Subjects ran the gamut from Civil Rights to the Radical Right.
Subjects ran the gamut from Civil Rights to the Radical Right.

Click on the link here for Audio Player – President Kennedy News Conference – May 8, 1963 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection

A typical Press conference during the Kennedy Years, this one from May 8, 1963. JFK opens with a statement regarding the Civil Rights situation in Alabama and the events in Birmingham and those steps the government was taking to insure human rights weren’t being violated.

Questions from the Press ran the gamut from Birmingham and other Southern States, the Middle East, our increasing involvement in South Vietnam, the Statehood question for Puerto Rico, the removal of Admiral Anderson former chief of Naval Operations, meetings with Canadian Prime Minister Lester Pearson, to answering questions over why there is no statue of Winston Churchill in Washington.

All answered in the inimitable Kennedy fashion.

And that’s how the a Presidential Press conference went for May 8, 1963.

Enhanced by Zemanta