More Than a Brother

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At 8:15 one morning last week, a minor earthquake rattled Tokyo windowpanes. But the event caused hardly a tremor among the 10,000,000 inhabitants of the world's most populous city. They had already been shaken to near numbness by the presence of U.S. Attorney General Robert Francis Kennedy, 36, brother and most trusted adviser of President John Kennedy, an emerging force in U.S. foreign affairs--and an earthquaker in his own right.

Bobby Kennedy, accompanied by his wife Ethel, was on the first leg of a four-week world tour that would take him to eleven other countries. And during his five-day stay in Japan, he displayed all the qualities that have made him, beyond the big fact of being John Kennedy's brother, a major power in U.S. Government. His youthful energies were explosive; his capacity for listening, looking, learning was enormous; his charm (when he felt like turning it on) was electric.

Such a Promotion. From sunup to midnight, from Prime Minister's residence to backstreet sake house, Bob Kennedy shook hands, sang songs, asked questions, argued issues, made speeches--and explained the aims of the U.S. under his brother's Administration. The Japanese, accustomed to patriarchs in public life, marveled at his youth. Said a Japanese Supreme Court justice after meeting Bobby: "He must have worked and studied hard to achieve such a pace in promotion." At the Diet, Lower House Speaker Ichiro Kiyose, 77, and Upper House President Tsuruhei Matsuno, 78, watched Kennedy and sighed wistfully. "The days are here," said Matsuno. "for the younger generation to take over." Bobby gracefully deferred to age: "We gain by referring to the wisdom of experience."

But Bob Kennedy also showed the rough side of his tongue. Taking tea with 70 members of the Japanese Bar Association, Kennedy paid tribute to Japan's postwar recovery, called it a triumph of the democratic system of government. One of the lawyers thanked him for such "flattery." Snapped Bobby: "This is a helluva long way to come just to natter somebody. I can do that back home." When a delegation of Socialist legislators spoke some stereotyped criticisms of the U.S., Bobby demanded to know why they never seemed to say anything against the Soviet Union or Red China. "Just how many times," he asked, "have you criticized them in public statements? Give me just three cases." The five Socialists huddled. Finally one said lamely: "Well, once. About Soviet testing."

Wherever he went in Japan, Bob Kennedy made it plain that he spoke for the President of the U.S. Arriving at Tokyo's Haneda airport, Kennedy tried out two sentences in Japanese. The first was: "Ladies and gentlemen, we are very happy to visit your country." The second--and it sounded a theme that Kennedy was to repeat over and over again--was: "My brother, who is the President, wishes me to convey to you all his very best regards." Next day, calling upon Minister of Justice Koshiro Ueki, Kennedy commented on the "fair" way in which Japanese judges are appointed.* Said he: "This is quite different in the United States. I have made recommendations for more than 100 candidates for federal judgeships. A man asked for a judgeship for his brother. I declined. I received the inevitable telephone call. He said: 'After all, your brother appointed you Attorney General.' I answered: 'We only serve the will of the President.' "

It was to serve the will of the President that Bob Kennedy became Attorney General. From the moment of his election to office, Jack Kennedy knew that he wanted his younger brother in his Administration--not merely as a White House adviser, but as a top official of Government who could get things done. The Attorney General's job was the obvious one for Lawyer Bobby, who had already served for six years as a Senate committee investigator. Bob Kennedy was reluctant to take the post; he argued forcibly that his appointment would leave the President open to devastating charges of nepotism. He accepted the job only after John Kennedy strongly urged him to do so.

Of all President Kennedy's Cabinet appointments, Bobby's was by far the worst received. Many lawyers were shocked. Democrats groaned at the "kid brother" liability, and Republicans turned it into a political battle cry. Today it is a measure of Bobby Kennedy's energy, guts, brains and increasingly mature judgment that the bar generally rates him a good Attorney General, and politicians of both parties rank him among the strongest and ablest members of the Kennedy Cabinet. Barely a year in office, the kid brother is one of the President's solidest assets.

