Lyndon Johnson
1908 - 1973
Lyndon
Baines Johnson, 36th president of the United States
(1963-1969). Johnson was the first candidate from a Southern
state to be elected president of the United States for more
than a century. He became president on November 22, 1963,
hours after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in
Texas. In 1964 Johnson was elected to a full four-year term by
the largest popular majority in modern U.S. history. His
triumph represented a victory for the average voter in U.S.
politics, with which Johnson, as a congressman, Senate leader,
and vice president, had identified himself.
Johnson
was one of the most masterful politicians in the history of
the Congress of the United States. He was a champion of
bipartisan and consensus politics. His positions on public
issues were always in line with what he believed to be the
middle ground of popular opinion. He excelled in getting
things done. He was not an innovator of programs or ideas. His
domestic program, which he called the Great Society, was an
extension of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal of
the 1930s and 1940s. In foreign affairs, Johnson pursued the
basic U.S. postwar policy of containing Communism. His belief
in consensus politics and his unquestioning devotion to
accepted political beliefs were both a strength and a
weakness. With these attitudes he won passage of far-reaching
domestic legislation, but the same beliefs occasionally
trapped him in policies that were no longer relevant to the
rapidly changing world. President Johnson hoped that his
administration would be evaluated by the success of his Great
Society program. Johnson also hoped to improve the climate of
international affairs, chiefly by reaching an understanding
with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). At the
end of his term, however, it seemed more likely that the
frustrations of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War throughout
his presidency would overshadow his impressive domestic record
and his somewhat less successful efforts to improve relations
with the USSR.
Early
Life
Lyndon
Baines Johnson was born on a farm near Stonewall, Gillespie
County, Texas, in 1908. His grandfather, Samuel Ealy Johnson,
Sr., born in Georgia, had been taken by his parents to Texas
in 1846. He became a cattle rancher in the Pedernales River
valley, in the Hill Country west of Austin, and in 1867
married Eliza Bunton. Their son, Samuel Ealy Johnson, Jr.,
served five terms in the Texas legislature. In 1907, while
serving in the legislature, he married Rebekah Baines, the
daughter of another Hill Country ranching family. They had
five children, of whom Lyndon was the eldest.
The
Johnson family abandoned the family farm after failing to grow
cotton on it and moved to the nearby town of Johnson City in
1913. Lyndon Johnson attended the local schools and graduated
from Johnson City High School, one of six seniors in the class
of 1924. His father managed to support his growing family
through dealings in real estate, but his chief interests were
always political, and young Lyndon came naturally to his
passion for politics, as well as to his conviction that
government exists to help the people.
For
a considerable time after graduation from high school Johnson
drifted about. With five friends he bought an automobile and
drove to California. He did odd jobs on the West Coast,
picking fruit, washing cars, and helping in restaurants. He
eventually hitchhiked back to his home and took a job doing
manual labor on a highway crew.
Education
Johnson’s
mother had long sought to impress on him the need for a
college education, but it was not until 1927 that he decided
to follow her advice. With a small sum borrowed from a local
bank, he went to nearby San Marcos and enrolled in Southwest
Texas State Teachers College. Many of his friends were already
there, and it seemed the logical place to go to prepare for a
schoolteaching career.
In
September 1928 Johnson interrupted his education to take his
first professional job, as principal of a school for Mexican
children in the town of Cotulla. In this task he was
energetic, aggressive, and highly successful. The following
year he returned to San Marcos to complete his college work.
He was confident of his ability to teach and to administer and
had a strong respect for the Mexican-American people. Johnson
graduated with a degree in history in August 1930 and took a
position as teacher of public speaking at Sam Houston High
School, in Houston, where his uncle was chairman of the
history department. As a teacher, Johnson was self-confident
and virtually tireless. He drove himself hard and was
intensely demanding of his students. However, he had scarcely
begun his second year of teaching at Houston when he accepted
a political appointment.
Johnson’s
first political position was that of private secretary to the
newly elected Congressman Richard M. Kleberg of Corpus
Christi. Although Johnson had not taken part in Kleberg’s
campaign, he was a member of a politically powerful Hill
Country family and had been recommended to Kleberg by mutual
friends. Johnson arrived in Washington, D.C., to witness the
last months of the administration of President Herbert Hoover
(1929-1933) and the return to national power of the Democratic
Party under the leadership of President Franklin D. Roosevelt
(1933-1945). Johnson’s drive and energy soon brought him to
prominence among the many young people in Washington during
the early days of the New Deal.
Marriage
In
1934 Johnson married Claudia Alta (“Lady Bird”) Taylor, a
recent graduate of the University of Texas and a member of a
prosperous eastern Texas family. The couple had two daughters,
Lynda Bird, in 1944, and Luci Baines, in 1947.
Johnson
left the service of Congressman Kleberg in 1935 to become
Texas state director of the National Youth Administration, a
newly established relief organization headed by Aubrey
Williams, a controversial reformer with whom Johnson
established a lasting friendship. In his new position, with
headquarters in Austin, Texas, Johnson soon put an elaborate
program into effect. He also built up a large number of
important political friendships.
Political
Career
United
States Congressman
The
sudden death of the incumbent congressman in Johnson’s
central Texas district required a special election in 1937 to
fill the office, and Johnson decided to run. With $10,000
borrowed by his wife and aided by his many local friends,
Johnson put on an aggressive campaign against nine opponents.
While several of the candidates were better known in the
district, only Johnson ran as an all-out supporter of
Roosevelt. He even endorsed the president’s controversial
and ill-fated plan to enlarge the Supreme Court of the United
States. On April 10, 1937, Johnson won 8280 votes, 3000 more
votes than the next highest candidate. Soon after the
election, President Roosevelt, in Texas for a fishing cruise,
talked with the 28-year-old congressman-elect and took him for
a trip aboard the presidential train. Soon after Johnson was
sworn in, he learned that he had been appointed to the Naval
Affairs Committee, a very important position, thanks to the
intercession of the president and to the firm support of his
father’s old friend, House Majority Leader Sam Rayburn.
