第四课
习题全解
Ⅰ.John F. Kennedy(1917--1963),35th President of the United States
　 A. His family background
　 John Kennedy, whose ancestors came from Ireland, was the first Roman Catholic to become president of the United States. At 43 he was also the youngest man ever elected to the highest office of his country, although he was not the youngest to serve in it. Theodore Roosevelt was not quite 43 when the assasination of President McKinley elevated him to the Presidency. John Fitzgerald Francis Kennedy was born on May 29,1917, in Brookline, Massachusetts. Brookline was the suburb of Boston where his grandfather had been elected to many public offices. Joseph P. Kennedy, father of the future presi- dent, was at 25 the youngest bank president in the country. He was to build one of the great private fortunes of his time. He and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy raised a family of nine children. John was the second born.
　 When the first Kennedy child, Joseph, Jr. , was born, father Joe was reported to have said, "He' 11 be the first Kennedy to become president of the United States. " But he was killed while piloting a bomber in World War Ⅱ , and the leadership of the rising Kennedy generation passed to John.
　 Thus young John Kennedy, often called Jack, inherited a background of polities, wealth and determination. The family circle was close and warm. The boys learned competition first in sports. They played hard to win, a family trait in sports and politics all their lives. Young Kennedy attended private schools in Brookline and New York City; and then, in 1931, he entered Choate School, in Wallingford, Connecticut to prepare for college. Young Kennedy, after a short spell at the London School of Economics and Princeton, entered Harvard. In 1940 he graduated from Harvard cure laude.
　 B. His political career and election as president
　 In 1945 the Hearst newspapers hired Kennedy to cover the United Nations preliminary conference in San Francisco. He covered the British elections that year, then decided he had had enough of journalism. He did not know whether he would like politics, but decided to try it. In 1946 he ran for Congress as a Democrat, in a Boston district. Though he did not live there, Kennedy, by hard compaigning, defeated a large field of rivals. He was re-elected twice. Then he tried for election to the United States Senate against Republican Henry Cabot Lodge, who was supposed to be unbeatable in Massachusetts. It was a big Republican year in 1952, in Massachusetts and elsewhere, but Jack Kennedy beat Lodge by 70,000 votes.
　 On September 12, 1953, Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier were married at Newport, Rhode Island. They had three children—Caroline; John, Jr. , whom his father called John-John; and Patrick Bouvier, who lived but a few days.
　 Kennedy missed being nominated for vice-president by a few votes in 1956. But he gained an introduction to millions of Americans who watched the Chicago Democratic Convention on television. When he decided to run for president in1960, his name was widely known. Many thought that his religion and his youthful appearance would handicap him. Kennedy faced the religion issue frankly. He declared his firm belief in the separation of church and state. His wealth enabled him to assemble a staff and to get around the country in a private plane.
　 Kennedy’ s four television debates with Republican candidate, Richard M. Nixon, were a highlight of the 1960 campaign. The debates probably were important in Kennedy’s close victory electoral votes to 219 for Nixon. The popular vote was breathtakingly close Kennedy received only18,574 more votes than Nixon--a fraction of 1 precent of the total vote. (excerpts from the New Book of Knowledge)
　 C. Assasination
　 In November 1963, President Kennedy journeyed to Texas for a speech-making tour. In Dallas on November 22, he and his wife were cheered enthusiastically as their open car passed through the streets. Suddenly, at 12"30 in the after-noon, an assassin fired several shots, striking the president twice, in the base of the neck and the head, and seriously wounding John Connally, the governor of Texas, who was riding with the Kennedys. The president was rushed to Park-land Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead about a' half hour later. Within two hours, Vice President Johnson took the oath as president. On November 24, amid national and worldwide mourning, the President’s body lay in state on the rotunda of the U. S. Capitol. The next day, leaders of 92 nations attended the state funeral, and a million persons lined the route as a horsedrawn caisson bore the body to St. Matthew’s Cathedral for a requiem mass. While millions of Americans watched the ceremonies on television, the president was buried on an open slope in Arlington National Cemetry. There an eternal flame, lighted by his wife, marks the grave.
　 On the day of the assasination, the police arrested Lee Harvey Oswald, a 24-year-old ex-marine, for the president’s murder. Oswald, who had lived for a time in the Soviet Union, killed Dallas policeman J. D. Tippit while resisting at-rest. Two days later, in the station, Oswald himself was basement of the Dallas police fatally shot by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner. On November 29, President Johnson appointed a seven- member commission, headed by Chief Justice Earl Warren, to conduct a thorough investigation of the assassination and report to the nation. The commission’s report made public on Sept. 27, 1964, held that Oswald fired the shots that killed the president. Further, to allay suspicions that the murder was a conspiratorial plot, it stated that the committee "found no evidence" that either Oswald or Ruby "was part of any conspiracy, domestic or foreign, to assassinate President Kennedy".
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Ⅱ. 1. Kennedy thinks the world is different now because man has made great progress in science and technology and has not only the power (scientific farming, speedy transportation, mass production, etc. ) to abolish poverty, but also the power(missiles，H_bombs，etc．)to destroy all forms of human life．I agree with him．
　 2．According to Kennedy，the belief still at issue around the globe is the belief that all man are created equal and God has given them certain inalienable rights which no state or ruler can take away from them．
　 3．Kennedy considers as friends：
a)the old allies of the U．S．， such as Britain，Canada，Australia，New Zealand and the western European countries； b) the countries in South America and；c)many of the developing countries in Asia and Africa that rely on U．S．aid．He considers all socialist countries as foes(all that time the socialist camp headed by the Soviet Union)and those developing countries preparing to take the socialist road．
　 4． Britain，Canada，Australia，New Zealand．and in a wider sense one may also include France．
　 5．Many new nations were born after World WarⅡ．especially in Africa． In 1 960 alone， just one year before Kennedy’s inaugural speech， the following countries in Africa declared their independence：The Republic of Cen— tral Africa，The Republic of Chad，The Republic of Da-homey，The People’s Republic of the Congo。The(jabon Republic，The Republic of Ghana．etc．
　 6．The people who are in huts and villages are the poor people in backward developing countries in Africa and Asia．(Student give comments on the rest of the answer．)
　 7．The stated policy of Kennedy towards Latin America is summed up in the phrase “alliance for progress”．Kennedy pledged to take concrete steps to assist these governments and people in casting off the chains of poverty．
　 8．Kennedy’s policy towards “his adversary” is negotiation from a position of strength．The U．S．must first be strong enough to deter her adversary． From this strong position of absolute military superiority Kennedy proposes negotiating with the socialist camp(or the Soviet Union)on the following problems：a) arms control，b) cooperation in the fields of science，technology，arts and commerce，c)a new world system．