Former President Barack Obama will receive this year's John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation announced Thursday.
The award derives its name from the title of Kennedy's book "Profiles in Courage," which earned a Pulitzer Prize in 1957.
The award, created in 1989, is given to "public servants who have made courageous decisions of conscience without regard for the personal or professional consequences."
In a statement, the foundation said Obama demonstrated that courage with his push to make the Affordable Care Act law and with his leadership in ratifying the Paris Agreement, a global effort to combat climate change.
A bi-partisan 14-person committee selects the award recipients.
In a statement, Obama said he was “deeply humbled” to receive the award.
"It's been more than half a century since John F. Kennedy asked us to cast aside our narrow self-interest and take up the chase of a greater ambition: our collective capacity to do big things, especially when it's hard,” Obama said. “It was a call to citizenship as true as the words of our founding and a conviction that helped guide me to public service as a younger man. ... And I am deeply humbled to receive the Profile in Courage Award."
Kennedy's daughter, Caroline Kennedy, and her son, Jack Schlossberg, will present Obama with the award. Caroline Kennedy served as U.S. Ambassador to Japan under Obama.
About the Author
