by Jon Meacham
KING HAD ALREADY BEGUN Ibid.
“TELL ’EM ABOUT THE DREAM” Ibid.
A “NEW FOUNDING FATHER” Ibid., 887. Branch’s full observation: “More than his words, the timbre of his voice projected him across the racial divide and planted him as a new founding father. It was a fitting joke on the races that he achieved such statesmanship by setting aside his lofty text to let loose and jam, as he did regularly from two hundred podiums a year.” Ibid.
“I SAY TO YOU TODAY” Martin Luther King, Jr., “I Have a Dream…” National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/files/press/exhibits/dream-speech.pdf.
“I HAVE A DREAM” Ibid.
“THERE WAS GREAT FEAR” Author interview.
BOB DYLAN Meacham, Voices in Our Blood, 288–92.
“FOR MANY, THE DAY SEEMED” Ibid., 285.
IN THE WHITE HOUSE Beschloss, Presidential Courage, 275–76.
LISTENED WITH APPRECIATION Branch, Parting the Waters, 883. “He’s damn good,” Kennedy remarked. Ibid. For JFK during King’s speech, see also Beschloss, Presidential Courage, 275–76.
THE CONVERSATION DID NOT Branch, Parting the Waters, 883–87.
“IN THE PROCESS” King, “I Have a Dream…”
“THE DEMONSTRATION IMPRESSED” Meacham, Voices in Our Blood, 286.
“I HAVE A DREAM” King, “I Have a Dream…”
PRESIDENT JOHNSON ASKED KING Kotz, Judgment Days, 66–67.
“NOW EVERY PERSON” Beschloss, Taking Charge, 83–84.
JOHNSON WENT TO WORK See, for instance, Kotz, Judgment Days, 112–55; Todd S. Purdum, An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (New York, 2014); Clay Risen, The Bill of the Century: The Epic Battle for the Civil Rights Act (New York, 2014).
“THEY TELL [THIS] STORY” Miller, Lyndon, 342.
“I HAVE NO DOUBT” Ibid., 369.
“I MADE MY POSITION” Ibid.
THE PRESIDENT WOULD NOT BEND Kotz, Judgment Days, 38.
HE TASKED SENATOR HUBERT HUMPHREY Miller, Lyndon, 368–69.
“WE WERE WELL ORGANIZED” Ibid., 370.
“UNLESS WE HAVE” Kotz, Judgment Days, 141.
“WE DON’T WANT” Ibid.
JOHNSON WON THE CLOTURE VOTE Ibid., 151–52.
“IT’S JUST A MIRACLE” Ibid., 151.
“THERE WAS A GLORIOUS” Miller, Lyndon, 372.
ONE SOUTHERN MEMBER Kotz, Judgment Days, 153.
“I WOULD URGE” Ibid.
HE SIGNED THE CIVIL RIGHTS ACT E. W. Kenworthy, “President Signs Civil Rights Bill; Bids All Back It,” NYT, July 3, 1964.
KENNEDY CALLED JOHNSON Kotz, Judgment Days, 155.
“I WANT YOU” Miller, Lyndon, 375.
“HE USED TO” Ibid.
“IT IS AN” Kotz, Judgment Days, 154.
(“NOTHING EXCEPT A BATTLE LOST”) Christopher Hibbert, Wellington: A Personal History (New York, 1999), 185.
HE MUSED FOR Miller, Lyndon, 389–90.
“YOU ARE AS” Ibid., 391.
WE’RE ALL AMERICANS Transcript of LBJ and Theodore Sorensen telephone conversation, June 3, 1963, Collections of the Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library, 1–2.
“I BELIEVE THAT” Ibid., 2. Johnson specifically referred to George Wallace and Ross Barnett, the segregationist Democratic governor of Mississippi. Ibid.
“THEN A MAN” Ibid., 3.
“THIS AURA” Ibid., 2.
“I THINK THE PRESIDENCY” Ibid., 8.
“I’VE BEEN IN” Ibid., 9–10.
THE PRESIDENT IS Ibid., 19.
IN THE 1964 GENERAL ELECTION Theodore H. White, Making of the President, 1964 (New York, 1965), is a wonderful account of the campaign—in some ways, I think, a more important book than White’s fabled account of the 1960 campaign, for the forces in play in 1964, particularly the triumph of movement conservatism in securing the nomination for Goldwater, continue to shape our politics.
THE PRESIDENT WAS DUE Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 320.
“SEVERAL PEOPLE IN” Ibid.
HAD OTHER IDEAS Ibid., 320–22.
“IF WE ARE” Lyndon B. Johnson, “Remarks at a Fundraising Dinner in New Orleans,” October 9, 1964, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=26585.
“NOW, THE PEOPLE” Ibid.
“WHATEVER YOUR VIEWS” Ibid.
