Lyndon B. Johnson

"At his best, Lyndon Johnson was one of the greatest of all American presidents. He did more for racial justice than any president since Abraham Lincoln. He built more social protections than anyone since Franklin Roosevelt. He was probably the greatest legislative politician in American history, but he was also one of the most ambitious idealists. He had the rare ability to understand his own flaws and limitations, and he worked hard to overcome them. During the battle over the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a reporter asked him why he was fighting so strenuously for a cause to which he had previously demonstrated only a faint commitment. Johnson replied, “Some people get a chance late in life to correct the sins of their youth, and very few get a chance as big as the White House.” Johnson sought power not just to have it, but to use it to accomplish great things — and for a while he was spectacularly successful. But Johnson was not always at his best. He could be crude, overbearing, arrogant and often cruel. He harbored deep resentments that frequently undermined his own stature. He had terrible relations with the press. He was personally (and sexually) reckless in ways that make Bill Clinton seem a model of rectitude. He pushed his staff and his congressional colleagues so relentlessly that his legislative achievements were often rushed and deeply flawed. And, of course, he was largely responsible for one of the greatest disasters in American history: a war in Vietnam that he inherited, escalated, fiercely defended and failed to examine with the same courage and clarity of mind that he brought to so many other issues. He was, paradoxically, at once one of America’s most successful presidents and one of its most conspicuous failures."

"Among Woods’s many achievements in this fine biography is to allow us to see not only the enormous, tragic flaws in this extraordinary man, but also the greatness."

"When Lyndon Johnson -- President Johnson -- spoke here in 1964, he addressed issues that remain with us. He proposed revitalizing cities, rejuvenating schools, trampling down the hoary harvest of racism, and protecting our environment -- back in 1964. He applied the wisdom of his time to these challenges. He believed that cadres of experts really could care for the millions. And they would calculate ideal tax rates, ideal rates of expenditures on social programs, ideal distributions of wealth and privilege. And in many ways, theirs was an America by the numbers: If the numbers were right, America was right. And gradually, we got to the point of equating dollars with commitment. And when programs failed to produce progress, we demanded more money. And in time, this crusade backfired. Programs designed to ensure racial harmony generated animosity. Programs intended to help people out of poverty invited dependency. We should have learned that while the ideals behind the Great Society were noble -- and indeed they were -- the programs weren't always up to the task. We need to rethink our approach. Let's tell our people: We don't want an America by the numbers. We don't want a land of loopholes. We want a community of commitment and trust."

"Chris Cillizza: If there is a list of the 15 greatest senators ever, is McCain on it? Why or why not? Ross Baker: He’s not up there with [[Henry Clay|[Henry] Clay]], [[Daniel Webster|[Daniel] Webster]], [[John C. Calhoun|[John] Calhoun]], [[Charles Sumner|[Charles] Sumner]] and LBJ, but he’s a lot closer than Ted Cruz will ever be. Few senators in recent years, however, have had such a stupendous sendoff. He always had the media eating out of his hand. That’s no minor accomplishment."

"During the sixties and seventies we did really learn that change was possible. Not, ultimately, the kind of change we really wanted. I shouldn't put it that way. I should say not enough change because change did occur within the sphere of the law, which was extremely important. But we did not experience the economic change and other modes of structural change that we will need in order to begin to root out racism. That's the thing. How can movements pressure even the most reluctant politicians? Well, Lyndon B. Johnson, who was the president during that era he was a reluctant southern politician who clearly assented to racism. But it was under his administration that important laws were passed. So I think movements can indeed force reluctant politicians to take steps."

"lame-duck president Lyndon Johnson sat cloistered in his White House, guarded by armed marines, protected from the chants outside on Pennsylvania Avenue: "Hey, hey, LBJ, how many kids did you kill today?""

"Bobby doubted Johnson's liberalism, thought him insufficiently liberal. Ted Kennedy did not; in fact, Johnson's new liberal fervor seemed to have stoked Ted's and made him more liberal than he had been during his own brother's administration. He was catching the gust of liberal wind. And Johnson appreciated the support, even as he curried it."

