History.

By July of 1964, President Lyndon Baines Johnson continued on his plans for America. A major part of his agenda was the Great Society program. It was promoted in a Spring 1964 speech at the University of Michigan. The Great Society promoted the usage of the federal government and all levels of government to end poverty, end social injustice, develop parks, build roads, improve the environment in general, and use diverse means to improve American society. Liberals loved this idea and conservatives abhorred it for philosophical reasons. The truth is that the federal government should have an active role in improving the general welfare of society in America. By July 6, 1964, LBJ signed the Proclamation 3595. It designated the week beginning on October 4, 1964, as Fire Prevention Week. It also urged, that, "State and local governments, the American National Red Cross, the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, and business, labor, and farm organizations, as well as schools, civic groups, and public-information agencies to observe Fire Prevention Week, to develop and employ effective means for disseminating fire safety information and recommendations to all citizens throughout the year, and promptly to undertake other effective community actions designed to eliminate the causes of preventable fires." He worked with Paraguay and the United Arab Republic on trade issues. He spoke to the President’s Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity to advance the Civil Rights Act of 1964 at the Rose Garden. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy was on board with using legal avenues to ensure social equality in America. LBJ also believed in collective bargaining. On July 9, 1964, President Johnson signed the Urban Mass Transpiration Act of 1964 that invests in highways and airways for automobile plus airplane travel. He continued to speak nationwide. By the summer of 1964, he was in the 1964 Presidential campaign. His opponent was the conservative Barry Goldwater. Goldwater wanted less government intervention involving domestic affairs so much that he opposed the Civil Rights Act (as being too much of a governmental overreach while claiming not to be racist). He’s wrong because the federal government has every right to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment and protect civil rights nationwide via federal powers. Barry Goldwater wanted tax cuts, right to work laws, and no social welfare programs from the federal government. Goldwater believed in less government spending on education, public housing, and urban renewal. Yet, he was a war hawk that hypocritically wanted more federal government involvement in the Vietnam War. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke out and wrote literature in opposition to the reactionary views of Barry Goldwater.

Most Americans rejected Goldwater's views. LBJ believed in school lunches. By August, he or LBJ dealt with the Gulf of Tonkin situation and he later massively expanded American involvement in the Vietnam War. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1964 was signed into law by August 13, 1964. The Food Stamp Act of 1964 was signed on August 31, 1964, to help poor Americans. The 1964 election ends in a landslide for LBJ. LBJ won 60 percent of the popular vote, and Goldwater won Arizona and deep Southern states like Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina. Democrats controlled more of the Congress, and Goldwater’s views were rejected by most Americans. Also, Goldwater’s views would influence Reagan, both Bushes, and other right-wing politicians in the future. By 1965, LBJ signed the Voting Rights Act, which was a great achievement. It was signed after the bloodshed by black and non-black civil rights activists. On January 5, 1965, he promoted more of the Great Society programs in his State of the Union address.  President Lyndon Johnson signed Medicare that helped the elderly with health insurance, Medicaid that helped the poor with health insurance, and the Water Quality Act of 1965. The Water Quality Act improved the environment. The 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act sought to aid schools in poorer communities. It invested in new schools, libraries, language laboratories, and helped Native American, inner city, and Mexican American students. President Johnson reorganized immigration policy with his signing the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. It allowed almost 170,000 immigrants from the Western Hemisphere to come to America. Latin Americans, Central Americans, and Caribbean Americans came into America too. This ended the racist old 1920’s quota system that banned Chinese people and others from immigrating into America. The Great Society had imperfections, but it did cut poverty rates, helped to educate millions of Americans, and improved the lives of the elderly including the poor. The National Endowment for the Arts and Humanities was formed in 1965 and developed an intellectual culture in America. By 1966, LBJ dealt with many foreign policy issues. He expanded the Vietnam War involvement with military troops in Operation Rolling Thunder as early as 1965. In 1966, he spoke about housing, Vietnam, and the American peace efforts along with women in military service. By the end of 1966, Republicans retake Congress, and Lyndon Baines Johnson had more difficulty to pass progressive domestic legislation.

