She was 16 when an assassin stole her father’s life. With a face and a voice uniquely Kennedy, she considered my question a moment before answering: “We came to Seattle and went fishing. We caught a lot of salmon.”
I was fishing too, for Kathleen Kennedy Townsend’s most vivid memory of her father. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, poised to pick up the presidential torch, was slain June 5, 1968, having just won the California primary.
Figuring her salmon fishing answer was tailored to a Puget Sound audience, I asked differently. What was his most lasting message?
“Get involved. Get engaged,” Townsend said.
She recalled her father’s fondness for a verse from St. Luke: “To whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required.”
That message brought her to Everett, where Tuesday she delivered a keynote speech at the United Way of Snohomish County breakfast. With about 700 people at the Everett Events Center, she shared a gospel of public service and volunteerism.
At 52, she’s done her part. The eldest of 11 children, she’s been lieutenant governor of Maryland and deputy assistant attorney general in the Justice Department. She is founder of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award and serves on the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation board.
For her 50th birthday, she climbed Mount Rainier.
Now an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s School of Public Policy, she’s writing a book on religion and politics. She claims no current interest in higher office, which I don’t quite buy.
On her impressive resume is a sign she’s serious about volunteering. The mother of four daughters led Maryland to be the first state making community service a high school graduation requirement.
“The rewards of volunteering are pretty great,” she said. “It gives you the ability to expand your field of influence, to make a difference.”
A lawyer and wife of a university professor, Townsend said she’s impressed with the aim of United Way of Snohomish County to go beyond collecting and distributing money for the needy. The agency’s “community impact agenda” pushes positive change in the areas of children’s issues, family needs and civic involvement.
“I want Snohomish County’s United Way to be replicated all across the country,” Townsend said.
Service is an American tradition dating to the earliest settlers, she said. “This is who we are, gathering together to do something for the common good.”
She spoke of a “darker side” of American life, in which entrepreneurs “can be robber barons to competitors and exploiters to employees.”
Wealth that raises living standards can also spawn greed. “I don’t need to tell the people of Snohomish County about Enron,” Townsend said in reference to the bankrupt energy trader accused of manipulating power prices.
To give back is to counter such cynicism, she said. Besides, helping out is good for you.
“Volunteers live longer,” Townsend said. “I have a saying – volunteer or die.”
Columnist Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlsteinjulie@heraldnet.com.
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