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Home / State House Leaders Meet Senator Kennedy’s Succession Request With SilenceState House Leaders Meet Senator Kennedy’s Succession Request With Silence
Last Updated on Friday, 21 August 2009 12:22 Written by rslcpol Friday, 21 August 2009 12:22
From wbur.org:
State House leaders are responding with silence to a request from Sen. Edward Kennedy regarding his Senate seat.
Kennedy, who has brain cancer, wrote a letter to Gov. Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo, asking them to amend Massachusetts law so Patrick could appoint a temporary senator if Kennedy could not complete his term.
There is a precedent for what Kennedy is requesting. In 1960, when his brother John was elected president, Ted Kennedy was 28 — two years too young to run for the U.S. Senate. The governor at the time, Foster Furcolo, appointed a Kennedy friend, Benjamin Smith, to complete John Kennedy’s term. Then, in 1962, Ted Kennedy ran and won the Senate seat.