First
Years in Office
Johnson
quickly made a two-fold reputation. He was a firm supporter of
Roosevelt’s program, both domestic and foreign, and he was
also a tireless worker on behalf of the voters he represented.
Often the two activities coincided, as was the case when he
helped to bring public power into Texas through the Rural
Electrification Administration and the Lower Colorado River
Authority. He also secured funds for the building of dams,
roads, and other public improvements in his district, such as
new post offices, soil conservation projects, and farm credit
facilities. These accomplishments marked the young congressman
as “the man who gets things done.” He often worked his
staff for 12 or 15 hours a day; one of his office rules was
that each incoming letter be answered within 24 hours. A
friend later recalled, “People who knew Lyndon then were
never surprised at his later successes. If there ever was a
prototype of a young man going somewhere in politics, it was
Lyndon Johnson during his first few years in Congress.” He
had access to the president and was close to most of the House
leaders.
After
the outbreak of World War II in 1939, Representative Johnson
concerned himself more and more with national defense. Again
he was able to combine his defense policy with getting things
done for Texas. Among his local accomplishments were the
construction of a large U.S. Naval training station in Corpus
Christi, shipbuilding yards at Houston and Orange, and a Naval
Reserve installation at Dallas. In 1940 he was, as always, a
passionate supporter of President Roosevelt. Placed in charge
of the national campaign to keep the House of Representatives
Democratic, he had the satisfaction of seeing his party
increase its majority.
Unsuccessful
Campaign
In
the spring of 1941 one of the Texas senators died and Johnson
announced his candidacy for the office from the steps of the
White House. President Roosevelt went far in giving his
blessing, saying three things about the coming campaign:
“First, it is up to the people of Texas to elect the man
they want as their senator; second, everybody knows that I
cannot enter a primary election; and third, to be truthful,
all I can say is Lyndon Johnson is a very old, old friend of
mine.” Once again, Johnson ran as an enthusiastic supporter
of Roosevelt’s New Deal, but this time he also emphasized
the need to support the president in the world crisis and
warned of the danger of aggression by Germany, Italy, or
Japan. The June election was very close, and for two days it
appeared that Johnson had won. However, rural returns, coming
in late, gave the final victory to the conservative governor,
W. Lee O’Daniel, by 1311 votes out of nearly 600,000 cast.
War
Service
Following
the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, Johnson
became one of the first congressman to go into uniform. He was
a member of the U.S. Naval Reserve and went on a seven-month
tour of duty as a lieutenant commander. He served as an
observer in New Guinea, surviving two nearly fatal airplane
crashes and receiving a silver star for gallantry from General
Douglas MacArthur.
Back
in Washington, Johnson headed a special investigating
subcommittee of the Naval Affairs Committee that did important
work to help modernize the navy’s procedures. The death of
President Roosevelt in April 1945 was a deep personal loss for
Johnson. He told a reporter that Franklin D. Roosevelt had
been his “second daddy.”
Postwar
Activities
After
the war, Johnson seemed to grow more conservative. He voted
for the Taft-Hartley Labor Act of 1947 and voted to override
President Truman’s veto of this measure, which labor unions
had called the slave labor bill. He also announced his
complete opposition to Truman’s civil rights program;
earlier in his career he had been considered a firm friend of
blacks, as well as of Mexican-Americans.
In
1948 he ran for the Senate once again, after Senator
O’Daniel decided not to seek reelection. Former Texas
Governor Coke Stevenson, more conservative than Johnson, had
the support of labor unions because of Johnson’s vote on the
Taft-Hartley Act and ran far ahead in the first primary. In
the end, however, Johnson eked out the final victory by a
margin of 87 votes. He survived Stevenson’s court challenge
and at last entered the Senate, although it took him some time
to live down the nickname “Landslide Lyndon.”
United
States Senator
Lyndon
Johnson had unusual advantages for a freshman when he was
sworn into the U.S. Senate in January 1949. He had served in
the House for nearly a dozen years and was on intimate terms
with many influential people in Washington. His old friend and
mentor Sam Rayburn was again Speaker of the House, since the
Democrats had regained control after Republican domination of
the 80th Congress. Johnson was a link with the New Deal for a
number of newly elected liberal Democrats from the North, such
as Senator Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota. He was also trusted
as a moderate by important conservative Southern Democrats,
such as Senator Richard Russell of Georgia. Johnson was at
once appointed to the Armed Services Committee, of which
Russell was chairman. Since both men firmly believed in a
strong and prepared national defense, they had a common bond,
in addition to their Southern upbringing.
First
Years as Senator
During
his first two years in the Senate, Johnson specialized in
defense problems. He fought the Truman administration’s
defense cuts, which were advocated by Secretary of Defense
Louis Johnson. Senator Johnson was especially alarmed at
reductions in the U.S. Air Force, and allied himself with
Secretary of the Air Force Stuart Symington. In late February
1950 Johnson spoke out strongly in favor of a defense buildup.
The Korean War broke out four months later. The war began when
Communist North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic of
Korea) invaded South Korea (Republic of Korea). The conflict
quickly spread. Eventually the United States and 19 other
nations fought in Korea. The Korean War was one of the
by-products of the Cold War, the global political and
diplomatic struggle between the Communist and non-Communist
nations following World War II (1939-1945). Johnson supported
the administration’s intervention in Korea in the strongest
terms: “The Communists, not President Truman, were
responsible for the invasion of South Korea. The quicker we
direct our hostility to the enemy instead of our leaders, the
quicker we will get the job done.” Senator Russell appointed
Johnson as chairman of a subcommittee to investigate the
preparedness program. This group eventually produced a series
of 44 detailed reports.
