Great Moments in presidential history: LBJ calls Thurgood Marshall re: Solicitor General

[book_worm]

It's July 7, 1965 and Johnson offers the Solicitor Generalship to Thurgood Marshall, and dangles the possibility of a seat on the highest court:

LBJ: I want you to be my Solicitor General.

Marshall: Wow!

LBJ: Now, you lose a lot. You lose security, and you lose the freedom that you like, and you lose the philosophizing that you can do (on the Court of Appeals). I want to do it for two or three reasons. One, I want the top lawyer...representing me before the Supreme Court to be a Negro, and to be a damn good lawyer that's done it before...Number two, I think it will do a lot for our image abroad and at home...Number three, I want you to...be in the picture...I don't want to make any other commitments. I don't want to imply or bribe or mislead you, but I want you to have the training and experience of being there (at the Supreme Court) day after day...I think you ought to do it for the people of the world...And after you do it awhile, if there's not something better, which I would hope there would be,...There'll be security for you. Because I'm going to be here for quite a while.

Marshall: That's right. That's right.

LBJ: But I want to do this job that Lincoln started, and I want to do it the right way...I think you can see what I'm looking at. I want to be the first President that really goes all the way.

Marshall: I think it would be wonderful.

LBJ: I want to do it on merit...Without regard to politics...I'm not looking for votes...I had a margin of 15 million. All I want to do is serve my term and do it well. But I also want...to leave my mark, and...see that justice is done. And you can be a symbol there that you can't ever be where you are.

Marshall: The answer is yes.

LBJ: Well, it's got to be!

(from Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret WH Tapes 1964-1965)

[MADem]

1. "The Johnson Treatment"

Marshall: The answer is yes.

LBJ: Well, it's got to be!

For all his foibles, he was a fascinating human being!!!







Richard Russell gets the treatment!

[Tommy_Carcetti]

2. LBJ was a complex man

If you ran a column of all his positives and all his negatives side by side, they'd be just about even.

[AngryAmish]

3. Ever hear LBJ ordering pants?

[book_worm]

4. Here's Johnson pulling J. Edgar's chain

It's 10/31/64 and Johnson's top aide Walter Jenkins had been arrested on a "morals charge" at a YMCA in Washington DC, and LBJ is checking with J. Edgar Hoover to see if the GOP will be going public with it. Keep in mind that Johnson knew full well about Hoover and his Deputy director Clyde Tolson being housemates:

LBJ: They raised the question of the way he combed his hair and the way he did something else, but they had no act of his...

Hoover: It's just...that his mannerisms...were suspicious.

LBJ: Yeah, he worked for me for four or five years, but he wasn't even suspicious to me. I guess you are going to have to teach me something about this stuff...I swear I can't recognize them. I don't know anything about them.

Hoover: It's a thing that you just can't tell sometimes. Just like in this case of Jenkins...There are some people who walk kind of funny. That you might kind of think a little bit off or maybe queer.

[rurallib]

5. And then Thomas took Marshall's seat on the SCOTUS

like trading Babe Ruth for a batboy.

[goclark]

6. Batboy hired by the Mob~

He is not worthy of following in Marshall's huge footsteps.


Marshall was simply amazing.

[book_worm]

7. Absolutely a disgrace that Thurgood Marshall was replaced by Slappy Thomas