lbj & the great society

LBJ & The Great Society

LBJ Becomes President

• Despite being virtually useless as a v-p, LBJ assumed the control of government quickly and effectively after JFK’s assass.

• He set out his ideas to continue JFK’s programs in his “Great Society” speech.

• Major Goal: Abundance & freedom for all Ams by– Eradicating poverty – Ending racial injustice

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Great Society Programs• LBJ continued the New Frontier idea of

the Peace Corps, where Am college grads were trained to help developing countries

• Grads spent 2 years abroad creating programs to better education, agriculture, health, industry & technology

• LBJ also created the OEO to oversee other programs– Head Start, Upward Bound, Job Corps, &

Neighborhood Youth Corps & VISTA all aimed at children and young adults

Major Legislative Efforts

• ’64-66, LBJ sent # of bills to Congress to create Great Society- focused on health & education– Dept of Housing & Urban Development (HUD) was

created to oversee low-income housing– National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) offered grants

to artists & the National Endowment for the Humanities gave grants to scholars

– The Elementary & Secondary Ed Act (ESEA) was passed giving more $$ to schools

– Higher Ed Act was passed giving financial aid for college

– Medicare & Medicaid were est’d to provide health care for the elderly & disadvantaged

The US government gives the oil industry approx. 37.5 BILLION in subsidies (about 1% of the federal budget)

The NEA is granted 146,200,000.00 accounting for .00374% of the federal budget

Office of Econ Opportunity• The OEO was a large federal agency that

was designed to oversee and guide various programs.

• The OEO was the centerpiece of LBJ’s “War on Poverty” & was in charge of Head Start, Job Corps, & VISTA.

• It’s budget was eventually 1.8 billion, but eventually many of its programs were assigned to other agencies- Head Start to Dept of Ed; Job Corps to Dept of Labor

• By ’73, it was out of business

Federal Food Assistance• The purpose of the program is to make sure

that all Ams can receive a minimum diet of nutritionally balanced foods

• JFK re-instituted the Fed Food Assistance Program (aka Food Stamps), but under LBJ it was expanded and made permanent (‘64)– 1st year it was made permanent it helped 500K,

by ’70, it was at 4 mill, & by ’75, it was at 15 mill– Currently, FFA is called SNAP (Supplemental

Nutrition Assistance Program)• 76% of SNAP households included a child, an elderly person, or a

disabled person. These vulnerable households receive 83% of all SNAP benefits

Legal Aid• Legal Services (now Legal Aid) program

was designed to help poor & disadvantaged with civil legal services.

• The Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) administered the program & it also aimed to change laws which were unfair to their clients.– Make laws simpler & more accessible to the poor– Fight laws that punished the poor– By the late ’90s, this program had est’d 260 local

programs and helped more than 4 mill/year

The Job Corps

• Job Corps was a program also overseen by the OEO- it’s goal was to train disadvantaged youth b/t 16-24

• Job Corps est’d training centers all over the country.– Enrollees received tech training, learned

social skills, & when necessary, basic educational skills (reading & writing)

– In ’67, JC operated 123 centers- helping 42K, since then almost 2 mill have been helped by JC

Head Start

• Head Start was an educational program for poor & disadvantaged children

• Main goal was to improve school performance – They enrolled poor & disadvantaged children

in pre-kindergarten programs– Provided hot meals & immunizations for

children– In its first year, it helped 500K.– By late ’90s, +800K– Since it’s beginning, +17 mill kids have been helped

VISTA• VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America) was

a domestic version of the Peace Corps.• VISTA workers lived and worked in

poverty-stricken areas throughout the US to improve living standards.

• After 6 weeks of training, college grads taught English, office skills, set up food co-ops, gave legal advice, & set up youth clubs

• Eventually, VISTA was incorporated into Clinton’s AmeriCorps program- increasing its budget & popularity- by 2013, +900K Ams had volunteered in this program

the Great Society’s legacy

• Millions of Ams’ hopes were raised at the ideas being presented (racial equality, econ prosperity)

• LBJ’s programs meant a tremendous amount of fed $$ at a time when the US was spending increasing amounts of $$ in Vietnam – (2 billion for War on Poverty; 22 billion for War in Vietnam)

• W/i 2 years, the $$ needed for the programs had dried up

• Despite cutbacks, many of the programs cont’d and are still seen today.