Rev. Stephen Edington is the minister emeritus of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashua, New Hampshire. He is a former minister of the First Universalist Church of Rockland, Maine.

I grew up in West Virginia and have now lived most of my life in New England. When I graduated college and left the state in 1967, Robert Byrd had been its U.S. senator for eight years. He held that office for 42 more years.

Mr. Byrd began his Senate career as a right-wing Democrat. He opposed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. While he didn’t remake himself into a leftist, he made his way along the political spectrum to become one of the more distinguished, and longest serving, members of the Senate. He strongly opposed the American involvement in the Iraq War. Sen. Byrd put his mastery of the Rules of the Senate to good use as Senate majority leader. His legislative accomplishments are well-nigh uncountable.

When Sen. Byrd passed away in 2010, President Barack Obama delivered the eulogy at his memorial service on the grounds of the state capitol in Charleston, West Virginia.

Robert Byrd began his political career in the 1940s as the organizer, and as an “Exalted Cyclops,” of a West Virginia chapter of the Ku Klux Klan.

In 1944, he wrote a letter to Mississippi’s segregationist U.S. senator, Theodore Bilbo, declaring: “I shall never fight in the armed forces with a negro by my side … Rather I should die a thousand times.”

That’s right: The man who began his political career as an outspoken member of the KKK was eulogized by America’s only (to date) African-American president when he passed away.

Sen. Byrd characterized his KKK involvement as “The greatest mistake of my life.” But it was a mistake (putting it mildly) that he moved well beyond.

I’ve thought of Sen. Byrd while following the Senate campaign of Graham Platner.

[Disclosure: I am a resident of New Hampshire, with plans to move to Maine in 2027. I’m a former minister of the First Universalist Church of Rockland. While I cannot vote in this year’s Maine Senate race, I’ll be delighted, as a resident of Maine, with Angus King and Graham Platner as my senators.]

I’m quite aware of the troublesome baggage Mr. Platner brings to his Senate campaign. It is hard to read any kind of commentary about his candidacy — from practically any angle — without reading of the Nazi tattoo, the misogynist remarks, the harsh words about Israel, his use of the term “gay” in a disparaging manner, etc.

Mr. Platner has repeatedly apologized for these egregious missteps, while going on to speak words of hope and care for Maine’s working people who are being left behind in an unforgiving economy — and who have been told by President Trump that he does not care about them.

As reprehensible as Mr. Platner’s baggage may be — and for which, as noted, he has apologized and looks to move beyond — his baggage does not, as I see it, rise to the level (or sink to the depths) of Robert Byrd’s one-time leadership in the Ku Klux Klan.

I am not touting Graham Platner as the next Sen. Robert Byrd. I am saying I don’t feel that Mr. Platner’s previous indiscretions, serious as they are, should define him politically any more than Robert Byrd’s Klan membership, in the end, defined him.

I am a retired minister in the liberal Protestant tradition. I believe in redemption and forgiveness. Robert Byrd redeemed himself of his KKK involvement with an outstanding Senate career and gained the forgiveness of the African-American president who eulogized him.

Graham Platner deserves the same opportunity that Robert Byrd had when it comes to his Senate aspirations. I believe he will serve his Maine constituents well, and will help call us Americans to our better selves once again.