Nicholas Katzenbach, Former JFK, LBJ Aide Passes Away At 90

Nicholas Katzenbach, former aide to both Lyndon Johnson and John F. Kennedy, passed away Tuesday night at his home in Skillman, N.J.

Katzenbach, a former Justice Department and State Department official, was revered by Robert Caro, the man who is working on an epic series of Lyndon Johnson. He said of the former aide:

“He was a key figure in so many of the most crucial moments in both the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. And he was so careful about making sure that I truly understood them.”

Sean Wilentz, a History Professor at Princeton University, and a close friend of the late Katzenbach, stated that:

“Throughout his long and singular career in the nation’s service, Nicholas Katzenbach combined realism, loyalty, and supreme equability with a bedrock devotion to principle, especially on civil rights. He was one of his generation’s giants, and history will remember him that way.”

Included in his eight years as a White House aide were events like the Bay of Pigs, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the integration of schools, the Warren Report, the Civil Rights Act, and Vietnam.

Nicholas Katzenbach’s son, John, stated of remembered his father, saying:

“[He] passed away with the same quiet dignity that he displayed throughout his life…he never thought any battle was fully won until hearts and attitudes followed the law.”

Throughout his career in D.C., the former P.O.W. assisted with writing a legal brief to support President John F. Kennedy’s decision to begin a blockade of Cuba in the 1962 missile crisis. He earned the position of deputy attorney general in 1963, and served as attorney general and undersecretary of state for President Lyndon Johnson.

Nicholas Katzenbach described to the AP what it was like to be an aide in the White House in the 1960s. He stated:

“It was an exciting time. There were lots of young people who got themselves involved in civil rights, and later in protesting the Vietnam War, feeling involved in the government and what’s going on in their own future. To my mind that’s what makes this a great country.”