hen Robert F. Kennedy was shot on June 5, 1968, he had just assumed the leadership of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party by beating Eugene McCarthy in the California Primary. For nearly four years — ever since a dramatic appearance on the last night of the 1964 Democratic Convention, when a standing ovation delayed the opening of his speech by a full 16 minutes — he had been the favorite of liberal Democrats, who were deserting Lyndon Johnson because of the Vietnam War. Elected to the Senate from the state of New York in 1964, he had also emerged as a spokesman for the urban poor, who had rioted in Harlem in 1964, in Watts in 1965 and in nearly every major city from 1966 through the spring of 1968.
His death a day later froze him in time as a symbol of that era. For many American liberals, especially after that year’s election culminated in the victory of Richard Nixon, he also became a symbol of not just a better past, but also a better future that might have been. Lost in the aftermath of his death and the tumultuous events of the rest of 1968, is the matter of just how liberal Robert Kennedy really was.
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