Minority
Leader
Johnson
moved ahead rapidly in the Senate, in part due to the loss of
leading Democrats in 1950 and 1952. In 1950 Everett Dirksen
defeated Scott Lucas of Illinois, the Democratic majority
leader of the Senate. The Democratic whip (assistant leader),
Ernest McFarland, replaced Lucas, and Lyndon Johnson became
Democratic whip. In 1952 McFarland lost his senatorial seat to
Barry M. Goldwater and Johnson was chosen by his fellow
Democrats to replace McFarland. Since the presidential victory
in 1952 of Dwight D. Eisenhower had given the Republicans
control of Congress, Johnson was only minority leader.
Many
Democrats wanted to oppose the new administration at every
point; these were chiefly Northern liberals, who wanted the
government to take the lead in social reform. Johnson,
however, did not share their views. “The role of a minority
party is to hammer out a program that will solve the problems
of America—not just to obstruct the work of the majority
party.” His emphasis was on what he termed
“responsibility.” He explained this position well at a
Democratic dinner in New York City in 1953: “Our dedication
must be to the politics of responsibility—to a statesmanship
which is based upon the realization that we cannot survive
unless our country survives.” In foreign policy he
encouraged the Democrats to continue working with the
Republicans to develop a policy that both parties could
support in order to provide a united front in the Cold War.
Johnson
quietly changed one of the old Senate traditions in 1953. He
made certain that all of the junior, or beginning, Democratic
senators received at least one desirable committee assignment.
To do so, he had to persuade a number of senior senators to
give up choice committee positions. A number of freshmen were
thus pleasantly surprised, and a number of skeptical liberals
were won over by their new leader. He was also successful in
persuading his followers to judge issues on their merits,
rather than on their origins. Thus, he was able to assist the
Eisenhower administration when it ran into opposition from
conservative Republicans over such issues as trade barriers.
At the same time, Johnson vigorously fought the
administration’s cuts in defense spending.
Majority
Leader
Johnson
was reelected to the Senate by an overwhelming margin in 1954,
thus wiping out some of the embarrassment over his narrow
victory in 1948. He campaigned in behalf of Democratic
candidates in nine Western states, stressing the “politics
of responsibility.” The Democrats won control of both houses
of Congress and kept control for the remaining six years of
Eisenhower’s presidency. Johnson became Senate majority
leader at the age of 46. Rayburn was again Speaker of the
House. The Johnson-Rayburn team, although unable to win Texas
for Democratic presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson in 1952
and 1956, managed the affairs of the Democratic Party in
Congress with relative ease. The political commentator Walter
Lippmann observed, “I do not think it is any exaggeration to
say that Mr. Eisenhower’s success as president began when
the Republicans lost control of Congress and the standing
committees. In his first two years he had suffered an almost
unbroken record of frustration and of domination by the senior
Republicans, and particularly the Republican committee
chairmen in the Senate.”
Johnson
drove himself harder than ever during the first half of 1955,
and he very nearly lost his life as a result. On Saturday,
July 2, he suffered a massive heart attack while being driven
to a friend’s country home in Virginia. He was rushed to the
Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland, where he spent weeks
resting and dieting; afterward he went to his Texas ranch to
recuperate. By December a team of six specialists who examined
him reported that his recovery had been rapid. His blood
pressure was normal and his heart undamaged, although his
doctors urged him to delegate some of his work to others and
to get more rest.
Johnson
was able to resume his duties at the 1956 session of Congress.
He had kept his weight down and had permanently abandoned
cigarette smoking, but he soon showed that his energy had not
decreased. He was the traditional Southern candidate for the
Democratic presidential nomination in 1956, and as head of the
Texas delegation he was instrumental in throwing the state’s
votes to Senator and later President John F. Kennedy of
Massachusetts for the vice-presidential nomination. Both
Johnson and Kennedy lost, but they loyally supported the
campaign of Adlai Stevenson and Tennessee Senator Estes
Kefauver ticket in the 1956 election. Despite Eisenhower’s
second victory, the Democrats retained control of Congress.
Johnson and Rayburn frustrated the efforts of the Democratic
national committee to assume party leadership through the
device of a Democratic advisory council. Most members of
Congress stood firmly with their leaders on this question, but
the controversy created a considerable amount of bitterness.
Johnson secured Senate passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957
in a modified form to make it more palatable to his Southern
colleagues. He was also active as chairman of his
defense-investigating subcommittee, which, after the success
of the Soviet Sputnik 1 satellite in October 1957, speeded up
the U.S. missile program (see Space Exploration).
Johnson
obviously relished his Senate role, developing the politics of
responsibility in close cooperation with Speaker Rayburn. He
was a master of parliamentary procedure, he knew the attitudes
of his colleagues on every issue, he enjoyed the exercise of
power, and he loved to be able to decide issues on what he
believed were their merits. In a 1958 statement he presented
“My Political Philosophy,” flatly refusing to be
categorized: “I am a free man, an American, a United States
Senator, and a Democrat, in that order. I am also a liberal, a
conservative, a Texan, a taxpayer, a rancher, a businessman, a
consumer, a parent, a voter, and not as young as I used to be
nor as old as I expect to be—and I am all these things in no
fixed order.” Never noted for his eloquence, Johnson could
be and frequently was blunt in his speeches and private
conversations.
The
Election of 1960
In
1960, with Vice President Richard M. Nixon the certain
Republican candidate for the presidency, Johnson decided to
try once more for the Democratic nomination. Nixon was an old
opponent, in part because of what Johnson considered Nixon’s
partisanship, his tendency to value party victories above all
else. As majority leader, Johnson decided that he should not
enter the primaries, since the other leading candidates were
all Senate colleagues: John Kennedy of Massachusetts, Hubert
Humphrey of Minnesota, and Stuart Symington of Missouri.
