Two U.S. senators share Profile In Courage Award

By Judy Rakowsky, Globe Staff, May 25, 1999

The long and mercurial bid of US Senators John McCain and Russell Feingold to overhaul campaign finance netted yesterday the first Profile in Courage Award to be shared by elected officials of opposite parties.

The senators, who united to press for legislation to limit the impact of so-called soft money on federal elections, said at the ceremony in the John F. Kennedy Library that they are confident the bill will pass this year.

Over the past year, both men stood by the principle of fund-raising overhaul, putting their political careers in jeopardy.

Feingold and McCain "are two courageous men who have nothing to fear before the courts of history," said Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, who helped judge the 10-year-old contest named for her father, President John F. Kennedy, for his 1957 Pulitzer Prize-winning book "Profiles in Courage" about elected officials who risked their political careers for their beliefs.

The award includes a $25,000 stipend, which McCain and Feingold said they plan to donate to charity.

Feingold, a Democrat from Wisconsin, nearly lost a reelection challenge from Republican Mark Neumann after the incumbent swore off private donations.

McCain, an Arizona Republican, said his policy priorities differ sharply from those of Feingold and Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who participated in the awards ceremony. But he said he considered overhaul worthy of bucking his party leadership last year and again this year.

"Until we abolish soft money, Americans will never have a government that works as hard for them as it does for the special interests," McCain said.

Feingold said the award is "the ideal way to spur us on to get the last few votes."

For his part, Senator Kennedy said he is a strong supporter of the bill, but he declined to seize the occasion to forswear soft money donations to his 2000 reelection campaign. He said he will conform with established laws.

"But I'm hopeful we'll have it passed by then," Kennedy said after the ceremony.