Panorama

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Part of Panorama

Title: Panorama
Issue Date: Volume XV (Issue No. 12) December 1963
Year: 1963
Language: English
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extracted text: ' I fWr KENNEDY AND LINCOLN . . .both belong to the ages December, 1963 75 Centavos Vol. XV THi PHILIPPINE MAOAZINI 0* 0000 KIAMNQ MANILA, PHILIPPINES No. IN MEMORIAM The leaden skies of yesterday were like a pall. A sense of grief seemed to hang in the air. Such a feeling was inevitable, for it was as though the very wind was keen ing in the woodlands, the trees themselves sensitive to human emotions. Late November is the year’s own time of the long sleep, the summary if not the farewell. The hills are bare to the buffeting of winter. And yet, the hills still stand. The trees are still rooted and rugged. Rivers flow to the sea. And beyond the gray clouds the sun keeps to its course and the stars are in their appointed places. The eternities prevail. We live with those eternities, though ourselves mortal; it is the human dream, the hope and aspiration, that persists. Take away all else and those are the human eternities. Robert Frost, in his last book, wrote lines that sum it up: We vainly wrestle with the blind belief That aught we cherish Can ever quite pass out of utter grief And wholly perish. Dark days come, inevitable. And time persists, time that is both dark and light and forever changing. The time of the stars, the time of the hills, the time of man. And nothing cherished ever wholly perishes. Gray November is a passing thing, and year’s end is no end at all, but another marker on the great rhythm. A tree falls, and a seedling is already rooted. Man persists, man with the capacity to dream and hope and dream again. Man, with his capacity for shock and grief, but also with his inheritance of faith, of belief, is par ticipation in the great truth of continuity. — The New York Times, November 24, 1963. ■ “His death diminishes us all.” THE DEATH OF A PRESIDENT When great men of State die, it is their achievements which come to mind. The tragedy of Kennedy’s death is that we have also to mourn the achievements to come. There is a feeling that the future has been betrayed. When John Kennedy be came President, he not only symbolized youth in a world dominated by older men. He brought with him a sense of intellectual adventure. Sud denly, new prospects seemed possible. Life itself seemed more exciting. He seemed to be not so much the heir to an existing political situa tion as the herald of a new. one'. But Kennedy was no vi sionary driven on by dreams. He was a cool-headed poli tician with a great regard for facts. Indeed, the intellec tual detachment which allow ed him to see, more clearly than most men, what needed to be done, also at times prevented him from mobiliz ing the emotional fervour necessary to overcome oppo sition and to carry his poli cies through. • • • This was most true of his domestic policies. He had the courage to challenge deep American prejudices about public spending, so cialized medicine and foreign aid. He saw the supreme importance of the Civil Rights issue. And he fought hard to get his views accept ed. But his success in these fields was limited. He was thwarted by the cumbersome American system of govern ment, and did not always succeed in overcoming his weakness in the Congress by appealing to the people over their heads, as Roosevelt so frequently did. Perhaps his greatest suc cesses were in the crucial is sues of world affairs. Not that his policies were entirely free of ambiguity. He was, after all, elected after a cam paign in which he attacked Eisenhower for failing to deal with Cuba and stressed what subsequently proved to 2 Panorama be a mythical missile gap. But, once in office, he began an intensive study of the facts that never slackened. The importance of the dis astrous invasion of the Bay of Pigs lay in Kennedy’s abi lity to learn from mistakes. He quickly perceived the fol ly of one of his campaign promises and in subsequent crises — Berlin and Cuba again — he showed a rare com bination of caution and dar ing. The risks he took were based on a cool assessment of the situation. And in this moment of epic success, he resisted all temptation to crow — thus turning victory into constructive achieve ment. For Kennedy was quick to see the implications of the Cuban crisis. He realized that it showed not so much the supremacy of American power but the dependence of the United States and Rus sia on each other. The les son he drew was that it was necessary for the two Powers to establish a working re lationship with each other: that in a situation dominated by nuclear physics, the real enemy was not Communism but instability and chaos. For the first time, it seem ed just possible that America and Russia would pursue a limited common aim, modi fying their rivalry to meet the need to prevent nuclear proliferation. In the event, only the Test Ban treaty materialized. But the per ception that a new era could be opened, that there were tremendous opportuni ties ahead for constructive initiative, had been gained. While Kennedy lived, there was hope that these opportu nities would be exploited. With his death at the hands of a crazed assassin, that hope has been lessened, though not entirely destroy ed. The new President, Mr. Lyndon Johnson, is an able, perhaps a very able, politi cian, but a man of a more ordinary mould. And while it is improbable that there will be any dramatic changes in policy — indeed, the new President may be more suc cessful than his predecessor in persuading Congress to ac cept existing policies — it is difficult to see these policies being further developed to create a new order in our disordered world society. But as the example of Tru man showed, the office of December 1963 3 President can bring out un expected qualities in those who hold it. The men who helped to shape the Kennedy policies — McNamara, Rusk, Robert Kennedy and others — are still at hand. More important still, the world realities which determined these policies remain the same. It would therefore be wrong to assume that the new President will change the purpose or intention of American policy. But the effectiveness of Kennedy’s Administration lay as much in its style as in its actions — the way policies were car ried out was as important as their actual content. They were characterized by the President’s keen respect for intellect, ideas and know ledge. It was his style which also gave him his unique personal prestige outside America. His intellectual, somewhat princely, yet keenly profes sional approach to his tasks had an appeal beyond the shores of America: the sense of excitement which he con veyed quickened the tempo of political life everywhere. He communicated his own sense of adventure to others. Here was a man who saw himself a world leader, heir not only to America’s poli tical legacy, but to Europe’s intellectual tradition and, through his Irish ancestry, to the hopes and aspirations of the under privileged every where. The final irony is that the most rational of pre sent-day statesmen should have met his death as the re sult of an apparently irra tional act. In the end, Kennedy’s qua lities as a man command as much affection as respect. In him, the private man was never lost in the public fig ure. The friends he made before he became President were the friends he kept while in office. We mourn a man who —with his beauti ful wife, his respect for ideas and the arts, his humour, his informality and modesty in the face of the tremendous responsibilities which he fully understood — represented something vital, life-enhan cing. His death diminishes us all. — Editorial in The Observer, November 24, 1963. 4 Panorama ■ He opened the doors through which others may be able to walk. KENNEDY: THE MAN AND HIS LEGEND Roy Jenkins Kennedy’s tenure of the White House was the short est since the United States became a world Power. The youngest President to come, he was the quickest to go. There can now be no Age of Kennedy, with a gradual fulfillment of policies and a descriptive meaning for a whole epoch of American life. The most that he was able to do was to open doors through which others, if they have the will and the capa city, may be able to walk. Compared with the great est Presidents of American history therefore he inevit ably leaves more promise and less achievement behind him. Yet, aided perhaps by the manner of his death, it is difficult to believe that his name will not live with theirs. He will be the great “mightrhave-been,” the sym bol of fate in its most vicious and retaliatory mood. Yet his achievement was by no means all still to come. He had revitalized Washing ton and, still more important, he had led the world with almost faultless skill and pre cision through the most dan gerous crisis in its existence. The hackneyed criticism of John Kennedy is that he was a cold and calculating man, unwilling to take political risks, unable to infuse great crises with the warmth of human sympathy. This criti cism is at once exaggerated and irrelevant. Calculation Of course he was capable of political calculation. No one who has read the story first of his fight for the no mination, then for the Pres idency, can doubt that he December 1963 5 was a political planner of the most careful and determined kind. I am very glad that he was. Otherwise Richard Nixon would have been in the White House for the past three years. To suggest, however, that he habitually subordinated vital policy decisions to nar row political considerations is nonsense. In and after the Cuban crisis he did pre cisely the reverse. So anxious was he not to damage the future world prospect by any humiliation of Khushchev that he competely failed to bring home to the American people the magnitude of the victory which he had won. His decisions were, admit tedly, not emotional ones. But who would have wished that they were? To cite the Cuban crisis once again, the essence of his strength was his ability to watch the cases for and against the different courses of action being built up or destroyed, without rushing into a prior commit ment to one or another; and then, when all of the re levant information and argu ments were available, to make a clear decision in fa vour of the one that seemed best. He himself attributed the wisdom of the choice to the time that was availabe for the process; at least equal credit should be given to his own capacity to evaluate the evidence objectively. No doubt the reverse side of the coin was a certain hardness of presentation. As a speaker he had force and clarity, and at times a touch of eloquence. When I first heard him at the height of his Presidential campaign on Columbus Day, 1960, I listened to him making five New York speeches on that day. All of them were envigorating, one or two of them were moving. His command of widely contrasting au diences was complete. He was not, perhaps, an orator in the fullest sense. The play and interplay be tween himself and the au dience was not sufficient for that. Despite his Massachu setts-Irish, he could never have made a vast audience in the Boston Bowl chant back slogans at him as Roose velt did in 1940. Nor could he pick out with inspired timing the one moment for a launching of an idea and the one simple phrase in 6 Panorama which to do it, so that mil lions of stolid minds might be shifted. But this is a rare gift in deed, and liable to be per verted even when it exists. For most practical purposes Kennedy’s eloquence was a worthy and persuasive vehi cle for his clear and cogent thoughts. His private personality was far removed from that of a man who lived a life of nar row political calculation. That he had gaiety and charm goes without saying. But he also had sustained intellectual interest and zest. As any President must do, he saw an almost unending stream of visitors. But he chose them on the basis of who would interest him just as much , as who would be useful to him. And he gave enough time and contributed enough energy to these inter views to make them an ex change of ideas and not mere ly an empty formality. I saw him in this way one evening last January. When I came into the room he was standing talking to Sorensen, Salinger and a naval aide. In a moment they left and he settled down in his rock ing chair; there were no fur ther interruptions for 40 mi nutes. Rapid fire Three features of the con versation remain imprinted on my mind. The first is that he talked about half the time and encouraged me to do the same. Almost any other Head of Government would have struck a different balance. Either he would merely have answered ques tions or he would merely have asked them — perhaps resting his mind during the answers. Kennedy chose the much more stimulating and ex hausting middle course. He asked a series of rapid fire questions about all sorts of subjects — economic growth, Europe and de Gaulle, the Labour Party. He interrupt ed the answers, he gave his own views, he followed up a weak or unconvincing reply by forcing one hard against the ropes. My second memory of this conversation, therefore, is that it was peculiarly intel lectually testing. My third memory is that the President, during these interchanges, December 1963 7 contributed two pieces of original, rather unconvention al analysis. That, again, was unexpected from any Head of State. Yet the inexorable intel lectual vigour was only one facet of Kennedy’s personal ity. He could turn his mind in much more frivolous di rections. He could switch away from the highest alfairs of State and back again with the greatest speed. He had the self-confidence to feel that he could always get his eye back on the ball at the right moment. Self-confidence This self-confidence (not for a moment to be confused with a misplaced arrogance) was indeed one of the great changes which the New Frontier brought to Washing ton. It stemmed directly from the President. He ga thered around himself a team of outstanding intel lectual quality. They were not strikingly experienced in affairs of government. They were not strongly po litically connected in any traditional sense. They came from Harvard and the Ford Motor Company and from private law practice. But to gether — McNamara, Robert Kennedy, Bundy, Gilpatric, Sorensen — they amounted to a most formidable group. Kennedy’s great gift was that he could use them ef fortlessly. He trusted them. They respected him. He could give them the freest of rope without ever endanger ing his own command. Whe ther the same system can work equally well under an other President remains to be seen. Under Kennedy, however, it performed the great service of increasing the respect of the American people for their system of government. He was elected by the nar rowest of majorities after a bitterly fought campaign. He replaced the most widely popular President in Ameri can history. He was young and relatively inexperienced. His politics were disliked by most of America’s more pros perous citizens. Yet there was hardly ever a whisper that he was not up to the job. He was frustrated by the conservative majority (partly Republican and partly De18 Panorama mocratic) in the Congress. He provoked disagreement and criticism and satire. But he and his Administration were never sneered at or patronized. They greatly in creased the prestige not only of the executive branch of American government but of democratic leadership throughout the world. — The Observer., November 24, 1963. SOVIET REACTION Normal Moscow radio programmes were sus pended. The news announcements were followed by organ music. This was an unprecedented tribute. Russian television played Tchaikovsky’s Pathetique Symphony after a news bulletin. It went off the air later, still playing solemn music. Moscow radio stayed on the air, also playing funeral music. A person of broad outlook who realistically ac cepted the situation and tried to find ways for nego tiated settlement of the international problems which now divide the world. The Soviet Government and the Soviet people share the deep grief of the Am erican people over this great loss — Soviet Premier Khrushchev, to President Johnson. 