DWBI: If Johnson had lived..

[Hulkster'01]

As we all know on November 22, 1963 Vice President Johnson was assassinated. In the 1964 election he was replaced with Senator George Smathers from Florida as Kennedy’s VP and helped win him a second term. But the question remains in our brains, what if Lyndon Baynes Johnson had lived? What if Kennedy was the one gunned down in Dallas that afternoon instead of LBJ? What effects would JFK’s death have on America? How would the situation in Vietnam be affected with LBJ at the helm instead of JFK? But atlas, we are stuck in realty, not science fiction...

 

[SiddFinch1]

If JFK died and LBJ were President maybe the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act pass and we avoid the Rioting of the late 60's. Its long been rumored that Smathers helped sabotage JFK's efforts to pass it.

Maybe LBJ is smart enough to avoid the quagmire of Vietnam which tore the country apart

And LBJ could have beat Nixon in 68. Smathers lost by running to the right of Nixon on civil rights and race relations and split the Democratic party for a generation. Nixon shrewdly used the North/West strategy to win and keep the Republicans in control for years.

 

[1940LaSalle]

If JFK died and LBJ were President maybe the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act pass and we avoid the Rioting of the late 60's. Its long been rumored that Smathers helped sabotage JFK's efforts to pass it.

Maybe LBJ is smart enough to avoid the quagmire of Vietnam which tore the country apart

And LBJ could have beat Nixon in 68. Smathers lost by running to the right of Nixon on civil rights and race relations and split the Democratic party for a generation. Nixon shrewdly used the North/West strategy to win and keep the Republicans in control for years.

That's partially true. However, you're overlooking Nixon's speech in Chicago on Labor Day 1968 where he declared in no uncertain terms that he and VP nominee John Volpe were irrevocably in favor of the two acts you mentioned. Some say it was a cynical ploy to get blacks back to the Republican party; other historians are not nearly so sure. In any event, there was a clear swing to the GOP in the African-American community that has been sustained since then.

Nixon was also astute enough to bring on Henry Kissinger from the start as National Security Advisor, and charter him to negotiate peace in Viet Nam, achieved in early 1972. Neither Kennedy nor Smathers had anyone like that at their disposal, so it's possible Viet Nam could have dragged on through the 1970s. That certainly would have put a damper on any moves to open relations with China, which Nixon accomplished in 1973.