The Kennedy Half-Century (118 page)

18
. EX FG 2/Eisenhower, Dwight, Box 40, FG 2/Kennedy, John F., 1/1/64-4/30/64, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas; EX FG 2/Eisenhower, Dwight, Box 40, FG 2/Kennedy, John F. 11/22/63–12/31/63, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas.

19
. Eve Edstrom and Elsie Carper, “Proposal by Johnson Will Rename Cultural Center for Late President,” unnamed newspaper clipping, November 30, 1963, Jarold Keiffer Papers, Box 5, Folder: “November 1963,” JFK Library, Boston, Massachusetts.

20
. Philip Benjamin, “Idlewild Is Rededicated as John F. Kennedy Airport,”
New York Times
, December 25, 1963.

21
. “Across Knik Arm, a City That Never Was,”
Anchorage Daily News
, February 3, 2010, adn.com,
http://community.adn.com/adn/node/147535
 [accessed August 23, 2011].

22
. J. Maloy Roach, a songwriter for Commander Publications in Hollywood, composed “Lincoln and JFK”; Sister Rosalina Abejo wrote the “President Kennedy March”; the Nazareth Academy in Torresdale, Pennsylvania, produced “The Triply Incandescent Flame,” which was a “Sacred Cantata for Voices and Organ most gratefully dedicated to John F. Kennedy …” See the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Papers, Box 237, Series 10, “Musical Tributes,” and Box 238, “Musical Tributes and Poems,” John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts.

23
. Carrol E. Schwaderer heaped praise on JFK’s father: “Our debt to you is not only for the sacrifice of two sons to our country [Joe Jr. and JFK], but for your personal efforts in shaping their characters and destinies.” Schwaderer to Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr., November 29, 1963. Gloria M. Barron of Muttontown, New York, praised JFK’s mother: “You shared him [JFK] with the world and the demands and strain of his office denied to you both the close companionship of years gone by. Today we are all richer for your noble sacrifice.” Barron to Rose Kennedy, November 25, 1963. Rose Kennedy Papers, “Cards and Letters, 1963,” Box 236, JFK Library, Boston, Massachusetts. Mrs. June Bilimovich of Winnipeg, Canada, wrote, “We, in Canada, feel the pain and sorrow in the very depth of our hearts, minds and souls. We mourn your beloved son with you, your husband and your whole family. His name will be remembered for all times because he showed to … mankind a path of enlightenment and gave his young life in the supreme sacrifice. God help us all.” Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Papers, Box 236, Series 10, Folder “Cards and Letters from Other Countries,” John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts.

24
. EX FG 2/Eisenhower, Dwight, Box 40, FG 2/Kennedy, John F. 1/1/64–4/30/64, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas.

25
. Letter from Sidney Tarrson to Pierre Salinger, November 29, 1963, and Letter from Cullen Rapp to Pierre Salinger, December 9, 1963, GEN FG 2/A—C, Box 43, FG 2/Kennedy, John F. 11/22/63–12/15/63, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas.

26
. Tom Wicker, “Kennedy Without Tears,”
Esquire
, June 1964, Rose Kennedy Papers, Box 237, Folder: “Newspaper & Magazine Tributes to JFK, 1963,” John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts.

27
. Martin Lewis, “Hello Goodbye: Why the Great Mike Wallace Instantly Forgot His
Beatles TV Exclusive,”
The Huffington Post
, April 8, 2012,
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/martin-lewis/hello-goodbye-why-the-gre_b_1411495.html?ref=media
 [accessed April 9, 2012].

28
. Theodore H. White, “For President Kennedy: An Epilogue,”
Life
, December 6, 1963, 158–59.

29
. Joyce Hoffmann, “How ‘Camelot’ Lived Happily Ever After; The Rainy Evening When Jackie Kennedy Invented Our National Myth,”
Washington Post
, May 21, 1995; Jack Coleman, “1963: Theodore White Eulogy for JFK Links Kennedys and Camelot,”
Cape Cod Today
, December 6, 2008,
http://www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index.php/2008/12/06/today_in_cape_history_theodore_white_epi?blog=161
 [accessed July 13, 2011].

