Ted Sorensen
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| Theodore "Ted" Sorensen | |
 Ted Sorensen, 2006 |
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| Born | May 8, 1928 Nebraska |
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| Occupation | Special Counsel & Adviser, Speechwriter, lawyer |
| Political party | Democrat |
| Spouse | Gillian Sorensen |
| Children | Three sons; one daughter |
Theodore Chaikin "Ted" Sorensen (b. May 8, 1928) is of Counsel (retired Senior Partner) at the law firm of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP and writer, best known as President John F. Kennedy's Special Counsel & Adviser, legendary speechwriter, and "alter-ego." President Kennedy once called him his "intellectual blood bank."
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[edit] Early life
Born in Nebraska, the son of a Danish immigrant to the U.S., Sorensen graduated from Lincoln High School in 1945. Educated at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, where he also attended law school, Sorensen joined John Kennedy shortly after JFK was sworn in as Senator in 1953. Over the next decade, he became Kennedy's closest adviser. Sorensen also had an important role in researching and drafting Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize-winning book Profiles in Courage, prompting some controversy over the book's authorship. Syndicated columnist Drew Pearson alleged that Sorensen ghostwrote the book, leading Kennedy to demand a retraction. After Kennedy provided handwritten notes and Sorensen signed an affidavit attesting to Kennedy's authorship, Pearson acceded. However years later historian Herbert Parmet analyzed the text of Profiles in Courage and wrote in his book The Struggles of John F. Kennedy that although Kennedy did oversee the production and provided for the direction and message of the book, it was clearly Sorensen that provided most of the work that went into the end product.
[edit] Kennedy Administration
Sorensen was President Kennedy's Special Counsel & Adviser, and primary speechwriter, the role for which he is best remembered today. His inaugural address for the new president exhorted listeners to "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country". This call to service is the phrase still most closely associated with the Kennedy administration today. Although Sorensen played an important part in the composition of the Inaugural Address, the famous turn of phrase that everyone remembers from that speech was actually written by Kennedy himself. This has been acknowledged by Sorensen as well as documented in several substantive biographies of JFK, most notably Profile of Power by Richard Reeves.
He served as Special Counsel & Adviser to the president, with responsibility for the domestic agenda; however, after the Bay of Pigs debacle, President Kennedy asked Sorensen to take part in foreign policy discussions as well. As a result, he played a critical role in resolving the Cuban Missile crisis, drafting Kennedy's correspondence with Nikita Khrushchev.
After Kennedy was assassinated, he helped the new president, Lyndon B. Johnson, for several months, as LBJ was to recall in his White House memoirs. Sorensen left the White House to write Kennedy, a biography published in 1965. Providing an insight into the Kennedy White House, it became an international bestseller, and was translated into several languages.
[edit] Politics after Kennedy
Sorensen later joined the law firm, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, while still staying involved in politics. He played an important role in a number of campaigns, including the Robert F. Kennedy presidential campaign in 1968. Over the past four decades, Sorensen has led a prominent career as an international lawyer, advising governments around the world, as well as major international corporations.
In 1970, Sorensen ran for the U.S. Senate from New York, but lost in the primaries. In 1977 Jimmy Carter nominated him as Director of Central Intelligence, but the nomination was withdrawn before a Senate vote.
In addition to his successful career as a lawyer, Sorensen has also been a frequent spokesman for liberal ideals and ideas, writing op-eds and delivering speeches on both domestic and international subjects. For several years in the 1960s, he was an editor at the Saturday Review.
He has been affiliated with a number of institutions, including the Council on Foreign Relations, the Century Institute, Princeton University, and the Institute of Politics at Harvard.
[edit] Personal
He is married to Gillian Sorensen of the United Nations Foundation. He has three sons and a daughter.
In the 1998 miniseries From the Earth to the Moon, Sorensen was played by Jack Gilpin; in the 2000 film Thirteen Days, he was played by Tim Kelleher.
[edit] Books
- Decision-making In The White House (1963)
- Kennedy (1965)
- The Kennedy Legacy (1969)
- Watchmen in the Night : Presidential Accountability after Watergate (1975)
- A different kind of presidency: A proposal for breaking the political deadlock (1984)
- Let the Word Go Forth: The Speeches, Statements and Writings of John F. Kennedy, 1947-1963 (1988).
- Why I Am a Democrat (1996)
- Profiles in Courage (assisted JFK) (1956)
