RFK Dedication A Political Paradox

In this commentary, CBSNews.com Legal Consultant Andrew Cohen looks at President Bush's move to name the Justice Department headquarters after former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.

The current Administration's ironic and quite unexpected obsession with Robert Kennedy stems primarily from the current attorney general, who reportedly has turned to the writings of late Democratic presidential hopeful for solace and support and resolve during these difficult times for law and order in America. Ashcroft, apparently, admires the way Kennedy fought the good fight against organized crime in the 1950s when he was chief counsel of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations and, later, when he had the same title for the Select Committee on Improper Activities in the Labor or Management Field. Ashcroft, apparently, feels as though there are lessons to be learned from that fight that can help guide law enforcement officials in their fight against domestic and international terror.

All of which is fine. It's perfectly acceptable and even a little charming that Attorney General Ashcroft who look to the lessons of history and to its predecessors to help guide him in this big fight. But WWBS? What Would Bobby Say about all this attention from a successor whose political and legal views aren't exactly in sync with those who idolize Kennedy and his latter-day followers, including but not limited to, former President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary, the current junior senator from New York? The answer: it depends. Young Bobby probably wouldn't mind it at all. Older Bobby, the one who ran for president in 1968, probably would find it awful.

The young Robert Kennedy, the one who chased after former Teamster Boss Jimmy Hoffa for all those months and years, probably would applaud in large measure the way the current Justice Department has fought the war on terror. In Evan Thomas' fine book about Kennedy, published just last year, the author portrays the Senate counsel as a relentless, aggressive, zealous, tough, combative, suspicious and tightly-wound fighter. Thomas also portrays Kennedy, the attorney general for a few years during his brother's ill-fated regime, among other things as a practical, searing, searching, inquisitive, and demanding government official, someone who got things done and didn't just talk about them.

This Robert ennedy, the younger Robert Kennedy, probably would also have moved swiftly and, yes, perhaps ruthlessly, to round up the "usual suspects" following Sept. 11th. He would have found creative ways of interpreting existing federal laws and mandates to achieve his goals and he would have put enormous pressure on the White House– his brother's White House– to pass sweeping anti-terror legislation. He likely would have been on the telephone starting at 10 am on Sept. 11th calling around to FBI field offices around the country, micro-managing the way he did during the desegregation crises of the early 1960s.

He would have kept after domestic terrorists the way he kept after Jimmy Hoffa and the gangsters who were the subject of the Rackets Committee– with a savageness and concentration of purpose which is rarely seen in Washington or anywhere else. Monitoring conversations between attorneys and terror suspects? No problem, this early Kennedy likely would have said, given his history of authorizing the wiretapping of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s confident, among others. Longer detentions for immigration violators? Sure, as long as the government thought they could get something out of those people, this Kennedy might have noted. Military tribunals? Kennedy was Attorney General less than 20 years after military tribunals had been used in World War II.

This clearly is the Robert Kennedy that John Ashcroft wants to emulate. And why not? John Ashcroft will have to be all these things and more if he is to be successful in his Justice Department's war against terror. But the Robert Kennedy who embodied all those traits until the end of 1964 became a very different man in the last three and a half years of his life. He became distrustful of government, especially his own party's handling of the Vietnam War. And he embraced much more fully the underdogs of society, the poor and the downtrodden, the minorities and the halt and the lame. In 1965, about a year after he left the office of Attorney General and a year before he was elected as a senator in New York, he even expressed admiration for Che Guevara, which is not exactly a talking point this Administration is likely to use anytime soon.

This Robert Kennedy, the older one, almost certainly would not have thought highly of the current Administration's war on terror. The Robert Kennedy of 1968 would have been terribly concerned about the new laws' effects upon the poor and recent immigrants. He would have found the secrecy and expediency of military tribunals to be suspicious at best and disastrous at worse given his experiences with trust and government during the Vietnam War. Robert Kennedy in 1966 and 1967 and 1968 likely would have been among the first senators to demand that the Justice Department make public the list of post-attack detainees and that it be held much more accountable for their whereabouts, conditions and legal status. This Robert Kennedy would not have been satisfie with the platitudes coming out of the Justice Department these days about protecting these detainees from privacy problems.

In fact, so enormous is the dichotomy between the Robert Kennedy that John Ashcroft apparently revers and the Robert Kennedy that many Democrats and liberals cherish that even the late RFK's children cannot seem to agree on what to think about it. Given his remarks Tuesday at the ceremony marking the renaming of the Justice Department building, Joseph P. Kennedy II seems to think it's great that a conservative Administration is honoring his father so. But Kerry Kennedy Cuomo, RFK's daughter, seemed downright angry that this Justice Department was using her late father's mantle to gain support for its current policies. That tells me that Robert F. Kennedy's legacy is broad enough to give a little bit of something to everyone. And you can decide for yourselves whether that is good or bad.

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