Great Society

The Great Society was President Lyndon B. Johnson's far-reaching and ambitious program of an activist and liberal national government between 1964 and 1968. The Great Society significantly increased the role of the federal government in health care, education, and civil rights.

President John F. Kennedy promised bold liberal programs but could not deliver. Most of his proposals were mired in committees on Capitol Hill. In 1962, Kennedy commissioned a study of poverty in the United States, but his administration decided to hold their resulting legislative proposals until after the 1964 election. Kennedy proved no more effective in the realm of civil rights legislation, where the administration could not break a filibuster by southern senators. Kennedy's assassination in November 1963 brought Vice President Johnson to the White House. Unlike Kennedy, Johnson was a skilled legislative leader with a history of accomplishment in Congress. Furthermore, Johnson skillfully portrayed Kennedy as a martyr and used his death to inspire the sorrowed country and Congress to action.

In his State of the Union Address in January 1964, President Johnson declared a “war on poverty.” [Page 643]Congress responded by passing the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964. Johnson had taken a bill from the Kennedy administration and greatly expanded it. The act created the Office of Economic Opportunity, to disburse payments to local community action programs and oversee the Job Corps, Volunteers in Service to America, and Neighborhood Youth Corps. These programs sought to improve life in impoverished areas. In March 1964, during a commencement address at the University of Michigan, Johnson dubbed his program the Great Society.

Johnson also pushed hard to break the filibuster in the Senate and get the Civil Rights Act through Congress with a coalition of Republicans and liberal Democrats. The landmark law ended the Jim Crow laws in the South and was the most important civil rights measure since Reconstruction ended.

Johnson interpreted his landslide win over Republican Barry Goldwater in the 1964 election as a popular mandate for his Great Society programs. Knowing that the consensus he enjoyed could not last long, Johnson moved aggressively. Between 1964 and 1968, Congress responded with a startling amount of legislation.

The Great Society could be divided into five major efforts: civil rights, anti-poverty, environment, health care, and education. In addition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, civil rights measures of the Great Society included the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965 to end unfair voting practices, such as literacy tests, which were used in the South to disenfranchise African Americans; an open housing law to prevent discriminatory practices in housing sales; and establishment of affirmative action for hiring in federal jobs. In addition to the Economic Opportunity Act, major anti-poverty initiatives included the food stamp program, the school breakfast program, direct welfare payments to individuals, investment in Appalachia, the Model Cities Act, increased funding for federal housing projects, and Head Start. Environmental laws included the Wilderness Act, which created the National Wilderness System, 45 new national parks and thousands of miles of scenic trails and waterways, improved water- and air-pollution standards, an endangered species act, and highway beautification. In the field of health care, the Great Society established the national health insurance programs of Medicare, for the elderly, and Medicaid, for the poor, as well as funding for anti-cancer programs. A former teacher, Johnson believed strongly in education as a tool to uplift individuals from poverty. Education-related legislation included a massive increase in federal payments to primary and secondary schools and grants to libraries. At the college level, the federal government guaranteed student loans and funded scholarships allowing millions to attend college who previously could not afford it.

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