John F. Kennedy (JFK) enjoyed a unique relationship with the press during his presidency.
Based on his own experience as a reporter, he both understood the mechanics of news reporting
and respected the potential influence of the press on public opinion.1 As James T. Graha
m
explains, Kennedy took office in 1961 “driven by the belief that newspapers and magazines were
the most influential channels to shape public opinion.”2
Besides his savviness with the print
media, Kennedy also holds the distinction of being “the first president to effectively use the new
medium of television to speak directly to the American people.”3He also was the first to conduc
t
“live televised press conferences without delay or editing.”4 According to one estimate, Kennedy
held one press conference on average every sixteen days during his presidency.5
In this essay, we analyze Kennedy’s speech, “The President and the Press,” which he
delivered before the American Newspaper Publishers Association (ANPA) on April 27, 1
961.
Confronted with allegations that he deliberately misled the press and the people about the Bay
of Pigs invasion, Kennedy crafted a presidential “crisis” speech that attempted to explain and
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justify the invasion, blamed the press for its failure, and pressured the news media to voluntarily
censor itself on national security issues. We argue that Kennedy’s speech was widely considered
a failure because few bought into his “crisis” narrative and because the press refused to accept
his attempt to scapegoat and censor them. Our analysis lends insight into how presidents may
attempt to rhetorically exacerbate crisis situations in order to manage press coverage and
cultivate public consent.
John Fitzgerald Kennedy was born to Rose and Joseph (“Joe”) Kennedy on May 29, 1917,
in Brookline, Massachusetts. The Kennedys were a wealthy and influential Irish‐
Catholic family.
Rose was the daughter of John Francis “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, a popular Democratic mayor of
Boston. Joe made his fortune as a stock market and commodity investor. He later served as a U.S
.
Ambassador to the United Kingdom. John, the second of their nine children, attended exclusive
private schools in Massachusetts, New York, and Connecticut.6 After graduating from Harvard i
n
1940, Kennedy served honorably as a World War II naval officer from 1941 to 1945. Among his
military decorations, Kennedy earned the Purple Heart and the Navy and Marine Corps Medal
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for leading his crew to safety when their patrol torpedo boat was rammed by a Japanese
destroyer.7
The year following his discharge from the Navy marked JFK’s entry into politics.
In 1946, Kennedy became a Democratic congressman from Massachusetts, and six years
later, he won a seat in the U.S. Senate. Shortly after his senate victory, Kennedy marrie
d
Jacqueline Bouvier, also from an affluent and influential family. Together they had two children,
Caroline and John, Jr.8 Continuing his political climb, Kennedy earned national attention in 1956
when he was nominated for Vice President. Even though he lost that nomination, it was only four
years later when Kennedy became the Democratic nominee for president. Perhaps that election
is best remembered for Kennedy’s presidential debates with Republican opponent Richard M.
Nixon—
the first televised presidential debates in U.S. history.9 Kennedy ended up defeating
Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections of the twentieth century to become the
youngest person, as well as the first Roman Catholic, ever elected to the U.S. presidency.10
The challenges presented by the Cold War and international politics informed many of
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President Kennedy’s executive initiatives. By 1961, the Soviet Union was ahead in the space race
,
having launched a satellite and orbited a man around Earth. Motivated by Russia’s successes,
Kennedy expanded the U.S. space program and vowed to land a man on the moon by the end of
the decade.11 In what he considered a first step in ending the Cold War and the atomic arms race
,
Kennedy signed the Limited Nuclear Test Ban treaty on October 7, 1963. Also signed b
y the
United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, the treaty greatly restricted nuclear testing and
committed its signatories to work toward complete disarmament.12 Perhaps Kennedy’s mo
st
trying moment as president came in October 1962, after U.S. intelligence discovered that the
Soviet Union was building missile sites in Cuba. The American people would breathe a sigh of
relief after Kennedy ordered blockades to prevent more arms from reaching Cuba,
Kennedy
initiated negotiations with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, and Russia dismantled its weapons
and left Cuba. The Cuban Missile Crisis, as it became known, was the closest the United States
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ever came to nuclear war.13 But even before the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy faced another
foreign policy crisis—thefailure of an operation known asthe Bay of Pigs. Understandingthe
events surrounding the Bay of Pigs, however, necessitates a deeper understanding of the U.S.
Cold War with the USSR.
