Johnson's America
AN election result as totally foreseen as Presi- dent Johnson's victory unavoidably brings with it a whiff of anti-climax. It may be salutary to imagine, today, the waves of doubt and anxiety which would be shaking the western world if Senator Goldwater had won. Instead of that, President Johnson has what President Kennedy never had—a massive majority of the popular vote. And since he has already shown himself to be far more successful at getting what he wants out of Congress than his predecessor, and since the Republican Party is in Otter disarray, Lyndon B. Johnson now looks like one of the strongest Presidents in history. His position in- evitably recalls that of President Roosevelt in 1936—with the difference that he is the master of an America far richer, and far more powerful.
It is, for those who survey America from the standpoint of a firmly friendly ally, a profoundly satisfactory result. Nevertheless, President John- son is going to need all his resources of power and political ingenuity. It is plain that his policy of a wary but peaceable dialogue with the Com- munist world, based on unprecedented pros- perity at home, has overwhelming support: but on both these fronts his problems are formidable.
At home, he has above all else the responsi- bility of seeing that America's progress does not 'run aground' (as he put it) 'on the shoals of race prejudice.' The defeat of Senator Goldwater has been a rejection of the idea of a check to the Negro advance. This idea may have been turned down with mixed feelings, and with many dis- sentients: but still, it was turned down. President Johnson's America is committed to civil rights, to an end to racial injustice; and although hard struggles are ahead it is a noble commitment. Equally, the President's plans for education, for welfare, for his war on poverty, will now be tested: his concept of a 'great society,' even if expressed without the oratorical power of some other reforming presidents, aspires beyond the level of mere affluence for the many. He has promised to try to civilise the effects of mounting private affluence, and to help those who are ex- cluded from it. (These he puts at one-fifth of the nation, as against the impoverished one-third for whom President Roosevelt had to act.) He has proclaimed admirable, but daunting, aims.
Internationally, Johnson's America is moving into a situation of no less uncertainty. China, with its nuclear ambitions, and Russia, with the enigma of its leadership, pose major problems. The Communists in South-East Asia have grown markedly more militant even in the last hours of the election campaign, so that one of the President's first post-election acts may be directed against this aggressiveness—ironically, in view of Senator Goldwater's attempts to paint him as 'soft on Communism.' And the western alliance, the chief buttress of post-1945 peace, is at a critical point; before long France may have dropped out altogether, while the whole structure of the alliance's defensive dispositions is under review.
President Johnson comes to these problems refreshed by a remarkable landslide victory, but nevertheless it has been an uninspiring election, to put it mildly. Senator Goldwater was swept to the head of his party by forces wishing to challenge much that has become central to American life. The prospect of a debate on these lines was healthy enough in its way, but it never happened. The Senator's campaign, instead of presenting a thought-out alternative, dissolved in ccinfusioq and contradiction. His personal qualities are evidently attractive, but on the terrifying heights of the presidency they were eclipsed by his intellectual shortcomings and his ideological muddle. The true popular response to the ideas he was supposed to be representing remains obscure, because many who might have voted for the ideas jibbed at putting the un- predictable Senator in the White House. In their heads, they knew he was wrong for that.
What happens next inside the Republican Party is not likely to trouble President Johnson for some time, but the moderates whose inertia enabled Senator Goldwater to capture the leader- ship have a fearful task in trying to put the fractured party together again. The conservatives still wield power. Governor Romney of Michi- gan (who won a notable personal success at the
polls) forecast that Goldwater's nomination, would mean 'suicidal destruction' for his nttrtY,' and at the very least a long, slow climb is aheon; The extremist groups, so alarming a feature nt present-day America, are not likely to Oa, away; and many intellectuals of the 'radtent right' abandoned Goldwater early on and ntnv disown his debacle. Fierce days are coming . Meanwhile President Johnson. uninvolved In that particular battle, has been returned to Power, with an endorsement such as candidates &MI' of. If some of the electioneering mud still clings' he has a breathtaking opportunity to vindiciO.
both himself and his country. After too inii,nY tainted and soiled words. the time is non or for deeds.
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