KENNEDY HONORS SISTER AT NAMING OF EUNICE KENNEDY SHRIVER NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUM
WASHINGTON, DC— Today, Senator Edward M. Kennedy attended a ceremony to rename the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) in honor of his sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver. A life-long supporter and advocate for people with disabilities, Mrs. Shriver was also inducted into the NIHCH Hall of Honor for her role in founding the institute 45 years ago.
One of 27 Institutes and Centers that comprise the NIH system, the NICHD was established by Congress in 1962, a result of President Kennedy’s and Mrs. Shriver’s support. Mrs. Shriver is also the founder of the Special Olympics.
Senator Kennedy’s remarks are below.
What a wonderful, happy day this is, as we gather to celebrate an extraordinary honor for an extraordinary woman, my sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver. All of us in the Kennedy and Shriver families are so proud of Eunice and all she’s accomplished in her life. And we’re grateful to everyone who’s helped to make today possible.
I pay special tribute to my friend Orrin Hatch who’s done so much throughout his illustrious career in the Senate to improve the lives of people with disabilities, and to the House Majority Leader, Congressman Steny Hoyer and your Congressman Chris Van Hollen for their tireless service and unfailing support for NIH. I also pay tribute to my son Congressman Patrick Kennedy who couldn’t be here today, but who’s done so much to achieve equality for people with mental illness.
And I cannot be at NIH without acknowledging the tireless work of my friend and your Senator Barbara Mikulski. Her advocacy for NIH is legendary. And, without her, there wouldn’t be the focus on research in women’s health. Thank you, Barbara, for all you continue to do to support the work here at NIH to improve the health of all Americans. And thanks to my colleague Senator Ben Cardin and Paul Sarbanes before him. You couldn’t have stronger advocates for this outstanding institution.
And special thanks as well to the director of the NIH, Dr. Elias Zerhouni, and to the director of the National Institute of Child Health and Development – now the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Development—Dr. Duane Alexander, outstanding leaders both, who have done so much to improve the quality of life for so many.
As all of you who know Eunice understand, she is not the kind of person who takes no for an answer. In fact, she doesn’t take the first 100 no’s for an answer. She’s competitive. She’s tenacious. And she’s unstoppable.
I guess you could say that Eunice has a talent for getting her way. And lucky for all of us, “her way” is to make the world a better place for people with disabilities – and she’s been doing that with incredible success for more than 60 years.
As a young woman, fresh out of Stanford University, Eunice worked with female prison inmates, trying to help them get their lives back on track. She worked with juveniles, caught up in the criminal justice system, trying to help them get their lives back on track. And then, in what has been the cause of her life, she took over the direction of the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Foundation and dedicated herself to improving the lives of individuals with intellectual disabilities. Through her work at the Foundation, she spearheaded the establishment of the first Presidential Commission on Mental Retardation and helped develop a network of university-affiliated facilities and mental retardation research centers at major medical schools across the country. She was the moving force behind major centers for the study of medical ethics at Harvard and Georgetown Universities. And she founded the Special Olympics, which now provides year-round sports training to more than 2.5 million athletes with intellectual disabilities in more than 180 countries.
And that’s not all. Eunice also dreamed of a world class research facility that would focus on the needs and treatment of children with developmental disabilities. And after the election of 1960, Eunice saw her chance, and she lobbied President Kennedy with a vengeance! Every time she visited the White House, Eunice would make her case. And as we all know, she was a very successful advocate. In October 1962, President Kennedy signed a law that established the National Institute of Child Health and Development.
The Mission Statement of the Institute tells the story:
The mission of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development … is to ensure that every person is born healthy and wanted, that women suffer no harmful effects from the reproductive process, and that all children have the chance to fulfill their potential to live healthy and productive lives, free from disease or disability, and to ensure the health, productivity, independence, and well-being of all people through optimal rehabilitation.
And for the past 45 years the Institute has been on the front lines fulfilling that Mission. What an incredible success story it is. And how proud we are of my sister’s role in it.
Eunice’s life is an example to us all of what an individual can achieve when they have perseverance and determination. When she encounters bump in the road, she simply paves a new highway.
Eunice has dedicated her life to bringing comfort and hope to children and their parents around the country – and indeed around the world. They are not alone because she is fighting for them. Eunice might be a featherweight in size, but she’s the heavy weight champion of progress and possibility in the field of intellectual disabilities.
Eunice is truly an inspiration to us all. And may this Institute which now bears her name remind future generations that one person truly can make a difference and that each of us should try. We love you, Eunie, and are so, so proud of you.
Thank you all very much.