Republicans still take occasional jabs at him, especially when he ventures beyond the confines of the Attorney General's office. Said New York's G.O.P. Representative John Lindsay last week in a solicitous letter to State Secretary Dean Rusk: "We question whether it is necessary for you and your office to be either burdened or embarrassed by free-wheeling foreign missions on the part of highly placed amateurs." But in an interview on national television. Republican Richard Nixon gave Bobby a surprising plug. Said he: "Iam looking at Robert Kennedy, you have here a man who, except for the lack of experience, which he is now gaining, has many of the qualifications that would make him a very effective leader in the field of foreign policy. He's tough-minded, he's quick, he's intelligent. He is one who has a tremendous will to win." No Pretending. The will to win carried right over from the 1960 campaign against Richard Nixon to the mastering of the Attorney General's job. Says a Justice Department career man : "When you have a large bureaucracy like this, it's hard to instill a sense of urgency and interest in the people down the line. But Kennedy has been able to do it." A graduate ('51) of the University of Virginia Law School, Bob had served as counsel for the Democratic minority on the McCarthy Committee, and later as chief counsel for the McClellan Committee investigating labor racketeering (Bob still turns livid when reminded that he has yet to nail Teamsters' President Jimmy Hoffa). As Attorney General, Bobby Kennedy does not lay claim to legal wizardry. "He doesn't pretend to knowledge he doesn't have," says one of his deputies. "And you'd bet ter not either." At the very beginning, Attorney General Kennedy gathered about him a talented team. The key men: sb BYRON R. WHITE, 44, Deputy Attorney General. An All-America halfback at Colorado and later a Rhodes scholar at Oxford, "Whizzer" White met John Kennedy years ago at a U.S. embassy reception in London given by Ambassador Joseph Kennedy. White and Jack later served in the same Pacific PT flotilla; during the presidential campaign, White left his Denver law firm to head the Citizens for Kennedy. White is in charge of the day-by-day administration of the Justice Department. Last spring he handled the on-scene direction of 600 U.S. marshals during the Alabama riots precipitated by Freedom Riders on interstate buses.

sb ARCHIBALD Cox. 49, Solicitor General. A great-grandson of Andrew Johnson's Attorney General, Archie Cox learned Government law in the Justice, State and Labor Departments and the Wage Stabilization Board. He returned to Harvard as Royall professor of law, was Senator John Kennedy's adviser on labor legislation. During the 1960 campaign, with Fellow Professors Arthur Schlesinger Jr. and J. Kenneth Galbraith, Cox was a member of the Harvard brain trust that fed Candidate Kennedy facts, figures--and politically appealing ideas.

sb LEE LOEVINGER, 48, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Antitrust Division. A Phi Beta Kappa like Whizzer White, Loevinger was a Minnesota law partner of Agriculture Secretary Orville Freeman. He specialized in antitrust work until Freeman, as Minnesota's Governor, appointed him a state supreme court justice. Blunt and aggressive. Loevinger argues that the Kennedy Administration's policies promote competition and protect free enterprise rather than stifle business.

Moving into areas where previous antitrust chiefs have rarely trod, Loevinger has ordered five suits against bank mergers, is now seeking an across-the-board price-fixing injunction against General Electric.

sb BURKE MARSHALL, 39, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Civil Rights Division. Slight, seemingly shy but hard as nails, Yaleman Marshall left a lucrative Washington law practice to direct Bobby Kennedy's civil rights assault. With enlarged legal and research staffs, he keeps in touch with Negro groups and segregation leaders, attempts to solve issues primarily by persuasion rather than by coertion. When persuasion fails, he moves. To enforce Negro voting rights, the department has so far filed suits in 15 southern counties, has active investigations or negotiations under way in 61 other counties.

