Yet a more objective and discerning source, Jacqueline Kennedy, observed that Bobby was the Kennedy “least like his father.” She saw his inner sensitivity and his innate, though often well-concealed, sense of decency. Others did too. After John F. Kennedy was assassinated, a documentary mak-er asked a brooding Kenny O’Donnell, the close aide and friend to both JFK and RFK, if Bobby was “ruthless.” “Jack was the tough one, not Bobby,” O’Donnell replied. “Jack would cut you off at the knees. Bobby would say, ‘Why are we doing that to this guy?’ "
RFK was always more complicated than his tough-guy pose, and his gentler side began to emerge more clearly after JFK died and his father was rendered speechless by a stroke. He had long shown strong feelings toward children, particularly if they were somehow disadvantaged. Kennedy himself could be childlike, squirming in his seat, petulant, or, despite all his “toughness,” full of innocent wonder. In the mid- and late-’60s, he became a crusader for the poor, for blacks and Mexicans and Indians. He was not a typical ’60s liberal (“all liberals are s.o.b.s,” he once said, quoting his father). He was wary of welfare and believed in self-help and the dignity of work. But the underdogs sensed his empathy. Sonny Carson, a black militant in Brooklyn who led confrontational demonstrations against the white power structure, backed off when he saw RFK walk into a local church. “Man, it was like the pope walked in,” he recalled. “There was this strangeness that caused blacks to love him. He was this younger brother full of pain. That’s how he got over. I thought, Oh my God, if I interrupt him, people will look at me like, ‘What the f— are you doing, man! You can’t do that! That’s Robert Kennedy!’ "
