Jehangir Hussain :
‘Profiles in Courage’ is a 1956 volume of short biographies describing acts of bravery and integrity of eight senators of the United States. Then a senator JFK won the Pulitzer Prize for the book. ‘Profiles in Courage’ articulates and argues for the significance of the idea of political courage in the chequered American political history.
The volume profiles eight senators who defied the opinions of their party and the voters to do what they thought was correct and faced severe criticism as well as popularity losses because of what they did. The book begins with a quote from Edmund Burke on the courage of English statesman Charles James Fox in his famous 1783 attack upon the tyranny of the East India Company in the House of Commons.
‘Profiles in Courage’ deals with 19th century antebellum in America and the efforts of senators to delay the American Civil War. The conventions of the antebellum South took place before the US Civil War. ‘Profiles in Courage’ became a best seller. Its foreword is written by Allen Nevins.
JFK was elected to the House of Representatives thrice, in 1946, 1948 and 1950 from Massachusetts. He was elected a senator from Massachusetts in 1952 and 1958. JFK resigned from the Senate and was elected as president in 1960.
It was a passage from a book by American journalist, historian and editor of The Louisville Courier Herbert Aga for his 1933 book ‘The People’s Choice’ a critical look at the American presidency. The Price of the Union is about an act of courage by an earlier senator from Massachusetts, John Quincy Adams that gave JFK the idea of writing about senators’ courage. JFK showed the passage to Ted Sorensen and asked him to see it could find some more senators who had shown such courage. Sorensen found out the senators as requested and eventually there was enough material for not an article as JFK had planned, but for a book.
With assistance from research assistants the US Library of Congress, Sorensen wrote a first draft of the book while JFK was bedridden with Addison’s disease during 1954 and 1955, while recovering from surgery.
John Quincy Adams from Massachusetts, Daniel Webster also from Massachusetts, Thomas Herbert Benton from Missouri, Sam Houston from Texas, Edmund G Rose from Kansas, Lucius Lamar from Mississippi, George Norris from Nebraska and Robert A Taft from Ohio, were the eight senators profiled in the book for their extraordinary courage.
John Quincy Adams was profiled for breaking away from the Federalist Party, Webster for speaking in favour of the compromise of 1850, as part of it the Fugitive Slave Act was amended and the slave trade in Washington, DC was abolished, and California entered the Union as a free state and a territorial government was created in Utah.
Benton was profiled for staying in the Democratic Party, despite his opposition to the extension of slavery in the territories. Houston was profiled for speaking against the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, which would have allowed the two states to decide on the slavery question.
Edmund G Ross, from Kansas, was profiled for voting for acquittal of in the Andrew Johnson impeachment trial. As a result of Ross’s vote, along with those of other Republicans, Democrat Johnson’s presidency was preserved.
Lucius Lamar from Mississippi was profiled for praising Charles Summer on the Senate floor and other efforts to mend ties between the North and South during the Reconstruction and for his principled opposition to the Bland-Allison Act, referred to as the Grand Bland Plan of 1878, an Act of the US Congress requiring the US Treasury to buy a certain amount of silver and put it into circulation as silver dollar. He gave rousing speeches that eventually led to public approval of his decisions and cemented a legacy of courageousness.
George Norris from Nebraska was profiled for opposing Joseph G Cannon’s autocratic power as speaker of the House of Representatives, for speaking out against arming US merchant ships during United States’ neutral period during the First World War and for supporting the presidential campaign of Democrat Al Smith, the first Catholic to be a major party nominee.
Senator Robert A Taft, from Ohio, was profiled for criticising the Nuremberg Trials for trying Nazi war criminals under the ex post facto laws, counter criticism against Taft’s statements contributed to his failure to secure the Republican nomination for president in 1948.
In 1956, JFK gave a copy of ‘Profiles in Courage’ to Richard Nixon, who responded that he was looking forward to read it. In 1962, Nixon wrote his book ‘Six Crises in response to Profiles in Courage’.
JFK wrote two other books, A Nation of Immigrants and Why England Slept. His books were sold by book stores in Dhaka in the 1960s and he had many readers.
In 1990, JFK’s family created a ‘Profiles in Courage Award’ to honour individuals who acted with courage just like those profiled in the book. Despite the controversies surrounding JFK including his authorship of ‘Profiles in Courage’, for his charismatic leadership, he still remains popular with the old generation. The unresolved mystery of his assassination made him a tragic figure. He was popular also for his youthful leadership.
