Me and RFK and an Ad You Couldn't Make Today

Negative ads were hardly unheard of in 1968. Four years earlier, Lyndon Johnson's reelection campaign ran what remains the most famous attack spot in history, the so-called "Daisy" ad suggesting that Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater might trigger nuclear war. But the hopeful tone that Guggenheim struck in his ads bespeaks a nation not yet ready to assume the worst about the candidates who aspired to lead it.

Guggenheim recalled the scramble to assemble spots for the late-starting campaign. He borrowed clips from a biographical film he had made for RFK's 1964 New York Senate race. Other ads were simply extended clips from Kennedy stump appearances, capturing his blend of passion (for aiding the poor) and populism (disdain for welfare handouts and Washington paternalism) that hasn't quite been matched since.

At the same time, there were foreshadows of the manipulative arts that have contributed to the current cynicism about politics. The Indiana spot we filmed in Northwest Washington was repackaged--to excise a specific reference to the state--for the Nebraska contest one week later. (The Nebraska spot was on the same reel at the JFK Library.)

Of course, the calendar for Campaign 2000--jammed with early primaries--would have rendered Kennedy's entire strategy moot. This year, both parties' nomination fights effectively ended on March 7, precisely two months before Indianans went to the polls in 1968. Back then, however, Indiana mattered because it was one of just 14 states that held primaries, all but one of them in April or later. Most delegates were still picked by party insiders. That's why RFK could enter the race after that year's March 12 New Hampshire primary and still hope to build enough momentum to prevail at the Chicago convention. His victory over McCarthy and favorite-son Indiana Gov. Roger Branigin (an ally of the Johnson administration) on May 7 was a strong first step. After RFK's death, Vice President Hubert Humphrey captured the Democratic nomination without having won a single primary.

For Guggenheim, the 1968 race contributed to his disillusionment with the political ad business. He cringed when the Democratic Party sought permission to recycle one particularly affecting piece of RFK campaign footage--in which Guggenheim's toddler son pulls a toy school bus up the Capitol steps--for use in House and Senate campaigns that had nothing to do with Kennedy. It made him feel, Guggenheim says, that "I was not in a very good profession."

He worked in campaigns for a few more years, notably handling Al Gore Sr.'s unsuccessful bid for reelection as Tennessee senator in 1970. He then left the business to make documentaries, which have won several Academy Awards. Meanwhile, the son who marched up the Capitol steps has eschewed the political world altogether; he produced episodes of TV shows such as "ER" and "NYPD Blue" and now makes feature films.

By contrast, my role as a child campaign hack seems only to have whetted a lifelong appetite for presidential politics. I promise, however, at least one small contribution to the health of the democratic process: Should my fifth-grader somehow manage to worm her way into this year's campaign dialogue, I'll do everything I can to keep her from going negative.

John Harwood, the political editor of the Wall Street Journal, is covering his fifth consecutive presidential campaign.