The Truman Doctrine
At its most basic level, the Cold War was a struggle between democracy and capitalism in
the West versus communism in the East. The United States, a country committed to democracy
—
and the Soviet Union, a country committed to communism—represented the two major players
in this struggle.14 Many trace the genesis of the Cold War to the end of World War II, when the
U.S. dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Although they had been allies
during the war, the atomic bomb heightened distrust between the United States and the Soviet
Union and led to an escalating nuclear arms race.15 Shortly after World War II ended, President
Harry S Truman articulated what became known as the Truman Doctrine, pledging the United
States to the “containment” of communism. The goal was to stop the spread of communism into
neighboring free nations. More often than not, this commitment meant sending financial and
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military assistance to nations like Greece and Turkey, which were threatened by commun
ist
insurgencies. As Truman explained the doctrine, America’s mission was to “assist free peoples to
work out their own destinies in their own way.”16 Over the next three decades, the United States
would become embroiled in fights against communism around the globe, including conflicts in
Korea, Cuba, Vietnam, Grenada, and Afghanistan. Some scholars point to the economic collapse
of the Soviet Union in the 1980s as the end of the Cold War.17 As historian Martin Walker has
argued, the West ultimately prevailed “because its economy proved able to supply guns as well
as butter, aircraft‐
carriers and private cars, rockets as well as foreign holidays for an ever‐
increasing proportion of taxpayers.”18
The Bay of Pigs
The Bay of Pigs invasion marked the height of the Cold War, and most scholars agree that
it was Kennedy’s biggest political blunder.19 In 1959, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA
)
began planning an invasion of Cuba after Fidel Castro overthrew the American‐backed dictator,
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Fulgencio Batista. The following year, the CIA, operating under the secret authorization
of
President Dwight D. Eisenhower, began training anti‐ Castro Cuban exiles for an invasion of the
island nation.20 Shortly after Kennedy took office in 1961, the CIA informed the new president
of
their plan to unleash their trained forces at the Bay of Pigs, located on the south shore of Cuba.
The goal, according to historian Howard Zinn, was to “stimulate a general rising against Castro.”
21
Kennedy authorized the invasion, and it took place from April 14 to April 19, 1961. Yet, the plan
did not go as the CIA or Kennedy had hoped.22
Voices of Democracy 9 (2014): 23‐
40 26
In fact, anything that could have gone wrong with the plan did. Within just hours of the
invasion, Castro’s planes “sank two freighters carrying ten days of reserve ammunition and much
of the expedition force’s communications equipment.”23 Castro had arrested “virtually all th
e
potential rebels in his country” ahead of the invasion, and the local uprising that was supposed
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to rise up in support of the invasion never materialized.24 Additionally, outdated maps failed to
show that Castro’s favorite vacation spot was nearby and being developed as a resort; thus, when
alerted to the invasion, the Cuban leader was able to quickly move in “thousands of troops to
encircle the little exile force.”25 In the end, 114 people were killed and another 1,179 were taken
captive.26 Kennedy was forced to do damage control, as he was widely criticized for the “fiasco”
and for misleading the American public in the days leading up to the invasion.
For many Americans and press professionals, the most troubling aspect of the Bay of Pigs
situation was that the president had lied to them regarding America’s policy toward Cuba. At a
press conference on April 12, 1961, Kennedy had announced that “there will not be, under any
conditions, an intervention in Cuba by the United States Armed Forces.”27 Kennedy’s W
hite
House counselor, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., had warned Kennedy of the potential backlash in a
memorandum: “When lies must be told, they should be told by subordinate officials.”28 Given
the context of the early 1960s, Graham makes the important point that “journalists like most
Americans, still trusted government.”29 “The President and the Press” provided Kennedy with an
opportunity to repair the breach of trust with the press and the public. However, as we argue in
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our analysis, Kennedy miscalculated the rhetorical situation and delivered a presidential crisis
speech in which he blamed the press for the Bay of Pigs debacle and advocated for journalistic
self‐ restraint.
Kennedy faulted the press for leaking information about the Bay of Pigs operation just
days before its execution. The first report to uncover the president’s plans was slated for
publication in theNew Republic magazine. Kennedy instructed Schlesinger to have the st
ory
killed, and Schlesinger succeeded in his mission.30 But a reporter for the New York Times, Tad
Szulc, also had uncovered the story, and the Times ran the story after eliminating references to
the CIA and the word “imminent.” The Times’ publisher also downplayed Szulc’s story b
y
eliminating a four‐
column banner headline and running it instead as a more routine single column
story on the front page.31 Nevertheless, the damage was done. Kennedy reportedly complained
in private that “Castro doesn’t need agents over here. All he has to do is read our papers. It’s all
laid out for him.”32 As a result, of course, the invaders no longer had the element of surprise, but
Kennedy went ahead with the plan anyway. Amidst these lingering feelings of mutual distrust
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between the president and the press, Kennedy took to the podium.
