Lynching and segregation of African Americans were still occurring at the end of Truman’s presidency, but he did have some success with improving civil rights. Whether his motive was to gain more votes, or merely to follow the Democratic platform, he did succeed in bringing a great amount of attention to discrimination problems in the U.S. He helped the nation to take one of the first major steps towards desegregation, and helped pave the way for future presidents to even further eliminate segregation.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower, a Republican who followed Truman as President, was elected in 1953. Although many of the civil rights advancements made during Eisenhower’s presidency were more of a result of the efforts of American citizens than Eisenhower himself, Eisenhower did take many government actions to support the minority groups, particularly African Americans. Through his addresses to the nation, contact with American citizens, and action taken through bills supported, Eisenhower succeeded in having an impact on the progression of civil rights.
In his State of the Union address in 1953, Eisenhower recognized that despite some efforts made by previous presidents, segregation still existed, and he stated that he would “use whatever authority exists in the office of the President to end segregation in the District of Columbia, including the Federal Government, and any segregation in the Armed Forces.” He also reminded the American citizens that they or their ancestors were once immigrants, likely hoping to make them reconsider their discrimination against current immigrants. While Eisenhower did make promises to continue the advancement of civil rights in his State of the Union address, it was only mentioned in a very small portion of his lengthy speech, suggesting that it may not have been the most important factor in his mind.
Eisenhower did not take any major action towards civil rights until 1956, when submitted the Civil Rights Act of 1957 to congress. They denied the bill in this year, but in 1957, it was passed. This bill made it federal law that people could not stop eligible American citizens, including African Americans, from voting. While this bill did not include great enough consequences to be fully successful, it was the first civil rights bill to be passed in 82 years, and it symbolized the beginning of a series of bills to come.
Eisenhower’s motives in passing this bill can be questioned because he chose to have it proposed directly before an election. He may have been attempting to gain the vote African Americans in an attempt to increase his public support. However, it would not have made a difference, given that he won approximately 57 percent of the popular vote and won the electoral vote 457 to 73.
Eisenhower showed further support of the advancement of civil rights in September, 1957, when he used troops in support of the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. In this case, they ruled that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. When the governor of Arkansas ordered state troops to keep nine black students from entering a previously all-white school in Little Rock, Eisenhower took control of the state troops and sent 1,000 federal troops in to protect them. This action showed the states that Eisenhower was serious about enforcing the federal desegregation laws, and that no state government could trump the federal government.
Despite this success, Eisenhower soon recognized that Southern states were finding ways around the Civil Rights Act of 1957. In Response to this problem, he supported the passing of another bill, The Civil Rights Act of 1960, which would make the punishments for preventing people from voting more severe. Although congress eliminated some of Eisenhower’s recommendations within the bill, Eisenhower believed this Act to be “an historic step forward in the field of civil rights.”
In addition to helping segregated parties on a whole, Eisenhower also made contacts with many individual people who were suffering from segregation, symbolizing that he did not believe he was above them like many other white Americans did. Eisenhower was the first president to ever meet in the White House with black Civil Rights leaders. He invited Martin Luther King, Jr., A. Philip Randpolph, Roy Wilkins, and Lester B. Granger to his home for a meeting about national Civil Rights issues. Eisenhower was also the first president to place an African-American in an executive white house position, and an Italian-American as his official assistant.
During his presidency, Dwight D. Eisenhower took many risks when promoting Civil Rights. He declared that the government’s desegregation policies were not working, proposed controversial bills, and made alliances with people whose races were often considered inferior. Through his relentless efforts, Eisenhower not only made a huge impact on society, but set a precedent for more Civil Right advancements to continue after his presidential term ended in 1961.
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Johnson, a democrat, became president in 1963 after John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Like those before him, Johnson was committed to civil rights. Through his addresses to congress and the nation, and his actions through bills and his poverty program, Lyndon Johnson proved himself to be one of the most influential presidents of the Civil Rights Movement.