By 1967, more criticism of the Vietnam War grows as Dr. King in early 1967 gave many speeches opposing the Vietnam War. By this time, Eugene McCarthy ran for President on the Democratic side against Johnson. LBJ dealt with many issues and is still stubborn to continue with the status quo as it relates to the Vietnam War. LBJ also worked on researching the American cities to see the issues that must be addressed (especially during the city rebellions that came after those locations experience poverty, lax infrastructure, racism, and deindustralization). As money for the war increased, money for domestic programs was cut. This caused inflation that would undoubtedly plague America during the 1970’s. By January 31, 1967, in a message to Congress, President Johnson reflected on past legislative action toward service members and proposed the Vietnam Conflict Servicemen and Veterans Act of 1967 "to remove the inequities in the treatment of veterans of the present conflict in Vietnam", "enlarge the opportunities for educationally disadvantaged veterans", "expand educational allowances under the G.I. Bill", "increase the amount of Servicemen's Group Life Insurance", "increase the pensions now received by 1.4 million disabled veterans, widows and dependents", and "to make certain that no veteran's pension will be reduced as a result of increases in Federal retirement benefits, such as social security." The criminal law of the Safe Streets and Crime Control Act of 1967 dealt with funding police agencies, fighting the illegal drug trade, etc. It was a precursor to Bill Clinton’s Crime Bill. RFK wanted LBJ to have a diplomatic solution to the conflict, but LBJ refused to do so at that time. He supported Head Start, and he should have helped that program.

By 1968, the Presidential campaign increased among Democrats and Republicans. LBJ refused to back down from his position early on. Robert F. Kennedy ran for President, and Eartha Kitt confronted LBJ over the Vietnam War policy. 1968 saw his Presidency unravel. LBJ decides to quit running for President in 1968, and the Democratic race continues. Democratic split apart by generational differences and ideological disputes on the Vietnam War. The Republicans re-energize and choose Richard Nixon to defeat the Democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey. On October 31, 1968, remarks were aired of President Johnson announcing a bombing halt in North Vietnam during the evening. The address was recorded the previous day in the Family Theater at the White House. By December 4, 1968, President Johnson asserts the US must provide low-cost housing for the impoverished as the solution of major social problems during a ceremony commemorating the federal financed inexpensive housing project in Austin, Texas. By January 20, 1969, LBJ ended his Presidency and Nixon takes over as President via his inauguration. The Presidency of Lyndon Baines Johnson had a mixed legacy of the great progressive policies that he executed (plus he saw the Warren court promoting great policies promoting civil rights, voting rights, the separation of church, one person plus one vote, and Fifth Amendment rights) and the terrible foreign policy actions involving Vietnam and other affairs.

The Women’s Rights Movement existed for centuries and thousands of years. In America, the women’s rights movement after World War II grew into a higher level. Ironically, industrialization motivated not only labor rights efforts but women activism for their rights. Feminism means social equality among men and women. Today, some want feminism to be a dirty word, but feminism means simply equality among the sexes. Immediately after World War II, many women left their jobs to work at home because servicemen came home from war. Many women wanted to be homemakers, and many women didn’t. Women, who wanted to work, had the qualifications, the skills, and the determination. The problem was that the system back then (and today) has advanced sex discrimination. That is why the women’s rights movement developed to fight for justice. This fight for sexual equality changed our culture, our laws, and the world forever. The time of the 1960’s and 1970’s women’s rights activism has been called by scholars as Second Wave Feminism. First Wave Feminism started from the time of Seneca Falls, NY during the 1840’s and to 1920 (which is the time of women having the right to vote).  On 1961, President John F. Kennedy formed the President’s Commission on the Status of Women. She appointed Eleanor Roosevelt as chairwoman. The report was issued by the Commission in 1963. The report documented massive discrimination against women in the workplace, and it called for fair hiring practices, paid maternity leave, and affordable childcare. The women’s rights movement was about changing the traditional system of the sexes. Many of its advocates like Casey Hayden and Mary King (who were involved with SNCC) wanted to use the civil rights movement as a motivation for them to promote their cause. Many women of many colors worked together in the cause of gender equality. Many women abhorred the housewife stereotype since many women didn’t want to be housewives alone. Betty Friedan outlined the angst of many women in her historical book entitled, The Feminine Mystique. The book criticized conformity and wanted women to have more opportunities to express their own sense of happiness. It came out in the year 1963. Women in the workplace grew in population by the 1950’s and the 1960’s. Many working women were left out of top positions, and few were executives back then and now. Even Sandra Day O’Connor (who was the first woman Supreme Court Justice) had trouble with jobs early in her career when he graduated near the top of her class at Stanford plus had tons of high qualifications. So, women demanded equal treatment and equal rights in the workplace and beyond.  By June 10, 1963, Congress passed the Equal Pay Act. That law made it illegal for employers to pay a woman less than what a man would receive for the same job. 



By Timothy