Jump to content

Victoria Reggie Kennedy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 98.116.115.180 (talk) at 19:34, 1 September 2009 (flush out some naked citations). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Victoria Reggie Kennedy
Victoria Reggie Kennedy in March 2009.
Born
Victoria Anne Reggie[1]

(1954-02-26) February 26, 1954 (age 70)[1]
Crowley, Louisiana, United States
Alma materNewcomb College of Tulane University (bachelor of arts)
Tulane University Law School
Political partyDemocratic
Spouse(s)Grier C. Raclin (1981–1990, divorced)
Edward "Ted" Moore Kennedy (1992–2009, his death)
ChildrenCurran Raclin (born 1982)
Caroline Raclin (born 1985)
Parent(s)Edmund M. Reggie and Doris Ann (née Boustany) Reggie
RelativesStep-children:
Kara Anne (née Kennedy) Allen (born 1960)
Edward Moore Kennedy, Jr. (born 1961)
Patrick Joseph Kennedy II (born 1967)

see also Kennedy family

Victoria "Vicki" Reggie Kennedy (born February 26, 1954) is an American lawyer and the widow of U.S. Senator Edward Moore "Ted" Kennedy.

Early life and education

The second of six children, she was born Victoria Anne Reggie in Crowley, Louisiana to Louisiana judge and banker Edmund M. Reggie and Doris Ann Boustany Reggie, a Democratic national committeewoman.[2][3] She is of Lebanese descent, as all her grandparents were Maronites from Lebanon, who immigrated to the U.S. and settled in Louisiana.[4] Her grandparents became important players in the local Roman Catholic church and later their children became involved in business and politics.[4][5]

Her immediate family was wealthy because of money from her mother's family's interest in the Bunny Bread baking concern in New Orleans, Louisiana.[4][5] She was raised in a family that was constantly involved in politics and campaigns.[2] At the 1956 Democratic National Convention, her father helped deliver his state for John F. Kennedy's unsuccessful bid for the vice-presidential nomination. Over time, John Kennedy developed a close social relationship with the family.[6] Her mother cast the only Louisiana delegate vote for Ted Kennedy at the 1980 Democratic National Convention.[7]

She attended parochial schools growing up and was a straight-A student.[5] She attended Newcomb College at Tulane University in New Orleans, where she graduated with a bachelor of arts in English, magna cum laude[5][8], was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and was president of the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority.[5]

She then received her law degree, summa cum laude in 1979 from Tulane University Law School.[8]. There she was a member of Tulane Law Review.[5] Her education at Tulane, along with twenty years of other Tulane tuition for her brothers and sisters, was paid for by scholarships awarded by a political ally of her father.[9][10]

Early career and family

After law school, she clerked for Judge Robert Arthur Sprecher at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago.[5] As an attorney, she specialized in bank law.[2]

Reggie met her first husband, Grier C. Raclin, a telecommunications attorney[4] (who later became a senior executive at Charter Communications in St. Louis, Missouri),[11] when they clerked together at the Everett McKinley Dirksen Federal Courthouse in Chicago. Their 1981 church wedding was in Crowley and "feted 400 guests with a week's worth of parties."

Following marriage, the couple moved to Washington, D.C., where she practiced banking and savings and loan law and restructuring and bankruptcy law for Keck, Mahin & Cate.[3][4][5] She was made partner there, and was known to be "charismatic and hard-driving" and a tough negotiator in settlement talks[4] and "as a real star" for her ability to work on complicated financial transactions.[3]

She and Grier Raclin have two children: Curran Raclin (a son, born 1982) and Caroline Raclin (a daughter, born 1985).[2] They were divorced in 1990.[2][12] Upon her divorce, she was left to juggle her career as a lawyer with her role as a single mother of two young children.[3]

Remarriage and later career

While the Kennedy and Reggie families were friends for many years, Vicki remembers (but Senator Kennedy did not) their first meeting when Vicki was a summer intern in his Senate office's mailroom the year following her college graduation.[7] They began dating after meeting again in June 1991[13] at a party celebrating her parents' 40th wedding anniversary.[3] Ted Kennedy said of this meeting, "I had known Vicki before, but this was the first time I think I really saw her."[7] The relationship became serious in September 1991.[7] They were engaged in March 1992, and married July 3, 1992, in a civil ceremony at his home in McLean, Virginia. His political career had suffered from a long period of womanizing, drinking, and adverse publicity, and she is credited with stabilizing his personal life and helping him resume a productive career in the Senate.[3][6] Kennedy was devoted to her two children.[3][6]

In Kennedy's 1994 senatorial re-election campaign against Mitt Romney, she was credited by The New York Times with "giving him a political advantage in a difficult contest."[2] For a Boston, Massachusetts, reception she organized, 1,200 influential New England women met five of Kennedy's Senate colleagues.[4] In [clarification needed] his campaigns and his senatorial work, she became his principal assistant and closest political advisor.[6] By 1997, she no longer practiced law.[6] She came to the aid of the greater Kennedy family following the 1999 plane crash that took the life of John F. Kennedy, Jr.[14]

She is president and co-founder of Common Sense about Kids and Guns, an advocacy group begun in 1999 which seeks to reduce gun deaths and injuries to children in the U.S. She is a member of the board of trustees of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, and has served on the board of Stop Handgun Violence in Boston.[8]