THE “APPLAUSE WAS” Johnson, Vantage Point, 109.
“ONLY SAY WHAT” Ibid.
AN OLD DEMOCRATIC SENATOR Johnson, “Remarks at a Fundraising Dinner.”
SENATOR JOE BAILEY, SR. Johnson, Vantage Point, 110.
“HE WAS TALKING” Johnson: “Remarks at a Fundraising Dinner.”
“NIGRA, NIGRA, NIGRA!” Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 321. Other versions of the speech render Johnson’s peroration as “Negro, negro, negro!” Johnson, “Remarks at a Fundraising Dinner.” Johnson himself candidly recalled that he had said “ ‘Nigger, nigger, nigger.’ ” Johnson, Vantage Point, 110.
THE CROWD WAS Kotz, Judgment Days, 224.
A PROLONGED OVATION Ibid. Kotz reported the cheers lasted eight minutes. In William Leuchtenburg’s telling, the audience “let out a gasp….Then, led by blacks in the room, the audience rose to its feet and the hall was ‘rocked by a thunderous cheer’ that lasted fully five minutes.” Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 321.
“MANY OF HIS” Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 321–322.
“NOT IN NEW YORK” Johnson, Vantage Point, 109.
IN NOVEMBER LBJ WON “United States presidential election of 1964,” Encyclopaedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/event/United-States-presidential-election-of-1964.
“I’VE JUST BEEN” Kotz, Judgment Days, 260.
235–36 JOHNSON REACHED OUT TO CONGRESSMAN GERALD FORD Ibid., 261.
KING MARKED HIS THIRTY-SIXTH BIRTHDAY Ibid., 251.
“THERE IS NOT” Ibid.
HAD LAUNCHED A VOTING-RIGHTS DRIVE Ibid., 254.
ON SUNDAY, MARCH 7, 1965 My account of Bloody Sunday is drawn from interviews with John Lewis and from his memoir, with Michael D’Orso, Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement (New York, 1998), 323–47, among other sources. This account of Lewis’s experiences was the heart of an essay I wrote for Garden & Gun, “The G&G Interview: Congressman John Lewis,” February-March, 2015.
TRAPPED BETWEEN ASPHALT Author interview with John Lewis.
“PEOPLE ARE GOING TO DIE HERE” Ibid.
IMAGES OF THE Lewis, Walking with the Wind, 331.
“AT THE MOMENT” Author interview with John Lewis.
BORN IN 1940 TO SHARECROPPER PARENTS Ibid.
LEWIS HAD PREPARED Ibid.
THEN HE HEARD THE COMMANDER’S ORDER Ibid.
“THE TROOPERS AND POSSEMEN” Lewis, Walking with the Wind, 327.
LEWIS MADE IT BACK Ibid., 329–30.
HE STILL REMEMBERS Author interview with John Lewis.
“I ALWAYS FELT” Ibid.
“THE MARCH OF 1965” Ibid.
“IN THE FINAL ANALYSIS” Ibid.
“IF I JUST SEND” Kotz, Judgment Days, 303.
WORKING THROUGH HIS FRIEND Ibid., 304.
THE PRESIDENT SEATED WALLACE Ibid. “It was an intimidating Johnson maneuver that Hubert Humphrey called a ‘nostril inspection,’ ” Kotz wrote. “The psychological warfare had begun.” Ibid. See also Goodwin, Remembering America, 321–24.
“I KEPT MY EYES” Johnson, Vantage Point, 162.
“WHY DON’T YOU” Kotz, Judgment Days, 305.
“OH, MR. PRESIDENT” Ibid.
“DON’T YOU SHIT ME” Ibid.
; “GEORGE, WHY ARE” Ibid.
HE DESCRIBED THE Ibid., 305–6.
“NOW, LISTEN, GEORGE” Ibid., 306.
UNDER PRESSURE FROM Johnson, Vantage Point, 163. In the end, Wallace told Johnson that the state could not afford the financial costs of mobilizing the National Guard. “It needed federal assistance,” Johnson recalled. “I gave such assistance immediately. I signed an Executive Order federalizing the Alabama National Guard. So the troops went in after all. They went in by order of the President, because the Governor said Alabama couldn’t afford them financially. But they were not intruders forcing their way in; they were citizens of Alabama. That made all the difference in the world.” Ibid.
“HELL, IF I’D STAYED” Kotz, Judgment Days, 306.
WITH A PURPOSEFUL STRIDE “President Johnson’s Special Message to the Congress: The American Promise,” LBJ Presidential Library, http://www.lbjlibrary.org/lyndon-baines-johnson/speeches-films/president-johnsons-special-message-to-the-congress-the-american-promise.
HE DID NOT PAUSE Ibid.
THE PRESIDENT OPENED A FOLDER Ibid.