9 ■ The brightest legend of our time — he captured the imagination of a whole generation. THE MAN WE TRUSTED John Freeman The most grievous assassi nation in modern history has transformed John Kenne dy from an embatted pres ident, deadlocked with a hostile and suspicious Con gress, into the brightest le gend of our time. It was inevitable. The shock and the grief are universal and so great. Emotions have poured out — and they have gilded the truth. Yet that too may be misleading, for the emotions were part of the truth; and if Kennedy is re membered, as I think he may be, along with Lincoln and FDR as one of the great presidents, it will be more because he captured the ima gination of a whole genera tion in almost every corner of the world than because he succeeded in fulfilling the purposes to which he dedi cated his presidency. His great achievement, for which the world outside America chiefly honours him this week, was his leadership of the western alliance. When he took over, we walk ed in the shadow of nuclear war. Two years and 10 months later, the dialogue between the White House and the Kremlin has pro ceeded so far that no one can doubt the genuineness of Khruschev’s dismay at the young President’s death. Yet he wrought this change with out any surrender of vital in terest, by strength and not by weakness. He persuaded Khrushchev that negotiations were practicable, because he was himself clear about what could be negotiated — and firm about what could not. The test-ban treaty and the hotline are the visible signs of a business relation between the Soviet bloc and the West, in which each side re cognizes the power of the other and the suicidal folly of pressing points of difference to the brink of war. The 10 Panorama differences still exist; the Cold War goes on; errors of judgment by less sagacious men on either side can still plunge us all to catastrophe; there is no more than an agreement to disagree — but that, after all, is the essential prelude to an eventual har mony. Kennedy’s achievement in all this was not one-sided. Nuclear war would be as deadly to Russia as to the West, and Khrushchev has played his part. But few would deny that the initia tive has lain most of the time with the White House or that Kennedy’s own qualities have been decisive. The three personal gifts which lifted him into the realm of inter national statesmanship were intellect, steadiness of nerve and the capacity to take de cisions. Indeed, this week’s inevitable anxiety about the future is — or ought to be — based not on half-baked guesses about President John son’s capacity or intelligence as a politician, but on the fact that the decision-making machine — which Kennedy created to meet his own needs proved so uniquely well-suit ed to the strategic demands of the Cold War. The doubt must exist whether President Johnson, operating through more normal political chan nels, will be able, however sensible his purpose, to match the speed, logic and certainty of his predecessor. For Ken nedy’s decisions were his own. The professors, the soldiers, the computers, sel dom the professional politi cians, were detailed to pro vide the data and rehearse the arguments. The Pres ident listened, reflected, ba lanced the equation and, for tified by all that intellect and calculation could bring to bear, finally took the de cision. Naturally this method of government was unpopular on Capitol Hill, and the un popularity was reflected in Kennedy’s inability to secure from Congress either the mo ney or the legislation he needed to implement his do mestic policies. And this in ability amounted to some thing like failure. Whether it stemmed fundamentally from a lack of profound con viction about liberal causes with which he was saddled by his 1960 campaign-mana gers, or from the intellect’s contempt for the log-rolling of the workaday politicians, December 1963 11 or from over caution about the electoral consequences of controversy, or from a cons titutional inadequacy of the Congress to live with the speed of modern decision making will long be argued by American historians. And in the end we may never know. What we can say this week is that, despite his visi ble achievement in foreign affairs, the quality of Ken nedy’s presidency as a whole — apart from the noble and historic decision to stake the whole prestige of the pres idency on his civil rights leg islation — is arguable. His quality as a man is to me beyond argument. He brought to public life not only the hard assets of leader ship which determined ideas by the grace of his personal ity and the clarity of his speech. One can only guess, for instance, at the legislative outcome of his battle with Congress and his own party over civil rights. But one can be sure that individual American opinion about the cause of justice for the Ne groes has been touched, as never since Lincoln, by the words he spoke. Perhaps his greatest achievement in the end was to turn the gaze of his own people towards some of the more distant goals of political action and to infuse his pragmatic programmes with the radiant light of to lerance, idealism and pur pose. And so, my fellow Am ericans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.' Those words struck the keynote of his inaugural address; they form a message which evokes a response in every radical heart. However limited his social achievement, his ap proach to politics was funda mentally a challenge to conversatism everywhere. That is whyA with all our reser vations about where his ulti mate convictions lay — they certainly did not lie with the ideological left — and with all our disappointment at his comparative failure to make good the promise of 1960, the left in Britain admired and, when the chips were down* trusted him. He was the gold en boy of the post-war world, and we mourn him as a friend — The New Statesman. 12 Panorama ■ Death has transformed political scene in America. THE CRUEL LESSONS OF FORTUNE AND CAPRICE James Reston History seems determined to teach this nation that it must make more provision for fortune and caprice. All our assumptions, even about human ability and mortality, are subject to error. Franklin Roosevelt, who thought he was marked by fate to make the peace, died before the end of the war. Harry Truman, who was marked early $n his career for oblivion and defeat, sur vived to organize the greatest coalition of nations in his tory. Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was stricken twice in office and counted out, lived on to be the oldest President in the long story of the na tion. John F. Kennedy, the youngest elected President, who came to office proclaim ing the emergence of a new generation of leaders, is dead at 46. And Lyndon Johnson, who at first opposed Kennedy and later joined and served him, has succeeded to the Pres idency only after reaching the reluctant conclusion that he would never get it. The Coming Changes Accordingly, this is no time for anything but very modest speculation about the future. Time has been more cruel to President Johnson than it was to Harry Tru man. He has come into the White House near the end of the statutory four-year term rather than at the be ginning, and like Sir Alec Douglas-Home, the new Bri tish Prime Minister (who was also thrown up by a stroke of fate), he has less than a year to go before the election. December 1963 13 Policy under the new Pres ident, therefore, will prob ably remain very much as it was under Kennedy, but the execution of policy will un doubtedly be much different. The Administration of John F. Kennedy was a very personal affair. It was or ganized to fit his personality and style. He had his own strong view on policy, for eign and domestic, and his own highly original concepts about his personal staff and his Cabinet. He was a reader, an ana lyzer and a catalyst, and was to a very large extent his own Foreign Secretary, with gifts of grace, wit and know ledge that enabled him to fulfill the diplomatic and ceremonial aspects of his job. President Johnson is a to tally different type of man. He has not been a deep stu dent of foreign affairs over a long period of time. Un like Kennedy, he is not a great reader or analyzer of documents. He is a doer, who spends more time on how to get things done than on meditating on what to do. The prospect is, therefore, that the White House staff of brilliant intellectuals and Boston politicians will dec line in power and the Cabi net will rise. Johnson drives his staff with all the energy of an impatient Army of ficer, which is quite different from what Kennedy’s aides are accustomed to; but, iron ically, Kennedy’s Cabinet is likely to have more power under Johnson than it did under Kennedy. Moreover, there is no urg ent need for the new Pres ident to take new policy initiatives in the field of for eign affairs. His urgent pro blems are to get organized, to get something through the Congress, and to get ready for the election. The Political Outlook The death of President Kennedy has transformed the political scene. That is fair ly obvious. It has improved the Republican p a r t y’s chances of victory. It has hurt Senator Goldwater, who is identified in many minds with the extreme Right. It has certainly not increased the popularity of Texas in the North, and therefore, by indirection, it has complicat ed President Johnson’s poli tical problem. Everybody in the Democ 14 Panorama ratic Party will rally behind the new President now. He will almost certainly be un challenged for the Presiden tial nomination, and there is already considerable talk, here that Senator Hubert Humphrey will be strongly backed for the Vice Pres idential nomination, and may even replace Mike Mansfied as majority leader be fore then. Beyond these speculations, however, it is probably im prudent to go. Each of the last three Presidents has dev eloped in office in wholly unpredictable ways, and Pres ident Johnson is not likely to be an exception to this rule. — Washington, Nov 23. NEHRU GRIEVED AND SHOCKED It is a terrible thing that’s happened. The con sequences are bad enough and to a far reaching extent will gradually seep down. The very fact that he will not be there should have some effect. What this particular incident means is terribly difficult to say ... . I should imagine his policy will be con tinued. Anyhow, I am deeply grieved and shocked both for personal relations and for international re lations. — India’s Prime Minister Nehru. December 1963 15 ■ He sought to make sanity and realism the core of his political philosophy. HISTORY AS TRAGEDY* Karl E. Meyer. John F. Kennedy died a mortal on Friday and was already a legend when he was buried on Monday in a cere mony that strangely mixed tenderness and dignity. The princes and presidents lent pomp to the final rites and the demeanour of his widow was, as one reporter wrote, like that of a queen in classic tragedy. But what made the funeral unberably moving was the uncounted tens of thousands of young people who came from afar as if by invisible command to Wash ington. At freezing dawn on Monday, they formed most of a line far more than a mile long of those waiting to pass the President’s coffin in the dimly lit dome of the Capi tol. Until one stood with them, it was impossible fully to grasp what President Ken nedy meant to the generation for which he spoke. ♦ The New Statesman, London, November 29, 1963. For four days, beginning on Friday, television carried nothing but news about Mr. Kennedy’s death and for once without commeriual in terruptions. As from an other world, there were glimpses of Dallas and that city’s slack-jawed police, then the funeral itself, endless panel discussions, and throughout the tolling of bells and the muffled beat of drums. Friends sought each other’s warmth; floors were littered with newspapers; there was a mingled sense of incredulity, indignation and remorse as most of us became aware in Washington how much we had. taken for granted the singular man in the White House So soon afterwards, how can one pick up the frag ments and make of them a meaningful pattern? Yet surely there is one — the theme of violence, both domstic and international. The 16 Panorama circumstances of his death ■were ironic enough — a sniper’s bullet at high noon, fired by a madman, brought down a President who sought to make sanity and real ism the core of his political philosophy. But even more ironic, the murder of this gifted man may make it possibe for his far less imposing successor to aproach unex pected greatness by carrying out the Kennedy’ programme. Johnson as President During his early three years as Vice-President, LynIon Baines Johnson remained a stranger to much of the world. He is no stranger to Washington. His strengths and weaknesses are far bet ter known here than were those of Harry S. Truman in 1945. At the outset, it ought to be Said that Mr. Johnson is a politician to the tip of his boots, a seasoned and shrewd craftsman with the capacity of being a big man. In terms of learning and intellectual insight, the new President falls short of of the standards set by Mr. Kennedy — no brilliant din ners can be expected at the White House during the Texan’s tenure. But in terms of temperament, he is as much the prudent realist as the man he supplants. The three privotal facts about President Johnson are that he is a product of the South, the Senate and the stream of populism that forms one part of the Democ ratic Party’s tradition. His identity as a southerner is at once an asset arid liability — indeed, during his’ cam paign for the Presidential no mination in 1960, Mr. John son vainly tried to describe himself as a westerner. It is an asset because his roots in Texas (which was a Confe derate state) may tend to neutralize southern attacks. He is the first President from the South since the Civil War (Woodrow Wilson, born in Virginia, is counted as a New Jersey man). Since his renomination next year is considered certain, Mr. John son is in a position to nulli fy once and for all a demean ing 'law’ of eligibility in Am erican politics — that no southerner may head a na tional ticket. He can do for his region what Mr. Kennedy did for his religion. But as a southerner, the President may be unavoid December 1963 17 ably identified with the ra cial barbarisms of his region. His own record is the best answer to this; as Senate Majority Leader he guided the passage, in 1958, of the first civil rights legislation to be enacted since Reconstruc tion days. As Vice-President, his speeches on civil rights have been unequivocal, and his efforts on behalf of nondiscriminatory employment have won no applause from the bigots. It is conceivable that as a native southerner he can do more to heal the sick ness of Dixie than could a Catholic from Boston, whose very manner was anathema in the South. He is also a child of the Senate and his whole out look is coloured by his years as a legislator. Few deny his effidacy as Majority Leader, though his manipulative app r o a c h irritated liberals. The Johnson technique was to find the common denomi nator, settle differences in the cloakroom, and obtain con sent on the floor with a min imum of debate. He is far more familiar with the legis lative process — and is more highly regarded by the age ing potentates on Capitol Hill — than was the case with Mr. Kennedy. Circums tance has made Lyndon the President at a moment when Congress is floundering and the need for deft leadership obvious. Ln this area, his background will certainly not be a handicap. Though he abhors politi cal labels, his place in the spectrum is to the left of cen tre on many domestic 'issues. During the Thirties, he was a New Deal Congressman trusted by FDR, whom he idolised. His ideological background derives from the agrarian populisim of the South — in exact counter point to the urban, Catholic, melting-pot background of Mr. Kennedy. As Mr. John son rose in the Senate hierar chy, he shifted to the middip — and on some issues, not ably tax privileges for the oil plutocracy, he was solidly with the fight. But every politician responds to the pressures around him, and as Chief Executive of the Uni ted States Mr. Johnson has been vaulted to an eminence that changes the landscape around him. He will prob ably be more liberal as Pres ident than he was as Senator, 18 PANORAMA especially since he will be under more pressure from the left than Mr. Kennedy was. Where there are the most reservations is in the broad field of foreign affairs. Mr. Johnson’s utterances on for eign policy have been ortho dox and uninspired — set pieces laden with Cold War cliches. Yet here his relative inexperience may assure a broad continuity because Mr. Johnson will surely lean heavily on his predecessor’s advisers. Moreover, as Mr. Kennedy found, the intract able realities of the East-West stalemate, of ideological com petition in poorer nations, and of coalition diplomacy all tend to restrict the choices open to any American Pres ident. In fact, Lyndon Johnson may not only do no worse than Mr. Kennedy; he may do better. Three reasons can be advanced to support this hope. First, every new Pres ident has a honeymoon period in which he can ex pect national assent and, secondly, Mr. Johnson comes to his office at a critical time for his party — a national election is less than a year away. As a matter of simple self-survival, the Democratic majority in Congress will most probably fall behind a new President in desperate need of a record to run on in 1964. Add to this a third reason — the way in which Mr. Johnson succeeded to of fice. He carries with him not only the emotional after glow of a popular President, but he also takes command at a time of national contri tion, when the country may be prepared to do for a dead John F. Kennedy what it was unwilling to do for John F. Kennedy alive. The brutal drama of the assassination has given the President a claim to greatness that was Still only a promise while he breathed. The Assassins We may never know the full truth of the assassina tion, now that the suspected sniper himself himself has been murdered. Was Oswald the instrument for someone else, or did the motive force spring from his own psycho pathic mind? The ineptness of the Dallas police led to the killing of the one person best able to clear up the mat ter — and we are left with 19 the all-too-pat explanation that a self-styed Marxist car ried out in deed what the fanatic right wing has encou raged by word. What is clear is that Os wald, if his guilt may be as sumed, acted in accord with a dreadful American tradi tion. Four presidents out of 34 have now been murdered, while at least two others were brushed by death (FDR and Truman) and Theodore Roosevelt was almost killed when he campaigned for the Presidency in 1912. This re cord testifies to the deep stain of violence in the vaunted American way of life; in the end, Mr. Kenne dy perished under the savage code of the old frontier. Strangely, one of Lincoln’s first political speeches saw in lawlessness the chief threat to American political institu tions. Speaking in Spring field, Illinois, in 1838, a time when mob outrages ‘form the everyday n e w s’, Lincoln warned that all the armies of the world, with a Bonaparte for a commander, ‘could not, by force, take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge.’ He then said: At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer if it ever reaches us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher.. As a nation of free men, we must live through all time, or die by suicide. I hope that I am not over-wary; but if I am not, there is even now some thing of ill-omen amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country; the growing disposition to sub stitute the wild and fu rious passions, in lieu of the sober judgment of courts; and the worse than savage mobs for the execu tive minister of justice. It was only a few months ago that President Kennedy ventured into Alabama to ex hort American citizens to support the rule of law. •Only a few weeks ago, jour nalists visiting in Mississipi were told by responsible of ficials that the safety of the President could not be gua 20 Panorama ranteed if he should make a visit. And in Dallas, not long ago, an American who was twice Democratic candi date for the Presidency was assaulted by a mob worthy of Caracas or Baghbad. In a very sombre sense, the unifying element in Mr. Ken nedy’s brief years as Pres ident was the attempt to ap ply the restraint of reason to lawlessness, domestic and for eign. The racial explosion was beyond doubt the most menacing event of the Kenne dy years, and the menace sur vives his death. The recipient violence in Alabama or Missisippi finds its analogue in lawless relations of sovereign states, some of them armed with weapons that could (as Mr. Kennedy once said) make a funeral pyre of the world. It is no caprice that the right wing fanatics of Dallas loathe with equal fervour both the United Nations and civil rights. That a President who ably defended both should die in that city is more than a tragedy of history; it is a warning portent of the power of satanic madness. JFK'. Nunc Dimittis He came in with a snow storm, and the setting was flawlessly right on Inaugura tion Day, 20 January 1961. There was no premonition of tragedy, but rather a sense of rebirth in a capital man tled in beauty as the oldest President yielded power to the youngest man ever elected Chief Executive of the Unit ed States. More than a change of administrations, it was a change of generations, a change of outlook and most immediately apparent, a change of style. When John Fitzgerald Kennedy was sworn in, he appeared to fulfill Robert Frost’s au gury that an age of poetry and power was commencing in Washington. But the poetry is now hushed, and the promise wisely used is now an unfinished chapter in a volume entitled, ’Let Us Begin . . . ’ None of us suspected that in retrospect the Inaugural snow would seem as a shroud. It is too early to fix Mr. Kennedy’s place in history because so .much of what he initiated was left for others to complete. But two of his achievements seem likely to take root. He was not a man given to easy commitments, but before his death he em barked on two major ven 21 tures — for the first time in this century, he placed the power and might of his of fice behind a dispossessed race whose second-class sta tus demeaned all citizens; at the same time, he took the world to the precipice of a war but followed his unexam pled personal triumph by deeds intended to eliminate the risk of a holocaust through madness or miscal culation. The special pathos of his death is that he seem ed on the verge of broaden ing his commitment. Something else, however, is irretrievably lost — the brilliance of his presence, the glow of his style. To Am ericans like myself who were near to his age, he renewed our pride in our country and gave a dignity to the political calling. If we fretted at his failures and reproached him for his excessive caution, it was because we judged him in terms of his capacity for greater things. His unfail ing wit, which he could turn on himself, his literacy, his physical grace and his sense of history were part of a harmonious' whole. By vir tue of television, and his su perb perfomance at press conferences, he became in life an intensely personal fig ure to millions; in death he leaves a mournful void. A prodigious reader, he cherished not only learning, but the learned. His ideal of government seemed to be half academy, half precinct headquarters. He opened the White House to anybody who could impart a ferment and his good humour as a host was legend. His fa vourite biography was Lord David Cecil’s Melbourne, and the choice tells a good deal about the strengths and weaknesses of his self-defini tion. Like the urbane Whigs of Melbourne’s age, he blended a studied detach ment, broad if conventional interest in the arts, moderate liberalism, family pride and belief in reason. It is savage irony that this child of the Enlightenment was cut down by the very fanaticism that he sought to contain. The cause for which he stood re mains in doubt, and the last page of his biography must be written with what Virgil called the tears of things. 22 Panorama ■ A commentary from “Topic of the Times.” LINCOLN AND KENNEDY ‘When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d’ A bereaved country reach ed in vain for words until a great poet, Walt Whitman, wrote: "When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom’d,/ And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,/ I mourn’d, and yet shall mourn with ever-return ing spring.” So a singer of America wrote of President Lincoln, whose fearful trip was done that terrible day in April* of 1865. Norih and South The printers of 1865 took the one-point column rules and turned them downside up into six-point shrouds of black. Historians and jour nalists groped in the lan guage that he had used with such deceptive simplicity and found that simple words could not fully explain him. The preachers and the poli ticians, North and South, spoke mightily. And the people who didn’t speak and couldn’t find the proper ex pressions sought some mean ing. In the good columns of The Springfield Journal, the home-town paper that Lin coln called his "friend,” they remembered that as Pres ident-elect the had told his neighbors, leaving: "To this place, and the kindness of these people, I owe every thing. Here I have lived a quarter of a century, and have passed from a young to an old man. Here my child ren have been born, and one is buried. I now leave, not knowing when, or whether ever, I may return . . . Four years after a second American Revolution called the Civil War, he returned to Springfield. Hatred in Texas Newspaper Of his life, Lincoln had once told a contemporary that it was but one thing: "the short and simple annals of the poor.” But along the edges of the Confederacy December 1963 23 that was, in The Frankfort Commonwealth, they spoke this way about a native son who was born near Hodgen ville, Kentucky: “When Ab raham Lincoln fell, the South lost its best and truest friend.” Such was the sympathetic reaction in most parts of the South. But from Texas came a horrible statement in the pages of The Dallas Herald which said, “God Almighty ordered this event or it could never have taken place.” And in The Tri-Weekly Telegraph, in Houston, ten days after the assassination, these shocking words appear ed: "From now until God’s judgment day, the minds of men will not cease to thrill at the killing of Abraham Lincoln. < . . We saw succes sively in his public docu ments how super-ruling be came his purpose, and how callous to all the usual motives of humanity he grew. . . . Whoever would impose the fate of servitude and slavery on these Confederate States, whatever fatal Provid ence of God shall lay him low, we say, and say it gladly, God’s will be done.” ‘The Gift Outright* When President Kennedy took the oath of office on Jan. 20, 1961, another great poet sang of America in words that echoed Walt Whitman’s. Robert Frost’s vast television audience en abled him to be seen by more people than had ever in the history of mankind heard a poet recite. The de dication of his poem, “The Gift Outright,” was: "For John F. Kennedy.” The land was ours be fore we were the lands’s. She was our land than a hundred years Before we were her people. . . Something we were withholding made us weak Until we found out that it was our selves We were withholding from our land of living. And forthwith found salvation in surren der. . . 24 Panorama To the land vaguely realizing westward, But still unstoried, artless, unenhanced, Such as she was, such as she would become. It was, at the same time, a tribute to a still-young country personified by the new President. — The New York Times. MARTYR TO A CAUSE President Kennedy lies dead, a martyr in the cause of democratic government. His countrymen weep in sorrow and in anger. The immensity of the crime can hardly be grasped in these hours of con fusion. The deed in Dallas was different only in degree of importance from such acts; of violence as the bombing of houses of worship, racial murders and only last month, in the same city, the degrading assault on U. N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson. — Chicago Sun-Times. December 1963 25 ■ And the great came to commit themselves to the memory a great President. THE DAY JFK WAS BURED Alistair Cooke NEW YORK On this most beautiful morning, when the weekend rains have washed all the grey out of the skies, this city was more stilled than it has been since the great Christmas snow of 1947. There was the sun falling like a sword down Fifth Avenue, a slow swish of cars, a few children in the park, and the bells tolling everywhere. It was the same in hun dreds of other cities between Puget Sound and the Florida Keys, not least in stupefied Dallas: and it began to dawn on the people at home, fin gering the heavy papers and watching the funeral march in Washington, that a special surprising calm had fallen on more than a hundred lands that sent in here yes terday an Emperor, a King, a Queen, a Prince, their Pres idents, Premiers, Generals and Ministers of State. The schools and stores and banks and offices were shut down not only in New York and Chicago but also in New Delhi and Athens, through out Israel and Liberia. The flags flew at half mast in Iceland and France, in Japan and Indonesia. The registers of the United States embas sies were signed by queue ing thousands in London and Madrid and Belgrade. The anonymous mourners gathered in St. Pete r’s Square in Rome, in the cap itals of Jordan and Kenya and West Germany, in the University Square in Beirut, and in a rude chapel in the Antarctic base at McMurdo Sound. The little bells tin kled also on the spires of the 140 temples of Bangkok. Forlorn pride In less than 24 hours, the emissaries of all these allies, wards, neutrals, cold enemies, warm friends, and uncommit 26 Panorama ted nations passed through the international airport here on their way to commit themselves to the memory of the late President Kennedy. It now appears that no comparable gathering in one place of the great of so ma ny nations has been since the royal trek to London for the funeral of King Edward VII. The realization brought with it a forlorn pride in what the late President Ken nedy had meant to so many of the new and old nations, and also a barely spoken concern for the peaceful com ings and goings of so pre cious a congregation of na tional leaders. The concern was explicit among the New York police, the officials of the New York Port Authority and later the 250 plainclothes men from various Federal agencies in Washington. Although there is no evidence that the as sassination of the late Pres ident Kennedy could possibly have been balked by even the most elaborate security pro cedures, the Secret Service had not lost a President since its powers were greatly ex panded after the assassina tion of the late President Mc Kinley in 1961, and the ser vice is accordingly under a cloud. This anxiety has spread to police forces of all kinds, and yesterday the New York police department doubled its extra ordinary shift at Idlewild, and in the early afternoon the observation decks at the International Arrivals ’build ing were shut down for the first time in the history of the airport. All Customs regulations were waived for the distin guished visitors and all bag gage was automatically trans ferred to the Washington re lay planes. Most of the dig nitaries, President de Gaulle, President de Valera, Crown Princess Beatrix of the Ne therlands, Mayor Willy Brandt, Emperor Haile Selas sie for example, were taken under protection directly from the ramps to private lounges and never saw the public or the light of day. Today, the FBI, the State Department, and the Secret Service joined the Washing ton police in a round-theclock surveillance of all pub 27 lie. buildings, trees, sewer lids, and every other point of vantage along the route from the Capitol to the Ca thedral and from there to Arlington National Ceme tery. The funeral service, the processions, the naval parade, done as they were with great dignity and style in a beau tiful capital, could not purge the people, the onlookers, or the Government of the quak ing sense of outrage over the violence in Dallas. President Johnson ordered the Justice Department to make its own study of the monstrous case which the Dallas police have declared closed. The Federal Gov ernment has no power to in tervene in a State crime, not even the assassination of a President, but it can unearth and demand the examination of evidence. In this sorry instance, it is determined to convince it self that the legal recourse which was denied the wretch ed Oswald shall be explored to the limit. No proof There is as yet no tittle of proof that Oswald was tied to any political group or plot, and there is so far none of the European frenzy to wring the crime dry of poli tical significance. There is a tortured universal regret that Oswald was not a be liever in some religious sect that lies far from the fringe of even the lunatic fringes of any political party. There is no question, either, that Oswald was re mote from the so called Far Right, or any of its maniacal wings. But what the new Administration senses as keenly as the next man is that violence lies just below the surface of extremists of all stripes, and never more so than when the first trigger has been pulled. These fears twitched spora dically today in the con science of the people as they watched and mourned and felt too little of the healing purge which the intoning of holy scripture and the wis dom of all the best philo sophers so clearly recom mends. — The Guardian, November 25, 1963. 28 Panorama ■ “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” THE FAMED We observe today, not a victory of party but a cele bration of freedom — sym bolizing an end as well as a beginning — signifying re newal as well as change. For I have sworn before you and Almighty God the same so lemn oath our forebears pres cribed nearly a century and three-quarters ago. The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of hu man life. And yet the same revolutionary b e li e f s for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe — the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God. We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the The text of President Kenne dy's Inaugural Address delivered in Washington on Jan. 20, 1961. INAUGURAL word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans — born in this century, tempered by- war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our an cient heritage — and unwill ing to witness or permit the slow undoing of those hu man rights to which this na tion has always been com mitted, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world. Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to as sure the survival and the suc cess of liberty. This much we pledge — and more. Pledge to Allies To those old allies whose cultural and spiritual origins we share, we pledge the 29 loyalty of faithful friends. United, there is little we can not do in a host of new co operative ventures. Divided, there is little we can do — for we dare not meet a power ful challenge at odds and split asunder. To those new states whom we welcome to the ranks of the free, we pledge our word that one form of colonial control shall not have passed away merely to be replaced by a far more iron tyranny. We shall not always expect to find them supporting our view. But we shall always hope to find them strongly supporting their own free dom — and to remember that, in the past, those who foolish ly sought power by riding the back of the tiger ended up in side. To those peoples in the huts and villages of half the globe struggling to break the bonds of mass. misery, we pledge our best efforts to help them help themselves, for whatever period is re quired — not because the Communists may be doing it, not because we seek their votes, but because it is right. If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it can not save the few who are rich. To our sister republics south o£ our border, we of fer a special pledge — to con vert our good words into good deeds — in a new al liance for progress — to assist free men and free govern ments in casting off the chains of poverty. But this peaceful revolution of; hope cannot become the prey of hostile powers. Let all our neighbors know that we shall join with them to oppose ag gression or subversion any where in the Americas. And let eveiy other power know that this hemisphere intends to remain the master of its own house. Last Hope for Peace To that world assembly of sovereign states, the United Nations, our last best hope in an age where the instru ments of war have far out paced the instruments of peace, we renew our pledge of support — to prevent it from becoming merely a forum for invective — to strengthen its shield of the new and the weak — and to enlarge the area in which its writ may run. Finally, to those nations 30 Panorama who would make themselves our adversary, we offer not a pledge but a request: that both sides begin anew the quest for peace, before the dark powers of destruction unleashed by science engulf all humanity in planned or accidental self-destruction. We dare not tempt them with weakness. For only when our arms are sufficient beyond doubt can we be cer tain beyond doubt that they will never be employed. But neither can two great and powerful groups of na tions take comfort from our present course — both sides overburdened by the cost of modern weapons, both right ly alarmed by the steady spread of the deadly atom, yet both racing to alter that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of man kind’s final war. A New Beginning So let us begin anew — re membering on both sides that civility is not a sign of weakness, and sincerity is al ways subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to nego tiate. Let both sides explore what problems unite us in stead of belaboring those problems which divide us. Let both sides, for the first time, formulate serious and precise proposals for the in spection and control of arms — and bring the absolute power to destroy other na tions under the absolute con trol of all nations. Let both sides seek to in voke the wonders of science instead of its terrors.* To gether let us explore the stars, conquer the deserts, eradicate disease, tap the ocean depths and encourage the arts and commerce. Let both sides unite to heed in all corners of the earth the command of Isaiah — to “undo the heavy bur dens . . [and] let the op pressed go free.” And if a beachhead of co operation may push back the jungles of suspicion, let both sides join in creating a new endeavor — not a new ba lance of power, but a new world of law, where the strong are just and the weak secure and the peace pre served. All this will not be finish ed in the first 100 days. Nor will it be finished in the first 1,000 days, nor in the life of this Administration, nor even December 1963 31 perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But let us begin. In your hands, my fellow citizens, more than mine, will rest the final success or failure of our course. Since this country was founded, each generation of Amer icans has been summoned to give testimony to its national loyalty. The graves of young Americans who answered the call to service surround the globe. Now the trumpet summons us again — not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need — not as a call to bat tle, though embattled we are — but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation” — a struggle against the common enemies of 'man:1 tyranny, poverty, disease and war itself. Can we forge against these enemies a grand and global alliance, north and south, east and west, that can assure a more fruitful life for all mankind? Will you join in that historic effort? Light for the World In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this res ponsibility — I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The ener gy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this en deavor will light our country and all who serve it — and the glow from that fi;e can truly light the world. And so, my fellow Amer icans: ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man. Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citi zens of the world, ask of us here the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God’s work must truly be our own. 32 Panorama ■ “Together we shall save our planet or together we shall perish in its flames.'* HIS CREED AND BASIC PRINCIPLES On Freedom and Peace “Peace and freedom do not come cheap, and we are des tined ... to live out most if not all of our lives in un certainty and challenge and peril.” “However close we some times seem to that dark and final abyss, let no man of peace and freedom despair ... If we can all persevere, if we can in every land . . . look beyond our own shores and ambitions, then surely the age will dawn in which the strong are just and the weak secure and the peace preserved.” On the Role of the U.S. "Our strength as well as our convictions have im posed upon this nation the role of leader in freedom’s cause. No role in history could be more difficult or more important . . . This na tion was born of revolution and raised in freedom. And we do not intend to leave an open road to despotism.” “I think our people get awfully impatient and maybe fatigued and tired and say ing ‘We have been carrying this burden [of foreign aid] for 17 years, can’t we-lay it down!’ We can’t lay it down, and I don’t see how we are going to lay it down in this country.” "I do not believe that any of us would exchange place with any other people or any other generation. The ener gy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this en deavor will light our country and all who serve it — and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.” On the Presidency “I want to be a President who responds to a problem not by hoping his subordi nates will act, but by direct ing them to act.” “When things are very quiet and beautifully organ ized I think it’s time to be concerned.” December 1963 33 On the Western Alliance “Those who would sepa rate Europe from America or split one ally from another — would only give aid and comfort to the men who make themselves our adver saries and welcome any West ern disarray.” “The United States can not withdraw from Europe, unless and until Europe should wish us gone. We cannot distinguish its defen ses from our own. We can not diminish our contri butions to Western security or abdicate the responsibility of power.” On Disarmament "Together we shall save our planet or together we shall perish in its flames.” "It is . . . our intention to challenge the Soviet Union, not to an arms race, but to a peace race; to advance step by step, stage by stage, until general and complete disar mament has actually been achieved.” On Negotiating "Our patience at the bar gaining table is nearly inex haustible . . . [and] our hopes for peace are unfailing.” “If they [the Soviets] have proposals, not demands, we shall hear them. If they seek genuine understanding, not concessions of our rights, we shall meet with them . . . We shall ... be ready to search for peace — in quiet exploratory talks, in formal or informal meetings.” On Communist China “We’re not wedded to a policy of hostility to Red China. It seems to me that Red China’s policies are what create tension between not only the United States and Red China, but between Red China and India, be tween Red China and her immediate neighbors to the south and even between Red China and other Communist countries.” On the Berlin Issue "All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin. And therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words ‘Ich bin ein Berliner (I am a Berliner)’.” "The source of world ten sion and trouble is Moscow, not Berlin.” On the Common Market "If American industry can not increase its sales to the 34 Panorama Common Market and in crease this nation’s surplus of imports over exports, our international payments posi tion and our commitments to the defense of freedom will be endangered.” On Vietnam “The systematic aggression now bleeding [South Viet nam] is not a ‘war of libera tion,’ for Vietnam is already free. It is a war of attempt ed subjugation, and it will be resisted.” “Our object [is] to permit the South Vietnamese to maintain themselves as a free and independent country and permit democratic forces within the country to ope rate.” On Latin America “They [the Latin-Ameri can nations] and they alone, can mobilize their resources — enlist the energies of their people — modify their social patterns so that all, and not just a privileged few, share in the fruits of growth.” "We are determined to reinforce the inter-American principle of absolute respect for the sovereignty and inde pendence of every nation. That principle was at the heart of the Good Neighbor policy — and we remain good neighbors today. That principle is the foundation of our Alliance [for Progress] — and we shall always be allies for progress.” On Civil Rights “A rising tide of discontent . . . threatens the public safe ty .. . The events in Bir mingham and elsewher? have so increased the cries for equality that no city or state or legislative body can pru dently choose to ignore them.” “[The] result of continued Federal legislative inaction will continue, if not increase, racial strife — causing the leadership of both sides to pass from the hands of rea sonable and responsible men to tfie purveyors of hate and violence.” “We face ... a mesa! cris is as a country ajtd a people ... It is time to act in the Congress, in your state and local legislative body, and above all, in all our daily lives.” On Defense “Others in earlier times have made the . . . danger ous mistake of assuming that December 1963 35 the West was too selfish and too soft and too divided to resist invasions of freedom in other lands . . . The new preparations that we shall make to defend the peace are based on our needs to meet a worldwide threat . . . Our primary purpose is neither propaganda nor pro vocation — but preparation.” On Foreign Aid “The fundamental task of our foreign aid program . . . is to help make an historical demonstration that . . . eco nomic growth and political democracy can develop hand in hand.” On the Economy “We seek ... an economic climate in which an expand ing concept of business and labor responsibility ... in creasing 'awareness of world commerce and the free forces of domestic competition will keep the price level stable.” "Anyone who is honestly seeking a job and can’t find it deserves the attention of the United States Govern ment and the people . . .” On Space “It is . . . time for this na tion to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.” On the Role of the Military “The basic problems fac ing the world today are not susceptible of a final mili tary solution. While we will long require the services and admire the dedication and commitment of the fighting men of this country, neither our strategy nor our psycho logy as a nation . . . must be come permanently dependent upon an ever-increasing mili tary establishment.” A flame is extinguished for all the people who hope for freedom, justice and a better life in this world. The world in this dark evening has become much poorer. — Willy Brandt, Mayor of West Berlin. 36 Panorama John-John dances as Dad claps . • • December 1963 37 John-John salutes his Dad's remains . . . 38 Panorama Bobby, Jackie and Edward walk to cathedral for Requiem Mass December 1963 39 40 Panorama Cortege enroute to Arlington . . . December 1963 41 L L i A Burial service* a* Arlington . . . 42 Panorama Kennedy and his successor Johnson . . . December 1963 43 America's New First Family — The LB J's of Texas. 44 Panorama ■ Obituary from The Guardian, London, November 23, 1963. A GREAT PRESIDENT - When Facing New Issues President Kennedy was, in many respects, an enigma to his contemporaries, and he is likely to remain equally enig matic to future historians. He was the youngest President ever elected—yet in spite of a certain youthful panache, his poitical style was on the whole curiously sedate. His personality was reserved and he found it difficult to express his emotions in public— yet he was a professional politi cian to his fingertips. Like Roosevelt he was a man of great wealth who joined the liberal wing of his: party out of conviction rather than inheritance—yet he never emulated the pass ion and drive of Roosevelt’s liberalism or identified him self, in the way that Roosevelt did, with the aspirations of ordinary Americans. In the last report the cast of his mind was pragmatic, not ideo logical; and his liberalism, though sincere, was of the head, not of the heart. John Fitzgerald Kennedy was born in Massachusetts in 1917. The history of his fa mily could serve as a case study of the social revolution which has transformed the po sition of America’s ethnic mi norities during the past forty years. His maternal grand father. John Fitzgerald (“Ho ney Fitz”) was one of the leaders of the Boston Irish community, Mayor of Boston, and three times a Congress man. His father, Joseph Ken nedy, was educated at Har vard, made a fortune in real estate and on the Stock Mar ket and became Ambassador to Great Britain. John Kennedy himself was educated at Choate School and Harvard; spent a brief time at the London School of Economics while his father was Ambassador; wrote a best seller “Why England Slept’’; and served with great courage and distinction in the US Navy. In 1946 he was elected to the House of Representa Decbmbkr 1963 45 tives, for one of the poorest districts in Boston. In 1952 he was elected Democratic Senator for Massachusetts, de feating Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., in order to do so. In 1956 he was the Demo cratic candidate for the VicePresident; and it is clear that from then on he hoped and planned for the presidential nomination in 1960. Hard campaign He was elected Preisdent in November, 1960, after one of the hardest-fought cam paigns in American history. His election would have been remarkable in any event, because of his youth. It was made doubly remarkabe be cause he was the first Roman Catholic to reach the White House. A Roman Catholic had been nominated only once before by one of the major parties; and Al Smith’s defeat in 1928 had been wide ly (if not entirely accurate ly) attributed to his religion. The memory of 1928 was one of the chief obstacles in Ken nedy’s path to the Democra tic nomination. He surmounted it in the only way possible: by de monstrating, in primary elec tions all over the country, that he was the most popular candidate in his party. When the Democratic convention met in Los Angeles in July, Kennedy was only a few votes short of the nomination; and there was no real doubt that he would receive it. He won it on the first ballot. The campaign that follow ed was fought on three ac knowledged issues — the slack state of the American econo my; the need for vigorous leadership in Washington to "get America moving again" and to rally the Western al liance; and the alleged inex perience of the Democratic candidate, in contrast to Vice-President Nixon’s sup posed political maturity. The unacknowledged issue was, of course, Kennedy’s Roman Catholic faith. How much the final result was affected by these issues is not.clear. What is clear is that Kennedy was elected by one of the narrowest margins in American history. VicePresident Nixon actually car ried 26 States to Kennedy’s 23, and won 49 per cent of the popular vote as against Kennedy’s 49.7 per cent. The geographical pattern of the results was equally disturbing to a President who 46 Panorama would be called upon to re present the whole nation, at a time of great international tension. On the Pacific Coast, in the Rocky Moun tain States, and in the Mid West, Nixon won a majority of the total votes cast. Only in the industrial North-east and in the traditionally De mocratic stronghold of the confederacy was Kennedy clearly ahead. This was to have an important bearing on the President’s strategy in office. The domestic record of the first eighteen months of the Kennedy Administration was a disappointment to most American liberals — though not, if the public opinion polls could be trusted, to the mass of the American peo ple as a whole. In the Senate the