30
. Memo from T. J. Reardon to the Heads of Departments and Agencies, November 29, 1963, EX FG 2/Eisenhower, Dwight, Box 40, FG 2/Kennedy, John F. 1/1/64–4/30/64, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library, Austin, Texas.

31
. “A Statement by the Editors: ‘This Nation, Under God,’ ”
Reader’s Digest
, January 1964, pp. 37–38, Rose Kennedy Papers, Box 237, Folder: “Newspaper & Magazine Tributes to JFK, 1963,” John F. Kennedy Library, Boston, Massachusetts.

32
. Memo from Jack Valenti to LBJ, January 11, 1964, White House Central Files, EX PR 181, Box 367, LBJ Library, Austin, Texas. As much as Johnson wanted to be his own man, though, he knew that would have to wait until his own elected term. For political and personal reasons, LBJ continued to link his presidency to Kennedy’s. During the 1964 Democratic National Convention, for example, LBJ specifically referred to “the four years of the Kennedy administration.” See “Remarks Before the National Convention Upon Accepting the Nomination, August 27, 1964,” LBJ Library website,
http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/speeches.hom/640827.asp
 [accessed September 4, 2012].

33
. Warren Weaver, Jr., “Political Picture for ’64 Confused,”
New York Times
, November 23, 1963, A1.

34
. The same effect helped President Calvin Coolidge win a full term in 1924. Coolidge is the only man besides Lyndon Johnson to have succeeded to the Oval Office with fifteen months or less remaining before the next presidential election. Having been shaken by presidential death so soon before an election, the public is understandably hesitant to make another change so quickly. The “honeymoon” glow also helps the new president win his own term.

35
. In 1948 Johnson beat Coke Stevenson, a popular Texas governor, in a race for the U.S. Senate. Johnson’s razor-thin margin of victory, a mere 87 votes, and various documented irregularities convinced many people that he had stolen the election. His critics subsequently referred to him as “Landslide Lyndon.” Robert A. Caro,
Means of Ascent
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990), 317.

36
. Lyndon B. Johnson, “Annual Message to the Congress on the State of the Union, January 8, 1964,” John T. Woolley and Gerhard Peters,
The American Presidency Project
[online], Santa Barbara, CA,
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=26787#axzz1 SrV9lavY
 [accessed July 22, 2011].

37
. Edward S. Cohen, “First Major Cut in Rates Slated Since 1954,”
Washington Post and Times Herald
, February 23, 1964.

38
. The rest of the tax cut went into effect in 1965. The 1964 cut was considerably larger than the 10%, tax reduction President Eisenhower secured in 1954.

39
. The unemployment rate dropped from 5.4%, to 4.4%, between February 1964 and July 1965 and “the 16.9%, rise in GDP in the two years after the February 1964 tax cut made possible a 13.5%, rise in government expenditures at lower tax rates.” John W. Sloan, “Economic
Policymaking in the Johnson and Ford Administrations,”
Presidential Studies Quarterly
20, no. 1, “Leadership and Crisis Management” (Winter 1990): 112. Middle- and lower-income groups benefited the most from LBJ’s economic policies. Charles B. Garrison, “The 1964 Tax Cut: Supply-Side Economics or Demand Stimulus?”
Journal of Economic Issues
17, no. 3 (September 1983): 681–96.

40
. See Bernard Grofman,
Legacies of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
(Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2000); Charles and Barbara Whalen,
The Longest Debate: A Legislative History of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
(Cabin John, MD: Seven Locks Press, 1985); and Aldon D. Morris,
The Origins of the Civil Rights Movement: Black Communities Organizing for Change
(New York: Free Press, 1984).

41
. Diane Holloway reports, “Oswald’s later writings protested segregation and argued for integration.” Holloway,
The Mind of Oswald: Accused Assassin of President John F. Kennedy
(Victoria, BC: Trafford Publishing, 2000), 4. Oswald listed “racial segregation” as one of America’s faults during a November 1959 interview with a UPI reporter. Holloway, ed.,
Autobiography of Lee Harvey Oswald: My Life in My Words
(Bloomington, IN: iUniverse Books, 2008), 38.

