“Truly, Eleanor Roosevelt was the imperishable conscience of the world,” President Kennedy declared at her passing. Was he required to remember the late First Lady in such glowing terms? Or had former enemies become eternal allies? He ordered US flags to fly at half-staff in Mrs. Roosevelt’s honor until her burial. He and Mrs. Kennedy received a telegram inviting them to the funeral service at St. James Episcopal Church in Hyde Park and the interment in Springwood’s Rose Garden. They would attend, along with Vice President Johnson, former Presidents Truman and Eisenhower, UN Ambassador Stevenson, Chief Justice Earl Warren, and UN Secretary General U Thant. But first, they and Eleanor’s friends gathered at Val-Kill for visitation with the Roosevelt family. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, who had praised her predecessor in a letter to ER earlier that year as “so rare and so good for all women of my age to have to emulate—a great lady,” penned a kind note to Anna Roosevelt Halstead, thanking her for the intimate memorial arrangements that “made us all feel as if we were private people.” Nothing impressed Mrs. Kennedy more than protecting the privacy of presidential families—especially hers, with two young children being raised in the White House fishbowl.

JFK had come full circle since that fateful August day two years earlier when he met with Mrs. Roosevelt for their showdown lunch at her cottage and then delivered his Social Security commemorative address on Hyde Park’s lawn. Now he watched her simple oak coffin, covered in pine boughs from the woods surrounding Val-Kill, as ER requested, arrive at its final resting place next to the graves of FDR and his famous Scottish terrier, Fala. Eleanor had cared for her husband’s beloved canine friend after Franklin’s death. Like Greyfriars Bobby, Fala always seemed on guard for his master’s return, lying by the Val-Kill door in expectation and standing at the ready when he heard a motorcade approaching, until he died in 1952.

The look of sadness on President Kennedy’s face at the Roosevelt gravesite reflected that a genuine alliance, not simple political opportunism, bonded ER and JFK in the last two years of her life. Just a week after Eleanor’s death, the president announced that, at the request of her family, he had appointed a committee, headed by Ambassador Stevenson, “to explore and make suggestions regarding the manner in which the major interests to which Mrs. Roosevelt dedicated her life could be continued,” especially “the securing and protection of human rights and on improvement of living conditions among the underprivileged.” JFK asked the committee to meet in Washington before November’s end to organize and streamline the efforts that many of her friends wished to undertake in her honor. We will never know what the former First Lady would have thought about the fact that only one woman, her friend Mary Lasker, appeared among the fifteen-person committee, and one, “Mrs. Joseph Lash,” among the handful asked to serve as consultants. Kennedy also accepted a suggestion from Senator Muskie to recommend that Canada and the United States jointly create an international park around Eleanor and Franklin’s Campobello home.

The look of sadness on President Kennedy’s face at the Roosevelt gravesite reflected that a genuine alliance, not simple political opportunism, bonded ER and JFK in the last two years of her life.

In the redesigned White House Rose Garden, just springing to renewed life in April 1963, President Kennedy announced his signing of a bill granting a federal charter to the Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Foundation, which was dedicated to her causes: “Relief of the poor and underprivileged, promotion of public health, promotion of economic welfare, and furtherance of international good will.” The president’s written remarks concluded that “Mrs. Roosevelt, I believe, would be pleased to know that her friends and associates have chosen this way to continue her work, especially because it enables all citizens to take part in deeds rather than just words.” Kennedy received a certificate naming him a “Founding Member” of the Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Foundation, signed by Ambassador Stevenson, who attended the White House ceremony establishing the foundation. Its mission was “to keep alive the courageous ideals and efforts of Eleanor Roosevelt.”

