Who You Gonna Call? Ghostwriters!

On a cold, wind-chilled morning in January of 1961, John F. Kennedy was standing at the podium of the U.S Capitol in Washington D.C. It was his inauguration.

As thousands shivered and breath steamed from their noses while they watched, Kennedy uttered his famous lines:

"And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.

My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man."

President John F. Kennedy speaking at his inauguration in 1961.  AP

The lines received applause and cheers, and became one of the most famous presidential quotes in American History.

If only Kennedy had written them.

Instead, that distinction belongs to Kennedy's aide, Ted Sorensen. According to Robert Schlesinger's book White House Ghosts, Kennedy told Sorensen to solicit suggestions, keep it short and make it forward-looking.

It seems strange that such famous lines, which we attribute to Kennedy and which help form his reputation, were not really his. Is this common? Is this legal? Is this a huge disappointment to those who value originality and authenticity?

Ted Sorensen in the White House in the early 1960s.  Abbie Rowe / National Park Service

First, is this common? Yes.

It's clear to us now that every president since Warren G. Harding and many major political figures have a speech writer, or a team of them:

• Actor and filmmaker Orson Welles contributed lines to some of President Franklin Roosevelt's speeches as FDR was campaigning for a fourth term.

Orson Welles.

• Ted Sorensen not only wrote every major speech for JFK, he also wrote his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, Profiles in Courage.

• Clarence B. Jones helped pen Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech.

Clarence B. Jones behind Martin Luther King, Jr.  Clarence B. Jones

• Peggy Noonan authored many of President Ronald Reagan's speeches, including his famous speech after the Challenger explosion.

Peggy Noonan with President Ronald Reagan in 1988.

• Tony Schwartz scribed President Donald Trump's book that rocketed him to fame, The Art of the Deal.

Tony Schwartz.

Most recently we learned, through a fascinating process, that it was John Hay, President Abraham Lincoln's secretary, who composed the famous Bixby letter, in which Lincoln consoles a mother who supposedly lost five sons in the Civil War:

"I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom."

President Lincoln, center, with his secretaries in 1863. John Hay is on the right.  Alexander Gardner

Second, is this legal? Yes. Though the bigger question probably is, Is this ethical?

An author at freelancewriting.com (who remains nameless, naturally), argues:

"As long as two individuals are willing to enter into a contractual arrangement where one does the work and another gets the credit, then ghostwriting provides someone with talent at capturing another person’s voice and shaping their ideas into words that get the message across a way to make an honest living."

Commentator Dan Gillmor disagrees:

"Society has a blind spot about this practice – and applies a double standard. If we catch a student paying someone to write his or her paper for a class, or even if the actual writer does it for free, we give the student a failing grade. . . . If I'd flunk a student for doing it, why should I give a pass to the rich and powerful?"

But David Leonhardt, who wrote speeches and correspondence for a member in the Canadian Parliament, takes perhaps the most pragmatic view:

"All this was standard and typical activity for any politician at any level of government. Without a ghostwriter, no correspondence or speech would ever get written."

Finally, is this a huge disappointment to those who value originality and authenticity?

That's up to only you. But whatever you feel, it's the way things work.

But what about that other famous presidential speech, the Gettysburg Address? Never fear, Abraham Lincoln did indeed write that.

For now.

President Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg in 1863, the only known photo of him at that event.  David Bachrach

I am currently working on a book (yes, writing it myself) about Ah Toy, the first Chinese brothel madam in gold rush San Francisco.

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