However, a group of enthusiasts began to campaign for Johnson,
especially in the South and West. The majority leader’s
campaign was based on the assumption that no candidate would
be able to win on the first ballot at the Democratic National
Convention in Los Angeles and that he might well become the
second choice of many delegates after the deadlock. However,
he did not count on the superbly managed Kennedy campaign,
which resulted in the first-ballot nomination of the young
senator from Massachusetts.
Kennedy
then surprised many people, including Johnson, by offering him
the vice-presidential nomination. Johnson caused even more
surprise by accepting it. It was generally believed that
Kennedy, although on record as having called Johnson the
next-best-qualified candidate for president, had fully
expected to be turned down. Johnson and his wife threw
themselves into the campaign, working especially in the South
to counteract the traditional Protestant suspicion of a Roman
Catholic candidate for president. (Many Protestants suspected
that a Roman Catholic president might listen too closely to
the advice of the Pope.) The election was very close, and it
may well be that Johnson’s work saved the Carolinas for the
Democratic ticket and brought Texas and Louisiana, both of
which had gone Republican in 1956, back into the Democratic
fold. Kennedy had reason to be grateful to Johnson, but many
wondered how Johnson would settle down in such a low-pressure
position as the vice presidency.
Vice
President
John
Kennedy, well aware that in many ways his vice president was
more experienced in practical politics than he was himself,
made use of some of Johnson’s energy. The two men, in the
words of Kennedy’s assistant and biographer, Theodore
Sorensen, “to the astonishment of many and somewhat to the
surprise of them both, got along famously.” Johnson had
several official assignments: He was president of the Senate
(under the Constitution of the United States), a member of the
National Security Council, chairman of the National
Aeronautics and Space Council, and chairman of the
President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity.
Johnson pursued each of these official tasks aggressively,
with the exception of his role in the Senate, where he was
limited to casting a vote to break a tie. He played an
important part in helping to speed up the vast and expensive
space program and took a native Texan’s pride in seeing its
headquarters moved to Houston. As a Southern white, he was
peculiarly effective on the equal-employment committee and
took satisfaction in its progress.
Kennedy
relied on Johnson for advice on personnel appointments, on
political strategy and tactics, and on policy matters, both
domestic and foreign. The president took care to inform his
vice president of major actions well in advance. While he did
not delegate decision-making power, he asked for Johnson’s
assistance on nearly all major subjects. The president seems
to have valued his vice president’s advice second only to
that of his own brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
The Kennedy staff, consisting mostly of persons closer in age
to the president than to the vice president, seems to have
held Johnson in considerably lower esteem than did the
president himself. Despite frequent rumors that Johnson would
be dropped from the ticket in 1964, John Kennedy twice made it
clear in public that it was not his intention to do so.
There
can be no doubt that Johnson, accustomed to wielding immense
power himself, felt frustrated as vice president, especially
when he must have believed that he could have been of enormous
help in getting the Kennedy program through Congress if he had
been asked to do so more frequently. Nevertheless, he did not
complain publicly. Indeed, Johnson admitted to one reporter,
“I believe he is more considerate of me than I would be if
the roles were reversed.”
Foreign
Travel
Of
particular importance for the future was the great amount of
foreign travel Johnson did on behalf of the administration.
Johnson visited 33 countries and made about 1500 speeches on
these journeys. He had not seen much of the world before, and
the experience opened his eyes to some of the enormous
problems in underdeveloped areas, as well as to some of the
difficulties involved in carrying on diplomatic relations with
traditional U.S. allies. Johnson took pride in his rather
folksy type of personal diplomacy, for he soon found that he
was as fond of mixing with foreign peoples as he was of
“politicking” back home. He learned a great deal from his
private conversations with political leaders wherever he went,
and he later put these impressions to use as president in his
own right. He even managed to keep up with French President
Charles de Gaulle. When the somewhat distant French president
asked him, “Now, Mr. Johnson, what have you come here to
learn from us?”, Johnson smilingly replied, “Why, General,
simply everything you can possibly teach me.”
As
near as can now be determined, Johnson usually recommended in
foreign affairs a slightly more militant policy, but he gave
full support to Kennedy’s decisions once they were made. He
helped secure the ratification of the Test Ban Treaty of 1963,
which prohibited nuclear explosions above ground or
underwater, and fought for Kennedy’s proposed new civil
rights and tax reduction legislation. He gave wholehearted
backing to the defense buildup and to Kennedy’s decision to
commit U.S. military advisers to the war in Vietnam.
The
Assassination of Kennedy
On
November 21, 1963, President Kennedy and his wife, Jacqueline,
flew to Texas for a pleasure and political visit. The
president hoped to patch up the quarrel between the
conservative Democrats, led by Johnson’s former assistant,
Governor John Connally, and the liberals, led by U.S. Senator
Ralph Yarborough. The continued infighting among Texas
Democrats had allowed important Republican gains in the state.
The Johnsons joined the Kennedys when they got to Texas and
were riding in separate cars in the motorcade in Dallas the
next day, when an assassin’s bullets struck the young
president. Johnson was shielded by a Secret Service agent who
had been assigned to guard him. Johnson rushed to the
hospital, where John Kennedy died. Next he was sped to the
presidential airplane, aboard which he was administered the
oath of office as the 36th president. Then the plane, bearing
both the new president and the body of his predecessor, flew
back to Washington, D.C.
President
of the United States
Domestic
Affairs
During
the official month-long period of mourning for John Kennedy,
the new president quickly took command of the United States.
