This document summarizes major events and policies from JFK's New Frontier to LBJ's Great Society programs in the 1960s. It outlines LBJ's goals to cut the deficit while maintaining military size and assist the less fortunate. His Great Society aimed to declare war on poverty through programs like Medicare, Medicaid, education assistance, and tax cuts. It also details LBJ's remarks calling for a Great Society with abundance and liberty for all. Major Great Society programs targeted poverty, housing, education, healthcare, and the environment. The Civil Rights Movement achieved acts and laws promoting voting rights and ending discrimination.

1. J.F.K’s “New Frontier” to
L.B.J’s “Great Society”

2. Major Events
•Civil Rights Movement
•Civil Rights Act, 1964
•Voting Rights Act, 1965
•War On Poverty = "Great
Society"
•Anti-Poverty Act, 1964
•Education reform
•Cold War = US
involvement in Vietnam

3. LBJ’s State of the Union Address
 LBJ wants to cut the deficit in ½
 Wants to reduce the size of the gov’t
while maintaining the size of the
military
 LBJ pledges to assist the less fortunate
“THE GREAT SOCIETY”
 Declares war on poverty
 Medicare/Medicad
 Assistance to the inner cities & rural
areas
 Unemployment assistance & Job
creation programs
 Education Assistance
 Tax Cuts to stimulate the economy
 Modernization of schools, libraries,
hospitals, & nursing homes

4. LBJ’s Remarks at the University of
Michigan:
(May 22, 1964)
 Next Generation’s challenge =
solve the problem of poverty
 American need to build a “Great
Society”
 abundance and liberty for all
 three places to build the Great
Society
 in our cities
 in our countryside
 in our classrooms

5. Major Great Society Programs
War on Poverty:
 forty programs that were intended to eliminate
poverty by
 improving living conditions and enabling people
to lift themselves out of the cycle of poverty.
 HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT
ACT
 DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND
URBANDEVELOPMENT ACT
 FOOD STAMP ACT OF 1964
 URBAN MASS TRANSPORTATION

7. Improving Education
 Education: sixty separate
bills that provided for new
and better-equipped
 classrooms, minority
scholarships, and low-interest
student loans.
 HIGHER EDUCATION ACT
OF 1965
 NATIONAL SCHOOL LUNCH
ACT of 1968
 Head Start: program for four-and
five-year-old children
from low-income families.

8. HEALTHCARE:
MEDICARE AND
MEDICAID
 Medicare & Medicaid: guaranteed health
care to every American over sixty-five and to
low-income families.
 Medicare was eventually passed during the LBJ
administration
 It was first passed on July 30, 1965
 It served as an amendment to Social Security

9. Environment and the Arts
 The Environment: introduced measures to
protect clean air and water.
 CLEAN AIR ACT OF 1963
 National Endowment for the Arts and the
Humanities: government funding for artists,
writers and performers.
 NATIONAL FOUNDATION ON THE ARTS &
THE HUMANITIES ACT

10. GREAT SOCIETY

12. 5min LBJ Great Soc

13. •March from Selma,
Alabama to Montgomery,
Alabama to register to
vote…..
•Two marches:
• March 3, 1965, 1st march
was unsuccessful.
NATIONAL MOVEMENT-Civil
Rights, Marchers Carrying
Banner "We March with Selma!",
Harlem, New York City, 1965
March 15, 1965, President Johnson
introduced the Voting Rights Act.

