MovieChat Forums > Thirteen Days (2001) Discussion > Who would have been in an RFK administra...

Who would have been in an RFK administration?

posted 15 years ago by stephenwright1991
7 replies | jump to latest

Lets presume for a moment that RFK didn't get killed in 1968 and he went on to beat Nixon in the Presidential election. Who would he have chosen as his running mate and who would have been in another Kennedy administration, would there be people coming over from the JFK years or would RFK want to start a new government.

President:Robert F Kennedy
Vice President:Hubert H Humphrey
Secretary of State:Mcgeorge Bundy
Secretary of Defense:Sargent Shriver
Secretary of the Treasury:William McChesney Martin Jr.
Attorney General:George Ball
National Security Advisor:Maxwell Taylor

[–] KSzir 15 years ago

I don't know if they would have kept Taylor around, after all they weren't too thrilled with how he handled the crisis, such as backing Lemay's authority for the limited Def-Con 2 alert. Got to do a little more thinking but I'm not sure about Shriver or Taylor. It'd probably be people who had nothing to do with Vietnam in order to ensure he's pledge to withdraw, I've got to do some research and see who was advising him in the campaign. Interesting thread, I'll be back.

[–] jakob3 14 years ago

Shriver, Taylor (whom RFK admired personally but disagreed with on policy)
and HHH are unlikely. Although RFK would have offered the VP to HHH 1st,
I think the Hump would have demurred, unlike LBJ in 1960.

As a substitute unifier for Hube,
RFK might have offered VP to a governor or ex-governor like Terry Sanford
of NC, who was a liberal ally of the Kennedys on civil rights, a military
vet, and a political coordinator for LBJ & HHH in 1968.

Had the Constitution allowed 2 candidates from the same state, RFK
might have been creative enough to offer VP to Rockefeller: their
support overlapped.

But maybe Terry & Rocky are wishful thinking on my part.
Look who RFK people turned to him to carry their cause in Chicago
after RFK was slain: I think RFK most likely would have picked
George McGovern, who shared RFK's religious earnestness & values.

Anybody but Clean Gene, of whom it was said, "You had to get to know
McCarthy well to really dislike him." He seemed to strike intimates
as too detached & vindictive.

[–] Landulph 14 years ago

More plausible VP pick: RFK's good friend and ally George McGovern, who was one of his earliest supporters against Johnson/Humphrey and took up the reins of RFK's campaign after his assassination. At the very least, the SD senator would have been an absolute shoo-in for Secretary of Agriculture in an RFK admin--McGovern has said that prior to running in 1972, Sec of Ag in a Dem admin was his highest political ambition.

[–] pe81171 14 years ago

In a lower position, I guess Pierre Salinger would have been Press Secretary again.

Frank: Just a man.
Harmonica: An ancient race.

[–] 14 years ago

[deleted]

[–] jaystarstar 14 years ago

I think there would have been some carryover from the JFK administration but a lot of new faces as well.

HHH would have been too identified with the LBJ administration to take the VP nomination from RFK.

I think Edmund Muskie, who DID get the VP nod from Humphrey in real life, would have been a logical choice for Kennedy as well (although the ticket would have been geographically tilted way to the Northeast).

John Connally would have been a geographic as well as an ideological balance as a VP candidate. Connally of course was about as far right as you could get and still be Democratic, he might have drawn a small percentage of conservatives who otherwise might have gone GOP.

I think Shriver would have been a better fit as Secretary of State than Defense.

Although in the wake of all the carping JFK took over naming RFK as AG, I suspect RFK would probably have avoided naming any actual family members to the Cabinet. Shriver might well have been Chief of Staff.

Attorney General: Nick Katzenbach, a close family friend who succeeded RFK as AG and served for a couple years under LBJ.

George Plimpton, a close friend of RFK's, could have been press secretary or a lead speechwriter. Or, as someone suggested, maybe Salinger would have come back.

[–] cdon 14 years ago

Most of the people on the list probably would have made it into a RFK administration, except for Sargent Shriver. I was just reading Symptoms of Withdraw by Christopher Lawford and he said that before RFK's death he was angry at Sargent Shriver for accepting an ambassadorship to France from LBJ whom RFK did not like.