President was supported by a liberal majority. In the House of Representatives, however, the liberal Democ rats were in a minority. They faced a conservative majority made up of Re publicans and Southern De mocrats, working together against progressive legisla tion. In consequence, most of the domestic programme on which the President had campaigned during the elect ion — medical care for the aged, increased federal aid to education, and housing — was badly mauled or defeat ed altogether. Gave warning In part, this was because the President’s attention was, for much of the time, other wise engaged. In his inaugu ral address, he gave the warn ing that the news might get worse before it got better. His warning turned put to be an understatement. As Roosevelt’s first Administra tion was dominated by crisis at home, so Kennedy’s was dominated by world crisis abroad. The first, and perhaps the worst, of these crises was largely of American making. On April 17, 1961, the island of Cuba was invaded by a force of Cuban refugees, hos tile to the pro-Communist regime of Dr. Castro. The invasion had been planned on American territory with the knowledge, and indeed the enthusiastic consent, of the American Administra tion. Short of giving the in vaders American air cover, or reinforcing them with Am erican troops, President Ken nedy could hardly have made 47 his support of the invasion more obvious than it was. This, of course, was a breach of international law and a serious affront to the suscep tibilities of the uncommitted nations. Worse still, the moral and political losses incurred by supporting the invasion in the first place were not red ressed by the gains that might have accrued from mi litary success. If the inva sion had succeeded the Uni ted States would have looked to the neutral world like a successful bully. In the event, she looked like a weak and unsuccessful one. Liberal support Cuba apart, however, Ken nedy’s foreign policy deserv ed — and on the whole re ceived — the support of libe ral opinion in his own coun try and in the rest of the world as well. His interna tional aims can be considered under three heads. In the first place he had to hold the line against renewed Soviet pressure in Europe, and to prevent the NATO alliance from disintegrating under that pressure. Secondly, he showed more anxiety than any of his predecessors had done to reach agreements with the Soviet Union on dis armament and on banning nuclear tests — and if that proved impossible, he wished at least to minimize the dan gers of accidental nuclear war, and of the escalation of a conventional war into a nuclear one, by changes in American defence policy. Finally, he realized the neces sity for a more vigorous pro gramme of aid to the undev eloped world, both in order to prevent the spread of com munism and on moral grounds. For a short time imme diately after Kennedy’s elec tion it seemed that the new Administration might be able to reach agreement with the Soviet Union more easily than its predecessor had done. During the election cam paign itself, international re lations had been almost in abeyance. The fight of the U-2 and the collapse of the Summit conference in the summer of 1960 had led to a period of tension; but the Russians seemed to realize that there was little they could do, one way or the other, until the presidential elections were over in the United States. 48 Panorama Now that the elections were over they seemed inclin ed to believe that the new President (who had, after all, announced publicly that he would have been prepared to apologize for the U-2) would follow a substantially different policy from his pre decessor; and accordingly they treated him at first with a certain wary cordiality However, the honeymoon did not last long. In June, 1961, President Kennedy and Mr. Khrushchev met at Vien na, for an informal summit conference. The main sub ject of their discussions was Berlin. It quickly became clear that the positions of the two sides were as far apart as they had ever been. The Russians insisted that West Berlin must become a demi litarised “free city” and that East Germany must be recog nized as a sovereign State. They threatened that if this were not done by interna tional agreement they would sign a seperate peace with East Germany. They claim ed that in that event West ern rights in West Berlin would automatically lapse, and that the communications between West Berlin from West Germany would auto matically come under East German control. Sky darker The Americans replied that Western rights in Berlin arose out of the Potsdam agreements of 1945 which could not be unilaterally abrogated by the Russians; that the status of West Berlin would therefore remain un changed no matter what treaties the Russians chose to sign with their East Ger man satellites; and that no agreement on the future of Germany would be accept able to the West unless it promised to unite the coun try in peace and freedom. For the rest of the summer the international sky grew steadily darker. Khrushchev launched a war of nerves of the kind Hitler had employ ed in the thirties; Kennedy replied with an adroit mix ture of firmness and concilia tion. The Russians renewed their threat to sign a separate peace with East Germany and boasted of the size of their rocket arsenal. In Aug ust the crisis reached a still more acute stage. On Aug ust 18 the East Germans sealed off their sector from December 1963 49 the Western sectors of the the city and built a wall around West Berlin. In re ply the Western garrison in Berlin was strengthened, Vice-President Johnson was dispatched on a visit to West Berlin to stiffen the morale of the Berliners, and for a whie American and East German troops glowered at each other across the sector border. At the end of the same month, the Russians announced that they would carry out a series of atmos pheric nuclear tests, thus breaking the moratorium on such tests which had been in existence for three years. To all this President Ken nedy replied by making it clear that the West was pre pared to fight, if necessary, for the liberties of the West Berliners and Western rights in the city. At the same time he took care to avoid making provocative gestures which might confront the Russians with a choice be tween losing face and making even more provocative ges tures themselves. The line between appeasement and unnecessary firmness was an extremely delicate one; and Kennedy trod it with great skill. In doubt By October it was becoming clear that the crisis, though still menacing, no longer threatened to explode into physical fighting at a mo ment’s notice. Meanwhile, both sides made tentative approaches to negotiation. The end of the West Ger man election campaign on September 17 removed an element making for rigidity in the Western camp; and the end of the party Congress in Moscow in October did the same for the East. In October there was a meeting between the Secre tary of State, Mr. Dean Rusk, and Mr. Gromyko; and this was followed by a prolonged “probe” of Soviet intentions by the Americans. In the following eight months it looked as if Kennedy would be prepared to offer a limit ed degree of de facto recog nition to East Germany in return for international con trol of the access routes be tween West Berlin and West Germany; but the precise de tails of an agreement remain ed in doubt. They were still in doubt by June, 1962. In the first eighteen months of his Administra 50 Panorama tion, at last, President Ken nedy’s disarmement policy had produced equally little in the way of tangible results. This was not, of course, his own fault. In 1961, with the Russians threatening to sign a separate peace with. East Germany and ending the moratorium on nuclear tests, no progress was possible. In 1962 some progress was made, but it was still painfully slow. Another attempt was made to negotiate a controled ban on nuclear tests, but although the Americans were now willing to make more concessions than they had of fered in the past, agreement seemed as far off as ever. Cuban crisis In the sphere of compre hensive disarmament the out look was slightly more en couraging, perhaps because of the increasingly important part played by the neutrals. These prospects were sud denly and brutally interrupt ed by the Soviet decision to install nuclear missiles in Cuba,, only miles from the coast of Florida. For a few days at the end of October, 1962, the world approached nearer to the brink of ther monuclear war. President Kennedy heard what the Rus sians were doing on October 17. Rightly or wrongly he and his advisers believed that Soviet missiles in Cuba would tilt the strategic ba lance decisively against the West. They knew from their intelligence sources that the Russians were racing against time to make the mis sile pads operational; and they knew that once the launching pads were opera tional, the heartland of the American continent would be vulnerable as never be fore. It seemed clear that they had to act at once. In ‘quarantine’ On the night of October 22 President Kennedy an nounced that the United States had put Cuba into “quarantine.” The “quaran tine” would be enforced by the United States Navy; and all ships carrying offensive weapons to Cuba would be turned back. He also anounced that he had directed “continued and increased close surveillance of Cuba and its military buijd-up”; that the United States would regard any nuclear attack launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western December 1963 51 hemisphere as an attack on the United States. Finally, he called on Mr. Khrushchev to “halt and eliminate this clan destine, reckless and provo cative threat to world peace.” The following day the Latin American countries decided to support the United States. On October 24 Mr. Khrushchev announc ed that the Soviet Union was ready for a summit meeting, and the US blockade went into effect. But the first cri sis point was still to come. It was known that Soviet ships were on their way to Cuba. If they tried to break the American blockade, they would be fired upon. If they were fired on, war might re sult. A new turn On October 25 the first Soviet ship reached the Am erican blockade. It was in tercepted and allowed to proceed. Next day, the cri sis took a new turn. The White House announced that development of Soviet missile sites in Cuba was still con tinuing at “a rapid pace”; and the State Department added that if offensive pre parations in Cuba were to continue "further action” would be justified. This was the second major crisis point. Mr. Khrushchev had been warned that the Russian mis siles must be removed, and so far he had not done so. Soon President Kennedy would have to act: by pin point bombing of the sites, by a parachute assault, by a massive invasion of Cuba or by a nuclear strike against the bases. On October 28 Mr. Khrushchev finally saw the folly of persisting, and announced that the Soviet missiles bases in Cuba would be dismantled. Anxious mo ments were still to come, but the crisis was over. Edge of catastrophe Firmness coupled with caution had prevailed: and it is clear in retrospect that both elements were equally important. For President Kennedy had steadily refused to launch a surprise air strike against Cuba, as some of his advisers had suggested; he had made every possible effort to leave the Russians a chance to retreat without los ing face. No one will ever know whether he was right about the magnitude of the threat the Soviet missiles seemed to represent. There 52 Panorama can be no doubt, however, that his handing of the threat showed statesmanship of a high order. Over Cuba, one of Pres ident Kennedy’s advisers said.. afterwards, they had felt in Washington as though they could be "within five mi nutes of destruction." Both Mr. Kennedy and no doubt Mr. Khrushchev as well real ized that they had been to the edge of catastrophe; and both tried to withdraw from it as soon as they could. President Kennedy’s part in this was notable. Cuba re presented a victory for him and his country; but he steadily refused to boast about it, or to humiliate his opponent. Instead, he made every effort to reach a gen uine understanding with the Russians, International relations slowly took a turn for the better. In January 1963 "ex ploratory taks” were held in New York between Russia and the United States, in an atempt to establish a founda tion for a ban on nuclear tests. Towards the end of the month Mr. Khrushchev sud denly announced that he was prepared to accept the principle of on-site inspec tion; and for a short time it looked as though a full-scale agreement might soon be reached. But these hopes proved over-optimistic. Endless hag gling took place over the exact number of on-site ins pections to be allowed in a year. The West insisted on seven; the Russians stuck at three. By the summer it had become clear that the Russians were not prepared to accept any inspection, and that a full-scale ban was therefore impossible. Then on June 10 President Kennedy made a last effort to break the deadlock. In a striking speech at the Am erican University, he an nounced that the United States would not resume at mospheric tests so long as other countries also abstained. He called on his own country men "not to fall into the same trap as the Soviets, not to see only a distorted and desperate view of the other side, not to see conflict as inevitable." At the same time it was announced that a high-level conference would be held in Moscow in July to look for a way out of the impasse in which all previous December 1963 S3 conferences had been bogged down. The conference was success ful; and by the end of the summer a treaty had been signed banning nuclear tests in the atmosphere, under the sea and in outer space. World opinion In itself, the test-ban treaty meant comparatively little. It contained no measures of inspection or control; and the only real sanction behind it was the pressure of world opinion. But in spite of its limitations as a disarmament treaty, it had immense signi ficance for world politics. For the first time since the Cold War, the great nuclear powers had agreed to restirct their own freedom of action in the interests of world peace. At the least it was a step in the right direction. The danger of nuclear war still remained, and would re main. But it was now possi ble to hope for further steps to a geniune detente between East and West. Paradoxically, the prospect of a relaxation of tension be tween East and West led to a renewal of tension within the Western Alliance. Pres ident de Gaulle was adamant ly opposed to any detente with the Russians in the fore seeable future. It was an open secret that many West Germans were alarmed by the possibility that a detente with Russia might lead to some form of recognition for East Germany. Apart from these fears, the Alliance grew increasingly divided by the thorny pro blems raised by its own nu clear arsenal. Britain insisted on retaining her own inde pendent nuclear deterrent; and at Nassau at the end of 1962 President Kennedy was reluctantly persuaded to sup ply Polaris missiles to Bri tain, on certain conditions, when the British V-bomber force became obsolete. Mean while France was equally determined to become an in dependent nuclear power; and there seemed to be a real danger that West Germany would soon follow suit. In January, 1963, President de Gaulle vetoed Britain’s application to join the Eu ropean Common Market — in terms which implied a fundamental hostility to Am erican leadership in the At lantic alliance. This was fol lowed by a series of pinpricks culminating in a decision to 54 Panorama withdraw the French Atlan tic fleet from its NATO as signment. In order to isolate France, and contain West Germany, President Kennedy put forward a proposal for a “mixed-manned” NATO nu clear force. The proposal was received with little en thusiasm. West Germany was eager to join the mixedmanned force; but the other allies were suspicious. Mili tarily the proposal had little value; its political benefits were at best dubious. At the time of President Kennedy’s death, its fate was still in doubt. The only certainty was that the legitimate de mands of the European allies for a voice in nuclear strategy would somehow have to be reconciled with NATO soli darity. Here President Ken nedy’s successor faces a major unsolved problem. He faces another problem — almost as grave, and also unsolved — at home. In the summer of 1963 the Am erican domestic scene was transformed by a massive re volt of the Negro community — North as well as South — against discrimination and inequality. In the first two years of its life, the Kennedy Administration had had a disappointing record in the field of civil rights. The promise of his election plat form had not been fulfilled; the hopes of the Negro com munity — and of white libe rals as well — had been dis appointed. But after the race riots in Alabama the Administration at last began to act, and it acted with courage and de termination. A sweeping civil rights bill was placed before Congress, more-farreaching in scope than any thing which had ever been attempted in this century. More important still, Pres ident Kennedy -threw the weight