The Stormy Sixties: Kennedy's New Frontier Spirit

1. Chapter 38 The Stormy Sixties, 1960–1968

2. I. Kennedy’s “New Frontier” Spirit • John F. Kennedy: • Inaugural address on January 20, 1961 • Personified the glamour and vitality of the new administration • The youngest president ever elected • He assembled one of the youngest cabinets, including 35 year-old brother, Robert F. Kennedy • He set out to recast the priorities of the FBI • His efforts were stoutly resisted by J. Edgar Hoover, who had served as FBI director longer than the new attorney general had lived.

3. I. Kennedy’s “New Frontier” Spirit (cont.) • Robert S. McNamara left the presidency of the Ford Motor Company to head the Defense Department • Made up an inner circle of “the best and the brightest” men around the president • Kennedy inspired high expectations: • New Frontier quickened patriotic pulses • Peace Corps an army of idealists and mostly youthful volunteers to bring American skills to undeveloped countries • He invited Robert Frost to speak at his inaugural ceremonies.

4. II. The New Frontier at Home • Kennedy and Congress: • They threatened to ax New Frontier proposals: • Medical assistance to the aged • Increased federal aid to education • Won a first round in his campaign: • Forced Congress to expand the all-important House Rules Committee: • Dominated by conservatives • The New Frontier did not expand swiftly: • Key medical and education bills remained stalled in Congress

5. II. The New Frontier at Home(cont.) • Vexing problem—the economy: • Campaigned on the theme of revitalizing the economy • Helped negotiate a noninflationary wage agreement in the steel industry in early 1962 • The steel episode provoked fiery attacks on the New Frontier: • Announced support for a general tax-cut bill • Chose to stimulate the economy by slashing taxes and putting money directly into private hands

6. II. The New Frontier at Home(cont.) • The New Frontier extended to the “final frontier” • Promoted a multibillion-dollar project dedicated to “landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to earth” • The moon shot was a calculated plan to restore America’s prestige in the space race • Severely damaged by the Soviet Sputnik successes (see p. 877) • $24 billion later, in July 1969, two NASA astronauts triumphantly planted their footprints—and the American flag—on the moon’s dusty surface • The Apollo mission was seen on television

7. III. Rumblings in Europe • Kennedy and Khrushchev: • First met in Vienna in June 1961 • Soviets begin to build the Berlin Wall August 1961 • Designed to plug the heavy population drain from East Germany to West Germany • Stood for almost three decades as a symbol of post-World War II division of Europe into two hostile camps

8. Rumblings in Europe(cont.) • European Economic Community (EEC): • The free trade area that later evolved into the European Union • Secured passage of the Trade Expansion Act 1962 • Authorizing tariff cuts of up to 50% to promote trade with EEC countries • Led to the so-called Kennedy Round of tariff negotiations, concluded in 1967 • And to a significant expansion of European-American trade. • Globalization—a new era of robustly invigorated international commerce

9. Rumblings in Europe(cont.) • Kennedy’s ambitious design for Europe: • Not all plans were realized • “Atlantic Community” of economically and militarily united countries, with the United States the dominant partner: • Idea blocked by Charles de Gaulle, president of France • He vetoed British application for Common Market membership in 1963 • He deemed the Americans unreliable in a crisis • So he tried to preserve French freedom of action by developing his own small atomic force • de Gaulle demanded an independent Europe, free of Yankee influence.

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11. IV. Foreign Flare-ups and “Flexible Response” • U.S. foreign policy: • Emerged from the worldwide decolonization of European overseas possessions • Laos • Freed from its French colonial overlords in 1954 • United States failed to cleanse the country of aggressive communist elements • Laotian civil war raged • Kennedy sought a diplomatic escape hatch in the fourteen-power Geneva conference: • Which imposed a shaky peace on Laos in 1962

12. IV. Foreign Flare-ups and “Flexible Response” (cont.) • Kennedy moved from the Eisenhower/Dulles doctrine of “massive retaliation” to Defense Secretary McNamara’s strategy of “flexible response”— • Developing an array of military “options” that could be pre-cisely matched to the gravity of the crisis at hand • Kennedy increased spending on conventional military forces and bolstered the Special Forces (Green Berets)

13. V. Stepping into the Vietnam Quagmire • Doctrine of “flexible response”: • Potentially lower the level at which diplomacy would give way to shooting • Provided a mechanism for a progressive, and possibly endless, stepping-up of the use of force • Vietnam presented proof of these pitfalls • Corrupt, right-wing government of Ngo Dinh Diem in Saigon ruled shakily since the partition in 1954 (see p. 875) • Late in 1961, Kennedy ordered a sharp increase in the number of “military advisers” (U.S. troops) in South Vietnam.