When President Johnson went into office, he wasted no time before attempting to pass a bill. He urged for the quick passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which Kennedy had introduced. The bill passed and made segregation in all public places illegal. This bill symbolized a major step for civil rights of the time, and it led to the passing of even more civil rights acts.
In his famous speech of 1964, The American Promise, Lyndon Johnson bluntly described how blacks were being denied the right to vote. He claimed that “No law that we now have on the books-and I have helped to put three of them there--can ensure the right to vote when local officials are determined to deny it.” He felt that the only way to be sure that blacks were able to register and vote was to make a new bill that would truly enforce the constitutional voting right for Negroes. He described how previous civil rights bills had taken eight months to get back to the president, and after they did ,all of the reasons they would have been beneficial had been eliminated. Foreseeing that this would likely happen again, he told congress they must act quickly. In this inspirational speech, Johnson had the courage to state the problems with voting rights without any fluff. By taking this risk, he ended up being successful, and The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed shortly after. A year later, almost one million African American’s had successfully registered to vote.
In 1965, Johnson also began to refer to his reform party as the Great Society. This party was dedicated to eliminating “poverty and racial injustice” within the nation, and it included many actions that benefited civil rights as well. Through this program, Johnson god rid of the “discriminatory quotas set in 1924” for immigration. He also helped to raise the income for African American families from “54 percent to 60 percent of white-family income” between 1965 and 1968. In 1968, Johnson supported the passing of another bill, which protected people against discrimination in housing.
While the Great Society had much success and made Johnson famous for many of his reforms, it also had flaws. Johnson did not hesitate to mention Negroes specifically in his speeches such as The American Promise, but he failed to recognize smaller groups such as Hispanics and Chicanos when fighting for these civil rights. These less vocal groups were unable to put enough pressure on congress to create better opportunities for themselves, and were thus neglected in Johnson’s speeches and actions. Many of the other anti-poverty organizations made by Johnson were also under-funded. While he still had an overall beneficial impact on the elimination of poverty, the impact was not as great as it was originally planned to be.
Due to his loss of support because of the Vietnam War and problems arising with the Great Society, Johnson withdrew from the 1968 election. Although he did not run for a second term, the reforms Johnson initiated during his presidency made him a vital part of the Civil Rights Movement.
Comparison
Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Lyndon B. Johnson all made significant contributions to the advancements of civil rights in our nation. However, although they all helped promote equality, they contributed in different ways, and some were more successful than others. Through their executive orders and bills, risks taken, and national support as presidents, the similarities and differences between these men are evident.
While some of these men’s actions had more of an impact than others, they all helped to take positive steps in the promotion of civil rights. Truman was unable to pass any bills regarding equality and desegregation, but he did create the Committee of Civil Rights and a ten-point civil rights message to congress. Congress did not follow through with any of the suggestions he made immediately, but he did take the first major step towards raising the issue of civil liberties within the executive government. He later created two executive orders calling for an end to racial discrimination in government and banning segregation in the armed services. Although Truman may appear to have been unsuccessful in the sense that neither of these two orders were followed by a majority of the nation’s citizens, he did create a path for future president’s to follow.
Unlike Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, the next president, succeeded in passing two major civil rights bills. The first of these bills, stating that people cannot stop eligible citizens from voting due to race or religion, was the first of its kind passed in eighty-two years. While Eisenhower is given much credit for these advancements, and he did help to support them, civil rights were not as big of a focus for him as they had been for Truman. Eisenhower was president during a time when African Americans were really pushing for their rights, and most of what he did was mainly just backing many of the ideas of Civil Rights Leaders rather than being personally responsible for making these advancements.
Eisenhower devoted little speech time, such as in his State of the Union address in 1953, to civil rights. He claimed he supported them, but took a backseat roll in making sure bills were passed. While Eisenhower made many advancements during his presidency, it is questionable as to whether it was because of his own personal actions, or merely because of the protests going on in the country while he was in office. In addition, while his bills were meant to make greater consequences for the crime of discrimination, many of the ideas were not followed by the states and segregation continued. Eisenhower’s biggest accomplishment was setting the stage for more bills to come, not for greatly enhancing equality in the U.S.
