Ted Kennedy's Speech to the Moral Majority

TED KENNEDY SPEECH TO THE MORAL MAJORITY

This essay discusses a speech given by Senator Edward (Ted) Kennedy at Liberty Baptist College in Lynchburg, Virginia on October 3, 1983 to 5,000 students and townspeople, most of whom were adherents of the Reverend Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, analyzes its background, goals and rhetorical obstacles and evaluates the strategies used by the speaker for overcoming those obstacles as well as the success or failure of the speech.

Senator Kennedy's speech which was entitled "Truth and Tolerance in America" came about in part by accident. Through a computer error, Senator Kennedy was included in mid-May, 1983 on a mass membership solicitation mailing of the Moral Majority and was offered Membership No. B0500878. The Senator's office leaked the error to the New York Times which wrote a humorous article about it (Wrong B 12). Senator Kennedy told Cal Thomas, a Vice President of the Moral Majority that "he knew [you] are not at all happy with President Reagan but this is ridiculous" (A 30).

Thomas told the New York Times that the membership offer would not be withdrawn, stating that "we'll offer him an opportunity to atone for his past political sins. No man is beyond redemption" (Wrong B 12). Kennedy showed no interest in becoming a member but when Thomas invited him to visit Liberty Baptist College, he offered to speak there. After considering the matter, Falwell arranged the speech and sent his private plane to transport

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unless stopped by a return to moral principles, destroy the nation" (Webber 15). The Moral Majority was for a strong national defense, the teaching of literal creationism in schools, the restoration of prayer in the public schools, and against pornography, gay rights, loose morals, and the breakdown of the family, issues on which liberal Democrats in general and on some of which Kennedy in particular after the Chappaquidick incident was especially vulnerable. Strategies for Overcoming Obstacles Kennedy used a number of devices to overcome or sidestep these obstacles. He sprinkled his speech with humor to relax his audience. In issuing his plea for tolerance, he said "we will always respect the right of others to differ --that we will view ourselves with a sense of perspective and a sense of humor." He pointed out that Falwell had been criticized by strict fundamentalists by including various faiths in his coalition, including Catholics, and had thus "become the target of narrow prejudice." To make several of his points, he used examples and language from the Bible. In recounting efforts to establish a framework of religious liberty in colonial days, he threw in a reference to Virginia having harassed Baptist preachers, an obvi

Category: Government - T