42
. United States House of Representatives: 290–130 vote for the Civil Rights Act on February 10, 1964. Democrats voting aye: 152; Democrats voting nay: 96. Democrats 61% for, 39% against. Republicans voting aye: 138; Republicans voting nay: 34. Republicans 80% for, 20% against. United States Senate: 61–27 vote for the Act on June 30, 1964. Democrats voting aye: 46; Democrats voting nay: 21. Democrats 69% for, 31% against. Republicans voting aye: 27; Republicans voting nay: 6. Republicans 82% for, 18% against.

43
. The Civil Rights Act of 1957 included a voting rights provision and established a civil rights division within the Department of Justice. As Senate majority leader, LBJ played a major role in getting the bill through Congress. But overall, his record on civil rights was less than stellar and he had blocked passage of a similar bill the previous year. By 1957 Johnson had his eyes on the upcoming presidential contest and knew that he would need liberal and black support to win his party’s nomination. David. A. Nichols,
A Matter of Justice: Eisenhower and the Beginning of the Civil Rights Revolution
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 2007), 145. The Civil Rights Act of 1960 aimed to strengthen black voting rights, though it was weak. Southerners blasted LBJ for betraying his region while some liberals accused Johnson of supporting a watered-down bill in order to bolster his presidential prospects in the South. Robert Dallek,
Lone Star Rising: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1908–60
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 563; Robert A. Caro,
The Years of Lyndon Johnson: Master of The Senate
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003), 1033.

44
. Lyndon Baines Johnson, “Remarks Upon Signing the Civil Rights Bill (July 2, 1964),” Miller Center, University of Virginia,
http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/speeches/detail/3525
 [accessed July 25, 2011].

45
. Letter from LBJ to Justin Turner, July 23, 1964, EX FG 2/Eisenhower, Dwight, Box 40, FG 2/Kennedy, John F. 5/1/64–11/19/64, LBJ Library, Austin, Texas. According to the LBJ Library, Turner was the president of the National Society of Autograph Collectors and board chairman of the Abraham Lincoln Sesquicentennial Association. E-mail from Eric Cuellar of the LBJ Library, August 31, 2011. Turner wrote to LBJ after meeting with a group of historians who argued that JFK’s assassination had helped expedite the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Turner wanted to know if this was true and also whether Johnson had expected his bill to pass when he first introduced it. See Justin G. Turner to LBJ, July 13, 1964, WHCF Subject File-LE, LE/HU 2 8/1/64–12/31/66, LBJ Library, Austin, Texas.

46
. However, Kennedy played the critical role in another civil rights milestone that is rarely given its due: the ratification of the Twenty-fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This amendment abolished the “poll tax,” an insidious device designed to prevent African Americans and many poor whites from voting in the five Southern states that employed it as of the early 1960s (Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas, and Virginia). In order to register to vote, and stay registered, citizens were required to pay an annual tax. FDR had tried to abolish the poll tax, but was stymied by conservative Democrats in the Senate, and Kennedy decided to use the constitutional amendment route instead. The amendment was passed by two thirds of both houses of Congress in 1962, and Kennedy continued to urge the states to ratify it. The required thirty-eighth state, South Dakota, did so in January 1964.

47
. A bestselling book by Michael Harrington,
The Other America
(New York: Macmillan, 1962), had stirred concern in the public about widespread poverty in the country.

48
. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.,
A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2002), 1012; Schulman,
Johnson and American Liberalism
, 70–71.

49
. See
http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/lbjforkids/pov_weapons.shtm
 [accessed September 11, 2011], and also
http://presidentialrecordings.rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/essays?series=WarOnPoverty
 [accessed September 12, 2011].

50
. This recollection is Heller’s.

51
. Nicholas Lemann, “The Unfinished War,”
Atlantic Monthly
262, no. 6 (December 1988): 37–56.

52
. “When LBJ took office, 22.2 percent of Americans were living in poverty. When he left, only 13% were living below the poverty line. Not much changed afterwards; at century’s end (1999), the poverty level still stood at 12.7%, a disgracefully high level in the context of the great economic boom then under way. But if the Great Society had not achieved quite as dramatic a reduction in poverty as many had hoped, the nation had at least maintained LBJ’s program. Without it, “26 million more Americans would have been living below the poverty level.” Joseph A. Califano, Jr.,
The Triumph and Tragedy of Lyndon Johnson: The White House Years
(College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2000), 354.