Following the assassination of Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson came into presidency, and was more successful than both Truman and Eisenhower. Upon entering office, Johnson immediately took action to have two civil rights bills passed within a year of 1964. He succeeded in passing another one in 1968. Differing from Truman and Eisenhower, Johnson became famous for the effects of his bills. He was the first president to have his requests truly enforced. However, it is likely that Johnson could not have succeeded in the way that he did without the actions made by Truman and Eisenhower before him.
In addition to the positive impacts they had on society, Truman, Eisenhower and Johnson also had another trait in common. They all dared to take risks regarding civil rights.
When Truman was in office, he spoke to the National Association of the Advancement of Colored people in support of their cause. When Eisenhower was in office, he met with multiple black Civil Rights Leaders in the White House. Both of these presidents were the first to reach out to African Americans in this way, showing their respect for these groups, and emphasizing each of their wills to make changes towards equality in our nation.
Lyndon Johnson also took a risk, but in a different way. In both Truman and Eisenhower’s speeches, they avoided directing referring to blacks, but rather referred generally to “segregation.” In Lyndon Johnson’s speeches, particularly his speech The American Promise, he directly states the many problems that face “Negroes.” He is blunt and, rather than asking for the nation and congress’ help, he demands it. He tells congress that “All Americans must have the privileges of citizenship regardless of race. And they are going to have those privileges of citizenship regardless of race.” While this speech could have had a negative effect on society, making congress and the nation feel as if the president was trying to dictate their actions and thus making them not want to comply, it didn’t. Congress passed the bill as quickly as possible after this speech, and due to his strong feelings towards civil rights issues, Lyndon B. Johnson was responsible for major improvements in equality in the U.S.
Johnson and Truman both came into the presidency by way of the 25th amendment. They were each vice presidents to a president who died, and thus both had time to serve as president before running for presidents themselves. Because they each had time in office before their elections, it gave the nation time to get an opinion of them as a president, meaning that their support in their first elections as president can be compared with the support Eisenhower gained in his second election. The following graph gives a visual image of the electoral votes gained and lost by each of the three presidents during their elections. The data used includes Johnson and Truman’s first presidential elections, and Eisenhower’s second.
As shown in this graph, the support for the last of the three president’s, Johnson, was initially greater than the second’s, Eisenhower’s. However, Eisenhower’s was greater than the first of the three’s, Truman’s. Both Eisenhower and Truman were similar in the sense that they both took major action towards civil rights during their election years. Truman made two executive orders, which called for rights mainly for African Americans, and Eisenhower passed a major bill. It can be argued that these president’s only took these actions in order to gain support from black voters. The fact that Eisenhower had more electoral votes than Truman suggests that U.S. citizens were becoming more unified in their support for civil rights. Because both of these presidents had made accomplishments in civil rights during that year, they would be likely to draw mainly citizens who supported civil rights to vote for them. It also suggests that more black Americans had registered to vote because African Americans would also be likely to vote for these two presidents due their civil rights accomplishments.
Although Johnson differed from Truman and Eisenhower in the sense that he had lost support by the end of his second term, his support at the beginning suggest that he was affected by the same pattern of increased support for civil rights. He gained his support through his promises for civil rights, and although he achieved many of them, the Vietnam War caused him to lose much of his support as president.
The building of the successes of these presidents may have also been responsible for the increased support as time went on. Truman made an executive order for desegregation in the military, Eisenhower attempted to enforce it but did not fully succeed, and Johnson passed a bill that caused this idea to really take action. The increased success that occurred as each of these presidents built off of the ideas of the ones before them likely produced a new national confidence in the president’s actions, thus leading more people to choose to vote for them.
Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Lyndon B. Johnson were all made vital accomplishments towards promoting equality in our nation through civil rights. Although they made impacts in various ways, with one perhaps having a greater effect than the other, they all played important rolls in one of the most major reform eras in our nations history. Through their contributions to the Civil Rights Movement, these presidents helped to make our nation the free rights nation it is today.
Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 2007
Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953
Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1960
Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 2007
Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 2007
Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 2007