He placed great emphasis on continuity, both in policy and
personnel; he asked Kennedy’s Cabinet and staff to stay on
in their jobs. On November 27 he began his first address to
Congress with these words, “All I have I would have given
gladly not to be standing here today.” He pledged to carry
on the Kennedy policies, foreign and domestic, reminding his
audience that the late president had asked for solutions to
the great problems of the nation. “Today, in this moment of
new resolve, I would say to all my fellow Americans, let us
continue.” He asked particularly for the passage of the
civil rights and tax reduction legislation for which Kennedy
had fought. He also pledged that he would attempt to implement
more of Kennedy’s New Frontier program of domestic
legislation.
Yet,
it was soon evident that Lyndon Johnson was determined to be
his own president. New faces, many of them from Texas, began
to appear on his staff, although most of the key Cabinet
officers stayed on for at least a year and some for much
longer. Of more fundamental importance was the revision of the
federal spending program.
Johnson
had long been identified with gigantic spending programs while
he was in Congress. He fought for public-works projects, for
larger expenditures for those in need, and for great increases
for defense. Then, as president, he decided to keep projected
spending under $100 billion, an almost magic figure that had
seemed certain to be exceeded at the current rate of
expenditure. This decision seemed to be politically
advantageous, since it might enable him to break the loose
coalition of conservative Southern Democrats and Republicans
that had largely controlled Congress since the 1938 elections.
A fondness for minimizing federal spending seemed to be the
chief element these two groups had in common. Johnson’s
efforts to slash the federal budget were well publicized. Some
$2 billion was cut, chiefly from Defense Department and Atomic
Energy Commission projects, while small sums were added to
projects that supported the poor and the elderly. Perhaps the
symbol of all this cutting was the president’s much-derided
switching off of “unnecessary” lights in the White House.
In
his first State of the Union address, on January 8, 1964,
Johnson made much of his economy program but even more of a
new spending plan. He announced that his administration
“today, here and now, declares unconditional war on poverty
in America, and I urge this Congress and all Americans to join
with me in that effort.” His program called for a systematic
effort in “chronically distressed areas” of the country, a
youth employment (“job corps”) plan, expansion of the food
stamp and unemployment relief systems, and special aid to
schools, libraries, hospitals, and nursing homes. Thus, with
supreme cleverness, Johnson was able to make cuts in spending
in some areas and expand spending in others at the same time.
Johnson,
the master of the machinery of Congress, was exceedingly
active in the early months of his presidency, with impressive
results. Of crucial importance was Johnson’s detailed
knowledge of the personality and local concerns of nearly
every member of Congress. Equally effective was his untiring
use of the prestige and power of his office. Kennedy had been
the first president to work for passage of specific programs
by personal telephone calls to key legislators. Johnson
carried this practice much further. When even a minor
amendment to his tax-cut bill threatened to pass the Senate
finance committee, he called up enough committee members to
defeat it. Legislators were invited to informal dinners at the
White House, and the president made visits to Capitol Hill.
Johnson’s unique understanding of congressional politics
gained in his long apprenticeship was vital for these
maneuvers. As he said on his first address to Congress as
president, “For 32 years, Capitol Hill has been my home.”
Legislative
Progress
Johnson
wanted Congress to adopt his legislation, for passing laws
seemed to him, a man who had spent nearly all his political
life as a legislator, to demonstrate definite progress in a
way that nothing else would. Within three months of his
assumption of office the new president had the satisfaction of
seeing the civil rights bill pass the House and the tax cut
bill get through the Senate. Other key measures were moving
along through previously recalcitrant committees. In February
he asked for two further measures: a law to protect consumers
from unsafe products and deceptive packaging; and a program
known as Medicare, an extensive scheme for hospital and
nursing-home care for the elderly through social security (see
Medicare and Medicaid). In March and April 1964 he sent
special messages detailing his antipoverty proposals. The
president’s greatest legislative triumph was the passage on
June 19 of a sweeping civil rights bill outlawing racial
discrimination in public accommodations and by employers,
unions, and voting registrars. Earlier the House had passed
the tax cut bill by a decisive margin. The government would
receive about $11.5 billion less in revenue, but proponents
argued that because individual citizens would stimulate
business by spending more money, tax revenues would eventually
increase as the size of the economy increased.
Other
major parts of the Johnson program were enacted by the second
session of the 88th Congress. Many of these measures were
passed with help from the Republicans, and it appeared that
the 25-year legislative logjam had at last been broken.
The
1964 Campaign
That
the Democratic Party would nominate Johnson for president in
1964 was never in doubt, in spite of signs of support for
Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and of a substantial
protest vote cast in the Wisconsin, Indiana, and Maryland
primaries for the governor of Alabama, George Wallace. Wallace
believed that the federal government should not intervene in
the affairs of the individual states, particularly not to
change the states’ segregation policies, which were designed
to separate black and white people. Johnson supporters
controlled all delegations to the Democratic National
Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey, except those of a few
Southern states. The only excitement provided by the president
came in the way he announced his choice of a running mate. On
July 30 Johnson said “ … it would be inadvisable for me to
recommend to the convention any member of my Cabinet or any of
those who meet regularly with the Cabinet.” He thereupon
specifically mentioned six of those thereby eliminated,
notably Attorney General Kennedy and Adlai E. Stevenson,
ambassador to the United Nations. At the convention late in
August, Johnson introduced his choice for vice president,
Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota, who was nominated by
acclamation.
Much
of the burden of the actual campaigning fell on Humphrey, who
had entered the Senate with Johnson in 1949 and had risen to
the position of majority whip. Humphrey had built the
Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party of his state and served as mayor
of Minneapolis. He had attracted national attention when he
convinced the 1948 Democratic National Convention to take a
strong stand in favor of civil rights. He was a magnetic,
highly energetic person, an expert in debate, as well as in
campaign oratory, and a great favorite of Northern liberals.
