LBJ's Brand on the Presidency
1963-1968
How Johnson became President
- Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963
- LBJ takes over the same day on an airplane flying back to D.C.
- Election of 1964 was Dem. LBJ vs. Rep. Barry Goldwater
- main issues were the Great Society, the nuclear test ban, the Social Security system, TVA, federal income tax, and civil rights legislation
- popular vote: LBJ won 43.1 million to 27,1 million
- electoral vote: LBJ won 486 to 52
The Great Society
- A billion-dollar plan with economic and welfare measures to transform American way of life; LBJ's "War on Poverty"
- Supported by Harrington's The Other America which stated 20% of America's population and 40% of the black population lived in poverty
- created the Department of Transportation and the Department of Housing and Urban Development
- Big Four goals: aid to education, medical care for the elderly and indigent, immigration reform, new voting rights bill
- Medicare / Medicaid – medicare for the elderly, medicaid for the poor; 1965; created medical “entitlements” to the old and poor
- Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 – abolished the “national-origins” quota system; doubled the number of immigrants allowed to come each year without restricting close relatives of current U.S. citizens; immigrants mainly came from Latin America and Asia
- Project Head Start – antipoverty program; improved the educational performance of underprivileged youth
24th Ammendment
- abolished the poll tax in federal elections
- January 1964
Tonkin Gulf Resolution and Vietnam War
- Tonkin Gulf Resolution – August 7, 1964; in direct response to a minor naval engagement known as the Gulf of Tonkin Incident; it gave U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson authorization, without a formal declaration of war by Congress, for the use of military force in Southeast Asia.
- Operation Rolling Thunder – full-scale bombing attacks on North Vietnam; in response to guerrillas attacking American air base in Pleiku, South Vietnam; March 1965
- first time U.S. troops were ordered to land in Vietnam
- by 1968 Southeast Asia had 500,000 troops in it and $30 billion had been spent
- American's anti-war crimes grew louder and louder
- Tet Offensive – Vietnamese New Year in January 1968; Viet Cong attacked 27 South Vietnamese cities; military defeat but political victory for the guerrillas
- further proved that LBJ's strategy of increasing the pressure "little by little" was ineffective and unfeasible
- declared in March 31, 1968 that America would send no more troops, lessen aerial bombardment, and shift more responsibility onto the South Vietnamese
Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act
- Civil Rights Act of 1964 – passed under LBJ; banned racial discrimination in most private facilities open to the public; strengthened the govs ability to desegregate schools; prohibited both racial and gender discrimination
- Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) – eliminated discrimination in hiring; created by the Civil RIghts Act of 1964
- Voting Rights Act of 1965 – August 6, 1965; outlawed literacy tests and and sent federal troops into many southern states to watch over voting
- the south was changed forever, for the first time since emancipation black people began to migrate into the South instead of away from it
1968
A “watershed” year! There were assassinations, major events in the Vietnam War, etc… Look at what makes this such an important year in US history
- Robert Kennedy was killed by an Arab immigrant as he campaigned for president
- bombshell address on March 31; the U.S. would freeze the troop level in Vietnam, reduce aerial bombings, and give more responsibility to the South Vietnamese
- election of 1968 consisted of Dem. Hubert Humphrey, Rep. Nixon, and third party Wallace
- Nixon won the election