"In this respect, Ted Kennedy was more like Lyndon Johnson than like his brothers. He was laying down his marker on the Senate as Johnson had. He was demonstrating that he could make the institution work. It was as if he was seeking to escape the politics of charisma that his brothers had personified and that had, arguably, cost them their lives; as if he was seeking reposition himself as a pol, not a messiah, burying himself in Senate drudgery, retreating into the institution, following Johnson's lead and Humphrey's, both of whom had been whips, protecting himself physically but also spiritually. It was totally uncharacteristic for a Kennedy to do so. No Kennedy had ever been an institutionalist, much less an errand boy."

"An extraordinarily gifted president who was the wrong man from the wrong place at the wrong time under the wrong circumstances."

"Johnson was a dirty fighter. Any campaign with him in it would involve a lot of innuendo and lies. Johnson was a wheeler-dealer. Neither he nor anyone else could change that. That's what he was. And Johnson was a treacherous boot. He'd slap you on the back today and stab you in the back tomorrow. Moreover, LBJ was dull. He was a lousy public speaker. The man didn't believe half of what he said. He was a hypocrite, and it came through in the hollowness of his speech. LBJ made me sick."

"And we need to remind people — and I’m saying this because I would say this anywhere in the country — we need to remind people that Texas Democrats are Texas tough. You are Texas tough. Tough like Texan President Lyndon B. Johnson — whose family is here with us. Luci Baines Johnson — I spent time with them earlier at the library — a leader in her own right, who reminds us every time that President Johnson, he never backed down from the hardest fights. Against fierce opposition, he worked beside leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, the labor movement, mobilizing Americans to enact the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, Medicare and Medicaid. Think about how tough he and you were to understand the odds against getting any of that done — the inability of a lot of people to be able to see that it was possible. But you and he did."

"The reaction to Bob Woodward’s new book Fear has been almost completely devoid of historical context. The very folks who are trying to convince us, based on Woodward’s account, that Donald Trump is unhinged are ignoring the fact that Trump is hardly the first American president to have temperamental deficiencies. Many of Trump’s alleged personality-related problems are not new in presidential history. Presenting his eccentricities as evidence of a constitutional crisis reflects a clear bias of omission by those doing the reporting."

"Johnson was unquestionably an insecure man. A graduate of Southwest Texas State Teachers College, he’d forever felt inferior to anyone with an Ivy League degree, especially if their last name was Kennedy."

"As noted previously, Lyndon Johnson and Woodrow Wilson are ranked among the top 11 presidents in American history. Yet how much did their personality flaws actually inhibit their overall records of accomplishment? The same question must be asked of Donald Trump."

"President Obama is no President Lyndon Johnson — and wouldn't be even if he tried. To those who might wish the president would emulate Johnson's hands-on approach with Congress, Obama and his supporters say the times — and the Republicans — have changed too much in the past five decades. "LBJ does not live in these times, and Obama would be a stranger in his," says former Johnson aide Bill Moyers. Memories of the Johnson presidency are in vogue. Obama will speak next week at a conference on the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the president occasionally hears a variation of this question: Why can't you be more like LBJ?"

"There are also stylistic differences between LBJ and Obama. The earthy, rough-hewn Texan often applied what came to be known as "the Johnson treatment," leaning into people, rubbing their elbows, cajoling, threatening and sometimes even begging lawmakers to do his bidding. It's hard to imagine the bookish, professorial Obama grabbing someone by the lapels and pulling him (or her) close in – and harder still to imagine that style might be effective today."

"Mr. Speaker, as a proud Texan, I rise today to pay tribute to Lyndon Baines Johnson, the 36th President of the United States and the greatest "Education President" in the history of our Nation. It is no exaggeration to say, Mr. Speaker, that Lyndon Baines Johnson's record of extending the benefits of education to all Americans in every region of the country, of every race and gender, irrespective of economic class or family background, remains unsurpassed. Lyndon Johnson recognized that the educated citizenry is a nation's greatest economic asset and most powerful guardian of its political liberties. Mr. Speaker, Lyndon Johnson did more than any single American, living or dead, to make the federal government a partner with states and localities in the vitally important work of educating the people of America, from pre-kindergarten to post-graduate school. It makes perfect sense, therefore, to name the headquarters building of the U.S. Department of Education in his honor."

