To be honest, I regret posting the quote from his letter. I was mostly being snarky because I was annoyed that the OP posted a lengthy speech with no context regarding who said it or why it was being posted, so I felt like being contrary.
I'm more than willing to acknowledge that bringing up something Byrd wrote 60 years ago is a cheap-shot, especially given the somewhat overwhelming evidence that he was a very different person at age 65 than he was at age 25.
Then only current thing I remember from this guy is using the n-word to describe certain white folk in an interview...I might be way the **** off, but I could swear thats the way it went down.