At 10 o’clock in the evening on June 30, Theodore (Tod) and Kate Sedgwick had just turned out the lights of their shoreside colonial summer home in Vineyard Haven, ready to settle into their first night of vacation when the phone rang with an unusual insistence.
“I said don’t answer it, we know where our children are,” recalled Mrs. Sedgwick.
On the phone was Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia calling Mr. Sedgwick to inform him that he had been confirmed as the United States Ambassador to Slovakia.
“I’m glad he answered the phone,” she said.
After months of delay while his confirmation was customarily held up in Congress, it was a whirlwind matter of days over the holiday weekend for Mr. Sedgwick, who was sworn in as ambassador on the Fourth of July on his own porch by longtime friend and tennis partner Mark Wolf, chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts. As chief judge, Mr. Wolf has the authority to conduct court at any place of his choosing in the state, whether that is in a federal courtroom or among Adirondack chairs and marsh grass on the Vineyard.
“I have to say it was a wonderful ceremony,” said Mr. Sedgwick, who was joined by the legion of family and friends who populated his lawn while Mr. Wolf administered his oath, and by Newsweek assistant managing editor and seasonal Vineyard resident, Evan Thomas, who spoke on his behalf.
The proceedings began formally, as any federal court session must, before Mr. Wolf offered an introduction that gave historical context to the evening, which he recalled and recited in an interview at Mr. Sedgwick’s house this past Thursday.
“In 1630 off these shores John Winthrop declared to conceive this country as one that would be a shining city on the hill, with the eyes of all people upon us. In 1776 on this day, July 4, our founding fathers declared that we would be an inspiring example of the fact that all men and women are created equal, endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights among these life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Now in the course of human events it has become necessary to this nation to appoint an ambassador to a fledgling democracy,” Mr. Wolf said, referring to Slovakia, which has only existed in its present form since 1993.
“The President in his wisdom nominated Tod Sedgwick,” Mr. Wolf went on. “I said, ‘We’re reminded today that we’re descended from patriots who didn’t just do what public officials in remote places directed them to do and the consent of the governed is necessary to inform public decisions, so the impartial jury — that would be the people assembled on the lawn — would have to decide whether I should administer the oath.’”
“That part worried me a little,” laughed Mr. Sedgwick, a history buff who briefly flirted with the idea of holding the ceremony on a tennis court, to honor both his love of the game and the democratic connotations of the French Tennis Court Oath of 1789.
After Mr. Thomas persuaded those present of the nominee’s fitness for the post, the oath was administered and a very special Fourth of July celebration kicked off for Mr. Sedgwick, who fittingly can trace his ancestry to William Ellery, an original signer of the Declaration of Independence.
A former executive in the timber and publishing industries, Mr. Sedgwick and his wife look forward to the move to Bratislava, an international city, by Mr. Sedgwick’s estimation, with strong cultural institutions.
“They have an excellent opera and philharmonic orchestra, excellent theatre, a good soccer team,” he said. “I love to play tennis though and I’m told it’s a very popular sport over there, so I look forward to having some tennis diplomacy.”
On a more serious note Mr. Sedwgick noted that Slovakia has been a strong strategic partner, both in the war in Afghanistan and in a number of aid programs and initiatives, in the Middle East, the Balkans and around the world. Most importantly, Mr. Sedgwick hopes to continue to strengthen the democratic foundations of what has become an example to its Eastern European neighbors.
“I think of the United States as being a new country but this is really a new country; less than 20 years old,” he said. “The striking thing to me is how much of our relationship with Slovakia has to do with what we and the Slovak people can do together around the world as it is about our bilateral relationship, which is strong.”
And Mr. Sedgwick is not the only diplomatic asset the State Department is deploying, as Mr. Wolf explained.
“With Kate going I’ve always said that the U.S. is getting two ambassadors for the price of one,” he said.
Mrs. Sedgwick, who has a master’s degree in public health from the Harvard School of Public Health, looks forward to working in the field while abroad in an area she describes as both politically neutral and popular.
While they are trying to enjoy what remains of their vacation, the Sedgwicks having been gearing up for the move, Mr. Sedgwick diligently studying his foreign language tapes (“Slovak really is a difficult language”) and consulting Vineyard Haven neighbor William Luers who, fortuitously enough, served as ambassador to the former Czechoslovakia. Mrs. Sedgwick is collecting artifacts from the Vineyard to showcase as the best Americans, and Vineyarders in particular, have to offer to the people of Slovakia.
“We’re bringing some Chilmark pottery and Randy Durbin (of Vineyard Haven) has made two wonderful chairs we’re bringing with us,” she said. “It’s a reflection of our connection to Martha’s Vineyard, which is part of our heritage.”
While the embassy scene and business abroad in general tends to wind down in August, Mr. Sedgwick still hopes to visit the Island in late July.
“I promised Mark I would try to get here that last week,” he said. “You know how the Vineyard works; there’s the July people and then there’s the August people. We love all of them so we’d like to straddle those weeks.”
To which his wife easily replied, “Is that a diplomatic statement or what?”
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