"Mr. Speaker, Lyndon Baines Johnson, who died January 22, 1973, will be remembered not only as a great President and Member of Congress, but also as the greatest champion of accessible and affordable quality education for all. President Johnson truly understood the importance of leaving no child behind, and he didn't. For all these reasons, Mr. Speaker, it is most appropriate that the House voted to rename the headquarters building of the Department of Education located at 400 Maryland Avenue Southwest in the District of Columbia as the "Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education Building.""

"Lyndon Baines Johnson was a giant of a man and a towering figure in the history and life of our nation. We are not going to see his like again."

"Today I introduced legislation awarding the Congressional Gold Medal to Lyndon Baines Johnson, the 36th President of the United States whose vision and leadership secured passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Social Security Amendments Act (Medicare) of 1965, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Higher Education Act of 1965, and the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965. The awarding of the Congressional Gold Medal is long overdue recognition of the remarkable record of achievement in the field of domestic affairs of the person most responsible for several of the nation's landmark laws that mark their 50th anniversary this year. Mr. Speaker, as a Member of Congress from the Tenth Congressional District of Texas, as Majority Leader of the U.S. Senate, Vice-President and President of the United States, Lyndon Baines Johnson's domestic accomplishments in the fields of civil rights, education, and economic opportunity rank among the greatest achievements of the past half century."

"Making a speech on economics is a lot like pissing down your leg. It seems hot to you, but it never does to anyone else."

"If the circumstances make it such that you can't fuck a man in the ass, then just peckerslap him. Better to let him know who's in charge than to let him get the keys to the car."

"Eisenhower used to tell me that this place was a prison. I never felt freer."

"[[Gerald Ford|[Gerald] Ford]]'s economics are the worst thing that's happened to this country since pantyhose ruined finger-fucking."

"This civil rights program about which you have heard so much is a farce and a sham; an effort to set up a police state in the guise of liberty. I am opposed to that program. I fought it in the Congress. It is the province of the state to run its own elections. I am opposed to the anti-lynching bill because the federal government has no business enacting a law against one kind of murder than another ... If a man can tell you who you must hire, he can tell you who not to employ. I have met this head on."

"This is a sad time for all people. We have suffered a loss that cannot be weighed. For me, it is a deep, personal tragedy. I know the world shares the sorrow that Mrs. Kennedy and her family bear. I will do my best; that is all I can do. I ask for your help and God's."

"I am so proud of our system of government, of our free enterprise, where our incentive system and our men who head our big industries are willing to get up at daylight and work until midnight to offer employment and create new jobs for people, where our men working there will try to get decent wages but will sit across the table and not act like cannibals, but will negotiate and reason things out together."

"The challenge of the next half century is whether we have the wisdom to use that wealth to enrich and elevate our national life, and to advance the quality of our American civilization…. The Great Society rests on abundance and liberty for all. It demands an end to poverty and racial injustice, to which we are totally committed in our time. But that is just the beginning. The Great Society is a place where every child can find knowledge to enrich his mind and to enlarge his talents. It is a place where leisure is a welcome chance to build and reflect, not a feared cause of boredom and restlessness. It is a place where the city of man serves not only the needs of the body and the demands of commerce but the desire for beauty and the hunger for community. It is a place where man can renew contact with nature. It is a place which honors creation for its own sake and for what it adds to the understanding of the race. It is a place where men are more concerned with the quality of their goals than the quantity of their goods. But most of all, the Great Society is not a safe harbor, a resting place, a final objective, a finished work. It is a challenge constantly renewed, beckoning us toward a destiny where the meaning of our lives matches the marvelous products of our labor."

"The purpose of protecting the life of our Nation and preserving the liberty of our citizens is to pursue the happiness of our people. Our success in that pursuit is the test of our success as a Nation."

"Poverty must not be a bar to learning, and learning must offer an escape from poverty."

