Ted Kaufman
From Philosopedia
Ted Kaufman (15 March 1939 - )
Edward E. "Ted" Kaufman is the junior United States Senator from Delaware. A Democrat, he replaced Joe Biden upon his election as Vice President and took office on 16 January 2009.
Kaufman was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Helen Carroll - a teacher and nominal Catholic - and Manuel Kaufman - a social worker and nominal Jew. He earned a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Duke University and a Master of Business administration from Wharton School of the University of Delaware. From 1973 to 1995 he was on Senator Joe Biden's staff, the last nineteen years as chief of staff.
Beginning in 1991, he was a senior lecturing fellow at Duke University School of Law. In 1995 President Bill Clinton appointment him to the Broadcasting Board of Governors, where he served four terms, resigning on 25 November 2008.
Rita K. Farrell wrote on 29 January 2009 in The New York Times about Kaufman's having been raised a Catholic:
- In a Senate dominated by lawyers and career public servants, Mr. Kaufman, who holds an undergraduate degree from Duke and an M.B.A. from the Wharton School, is one of only two engineers. (The other is Jack Reed, Democrat of Rhode Island.)
- What he calls his “humanistic” way of thinking he attributes largely to his Irish Catholic mother, a teacher, and his father, a secular Jew, a social worker and his hero.
- He and his three sisters were raised in Philadelphia as Catholics. After attending Mass on Sundays with their mother, they would return home to eat bagels and lox with their father and engage in wide-ranging discussions.
- “I knew the world was changing,” he recalled with a smile, “when non-Jewish friends began to say, ‘Let’s go out and get bagels and lox.’ ”
Ted and his wife, Lynne, have been married since 1960 and reside in Wilmington. They have three daughters - Kelly, Murry, and Meg - and 7 grandchildren.
