Great Society Launched: Johnson Fights Poverty
Lyndon Johnson stood before Congress on January 4, 1965, and said the words Great Society in his State of the Union address. He'd first used the phrase at Ohio University eight months earlier, but this night it became a governing agenda. What followed was the most concentrated burst of domestic legislation since the New Deal: Medicare, Medicaid, the Voting Rights Act, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Immigration and Nationality Act — all in 1965 alone. Johnson understood he had a window. The 1964 landslide had given Democrats their biggest House majority since 1938, and he worked that majority relentlessly. His Chief of Staff recalled him once making 85 phone calls in a single evening. Vietnam eventually consumed his presidency. But Medicare still covers 65 million Americans. Medicaid covers 90 million more. The window opened on January 4 and Johnson ran through it.
January 4, 1965
61 years ago
Key Figures & Places
What Else Happened on January 4
Julius Caesar suffered his first tactical defeat at the Battle of Ruspina, narrowly escaping total annihilation after Titus Labienus’s cavalry surrounded his ou…
Titus Labienus trapped Julius Caesar’s forces at the Battle of Ruspina, nearly annihilating the future dictator’s army through superior cavalry tactics. This ra…
Ethelred of Wessex clashed with a Danish army at Reading, suffering a defeat that foreshadowed the Viking's growing power. This loss, though a setback, didn't b…
She was sixteen and already a political hurricane. Anna of Brittany, ruling duchess of her independent duchy, drew a line in the sand that would reshape France'…
Sunburned, seasick, and hauling exotic parrots and kidnapped indigenous people, Columbus limped back to Spain with ten weeks of wild stories. His ships were pac…
Charles I didn't come alone. He brought 400 soldiers into the House of Commons on January 4, 1642, looking for five members of Parliament he wanted arrested for…
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