Caroline's Troubles

It was reported yesterday that housekeeping and tax issues may have forced Caroline Kennedy to withdraw from Senate consideration. As the news flashed, I suddenly remembered a former professor of mine, Paul Bator of the Harvard Law School, a former solicitor general of the United States and one of the very few Reagan conservatives on the faculty then.

He told the class the story of James Landis, one of the most brilliant of the New Dealers, the second chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, holder of a series of important government jobs, then dean of the Harvard Law School and an important adviser to the Kennedy family. Everyone expected President Kennedy to appoint him to the first available vacancy on the Supreme Court – until it was revealed that he had not filed tax returns for years.

Bator detailed the story, then commented in his very distinctively wry voice, “What is it with these liberals?” I can still hear him now, and I still don’t know the answer.