14. V. Stepping into the Vietnam(cont.) • American forces entered Vietnam to foster political stability: • To help protect Diem from the communists • Kennedy administration encouraged a coup against him in November 1963 • Kennedy told the South Vietnamese that it was “their war,” but made dangerously deep political commit- ments • He had ordered more than 15,000 American men into the far-off slaughter pen • A graceful pullout was becoming difficult (see Map 38.1)

15. V. Stepping into the Vietnam(cont.) • “Modernization theory”: • The theoretical underpinnings for an activist U.S. foreign policy in the “underdeveloped” world • The traditional societies of Asia, Africa, and Latin America could develop into modern industrial and democratic nations following the West’s own path • Walt Whitman Rostow in The Stages of Economic Growth (1960): • Charted the route from traditional society to “the age of high mass-consumption” • Later this theory would come under attack for its European bias • Modernization served as a powerful intellectual framework for policymakers ensnared in Cold War.

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17. VI. Cuban Confrontations • Kennedy and Cuba: • Alliance for Progress (Alianza para el Progreso): • Hailed as a Marshall Plan for Latin America • Primary goal to help the Good Neighbors close the gap between the callous rich and the wretched poor • Thus quieting communist agitation • Results were disappointing: • There was little alliance • There was less progress • American handouts had little positive impact on Latin America’s immense social problems.

18. VI. Cuban Confrontations(cont.) • Inherited from Eisenhower administration a CIA-backed scheme to topple Fidel Castro: • By invading Cuba with anti-communist exiles • On April 17, 1961 the Bay of Pigs invasion bogged down • These events pushed Castro further into Soviet hands • By October, 1962 American spy plan revealed that the Soviets were secretly and speedily installing nuclear- tipped missiles in Cuba • Kennedy and Khrushchev began a nerve-racking game of “nuclear chicken” • On October 22, 1962, he ordered a naval “quarantine” of Cuba

19. VI. Cuban Confrontations(cont.) • And demanded immediate removal of the threatening weapons • Any attack on the United States from Cuba: • Would be regarded as coming from the Soviet Union • Would trigger nuclear retaliation against the Russian heartland. • On October 28 Khrushchev agreed to a partial compromise: • He would pull the missiles out of Cuba • The United States agreed to end the quarantine and not invade the island • The United States agreed to remove from Turkey some of its missiles targeted at the Soviet Union

20. VI. Cuban Confrontations(cont.) • Fallout from the Cuban missiles crisis: • A disgraced Khrushchev was ultimately hounded out of office, became an “unperson” • Soviets launched an enormous program of military expansion • This stimulated a vast American effort to “catch up with the Russians” • Kennedy pushed harder for a nuclear test-ban treaty with the Soviet Union • Finally a pact prohibiting trial nuclear explosions in the atmosphere was signed late 1963.

21. VI. Cuban Confrontations(cont.) • A thaw—the installation (August 1963) of a Moscow-Washington “hot line:” • Permitting immediate teletype communication • Most significant was Kennedy’s speech at American University in Washington, D.C., June 1963: • He urged Americans to abandon a view of the Soviet Union as a Devil-ridden land filled with fanatics: • And to deal with the world “as it is, not as it might have been had the history of the last eighteen years had been different.” • Tried to lay the foundation for a realistic policy of peaceful coexistence with the Soviet Union • The modern origins of the policy known as “détente” (French for “relaxation of tension”).

22. Map 38-1 p894

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24. VII. The Struggle for Civil Rights • Kennedy and Civil Rights: • Pledged to eliminate racial discrimination in housing • Bold moves for racial justice had to wait • Freedom Riders: • They fanned out to end segregation in facilities serving bus passengers • A white mob torched a Freedom Ride bus near Anniston, Alabama, May 1961 • Attorney General Robert Kennedy’s personal representative was beaten unconscious in another anti-Freedom Ride riot in Montgomery • When local government couldn’t stop violence, Washington dispatched federal marshals to protect the Freedom Riders.

25. VII. The Struggle for Civil Rights(cont.) • The Kennedy administration had joined hands with the civil rights movement: • The Kennedy became ultrawary about the political association of Martin Luther King, Jr. • Some thought King’s advisers had communist affiliations, so Robert Kennedy ordered FBI director Hoover to wiretap King’s phone in late 1963 • The relationship between King and the Kennedys was a fruitful one • The Voter Education Project was inaugurated to register the South’s historically disfranchised blacks.

