Essay, Research Paper

Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard M. Nixon were presidents during one of the most disruptive periods in American history. Both grappled with important societal agitation and the inquiry of whether to go on engagement in the Vietnam War. Although these two presidents faced similar jobs during their presidential term, their presidential manner and attack to these jobs was basically different. However, Johnson and Nixon shared a willingness to misdirect the populace and their associates in order to prosecute their ain class of action.

Johnson and Nixon had basically different presidential manners which explains much of the differences in their attacks to domestic and foreign policy. Johnson had a grandiose and domineering political manner which he learned in portion from his male parent who was a local politician in Texas. He was gifted at carrying people to his point of position, frequently trusting on bumbling tactics that have been referred to as? The Treatment. ? The Treatment included:

invocation, accusal, blandishment, exuberance, scorn, cryings, ailment, the intimation of menace. . . Its speed was breathtaking, and it was all in one way. Ejaculations from the mark were rare. Johnson anticipated them before they could be spoken. . . Mimicry, wit, and the mastermind of analogy made The Treatment an about hypnotic experience and rendered the mark stunned and helpless. . . . ( Dallek ) .

Johnson used misrepresentation, appeal and coercion to accomplish the support of individuals with really different sentiments. Achieving political consensus was something Johnson did good, and he sharpened these accomplishments while functioning as a U.S. Senator from Texas. Although Johnson sought to command the actions of those who were necessary to accomplish his will, he besides suffered from a deep-seated? privation, ? a desire to be liked by everyone, to surpass his predecessors, and to be known as the best president in American history. He ever wanted the blessing of his advisers and the American populace, and he viewed unfavorable judgments of his policies as personal onslaughts which led him to duplicate his resoluteness and escalate his attempts. Johnson? s modest upbringing and exposure to crude, wheeling and covering Southern political relations influenced his manner and caused him disdain for those with pureblood backgrounds. He was besides influenced to a great extent by his exposure to poorness and favoritism in the South, peculiarly while learning Mexican-American kids in Cotulla, Texas. These experiences and his desire to be needed and praised gave him a strong desire to assist the least advantaged in society.

Nixon, like Johnson, was to a great extent influenced by his middle-class background land. He grew up helping his male parent with running a food market shop in Los Angeles. Because his household was non affluent, he was non able to go to Ivy League colleges, and as a consequence, Nixon was tormented by a feeling of insecurity and by a demand to turn out himself to those of the privileged category throughout his political calling. Although both Nixon and Johnson shared a demand to turn out themselves, Nixon was non comfy with traditional political methods as was Johnson. Whereas Johnson had a epic political manner, Nixon was diffident and shrank from the spotlight. He was awkward and uncomfortable in forepart of people, and many described him as? stiff. ? While Johnson was a maestro at persuasion, Nixon was uncomfortable with? glad-handling and pressing the flesh. ? ( Wicker 24 ) . Rather than trusting on these extroverted tactics to turn out himself, Nixon believed in the power of subject and in ageless attempt. Nixon felt that he could get the better of the rebuff and rebuffs of the privileged category? by excellence [ and ] personal intestine public presentation, while those who have everything are sitting on their fat butts. ? ( Wicker 9 ) . Nixon was introverted and autonomous. Whereas Johnson used persuasive tactics to construct a consensus among his dissidents, Nixon shunned the aid of his advisers and cabinet members, and alternatively contemplated issues in private in isolation. The differences in character between Johnson and Nixon influenced the class of their policies.

Johnson? s domestic policy was characterized by monolithic societal statute law and a desire to consequence brushing reforms of America? s societal jobs. Upon taking office in 1963, Johnson took advantage of the wake of the blackwash of President John F. Kennedy to force for the transition of civil rights and economic statute law that Kennedy had supported. Although Johnson had non ever supported this statute law, sing it as political self-destruction, he recognized the chance that the emotional reaction to Kennedy? s blackwash created, every bit good as the demand to show himself as a leader to the mourning state. He employed the adept consensus edifice accomplishments that he had learned as Senate Majority Leader, and within months after taking office, ensured the transition of the Civil Rights Act, the Tax Act of 1964 and the Economic Opportunity Act. The Tax Act enacted a revenue enhancement cut during a roar economic system to heighten disbursement and production, while the Economic Recovery Act focused on developing those who were unemployed and jobs such as wellness, instruction and medical attention that affected the poorest Americans. However, Johnson? s desire to outshine those who came before him led him to specify his ain domestic policy that was non tied to Kennedy. In typically grandiose manner, Johnson announced to the state his vision for a? Great Society? in which all Americans would bask equality, freedom and economic prosperity. After he was reelected in 1964, Johnson ensured the transition of more societal statute law than occurred even during the New Deal. This statute law had ambitious ends and resulted in the creative activity of federal assistance to instruction, Medicare, lodging subsidies to low income Americans, Operation Headstart, new mental wellness installations and assistance to urban mass theodolite. Johnson was obsessed with illustriousness and with work outing all of America? s jobs. One White House letter writer wrote that Johnson viewed himself as a? great popular leader, something like Franklin Roosevelt, except more so, striding over the land and cupping the people in his manus and modeling a national integrity that every President dreams about but none is of all time able to achieve. ? ( Chafe 245 ) . Because Johnson? s vision was so big, nevertheless, it led him to settle for less than the most effectual solution. He was concerned with his image as a great leader which frequently led him to put a greater accent on propaganda than carefully thought plans. In the terminal, Johnson spent more clip making the semblance of integrity and consensus so turn toing the implicit in tensenesss and divisions that American society was coping with. Furthermore, the resources and attending that his plans would hold required to be successful were progressively diverted to the war in Vietnam. Despite the fact that Johnson had devoted more energy to societal jobs and to brining Americans together than had any other American President, his presidential term ended in the thick of great societal protest and turbulence. His presidential term saw the outgrowth of a strong civil rights motion, anti-war motion and adult females? s rights motion. Ironically, although Johnson urgently sought to accomplish integrity, his presidential term ended in the thick of divisiveness and civil agitation.

