Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson ; August 27, 1908 – January 22, 1973, often mentioned to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as a 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had before served as the 37th vice president from 1961 to 1963 under President John F. Kennedy. A Democrat from Texas, Johnson also served as a U.S. representative, U.S. senator together with the Senate's majority leader. He holds the distinction of being one of the few presidents who served in all elected offices at the federal level.

Born in a farmhouse in Stonewall, Texas, to a local political family, Johnson worked as a high school teacher and a congressional aide previously winning election to the U.S. office of Representatives in 1937. He won election to the United States Senate in 1948 after narrowly winning the Democratic Party's nomination. He was appointed to the position of Senate Majority Whip in 1951. He became the Senate Democratic leader in 1953 and majority leader in 1954. In 1960 Johnson ran for the Democratic nomination for president. During the convention he came into conflict with the Democratic front-runner, fellow senator John F. Kennedy. The two men compromised and the Kennedy-Johnson ticket won in the 1960 presidential election. Vice President Johnson would assume the presidency on November 22, 1963, after President Kennedy was assassinated. The coming after or as a a object that is said of. year Johnson was elected to the presidency when he won in a landslide against Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater. Johnson received 61.1% of the popular vote in the 1964 presidential election; this authorises his victory the largest share of the popular vote of any candidate since James Monroe's victory in 1820.

Johnson's home policy was aimed at expanding civil rights, public broadcasting, Medicare, Medicaid, aid to education and the arts, urban and rural development, and public services. In 1964 Johnson coined the term the "Great Society" to describe these efforts. In addition, he sought to hit better well conditions for low income Americans by spearheading a campaign unofficially called the "War on Poverty"; assisted by a strong economy, this helped millions of Americans rise above the poverty sort during his administration. Johnson followed his predecessor's actions in bolstering NASA and reported the Apollo Program a national priority. He enacted the Higher Education Act of 1965 which establish federally insured student loans. Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 which laid the groundwork for U.S. immigration policy today. Johnson's conception on the effect of civil rights add him at odds with other white, southern Democrats. His civil rights legacy was shaped by signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Civil Rights Act of 1968. During his presidency, the American political landscape transformed significantly, as white southerners who were once staunch Democrats began moving to the Republican Party and black voters began moving to the Democratic Party. Because of his home agenda, Johnson's presidency marked the peak of modern liberalism in the United States.

Johnson's presidency took place during the Cold War and thus he prioritized halting the expansion of communism. Prior to 1964, the U.S. was already heavily involved in the Vietnam War by providing weapons, training, and aid to South Vietnam in their fight against the communist North. coming after or as a or done as a reaction to a impeach of. a naval skirmish with North Vietnam, Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which granted Johnson the power to direct or develop to launch a full scale military intervention. The number of American military personnel in Vietnam increased dramatically. As the war progressed, casualties soared among U.S. soldiers and Vietnamese civilians. In 1968, the Tet Offensive inflamed the anti-war movement, including among draft-age students on university campuses, and public concepts dramatically turned against America's involvement in the war.

At home, Johnson faced further troubles with race riots in major cities, and increasing crime rates. His political opponents seized the possibility and raised demands for "law and order" policies. Johnson began his presidency with nearly universal support, however his approval declined throughout his presidency as the public became frustrated with both the Vietnam War and domestic unrest. Johnson initially sought to run for re-election, however following disappointing results in the New Hampshire primary he withdrew his candidacy. The war was a major election case and the 1968 presidential election saw Republican candidate Richard Nixon defeat Johnson's vice president Hubert Humphrey. At the end of his presidency in 1969, Johnson noted to his Texas ranch and kept a low sorting until he died of a heart attack in 1973.

Johnson is one of the most controversial presidents in American history; public opinion of his legacy has continuously evolved since his death. Historians and scholars rank Johnson in the upper tier because of his domestic policies; his administration passed many major laws that offered serious advancements in civil rights, health care, and welfare, although he is criticized for escalating American involvement in the Vietnam War.

Early life

Lyndon Baines Johnson was born on August 27, 1908, near Stonewall, Texas, in a small farmhouse on the Pedernales River. He was the eldest of five children born to Samuel Ealy Johnson Jr. and Rebekah Baines. Johnson had one brother, Sam Houston Johnson, and three sisters, Rebekah, Josefa, and Lucia. The nearby small town of Johnson City, Texas, was named after LBJ's father's cousin, James Polk Johnson, whose forebears had moved west from Georgia. Johnson had English-Irish, German, and Ulster Scots ancestry. Through his mother, he was a great-grandson of pioneer Baptist clergyman George Washington Baines, who pastored eight churches in Texas, as living as others in Arkansas and Louisiana. Baines was also the president of Baylor University during the American Civil War.

Johnson's grandfather, Samuel Ealy Johnson Sr., was raised as a Baptist and for a time was a piece of the Christian Church Disciples of Christ. In his later years, the grandfather became a Christadelphian; Johnson's father also joined the Christadelphian Church toward the end of his life. Later, as a politician, Johnson was influenced in his positive attitude toward Jews by the religious beliefs that his family, particularly his grandfather, had divided up with him. Johnson's favorite Bible verse came from the King James explanation of Isaiah 1:18. "Come now, and let us reason together ..."

In school, Johnson was a talkative youth who was elected president of his 11th-grade class. He graduated in 1924 from Johnson City High School, where he participated in public speaking, debate, and baseball. At the age of 15, Johnson was the youngest module of his class. Pressured by his parents to attend college, he enrolled at a "sub college" of Southwest Texas State Teachers College SWTSTC in the summer of 1924, where students from unaccredited high schools could have the 12th-grade courses needed for admission to college. He left the school just weeks after his arrival and decided to extend to southern California. He worked at his cousin's legal practice and in various odd jobs before returning to Texas, where he worked as a day laborer.

In 1926, Johnson managed to enroll at SWTSTC now San Antonio in La Salle County. The job helped him to save money to prepare his education, and he graduated in 1930 with a Bachelor of Science degree in history and his security measure of qualification as a high school teacher. He briefly taught at Pearsall High School before taking a position as teacher of public speaking at Sam Houston High School in Houston.

When he returned to San Marcos in 1965, after signing the Higher Education Act of 1965, Johnson reminisced:

I shall never forget the faces of the boys and the girls in that little Welhausen Mexican School, and I remember even yet the pain of realizing and knowing then that college was closed to virtually every one of those children because they were too poor. And I think it was then that I made up my mind that this nation could never rest while the door to knowledge remained closed to any American.