[Oe List ...] Fw: Martin Luther King and LBJ by Bill Moyers

[Charles or Doris Hahn]

Roger, thanks so much for putting this on.  Moyers
Journal is the most important spot on my weekly TV
viewing.  His piece on Corporate Welfare last night
was another stellar challange no one wants to take on
today.  This week I came across in my files a Nov.
9,1998 issue of Time Magazine which was a special
report on "What Corporate Welfare Costs". They then
put it out in a Special Report format and I ordered
several for some study groups at the time.  No
national news magazine would dream of publishing this
report today.  I still have four or five copies if
anyone wants one.
Thanks again.
Charles Hahn,  
--- Roger Alexander <ralexan934 at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

>     Martin Luther King and LBJ 
>     By Bill Moyers 
>     Bill Moyers Journal 
>     Friday 18 January 2008
> 
> The following is a transcript from Bill Moyers
> Journal.
> 
>     Bill Moyers: If William Shakespeare were around
> I suspect he might describe the recent flap between
> the Obama and Clinton camps as much ado about
> nothing or a tempest in a teapot. Senator Clinton
> was heard to say that it took a president - Lyndon
> Johnson - to consummate the work of Martin Luther
> King by passing the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Almost
> no one in the media bothered to run the whole quote.
> Here it is: 
> 
>     Hillary Clinton: Dr. King's dream began to be
> realized when President Lyndon Johnson passed the
> Civil Rights Act of 1964, when he was able to get
> through Congress something that President Kennedy
> was hopeful to do, the president before had not even
> tried, but it took a president to get it done." 
> 
>     Bill Moyers: There was nothing in that quote
> about race. It was an historical fact, an
> affirmation of the obvious. But critics pounced. THE
> NEW YORK TIMES published a lead editorial accusing
> Senator Clinton of "the distasteful implication that
> a black man needed the help of a white man to effect
> change." Suddenly we had a rhetorical inferno on our
> hands, with charges flying left and right, and
> pundits throwing gasoline on the tiniest of embers.
> Fortunately the furor has quieted down, and
> everyone's said they're sorry, except THE NEW YORK
> TIMES. But I can't resist this footnote to the
> story. 
> 
>     Many, many years ago, I was a young White House
> Assistant, when President Johnson at first wanted
> Martin Luther King to call off the marching,
> demonstrations, and protests. The civil rights
> movement had met massive resistance in the South,
> and the South, because of the seniority system,
> controlled Congress, making it virtually impossible
> for Congress to enact laws giving full citizenship
> to black Americans, no matter how desperate their
> lives. LBJ worried that the mounting demonstrations
> were hardening white resistance. 
> 
>     He had been the master of the Senate, the great
> persuader, who could twist your arm with such flair
> and flattery you thought he was actually doing you a
> favor by wrenching it from its socket. He reckoned
> that with a little time he could twist enough arms
> in Congress to end, or neutralize, the power of
> die-hard racists - all of them, including some of
> his old mentors, white supremacists who threatened
> to bring the government, if not the country, to its
> knees before they would see blacks eat at the same
> restaurants, go to the same schools, drink from the
> same fountains, and live in the same neighborhoods
> as whites. 
> 
>     As the pressure intensified on each side,
> Johnson wanted King to wait a little longer and give
> him a chance to bring Congress around by hook or
> crook. But Martin Luther King said his people had
> already waited too long. He talked about the murders
> and lynchings, the churches set on fire, children
> brutalized, the law defied, men and women
> humiliated, their lives exhausted, their hearts
> broken. LBJ listened, as intently as I ever saw him
> listen. He listened, and then he put his hand on
> Martin Luther King's shoulder, and said, in effect:
> "OK. You go out there Dr. King and keep doing what
> you're doing, and make it possible for me to do the
> right thing." Lyndon Johnson was no racist but he
> had not been a civil rights hero, either. Now, as
> president, he came down on the side of civil
> disobedience, believing it might quicken America's
> conscience until the cry for justice became
> irresistible, enabling him to turn Congress. So King
> marched and Johnson maneuvered and Congress folded. 
> 
>     News Coverage: President Johnson calls for all
> Americans to back what he calls a turning point in
> history. 
> 
>     Bill Moyers: The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended
> segregation in public places. 
> 
>     Marchers: "We shall overcome ..." 
> 
>     Bill Moyers: But they weren't done. King kept on
> marching, this time for the right to vote, and once
> again Johnson kept his word, and did the right
> thing. As one of his young assistants, I stood on
> the floor of the House that Ides of March when
> morality and politics converged, and watched the
> faces of Congress transfixed ... mesmerized ...
> knowing they were riding the surf of history as the
> president of the United States enlisted all of us in
> the cause. 
> 
>     Lyndon Johnson: It's all of us, who must
> overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and
> injustice. And we shall overcome. 
> 
>     Bill Moyers: As he finished, Congress stood and
> thunderous applause shook the chamber. Johnson would
> soon sign into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and
> black people were no longer second class citizens.
> Martin Luther King had marched and preached and
> witnessed for this day. Countless ordinary people
> had put their bodies on the line for it, been
> berated, bullied and beaten, only to rise, organize
> and struggle on, against the dogs and guns, the bias
> and burning crosses. Take nothing from them; their
> courage is their legacy. But take nothing from the
> president who once had seen the light but dimly, as
> through a dark glass - and now did the right thing.
> Lyndon Johnson threw the full weight of his office
> on the side of justice. Of course the movement had
> come first, watered by the blood of so many,
> championed bravely now by the preacher turned
> prophet who would himself soon be martyred. But
> there is no inevitability to history, someone has to
> seize and turn it. With these words at the right
> moment - "we shall overcome" - Lyndon Johnson
> transcended race and color, and history, too -
> reminding us that a president matters, and so do we.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Roger Alexander
> 5809 Meadowcrest
> Bartlesville, OK 74006
> 918-333-5299
> ralexan934 at sbcglobal.net>
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