E-mail a friendVernon Jordan
airdate August 26, 2009
Vernon Jordan is known internationally for his work in the civil rights, business, legal and political arenas. He served as National Urban League president-CEO, UNCF exec director and director of the Southern Regional Council's Voter Education Project. He's also advised U.S. presidents and was chair of President Clinton's transition team. Jordan is a Howard University law school graduate and author of Make It Plain and Vernon Can Read!: A Memoir, which chronicles his rise from the Atlanta projects to Washington power broker.
Civil rights attorney reflects on his personal friendship with the late senator. (3:08)
Full interview. (7:27)
Vernon Jordan
Tavis: Earlier today I spoke by telephone with veteran Washington insider Vernon Jordan to get his thoughts on the passing of Senator Ted Kennedy.
[Begin recorded phone interview.]
Tavis: Vernon Jordan, thanks for your time. I appreciate the opportunity to talk to you today.
Vernon Jordan: I'm happy to talk to you, though it's a sad moment in America.
Tavis: Let me start by asking you about your long-term friendship and relationship with Ed Kennedy. I know, of course - we all know at one point for a number of years you were the head of the National Urban League, and I certainly expect in that capacity you worked with Senator Kennedy. But I can also imagine you probably knew him long before then.
Jordan: Knew him long before that. I actually met him, Senator Kennedy, in 1968 when his brother Robert, who was pursuing the Democratic nomination for the presidency, asked me to have a conversation with Teddy and with Ted Sorensen about a direct involvement on my part in the Robert Kennedy campaign.
And I had a long session with Ted Kennedy and with Ted Sorensen in Washington about that and made the decision that I could do best by all of the candidates that were running by continuing my stewardship at the Voter Education Project of the Southern Regional Council.
Tavis: So you turned down Bobby Kennedy?
Jordan: I did. Through Edward, through Teddy, I did - yes, I did, in 1968.
Tavis: And for all the stories we've heard over the years, and certainly over the last hours since he passed away, for all the stories we've heard, Vernon Jordan, about what a great negotiator he was, how did Edward Kennedy take that you were telling him to tell his brother that you were going to pass?
Jordan: He got over it. (Laughter) And we remained great friends. You may remember in 1980 when I was shot in Ft. Wayne one of the first visitors to that intensive care unit to see me when my life was like having one foot in the grave and another on a banana peel, and Teddy Kennedy came to Ft. Wayne to see about his friend, Vernon Jordan.
And then in July of 1980, when I was still in the New York Hospital recovering from that incident, Ted Kennedy was campaigning in the Bronx and I heard it on the radio and saw it on television. Before the afternoon was over, unexpectedly he was in room 1719 in New York Hospital to visit and give comfort to his friend, Vernon Jordan.
He was incredibly compassionate when it came to his friends and he was one who was not only sympathetic but he went with you and stood by you and propped you up on every weak and leaning side. I shall never forget those two hospital visits from Teddy.
Tavis: You referenced 1980. We, of course, all remember that was the year that he decided to run against Jimmy Carter, and I suspect the campaign you're referencing was that campaign, where he was trying to wrest the Democratic nomination from then-President Jimmy Carter.
I've seen Jimmy Carter, of course, interviewed today sharing his remembrances of that. Let me ask you specifically what Kennedy jumping in that race against that incumbent president named Jimmy Carter did to Black folk.
Jordan: Well, I think it created a kind of an ambivalence. We had elected Carter in 1976. The Black vote made a huge difference in sending him to the White House, and I think that there were some feelings about which way to go, whether to stay with the incumbent or whether to stay with Kennedy. I forget what the break-down was but I'm very much aware that there was some ambivalence.
Tavis: We've heard a lot, of course, over the past few hours since his passing about his strong and unequivocal record in civil rights. Let me ask you to properly contextualize for me where he stands and how he rates juxtaposed against his brothers, because my read of history says that John Kennedy, respectfully, had a spotty record, Robert Kennedy got better over time before he died during the civil rights era, but that Edward Kennedy, quite frankly, is the best of the three on a civil rights record.
Jordan: Well, there's no question about that. He had something to build on. He had what his brother the president did, and what his brother the attorney general and senator did and he built on it. And he had longer to work at it than they did. The president was in office not very long and Bobby Kennedy was attorney general not very long, and then not very long as senator.
But Teddy served for 47 years in the United States Senate and we could always count on him. He was there when we needed him.
Tavis: I wonder, Vernon Jordan, now that we live in the most multicultural, multiracial, multiethnic America ever, now that we have an African American president, I wonder whether or not there will ever be another senator like him in terms of fighting for the least among us, those who are disenfranchised politically, socially, economically.
Will we ever see another senator like him? And put another way, will history demand that we have other senators like that, given that some believe now that we don't need a Ted Kennedy, that we live now in a post-racial America?
Jordan: Well, I think we have to hope that we will not just get one Ted Kennedy but we would get 10, 15, 20 Ted Kennedys to serve in the United States Senate or to serve in the House of Representatives. This notion about post-racial, I'm not sure it's post-racial. I'm very pleased, obviously, about the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States, but that does not mean that the issue of race is finished, that we have crossed the finished line in this process. We need what Teddy Kennedy has given us, and we need what he has left us, and I hope that we will get many more like him.
Tavis: Finally, then, for those who will take an interest in the nobility of public service, what's the abiding lesson you think they, we ought to take from the life and legacy of Ted Kennedy?
Jordan: Well, he showed us the way. He was an example - 47 glorious years in the United States Senate, and he served well, he served long, and we are the beneficiaries of that service.
Tavis: A great leader in his own right, Vernon Jordan with his thoughts tonight on the life and legacy of now the late, great United States Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts.
Mr. Jordan, as always, thanks for the opportunity to talk to you, sir.
Jordan: Anytime, my friend.
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