14. March 21, 1965, MLK
led a 2nd march from
Selma to
Montgomery.
President Johnson
sent in the National
Guard to protect
marchers.
Successful in
registering 3200
African Americans
to vote!
August 1965, President Johnson signed into
law the Voting Rights Act.
March in
Harlem to
support March
from Selma to
DC

15. civil rights
African-American
Civil Rights Law
Civil Rights
Act of 1964
24th
Amendment
(1964)
Banned the poll tax.
Voting
Rights
Act of 1965
Banned literacy tests in counties where
over half of eligible voters had been
disenfranchised.
•President Johnson
meeting MLK
discussing Civil
Rights.
•President Johnson’s
support of Civil
Rights was
continuation of
President Kennedy’s
stand on Civil Rights.
• Abolished the use of voter
registration or a literacy requirement
to discriminate against any voter.
• Elimination of Employment
Discrimination based on RACE

16. Civil Rights Act 3.11

17. THURGOOD
MARSHALL
1st African American
on SCOTUS
• Earned nationwide
recognition
through Brown v.
Board of Education
• Appointed to
SCOTUS by LBJ
• Significant moment
for an African
American to be on
the highest court in
the country

18. Malcolm X
X Born in Omaha Nebraska, Malcolm Little was the son of a
Baptist preacher who urged Blacks to stand up for their rights.
X His father was killed by White Supremacist in Michigan, in
1931.
X After time, Malcolm moved to Harlem where he became
involved in gambling, drug dealing and robbery.
X Malcolm Was Arrested at the age
of 20 for armed robbery. In jail
he studied the teaching of the
Elijah Muhammad and converted to Islam.
X His critics accused him of preaching racism, black supremacy,
anti-semitism and violence.

19. Malcolm X Speaks, 1965
X “Be peaceful, be courteous, obey
the law, respect everyone; but if
someone puts his hand on you,
send him to the cemetery.”
X “Nobody can give you freedom.
Nobody can give you equality or
justice or anything. If you're a
man, you take it.”
X “You can't separate peace from
freedom because no one can be at
peace unless he has his freedom.”

20. Black Panther Party
 U.S. African American Militant group.
 Founded in 1966 in Oakland.
 Led by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale.
 Believed violent revolution was the only way to receive
freedom.
 Urged African Americans to arm themselves.
 In the late 60’s party leaders got involved in violent confrontations
with the police.
 Huey Newton was tried in 1967 for killing a police officer.

21. Quiz Yo’self

24. Think about it… What is the
CORRECT ANSWER?

25. The War in Southeast Asia
vn map
“Domino Theory”
Must “contain” communism and not
allow it to spread. If it does, it would
lead to more countries falling to the
communists.

26. Johnson Sends Ground
Forces
 Remembers Truman’s “loss”
of China  Domino Theory
revived
I’m not going to be
the president who
saw Southeast Asia
go the way China
went.- LBJ

27. Johnson Sends
Ground Forces
 Advised to rout the
communists by
Secretary of State,
Robert S. McNamara
• Tonkin Gulf Incident -->Aug ‘64 -- N Vietnamese gunboats
attack 2 US destroyers in Gulf of Tonkin…maybe
• Tonkin Gulf Resolution-“The Blank Check”
• Passed by Congress 5 Aug 1964
*No FORMAL declaration of WAR
by Congress*
• Committed the US to fighting in Vietnam
• “To take all necessary steps to repel armed attack against US forces”, including
force, to assist South Vietnam and any member of SEATO”

28. Years of Escalation: 1965-68
 After Gulf of
Tonkin incident
Johnson had a
“blank check” to
wage war in
Vietnam.
 Escalation included:
 Operation Rolling
Thunder
 Use of agent orange
 Use of ground troops
for Search and destroy
missions

29. The Ground War
1965-1968
 No territorial goals
 Body counts on TV
every night
(first “living room” war)

30. The role of the Media in Vietnam
The most significant statement came from the "most trusted man in
America", Walter Cronkite. In a CBS special, Cronkite concluded, 'To
say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the
evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past to say that
we are mired in a bloody stalemate seems the only realistic, yet
unsatisfactory conclusion"
Walter
Cronkite
Johnson is said to have responded to the news by saying- “If I’ve lost
Cronkite, I’ve lost Middle America.”
– Lyndon Johnson, February 27, 1968

