I’m not sure that I really know too much about Ted Kennedy.  Sure, he was the youngest brother of John and Bobby, but he was different.  He drove his car off a bridge at Chappaquiddick, failed to report the fatal accident for 10 hours.  He divorced his first wife (the marriage was later annulled.)  He supported a woman’s right to abortion.  I remember when he ran for President in my Senior year at a Catholic high school, the priests and brothers and even a few of my classmates derided him for his stance on issues that ran against those of the Church.  I remember my mother calling him a drunk.  Yet, in many ways those flaws made him all the more real to me.  Sure, he was from Massachusetts, and of course a Red Sox fan (coincidentally, it was 10 years ago back in July 1999 when I was attending an inter-league game between the Phillies and the Sox at Fenway Park that Teddy’s nephew, the late JFK, Jr. was memorialized in a moment of silence, as the airplane he had been piloting was missing off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard.)  He wasn’t really ever Presidential material, and he surely did his best work in the Senate, which is where he belonged.  In many ways, thanks to his longevity, he left a more enduring legacy than his older brothers, and while many Americans look at John and Bobby and ask “what might have been.” we look to Teddy’s achievements and we find the answer.

The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.