Overview

The Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 was one of the great legislative triumphs of Lyndon Johnson's presidency. In Launching the War on Poverty, forty-nine veterans of this unprecedented legislative effort tell their stories, offering a fascinating inside look at how Community Action, Head Start, the Job Corps, Legal Services, and other efforts went from brainstorming sessions in Washington to real-life programs in low-income neighborhoods throughout the nation. As the interviews reveal the idealism of the 1960s, they also capture the excitement and disappointment, the determination and doubt, the cut-and-thrust of American lawmaking, and the sheer force of the personalities involved. This second edition offers a new introduction that shows how many of these programs survived a volatile beginning to become accepted, permanent elements of domestic policy. In addition, the book now includes transcripts of Johnson's pivotal phone conversations, underscoring the president's determination and resourcefulness, his judgments of personnel and programs, and his sensitivity to political fallout. There is an updated bibliography with a list of web and archival sources on the War on Poverty.

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9780195387278

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Reviews

Launching the War on Poverty in its revised form will continue to provide specialists in the areas of public policy and the domestic reforms of the 1960s with an important record of one of the most ambitious programs of Johnson's Great Society. --Sound Historian Michael Gillette has assembled in the words of the participants the inside story of how Lyndon Johnson mounted his war on poverty and created the Office of Economic Opportunity. This book offers the reader a unique seat at the tables in Washington where the poverty program was conceived, written into law and carried out. It is an invaluable and exciting look at history the way it really happened. - Hon. Joseph A. Califano Jr., chief assistant for domestic affairs to President Lyndon B. Johnson (1965-1969) and Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare (1977-1979) An indispensable guide to the federal war on poverty and the programs that formed its core. This is oral history at its finest. - David M. Oshinsky, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Polio: An American Story An excellent collection. -- CHOICE

<br> Michael Gillette has assembled in the words of the participants the inside story of how Lyndon Johnson mounted his war on poverty and created the Office of Economic Opportunity. This book offers the reader a unique seat at the tables in Washington where the poverty program was conceived, written into law and carried out. It is an invaluable and exciting look at history the way it really happened. - Hon. Joseph A. Califano Jr., chief assistant for domestic affairs to President Lyndon B. Johnson (1965-1969) and Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare (1977-1979) <br><br> An indispensable guide to the federal war on poverty and the programs that formed its core. This is oral history at its finest. - David M. Oshinsky, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Polio: An American Story <br><br>

Author Information

Michael L. Gillette is Executive Director of Humanities Texas and the former director of the Lyndon Baines Johnson Oral History Program.

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