Following her husband's May 2008 diagnosis of brain cancer, she became his primary caregiver, dealing with the Kennedy clan along with Ted's political connections. She assisted him in planning his course of treatment.[6] Reports indicated that he expressed the wish that his wife would succeed him in office,[6][14] and speculation towards that possibility continued during his illness.[15] However, upon his death she indicated no interest in assuming her husband's Senate seat, even temporarily.[16][17]

References

  1. ^ a b "The Kennedys" (film (Adobe Flash required; transcript available). American Experience. PBS. 2003-10-02. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Rimer, Sarah (1994-09-24). "The 1994 Campaign; Kennedy's Wife Is Giving Him a Political Advantage in a Difficult Contest". The New York Times. Retrieved 2009-08-29. This may be her first campaign...but in some ways Vicki Kennedy, who was divorced from her first husband in 1990 and is the mother of two children -- Curran, 11, and Caroline, 9 -- has trained for this role. She is a lawyer who specialized in banking -- she is not now practicing. And she was raised ...as a daughter of a retired judge and a Democratic national committeewoman. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |work= (help)
  3. ^ a b c d e f g Kahn, Joseph P. (2009-02-19). "An Untidy Private Life, Then a Turn to Stability". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 2009-02-20. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  4. ^ a b c d e f g Hersh, Burton (1997). The Shadow President: Ted Kennedy in Opposition. Steerforth Press. pp. 105–109. ISBN 1-883642-30-2.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Gliatto, Tom (1992-03-30). "Time to Marry? Right, Said Ted". People. Retrieved 2009-08-29. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  6. ^ a b c d e f g Romano, Lois (2008-06-07). "Senator's Wife Is His First Mate, Adviser and Caregiver". The Washington Post via The Ledger. Retrieved 2009-08-29. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  7. ^ a b c d Adam Clymer (1999). Edward M. Kennedy: A Biography. William Morrow. pp. 492–493. ISBN 0-688-14285-0.
  8. ^ a b c "Common Sense about Kids and Guns: Kennedy Bio". Mrs. Kennedy received her undergraduate degree, a B.A. magna cum laude, from Newcomb College of Tulane University, in New Orleans, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and other honor societies and was involved in student government. She was graduated summa cum laude from the Tulane Law School in 1979, where she was an editor of the Tulane Law Review and was inducted in the Order of the Coif. In May 1998, Mrs. Kennedy received an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the Suffolk University Law School in Boston for her service to her community. {{cite web}}: line feed character in |quote= at position 412 (help)
  9. ^ Tyler, Bridges (1995-10-15), "Records Reveal More Perks to the Powerful; The Tulane Scholarship Scandal Part II", The Times-Picayune
  10. ^ [dead link‍]"Louisiana Scholarships Have Political Pedigree". The New York Times. 1995-10-17. Retrieved 2008-10-28. Victoria Reggie, who married Mr. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat, in 1992, attended Tulane University's Newcomb College and Tulane Law School for free, courtesy of a state legislator who grew up with her father, Edmund Reggie, The Times-Picayune reported. Under programs dating from the 1880's, each state legislator can award one scholarship a year, and the Mayor of New Orleans can award five. In all, the Reggie children got twenty-seven years' worth of free tuition at Tulane, the newspaper reported. A nephew of Edmund Reggie got seven years of tuition. The tuition waivers were made by State Representative John N. John, who gave all the scholarships at his disposal to Mr. Reggie's family. Mr. John died in 1983. It is said that her father, Judge Edmund Reggie who served on Tulane's board secured these scholarships. Reggie was cited in the press for having obtained 34 years of Tulane scholarships for members of his family from Louisiana legislators during the period of 1971 to 1989 [17]. Few Democratic legislators aware of the political ramifications would risk denying a kingmaker's request for the favor of a tuition waiver. The legislative scholarships were intended for needy students who were otherwise qualified to attend Tulane. Reggie justified asking for the scholarships as "...a perfectly legal thing to do..." and that "Nobody else applied for them..." [18]. He also acknowledged in court that in the 1980s he had a net worth of $13 million [19]. Tulane officials approved the scholarships, which at 2003 rates were valued in excess of $1.1 million. http://www.tulanelink.com/tulanelink/reggie_box.htm {{cite news}}: External link in |quote= (help); line feed character in |quote= at position 412 (help)
  11. ^ Staff writer (Undated). "Corporate Governance — Biography; Grier C. Raclin — Executive Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer". Charter Communications. Accessed 2009-09-01.
  12. ^ Blumenfeld, Laura. (1992-03-20, page b.01). "Victoria Reggie, Ready for Teddy; Her Friends and Family Agree. She's Perfect for Him", The Washington Post, .
  13. ^ Trueheart, Charles (1992-03-15, page A.05). "Kennedy Announces Plans to Wed Washington Lawyer." The Washington Post.
  14. ^ a b Bishop, Ian (2008-05-22). "Ted Kennedy: I'd Like Wife to Take Seat". Daily News. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  15. ^ Fee, Gayle; Raposa, Laura (2009-02-20). "Is Vicki Kennedy Ready to Succeed?". Boston Herald. Retrieved 2009-08-29. {{cite news}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  16. ^ Parnes, Amie (2009-08-29). "Next Step Not Clear for Vicki Kennedy". The Politico. Accessed 2009-09-01.
  17. ^ Healy, Orla (2009-08-30). "Race to Follow Ted Waits for Family to Make up their Minds". Irish Independent. Accessed 2009-09-01.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Victoria_Reggie_Kennedy&oldid=311331089"