He was also a close personal friend of the president. Each man
had had a considerable measure of success in winning over his
own associates to friendship for the other.
The
Politics of Consensus
It
is not surprising that Johnson, a veteran of single-party
election campaigning, should have run in 1964 as what might be
termed a consensus candidate, a candidate who appealed to a
large majority of the population. Like his idol, Franklin
Roosevelt, he yearned to be “president of all the people.”
Even Humphrey, who was used to the cut and thrust of the
intense two-party politics of Minnesota, became something of a
consensus politician before the 1964 campaign was over. The
character of their opponents on the Republican ticket, Senator
Barry M. Goldwater of Arizona and Congressman William Miller
of New York, was responsible in part for the kind of campaign
the Democrats waged. Democratic slogans were generalities like
“Prosperity,” “Unity,” and “Peace.” Moreover, it
was able to point with pride to the legislative record of
Congress and with sorrow to the tragic loss of the young
president who had pledged to attempt so much. Johnson was at
the center of the campaign, directing it with his usual vigor
and close attention to detail, concentrating on independent
and Republican voters.
Meanwhile,
the Republicans were floundering. Goldwater, as an experienced
party fund-raising speaker and three-time head of the Senate
Republican Campaign Committee, was accustomed to addressing
the party faithful. He had long known that most of these
devout Republican workers shared his own conservative views:
his doubts about the United Nations, social security, and the
federal income tax. From the time of the February primary in
New Hampshire, which he lost, to the June primary in
California, which he won, Goldwater continued to express these
conservative views. At the Republican National Convention more
moderate or pragmatic Republicans had been unable to prevent
Goldwater’s nomination. These Republican challengers had
accused Goldwater of being too extreme in his policy
recommendations. In his acceptance speech at the convention,
Goldwater indicated that he was going to carry on a campaign
that would give the voters, in the words of a current slogan,
“a choice, not an echo.” He also said, “Extremism in the
defense of liberty is no vice! … Moderation in the pursuit
of justice is no virtue!” Thus, he defied those in his own
party who wanted to base the campaign on more moderate policy
positions that they believed would appeal to most voters.
In
retrospect, it seems clear that the election of Johnson over
Goldwater was almost unavoidable. Even so, Johnson made heroic
efforts to win by as wide a margin as possible. Leading
Republicans were courted and some of them won over. By the end
of the campaign only four major newspapers, the Chicago
Tribune, the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Los Angeles Times, and
the Oakland Tribune supported Goldwater. Senator Humphrey’s
whirlwind campaign portrayed Goldwater as an enemy of social
legislation and as a trigger-happy militarist. Humphrey
emphasized Goldwater’s votes against the Test Ban Treaty of
1963 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Johnson, meanwhile,
campaigned as “President of All the People.” As the
journalist Theodore White put it, “Never were Republicans
denounced as such; the opposition was involved in its own
civil war, and the president obeyed Napoleon’s maxim:
‘Never interfere with the enemy when he is in the process of
destroying himself.’”
The
result was an enormous landslide. The greatest popular-vote
margin ever won in modern U.S. history, 61 percent, went to
Johnson. Goldwater carried only five states of the South and
his own Arizona. Vermont voted for a Democratic candidate for
president for the first time since the Republican Party came
into being, and by a margin of two to one. Democrats increased
their membership in the Senate from 66 to 68 and in the House
from 259 to 295. A number of promising Republican candidates
went down to defeat, despite the efforts of some of them to
avoid being tabbed extremists. The day following the elections
found the Republican Party in a sad state of disarray.
The
Great Society
Johnson’s
domestic program for his own term, as he apparently liked to
think of it, was built around the concept of the Great
Society. He had used this expression from time to time, but he
had not emphasized it until he gave a speech at the University
of Michigan on May 22, 1964. In this address, which preceded
the party conventions, Johnson described his plans to solve
pressing problems: “We are going to assemble the best
thought and broadest knowledge from all over the world to find
these answers. I intend to establish working groups to prepare
a series of conferences and meetings—on the cities, on
natural beauty, on the quality of education, and on other
emerging challenges. From these studies, we will begin to set
our course toward the Great Society.” Soon afterward he told
reporters, “I’m going to get the best minds in the country
to work for me.”
Almost
immediately 14 separate task forces began thoroughly studying
nearly all major aspects of United States society, each
working without publicity while it did its job. Presidential
assistants Bill Moyers and Richard N. Goodwin helped create
these groups, drawing on the expertise of other government
officials in selecting the members. During June the task
forces were recruited. The average membership was nine, and
particular care was taken to include governmental experts, as
well as academicians. Each task force was assigned a
particular subject: cooperation among government agencies in
dealing with financial questions; making the federal
government more efficient and less costly; developing policies
to prevent economic recessions; developing policies on
economic issues related to other countries; and determining
how best to help individuals maintain their income. It is
notable that only one of these task forces dealt with foreign
policy. Many of Kennedy’s committees had dealt with foreign
affairs, and he had encountered political problems when their
proposals were leaked to the press.
The
task-force reports, drawn up separately, were turned in to the
White House. Moyers then circulated them to the agencies
concerned and set up a new group of committees of government
officials to evaluate the various recommendations. Experts on
relations with Congress were also drawn into the deliberations
to get the best advice on persuading the Congress to pass the
legislation. Finally, the president went over the refined
recommendations at his ranch with Moyers and Budget Director
Kermit Gordon. Many specific proposals were included in brief
form in Johnson’s State of the Union address delivered on
January 7, 1965.
