ABSTRACT
The early years of the Republic saw only one example of the dynastic impulse: John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams. The twentieth and twenty-first century presidencies, however, are almost a register of family successions, starting with Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Actually, dynastic rule in America began with the Kennedy family. Joseph P. Kennedy, Roosevelt's ambassador to Britain, had early decreed that his eldest son Joseph Jr. would be the Democratic candidate for president. But Joseph Jr. died prematurely in World War II. This left the next in line, John F. Kennedy, to fill the post, which he did reluctantly due to extreme back pain until his assassination in 1962. With no Kennedys filling the office of vice president, the family had to wait until the death of Lyndon Johnson to put forth a presidential candidate. This proved to be Bobby Kennedy, who was likewise gunned down by an assassin.
