Edward M. Kennedy came to Washington following the trail blazed by his older brothers, John and Robert. He became a Senator for Massachusetts in 1962, elected to fill the vacancy left by John's election as president, and held the position until his death, on Aug. 25, 2009.
On May 17, 2008, Mr. Kennedy suffered a seizure and was airlifted to a Boston hospital, where doctors discovered a malignant tumor in his brain.
After undergoing an operation for brain cancer at the Duke University Medical Center in June, he managed to make a rousing speech at the Democratic convention in Denver but faded more and more from view afterwards.
In July, 2009 as a divided Senate tangled over health care legislation, there was bipartisan consensus on one point: Ted Kennedy could make a big difference, if only he were here. Mr. Kennedy, battling brain cancer, had not been on Capitol Hill since April. Colleagues routinely lamented his absence, which had been especially painful to Mr. Kennedy, the committee chairman, who had spent much of his career trying to expand health coverage. People close to Mr. Kennedy marveled at how his fight for his life could coincide so dramatically with what may be the culminating summer of his life's cause.
As his health declined, Mr. Kennedy became more of an inspirational leader than a tangible one. He turned over his day-to-day committee duties to Mr. Dodd in the spring. Mr. Dodd called him on July 14 to tell him the health committee, known as HELP, would pass the health bill - whose centerpiece is a government-run insurance plan - the next day. "I called about 8:15, and he was already asleep," Mr. Dodd said. Mr. Kennedy called back at 7 a.m. the next morning sounding thrilled.
"Just bellowing with joy," Mr. Dodd said, "as excited as I've heard him in a long time."
Mr. Kennedy's enthusiasm was in keeping with his reputation as one of the last lions of liberalism, a full-throated defender of the policies the Democratic party pursued in the 1960's and 1970's. But within the Senate he had a reputation as one of the most effective members at building bipartisan coalitions.
When President Bush's No Child Left Behind bill was floundering in 2001, it was Mr. Kennedy he turned to and who saw it into law. In 2007, with the bill's renewal stalled, it was Mr. Kennedy Mr. Bush turned to again, despite bitter disagreements in the years in between on a wide range of issues, most notably the war in Iraq, which Mr. Kennedy opposed. When the Senate that spring seemed poised to pass a bipartisan bill on immigration, one of the names on it was Kennedy's.
In a family synonymous with tragedy, Mr. Kennedy had his share of woes, many of which were self-inflicted. The car accident in Chappaquiddick in 1969 in which a young woman drowned permanently stained his reputation for many voters; his only bid for the presidency, a 1980 primary challenge, was easily turned back by President Jimmy Carter. In 1991, with his poll ratings among the lowest in Congress, he issued a public apology for his personal shortcomings. In 1994, after having divorced and remarried, and with a new sense of energy and determination, he bounced back to defeat Mitt Romney and hold onto his Senate seat. He never faced a serious challenge again, and at the 2004 Democratic convention in Boston, he was cheered and celebrated as the party's patriarch.
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