The President and the Press
President Kennedy arrived in New York City on April 27, 1961, to deliver his remarks to
the annual dinner of the Bureau of Advertising of the American Newspaper Publishers
Association.33 The event marked the close of New York’s annual Press Week, which inclu
ded
meetings of the Associated Press and United Press International.
34 A New York Times reporter,
Russell Porter, described the scene outside the hotel, as “more than 2,000 anti‐ Castro Cubans
and anti‐ Communist Hungarians. . . . sang, chanted, waved banners and held aloft signs urging
the President to continue his opposition to communism.”35 Inside the hotel, the Associated Press
reported that President Kennedy was “attired in white tie and tails,”36 and he “received a standin
g
ovation from 1700 diners when he arrived at the grand ballroom of the hotel.”37 There was some
speculation about the content of Kennedy’s speech since a draft was not released to the press
prior to delivery.38 In advance of the speech, the Los Angeles Times noted that “Mr. Kennedy,
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known to feel that the failure of the Cuba invasion attempt was due in part to the flood
of
advance news reports on the operation, is expected to appeal to publishers for restraint i
n
dealing with national security affairs.”39 Kennedy had already addressed the topic of pres
s
restraint one week earlier in an address before the American Society of Newspaper Edito
rs
(ASNE).40
Works cited
Kennedy worked briefly as a reporter in 1945 covering the opening
of the United Nations
and the Potsdam Conference.
2 James T. Graham, “Kennedy, Cuba, and the Press,” Journalism
History 24 (1998): 60.
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3 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “John F. K
ennedy and the Press,”
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK‐ in‐ History/John‐ F‐
Kennedy‐ and‐ the‐ Press.aspx (accessed
June 3, 2013). For more on Kennedy’s television savvy, see: Joseph
P. Berry, Jr., John F. Kennedy
and the Media: The First Television President (Lanham, MD: Unive
rsity Press of America, 1987).
4 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “John F. K
ennedy and the Press,”
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK‐ in‐ History/John‐ F‐
Kennedy‐ and‐ the‐ Press.aspx (accessed
June 3, 2013).
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5 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “John F. K
ennedy and the Press,”
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK‐ in‐ History/John‐ F‐
Kennedy‐ and‐ the‐ Press.aspx (accessed
June 3, 2013).
6
Michael O’Brien, John F. Kennedy: A Biography (New York: St. M
artin’s Press, 2005), 27‐
30.
7 Marie Hodge, John F. Kennedy: Voice of Hope (New York: Sterlin
g, 2007), 28‐ 34.
8
Sadly, two of Jacqueline and John Kennedy’s children did not survi
ve: daughter Arabella
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was still‐
born in 1956 and son Patrick died two days after birth in 1963.
9 Gary A. Donaldson, The First Modern Campaign: Kennedy, Nixo
n, and the Election of
1960 (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007), 109‐ 126.
10 To read more about Kennedy’s presidential tenure, see: Arthur
M. Schlesinger, Jr., A
Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House (New York: F
irst Mariner Books, 2002); and
James M. Giglio, The Presidency of John F. Kennedy (Lawrence: U
niversity Press of Kansas, 1991).
11 Robert Dallek, An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917‐
1963 (New York: Little, Brown
and Co., 2003), 392‐ 394.
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12 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, “Nucle
ar Test Ban Treaty,”
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK/JFK‐ in‐ History/Nuclear‐ Test‐
Ban‐ Treaty.aspx (accessed June 3,
2013).
13 Paul J. Byrne, The Cuban Missile Crisis: To the Brink of War (
Minneapolis, MN: Compass
Point Books, 2006), 86.
14 Martin Walker, The Cold War: A History (New York: Henry Ho
lt and Company, 1995), 1‐
7.
15 John Lewis Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History (New York: P
enguin Group, 2007), 25.
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16 Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, “Address of the P
resident to Congress,
Recommending Assistance to Greece and Turkey, Mary 12, 194
7,”
http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/study_collections/doctrin
e/large/documents/index.
php?pagenumber=4&documentdate=1947‐ 03‐
12&documentid=5‐ 9 (accessed 3 July 2015).
17 The history, politics, economics, and social ramifications of the C
old War are much more
nuanced and intricate than can be captured here. For more, also rea
d David S. Painter