Prisoners of hope : Lyndon B. Johnson, the Great Society, and the limits of liberalism

Prisoners of hope Lyndon B. Johnson, the Great Society, and the limits of liberalism

Randall Bennett Woods, 1944-

Book - 2016

"In Prisoners of Hope, prize-winning historian Randall B. Woods presents the first comprehensive history of the Great Society, exploring both the breathtaking possibilities of visionary politics, as well as its limits. During his first two years in office, Johnson passed a host of historic liberal legislation as part of his Great Society campaign, from the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act to the 1964 Food Stamp Act, Medicare, and Medicaid. But Johnson's ambitious vision for constructing a better, stronger America contained within it the seeds of the program's own destruction. A consummate legislator, Johnson controlled Congress like no president before or since. But as Woods shows, Johnson faced mounting r...esistance to his legislative initiatives after the 1966 midterm elections, and not always from the Southern whites who are typically thought to have been his opponents. As white opposition to his policies mounted, Johnson was forced to make a number of devastating concessions in order to secure the passage of further Great Society legislation. Even as Americans benefited from the Great Society, millions were left disappointed, from suburban whites to the new anti-war left to urban blacks. Their disillusionment would help give rise to powerful new factions in both the Democratic and Republican parties. The issues addressed by Lyndon Johnson and his cohort remain before the American people today, as we've witnessed in the fight for Obamacare, the racial unrest in St. Louis and Baltimore, and the bitter debate over immigration. As Prisoners of Hope tragically demonstrates, America is still fundamentally at war over the legacy of the Great Society"--

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Subjects
Johnson, Lyndon B. > (Lyndon Baines), > 1908-1973.
Economic assistance, Domestic > History > 20th century.
Social legislation > History > 20th century.
Liberalism > History > 20th century.
United States > Politics and government > 1963-1969.
United States > Economic policy > 1961-1971.
United States > Social policy > 20th century.
Published
New York : Basic Books, a member of the Perseus Books Group [2016]
Language
English
Main Author
Randall Bennett Woods, 1944- (-)
Physical Description
461 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN
9780465050963
  • Introduction: The Paradox of Reform
  • Chapter 1. "I Am a Roosevelt New Dealer": Liberalism Ascendant
  • Chapter 2. Funding the Great Society and the War on Poverty
  • Chapter 3. The Second Reconstruction
  • Chapter 4. The Mandate: The Election of 1964
  • Chapter 5. Liberal Nationalism Versus the American Creed: The Great Society from Schoolroom to Hospital
  • Chapter 6. March to Freedom: Selma and the Voting Rights Act
  • Chapter 7. Cultures of Poverty
  • Chapter 8. Progressivism Redux: The Challenges of Social Engineering
  • Chapter 9. Nativism at Bay: Immigration and the Latino Movement
  • Chapter 10. The New Conservation
  • Chapter 11. Guns and Butter
  • Chapter 12. The Search for a New Kind of Freedom
  • Chapter 13. The Imp of the Perverse: Community Action and Welfare Rights
  • Chapter 14. Reform under Siege
  • Chapter 15. Whiplash: Urban Rioting and the War on Crime
  • Chapter 16. A "Rice-Roots Revolution": The Great Society in Vietnam
  • Chapter 17. Abdication
  • Chapter 18. American Dystopia
  • Conclusion
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • Index
Review by Choice Review

Vietnam has often dominated the discussion concerning the success or failure of Lyndon Johnson's presidency. "If not for Vietnam" assumes that LBJ's demise in 1968 was due mostly to his failures in Southeast Asia. However, in a very lucid and beautifully written narrative, Woods (history, Univ. of Arkansas) finds that part of LBJ's downfall was due to his "Great Society" program. In fact, Woods points out that Johnson's "liberal nationalism" went against the "American Creed" of small government and individualism. Realizing fully the risk of his ambitious program, LBJ nevertheless demonstrated idealism in pushing forward the greatest domestic program since the New Deal. However, this push was often counter to Johnson's cautious instincts. At times in 1964, it seemed that he was, as one observer put it, "Franklin Delano Hoover." Moreover, LBJ trusted existing institutions rather than community action programs, preferring to deal with "Dick Daley" instead of the Urban League. Indeed, law and order concerns after urban riots may have had more of an impact in bringing Johnson down in March 1968 than did the Tet Offensive. Along with Wood's earlier biography, LBJ: Architect of American Ambition (CH, Mar'07, 44-4070), this work is an original and superb contribution. Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries. --David R. Turner, Davis and Elkins College

Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review

*Starred Review* A biographer of the architect of the Great Society (LBJ, 2006), Woods here examines its array of social programs. He begins, naturally, with Johnson's abrupt ascension to the presidency. More politically determined than Kennedy to remedy the plights of poor and black Americans, Johnson capitalized on the trauma of the assassination to push stalled JFK initiatives through Congress. The first item was an income tax reduction, which economists promised would (and initially did) increase federal revenue. This gusher of money, promising reform without too onerous a cost, was the fiscal predicate for the programs LBJ rolled out in 1964 and 1965. Enumerating them and the social ills their designers proposed to cure, Woods recounts the legislative processes leading to the War on Poverty, civil rights acts, immigration liberalization, Medicare and Medicaid, and federal aid to education. Woods' analysis of the political constituencies involved points to an instrumental (not philosophical) limit to LBJ-style, activist-government liberalism: the fragility of the Democratic Party coalition that won the 1964 election. It fractured by 1968, as Woods recounts, due to riots, the Vietnam War, inflation, and anxiety about the newly expanded government. Clearly an intellectual supporter of the Great Society's ambitions, Woods offers an astute analysis of the achievements and unintended consequences of an historic era of reform.--Taylor, Gilbert Copyright 2016 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Library Journal Review

Award-winning historian Woods (LBJ: Architect of American Ambition) returns to his focus on Lyndon B. Johnson (1908-73) with this history and analysis of the Great Society program. The scope of the book includes the passage of the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act in 1964 and 1965 respectively, as well as Johnson's War on Poverty, which was inextricably tied to civil rights. Woods demonstrates that Johnson was adept at passing important legislation, using the legacy of John F. Kennedy as political leverage, and making concerted efforts to generate consensus and support for his programs. However, Woods also details how Johnson's legacy of social reform was tarnished by the quagmire of the Vietnam War, white backlash against the Civil Rights Act, and urban and civil unrest. The author acknowledges that many of Johnson's programs, Medicare for example, were quite groundbreaking yet also difficult to curtail in the long run. VERDICT While Robert Caro's biographies of Johnson are exhaustive, his latest volume, The Passage of Power, stops short of the Great Society. This important and timely work will give all U.S. readers a sense of historical context for the programs that still affect the country today and a nuanced understanding of how government reform and public support must work in tandem to be truly successful.-Barrie Olmstead, Sacramento P.L. © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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