"If we do our job right," says Marshall, "there should be no need for a civil rights division in a very few years." For all the skills of his subordinates, there is no question that Bob Kennedy is the man in charge. Shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow, tie askew and feet planted firmly atop his mahogany desk, Kennedy runs the Department of Justice from a gymnasium-sized office decorated with watercolors by his children. He has personally taken charge of one of the New Frontier's most ticklish tasks: recommending the appointments of 125 new federal judges (some to fill vacancies, 73 to fill the requirements of an authorization passed last year by Congress for an expanded judiciary). So far, the President has sent 89 names to Congress for confirmation. Of those nominations, 13 have been rated by the American Bar Association as exceptionally well qualified, 41 as well qualified, 22 as qualified, 6 as inadequate (the A.B.A. has not rated the rest).

Like a Bop. Within the Justice Department building, Bobby Kennedy has made it his business to wander the corridors, pop into offices, chat with the help. Last spring, deeply concerned about the causes and cures of juvenile delinquency, he went to New York and, without the usual coterie of newsmen, wandered on foot into the tenement districts of East Harlem. There, his coat draped over his shoulder, he sat on a street curb and discussed with members of a gang called the Viceroys their thinking, their problems, their interests. "He looked like a bop himself," said one of the Viceroys later. Said another: "He's sort of an in-between guy. You know. Not hip. But not square."

Asked in Tokyo last week if her husband ever had time for family relaxation, Ethel Kennedy replied: "Oh yes. And when he comes in, it's quite lively. All the children jump on his back."

On the ten-acre estate at McLean, Va. (ten miles from Washington), the place is alive with barks, meows, neighs and other animal noises. Collectively, the four Kennedy boys and three girls own three dogs (an Irish setter, a Newfoundland, a Labrador retriever), two goats, a cat, 40 rabbits, three geese, a burro, a horse and four ponies. Near the house are a tennis court, two swimming pools and. of course, a touch-football field.

Wherever he is, Bob Kennedy is always at the beck of his brother. The relationship between Jack and Bobby is close but not constant. In the course of the ordinary week, they see each other no more than once or twice, talk on the telephone every other day or so. Such conversations are generally brief; by instinct, each of the brothers seems to know what the other is thinking, and long explanations are unnecessary. "It's by osmosis," says Jack Kennedy. "We're both cryptic."

But when the going gets rough, it is Bobby that the President calls for. When the Berlin Wall was raised one Sunday morning last summer, President Kennedy cut short a cruise aboard the presidential yacht and raced back to shore. He quickly digested dispatches, then gave his first order: "Get Rusk on the phone. Go get my brother." When it became apparent that the U.S.-backed invasion of Cuba was failing, President Kennedy's word was: "Get General Lemnitzer. Get the Attorney General."

"You Were For It." In the days that followed the Cuban fiasco, it was Bobby Kennedy who played the major role in trying to pick up the pieces. The President assigned the Attorney General to help investigate the role that the Central Intelligence Agency had played in the Cuba planning. To work with him, the President picked CIA Director Allen Dulles, Admiral Arleigh Burke and retired Army General Maxwell Taylor. Later, on grounds that the President should have his own close, trusted military adviser, Bobby pushed successfully for the appointment of Taylor to the White House staff. Among his other chores in the aftermath of Cuba, Bobby ticked off Under Secretary of State Chester Bowles, who had been telling newsmen that he had opposed the Bay of Pigs assault all along. Said Bobby to Bowles: "I understand that you advised against this operation. Well, as of now, you were for it." (If Bobby had had his way, Bowles would have been fired out of hand at the time.)

A month after Cuba, Bobby again played a major role in confronting Caribbean crisis. When the Dominican Republic's Dictator Trujillo was assassinated and anarchy threatened to sweep the island, President Kennedy was away on a state visit to France. Bobby moved into a command post on the seventh floor of the State Department to oversee the implementation of a plan for U.S. support of anti-Trujillo, anti-Communist Dominicans. He okayed a move to station U.S. Navy ships near the island in a show of force. Recalling that period, President Kennedy today acts as if it had been the most natural thing in the world for Bobby to take over. "Oh yes," he says. "That's because I was out of the country."