of his office behind the civil rights movement in a way that neither he, nor his predecessors, had pre viously done. It is too soon to tell what the immediate future holds in store for the American Negro. What is certain is that President Ken nedy in the end earned a distinguished place in the list of those wno have tried to make the American dream a reality for the coloured tenth of the population. Fulfilling promise President Kennedy was the youngest President ever elect 55 ed; and for the first half of his presidency he seemed to be feeling his way. Apart from the disaster of the Bay of Pigs his policies were thoughtful, judicious and sometimes even wise. But there was a curious lack of passion and urgency in the way he presented them to his countrymen. After the sear ing experience of Cuba, this changed. On strictly political issues, the domestic performance of his Administration remained disappointing — less because of any faults of omission or commission on its part than because of stubborn conser vative opposition in Congress and an apathetic public opinion. But on civil rights he had at last begun to fulfill the promise of his election campaign and on the sup reme issues of peace and war, he had proved himself a great President. THE PONTIFF'S HOPE “We pray God that the sacrifice of John Ken nedy1 may assist the cause promoted and defended by him for the liberty of peoples and peace in the world. . . . We deplore with all our heart this event. We express the hope that the death of this great states man does not bring harm to the American people, but reinforces its moral and civil sense and strengthen its sentiments of nobility and concord.” — Pope Paul. 56 Panorama ■ The speech that was to have been delivered in Dallas, Texas just before the assassination. AMERICA'S STRENGTH IS FOR PEACE John F. Kennnedy I am honored to have this invitation to address the an nual meeting of the Dallas Citizens Council, joined by the members of the Dallas As sembly — and pleased to have this opportunity to sa lute the Graduate Research Center of the Southwest. It is fitting that these two symbols of Dallas progress are united in the sponsor ship of this meeting. For they represent the best qua lities, I am told, of leadership and learning in this city — and leadership and learning are indispensable to each other. The advancement of learning depends on commu nity leadership for financial and political support — and the products of that learning, in turn, are essential to the leadership's hopes for con tinued progress and prosper ity. It is not a coincidence that those communities pos sessing the best in research and graduate facilities — from MIT to Cal Tech — tend to attract the new and growing industries. I con gratulate those of you here in Dallas who have recog nized these basic facts through the creation of the unique and forward-looking Graduate Research Center. This link between leader ship and learning is not only essential at the community level. It is even more indis pensable in world affairs. Ig norance and misinformation can handicap the progress of a city or a compay — but they can, if allowed to pre vail in foreign policy, handi cap this country’s security. In a world of complex and continuing problems, in a world full of frustrations and irritations, America’s leader December 1963 57 ship must be guided by the lights of learning and reason — or else those who confuse rhetoric with reality and the plausible with the possible will gain the popular as cendancy with their seeming ly swift and simple solutions to every world problem. There will always be dissi dent voices heard in the land, expressing opposition with out alternatives, finding fault but never favor, per ceiving gloom on every side and seeking influence with out responsibility. Those voices are inevitable. But today other voices are heard in the land — voices preaching doctrines wholly unrelated ta reality, wholly unsuited to the Sixties, doc trines which apparently as sume that words will suffice without .weapons, that vitu peration is as good as victory and that peace is a sign of weakness. At a time when the national debt is steadily being reduced in terms of its burden on our economy, they see that debt as the greatest single threat to our security. At a time when we are steadily reducing the number of Federal employees serving every thousand citizens, they fear those supposed hordes of civil servants far more than the actual hordes of opposing armies. We cannot expect that everyone, to use the phrase of a decade ago, will “talk sense to the American peo ple." But we can hope that fewer people will listen to nonsense. And the notion that this Nation is headed for defeat through deficit, or that strength is but a matter of slogans, is nothing but just plain nonsense. I want to discuss with you today the status of dur strength and our security be cause this question clearly calls for the most responsible qualities of leadership and the most enlightened pro ducts of scholarship. For this Nation’s strength and security are not easily or cheaply obtained — nor are they quickly and simply ex plained. There are many kinds of strength and no one kind will suffice. Over whelming nuclear strength cannot stop a guerilla war. Formal pacts of alliance can not stop ■ internal subversion. Displays of material wealth cannot stop the disillusion 58 PANORAMA ment of diplomats subjected to discrimination. Above all, words alone are not enough. The United States is a peaceful nation. And where our strength and determination are clear, our words need merely to convey conviction, not blligerence. If we- are strong, our strength will speak for itself. If we are weak, words will be of no help. I realize that this Nation often tends to identify turn ing-points in world affairs with the major addresses which preceded them. But it was- not the Monroe Doc trine that kept all Europe away from this hemisphere — it was the strength of the British fleet and the width of the Atlantic Ocean,. It was not General Marshall’s speech at Harvard which kept communism out of Western Europe — it was the strength and stability made possible by bur military and economic assistance. In this Administration also it has been necessary at times to issue specific warnings — warnings that we could not stand by and watch the com munists conquer Laos by force,- or intervene in the Con go, or swallow West Berlin or maintain offensive missiles on Cuba. But while our goals were at least temporarily ob tained in these and other instances, our successful de fense of freedom was due — not to the words we used — but to the strength we stood ready to use on behalf of the principles we stand ready to defend. This strength is composed of many different elements, ranging from the most mas sive deterrents to the most subtle influences. And all types of strength are needed — no one kind could do the job alone. Let us take a moment, therefore, to review this Nation’s progress in each major area of strength. First, as Secretary McNa mara made clear in his ad dress last Monday, the strate gic nuclear power of the United States has been so greatly modernized and ex panded in the last 1,000 days, by the rapid production and deployment of the most mo dern missile systems, that any and all potential aggres sors are clearly confronted now with the impossibility of strategic victory — and the certainty of total destruction December 1963 59 — if by reckless attack they should ever force upon us the necessity of a strategic reply. In less than three years, we have increased by 50 per cent the number of Polaris submarines scheduled to be in force by the next fiscal year — increased by more than 70 percent our total Polaris purchase program — increased by more than 75 percent our Minuteman pur chase program — increased by 50 percent the portion of our strategic bombers on 15minute alert — and increased by 100 percent the total num ber of nuclear weapons avail able in our strategic alert forces. Our security is fur ther enhanced by the steps we have taken regarding these weapons to improve the speed arid certainty of their response, their readiness at all times to respond, their ability to survive an attack and their ability to be care fully controlled and directed through secure command operations. But the lessons of the last decade have taught us that freedom cannot be defended by strategic nuclear power alone. We have, therefore, in the last three years acce lerated the development and deployment of tactical nu clear weapons — and increas ed by 60 percent the tactical nuclear forces deployed in Western Europe, Nor can Europe or any other continent rely on nu clear forces alone, whether they are strategic or tactical. We have radically improved the readiness of our conven tional forces — increased by 45 percent the number of combat-ready army divisions — increased by 100 percent the procurement of modern army weapons and equip ment — increased by 100 our ship construction, con version and modernization program — increased by 100 percent our procurement of tactical aircraft — increased by 30 percent the number of tactical air squadrons — and increased the strength of the Marines. As last month's "Operation B i g Lift” — which originated here in Texas — showed so clearly, this Nation is prepared as never before to move sub stantial numbers of men in surprisingly little time to advanced positions anywhere in the world. We have in 60 Panorama creased by 175 percent the procurement of airlift air craft — and we have already achieved a 75 percent in crease in our existing stra tegic airlift capability. Final ly, moving beyond the tradi tional roles of. our military forces, we have achieved an increase of nearly 600 per cent in our Special Forces — those forces that are prepar ed to work with our allies and friends against the guer rillas, saboteurs, insurgents and assassins who threaten freedom in a less direct but equally dangerous manner. But American military might should not and need not stand alone against the ambitions of international communism. Our security and strength, in the last an alysis, directly depend on the security and strength of others — and that is why our military and economic as sistance plays such a key role in enabling those who live on the periphery of the communist world to main tain their independence of choice. Our assistance to these nations can be painful, risky and costly — as is true in Southeast Asia today. But we dare not weary of the task. For our assistance makes possible the stationing of 3.5 million Allied troops along the communist fron tier at one-tenth the cost of maintaining a comparable number of American soldiers. A successful communist breakthrough in these areas, necessitating direct United States intervention, would cost us several times as much as our entire foreign aid program — and might cost us heavily in American lives as well. About 70 percent of our military assistance goes to nine key countries located on or near the borders of the communist bloc — nine coun tries confronted directly or indirectly with the threat of communist aggression — VietNam, Free China, Korea, Ind i a, Pakistan, Thailand, Greece, Turkey and Iran. No one of these countries possesses on its own the re sources to maintain the for ces which our own Chiefs of Staff think needed in the common interest. Reducing our efforts to train, equip and assist their armies can only encourage communist penetration and require in time the increased over December 1963 61 seas deployment of American combat forces. And reduc ing the economic help need ed to bolster these nations that undertake to help de fend freedom can have the same disastrous result. In short, the $50 billion we spend each year on our own defense could well be inef fective without the $4 billion required for military and economic assistance. Our foreign aid program is not growing in size — it is, on the contrary, smaller now than in previous years. It has had its weaknesses — but we have undertaken to correct them — and the proper way of treating weaknesses is to replace them with strength, not to increase those weaknesses by emascu lating essential programs. Dollar for dollar, in or out of government, there is no better form of investment in our national security than our much-abused foreign aid program. We cannot afford to lose it. We can afford to maintain it. We can surely afford, for example, to do as much for our 19 needy neigh bors of Latin America as the communist bloc is sending to the island of Cuba alone. I have spoken of strength largely in terms of the de terrence and. resistance of aggression and attack. But, in today’s world, freedom can be lost , without a shot being fired, by ballots as well as bullets. The success of our leadership is dependent upon respect for our mission in the world as well as our missiles — on a clearer recognition of the virtues of freedom as well as the evils of tyranny. That is why our Informa tion Agency has doubled the shortwave broadcast power of the Voice of America and increased the number of broadcasting hours by 30 per cent — increased Spanish-language broadcasting to Cuba and Latin America from one to nine — hours a day — in creased seven-fold to more than 3.5 million copies the number of American books being translated and publish ed for Latin American Readers — and taken a host of other steps to carry our message of truth and freedom to all the far comers of the earth. And that is also why we have regained the initiative in the exploration of outer space — making an annual 62 Panorama effort greater than the com bined total of all space acti vities undertaken during the Fifties — launching more than 130 vehicles into earth orbit — putting into actual operation valuable weather and communications satel lites — and making it clear to all that the United States of America has no. intention of finishing second in space. This effort is expensive — but it pays its own way, for freedom and for America. For there is ho longer any fear in the free world that a com munist lead in space will be come a permanent assertion of supremacy and the basis of military superiority. There is no longer any doubt about the strength and skill of Am erican science, American in dustry, American education and the American free enter prise system. In short, our na tional space effort represents a great gain in, and a great resource.of, our national strength — and both Texas and Texans are contributing greatly to this strength. Finally, it should be clear by now that a nation can be no stronger abroad than she is at home. Only an Am erica which practices what it preaches about equal rights and social justice will be res pected by those whose choice affects our future. Only an America which has fully edu cated its citizens is fully cap able of tackling the complex problems and perceiving the hidden dangers of the world in which we live. And only an America which is growing and prospering economically can sustain the worldwide defenses of freedom, while demonstrating to all con cerned the opportunities of our system and society. It is clear, therefore, that we are strengthening our se curity as well as our econo my by our recent record in creases in national income and output — by surging ahead of most of Western Europe in the rate of busi ness expansion and the mar gin of corporate profits — by maintaining a more stable level of prices than almost any of our overseas competitors — and by cutting personal and corporate income taxes by some $11 billion, as I have proposed, to assure this Nation of the longest and stongest expansion in our peacetime economic history. December 1963 63 This Nation’s total output — which three years ago was at the $500 billion mark — will soon pass $600 billion, for a record rise of over $100 billion in three years. For the first time in history we have 70 million men and women at work. For the first time in history average factory earn ings have exceeded $100 a week. For the first time in history corporation profits after taxes — which have ris en 43 percent in less than three years — have reached an annual level of $27.4 bil lion. My friends and fellow citizens: I cite these facts and figures to make it clear that America today is strong er than ever before. Our ad versaries have not abandoned their ambitions — our dan gers have not diminished — our vigilance cannot be re laxed. But now we have the military, the scientific and the economic strength to do whatever must be done for the preservation and promo tion of freedom. That strength will never be used in pursuit of aggres sive ambitions — it will al ways be used in pursuit of peace. It will never be used to promote provocations — it will always be used to pro mote the peaceful settlement of disputes. We in this country, in this generation, are — by destiny rather than choice — the watchmen on the walls of world freedom. We ask, therefore, that we may be worthy of our power and res ponsibility — that we may exercise our strength with wisdom and restraint — and that we may achieve in our time and for all time the ancient vision of ’’peace on earth, goodwill toward men.” That must always be our goal — and the righteousness of our cause must always un derlie