John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage: Decisive Moments in the Lives of Celebrated Americans, 1955; Harper; 266 pages. This was required reading for Va. and U.S. History in 11th Grade at Washington-Lee High School in Arlington VA during the 1959-1960 school year, in Simon Korczowski ('s) history class. Senator Kennedy would be elected president in 1960. This particular history teacher was notorious for making his exams all essay (except for one time when the school board made him give a multiple choice test for 20% of the midterm -- today, of course, the Virginia SOL's are largely multiple choice, although there are free response essay questions on SAT's and AP exams and even on the SOL's there is at least one free-response writing sample, where history knowledge could be appropriate). The teacher, an ex-Army office hero in WWII and Korea, had become a passionate progressive and reformist, very much a political liberal despite his military background, and I think he believed he was training the next generation of social activists (including me). He was notorious for marking points off on exams for leaving things out of answers, and he demanded extreme intellectual objectivity from students in answer essay questions about controversial issues from the past. (If you go to Colonial Williamsburg's Revolutionary City, you get an idea of what these controversies could be.) Some of his pet questions (often worded a bit annoyingly in a pedantic future tense) included: analyzing mercantilism in colonial times, discussing the role of the Negro (an acceptable term in 1960) in the revolutionary war and again during the Reconstruction, discussing the Dred Scott Decision, discussing Plessy v. Ferguson comparing it to Brown v. Board of Education, discussing the Fall Line, tracing the positions of major political parties (including the Whigs). This kind of intellectual objectivity and personal disjunction becomes a theme of the book, but it also contradicts the behavior expected of most people in a competitive economy where people are paid to sell the goods, services or intellectual positions of others in order to provide for a family!
Now, the teacher assigned this book as required reading during the later part of the school year, in May of 1960, and we had to write in in-class book report (I think it was open book). I remember getting an "85" on it. (That was a C in W-L's grading scale at the time.) He would mark down if "I didn't learn anything." The book has nine detailed profiles: John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster, Thomas Hart Benton, Sam Houston, Edmund G. Ross, Lucius, Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar, George Norris, Robert A. Taft. One could add to the list today: Rosa Parks, for example. Or the heroes of 9/11. The last chapter is called "The Meaning of Courage" and Kennedy dissects some of the paradoxes in his concept of courage. This may be the part that the history teacher wanted us to get. Kennedy writes:
'It (courage) is not intended to justify independence for the sake of independence, obstinacy to all compromise or excessively proud and stubborn adherence to one's own personal convictions.... Finally, the book is not intended to disparage democratic government and popular rule... The true democracy, living and growing and inspiring, puts its faith in its people--faith that the people will not simply elect men who will represent their views ably and faithfully, but also elect men who will exercise their conscientious judgment--faith that the people will not condemn those whose devotion to principle leads them to unpopular courses, but will reward courage, respect honor, and ultimately recognize right.'
Carolyn Kennedy gives an annual award to a public servant who fights for his or her convictions despite adversarial political pressure. The latest award was given on the NBC "Today" show on May 22, 2006.