A few years before he became president, John F. Kennedy wrote Profiles in Courage on the lives of John Quincy Adams, Sam Houston, Daniel Webster and Robert Taft, among others -- men of principles who acted courageously, disregarding political adversities.

In the time we are living, it was refreshing indeed to watch U.S. Rep. Anh Cao, the Vietnamese-American Republican from Louisiana, casting the only Republican vote for the passage of the Democratic health-care legislation. He acknowledged that it might hurt his political career, but it was the right decision -- a decision of conscience based on the need of the people of my district.

It is not only a lesson of courage to his peers, but also to the 39 yellow-dog Democrats who followed them.

Joaquin Godoy, Aiken, S.C.