At his brother's request, Bobby Kennedy sits in on almost all meetings of the National Security Council. He refuses to sit at the table; he takes a chair close to the wall of the Cabinet room, behind and to the left of the President. He rarely speaks up at NSC meetings--but when he does, he is heard. After Cuba, Chester Bowles, who was sitting in for Absent State Secretary Rusk, delivered a position report on Cuba that was long on platitudes, short on concrete proposals. From his seat behind the President, Bobby protested. ''This is worthless. What can we do about Cuba? This doesn't tell us." For ten minutes the Attorney General tore the Bowles report to bits. When he was through, there was an awkward silence, broken only when the President changed the subject. Before the session's end. President Kennedy had assigned a task force under Assistant Defense Secretary Paul Nitze to draw up new proposals for U.S. policy toward Cuba.

The President does not always follow his brother's advice. Last August, Bobby and Ethel Kennedy spent three days in Africa during the independence anniversary celebration of the Ivory Coast. The trip was an opportunity to meet African leaders. Bobby became convinced that Ghana's left-leaning President Kwame Xkrumah was implacably hostile to the U.S.. and on his return he argued privately with the President against a proposed $133 million loan to Ghana for construction of a Volta River power project. When the issue came up at an NSC meeting, the President went around the table seeking opinions; he got mostly favorable replies. 'The Attorney General," he then said, "has not spoken. But I can feel the hot breath of his disapproval on the back of my neck." Despite Bobby's objection, the loan was approved.

"I'm Already Married." Last week, on his first morning in Tokyo. Bobby Kennedy rose early at his U.S. embassy quarters, gave three separate newspaper interviews, left the building at 8:15 a.m. for a round of official calls. He stopped at the home of Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda. discussed Berlin, Laos, Japanese-Korean relations. From Ikeda's residence, Kennedy moved on to the Foreign Office, the Ministry of Justice, the Diet, a couple of television studios, an embassy reception, a Bar Association tea and the Japanese Supreme Court.

That night, after a dinner given by Foreign Minister Kosaka. Kennedy went with a group of Japanese labor leaders to a sake shop off the Ginza, Tokyo's Gay White Way. "How do you like Japanese women?" asked one of the shop's customers. Said Kennedy: ''They're pretty. But I can't comment any more. I'm already married to an American woman." Kennedy, whose favorite beverage is a glass of milk chilled precisely 15 minutes in a freezer, was pressed to taste sake. Asked he: "Is it good for the health?" Replied the bartender: "It's the best medicine." Soon, the Japanese began serenading their guest with a folk song called The Coal Miners' Song ("Over the coal mines the moon has risen! But since the mine chimneys are so tall, certainly the moon must find it smoky"). Bobby responded with When Irish Eyes Are Smiling.

Next day, Kennedy began his rounds at 7:35 a.m., spent the morning talking with politicians and business executives, had lunch with a dozen Tokyo college students. That afternoon the Attorney General visited Nihon University, accepted an honorary doctor of laws degree, then drove across town to Waseda University--where he ran into riot. Trying to make their way into the university's memorial hall to deliver a speech, Bobby and Ethel Kennedy were mobbed by enthusiastically friendly students. But awaiting Kennedy inside the hall were members of Zengakuren, the ultra-leftist Japanese students' organization. They booed and catcalled, drowned out his remarks. Finally, Kennedy pointed to the noisiest of them all. "You, sir," said Kennedy, "have you something to tell against us? Come up to the platform."

The student, 21-year-old Yuzo Tachiya, leaped onto the stage and, while Kennedy held a microphone for him, launched into a long harangue against the U.S. When Kennedy pulled the microphone back to answer, a power failure knocked out the public-address system and half the stage lights. Icily calm. Kennedy borrowed a portable police megaphone and tried to speak. Standing beside him, Tachiya kept up his screaming diatribe. The audience began to yell too. With the meeting out of control, a student cheerleader climbed to the platform, closed the session with a call for the Waseda school song ("Towering edifice In woods of Waseda"). In a final indignity, one cheerleader accidentally struck Ethel Kennedy in the stomach with his arm. Mrs. Kennedy reeled back, straightened again, managed a weak smile.

