What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr’s cause has ever been stilled by an assassin’s bullet. No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason. Whenever any American’s life is taken by another American unnecessarily – whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence – whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded. Robert Kennedy, April 1968
For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colours. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter. This is the breaking of a man’s spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all. ibid.
When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his colour or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered. We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. ibid.
For those who have made our own lives possible, those who have given us our traditions, they didn’t look back to find out what our colour was or what our religion was or what our race was, they didn’t look that way to us. Robert Kennedy, South Africa June 1966
A revolution is coming – a revolution which will be peaceful if we are wise enough; compassionate if we care enough; successful if we are fortunate enough – but a revolution which is coming whether we will it or not. We can affect its character; we cannot alter its inevitability. Robert Kennedy, report to Senate of trip to South America 1966
Some day I’m gonna get rid of that guy. Robert Kennedy, re Carlos Marcello, to associates on investigatory committee
When I look out upon this audience I see both black and white faces. The basic question of whether we as black and white citizens in the United States are going to be able to live together, or whether we are going to divide ourselves into two armed camps. Robert Kennedy
How can we say to a Negro in Jackson when war comes you will be an American citizen but in the meantime you’re a citizen of Mississippi, and we cannot help you? How by any moral standards can we tell our Negro citizens our forefathers brought your forefathers over here against their will and we are going to make you pay for it? Yet isn’t that what this argument boils down to? The United States is dominated by white people politically and economically. The question is whether we in this position of dominance are going to have not the charity but the wisdom to stop penalising our fellow citizens whose only former sin is that they were born. Robert Kennedy
I think the great divisions in the country at the present moment are between those who are less affluent – our black citizens, Mexican-Americans and those who are poor whites – and the rest of the United States. They feel that they have been disenfranchised. Or that they have no association or identification with the United States government or with our society. That is the division. Robert Kennedy
Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total; of all those acts will be written the history of this generation. Robert Kennedy
I think you two should team up. Robert Kennedy and His Times starring Brad Davis & Veronica Cartwright & Cliff de Young & Ned Beatty & Beatrice Straight & Joe Pantoliano & Harris Yulin & Jeffrey Tambor & Jack Warden & River Pheonix & Jason Bateman et al, director Marvin J Chomsky, RFK’s sister to RFK & Ethel, CBS 1985
You can really help me by covering the details. ibid. JFK to RFK
We’re concerned with the spread of communism through the emerging nations of Asia. ibid. JFK
J Edgar Hoover is an important enemy. ibid. JFK to RFK
Dave Beck, President of America’s largest and most powerful labour union, is a crook. ibid. RFK
Mother thinks you’d make a fine Attorney General. ibid. JFK to RFK
I really want this disarmament agreement with Russia. ibid. JFK to RFK
Do you remember what Nehru suggested? Maybe we can provide an aura for democracy. ibid.
I doubt that there’s been a president since Roosevelt who’s been so systematically vilified. ibid. Pierre
To reign bombs on the innocent citizens of Cuba is simply immoral and to my mind unthinkable. ibid. RFK in cabinet
The two most powerful nations in the world are poised for self-destruction. ibid. JFK
My next term will the beginning of a major effort to deal with poverty in this country. ibid.
The one that worries me is Romney. ibid.
Bobby Kennedy is just another lawyer now, and my troubles are over. ibid. J Edgar Hoover
The day may come when cigarette smoking is banned from all public places. ibid. RFK
Let me get this straight: are you telling me that if you mess around with an American oil company, we take away aid? But if you have a military take-over, outlaw political parties and deny basic freedoms, you can have all the American aid you want? ibid. RFK
He robs me of moments that should be mine. ibid. LBJ
It is immoral to attempt to change by military force the destiny of another country. ibid. RFK
The poor are carrying the burden of your war. ibid. RFK
Five more years of a crazy man. ibid. RFK, re LBJ
On June 5 1968 shortly after midnight Senator Robert Kennedy was mortally wounded by assassin Sirhan Sirhan. He died the next day. ibid.
In 1957 my father became chief council of the Senate’s labor rackets’ committee. Ethel, Sky Atlantic 2013
I thought it was a gorgeous thing to do to go after racketeers and particularly Hoffa. ibid. Ethel
ELECTED! ibid. Daily News front page
‘Glory glory segregation, the south shall rise again.’ ibid. crowd
Governor Wallace was forced to step aside. ibid.
Mummy has a long history of dealings with cops. ibid. daughter
They had a great relationship; I think there was enormous affection between them. ibid.
New York: he was called a carpetbagger. ibid. daughter
The politics of reality and the politics of hope. ibid. Bobby
April 4 1968: Dr Martin Luther King, the apostle of non-violence in the civil rights movement, has been shot to death in Memphis, Tennessee. ibid. television news bloke
Riots broke out in over a hundred cities. ibid. daughter
June 4 1968: a few minutes after he made his victory speech in the ballroom of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles my father was shot. ibid. daughter
My mother was always there for him. ibid.
If James R Hoffa is acquitted, I will jump from the Capitol Dome. Hoffa 1992 starring Jack Nicholson & Danny De Vito & Armand Assante & J T Walsh & John C Reilly & Frank Whaley & Kevin Anderson & John P Ryan & Robert Prosky & Natalie Nogulich & Nicholas Pryor et al, director Danny De Vito, Kennedy to Hoffa
Someone ought to give that punk a dose of reality. ibid. Hoffa to sidekick
And I say fuck you too. This guy needed his brother elected fucking president of the United States to get a job. You’re a joke. You would have been a bond salesman somewheres. You’re the brother-in-law they make jokes about. I’m proving what? You got nothing on me. You got a TV show. You don’t impress me, and your office don’t impress me, and your family don’t impress me: a bunch of rumrunners, and I don’t need three hundred million dollars, and my brother-elected president’ll whap your fucking ass, you slimy little prick. I beat your ass on that trumped up charge down south, I’m gonna beat you again. There is no organised crime in the Teamsters ... Fuck you and fuck your threats and fuck your brother. ibid. Hoffa to Kennedy
Bobby Kennedy! Jimi Hoffa! Two ambitious clever men with an instinct for power, each with his own vision. Blood Feud I 1983 starring Robert Blake & Brian Dennegy & Danny Aiello & Edward Albert & Ernest Borgnine & Cotter Smith & Sam Groom & Forrest Tucker et al, director Mike Newell, opening scene
1956: Jimmy Hoffa was consolidating his power within the central states conference of the Teamsters Union. ibid.
I believe in this great union. ibid. Hoffa to members
Sooner or later, Bob, everyone does business with everyone. ibid. dad
Teamster records are being shredded, we’ve got false financial reports are being filed … There’s evidence of union goon squads, Mob infiltration … ibid. Clark
I can’t afford to be seen as anti-labour. ibid. Jack to Bobby
A powerful new committee was formed. ibid. commentary
He’s gutless and he knows it. ibid. Hoffa