A
number of these proposals became laws. The Elementary and
Secondary Education Act of 1965 was the first broad federal
aid given to education in U.S. history, allotting more than $1
billion to help schools purchase materials and start special
education programs. The Higher Education Act that same year
increased federal money given to universities and created
scholarships and low-interest loans for students. The Medical
Care Act of 1965 authorized a program, called Medicare, that
covered most hospital and nursing costs, as well as another
plan to help with the medical expenses of the needy regardless
of age. The so-called Model Cities Act of 1966 approved $1.2
billion to improve housing, recreation areas, health, and
education in economically depressed areas of cities across the
country. In addition, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act in
1965 to assure minority registration and voting. The law
suspended use of literacy or other voter-qualification tests
that had sometimes served to keep blacks off voting lists and
provided for federal court lawsuits to stop discriminatory
poll taxes. It also reinforced the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by
authorizing the appointment of federal voting examiners in
areas that did not meet voter-participation requirements. Some
of the credit for the success of Johnson’s domestic programs
must be given to the secret task forces, although most must go
to the virtually tireless president, one of the few true
masters of congressional politics ever to occupy the White
House.
Foreign
Affairs
Lyndon
Johnson was an unabashed patriot, a fervent advocate of
military preparedness, and a firm supporter of the foreign
commitments of the United States. On November 27, 1963, in his
first address to Congress as president, he pledged: “This
nation will keep its commitments from South Vietnam to West
Berlin. We will be unceasing in the search for peace;
resourceful in our pursuit of areas of agreement, even with
those with whom we differ; and generous and loyal to those who
join with us in common cause.”
European
Policy
Johnson’s
European policy was essentially a continuation of Kennedy’s
policy. Warm friendship with Great Britain and its prime
ministers was balanced by coolness toward France and its
enigmatic president, Charles de Gaulle. De Gaulle had refused
to sign the Test Ban Treaty; insisted on keeping Great Britain
out of the European Common Market, an organization of European
nations to promote economic cooperation (see European Union);
demanded the removal from French soil of the elaborate and
expensive facilities of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO), thus, in effect, taking France out of that
organization; and criticized U.S. policy in Southeast Asia.
Johnson was clearly not very fond of de Gaulle and his
policies, but he reacted calmly to them, perhaps because he
was not certain that de Gaulle needed to be taken very
seriously.
Relations
with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)
High
on Johnson’s foreign policy priorities were his efforts to
improve relations between the United States and the USSR. He
increased the trade, cultural, and economic exchange programs
that had been started during the Kennedy administration, and
in 1968 direct passenger flights began between Moscow and New
York City.
Johnson’s
efforts were moderately successful. In the June 1967
Arab-Israeli War, in which the USSR supported the Arab
countries and the United States supported Israel, a
potentially destructive situation was avoided by the careful
diplomacy exercised by both the Johnson administration and the
Soviets. In a situation that could have triggered a much
larger war, the leaders of the two great powers were able to
come to a mutual understanding that, in effect, banked the
fires in the Middle East, at least temporarily (see Six-Day
War). Less than a month after the crisis, in fact, relations
between the two countries were such that Johnson and Soviet
Premier Aleksey Kosygin were able to meet at a summit
conference held at Glassboro, New Jersey. Although no specific
agreements were made at that meeting, both leaders stated that
they considered it a success and that it had contributed to
better relations between the USSR and the United States.
Other
important agreements that the Johnson administration made with
the USSR include the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, agreed
upon in 1968; a treaty, signed in 1967, whereby the parties
agreed to ban nuclear weapons from outer space; and an
agreement by the two countries to assist and repatriate any
astronauts who might land by accident on the other country’s
territory.
Near
the end of the Johnson administration, relations between the
two countries cooled somewhat as the result of the August 1968
invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union and four of its
Warsaw Pact allies.
Caribbean
Crises
Johnson
was vitally concerned with the Caribbean area, and he relied
on an old Texas friend, Assistant Secretary of State Thomas C.
Mann, for advice about the region. The first Caribbean crisis
occurred in the Panama Canal Zone in January 1964. American
officials had agreed to fly the Panamanian flag in places
within the Canal Zone, as a gesture toward Panamanian
nationalism. When U.S. students at a high school refused to
fly Panama’s flag, Panamanian students marched to the school
and a confrontation took place. Riots then broke out, in which
U.S. soldiers fired on protestors. In response, Panama broke
diplomatic relations with the United States and protested to
the United Nations Security Council and the Organization of
American States (OAS). Within a few hours a truce was worked
out, but it was many months before good feeling was restored.
In September 1965 Johnson announced that the two countries had
agreed in principle to renegotiate the 1903 treaty that had
established the Canal Zone. The new treaty would, at least,
provide for integration of the area into Panama, with joint
operation of the canal.
The
other major Caribbean crisis in the early years of the Johnson
administration occurred in the Dominican Republic. In April
1965 supporters of the exiled president Juan Bosch attempted
to take over the government. Although businessleaders and
landholders disliked his reforms, Bosch had won an
overwhelming victory in his country’s first free election.
He had been ousted in 1963 by the military, who resisted the
effort to restore Bosch, and civil war followed. Johnson,
apparently decided that the coup was Communist-inspired, and
after announcing that there would be “no more Castros”
(referring to the Communist leader of Cuba, Fidel Castro)
ordered U.S. Marines to the Dominican Republic. An OAS
commission worked out a truce in May, and a peace force
containing U.S. troops remained in the republic. In June 1966
new elections resulted in the defeat of Bosch by Joaquín
Balaguer, who did not favor reform. Many believed that Johnson
had overreacted in 1965 and that the use of U.S. troops would
be harmful to U.S. relations with all of Latin America. By
1968, however, the Balaguer government had established a
minimum level of stability.