Now that “Mrs. R” had exited the political stage, JFK had no personal obligation to honor her posthumously, but she and her late husband Franklin remained patron saints of the Democratic Party’s liberal wing. The Americans for Democratic Action (ADA), of which Eleanor was a founding member and honorary chair, celebrated the New Deal’s ideals each January with Franklin D. Roosevelt Day dinners on his birthday at chapters across the country. Democratic presidents sent greetings and a brief statement to the celebrations. In January 1963, JFK devoted his remarks to Mrs. Roosevelt. Her loss “cannot be measured,” he began, but “grief is the last thing that she, most of all, would wish to preoccupy us. Her orientation was never with bygones. It was always with things to come. The beliefs she lived by—the dedication to people which was her genius, and the understanding of them which was her charm—are ever-living. . . . Her commitment to humanity and her hopes for the world went way beyond her mortal self.” Mrs. Roosevelt “would want these dinners to continue to be annual reminders of the spirit and principle of her husband, Franklin D. Roosevelt,” Kennedy declared. Attendees, he observed, were “champions and exponents of the great liberal tradition of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt.” “The need for expression of liberal—often unpopular—ideas is one that will survive us all,” JFK concluded.

Official tributes were not the only ways that the Kennedys and Roosevelts remained bonded. Eleanor’s son, Congressman James Roosevelt, who had been such a close associate of Ambassador Kennedy, wrote a poignant letter to Joe’s wife Rose, thanking her for condolences after his mother’s death: “Your very wonderful letter meant so very much to me. You and Joe through the years have always made me feel a part of your family, and I have, and always will, the same deep respect and affection for you and your family.” James wrote frankly about ER: “Mother had a full and rare life. She truly loved people for themselves, not what they seemed to be. One of the last things she said to me, about two weeks before she died, was, ‘I think the president would have an easier time if Nixon is not governor of California.’ And so it is. Her mistakes were those of judgment but rarely involved ill will, and her loyalties ran deep.” Perhaps this was his explanation of her late arrival aboard the 1960 Kennedy bandwagon. Her dislike of Nixon and his 1950s Red-baiting, especially of her friend Helen Gahagan Douglas, also ran deep. Sadly, she probably wasn’t aware that Nixon lost the Golden State gubernatorial race the day before she died and declared his retirement from politics (prematurely, as it happened).

Official tributes were not the only ways that the Kennedys and Roosevelts remained bonded.

Congressman Roosevelt’s description of his siblings’ and perhaps his father’s relationship with ER reveals stark honesty: “She loved her family and stood by us even when we brought her grief and tribulation.” Her five children had nineteen marriages among them and fought frequently over money and the family’s tangible assets, including the Hyde Park and Val-Kill properties. “We, her children, have so much to be proud of and the responsibility not to mar but to uphold her image.” As the Kennedy family’s supreme image-maker, Rose could certainly understand the congressman’s wish.

He concluded with heartfelt warmth toward Rose and Joe: “You and Joe have given us much through yourselves and your family that perhaps you will know what I mean when I say that my duty to my mother’s memory will best be served if I join in your prayers for her and continue to deserve your affection as well as do my part to help your son and my president. I will try to see you both very soon. Many thanks and my love always, Jimmy.”

During his presidency, JFK wanted to reward Franklin Jr. for his crucial help in winning the 1960 West Virginia primary over Hubert Humphrey. Given Franklin’s distinguished World War II Navy service, Kennedy thought it appropriate to appoint him secretary of the Navy, but Defense Secretary Robert McNamara nixed the nomination, opposing most courtesy appointments at the Pentagon and perhaps knowing of Franklin’s less than stellar congressional career. Moreover, McNamara was a Republican until 1978, which would have made him disinclined toward FDR fandom. Franklin Jr. settled for undersecretary of commerce.

During his presidency, JFK wanted to reward Franklin Jr. for his crucial help in winning the 1960 West Virginia primary over Hubert Humphrey.

