, it could not be allowed to reinforce the already rampant social and economic disparities in our system of [selective] service.

"Third, we should not assume that we could overcome the unattractive aspect of military life by giving higher benefits to those in the military [by] imposing greater burdens on those in the alternate service.

So I do not come before you with a complete program of alternative service. But I do say that America should be a nation where a man can serve his country without a uniform and without a gun [applause]. And I do say that America should honor those who improve the quality of our national life as much as those who fight to defend it. I do say that by working together we can design the kind of program that will fairly and equitably begin the process of alternative service. Obviously this is not an easy task. But it is not given to us to lead an easy life.

"It was once said of Utah (of the hard soil and the tribulation of your pioneers) that life does not come easy. Perhaps some of the special flavor of Utah comes from this quality that things come hard. That will be true too of our efforts, yours and mine, to match the generosity of our impulses with a determination to act. It will not be easy. But it will be a special task, one which will ennoble those who are willing to participate even as it wins for us a better country. And I ask you to join with me in that task. Thank you very much [extended applause]. Now, Doctor, that wasn't so bad was it? [laughter and more applause]"

("RFK at BYU" 27 March 1968, transcript of a tape of the speech made by BYU student Robert Reeve, http://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V03N03_165.pdf)



Edited 12 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2017 04:39PM by steve benson.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2017 08:27PM by Shummy.

Not to his speech, but at the time I was a former BYU student in California. It took longer for news to travel--no Internet.

Wilkinson was not an admirable human being. I think there is a whole book about him and his shenanigans. I was at BYU when he had spies in the political science department.

And I remember well the night Bobby died.

I also remember when my Mom's RS president was visiting my folks' house and complained about "Dirty Ernie" doing something to undermine the U. There was a battle between good and evil in the 1960s, Ernie vs. the saintly Lowell Bennion and T. Edgar Lyon. When the RS president complains about Dirty Ernie, you know he was a bad, bad, man.

It felt like the entire campus went numb from shock.

Thank you, Steve B, for the transcript of his talk. Just reading it brought back the memory of what a marvelous speaker he was, with that charismatic twinkle and quick wit.

The same quote was also misused by members. of the Kennedy clan, including by Robert. F. Kennedy.

Some background on the quote:

The late, assassinated candidate for the U.S. presidency, Robert F. Kennedy, was famous for invoking the following inspiring words (unfortunately, without attribution to its original author). As explained on an internet site devoted to famous works:

"Senator Robert F. Kennedy used a . . . quotation [originally penned by George Bernard Shaw] as a theme of his 1968 campaign for the presidential nomination:

'Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not.'"

RFK's brothers also used the same borrowed quote (also without attribution):

"Senator Edward M. Kennedy quoted these words of Robert Kennedy’s in his eulogy for his brother in 1968. ("The New York Times," June 9, 1968, p. 56) . . .

"President John F. Kennedy quoted these words in his address to the Irish Parliament, Dublin, June 28, 1963."

("Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963," p. 537)"


George Bernard Shaw was the original author of the quote that the Kennedys borrowed without giving proper credit.

Shaw's version was worded thusly:

"You see things; and you say 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say 'Why not?'"

"(ATTRIBUTION: GEORGE BERNARD SHAW [1856-1950], "Back to Methuselah," Act I,, "Selected Plays with Prefaces, vol. 2, p. 7 (1949). (The serpent says these words to Eve). . . . SUBJECTS: Dreams, WORKS: 'George Bernard Shaw Collection"

(cited from "Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations" 1989. "Great Books Online," Number 465, at Bartleby.com.http://www.bartleby.com/73/465.html)
_____


When my dad, Mark Benson, was president of the Indiana-Michigan Mission back in the 1970s, he would travel around the mission attending zone conferences and giving motivational speeches to the assembled LDS missionaries, in which he would quote RFK's version of Shaw's creation in an effort to commit his LDS missionaries to increasing their baptism numbers to meet my dad's mandated goals.

My dad, like the rest of the Benson family's dominating male hierarchy, was uber-conservative in his personal politics and, therefore, did not feel comfortable sharing RFK's purloined quote at missionary zone conferences without prefacing it with comments that criticized RFK that went something like this:

"I would like to share with you some great words from Robert F. Kennedy., although he was a Democrat. I didn't agree with his politics, but he did say something that I do agree with."

Dad would then quote RFK's reworked version of Shaw:

"Some men see things as they are and say, why; I dream things that never were and say, why not."
_____



So, the Kennedys used Shaw's quote without giving due credit to its originator, George Bernard Shaw.

My dad used the same quote, giving credit given for it to Robert F. Kennedy as its supposed originator--but not before dissing RFK for being a Democrat.

What an inglorious mess.



Edited 8 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/2017 12:01AM by steve benson.

I was there. He was an excellent speaker. Impressive.

I was already back in Canada by then and a student in Calgary but woke up to the news of his assassination. I still remember my cousin Hazel (a nasty piece of work) in Magna UT, who spewed vitriol when she talked about the Kennedys....because they were democrats and Catholics. My mom had Catholics in her family and I know she had to bite her tongue.

I was at that speech, but sadly I don't remember much about it at this point. I do remember being a big crowd of people which kind of surprised me. I was sure that I was the only Democrat at BYU and made a point to go see him. I was 19 then, just done with my first year at BYU.

I remember more vividly about 2 months later, being out with friends in Salt Lake City, a group of friends from high school. We were having a late 2AM breakfast at a restaurant in downtown SLC. When we went in, we could see the workers watching a TV and a waitress came in and told us what had happened earlier that night in Los Angeles. We’d been in a friends car and likely listening to AM radio and had no clue what was going on.

When I finally got home, my mom was upset with me and afraid that I had forgotten that I had an appointment that next morning at 8AM with the stake president to start my papers for my mission.

She told me some of the details about RFK’s death and I don’t remember if I slept or not.

I made it to the SP”s house just a few minutes late and he was sitting out in his driveway, in the front seat of his Chrysler Imperial. He saw me arrive and had forgotten my appointment but he decided to just sit there in the front seat and do the interview. The subject of what happened came up and he hadn’t heard anything about it. This of course was long before the days on non-stop news. I do remember that he said something like “Well, he wouldn’t have made a good president anyway”. He had been on the way to work so the interview only took about 15 minutes.

I don't know if I'm remembering it correctly, but I think there was some Q&A and some associated heckling afterward. What I do remember is that I had come early, and there was standing-room only once it filled up, seemingly beyond fire code level.

I doubt it would happen today at BYU. They allowed Cheney to speak, though. I think that really says something about where BYU's heart is. during my time there I heard Pearl Buck and other notable authors speak. I thought of one other notable female author I heard speak at BYU back then, but I can't remember who it was now. Point is, there was some degree of open forum back then. But LDS leaders tightened the wagons more and more, and now don't allow any outside voice to reach the ears of the insulated student audience. My daughter and her husband made it out of there just in time, when Tom Lantos spoke at commencement. That was the last outsider to speak there, as I recall--except for Cheney, of course.

Thanks Steve for putting up Bobby's speech. Reading his words again reminds me why they had such an impact on my young mind back when I first heard them in the Fieldhouse that fine spring day.

I'm so glad I cut class to hear them.

The masterful Kennedy touch is evident in the well prepared manner with which RFK calmly took on the explicit hostility of the Mormon establishment in general and that of Dirty Ernie in particular. Shades of Sorensen and brother John in ample evidence.

Seriously, calling upon historical Mormonia such as PPP and BY would be analogous to, say, Mitt Romney delivering a presidential campaign speech at Notre Dame complete with wisecracks about the Spanish Inquisition.