Essay | How JFK’s Secrets Fed Conspiracy Culture

The assassination of President John F. Kennedy on Nov. 22, 1963, remains America’s ur-conspiracy—a source of continuing skepticism about the possibility of official truth for both the left and the right. Sixty years later, it’s time to acknowledge that a major reason for this enduring suspicion is Kennedy himself.

Contrary to the image that he and his allies worked so hard to promote while he was alive, JFK was a man of secrets, and when he died he was engaged in many active conspiracies, both small and large. None of them was responsible for his death, but each would entail a cover-up to protect his legacy. And these cover-ups had a deeply negative effect on the American public’s trust in government, including its ability to get to the bottom of what really happened in Dallas in 1963.