On June 20, 1963, the a centesimal birthday of West Virginia, President John F. Kennedy made his final look within the Mountain State. Talking in Charleston, he declared: ‘‘I’d not be the place I’m now, I’d not have a few of the tasks which I now bear, if it had not been for the folks of West Virginia.’’ He referred to the 1960 West Virginia main, when he triumphed over Hubert H. Humphrey.
The success of Senator Kennedy in profitable the Democratic main on Might 10, 1960, eradicated the spiritual barrier to Catholics to run for president. It was additionally an early instance of the very costly media campaigns which have since grow to be frequent. The marketing campaign additionally started televised marketing campaign debates between Kennedy and Senator Humphrey, previous the well-known debates held within the fall between Kennedy and Nixon.
Though Kennedy narrowly defeated Richard Nixon nationally in 1960, he gained by the snug margin of 46,000 votes in West Virginia. Nonetheless, he ran far behind different statewide Democratic candidates and this poor exhibiting has been attributed to an anti-Catholic vote. Former Governor Hulett Smith, the Democratic state chairman in 1960, mentioned, ‘‘I believe each voter in West Virginia was besieged with several types of hate literature’’ and attributed Kennedy’s lack of some counties to the anti-Catholic effort.
What was the Kennedy legacy within the Mountain State? In his first act as president, Kennedy doubled the excess meals allotment for the poor in West Virginia. He additionally prolonged welfare advantages for the needy, initiated the nationwide meals stamp program in West Virginia, and in just a few months drastically elevated the quantity of federal help despatched to the state. In three years he boosted West Virginia’s rank in protection contracts from fiftieth to twenty fifth and helped the state to acquire new buildings and to enhance the park system. Maybe the best boon was the inclusion of a north-south freeway as a part of the federal interstate freeway system. Kennedy’s election gave the folks of the state an uplift of spirit and a way of satisfaction for the key function they’d performed in his turning into president.
The phrases from his final go to to the state had been: ‘‘The solar doesn’t all the time shine in West Virginia however the folks all the time do.’’ Kennedy discovered a particular place within the hearts of West Virginians, his {photograph} going in lots of properties that beforehand had displayed footage of the beloved Franklin Roosevelt or union chief John L. Lewis.
To study extra about West Virginia historical past, equivalent to Francis Pierpont was unanimously elected as governor of the unionist Reorganized State of Virginia, go to register-herald.com