31. The Air War
1965-1968
 1965: Sustained bombing of North Vietnam
 Operation Rolling Thunder (March 2, 1965)
 1966-68: Ongoing bombing of Hanoi
nonstop for 3 years! Esp. targets the
Ho Chi Minh Trail.
 Downed Pilots: P.O.W.s
 Carpet Bombing – **napalm**

32. The Air War:
A Napalm Attack

33. The Tet Offensive,
January 1968
 N. Vietnamese Army + Viet Cong
attack South simultaneously
(67,000 attack 100 cities,
bases, and the US embassy in
Saigon)
 Take every major southern city
 U.S. + ARVN beat back the
offensive
 Viet Cong destroyed and N.
Vietnamese army debilitated
 BUT…it’s seen as an
American defeat by the
media (shows how
important accurate
journalism is…Don’t
believe EVERYTHING
you see on TV…)

35. Impact of the
Tet Offensive
 Domestic U.S. Reaction: With
the portrayal of the Tet
Offensive…Disbelief, Anger,
Distrust of Johnson
Administration
 Hey, Hey LBJ! How
many kids did you
kill today?

36. Johnson’s
popularity
dropped in
1968 from
48% to 36%.

37. American Morale
Begins to Dip
 Disproportionate representation of
poor people and minorities.
 Severe racial problems.
 Major drug
problems.
Roy Benavidez-received
the Medal of
Honor (1981) for his valorous
actions in combat in Vietnam on
May 2, 1968.

38. Effect of public opinion: Are We
Becoming the Enemy?
Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 20th Infantry
 Lt. William Calley,
Platoon Leader
 My Lai Massacre, 1968
 200-500 unarmed
villagers

39. Who Is the
Enemy?

41. Anti-War
Demonstrations
Columbia University
1967

42. Anti-War
Demonstrations
 May 4, 1970
 4 students
shot dead.
 11 students
wounded
Kent State University
 Jackson State
University
 May 10, 1970
 2 dead; 12
wounded

43. Tinker v. Des Moines ISD (1969)
 Situation: students were wearing black
“peace” armbands at school and refused to
take them off-SUSPENDED
 decision by the United States Supreme
Court that defined the constitutional rights
of students in U.S. public schools.
 The Tinker test is still used by courts today
to determine whether a school's disciplinary
actions violate students' First Amendment
rights.

45. 1969 draft lottery
(Conscription)
 Draft lottery starts which adds to the Anti-War
movement.
 DRAFT DODGERS: Many draftees refused
to report or moved to Canada.
 Muhammad Ali –Heavyweight Champion-
Refused to report.
First occurred December 1st 1969
Men with birthday between 1944-1950 were
eligible for the draft.
366 numbers were put in a tumbler and drawn.
258 was the first number drawn (Sep 14th)
195 birthdates were drawn
A second lottery used 26 letters to place order of
those drafted ( J was the first letter)

46. Opposition to the draft

47. Democratic
Convention in
Chicago, 1968
Anti-War
Demonstrations
Student Protestors
at Univ. of CA
in Berkeley, 1968
Burning Draft Cards

48. 26th Amendment passed
 The rights of citizens of the United States, who
are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall
not be denied or abridged by the United States
or by any State on account of age.
 Passed 1971
 Direct effect of the Vietnam War

49. Miranda v. Arizona (1966)
 Decided statements made in response to interrogation
by a defendant in police custody will be admissible at
trial only if the prosecution can show that the
defendant was informed of the rights

50. Impact of the
Vietnam War
Johnson announces (March, 1968):
…I shall not
seek, and I will
not accept, the
nomination of my
party for another
term as your
President.

52. Foreshadowing: Nixon
on Vietnam
 Nixon’s 1968 Campaign promised an
end to the war: Peace with Honor
 Appealed to the great
“Silent Majority”
 ‘Vietnamization’
 Expansion of the
conflict  The “Secret War”
 Cambodia
 Laos
 Agent Orange
(chemical defoliant)
 Cease Fire in 1973