2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumThe Lyndon B. Johnson Renaissance
Last edited Mon Feb 17, 2014, 08:35 PM - Edit history (1)
Despite his titanic role in Americas quest for civil rights, the greatest domestic movement of the Twentieth Century, LBJ has been largely underappreciatedeven ignoreduntil recently.History often casts its glow fickly. Sometimes we get a sense of how one will be reflected in its light contemporaneously. Sometimes it takes a little longer to sort things out.
In 1865, when an assassins bullet felled Abraham Lincoln, his loss was felt immediately and his place in the presidential pantheon all but assured. Though he had elicited withering criticism during the course of his four-year presidency, the sixteenth president had lived to see the Civil War to its bloody end, keeping the Union whole while putting a constitutional end to the odious institution of slavery. It is small consolation that he died at a moment in the war when he could best be spared, wrote Harpers Weekly just after his death, for no nation is ready for the loss of such a friend.
It has taken history far longer to catch up to the legacy of our 36th president, Lyndon Johnson.
A hundred years after Lincolns passing, Johnson stood before Congress and delivered one of the great, unheralded speeches of its age, a plea before Congress to put the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law. Though slavery had long been abolished at Lincolns hand, racism, virulent and intractable, continued to plague much of America. A year earlier, Johnson had signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the first meaningful civil rights bill since Reconstruction, striking down Jim Crow laws that allowed for racial segregation throughout the South. But the power of the ballot eluded many people of color in Southern states. In Mississippi alone, less than seven percent of the black population was registered to vote in 1962. It is all of us who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice, Johnson said as he looked over his former Congressional colleagues in the House chamber, many of them unyielding segregationists, as his mouth tightened and his eyes narrowed determinedly. And we shall overcome.
more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/02/17/the-lyndon-b-johnson-renaissance.html
mc51tc
(219 posts)Landmark Laws of the Lyndon B. Johnson Administration (in the hundreds)
http://www.lbjlibrary.org/lyndon-baines-johnson/lbj-biography/landmark
-----1963-----
College Facilities
Clean Air
Vocational Education
Indian Vocational Training
Manpower Training
-----1964-----
Inter-American Development Bank
Kennedy Cultural Center
Tax Reduction
Presidential Transition
Federal Airport Aid
Farm Program
Chamizal Convention
Pesticide Controls
International Development
Association
Civil Rights Act of 1964
Campobello International Park
Urban Mass Transit
Water Resources Research
Federal Highway
Civil Service Pay Raise
War on Poverty
Criminal Justice
Truth-in-Securities
Medicine Bow National Forest
Ozark Scenic Riverway
Administrative Conference
Fort Bowie Historic Site
Food Stamp
Housing Act
Interest Equalization
Wilderness Areas
Nurse Training
Revenues for Recreation
Fire Island National Seashore
Library Services
Federal Employee Health Benefits
-----1965-----
Medicare
Aid to Education
Higher Education
Four Year Farm Program
Department of Housing and Urban
Development
Housing Act
Social Security Increase
Deaf-Blind Center
College Work Study
Rail Strike Settlement
Voting Rights
Fair Immigration Law
Older Americans
Heart, Cancer, Stroke Program
Law Enforcement Assistance
National Crime Commission
Drug Controls
Mental Health Facilities
Health Professions
Medical Libraries
Vocational Rehabilitation
Anti-Poverty Program
Arts and Humanities Foundation
Aid to Appalachia
Highway Beauty
Clean Air
Water Pollution Control
High Speed Transit
Manpower Training
Presidential Disability
Child Health
Regional Development
Aid to Small Businesses
Weather-Predicting Services
Military Pay Increase
GI Life Insurance
Community Health Services
Water Resources Council
Water Desalting
Assateague National Seashore
Whiskeytown National Recreation Area
Delaware Water Gap Recreation Area
Juvenile Delinquency Control
Arms Control
Strengthening U.N. Charter
International Coffee Agreement
Retirement for Public Servants
-----1966-----
Food for India
Child Nutrition
Department of Transportation
Truth in Packaging
