What is the legitimate basis for funding a memorial to a drunken philanderer who couldn’t even get the presidential nomination of his own party when he challenged the worst president of the last half-century?

More than one out of every five dollars of the $126 million Massachusetts is receiving in earmarks from a $410 billion federal spending package is going to help preserve the legacy of the Kennedys.

The bill includes $5.8 million for the planning and design of a building to house a new Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the Senate. The funding may also help support an endowment for the institute.

Let Teddy raise money for his own memorial project – or better yet, let him leave some of his daddy’s bootlegging money to finance the project. Or even assign the rights to his soon-to-be-released memoir to a foundation creating the program.

And that $5.8 million? Spend it on establishing the Mary Jo Kopechne Institute for the Study and Elimination of Drunk Driving.