"Fuck your parliament and your constitution. America is an elephant. Cyprus is a flea. Greece is a flea. If these two fleas continue itching the elephant, they may just get whacked good ... We pay a lot of good American dollars to the Greeks, Mr. Ambassador. If your Prime Minister gives me talk about democracy, parliament and constitution, he, his parliament and his constitution may not last long ..."

"Well, I think we may have lost the south for your lifetime—and mine."

"Our government is united in its determination to take all necessary measures in support of freedom and in defense of peace in Southeast Asia."

"This has been a year without precedent in the history of relations between the Executive and the Legislative Branches of our Government. This session of Congress has enacted more major legislation, met more national needs, disposed of more national issues than any other session of this century or the last."

"And I just want to tell you this — we're in favor of a lot of things and we're against mighty few."

"There are no problems which we cannot solve together, and there are very few which any of us can settle by himself."

"I am going to build the kind of nation that President Roosevelt hoped for, President Truman worked for and President Kennedy died for."

"The same society which receives the rewards of technology must, as a cooperating whole, take responsibility for control. To deal with these new problems will require a new conservation. We must not only protect the countryside and save it from destruction, we must restore what has been destroyed and salvage the beauty and charm of our cities. Our conservation must be not just the classic conservation of protection and development, but a creative conservation of restoration and innovation. Its concern is not with nature alone, but with the total relation between man and the world around him. Its object is not just man's welfare, but the dignity of man's spirit."

"The American city should be a collection of communities where every member has a right to belong. It should be a place where every man feels safe on his streets and in the house of his friends. It should be a place where each individual’s dignity and self-respect is strengthened by the respect and affection of his neighbors. It should be a place where each of us can find the satisfaction and warmth which comes from being a member of the community of man. This is what man sought at the dawn of civilization. It is what we seek today."

"We don't propose to sit here in our rocking chair with our hands folded and let the Communists set up any government in the Western Hemisphere."

"You do not wipe away the scars of centuries by saying, "Now you are free to go where you want, and do as you desire, and choose the leaders you please." You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, "You are free to compete with all the others," and still justly believe that you have been completely fair. Thus it is not enough just to open the gates of opportunity. All our citizens must have the ability to walk through those gates. And this is the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights. We seek not just freedom but opportunity. We seek not just legal equity but human ability, not just equality as a right and a theory, but equality as a fact, and equality as a result."

"We do not want an expanding struggle with consequences, that no one can perceive, nor will we bluster or bully or flaunt our power, but we will not surrender and we will not retreat, for behind our American pledge lies the determination and resources, I believe, of all of the American nation."

"I do not find it easy to send the flower of our youth, our finest young men, into battle."

"I hope that you of the IPA will go out into the hinterland and rouse the masses and blow the bugles and tell them that the hour has arrived and their day is here; that we are on the march against the ancient enemies and we are going to be successful."

"We know that most people's intentions are good. We don't question their motives; we've never said they're unpatriotic, although they say some pretty ugly things about us. And we believe very strongly on preserving the right to differ in this country, and the right to dissent; and if I have done a good job of anything since I've been president, it's to ensure that there are plenty of dissenters."

"What did you expect? I don't know why we're so surprised. When you put your foot on a man's neck and hold him down for three hundred years, and then you let him up, what's he going to do? He's going to knock your block off."

"Make no mistake about it. I don't want a man in here to go back home thinking otherwise; we are going to win."

"Our society is illuminated by the spiritual insights of the Hebrew prophets. America and Israel have a common love of human freedom, and they have a common faith in a democratic way of life."

"On this hallowed ground, heroic deeds were performed and eloquent words were spoken a century ago. We, the living, have not forgotten–and the world will never forget–the deeds or the words of Gettysburg. We honor them now as we join on this Memorial Day of 1963 in a prayer for permanent peace of the world and fulfillment of our hopes for universal freedom and justice."

"We are called to honor our own words of reverent prayer with resolution in the deeds we must perform to preserve peace and the hope of freedom. We keep a vigil of peace around the world. Until the world knows no aggressors, until the arms of tyranny have been laid down, until freedom has risen up in every land, we shall maintain our vigil to make sure our sons who died on foreign fields shall not have died in vain."