With support from the University of Richmond

History News Network puts current events into historical perspective. Subscribe to our newsletter for new perspectives on the ways history continues to resonate in the present. Explore our archive of thousands of original op-eds and curated stories from around the web. Join us to learn more about the past, now.

James Kilpatrick, conservative commentator, dies at 89

James J. Kilpatrick, the conservative commentator and former editor of The Richmond News Leader, has died after a long illness, his family said today. He was 89.

Mr. Kilpatrick died last night at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, said one of his sons, Sean Kilpatrick.

Kilpatrick, known to television viewers as a commentator on “Point-Counterpoint” segment of “60 Minutes,” and as a columnist who eloquently wrote about the use of the language, was a syndicated columnist after leaving The News Leader, where as an editorialist he supported the failed policies of Massive Resistance to school desegregation.

In a Times-Dispatch interview in 2000, Mr. Kilpatrick said that in later years, he remained troubled by his former editorial stance. But, he added, his argument on school integration was “an effort to elevate the debate above the blood in the streets. The hope was it might in some obscure way have calmed the waves of passion. That was one of the motives, and the other was to keep the schools segregated until things settled down.”
Read entire article at Richmond Times-Dispatch