At midweek the Kennedys climbed aboard a chartered plane and flew 225 miles to Osaka, "the Chicago of Japan." They visited a technical high school, discovered that television appearances in Tokyo had made them national celebrities. In the schoolyard hundreds of students rushed up, thrust out their arms, yelled "Kennedy-san, shake hands." Bobby shook. At the nearby Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., the Attorney General sat down at a workers' table, chatted about Communism while munching manfully on a whale steak.

From Osaka, the party drove to an ancient Buddhist temple at Nara, where priests offered Kennedy incense sticks, indicated a nearby bronze kettle where the sticks are traditionally burned by visitors. Kennedy motioned to accompanying Ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer. "What are the implications if I do this?" Replied the ambassador: "It just shows respect. Go ahead." "You're sure it won't look as if I'm worshiping Buddha?" asked Roman Catholic Kennedy. Whispered Reischauer: "No, It's O.K." Kennedy picked up an incense stick still muttering: "If I get kicked out . . ."

Back in Tokyo, Bobby Kennedy rounded out his week with a luncheon appearance at the foreign correspondents' club. "I had seaweed for breakfast yesterday," he told the audience. "To tell you the honest-to-goodness truth, it didn't taste bad. When I went to Central Asia with Justice Douglas in 1955, they brought in a goat, very dead, plucked out its eyes and served them to us. Justice Douglas turned to me and said. 'For the sake of America, Bob, make like it's an oyster.' So things have gone up since then." But it was on a sober note that he closed his speech. "My greatest impression of Japan is the great thirst for knowledge of the people. I'm amazed at how interested they are and how much they know about the United States and what is going on."

Right Where He Is. Leaving Tokyo at week's end. the Kennedys had only begun their journey. Ahead lay Formosa, then Hong Kong. The Attorney General would spend six days in Indonesia, where rioting students last week broke the windows of the U.S. embassy. Beyond that was Thailand, whose government is nervous about Communist inroads in nearby Laos and Viet Nam, expects to hear reassuring words from the President's brother. After that would come visits to Rome, Berlin, Bonn. The Hague and Paris--and finally the return to Washington.

What then? Because of his increasing activities in foreign affairs. Washington is alive with rumors that Bobby is tiring of the Department of Justice, might want to move over to State. But President Kennedy, even while encouraging Bobby's global interests, is blunt about saying that he has no intention of moving his brother out of Justice; he likes Bobby right where he is. and hopes to keep him there for the next seven years.

Beyond that, there is the possibility--once just a joke about the numerousness of the Kennedys, now sometimes talked about seriously--that Bobby might try to succeed Jack in the White House. Any mention of this notion angers Bob Kennedy. "This idea is so obviously untrue." he says, "that it's foolish, even as rumor." Voters might agree. Bobby lacks his brother's easy grace; he is earthier, bristling in his loyalties (the U.S., Jack, and his church; other Kennedys; other Democrats), implacable in his enmities. Jack has been called the first Irish Brahmin; Bobby is the Irish Puritan, not an ascetic but a man of burning zeal. If he does not want to become President, it is safe to say that he wants his brother to become a great President, assisted by a great Attorney General. Meanwhile, as President John Kennedy of the U.S. had long known, as the U.S. has come to realize, as the peoples of the nations he visited were discovering, Bobby Kennedy is a power in his own right.

* Unlike the U.S. federal judiciary, Japanese judges do not receive lifetime appointments, but are subject to periodic review. Lower-court judges, appointed by the Cabinet, must be reappointed every ten years. But justices of the Supreme Court, each ten years, appear unopposed on the general election ballot and must receive a majority of the national vote to remain on the bench.

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