Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s interest in food policy may run in the family, albeit from a different perspective.  

RFK Jr. is focused on his Make America Healthy Again initiative with its emphasis on vaccinations, pesticides, genetic seeds, and additives, along with fluoride in the water.  However, his dad, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, D-N.Y., focused more on those who were malnourished and on growing America’s anti-hunger initiatives.

Much has been written about the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs and the legacy of Sens. George McGovern, D-S.D., and Bob Dole, R-Kan..  In truth, however, the roots of the committee trace back to Sen. Bobby Kennedy. 

On April 11, 1967, Kennedy, along with Sen. Joseph Clark, D-Pa., as a part of the Subcommittee on Employment, Manpower, and Poverty, visited the Mississippi Delta as part of a two-year examination of the impact of the War of Poverty.  Kennedy’s hearings inspired the powerful CBS documentary “Hunger in America,” which aired on May 21, 1968. It brought the face of hunger into every American home. 

Kennedy’s work and this exposure led to the creation of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs.  

Kennedy, of course, ran for president in 1968. The California primary took place on the same day as the much less significant South Dakota primary.  Interestingly, as Kennedy campaigned that Spring in South Dakota, he insisted that McGovern take him to Wounded Knee, which McGovern did, as it remains of great significance to Indian people.  

McGovern-Bobby.pngGeorge McGovern and Bobby Kennedy

Tragically, Kennedy was assassinated on the night of the California and South Dakota primaries. One of his last calls was to McGovern to thank him for his leadership in winning the South Dakota primary. (But for the assassination, Kennedy may have been the nominee in 1968 and reelected in 1972.)

After the assassination and, in part, as a tribute to Kennedy’s vision, the Select Committee on Nutrition was formed by the Senate.  The primary goal of the committee was to reduce and ultimately end hunger in America.  

The results of the committee’s work under the leadership of McGovern and Dole were transformative: food stamps became a national program (now the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, school lunch was expanded, school breakfast was established, and the WIC program (Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children) was launched fifty years ago in 1974. 

In 1977, the committee released the Dietary Goals for the United States, which later led to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, published by the departments of Agriculture, and Health and Human Services in 1980 and revised by law every five years since 1980. The guidelines were originally a simple pamphlet that easily fit in a breast pocket or pocketbook. Now, the Dietary Guidelines of 2020 and presumably the Dietary Guidelines of 2025 will be a complicated document, with footnotes and an appendix, more for PhDs than for the public. 

Following its work, the Select Committee became a permanent Subcommittee of the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, which now carries forward the mission to address hunger and nutrition policy in the United States. 

McGovern and Dole remained friends and allies in the fight against hunger. In 2000, long after leaving the Senate, under different circumstances, they met with President Clinton to establish the Global School Food Program as a discretionary program.  Congress later enacted the program and made the program permanent.  

Today, as we reflect on Sen. Robert F. Kennedy’s legacy, we must recognize his essential role in inspiring the U.S. fight against hunger and advancing nutrition policy.  His enduring commitment to ending hunger lives on in the programs he helped inspire.

This is the birthright RFK Jr should remember.  RFK Jr could bestow no greater honor to his dad’s memory than to use his position, should he be confirmed, to help lift up the least among us.

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Marshall Matz has specialized in food security since serving as general counsel to the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs.  He was the founder of the World Food Program, USA.  Alan J Stone retired as vice resident for external relations at Harvard University. He was also a White House speechwriter for President Bill Clinton. He began his career as staff director of the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs.