Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson (August 27, 1908 – January 22, 1973), often called by his initials LBJ, was an American politician. He was the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. Before becoming president, he was the 37th vice president of the United States from 1961 to 1963. He became president when President John F. Kennedy was killed in November 1963. He was also a U.S. representative, U.S. senator, and the Senate's Majority Leader. He was a Democrat.

Johnson was born in Stonewall, Texas in 1908. Before he became a politician he was a high school teacher. In 1937, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. In 1948, he was elected to the U.S. Senate, then became its majority leader in 1954. In 1960, he ran for president, but did not win the Democratic nomination. He was then chosen to become the running mate for vice president of Senator John F. Kennedy, and the Kennedy-Johnson ticket won.

On November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was killed in Dallas, Texas. Johnson then became the next president of the United States. In 1964, Johnson was elected president, defeating his opponent, Senator Barry Goldwater, in a landslide. He received 61.1% of the popular vote.

As president, Johnson created the Great Society. It was a series of programs created to help the American people. They involved expanding civil rights, public broadcasting, Medicare, Medicaid, aid to education and the arts, urban and rural development, and public services. He passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Civil Rights Act of 1968. His personal beliefs on the issue of civil rights were very different from other white, southern Democrats. He also wanted to make poor Americans' lives better by launching the "War on Poverty." He continued President Kennedy's space program, making the Apollo program bigger. He also helped make into law the Higher Education Act of 1965, making federal student loans. Johnson also signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which helped make U.S. immigration policy today.

In foreign policy, Johnson's presidency wanted to stop the expansion of Marxist–Leninist governments. In 1964, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. This made the U.S. become more involved in the Vietnam War. More American soldiers were sent to Vietnam, and as the war continued, American deaths went up along with deaths of Vietnamese civilians. In 1968, the Tet Offensive happened, which made the public start to dislike the war. Many people wanted the U.S. military to no longer be in Vietnam.

During his presidency the American political landscape changed a lot, as white southerners who supported the Democrats started to support the Republican Party and African-Americans began supporting the Democratic Party. Because of his domestic agenda, Johnson's presidency was the peak of modern liberalism in the United States. Johnson started his presidency popular, but he lost popularity because of the Vietnam War and big social problems.

In the 1968 presidential election, he ended his run for another term as president after he did not do well in the New Hampshire primary. The election was eventually won by Republican candidate Richard Nixon. Johnson went back to his Texas ranch and remained private until he died of a heart attack in 1973 at age 64 in Texas.

Historians and scholars mostly think Johnson is good compared to other presidents because of his domestic policies which helped civil rights, health care, and welfare. However, he gets criticism for his role in escalating the Vietnam War, which resulted in the deaths of 58,220 American service members, dropping over 7.5 million tons of explosives over Vietnam, and the use of the noxious herbicide Agent Orange. 

Working under President Johnson, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara made Project 100,000, a program of the Great Society domestic agenda, where men who were thought to be mentally and physically bad were drafted into military service during the Vietnam War. Some thought the program would reduce poverty through the recruits' education during military training. Of the 352,000 who entered into service, around 140,800 were Afro-Americans. The Project 100,000 participants were killed in Vietnam at a rate three times greater than the rate of soldiers of normal fitness for duty.

Early life
Johnson was born in Texas. His father was a politician who had worked for the Texas state government. As a young adult, he was a teacher. He was elected to the House of Representatives in 1937, then to the Senate in 1948. He won the Senate election by just 87 votes.

Political career
In the Senate, Johnson very quickly became powerful and in 1955 became leader of the Senate and was the youngest to have ever held that position.  He started great programs for the public. It helped that he knew the other Senators well and could often persuade them to support his ideas. In 1960, he ran for president, but during the contest to see who the Democrats would support, he lost to John F. Kennedy. Johnson was then selected by Kennedy as the candidate Vice President. Kennedy narrowly won the election and Johnson became vice president. Like most vice presidents, Johnson did not like the job. It gave him too little power.

Lyndon B. Johnson was well known as someone who could persuade other lawmakers in Congress to pass laws.  To gain more support for his ideas, he often arm-twisted other politicians (meaning he would threaten them if they didn't agree with him).

Presidency, 1963–69 
Johnson took over as president after Kennedy was assassinated. He finished Kennedy's term as president then in 1964 he ran for re-election and won easily against Barry Goldwater. Johnson won 61.1% of the vote. This is the highest percentage of the vote ever won by someone running for president since 1820.

Johnson began a "war on poverty". He created the Great Society (a series of government programs intended to improve the living standards of the country).  These programs include public broadcasting, protecting the environment, Medicare (health care for the elderly), Medicaid ([health care for the poor).  He supported civil rights for African Americans and continued where Kennedy left off in giving them freedom. The Voting Rights Act in 1965 gave the government powers to stop them from being denied the right to vote. Compared to Kennedy's weak relationship with Congress, Johnson was able to convince politicians to support some of the same policies which they opposed under Kennedy.

At the same time, Johnson increased the United States' involvement in the Vietnam War. Johnson increased the number of soldiers in Vietnam from 16,000 to 500,000 in order to stop the Viet Cong (the Communist rebels in South Vietnam). As the years passed, Johnson became more and more unpopular as the war kept on going without an end in sight. By 1968, almost 1000 American soldiers were being killed in Vietnam every month and the enemy still had not been defeated. In March 1968, Johnson said he would not run for re-election.

Post-presidency, 1969–73 
Johnson's time as president ended on January 20, 1969. He went back to Texas to live on his ranch in Stonewall. He began smoking cigarettes again for the first time since 1955, and his health quickly declined. He began suffering heart attacks which later resulted in his death.

Death, funeral and legacy
Johnson died at his ranch on January 22, 1973, at age 64 after having a heart attack. Johnson had a state funeral, and the final services took place on January 25. The funeral took place at the National City Christian Church in Washington, D.C.

Despite the disaster in Vietnam, Johnson is still thought of as being a good president by historians because of what he achieved with civil rights. In 1973, the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston was renamed the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center.

References

Other websites 

 Lyndon B. Johnson's White House biography

1908 births
1973 deaths
Deaths from myocardial infarction
 
People of the Vietnam War
Presidents of the United States
Minority leaders of the United States Senate
Majority leaders of the United States Senate
Time People of the Year
1960 United States presidential candidates
1964 United States presidential candidates
United States representatives from Texas
United States senators from Texas
Democratic Party (United States) politicians
20th-century American politicians