Family First

Behind the pardon

The young man looked out at the whitecapped waves crashing into the seaweed-strewn shore. He watched as the cold New England winds whipped the water into the dunes, pounding rocks into pebbles, and pebbles into sand, a process forever repeating, a signifier of Time Immemorial itself. Exactly one week prior he had turned 33 years old, his hair was still full and dark, his gait still light, and the better part of his life was still ahead of him. Life hadn’t been easy the previous three years—in fact, it had been harder than anything he or anyone else could have ever imagined. But through it all, he had his family around him—his sister, his brothers, his mother, his father—and most importantly, his sons: Beau and Hunter.

Because for Joe Biden, family always came first.

It was Thanksgiving, 1975 and Senator Biden had taken his two boys and his new girlfriend, Jill, to Nantucket to get away from Washington, away from Delaware, and away from the world. When he was elected to the Senate in 1972, Biden was just 29 years old. It had already been a whirlwind to that point. During that first race for the Senate, Biden employed his sister—Valerie, just 27—as his campaign manager. His principal fundraiser was his brother, Jimmy, who was 24. His mother ran the coffee klatches around his hometown of Wilmington—and of course his youngest brother, Frankie, was around to help too. But to Biden, it all made perfect sense: Valerie had managed all his campaigns, including his successful run for the 4^th District seat on the New Castle County Council two years prior along with his other successful race, when he was elected Senior Class President in high school.

But that all mattered less to Biden than his home life, and the woman he had met a few years prior, Neilia Hunter, in the spring of 1964 when he was a junior at the University of Delaware. Neilia was at the University of Syracuse, where, shortly after, Biden decided he wanted to go to Law School. Every Thursday night that spring they met; Joe would drive the 270 miles north from Wilmington to Syracuse at a clip of about 80 miles an hour, in an old Mercedes that his father—a used car salesman—had helped him get. About halfway through the drives each week, he would pass through Scranton, the hometown his family left when he was 10 years old, after his father lost his job. Those visions of family failures—of the dilapidated apartment they first moved into in Wilmington, of his father’s professional instability, of the time when his classmate Jimmy Lanahan started calling him “Bye Bye” in the school yard for his stutter when he struggled to pronounce his own last name—all drove Joe Biden.

Soon, Neilia fell for Joe, even if on their second date she had to slip him a twenty-dollar bill under the table so he could afford to pay for their dinner. That didn’t matter—and neither did the fact that he graduated 76^th of 85 students in his graduating law school class. He had told her that he was going to be a United States Senator by the time he was 30, and then one day, he would be President. He even told Neilia’s mother. She had asked when they met what Biden wanted to be one day. He told her: “President.” And then, after a brief pause, “…of the United States.”

On August 27, 1966, Joe and Neilia married. Soon, their first child, Beau, was born in 1969. Then Hunter the next year, followed by Naomi in 1971. Incredibly, Joe’s plans were all coming together. Soon, on November 20, 1972, Senator-Elect Joe Biden finally turned 30. But then came Monday, December 18. At about 2:30 PM, Neilia and the three kids were driving westward on Valley Road in Hockessin, Delaware on their way to go Christmas shopping in the family station wagon when Neilia stopped where the road met Route 7. Hunter was up front with his mother, and Beau and the baby were in the back. Within a split second, as Neilia pulled away from the stop sign, a tractor trailer collided with the left side of the car, sending them spinning for 150 feet into an embankment. Initially, paramedics had trouble identifying Neilia until they saw the “Biden For Senate” brochures fluttering in the wind.

Biden was in Washington hiring Senate staff. Naturally, he was with Valerie. Jimmy Biden took the call from the hospital at the Delaware campaign office. Neilia and Naomi were dead. Beau and Hunter were in intensive care. By 6 PM, Joe had arrived at the hospital—but he didn’t know the full extent yet. Jimmy Biden broke the news. Joe looked helpless, but his first question was if he could see his boys. Beau needed to have his legs worked on but was okay to stay in place at Wilmington General Hospital. Hunter needed to be transferred to the Delaware Division Hospital nearby. Joe got into the back of the ambulance with his son, just two and a half years old. “I’m gonna be right with you, son,” he told him.

Because for Joe Biden, family always came first.

Years later in 2013, when Joe Biden was Vice President, Beau became sick. He had been diagnosed with an aggressive brain cancer that developed because of his exposure to burn pits while serving in Iraq. In 2014, after another annual Nantucket Thanksgiving, while the other Bidens filled out their Christmas wish list, Joe Biden only wrote one thing: “Just home from Nantucket. I pray we have another year together in 2015. Beau. Beau. Beau. Beau.” His wish didn’t come true. Beau Biden died on May 30 that year at 46 years old. Now it was just Joe and Hunter left from the original family unit. A few years later—to keep his promise to Beau—Biden ran for president and won. All of the dreams he had told Neilia about when they first met had come true, except she wasn’t there. Neither was Naomi. And now, neither was Beau.

By Thanksgiving last week in Nantucket, the young man was now old. At 82, his hair was now thin and white, his gait now halted, the better part of his life now behind him. But there were the same, cold New England winds and the same, whitecapped waves whipping the water into the dunes, rocks into pebbles, and pebbles into sand.

And there was still Hunter. “I’m gonna be right with you, son.”

…Because for Joe Biden, family always came first.

Sources:

Richard Ben Cramer. What It Takes. 1992.