Model Cities
Rent Supplements
Teachers Corps
Asian Development Bank
Clean Rivers
Aid-to-Handicapped Children
Redwoods Park
Flaming Gorge Recreation Area
Food for Freedom
Child Safety
Narcotics Rehabilitation
Traffic Safety
Highway Safety
Mine Safety
International Education
Bail Reform
Tire Safety
New GI Bill
Minimum Wage Increase
Urban Mass Transit
Civil Procedure Reform
Federal Highway Aid
Military Medicare
Public Health Reorganization
Cape Lookout Seashore
Water Research
Guadalupe National Park
Revolutionary War Bicentennial
Fish-Wildlife Preservation
Water for Peace
Anti-Inflation Program
Scientific Knowledge Exchange
Cultural Materials Exchange
Foreign Investors Tax
Parcel Post Reform
Civil Service Pay Raise
Stockpile Sales
Participation Certificates
Protection for Savings
Flexible Interest Rates
Freedom of Information
-----1967-----
Education Professions
Education Act
Air Pollution Control
Partnership for Health
Social Security Increases
Age Discrimination
Wholesome Meat
Flammable Fabrics
Urban Research
Public Broadcasting
Outer Space Treaty
Modern D.C. Government
Vietnam Veterans Benefits
Federal Judicial Center
Civilian-Postal Workers Pay
Summer Youth Programs
-----1968-----
Fair Housing
Indian Bill of Rights
Safe Streets
Wholesome Poultry
Food for Peace
Commodity Exchange Rules
U.S. Grain Standards
School Breakfasts
Bank Protection
Defense Production
Corporate Takeovers
Export Program
Gold Cover Removal
Truth-in-Lending
Aircraft Noise Abatement
Auto Insurance Study
New Narcotics Bureau
Gas Pipeline Safety
Fire Safety
Sea Grant Colleges
D.C. School Board
Tax Surcharge
Better Housing
International Monetary Reform
International Grains Treaty
Oil Revenues for Recreation
Virgin Islands Elections
San Rafael Wilderness
San Gabriel Wilderness
Fair Federal Juries
Candidate Protection
Juvenile Delinquency Prevention
Guaranteed Student Loans
D.C. Visitors Center
FHA-VA Interest Rate Program
Health Manpower
Eisenhower College
Gun Controls
Aid-to-Handicapped Children
Redwoods Park
Flaming Gorge Recreation Area
Biscayne Park
Heart, Cancer, and Stroke Programs
Hazardous Radiation Protection
Colorado River Reclamation
Scenic Rivers
Scenic Trails
National Water Commission
Federal Magistrates
Vocational Education
Veterans Pension Increases
North Cascades Park
International Coffee Agreement
Intergovernmental Manpower
Dangerous Drugs Control
Military Justice Code
- See more at: http://www.lbjlibrary.org/lyndon-baines-johnson/lbj-biography/landmark#sthash.7d57Syhd.dpuf
former9thward
(31,981 posts)Which directly led to over 50,000 American deaths and hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese.
and that wretched war in Vietnam sent him to an early grave at age 64. He could not live with those facts unlike GWB, the non-native Texan who sleeps like a baby everynight with his war nightmare. I would take LBJ as the better man. By not running again in 1968, he put country over party; something we never see now.
LBJ was/is one of the most liberal Presidents in history.
bvar22
(39,909 posts)and chanted,
"Hey, Hey, LBJ.
How many kids did you kill today?"
Little did I realize that LBJ would be the most Liberal President for the next half a century.
We were heading in the right direction with the New Deal, LBJ's Great Society,
the War on Poverty, the Civil Rights Act,....... AND a [font size=3]National, Government Administered, Non-Profit, Single Payer Health Care system, Medicare[/font]!
That was an era back when Democrats STOOD for Something,
and had the courage to Do-the-Right-Thing despite the popularity polls and political inconveniences.
It was FUN to BE a DEMOCRAT back then, and KNOW what that meant!
What the hell happened?
bvar22
(39,909 posts)[font color=white]...............................................[/font][font size=3]"The Johnson Treatment"[/font]
http://thejohnsonpost.blogspot.com/2009/08/johnson-treatment.html
Paladin
(28,252 posts)I did my share of anti-war protesting way back then, but I'm glad to see a renewed appreciation for President Johnson. He deserves it.
gerogie2
(450 posts)die off over time history will treat him kindly. But the dead 3 million Vietnamese families, 58,000 dead US soldiers families and hundreds of thousand wounded will have a bitter memory of the man that knowingly led America into a war he and his administration knew that we could not win.
Splinter Cell
(703 posts)I can't get passed the fact that I believe he was somehow involved in the murder of our 35th President.