The Impact of the Election on the Candidates' Kids

Sara B. Miller, in the Christian Science Monitor (July 29, 2004):

Life was easier for Vanessa Kerry in November, when her father had been all but written off as a presidential contender. "I could go to a primary state, I could campaign, and I could come back to my life," says the daughter of the Democrats' presumptive nominee.

She was no less fervent back then - just less famous. Now, as Nov. 2 nears, the trickle of parties and press conferences is reaching high tide. These days, Vanessa and her older sister, Alexandra, are briefed on everything from economics to national security. They board planes on a few hours' notice. This week in Boston, Ron Reagan, son of the late president, asked Alexandra: "Do you know how much this process is going to change you?"...

... "This campaign is tempting fate," says Doug Wead, author of "All the President's Children." "Both families are moving away from the conventional wisdom that their children should be kept under wraps and their lives should be kept private."

Almost always, candidates have brought their kids - or someone's kids - into the political fold. In the 1860s, Ulysses Grant's children gave speeches on the trail. "There's always been the history of candidates surrounding themselves with young children, even strangers' young children, kissing the baby," says historian Carl Sferrazza Anthony, author of "First Ladies."

But more recently, privacy has been the norm. The Clintons fiercely shielded their daughter Chelsea, even in the early campaign days of braces and Laura Ashley dresses. The Bushes did the same. So Barbara and Jenna Bush, recent college graduates, made a splash when they posed in the August issue of Vogue and formally joined their father's campaign.

Historically, Wead says, many first children have suffered under scrutiny. First Lady Louisa Adams, for one, mourned the loss of two sons she'd had with President John Quincy Adams - boys she felt were "sacrificed on the altar of politics." And for every story of a girl as fearless as Alice Roosevelt, toting her pet snake Emily Spinach, there are children who unravel, or simply fall short of expectations: How, after all, can one rise above a father's lot in life when that father presides over the most powerful nation on earth?