Kirkpatrick, Jeane D.J. 1926-2006

(Jeane Duane Jordan Kirkpatrick)

OBITUARY NOTICE— See index for CA sketch: Born November 19, 1926, in Duncan, OK; died of congestive heart failure, December 7, 2006, in Bethesda, MD. Political scientist, educator, diplomat, and author.

Kirkpatrick is best remembered for her role as the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations during President Ronald Reagan’s first term in office. Her education included an A.A. from Stephens College, a B.A. from Barnard College in 1948, an M.A. from Columbia University in 1950, and a Ph.D. from that institution in 1967; she also attended graduate courses at the Institut de Science Politique at the University of Paris from 1952 to 1953. After completing her master’s degree, she worked as a research analyst for the U.S. State Department, and was a research associate at George Washington University and at the Fund for the Republic during the mid-1950s. Kirkpatrick began her academic career in earnest at Trinity College, where she was an assistant professor of political science from 1962 to 1967. She then joined the Georgetown University faculty, where she rose to become Leavey Professor in Foundations of Freedom in 1978. For much of her life, Kirkpatrick was a Democrat with strong liberal leanings. However, she was a staunch anticommunist as early as the 1950s, when she first became aware of the many social injustices perpetrated in the Stalinist Soviet Union. In the early 1970s, she joined the Coalition for a Democratic Majority, an organization that tried to wrest control of the party from the followers of George McGovern, and in 1978 she joined the American Enterprise Institute. Kirkpatrick remained loyal to Democratic ideals concerning workers’ rights and other social issues, but she became increasingly frustrated with her party’s positions on foreign relations. She came to believe in a strong U.S. military and favored American support of right-wing governments that she felt might eventually turn toward democracy. After publishing an article critical of President Jimmy Carter’s foreign policies, she attracted the attention of Republican presidential hopeful Ronald Reagan. After Reagan won the election, he appointed her U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Here, her willingness to express her opinions, even when they did not fully reflect the administration’s, sometimes rankled her superiors. However, Kirkpatrick supported Reagan on such issues as opposition to the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and support of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon. A particular moment in the spotlight came in 1983, when she presented a film to the U.N. showing the Soviets shooting down a South Korean passenger airplane. A woman who was also officially a Democrat in a government dominated by Republican men, Kirk-patrick often felt frustrated in her government post. She was, nevertheless, disappointed and surprised when Reagan did not ask her to return to his team when he won reelection. Kirkpatrick switched to the Republican Party in 1985. She returned to Georgetown University, where she continued to teach until her 2002 retirement. She also was a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board from 1985 to 1993 and of the Defense Policy Review Board from 1985 to 1993, and she chaired the Commission on Fail Safe and Risk Reduction from 1990 to 1992. In 2003, as well, she headed the U.S. Delegation to the Human Rights Commission. Kirkpatrick was the author of many books on politics, including Political Women (1974), The Reagan Doctrine and U.S. Foreign Policy (1985), and Good Intentions: Lost on the Road to the New World Order (1996). She earned many honors for her contributions over the years, including the 1982 B’nai B’rith Humanitarian award, the 1984 French Prix Politique, the 1985 Presidential Medal of Freedom, the 1996 Jerusalem 2000 award, the 1999 Hungarian Presidential Gold medal, and the 2000 Living Legends medal from the Library of Congress.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES

PERIODICALS

Chicago Tribune, December 9, 2006, Section 1, pp. 1, 11.

New York Times, December 9, 2006, pp. A1, A15.

Times (London, England), December 9, 2006, p. 76.

Washington Post, December 9, 2006, pp. A1, A9.