Prisoners of hope
Subtitle: Lyndon B. Johnson, the Great Society, and the limits of liberalism
By: Randall B. Woods
Published: 2016
Language: eng
Number of pages: 461
ISBN-13: 9780465050963
Subjects: Politics and government; Social legislation; Economic policy; Domestic Economic assistance; Social policy; Liberalism; History
Description: "An eminent historian charts the origins and impact of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society "--

"In Prisoners of Hope, prize-winning historian Randall B. Woods presents the first comprehensive history of the Great Society, exploring both the breathtaking possibilities of visionary politics, as well as its limits. During his first two years in office, Johnson passed a host of historic liberal legislation as part of his Great Society campaign, from the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act to the 1964 Food Stamp Act, Medicare, and Medicaid. But Johnson's ambitious vision for constructing a better, stronger America contained within it the seeds of the program's own destruction. A consummate legislator, Johnson controlled Congress like no president before or since. But as Woods shows, Johnson faced mounting resistance to his legislative initiatives after the 1966 midterm elections, and not always from the Southern whites who are typically thought to have been his opponents. As white opposition to his policies mounted, Johnson was forced to make a number of devastating concessions in order to secure the passage of further Great Society legislation. Even as Americans benefited from the Great Society, millions were left disappointed, from suburban whites to the new anti-war left to urban blacks. Their disillusionment would help give rise to powerful new factions in both the Democratic and Republican parties. The issues addressed by Lyndon Johnson and his cohort remain before the American people today, as we've witnessed in the fight for Obamacare, the racial unrest in St. Louis and Baltimore, and the bitter debate over immigration. As Prisoners of Hope tragically demonstrates, America is still fundamentally at war over the legacy of the Great Society"--
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: The paradox of reform; title: "I am a Roosevelt New Dealer"; liberalism ascendant; title: Funding the Great Society and the War on Poverty; title: The second reconstruction; title: The mandate: the election of 1964; title: Liberal nationalism versus the American Creed: the Great Society form schoolroom to hospital; title: March to Freedom: Selma and the Voting Rights Act; title: Cultures of poverty; title: Progressivism redux: the challenges of social engineering; title: Nativism at bay: immigration and the Latino Movement; title: The new conservation; title: Guns and butter; title: The search for a new kind of freedom; title: The imp of the perverse: community action and welfare rights; title: Reform under siege; title: Whiplash: urban rioting and the War on Crime; title: A "rice-roots revolution": The great society in Vietnam; title: Abdication; title: American dystopia.