Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

On November 22, 1963, President Kennedy participated in a motorcade through the streets of Dallas, Texas, on his way to give a speech at the Dallas Trade Mart. The President and his wife rode in an open top convertible limousine, and were accompanied by Texas Governor John Connally and his wife. As they drove through the Dealey Plaza area, shots rang out, killing President Kennedy and wounding the Governor.

A number of witnesses to the shooting had noticed a man with a rifle in a sixth floor window of the Texas Book Depository, which the motorcade had passed only moments before the shootings occurred. This man was later identified as Lee Harvey Oswald. Oswald was arrested several hours after the President was shot; he was charged with the murder of Dallas police Officer J. D. Tippit, who had been killed shortly after the President's fatal wounding (Kurtz 15-16). Evidence quickly began to pile up linking Oswald to the murder of

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tion clearly indicated that Connally had been shot no more than 1.6 seconds after Kennedy (Kurtz 31-32). This would seem to indicate that another shot had been fired from a second weapon. Arlen Specter, the commission's junior counsel, theorized that this discrepancy was actually due to the fact that one bullet had hit President Kennedy, passed through his body, exited, and then hit Governor Connally. This explanation has been seriously challenged. Josiah Thompson has noted that "tests indicated that a pristine bullet from Oswald's rifle could not have caused the Governor's wrist wound" (207). Furthermore, Thompson argues that "Specter bent the evidence . . . to accord with his single-bullet theory" (206). The single bullet theory served to explain away the clearest signs of conspiracy in the Kennedy assassination. As Kurtz has noted, if it were determined that there were two assassins, "by definition, John Kennedy's murder would be the result of a conspiracy" (31). Many writers on the topic of Kennedy's assassination feel that Lee Harvey Oswald was falsely implicated for the murder of the President. Furthermore, it is believed that Oswald was chosen for this role by the real assassins, who created a trail of false clue
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Approximate Word count = 1995
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

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