Johnson had attempted to be known for accomplishing consensus and integrity amongst all Americans despite their differences. Although Nixon appeared to portion this vision when he promised to? convey the American people together. . . to bridge the coevals spread. . to bridge the spread between the races? during his presidential run, during his presidential term he exploited the divisions in American society to accomplish a political power base. ? ( Chafe 384 ) . Nixon sought to appeal to those Americans who were by the rapid alterations in American society that were reflected by Johnson? s policies every bit good as by the turning civil agitation. When Nixon was runing for president, he promised? jurisprudence and order? and claimed to talk for the? forgotten? and? silent? Americans. ( Chafe 383 ) . Nixon catered to these Americans in his domestic policy by assailing broad plans. Although he really achieved the transition of important progressive societal statute law, including public assistance reform, rigorous environmental Torahs, and consumer protection statute law, Nixon? s bequest was to get down the assault on broad political orientation that has characterized all subsequent Republican disposals. He criticized school integration in the South and alternatively argued for? freedom of pick? programs which permitted inkinesss to take the school they wished to go to. He attacked the liberalism of the Supreme Court and focused on put uping conservative justnesss to the Supreme Court. Whereas Johnson desired to win the American people by conveying them together through consensus, Nixon sough to accomplish a? conservative dominance through

polarization. ? ( Chafe 387 ) . Like Johnson, nevertheless, Nixon faced the job of emerging societal agitation, intensified by his policies in Vietnam. Student activism was at an all clip high during his presidential term and led to outline opposition and campus protest. While Johnson reacted to these tensenesss with a sense of treachery, Nixon responded with the covert determinism that characterized his manner. He initiated insurgent attempts against left wing organisations, and enlisted the assistance of the FBI and CIA to infiltrate such organisations. He organized conservative counter-demonstrations. And, he continued to utilize the tensenesss in America to his political advantage by mobilising the ill-affected white in-between Americans. He catered to the right by blackballing national day care statute law as? counterculturish? and by taking a stance against abortion. He openly criticized the? terrorists of the far left? and claimed that? [ T ] he clip has come to pull the line, . . . for the Great Silent Majority to stand up and be counted against the calming of the stone throwsters and the lewdness roarers in America. ? ( Chafe 416 ) . Ultimately, the bequest of Nixon? s presidential term was to mobilise a alliance of conservative disaffected in-between Americans, many in the? Sun Belt? ? the provinces in the South plus Texas, California, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Arizona? who would subsequently play a important function in undoing much of the integrity that Johnson and his plans had sought to accomplish.

Despite the huge differences in their domestic policy, Johnson and Nixon? s attack to foreign policy, and in peculiar the crisis in Vietnam, was similar in many ways. When Johnson assumed office, he ab initio planned to keep the policy of the Kennedy disposal which was to go on increasing the American presence in South Vietnam without get downing a major escalation. From the beginning, nevertheless, Johnson viewed foreign policy as a mode of committedness, award and bravery, a consequence of his Southern-style political relations. Furthermore, he understood the political importance of keeping a strong stance on anti-communism in order to go on to hold support for his favorite domestic policies. Finally, he subscribed to the? Domino theory? ? that a failure to halt the coup d’etat of South Vietnam by North Vietnam would raise the possibility that all of Southeast Asia would be lost to the Communists. For these grounds, Johnson began to authorise secret sabotage missions in Vietnam by telling the bombarding of coastal bases and directing guerilla squads into the North. After he had determined that America should get down a more aggressive run in North Vietnam, he seized the juncture of the North Vietnamese onslaught against American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin in August, 1964 to force Congress to go through a declaration authorising Johnson to take all military action necessary in Southeast Asia. However, Johnson achieved this wide statement of Congressional support by pull stringsing the facts of the Tonkin onslaught and by lying about his true aims. After this event, Johnson began to badly intensify American troop? s engagement in South Vietnam. He initiated a monolithic bombardment run in the North in February 1966, and escalated the presence of American military personnels in the part. He began to take the war really personally, sing it as? his war being fought by his male childs, with his choppers and his guns. ? ( Dallek ) . He refused to listen to unfavorable judgment and concern by his advisers, and would close out from political argument all those who disagreed with him. As with his domestic policy, Johnson focused on keeping the visual aspect of integrity and consensus, despite serious tensenesss in his disposal refering the appropriate class in Vietnam. He misled the populace about the success of the increased American mission in Vietnam, despite the fact that private studies indicated that the bombardment onslaughts and enhanced mission had failed to impact the resoluteness of North Vietnam. Johnson became obsessed with winning the war in Vietnam and engaged in a policy of perpetrating even greater resources in the fact of negative grounds. In order to increase the military personnels in Vietnam from 75,000 to 125, 000 in 1965, he lied to the American populace and told them that he could make this without increasing revenue enhancements or naming upon the militias. By 1967, 14,000 American military personnels had died in Vietnam and 57 per centum of Americans disapproved of Johnson? s handling of the war. Johnson ended his presidential term bitter and frustrated by the emerging unfavorable judgment of his policy in Vietnam. He felt betrayed by the American people, and he refused to believe that America could non accomplish its will with such? a small piss-ant country. ? ( Chafe 291 ) .