26. VII. The Struggle for Civil Rights(cont.) • Integration of southern universities: • Threatened to provoke wholesale slaughter • The University of Mississippi (“Ole Miss”) became a volcano • James Meredith encountered violent opposition when he attempted to register in October 1962 • President Kennedy was forced to send in 400 federal marshals and 3,000 troops to enroll Meredith in his first class. • In spring 1963 King launched a campaign against discrimination in Birmingham, Alabama • The most segregated big city in America

27. VI. The Struggle for Civil Rights(cont.) • Blacks ½ of the population, fewer than 15% of the voters • Previous attempts to crack the racial barriers produced more than 50 cross burnings and 18 bomb attacks since 1957 • Violence occurred, even portrayed on television • Causing President to deliver a memorable televised speech to the nation on June 11, 1963 • He called the situation a “moral issue” and committed his personal and presidential prestige to finding a solution • He declared that the principle at stake “is as old as the Scriptures and is as clear as the American Constitution” • He called for new civil rights legislation to protect black citizens.

28. VI. The Struggle for Civil Rights(cont.) • March on Washington: August 1963: • King led more than 200,000 blacks and white demonstrators on a peaceful march • In an electrifying speech at the Lincoln Memorial, King declared, “I have a dream…” • Still violence continued • On the night of Kennedy’s television address: • A white gunman shot down Medgar Evers, a black Mississippi civil rights worker • In September 1963 an explosion blasted a Baptist church in Birmingham, killing four black girls • By the time of Kennedy’s death, his civil rights bill was making little headway; blacks were increasingly impatient.

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30. VIII. The Killing of Kennedy • Violence stalked center stage on November 22, 1963, Dallas, Texas: • President Kennedy had been shot and died within seconds • The alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, was himself shot to death in front of television cameras by a self-appointed avenger, Jack Ruby • An elaborate investigation by Chief Justice Warren could not quiet all doubts and theories about what had really happened • Johnson was sworn in on a waiting airplane.

31. VIII. The Killing of Kennedy(cont.) • Johnson retained most of Kennedy’s team • He managed a dignified and efficient transition. • Kennedy had gone slightly more than a thousand days in the White House • Acclaimed more for his ideals that he enunciated, • And the spirit he had kindled, • Than for the concrete goals he had achieved. • He had laid to rest forever the notion that a Catholic could not be trusted with the presidency of the United States • In later years, revelations about his womanizing and allegations about his involvement with organized crime figures tarnished his reputation.

32. IX. The LBJ Brand on the Presidency • Lyndon Baines Johnson: • Torch passed to him: • Sent to Congress at the age of 29 in 1937 • Franklin D. Roosevelt was his political “Daddy,” Johnson claimed, and he supported New Deal measures down the line • When he lost in 1941, he learned that liberal political beliefs did not necessary win elections in Texas • With some trimming sails to the right he returned to Congress in 1948, with a questionable eighty-seven-vote margin—hence the ironic nickname “Landside Lyndon.”

33. IX. The LBJ Brand on the Presidency (cont.) • In the Senate, Johnson developed into a masterful wheeler-dealer: • Became the Democratic majority leader 1954 • Wielding power only next to Eisenhower in the White House • Used what was called the “Johnson treatment”—a flashing display of backslapping, flesh-pressing, and arm-twisting that overbore friends and foes alike • His ego and vanity were legendary • He shredded the conservative coloration of his Senate years to reveal the latent liberal underneath

34. IX. The LBJ Brand on the Presidency (cont.) • Congress passed the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964: • It banned racial discrimination in most private facilities open to the public • Including theaters, hospitals and restaurants • It strengthened the federal government’s power to end segregation in schools and public places • Title VII barred employers from discriminating on race or national origin in hiring • Empowered the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) to enforce the law

35. IX. The LBJ Brand on the Presidency (cont.) • Title VII passed with the sexual clause intact • Proved to be a powerful instrument of federally-enforced gender equality • Johnson in 1965 issued an executive order requiring all federal contractors to take affirmative action against discrimination • Johnson rammed Kennedy’s stalled tax bill: • A billion-dollar “War on Poverty” • Johnson voiced special concern for Appalachia • Where thousands of humans were suffering because of the coal industry.

36. IX. The LBJ Brand on the Presidency (cont.) • The Great Society: • Johnson’s domestic program—a sweeping New Dealish economic and welfare measure • Aimed at transforming the American way of life • Michael Harrington’s The Other America (1962): • Showed public support for LBJ’s antipoverty war • And revealed that in affluent America 20% of the population, and over 40% of the black population, suffered in poverty.