our strength. For as was written long ago: "Ex cept the Lord keep the city, the watchman but in vain.” 64 Panorama ■ “Let us put an end to the teaching and the preach ing of hate and evil and violence.” U.S. WILL MEET ITS COMMITMENTS ABROAD’ Lyndon B. Johnson All I have I would have given glady not to be stand ing here today. The greatest leader of our time has been struck down by the foulest deed of our time. Today John Fitzgerald Kennedy lives on in the im mortal words and works that he left behind. He lives on in the mind and memories of mankind. He lives on in the hearts of his countrymen. No words are sad enough to express our sense of loss. No words are strong enough to express our determination to continue the forward thrust of America that he be gan. The dream of conquering the vastness of space — the dream of partnership across the Atlantic — and across the ♦Speech before the U.S. Con gress on November 27, 1963. Pacific as well — the dream of a Peace Corps in less dev eloped nations — the dream of education for all of our children — the dream of jobs for all who seek them and need them — the dream of care for our elderly — the dream of an all-out attack on mental illness — and above all, the dream of equal rights for all Americans, whatever their race or color — these and other American dreams have been vitalized by his drive and by his dedication. And now the ideas and ideals which he so nobly re presented must and will be translated into effective ac tion. Under John Kennedy’s leadership, this Nation has demonstrated that it has the courage to seek peace, and it has the fortitude to risk war. We have proved that we are December 1963 65 a good and reliable friend to those who seek peace and freedom. We have shown that We can also be a formi dable foe to those who reject the path of peace and those who seek to impose upon us or our allies the yoke of ty ranny. This Nation will keep its commitments from South Viet-Nam to West Berlin. We will be unceasing in the search for peace; resourceful in our pursuit of areas of agreement even with those with whom we differ; and generous and loyal to those who join with us in common cause. In this age when there can be no losers in peace and no victors in war, we must re cognize the obligation to 'match national strength with national restraint. We must be prepared at one and the same time for both the con frontation of power and the limitation of power. We must be ready to defend the national interest and to ne gotiate the common interest. This is the path that we shall continue to pursue. Those who test our courage will find it strong, and those who seek our friendship will find it honorable. We will de monstrate anew that the strong can be just in the use of strength; and the just can be strong in the defense of justice. And let all know we will extend no special privilege and impose no persecution. We will carry on the fight against poverty and misery, disease and ignorance, in other lands and in our own. We will serve all of the Nation, not one section or one sector, or one group, but all Americans. These are the United States — a united people with a united purpose. Our American unity does not depend upon unanimity. We have differences; but now, as in the past, we can derive from those differences strength, not weakness, wis dom, not despair. Both as a people and as a govern ment, we can unite upon a program, a program which is wise, just, enlightened, and constructive. For 32 years, Capitol Hill has been my home. I have shared many moments of pride with you, pride in the ability of the Congress of the United States to act, to meet any crisis, to distill from our 66 Panorama differences strong programs of national action. An assassin’s bullet has thrust upon me the awesome burden of the Presidency. I am here today to say that I need your help; I cannot bear this burden alone. I need the help of all Am ericans, and all America. This Nation has experienced a profound shock, and in this critical moment, it is our duty, yours and mine, as the Government of the United States, to do away with un certainty and doubt and de lay, and to show that we are capable of decisive action; that from the brutal loss of our leaders we will derive not weakness, but strength; that we can and will act and act now. From this chamber of re presentative government, let all the world know and none misunderstand that I rede dicate this Government to the unswerving support of the United Nations,to the honor able and determined execu tion of our commitments to our allies, to the maintenance of military strength second to none, to the defense of the strength and the stability of the dollar, to the expansion of our foreign trade, to the reinforcement of our prog rams of mutual assistance and cooperation in Asia and Afri ca, and to our Alliance for Progress in this hemisphere. On the 20th day of Jan uary, in 1961, John F. Ken nedy told his countrymen that our national work would not be finished "in the first 1,000 days, nor in the life of this Administra tion, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But," he said, “let us begin.” Today, in this moment of new resolve, I would say to all my fellow Americans, let us continue. This is our challenge — not to hesitate, not to pause, not to turn about and linger over this evil moment, but to continue on our course so that we may fulfill the des tiny that history has set for us. Our most immediate tasks are here on this Hill. First, no memorial oration or eulogy could more elo quently honor President Kennedy’s memory than the earliest possible passage of the Civil Rights Bill for which he fought so long. We have talked long enough December 1963 67 in this country about equal rights. We have talked for 100 years or more. It is time now to write the next chap ter, and to write it in the books of law. I urge you again, as I did in 1957 and again in I960, to enact a -civil rights law so that we can move forward to eliminate from this Na tion every trace of discriminat’on and oppression that is based upon race or color. There could be no greater source of strength to this Na tion both at home and abroad. And second, no act of ours could more fittingly continue the work of President Ken nedy than the early passage of the tax bill for which he fought all this long year. This is a bill designed to in crease our national income and Federal revenues, and to provide insurance against re cession. That bill, if passed without delay, means more security for those now work ing, more jobs for those now without them, and more in centive for our economy. In short, this is no time for delay. It is a time for action — strong, forwardlooking action on the pend ing education bills to help bring the light of learning to every home and hamlet in America — strong, forwardlooking action on youth em ployment opportunities; strong, forward-looking act ion on the pending foreign aid bill, making clear that we are not forfeiting our responsibilities to this hemis phere or to the world, nor erasing executive flexibility in the conduct of our foreign affairs — and strong, prompt and forward-looking action on the remaining appro priations bils. In this new spirit of action, the Congress can expect the full cooperation and support of the Executive Branch. And in particular, I pledge that the expenditures of your Government will be adminis tered with the utmost thrift and frugality. I will insist that the. Government get a dollar’s value for a dollar spent. The Government will set an example of prudence and economy. This does not mean that we will not meet our unfilled needs or that we will not honor our com mitments. We will do both. As one who has long served in both Houses of the Con 68 Panorama gress, I firmly believe in the independence and the in tegrity of the Legislative Branch. And I promise you that I shall always - respect this. It is deep in the mar row of my bones. With equal firmness, I believe in the capacity and I believe in the ability of the Congress, despite the divisions of opinions which characterize our Nation, to act — to act wisely, to act vigorously, to act speedily when the need arises. The need is here. The need is now. I ask your help. We meet in grief, but let us also meet in renewed dedi cation and renewed vigor. Let us meet in action, in to lerance, and in mutual un derstanding. John Kennedy’s death commands what his life conveyed — that America must move forward. The time has come for Americans of all races and creeds and political beliefs to understand and to respect one another. So let us put an end to the teaching and the preaching of hate and evil and violence. Let us turn away from the fana tics of the far left and the far right, from the apostles of bitterness and bigotry, from those defiant of law, and those who pour venom into our Nation’s blood stream. I profoundly hope that the tragedy and the torment of these terrible days will bind us together in new fellow ship, making us one people in our hour of sorrow. So let us here highly resolve that John Fitzgerald Kennedy did not live — or die — in vain. And on this Thanks giving Eve, we gather to gether to ask the Lord’s bless ing, and give Him our thanks, let us unite in those familiar and cherished words: America, America God shed His Grace on thee, and crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea. President Kennedy died as a soldier, under fire, doing his duty, in the service of his country. In the name of the French people, a friend always to the American people, I salute this great memory. — General de Gaulle. 69 ■ A prince of horse traders and of that special breed — ‘wheeler-dealers.’ THE TEXAN WHO TAKES OVER Lyndon Baines Johnson succeeded on Friday in cir cumstances of tragic horror and irony to the office he has sought so long. He took the oath to “per form the duties of the Pres ident of the United States” standing in the cabin of the aircraft that was to leave his native Texas a few minutes later with the body of the man who was his rival before he was his predecessor. Less than three and a half hours later, the brutal glare of arc lights hit the plane as it taxied to a stop at three minutes 1 past six Eastern Standard Time at Andrews air force base near Washing ton. First a stunned group of President Kennedy’s aides and friends lowered the cof fin in a bright yellow cate rer’s lift into a waiting grey naval ambulance. Then Mrs. Kennedy was helped down the steps, her pink suit still smeared with blood from her husband’s wound. Only af ter this tragic party had gone did the waiting group of of ficials, Senators, diplomats and reporters, many of them openly weeping or close to tears, notice a tall man stand ing at a microphone. Johnson gave a sort of shi ver. He looked gauntly down at his wife for encou ragement. Then he began to speak. His first words were drowned by a roar of army helicopters, whose lights were flashing red. Then somebody gave an or der, and the new President could be heard. “I will do my best,” he was saying, “that is all I can do. I ask for your help and God’s.” Then he went straight by helicopter to the White House. There, the first offi cials President Johnson met were Mr. McNamara, Secreta ry of Defence, and Mr. McGeorge Bundy, President Ken nedy’s Special Assistant for National Security. The meet ing seemed to dramatise the crushing new responsibilities that have fallen on a man 70 Panorama whose career, up till now has been that of a consummately skilful domestic politician with little knowledge or ex perience of the great ques tions of foreign policy and defence that are now his to decide. Fully prepared for the job Lyndon Johnson comes to the Presidency after as full a preparation as any man could reasonably have. He was born to politics. His father’s father — who fought for the Confederacy against the Union — and his father were both members of the Texas Legislature, and an other of his ancestors on the same side carried a rifle for Texas against the Mexicans. On his mother’s side his forebears were Baptist preachers and teachers, typi cal of the pioneering stock of modest means from which the conservative South likes to choose its leaders. "When I was born,” Johnson told a visitor not long ago, “my daddy galloped over to his father’s place and told him that Lyndon Baines Johnson had just discovered America. Grandpa replied that a United States Senator had just been bom.” But— ac cording to Johnson, who is as fond of tales as any Texan — his mother used to urge him never to seek the Pres idency: “It would break your heart if you missed,” she used to say. The Johnsons came from a highly individual part of Texas near Austin, the capi tal of the State; it is an is land of hills starting out of the plains. It has a liberal tradition, owing much to German settlers who came out to Texas after 1848, in the middle of a State settled mainly by migrants from the conservative slave-o w n i n g South. Johnson was born in Stone wall, Texas, on August 27, 1908, and left high school at 15, first to hitchhike to Cal ifornia, and then to work for two years as a common la bourer in r o a d-building gangs. It was his father who persuaded him to go to col lege, and he worked his way through South West Texas State Teachers College, grar duating with a B.Sc. in 1930. He taught in a Houston school for nearly two years before going to Washington for the first time as secretary to a Congressman. December 1963 71 Less than five years later he was a Congressman him self. In what Britain would call a by-election he beat nine other candidates and won on a strongly pro-New Deal campaign which attracted the immediate notice and patronage of President Roose velt, who happened to be on a fishing holiday in Texas. Johnson was still only 27 when he rode in triumph to Washington on F.D.R.’s spe cial train. But if his political rise had been quick so far, after he reached Washington it was phenomenal. From the start, though far more of a New Dealer than the major ity of Southern Congress men, he attracted the atten tion and friendship of older men by his gifts as a practisirig political realist. After only four years in the House, in 1941, he stood for the Senate in a colourful campaign against an old pro known as “Pass-the-BiscuitsPappy,” and used for the first time the barn storming tech niques which became some thing of a trade-mark. He lost by a mere thirteen hundred votes. Then came Pearl Har bour. Next day, Johnson joined the Navy, and was decorated personally by General MacArthur for bravery on Navy bombing missions in the Far East. Then President Roose velt forbade Members of Congress to fight. Johnson came back to Washington, and was Chairman of an im portant House Committee investigating the conduct of the war. In 1948, he ran for the Senate again. Again it was a desperately close election, but this time John son won by 87 votes. But Johnson went on as though his margin had been a million. Within two years he was a member of the of ficial Senate leadership, and in 1953, after only five years in the Senate, he became De mocratic leader, the youngest man ever to lead either party there. Two years later again, in 1955, the Democrats won a majority in the Senate, and Johnson moved into the job he was to master as no one, by common consent, has ever mastered it before, as Major ity Leader. In July, 1955, when he had been in his job for less than six months, he had a heart 72 Panorama attack as he was sitting by the pool at his Texas ranch. His recovery was complete: long afterwards he used to carry an eledtro-<cardiograph in his pocket which he liked to show to visitors to prove how absolute his recovery had been. But he proved it perhaps even more with the tireless energy with which he marshalled the Senate. This is a uniquely proud col lege of independent poten tates who shy away from the Whip. Prince of the horse traders He was no orator, and, in deed, the Senate has no time for oratory. Johnson’s gift was for lightning and com plex calculations of where each man's interest lay, a minute knowledge of each man’s habits and views and even his whereabouts — on several occasions he sent his messengers south and west to summon his array by po lice car and jet plane for some crucial vote. He was the prince of horse traders and of that special Texan breed called “wheeler-deal ers.” But behind the lazy, some times cynical charm, behind the good fellowship and the drawled Texan jokes, there was not only a keen and sub tle political brain: there was plenty of late-night staff work and studying of bills and amendments and ballot lists. Johnson is a secret worker. At this time a colleague said of him: “He doesn’t have the best mind on the Democratic side in the Sen ate; he isn’t the best orator, he isn’t the best Parliament arian. But he’s the best com bination of all these quali ties.” And under President Eisenhower, he was probably the most powerful man in the U.S. It was his sheer political skill and his ability to mani pulate his colleagues that won him his position. He sensed the approach of trou ble. He was superb at sooth ing the ruffled. He passed a splendid compliment. He was a master of the few mur mured words, heads together, arm in arm, in the lobby or cloakroom, that could edge a ball through better than a long speech on the floor. He preferred to get things set tled before they were debat ed. Such gifts are also essen tial in the White House. December 1963 73 In 1960, when Johnson made his fiercely professional bid for the Presidential no mination, he was not widely known outside his native Texas and Washington. He seemed provincial. And he had even severer handicaps to overcome than that: he was a Southerner, and no man from the 11 States that seced ed from the Union in the Civil War has ever been elected to the Presidency, once almost a monopoly of Virginians. How much of a Southerner is Johnson? Or, which is the same thing in American poli tical terms, how much of a Conservative is he? As a Texan, and West Texan at that, there is a cer tain ambiguity about the tra dition from which he springs, an ambiguity which Johnson has deliberately exploited. To Northern and Western audiences, he has stressed that he thinks of himself as a Westerner: in the South, he has not denied that he is the son of the South. And in 1960 at least, it seemed that he was caught in the toils of his own ambiguity. To Southerners and con servatives, the man was sus pect because of his early sup port for the New Deal and his votes for measures favour ing Negroes and Mexican Americans. (Johnson has been a good friend to this large and under-privi leged group in Texas all his political life, and the Mexi cans repay him with political loyalty.) 