Superficially, Nixon? s foreign policy in Vietnam departed from Johnson? s. Upon taking office, Nixon was publically committed to stoping the war in Vietnam ( although, he did this in big portion based on political necessity, which explained the initial footing for Johnson? s policy as good ) . Nixon came up with the? Nixon philosophy? in which he argued that the South Koreans would hold to exert more self-help. Under this proposal, American military personnels would be withdrawn from Vietnam, and the United States would supply financess to back up the coup d’etat of contending duty by the South Vietnamese forces. However, like Johnson, Nixon had private aims about the war in Vietnam that he was determined to accomplish, even if it meant hiding facts and lying to the American people and even to his main advisers. Privately, Nixon devised a? secret program? to intensify the war in Vietnam and to convert the North every bit good as Russia and China that he was capable of deploying atomic arms if provoked. Like Johnson, Nixon shut out all advisers who disagreed with his program, including the State and Defense section. He relied chiefly on Henry Kissinger, his National Security Advisor, to put to death his programs. Nixon conducted a monolithic bombardment foray with Kissinger? s aid against the Communist bases in Cambodia, without the cognition of the American populace. Nixon? s need to turn out himself to America and to the elite policy advisers who were knocking him led him to get down to force more publically for increased American attempts in the part. When he decided to direct American military personnels into Cambodia in 1969 to destruct the central office of the North Vietnamese, he attempted to beat up the populace with brave rhetoric like that Johnson had repeatedly relied on. Like Johnson, he viewed the war in Vietnam as a trial of personal strength and award. He stated: ? We will non be humiliated. . . It is non our power but our will that is being tested tonight. ? ( Chafe 397 ) . The foray in Cambodia was non successful and resulted in monolithic public protest both in the United States and internationally. But it did bespeak to North Vietnam and Russia how far Nixon would travel to accomplish his program. For the following two old ages, Nixon continued to retreat military personnels while prosecuting in perennial Acts of the Apostless of military bullying. His concluding? secret scheme? involved a monolithic bombardment foray of North Vietnam during Christmas hebdomad 1972, in which military personnels devastated infirmaries, residential countries and mills. One hebdomad subsequently, North Vietnam agreed to a peace agreement that was acceptable to the South. Although Nixon is credited with stoping the war in Vietnam, 40 % of the U.S. casualties in the Vietnam War and half a million enemy casualties, occurred during his presidential term. Like Johnson, Nixon conducted much of his policy in Vietnam in secret and without admiting the dissension of the American populace. Both Johnson and Nixon? s personal position of their attempts in Vietnam, and their refusal to lose that war for personal grounds, resulted in casualties of American and Vietnamese soldiers on a ruinous graduated table.

At least superficially, the presidential terms of Lydnon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon shared small in common. Johnson operated in a domineering manner, accomplishing consensus through fast speaking and use. Nixon worked in isolation, and executed his will through a few chosen advisers while closing out the remainder of his disposal. Domestically, their policies were radically different. Johnson sought to unite the state? s many divisions through militant civil and societal statute law, while Nixon sought to work the divisiveness in America to derive the support of anomic white in-between category Americans. Johnson will be remembered for intensifying U.S. engagement in the Vietnam war, while Nixon will be remembered for stoping that war. Despite such differences, nevertheless, Johnson and Nixon shared a cardinal willingness to accomplish their ain docket despite public protest or the unfavorable judgment by their advisers. Both were driven by insecurity and the demand to turn out themselves, and this led them to trust to a great extent on fraudulence and straight-out misrepresentation to accomplish their will. Their presidential terms are singular illustrations of the consequence that one adult male? s will can hold on determining the class of American history.