37. X. Johnson Battles Goldwater in 1964 • Election of 1964: • Johnson’s nomination was a foregone conclusion • He was chosen by acclamation in Atlantic City as his birthday present • Democrats stood foursquare on their most liberal platform since Truman’s Fair Deal days • Republicans • Meet in San Francisco’s Cow Palace, nominated Senator Barry Goldwater, a rock-ribbed conservative • The American stage was set for a historic clash of political principles

38. X. Johnson Battles Goldwater in 1964 (cont.) • Goldwater’s forces galloped over the moderate Republican “eastern establishment” • Goldwater attacked: • Federal income tax • The Social Security system • The Tennessee Valley Authority • Civil rights legislation • The nuclear test-ban treaty • Most loudly, the Great Society • Democrats’ attack on Goldwater: • Exploited the image of Goldwater as a trigger-happy cowboy

39. X. Johnson Battles Goldwater in 1964 (cont.) • Johnson’s image: • A resolute statesman by seizing upon the Tonkin Gulf episode early in August 1964 • He called the attack “unprovoked” and moved swiftly to make political hay out of this episode • He ordered a “limited” retaliatory air raid against the North Vietnamese bases, saying “no wider war” • Spurred the Congress to pass the all-purpose Tonkin Gulf Resolution: • Congress abdicated their war-declaring powers • Handed the president a blank check to use further force in Southeast Asia

40. X. Johnson Battles Goldwater in 1964 (cont.) • Election results: • Voters were herded into Johnson’s column • By fondness for the Kennedy legacy • Faith in the Great Society promises • Fear of Goldwater • Count: • Popular vote: Johnson—43,129, 566; Goldwater—27,178,188 • Electoral count: Johnson 486 to 52 Goldwater (see Map 38.2)

41. X. Johnson Battles Goldwater in 1964 (cont.) • Goldwater: • Carried only his native Arizona and five other states • All of them, significantly, in the traditionally Democratic but now racially restless South • Johnson: • Record breaking 61% of the popular vote swept lopsided Democratic majorities into both houses of Congress

42. Map 38-2 p901

43. XI. The Great Society Congress • Johnson’s victory temporarily smashed the conservative congressional coalition of southern Democrats and northern Republicans • A wide-open road for the Great Society programs • Escalating the War on Poverty: • Doubled the appropriation of the Office of Economic Opportunity to $2 billion • Granted more than $1 billion to redevelop the gutted hills and hollows of Appalachia • Created two new departments: • The Department of Transportation • The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)

44. XI. The Great Society Congress(cont.) • Named the first black cabinet secretary in the nation’s history—the respected economist Robert C. Weaver • Established the National Endowments for the Arts and the Humanities: • Designed to lift the level of American cultural life • The Big Four legislative achievements that crowned LBJ’s Great Society programs: • Aid to education • Avoiding the separation of church and state issue, he awarded aid directly to students • He signed the bill in the humble one-room Texas school-house he had attended as a boy.

45. XI. The Great Society Congress(cont.) • Medicare for the elderly • Accompanied by Medicaid • Created “entitlements” • They conferred rights on certain categories of Americans virtually in perpetuity • Without the need for repeated congressional approval • Part of a spreading “rights revolution.” • Immigration reform: • The Immigration and Nationality Act 1965 abolished at last the “national-origins” quota system that had been in place since 1921 (see p.703) • It doubled (to 250,000) the number of immigrants allowed to enter annually • For the first time setting limits on immigrants from the Western Hemisphere (120,000)

46. XI. The Great Society Congress(cont.) • Provided for the admission of close relatives of United States citizens, outside those numerical limits • 100,000 people per year took advantage of this “family unification” provision in the decades after 1965 • The source of immigration soon shifted heavily from Europe to Latin America and Asia • Great Society programs came in for political attacks in later years: • Conservatives charged the billions spent for “social engineering” was too much • Yet the poverty level declined measurably in the ensuring decade (see Figure 38.1)

47. XI. The Great Society Congress(cont.) • Medicare dramatic reductions for the elderly • Antipoverty programs: • Project Head Start—sharply improved the educational performance of underprivileged youth • Infant mortality rates fell in minority communities • Johnson was not fully victorious in the war on poverty, but he did win several noteworthy battles.

48. Figure 38-1 p903

49. XII. Battling for Black Rights • The Voting Rights Act of 1965: • One of America’s most persistent evils—racial discrimination • The Civil Rights Act of 1964 • Gave the federal government more muscle to enforce school-desegregation orders • And to prohibit racial discrimination in all kinds of public accommodations and employment • But the problem of voting still remained • Mississippi: only 5% of eligible blacks were registered to vote • Similar throughout the South

50. XII. Battling for Black Rights(cont.) • Ballot-denying devices: poll tax, literacy tests, barefaced intimidation • Mississippi law required the names of prospective black registrants to be published for two weeks in local news-papers– a device that virtually guaranteed economic reprisals, or worse. • 1964 goals to open up the polling booths: • The Twenty-fourth Amendment, ratified in January 1964, abolished the poll tax in federal elections (see Appendix) • Freedom Summer 1964: blacks joined hands with whites in a massive voter-registration drive in Mississippi • In June one black and two white civil rights workers disappeared in Mississippi.