Aug. 6, 1963 - President Kennedy and other national leaders paid final tribute today to Philip Graham, publishing executive. About 2,000 persons, including members of Congress, the Cabinet, and the Supreme Court, attended a memorial service in Washington Cathedral. Mr. Kennedy sat just to the left of the Graham family. The President and Graham were personal friends, and it was to some extent through Graham’s intervention that Mr. Kennedy chose Vice President Johnson as his running mate in Los Angeles in 1960. Mr. Johnson was out of the city today and unable to attend the service. Rev. Angus Dun, retired Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Washington, conducted the brief service of prayers, Scripture readings, and hymns. The bishop gave thanks for Graham’s “fine intelligence and restless and creative energy of mind and spirit.” He recalled also that the dynamic 48-year-old publisher was guided by a “hatred of injustice” and an “eagerness to bring reconciliation into human conflict.” Mr. Graham committed suicide Saturday while on a day’s outing from the sanitarium where he was a patient. He was president of the Washington Post Company. Others attending the service included Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of the Treasury Douglas Dillon, and Felix Frankfurter, retired Supreme Court justice. President Kennedy, a Catholic, followed the Episcopal service closely, kneeling to pray and standing to join in the hymns.
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