The
Vietnam War
It
was in Southeast Asia that Johnson ran into his greatest
difficulties. The Vietnam War, a military struggle fought in
Vietnam from 1959 to 1975, had begun when Communist-led
nationalists rose in opposition to the government of South
Vietnam. They sought the reunification of Vietnam, which had
been temporarily divided in 1954 by the Geneva Accords. These
nationalists formed the National Liberation Front (NLF), which
was supported by the Communist government of North Vietnam.
The struggle widened into a war between South Vietnam and
North Vietnam and ultimately into a conflict involving other
nations in Southeast Asia. Unlike conventional wars, the war
in Vietnam had no defined front lines. Much of it consisted of
hit-and-run attacks, with the NLF guerrilla fighters striking
at government outposts and retreating into the jungle.
Johnson
had inherited a pledge from the Eisenhower administration that
the United States would not permit South Vietnam to fall to
the Communists. He had also inherited a commitment of several
thousand U.S. “advisers” in South Vietnam from the Kennedy
administration.
Gulf
of Tonkin Resolution
In
1964 Johnson reported that the North Vietnamese had attacked
U.S. vessels in the Gulf of Tonkin and asked Congress for a
resolution to increase U.S. military involvement. The measure
was passed by both houses. In February 1965 U.S. planes began
regular bombing raids over North Vietnam. Johnson stopped the
bombing in May to support peace talks, but when North Vietnam
rejected all negotiations, the bombings were resumed. U.S.
troop strength continued to increase in South Vietnam. On
March 6, 1965, a brigade of American marines landed at Ðà
Nang, and by year’s end U.S. combat strength was nearly
200,000.
While
continuing the military buildup in Vietnam, Johnson made
another attempt to end the war. In December 1965 he again
halted the bombing of North Vietnam in an effort to achieve a
peaceful settlement. Again negotiations failed, and the raids
were resumed. In June 1966 U.S. planes began bombing targets
near Hanoi, the capitol of North Vietnam, and the neighboring
port of Haiphong, both of which had previously been spared.
In
October 1966 representatives from the United States,
Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, South Korea, and the
Philippines—which all had troops in South Vietnam—met in
Manila and promised to withdraw within six months if North
Vietnam abandoned the war. The offer was rejected by North
Vietnam. In June 1967, when Johnson met with Soviet Premier
Kosygin in Glassboro, New Jersey, he unsuccessfully sought
Kosygin’s help in bringing North Vietnam to the peace table.
The
war continued, and casualty figures rose. In November 1967 the
Defense Department announced that total U.S. casualties in
Vietnam since the beginning of 1961 had reached 15,058 killed
and 109,527 wounded. With the mounting toll sentiment grew
within the United States for an end to the war, the cost of
which, apart from the loss of life, was estimated by the
president at $25 billion per year. A peace movement developed
and gathered momentum, and marches were organized against the
war in major U.S. cities (see Pacifism).
The
Tet Offensive
In
December 1967 Johnson visited foreign capitals in search of
support for his war policies, announcing “The enemy cannot
win, now, in Vietnam.” A month later, however, the
NLFlaunched the Tet Offensive (from the name of the Vietnamese
lunar new year in mid-February), a coordinated series of
attacks on more than 100 South Vietnamese targets that almost
cut South Vietnam in half. Despite its psychological effect,
the campaign failed, and the Communist forces were driven back
from most of the positions they had gained, having lost 85,000
of their best troops.
In
spite of this U.S. victory, however, by the early spring of
1968 much of the American public had concluded that the war
was unwinnable. Repeated predictions of victory from U.S.
generals and Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara had
proved wrong, and as the U.S. commitment grew, so did
opposition to the war and to Johnson personally. By 1967
Johnson began avoiding public appearances because of
demonstrations and threats to his life.
The
Decision to Retire
As
criticism of the Vietnam War reached its height, one of the
most vocal of the Vietnam critics, Senator Eugene McCarthy of
Minnesota, announced that he could not support the president
for reelection and entered the race for the Democratic
nomination. After McCarthy made a strong showing in the March
1968 New Hampshire primary, Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New
York also entered the race (see United States of America: The
Vietnam War Period).
Virtually
every political observer believed that Johnson would run for a
second full term, and most believed that, despite the
opposition to the war and his poor showing in the polls, he
would have little difficulty in gaining the Democratic
nomination. Therefore, it came as a shock to the nation when
the president announced on March 31 that he was going to
devote his full efforts to trying to end the war and that,
consequently, he would neither seek nor accept his party’s
nomination for another term. In the same speech, he announced
a partial halt to the bombing of North Vietnam as a gesture
aimed at getting peace talks started with the North
Vietnamese. North Vietnam responded to the gesture, and, after
preliminary negotiations, peace talks began several weeks
later in Paris.
It
was widely assumed that Johnson’s preference for his
successor was Vice President Humphrey, although Johnson made
no formal statement of support. The assassination of Senator
Kennedy in June threw the contest for the nomination into a
complete turmoil. Despite the closeness of the views of
Senators McCarthy and Kennedy, McCarthy was not able to obtain
the late senator’s base of support. The Democratic National
Convention was held in August in Chicago, which was the scene
of widespread demonstrations by critics of the war, mostly
young people, and of bloody clashes between them and the
Chicago police. After narrowly approving a platform plank that
defended Johnson’s Vietnam policies, the convention went on
to nominate Humphrey on the first ballot.
Although Johnson endorsed Humphrey, he did not actively participate in the 1968 election. Humphrey lost the election to Republican Richard M. Nixon by a narrow margin. After Nixon’s inauguration, Johnson returned to his Texas ranch to write his presidential memoirs, published in 1971 as The Vantage Point: Perspectives of the Presidency, 1963-1969. The Lyndon Baines Johnson Library in Austin, on the University of Texas campus, was dedicated in May 1971. Johnson died in 1973 and was buried at the LBJ Ranch, in Johnson City, Texas.