Senator Edward Kennedy (Democrat of Massachusetts), who broke his back in a plane crash last summer, returned to Washington Sunday (3 January) for the opening of Congress the next day. The late President's brother flew to the capital from Florida, where he and his family spent the Christmas holidays with his father, former ambassador Joseph Kennedy.

The first thing Senator Kennedy did on his return was to visit President Kennedy's grave at Arlington National Cemetery, just across the Potomac River from Washington. Senator Kennedy spent six months in the hospital following the plane crash. He was released last month.

With the opening of this session of Congress, he is beginning his first full term in the senate seat once held by his late brother.

Senator Kennedy is the youngest of the Kennedy brothers. His older brother, Robert Kennedy, won election as a Senator from New York in the 1964 elections. The late president was the oldest of the three.