LBJ and the Great Society

LBJ and the Great Society

Objective

• Students will determine the relationship between the Great Society and the Vietnam War.

• "It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor - both black and white - through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then came the buildup in Vietnam, and I watched this program broken and eviscerated, as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So, I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such.“-MLK

Vietnam and the Great Society

• Costs of the Vietnam War to the United States– Economic Costs:

• The war cost the United States more than $140 billion. It undermined most of the Great Society programs. Double-digit inflation and mounting federal debt that ravaged the American economy and eroded living standards from the late 1960s into the 1990s.

– Human Costs:• The war left over 58,000 American soldiers dead and more

than 300,000 wounded.

Vietnam and the Great Society

• Criticism of the Great Society– Enlargement of the Welfare State

(“welfare”/AFDC)– Job Corps and obsolescence – OEO/CAA and machine politics

• Vietnam’s Effect on the Great Society– Under funding of key programs like the OEO

(1 Billion in funds per year)– High Inflation

Vietnam and the Great Society

• Guns and Butter – LBJ deliberately underemphasized the escalation in

Vietnam and emphasized the Great Society.– He feared that any national debate that sought to

prioritize one over the other would end in disaster. – Unfortunately, the lack of communication between

foreign and domestic policy makers in his administration led to run away spending and inflation.

Vietnam and the Great Society

African American Family Incomes, 1947 and 1974(in 1974 dollars)

1947 1974

Less than $3,000 42 14

$3,000 to $6,999 41 31

$7,000 to $9,999 9 16

$10,000 and more 8 38

Vietnam and the Great Society

Legacy of the Great Society

• Popular programs like medicare remain to this day.

• Unemployment was low (between 5-6%) through much of the 60s (though this figure does NOT take into account incarcerations and the under-employed)

Vietnam and the Great Society

• Race and Vietnam – MLK assassination (1968)– Initially high rates of black casualties– Class and the draft = more black soldiers – “No gook ever called me a nigger”

Review

• What was the relationship between the Great Society and Vietnam?

• http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/us38.cfm