Freedom's Pragmatist: Lyndon Johnson and Civil Rights

Notes

271 Notes Abbreviations CRJA Civil Rights during the Johnson Administration, Part I: The White House Central Files. Bethesda: University Publications of America, 1984. JFKL John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Boston, Massachusetts LBJL Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library, Austin, Texas SCLC Papers Records of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference WHCF White House Central Files Introduction 1. New York Times, January 9, 2008, 18. 2. Senator Hillary Clinton, “Interview with Major Garrett, Fox News,” http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=v9LhWUsrJnM (accessed January 7, 2008). 3. In June 1999, at a three-day symposium on civil rights sponsored the LBJ Library , the University of Texas, and LBJ School of Public Affairs, historians described Johnson as the most productive president on civil rights. See Jet, June 7, 1999. 4. Kotz, Judgment Days. 5. Lawson and Payne, Debating the Civil Rights Movement, 109–10. 6. For a full discussion of the trends in civil rights historiography, see Lawson, Civil Rights Crossroads, 11, and Cowger and Markham, Lyndon Johnson Remembered, 3–18. 7. Lawson even argues that some of the key events in civil rights history—Birmingham , the march on Washington and Selma—were not as instrumental as previously thought. 8. Lawson and Payne, Debating the Civil Rights Movement, 3. 9. Ibid., 111. 272 · Notes to Pages 3–10 10. Gallup polls indicate that Johnson has a low approval rating among the American public, but presidential rankings by journalists, historians and political scientists rate Johnson more positively, especially on equality issues. See Lydia Saad, “Kennedy Still Highest-Rated Modern President, Nixon Lowest,” December 6, 2010, http:// www.gallup.com/poll/145064/Kennedy-Highest-Rated-Modern-President-NixonLowest .aspx (accessed May 10, 2010); C-SPAN 2009 Historians Presidential Leadership Survey placed Johnson second in the category “Pursued Equal Justice for All,” http://legacy.c-span.org/PresidentialSurvey/presidential-leadership-survey.aspx (accessed May 10, 2010); in a recent survey of British academics by the Institute for the Study of the Americas, Johnson was placed eleventh overall and third on domestic leadership, http://www.americas.sas.ac.uk/research/survey/ (accessed January 18, 2011). 11. Bryant, The Bystander. 12. See Haley, A Texan; Sherrill, Accidental President; Evans and Novak, Lyndon B. Johnson; Baker, The Johnson Eclipse; Dugger, The Politician. Other memoirs and biographies that were less than positive include Steinberg, Sam Johnson’s Boy, and Heath, Decade of Disillusionment. 13. Caro, Master of the Senate, 722–23. 14. D. K. Goodwin, Lyndon Johnson, 391. 15. Harvey, Black Civil Rights. 16. Bornet, The Presidency. 17. Dallek described Johnson as “a magnificent scoundrel, a self-serving altruist, a man of high ideals and no principles, a chameleon on plaid. He was a man of many contradictions, a man with vision who’s self-serving.” See Booknotes interview, September 22, 1991, http://www.booknotes.org/Watch/21448-1/Robert+Dallek.aspx (accessed June 13, 2011). 18. Beschloss, Taking Charge, 28. 19. Lawson, “Mixing Moderation with Militancy,” 82. 20. O’Reilly, Nixon’s Piano, 274–76. 21. Miroff, “Presidential Leverage,” 2–23. 22. Lawson, Civil Rights Crossroads, 32; Matusow, Unraveling of America. 23. Lawson, “‘I Got It from the New York Times,’” 159. 24. Booker, African-Americans and the Presidency, 130; Frantz, “Opening a Curtain ,” 26. Chapter 1. Formative Experiences 1. T. H. Williams, “Huey, Lyndon.” 2. Leuchtenburg, The White House Looks South, 2. 3. Woods, LBJ. See also Dyer, “Lyndon B. Johnson.” 4. L. B. Johnson, The Vantage Point. 5. Transcript, CBS News Special, “LBJ: The Last Interview,” February 1, 1973 (reporter : Walter Cronkite; producer: Burton Benjamin), 2. 6. Woods, LBJ, 5. 7. Key, Southern Politics, 254. Notes to Pages 11–17 · 273 8. U.S. Census Data, http://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/ twps0056/tab58 (accessed July 12, 2010). 9. Key, Southern Politics, 229, 254. 10. Ibid., 254. 11. Ibid. 12. Johnson City was named after James Polk Johnson, one of the original settlers. 13. Johnson attributed the saying to his father: “where the people know when you’re sick and care when you die.” See Steinberg, Sam Johnson’s Boy, 122. 14. Pycior, LBJ and Mexican Americans, 5. 15. Moursund, Blanco County History, 255; Speer, A History of Blanco County. 16. Sitton and Conrad, Freedom Colonies. 17. Moursund, Blanco County History; Speer, A History of Blanco County; Handbook of Texas Online, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/BB/ hcb8.html (accessed June 12, 2008). 18. Moursund, Blanco County History, 256–60; Dugger...