'One conservative businessman in 1960 called him a "damned radical New Dealing son of a bitch.” Yet at the same time John son was getting one of his secretaries to draw up a mi nute analysis of his voting record in the vain attempt to convince Northern labour and liberals and Negroes that he had never been the "reactionary” they took him for. Had he not used all his Parliamentary skill to put through the two Civil Rights Bills of 1957 and 1960? Yet he got no credit from the liberals for it. The assump tion was that Johnson was just a kind of enlightened conservative who was acting as a front for Southern re sistance to Civil Rights. Johnson’s intimates have always insisted that such sus picions were unjustified, while conceding that his tem 74 Panorama peramental affinity for the cunning old craftsmen of the Southern power structure in the Senate made them under standable. But, say those who have seen most of John son in the last three years, in any case his views on Civil Rights have moved, and mov ed perceptibly, to the Left. Whatever the reason, whe ther because there never was a chance of persuading the party that he could win enough Northern votes to be elected, or simply because the Kennedy organization had moved too fast too soon, Johnson was beaten at the convention at Los Angeles, after a struggle marked by personal bitterness. The story of how Johnson became President is the story of how he became Vice-Pres ident. At the national convention in July, 1960, the huge excite ment which had died after Kennedy’s nomination was abruptly revived when the word went round that John son might be his running mate and potential Vice-Pres ident. It was reckoned and at once brought two of the three major elements of the party-labour and the Demo cratic leaders from the big cities — into direct collision. The most detailed account of what probably happened behind closed doors in the Biltmore Hotel has been es sayed by Theodore H. White in his book “The Making of the President.” Most peo ple had thought the running mate would have been either Senator Henry M. Jackson of Washington or Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri. The battle for the candidacy was known to have stirred up a mutual bitterness between Kennedy and Johnson. Yet, according to White, it was in Kennedy’s mind that the choice of Johnson was first tentatively born and it was Kennedy himself who tele phoned the Johnson suite at the Biltmore at 8 o’clock in the morning to discuss the idea. When the news spread, the big city leaders thought the choice a fine one for the country and for the ticket. But the labour leaders — among them Walter Reuther and Arthur Goldberg — “vio lently and vehemently” ob jected to Johnson. They be lieved he would alienate the critical Negro vote in the North. December 1963 75 Even the Southern element of the party was divided when Johnson himself con sulted its leaders. One party sage put his position with Texan vividness. “I’ll tell you, Lyndon,” he said, “the Vice-Presidency isn’t worth a pitcher of warm spit.” It is said that what finally persuaded Johnson to accept a nomination he was believ ed to have rejected earlier with a single rude word was his discovery that Kennedy really wanted him. And most people now suppose that Kennedy’s choice was based on simple political arithme tic: he was convinced that a ticket with Johnson on it would swing most votes. During this brief crisis at the national convention, most of the American reporters were sure that Johnson him self had demanded the nomi nation in the teeth of Ken nedy’s desire to have some one else. At his first press conference after his nomi nation, Kennedy dismissed this version as "wholly un true.” He said that when word had reached him that Johnson’s nomination might be opposed on the floor of the convention he had indeed asked Johnson if he would consider another job. But when Johnson said he was prepared to go ahead in spite of the opposition, Kennedy said he “gladly agreed.” No personal closeness dev eloped betwen the late Pres ident and his deputy. John son’s style and his friends were utterly different from the style and people that predominated in the Kennedy Administration — less educated, more provin cial, socially less smart. Away from his own field of mastery in the Senate, John son discovered that he had lost the instrument of his power. And the death of his friend and mentor, Sam Ray burn, the fellow Texan who had run the House with an even cooler precision than Johnson had achieved in the Senate, robbed him not only of a powerful ally but also of a wise counsellor. Then there was the series of scandals, in none of which Johnson was implicated, but each of which touched poli tical friends and allies of his. One high official from Texas, Jerry Holleman, had to re sign after the Billie Sol Estes 76 Panorama scandal, Fred Korth, a pro tege of Johnson’s who was Secretary of the Navy, had to resign after writing letters that were, to say the least, indiscreet in their promotion of Korth’s private business on Pentagon stationery. And most recently, Bobby Baker, Johnson’s prize pupil, resign ed too, and now faces inves tigation of his high living and ramified private deal ings. He could have been dropped To cap it all, the growth of conservative sentiment in Texas and all over the South meant that there was serious doubt whether Johnson could command the support of his own State in 1964 — let alone fulfill the role for which he was originally put on the ticket in 1960, name ly to deliver the South. It was hardly surprising that in the last few weeks rumours have been sweeping Wash ington that Kennedy had de cided to drop Johnson from the ticket next year — ru mours which Kennedy re peatedly and publicly de nied. But if Johnson seemed far ther than ever from the res idency that was only a heart beat away, those who know him best believe that he was consciously and systematically preparing himself to run again and win in 1968. He was concentrating on three tasks. As head of the Pres ident’s Commission on Equal Employment Opportunity for Negroes, he was earning him self respect from Negroes, and indeed sometimes mov ing farther out on their be half than President Kenne dy, as when he flatly said in an Independence Day speech in Philadelphia this year: “It is not our respective races that are at stake, it is our nation.” Second, as overlord of the space programme he was not only tying his name to the most ambitious and modernminded of the Administra tion’s programmes — one, in cidentally, that he had ad vocated Jong before 1960 — he was also concerned with the distribution of massive political patronage in hun dreds of millions of dollars of space contracts. A despair to diplomats Third, in his capacity as the President’s ceremonial 77 representative, Mr. Johnson travelled all over the world, seeking to make up his de ficiencies in experience of foreign affairs. His deficiencies should not be exaggerated. As senior member of the Senate, he has followed all the great debates on foreign affairs since the days of the Marshall Plan. But he has followed them at some distance. He has stu died defence more closely, as one of the members of the Armed Services Committee. But in foreign affairs Mr. Johnson has been the des pair of some staider Ameri can diplomats, with his habit of swinging through Europe or Asia with all the hand grasping folksiness of a Texas politician on the stump. Still, if some of these journeys were not really ne cessary, at least as a result of one of them one more Pa kistani camel driver visited Texas than would have done otherwise. His record on world affairs is that of a mo derate. He is anti-Communist, yet no cold warrior, and without either isolationist or any other bees in his bonnet. As Vice-President, Johnson has kept up his habit of rest lessly seeking the informa tion he needs for political decisions. But he learns by word of mouth. He has ne ver been a great reader. He is a compulsive telephoner. Those who have worked for him tell awed stories of his marathon phone calls, some times lasting for hours at any time of the day or night, briefing himself in the mi nutest detail on the political situation when he had been out of town. Moreover, he has had every opportunity to get to know all sides of the Pres idency in the past three years. For if he seems never to have played a leading part in the great decisions — on Cuba last autumn, for example — he was always there. Several times a day he has been in the President’s office. He has seen all the papers, secret or not. And he knows well enough the men who served his predecessor — and whom he must now decide whether he will keep on to serve him. With most of these men he is temperamentally out of touch. It is not that he is known to have quarrelled with any of them, though with the Attorney-General, 78 Panorama Robert Kennedy, there were ancient wounds of political strife to heal, and some ra ther unflattering opinions have been heard from most levels in the State Depart ment after the Vice-Presid ential peregrinations. It is simply that it is hard to ima gine Johnson in the chair at a policy meeting, directing the flow of thinking of the articulate, self-c o n fi d e n t group of intellectuals that President K e n n ed y had forged into a machine to complement his very differ ent personality. Yet Johnson does not be gin to have a parallel ma chine of advisers and experts of his own on economics, strategy, or foreign policy which he could slip into the places of the Harvard and Yale meh. He has proteges and speechwriters and poli tical henchmen of several kinds, and some of them are as able in the practice of their own kind of closed poli tics as the Kennedy brains trust in theirs. But there is hardly a name that is known outside the Senate dining room where the pros gather over bean soup and elephan tine jokes. December 1963 Mr. Johnson’s private life, like his entourage and his whole personality, is cut in a different pattern from that of the cosmopolitan Kennedys. Mrs. Johnson, who was christened Claudia Alta Tay lor, but has been called Lady Bird all her life, is shrewd as well as vivacious and hand some, a smallish, dark woman who has helped Johnson in more specific ways than the wives of most successful men. It is she who has taken charge of his personal finan ces and made him a rich man, by any standards but those of his predecessor. Starting with the modest fortune of her father, an Alabama land owner who moved to Texas, and investing long-sightedly in television and radio and land, she is reported to have accumulated well over SI million for the family. The Johnsons have two grown-up daughters — Lynda Bird and Lucy Baines Johnson. A touch of Texas-style whimsy running through the Johnson family requires that the same initials shall be shared by all. Even the family pet is called Little Beagle Johnson. The Johnsons live in some splendour but with no pre79 tense to the cultural polish and intellectual sophistica tion of the Kennedy circle. They have a large house in a fashionable suburb of Washington and a luxurious ranch near Johnson City, Texas. The new President is a complex man, hard to under stand except in terms of the idiosyncratic traditions of his beloved and native Texas. He is at once homespun and folksy, and notoriously vain — the family initials, the ex pensively cut suits with cow boy trappings and (until re cently loud jshirts), the per sonal flag that flies over the ranch when L. B. J. is in residence, the oil paintings of himself in his bffice, these disclose an oddly naive vani ty. He is serious, religious etjn, yet. ribald in a hailfellow-well-met way that is hard to picture unless you have seen a mid-American businessman praying before a lunch meeting. Johnson is large — 6 ft. 3 in. — and lean, in the Texas tradition. He has dieted down from 16 to 14 stone. His face is seamed but strong, like a Western sheriff’s. But it is also extremely mobile and has been judged the most expressive in American politics with the possible ex ception of Eisenhower’s. When he is making a speech it works all over, like (as one observer has noted) "a piece of animated India rub ber.” But a Texan audience is needed to get him really going; it is only to his own people that he has felt free to bellow the national anger or bewail the anguish of the nation’s problems. Before a sophisticated gathering, a Johnson speech that would be a triumph in San Antonio is apt to fall flat. Johnson rightly dislikes reading his speeches from a prepared text. When he has to, he does it in a singularly sleep-inducing Texan drawl. On the other hand, if he im provises he risks getting car ried away by the exuberance of his sentiments. Once hr flew to New York to receive an honorary degree from th< Jewish Albert Einstein Me dical School. Put in his own purple prose Johnson got bored with the text and inserted one of his own purple passages. Looking down upon row af Panorama ter row of solemn young Se mites, he told them he knew he could trust them not only to take advantage of this ex cellent training for them selves, but to go out into the world as he had done and carry everywhere “the mes sage of Christianity.” Johnson is the second Chief Executive to belong to the Christian Church (Disci ples of Christ). The other was President James Ar Gar field, who was shot by an as sassin on July 2, 1881., and died on September 19 of that year. The Christian Church, as it is most commonly known, was founded in Am erica early in the nineteeth century by certain dissident Presbyterian ministers. Num bering about 1,800,000 mem bers in the United States, the Church is congregational in (structure. His manner in personal encounters of all kinds is overwhelmingly friendly. He is, as someone has said, “a backslapper, a shoulder — hugger, a knee-squeezer" and he himself confesses that he likes to be in the cloast pos sible physical contact with a man when he talks to him. When this proximity is esta blished, Johnson is apt to straighten his visitor’s tie for him if this seems necessary — as it often has done in the Kennedy circle. Strangers have always found him exceptionally easy to talk to. “He sticks his feet up on his desk,” as one dis tinguished British visitor has put it, “and tacitly invites you to do the same on your side.” Many people have found him straightforward and easy to like. He is a man who invites a certain cynicism. His virtues are hidden behind his slightly raffish facade. He has a sub tie intelligence and yet an utter lack of intellectuality. He will make a very Ameri can President of the United States. — The Observer, Nov ember 24, 1963. What he did achieve was to bring a new senM of purpose to the American people. He woke Am erica and got them moving in the economic sense . . . in the social field and the field of education. ~ Ha rold Wilson, leader of Britain’s Labor Party, Contents III Memoriam ....................................................... The Death of a President ............................ Kennedy: The Man and His Legend . . . . jl . . The Man We Trusted .................................... . . . .. The Cruel Lessons of Fortune and Caprice . |. History as Tragedy .................................................. Lincoln and Kennedy ............................ ................ The Day JFK Was Buried .................................... The Famed Inaugural............................................. His Creed and Basic Principles .......................... A Great President (Obituary) ............................... America's Strength is for Peace (his last undelivered speech) ..................... U.S. Will Meet its Commitments Abroad . . . . The Texan Who Takes Over (Johnson profile) ..................... . . .7. a * * •