Mrs. Roosevelt didn’t live to see the first substantive outcome from the President’s Commission on the Status of Women. Her testimony and Peterson’s legislative acumen, however, had already inspired the president and Congress to move forward even before the PCSW completed its final report. “I concluded very definitely that we had to have a federal [equal pay] law. That, too, I think, I can take some credit for,” Esther stated in her oral history. “I got Arthur [Goldberg] to really agree to put it on our legislative list, and I talked with the legislative people over there [at the White House]. I had to convince them that it was a good political issue, that they had to do something for women and that this would be one of the best things they could do.” Although the president’s legislative staff, led by Lawrence O’Brien, posed no obstacles to the equal pay for women proposal, they didn’t make it a priority.

Undersecretary of Labor Willard Wirtz, who replaced Goldberg as head of the department when JFK appointed the latter to the Supreme Court in 1962, “was not as warm toward this idea as was Arthur,” according to Esther. Wirtz “didn’t think we could ever get it. . . . He didn’t think it was possible. I don’t think he objected to it in principle as much. But I didn’t ever have enthusiastic support during those times. All you hear is, ‘Oh, another women’s sort of thing.’” Having drafted the pay equity bill at the same time as she and her colleagues were establishing the commission, Peterson wanted the record to show that the legislation moved forward separately: “We got Mrs. Roosevelt to testify for it, but it was well on its way before the commission acted.”¹⁴

In February 1962, the PCSW endorsed the equal pay bill, which passed both houses of Congress, but a conference committee to reconcile differences in the legislation failed to meet before adjournment, and the reform died. After reintroduction in the new Congress, the 1963 version made it all the way to President Kennedy, whom Peterson kept on board with supportive statements he could issue about the bill. He signed the Equal Pay Act in June. The landmark legislation prohibited “discrimination on account of sex in the payment of wages by employers.” Kennedy labelled the law “a first step” that “affirms our determination that when women enter the labor force they will find equality in their pay envelopes.” As an amendment to the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, the 1963 law required that employers pay workers equally, regardless of gender, for labor requiring “equal skill, effort, and responsibility.” This was the goal of “equal pay for equal work” that Eleanor had advocated for decades.

 After reintroduction in the new Congress, the 1963 version made it all the way to President Kennedy, whom Peterson kept on board with supportive statements he could issue about the bill. He signed the Equal Pay Act in June.

Meanwhile, Esther, with an editorial committee, prepared the commission’s unanimous final report, titled American Women.¹⁷ She knew they had the White House’s support when, after sending a draft to the president’s staff, his advisors asked that JFK’s photo be included in the report’s frontispiece. The commission also featured a picture of the smiling Eleanor Roosevelt as a tribute to their deceased leader. At the White House ceremony and reception for the commission, held on what would have been ER’s seventy-ninth birthday, October 11, 1963, President Kennedy departed from prepared remarks to speak extemporaneously about the importance of the PCSW’s work. After expressing his “very great appreciation to Miss Peterson and to Professor Lester” along with members of Congress on the commission, especially Senator Maurine Neuberger and Congresswoman Edith Green, both Oregon Democrats who fought for women’s rights on Capitol Hill, he declared, “I think this is a very vital matter with which we’re dealing.” He thought a civilization could be judged on “its opportunities for women.”

[…]

Neither the president nor the former First Lady would experience the PCSW report’s demonstrable impact or enduring progeny. JFK succumbed to an assassin’s bullet in Dallas on November 22, 1963. Yet the truce reached between Eleanor Roosevelt and John Kennedy in August 1960 at her lunch table in the modest Val-Kill cottage on her husband’s Hyde Park estate not only helped elect the 35th president of the United States but allowed the passing of the torch from one dynasty to another—“like the Plantagenets to the Yorks,” as Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wryly noted after attending Mrs. Roosevelt’s funeral. The lessons of how political cooperation can vanquish personal, ideological, and generational conflict should remain as eternal as the flame that First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy lit at her husband’s Arlington gravesite. The grande dame and her “dear boy” not only found common ground for pursuing their common interests but established a model, needed today more than ever, for burying old personal and political grudges to serve the common good.

Excerpted from Reconcilable Differences: The Unlikely Political Alliance of John F. Kennedy and Eleanor Roosevelt published by University of Virginia Press ©2026