Just five years after assuming his brother's Senate seat at age 30, Edward M. Kennedy helped enact the Medicare and Medicaid programs, beginning a 40-plus year involvement with federal health care issues. Kennedy was so passionate about extending coverage to the uninsured and fortifying the social safety net, that he made then-candidate Barack Obama pledge to make health care a first-tier priority in return for his support -- a promise the president fulfilled by staking much of his first-term agenda on an ambitious and controversial plan to retool the U.S. health care system.
Kennedy's colleagues in Congress -- including Obama's campaign opponent, Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain -- have lamented the progressive warrior's absence from the Senate during this year's health care debate and speculated how his presence might have by now helped forged consensus on the broad contours of a plan.
"Had his own health allowed him to fully participate, we would be far closer to consensus today on a path to health care in America," Sen. Thomas R. Carper, D-Del., said on Wednesday.
In the hours after Kennedy's death, progressive interest groups wasted little time invoking his legacy, in an effort to rally Congress to enact a sweeping health plan when lawmakers return on Sept. 8.
Kennedy's passing could yet alter the tenor of the debate, now mired in fierce partisan battles over how to pay for an overhaul and what role the government should play in a retooled health insurance market.
Fiscally conservative and centrist Democrats, particularly in the House, might be more inclined to take a tough vote on a health care bill containing a government-run insurance option and new taxes, if it is linked to the legacy of the late senator.
But Kennedy's death could underscore the shortage of legislative leaders in the current debate. The power vacuum, if it remains unfilled, might make undecided House members and senators more reluctant to embrace any compromise that smacks of liberal activism or expensive social engineering.
Anna Burger, chairwoman of the labor coalition Change to Win, on Wednesday linked progress on health legislation to Kennedy's work on social justice issues, saying, "The most fitting tribute to honoring the life and legacy of this great statesman is for Congress to pass quality affordable health care for all this year."
Jack Lewin, chief executive officer of the American College of Cardiology, predicted Kennedy's death will improve prospects for a bipartisan compromise, even at a time when the financial world is jittery about the prospect of more federal spending adding to the national debt.
"The sentiments and loyalties to the Lion will certainly nonetheless tilt the Congress' agenda toward passage of some kind of historic health reform bill. Whatever it contains, it will be more than it might have been in his honor and memory," Lewin said.
Even some Obama administration officials indicated Kennedy's death would strengthen their resolve to get a health bill this year. "Ensuring that all Americans have access to quality, affordable health care was one of the causes of Senator Kennedy's life and we will carry his mission forward," said Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
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