The Johnson Years: America in Turmoil

Lyndon Baines Johnson was one of the most fascinating and controversial figures in American political history. He was a man of extraordinary talents, appetites and ambition.  He first came Washington from Texas in 1931 as secretary to a Texas congressman, where he caught the attention of Franklin Roosevelt and was appointed as Director of the Texas National Youth Administration. He was elected to a full term in the House of Representatives in 1938 and served there until 1948, when he was elected to the United States Senate.

In 1951 Johnson was elected majority whip of the Democratic Party in the Senate, and in 1955 he became the Senate Majority Leader, a position he held until being elected vice president under John F. Kennedy in 1960. Johnson was an extraordinarily persuasive man, and in dealing with his fellow legislators, his methods were so direct and forceful that his political dealings became known as the “Johnson treatment.” He could be both charming and heavy-handed, but when he was determined to get votes for a bill he favored, he could exert relentless pressure in persuading colleagues to follow his lead.

Although the negotiations were carried out in private, considerable evidence exists that John Kennedy did not really want Johnson as his vice president, but since Johnson, as majority leader of the Senate, was the most powerful man in Washington in 1960, Kennedy and his aides felt that Johnson should be offered the job.  They also counted on Johnson to deliver the electoral votes of his native Texas as well as other Southern states. The Kennedy team was apparently shocked when Johnson decided to accept the position. The vice presidency of the United States has been described in less than glowing terms by more than one occupant of the office, and there is no question that Lyndon Johnson was frustrated over his lack of meaningful responsibilities.  President Kennedy made him overseer of the American space program, but that did not really satisfy Johnson's longing to be in the center of political action in Washington.

The vice president accompanied President Kennedy on his fateful trip to Texas in 1963.  Shortly after Kennedy was pronounced dead at Dallas’s Parkland Hospital following his assassination, Johnson was sworn in aboard Air Force One, as President Kennedy's widow, Jacqueline, stood by in her bloodied pink suit.

The transition from the Kennedy to the Johnson administration was understandably wrenching, first of all because Kennedy's cabinet and staff were in a state of shock following the sudden death of their leader.  In addition, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson were about as far apart as two politicians of the same party could get in style and personality.  Kennedy, the wealthy scion of an old Boston political family and Harvard graduate, epitomized everything glamorous and attractive about Washington politics.  Mrs. Kennedy conducted herself with enormous dignity during the ceremonies following her husband's death, and pictures of her standing side-by-side with her two young children, her son John being too young to comprehend what was happening, deeply touched the American people.

Lyndon Johnson, by contrast, had come from humble beginnings, attended Southwest Texas State Teachers College and, after teaching for a year, worked his way up through the political ranks by his own means. Whereas the Kennedys suggested candlelit tables with fine glassware and china, Lyndon Johnson and his family conveyed the image of a rousing Texas barbecue.  Johnson moved slowly and carefully during the weeks and months following Kennedy’s death, looking forward to the election of 1964 as he renewed contacts with political colleagues in Congress and elsewhere. As president, with the full apparatus of the White House at his disposal, he commanded attention and demanded loyalty.

Johnson’s forte was not foreign affairs, but the Cold War was a continuing reality, and the situation in Vietnam following the assassination of Premier Diem was murky at best; he could not afford to ignore the realities of international events. Johnson's interests, however, lay in his dreams for domestic programs, as he planned an all-out assault on what he saw as America's social skills: racism, poverty, lack of opportunity, and a host of other issues first addressed by Franklin Roosevelt during the New Deal. Johnson later told biographers that his goal had been to dance with the lady he called the “Great Society,” but instead he was distracted by what he called that “bitch goddess of Vietnam.” Although his legislative achievements in pursuing his goals for domestic improvements were stunning, in the end his legacy was determined by the Vietnam War. (See separate section on Vietnam, above.)

High on President Johnson’s agenda was progress in the area of civil rights, something which President Kennedy had started, but which was still far from completion upon his death.  As a Southerner Johnson was in a strong position to push civil rights legislation. Though it took all his powers of persuasion, Johnson's achievements in civil rights were of major significance.  The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were two of his major achievements. (See Civil rights section.)

Additional Achievements of Lyndon Johnson included bills to establish the Medicare and Medicaid programs; the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964; creation of the Job Corps, a sort of domestic Peace Corps; the Elementary and Secondary Education Act; and the Head Start program. Johnson also sponsored legislation that revised immigration policies, toughened anti-crime systems, and sought to improve public housing and clean up urban slums and the environment at large. Although many of these programs failed to meet their objectives, it was the greatest reform movement since the early days of FDR’s New Deal. Lyndon Johnson presided over much the “the sixties,” however, and the times were indeed a-changing.

The Space Race. During the mid 1950s most Americans were aware that the government was doing research on the exploration of space and that one day, probably in the far distant future, men would go to the moon and beyond. But when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, an artificial satellite, into Earth orbit in 1957, Americans were stunned. Russian scientists had been portrayed as less capable than their American counterparts, and Soviet successes were supposedly based on borrowing of western ideas. But when the Soviets leaped out in front in space exploration, even with a primitive vehicle, Americans reacted with a combination of disbelief and panic. Articles with titles like “Why Johnny Can’t read-And Why Ivan Can” began to appear, and the entire U.S. educational system was hauled into court and placed under scrutiny. Reflecting people’s attitudes, Congress passed legislation that created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and passed additional laws meant to improve American science and math curricula. The space race was seen as part of the cold war, and Americans felt they had to win.

No one played this theme more strongly than President Kennedy. Early in his administration he dedicated that nation to putting a man on the moon and returning him safely by the end of the decade, defined as January 1, 1970. The seven Mercury astronauts made flights in the early 1960s, and then the Gemini and Apollo programs began to prepare for an eventual lunar landing. With the assistance of former German V-weapon rocket scientists and an aviation industry with much talent, the Americans caught up with and passed the Soviets and reached Kennedy’s goal: Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon in July, 1969.

NASA eventually oversaw six landings on the moon, the last one on December 11, 1972. Since then all space flights have been limited to low orbits. The Space Shuttle program, which followed Apollo, accomplished much but was plagued by accidents, as the Challenger shuttle was destroyed during a launch in 1986, and the Columbia was destroyed during re-entry to the Earth’s atmosphere in 2003. NASA plans to retire the remaining shuttle craft in 2010 and replace them with a new vehicle, the Orion, designed to take astronauts back to the moon and perhaps beyond.

See Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff and the film of the same title; Norman Mailer, Of A Fire on the Moon; Also dramatic and historically sound are the Tom Hanks film Apollo 13 and his HBO series, From the Earth to the Moon. The NASA site is one of the most popular and frequently visited on the World Wide Web.

Part 8 Home | Academic Home | Updated September 7, 2007