A lesson learned from INCOMPARABLE GRACE: JFK IN THE PRESIDENCY, by Mark Updegrove

Acknowledge your mistakes and learn from them. 

When I embarked on this project of taking major historical lessons away from all the history books I read, I knew that they vary wildly in terms of depth, quality, and overall readability. Mark Updegrove’s Incomparable Grace, his new book on JFK’s presidency, is very much a book I would recommend to casual history readers, and not so much one for historians looking for an in-depth study. It’s a short, highly readable, and not particularly deep book, and as one who has read dozens of books about JFK and RFK I often found its lack of depth somewhat disappointing. That said, one lesson Updegrove does a tremendous job of presenting is the primary reason so many historians look back on JFK as a tragically lost great presidency, and that is that JFK was a man who very much knew when he had fallen short and needed to do better. His presidency stands in marked contrast to more modern presidencies, of presidents full of bluster who refuse to acknowledge errors or recognize they had to radically change course to meet the needs of the nation.

JFK was a fascinating contradiction of a man, as by some standards he was incredibly elite and unlikable. He was born into incredible wealth and privilege (his father was at one point one of the 10 richest men in America); he went to the best colleges, and was seen as a physical specimen desired by all; he married a beautiful, brilliant, wealthy woman from whom he then claimed the freedom to not take their marital vows seriously; and, he got away with reckless and destructive behavior that would gave ruined many a less privileged man. But beneath the surface, he was also a man who very much felt the tragedies of the world stalking him. He was the second favorite son of his father, who had originally raised his older brother Joe to be the family star and future president, only to see Joe killed in World War II; JFK was an incredibly unhealthy man who lived his life in constant pain due to adrenal disorders, and who numerous times in his youth fell deathly ill (it is speculated his constant fear of dying young drove much of his reckless behavior); and, he lost two children at birth, including one while he was president. These experiences made JFK a wealthy intellectual who could treat the women in his life terribly, but also gave him and (to an even greater degree) his brother Bobby a deep empathy for the world’s less fortunate, and a sense that even the most powerful and privileged had a duty to give back to the nation that had been so good to them.

JFK made some disastrous decisions early in his presidency, and they remain a mark on his historical reputation. Partly because they had lead lives of such privilege, JFK and RFK in the beginning were clueless about what daily life was actually like for many African-Americans, and they saw the Civil Rights Movement as an annoying distraction from more pressing national issues (such as the Cold War and economic growth); this left them caught totally off guard when protests such as the Freedom Rides were met with violent retribution from white Southerners. JFK agreed to escalate the American commitment to South Vietnam, viewing it as a part of the Cold War and failing to see how unpopular and chaotic the government in South Vietnam had become. Perhaps the single greatest mistake of his presidency was when JFK authorized the Bay of Pigs operation, on the advice of his military and CIA advisors who assured him of an easy victory. The U.S. armed Cuban exiles and sent them on what proved to be a fool’s errand to overthrow Fidel Castro, and JFK then helplessly watched as the exiles were slaughtered and imprisoned for their efforts.

Errors such as these would undo many a president, but JFK only seemed to grow stronger and more competent the longer he remained in office, and a key reason was because he was willing to learn from these mistakes. In the wake of the Bay of Pigs, a guilt-ridden JFK publicly took responsibility for the fiasco (could you imagine any president today admitting such a mistake?!), and was heard asking himself, “how could I have been so stupid?” From then on, he began downsizing the role of the CIA and refused to believe his military advisors when they assured him that force could solve anything. That lesson proved to be world-saving when JFK refused to listen to their demands to provoke a nuclear confrontation with the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis, a hair-raising moment that JFK peacefully averted. He and RFK also eventually decided to fully embrace the Civil Rights Movement and did so against the advice of campaign officials who told JFK such an action would destroy his presidency. This action required the pair to confront their own ignorance of the suffering of racial minorities, even sitting through meetings where black leaders castigated them, and absorbing their criticism rather than becoming angry and defensive. By the end of his presidency, JFK’s esteem in the world was skyrocketing and he looked likely to coast to re-election. America might very well have averted at least some of the chaos and division of the 1960’s that still casts a long shadow over our nation, had JFK not taken a trip to Dallas on November 22, 1963.

Ultimately, the main lesson of JFK is that you must be open to criticism, acknowledge your mistakes, and be willing to change in order to be better. Whether JFK would have avoided disasters such as Vietnam or learned to be a better husband and father and overall male role model (which he claimed to be trying to do before he was killed), we will ultimately never know. But in a world today where people are encouraged to dig in and continue on a course regardless of whatever disastrous end awaits, we can all learn from the example of a young, charismatic, flawed president who never got a chance to reach his full potential.