“I SPEAK TONIGHT” Lyndon B. Johnson, “Special Message to the Congress: The American Promise,” March 15, 1965, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=26805.
HERE, FOR THE FIRST TIME “President Johnson’s Special Message to the Congress: The American Promise,” LBJ Presidential Library.
THERE IS NO NEGRO PROBLEM Lyndon B. Johnson, “Special Message to the Congress: The American Promise,” American Presidency Project.
“IT IS IRONIC, MR. PRESIDENT” Kotz, Judgment Days, 314.
“IT IS DIFFICULT TO FIGHT FOR FREEDOM” Lyndon B. Johnson, “Remarks in the Capitol Rotunda at the Signing of the Voting Rights Act,” August 6, 1965, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=27140.
ON SUNDAY, MARCH 31, 1968 Miller, Lyndon, 618–25. I also drew on my essay “Fifty Years After 1968, We Are Still Living in Its Shadow,” Time, January 18, 2018.
HE HAD A DRAFT Miller, Lyndon, 619.
THE PRESIDENT HAD TALKED Ibid., 619–21.
JOHNSON STOPPED IN Ibid., 621.
“AFTER SPENDING ALL DAY” Ibid.
ONLY A FEW HOURS Lyndon B. Johnson: “The President’s Address to the Nation Announcing Steps to Limit the War in Vietnam and Reporting His Decision Not to Seek Reelection,” March 31, 1968, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=28772.
“I HAD ALREADY” Miller, Lyndon, 621.
MORE THAN HALF A MILLION “Vietnam War: Allied Troop Levels, 1960–1973,” American War Library, http://www.americanwarlibrary.com/vietnam/vwatl.htm.
ABOUT 46 U.S. TROOPS “Vietnam War U.S. Military Fatal Casualty Statistics: Electronic Records Reference Report,” National Archives, https://www.archives.gov/research/military/vietnam-war/casualty-statistics.
THE SETTING WAS SPLENDID This section appeared, in slightly different form, in my Martin Luther King Jr.: His Life and Legacy, Time special edition, 2018.
“WE ARE TIED TOGETHER” King, “Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution.”
HIS EVENING ADDRESS Johnson: “The President’s Address to the Nation Announcing Steps to Limit the War in Vietnam.”
“EVER ANCIENT, EVER NEW” The phrase is from book 10 of The Confessions of Saint Augustine, http://www.leaderu.com/cyber/books/augconfessions/bk10.html.
“ONE DAY WE” King, “Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution.”
“IT SEEMS THAT I CAN HEAR” Ibid.
HE TELEPHONED CORETTA SCOTT KING Kotz, Judgment Days, 415.
THE PRESIDENT ATTENDED Lyndon B. Johnson, “Address to the Nation Upon Proclaiming a Day of Mourning Following the Death of Dr. King,” April 5, 1968, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=28783.
“THE DREAM OF” Ibid.
LEARNED ABOUT THE ASSASSINATION Thomas, Robert Kennedy, 366.
WEARING AN OVERCOAT Ibid.
“WHAT WE NEED” “Robert Kennedy: Delivering News of King’s Death,” National Public Radio, April 4, 2008. https://www.npr.org/2008/04/04/89365887/robert-kennedy-delivering-news-of-kings-death.
“DO YOU KNOW” Thomas, Robert Kennedy, 361.
BACK IN THE BALLROOM Ibid., 391.
THE DYNAMICS OF THE ’68 CAMPAIGN See, for instance, Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1968 (New York, 1969); Joe McGinniss, The Selling of the President, 1968 (New York, 1969 ); Lewis Chester, Geoffrey Hodgson, and Bruce Page, An American Melodrama: The Presidential Campaign of 1968 (New York, 1969).
GEORGE WALLACE CARRIED “1968 Presidential Election,” 270 to Win, https://www.270towin.com/1968_Election/.
“THE MAGNITUDE OF” Johnson, Vantage Point, 565–66.
IMMIGRATION AND NATIONALITY ACT Lyndon B. Johnson: “Remarks at the Signing of the Immigration Bill, Liberty Island, New York,” October 3, 1965, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=27292.
AND A SINGLE WORD Sitaraman, Crisis of the Middle-Class Constitution, 206–8.
THE ADDITION OF WOMEN Ibid. “After the Civil Rights act was passed,” Sitaraman wrote, “the civil rights movement became a model for women, and equal opportunity became the approach to combating sex discrimination.” Ibid., 207–8.
SPOKE OUT IN THE SPIRIT Representative Shirley Chisholm of New York, “Equal Rights for Women,” Address to the U.S. House of Representatives, May 21, 1969, Washington, D.C., Archives of Women’s Political Communication, Iowa State University, https://awpc.cattcenter.iastate.edu/2017/03/21/equal-rights-for-women-may-21-1969/.
