Nation: Kennedy Makes It Official

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And so does Jerry Brown as the attacks on Carter widen

At last, the challenge was formally issued. In Boston's historic Faneuil Hall, where Samuel Adams once preached revolt against the ruling British, Ted Kennedy last week finally proclaimed his insurgency. It was, inevitably, a family affair. When Rose Kennedy arrived to watch the third of her sons' campaigns begin, she received a thunderous ovation from some 400 relatives and friends. Also attending were the widows of Ted's two murdered brothers: Jacqueline Onassis and Ethel Kennedy.

In announcing, Kennedy made a firm but quiet plea for leadership in a frustrated, confused and divided nation: "Before the last election, we were told that Americans were honest, loving, good, decent and compassionate. Now the people are blamed for every national ill and scolded as greedy, wasteful and mired in malaise. Which is it? Did we change so much in these three years? Or is it because our present leadership does not understand that we are willing, even anxious, to be on the march again? ... The only thing that paralyzes us today is the myth that we cannot move."

When the speech was over, a reporter quickly probed one of Kennedy's vulnerabilities. To scattered boos from the crowd, he asked whether Kennedy's separated wife Joan would participate in his campaign. Smiling broadly, Kennedy turned to Joan, who appeared nervous and replied in a quavering voice, "The answer is that I look forward to campaigning for my husband." Ted led the applause for his wife, and behind them their twelve-year-old son Patrick brushed tears from his eyes.

Kennedy promptly took off on a three-day campaign blitz of seven cities, extending from Manchester, N.H., to Charleston, S.C. He drew large crowds, including the same kind of squealers, jumpers and touchers who used to flock to Jack. But tragedy has tempered his approach. While not avoiding large rallies altogether, he is planning to concentrate on smaller, more secure sessions, where he can discuss issues at greater length. Attending the first of these at the Copernicus Senior Citizens Center in Chicago, Kennedy gave a speech touting his national health care program. Silvester Bonnis, 72, a retired factory worker, came up to the podium with his cane to say that if he ever had to go to the hospital, "it would take all that I have saved." Seeing his point made so poignantly, Ted urged, "Pour it on, Silvester."

Kennedy was accompanied by some notable Democratic officeholders: Maine Governor Joseph Brennan, New Hampshire Senator John Durkin, Massachusetts Lieut. Governor Thomas P. O'Neill III, and the biggest catch of all, Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne. Still smarting from heavy-handed pressure to endorse the President, Byrne railed at Carter in a way that made Kennedy's gibes seem mild by comparison. "Statements and threats have been delivered by Carter and his people," she charged. "I do not want to support a candidate because of blackmail and intimidation." Asked if she would meet Carter when he goes to Chicago for a fund raiser next month, the mayor snapped, "If I'm in town."