AS A BLACK PERSON Ibid.
JOHNSON’S LAST PUBLIC APPEARANCE Kotz, Judgment Days, 424; Miller, Lyndon, 681–85.
THE HUBERT HUMPHREYS Miller, Lyndon, 681–83.
HE WAS SICK Ibid., 681–82.
A HIGHLY UNUSUAL WINTER STORM Ibid.
THE SNOW AND THE ICE Ibid., 681.
“I WAS JUST” Ibid.
HE OVERRULED HIS DOCTORS Ibid., 681–82.
“FOR JOHNSON” Ibid., 682.
“I WAS DETERMINED” Ibid.
“PUT ON HIS” Ibid.
JOHNSON GREW FRUSTRATED Ibid., 681.
IN HIS REMARKS Kotz, Judgment Days, 424.
TWO MEMBERS OF THE AUDIENCE Ibid., 425.
“THE FATIGUE OF” Miller, Lyndon, 685.
“LET’S TRY TO” Kotz, Judgment Days, 425.
AND HE DIED Ibid., 425–26.
CONCLUSION · The First Duty of an American Citizen
THE PEOPLE HAVE Truman, Mr. Citizen, 27.
BEGIN WITH THE Theodore Roosevelt, “The Duties of American Citizenship,” Buffalo, New York, January 26, 1893, Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition, Yale University, https://glc.yale.edu/duties-american-citizenship.
GREAT LEADERS WE HAVE HAD Press release of speech given by Eleanor Roosevelt before the Democratic National Convention, August 13, 1956; correspondence between Eleanor Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman, Eleanor Roosevelt Papers, Part II, 1945–1960, FDRL.
KNEW THERE’D BE HELL TO PAY Gardner, Harry Truman and Civil Rights, 80–81. “He knew very well that this was a great risk, political risk, as indeed it was,” Truman assistant George Elsey recalled. “But as President, he saw what he thought was his duty, and he went right ahead with it.” Ibid.
“OUR AMERICAN FAITH” Truman, “Special Message to the Congress on Civil Rights,” February 2, 1948.
TRUMAN USED RACIAL SLURS McCullough, Truman, 83; 86; 247; 980. See also Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 151–52, and Leuchtenburg, “The Conversion of Harry Truman,” American Heritage, November 1991.
> IN 1911, WHILE COURTING “Truman’s Racial Ideas Changed, Letters Show,” NYT, April 11, 1983; Leuchtenburg, “Conversion of Harry Truman.” Truman was twenty seven at the time he wrote the letter.
THE DESCENDANT OF SLAVE OWNERS Leuchtenburg, “Conversion of Harry Truman.” McCullough described the ethos of the Independence, Missouri, of Truman’s childhood this way: “The atmosphere remained pervadingly southern—antebellum Old South, unreconstructed. Handkerchiefs were waved whenever the band played ‘Dixie.’ The United Daughters of the Confederacy thrived, and such formal parties as attended by genteel young folk like Bessie Wallace and her friends were hardly different from those put on in Macon or Tuscaloosa….The biggest memorial in Woodland Cemetery was the Confederate monument. Portraits of Lee and Jackson were displayed prominently in many front parlors.” McCullough, Truman, 53.
THE MARCH ON WASHINGTON AS “SILLY” Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 223.
INSPIRED BY COMMUNISTS Martin Luther King, Jr., The Papers of Martin Luther King, vol. 5, Threshold of a New Decade, January 1959–December 1960, (Berkeley, Calif.) 5:437.
HIS HORROR OVER BRUTAL ATTACKS Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 165–66.
IN SOUTH CAROLINA “Resonant Ripples in a Global Pond: The Blinding of Isaac Woodard,” https://faculty.uscupstate.edu/amyers/conference.html.
“MY GOD!” TRUMAN SAID Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 166.
“MY FOREBEARS WERE” Ibid., 366. See also McCullough, Truman, 588.
“WE BELIEVE THAT” Truman, “Special Message to the Congress on Civil Rights,” February 2, 1948.
“DAMNABLE, COMMUNISTIC, UNCONSTITUTIONAL” Gardner, Harry Truman and Civil Rights, 80.
AT A WHITE HOUSE LUNCHEON Alfred Steinberg, The Man from Missouri: The Life and Times of Harry S. Truman (New York, 1962), 303–4; Miller, Plain Speaking, 80–81; William Lee Miller, Two Americans, 337–38.
“I WANT TO TAKE” Steinberg, Man from Missouri, 303–4.
THE PRESIDENT THOUGHT Ibid., 304; Miller, Plain Speaking, 80–81; Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 366.
TAKING A COPY OF THE CONSTITUTION Leuchtenburg, White House Looks South, 366.
“I’M EVERYBODY’S PRESIDENT” Steinberg, Man from Missouri, 304.