Chicago '68: A Chronology
1967
August 15: At a convention of the National Student Association, Allard K. Lowenstein and Curtis Gans formally launch the "Dump Johnson" movement—an effort to oppose the renomination of Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson.
August 31: Five-day convention of the National Conference for a New Politics opens in Chicago. 3,000 delegates from some 200 left, community, and civil rights groups convene to discuss an electoral strategy for 1968. Some want a third-party slate with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., running for President and Dr. Benjamin Spock for Vice-president. But the conference breaks up in rancor and division. Leftists who want to be active in a national race have nowhere to turn but the Democratic Party.
September 23: Allard Lowenstein meets with New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Kennedy declines to run as the candidate of the anti-Johnson movement. (In his search for a candidate, Lowenstein will ask California Congressman Don Edwards, Idaho Senator Frank Church, Canadian-born economist John Kenneth Galbraith, General James M. Gavin, and South Dakota Senator George S. McGovern; no one accepts the role.)
October 20: Lowenstein meets with Minnesota Senator Eugene J. McCarthy. McCarthy agrees to be the movement's candidate.
October 21-22: A demonstration at the Pentagon organized by the National Mobilization to End the War in Vietnam (MOBE) draws 100,000. Afterwards, MOBE begins to talk about antiwar protests during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, where President Johnson is expected to be nominated for a second term.
November 30: Senator Eugene McCarthy officially enters the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, running on an antiwar platform.
December 31: Activists partying at Abbie Hoffman's New York loft resolve to hold a Festival of Life during the Democrats' "Convention of Death." Paul Krassner christens the group "Yippies."
1968
January 5: Dr. Benjamin Spock and four others are indicted on federal charges of conspiring to counsel draft evasion.
January 21: North Vietnamese troops surround the Khe Sanh combat base and begin a seventy-seven day siege of the 6,000 U.S. Marines stationed there.
January 30: The Tet offensive begins in South Vietnam; Vietcong and North Vietnamese troops strike at targets across South Vietnam, reaching even the grounds of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. Often cited as a turning point in public support for the war. American troops will peak at 542,000 during 1968.
February 1: Richard Nixon enters the race for the Republican nomination for President.
February 8: Alabama Governor George Wallace enters the presidential race as an Independent.
Also on this date, three black students are killed and twenty-seven are wounded in Orangeburg, South Carolina, when state troopers fire at demonstrators demanding the integration of the local bowling alley. The incident is known as the "Orangeburg Massacre."
March 12: Voters in the New Hampshire primary give President Johnson only a narrow victory over antiwar candidate Senator Eugene McCarthy.
March 16: Senator Robert Kennedy reverses his earlier decision and announces his candidacy for the Democratic nomination, criticizing Johnson for his handling of the war.
Also on this date, in South Vietnam, Charlie Company (11th Brigade, Americal Division) enters the village of My Lai and kills over 300 apparently unarmed civilians. The American public will not hear about the My Lai atrocities until November 1969.
March 22-23: A MOBE conference in Lake Villa, Illinois brings together MOBE, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), and Yippie activists to plan the Convention demonstrations.
March 31: Lyndon Johnson withdraws from the Democratic primary race. Read the New York Times story.
April 4: Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Riots break out in more than a hundred cities. On the west side of Chicago, nine blacks are killed and twenty blocks are burned.
April 11: President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1968. While primarily addressing open housing, the Act also includes a new federal anti-riot law, making it a crime to cross state lines with the intent to incite a riot.
April 15: Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley publicly criticizes Superintendent of Police James Conlisk's cautious handling of the riots that followed King's assassination. He said he was giving the police specific instructions "to shoot to kill any arsonist and to shoot to maim or cripple anyone looting."
April 23: At Columbia University on New York, students opposed to defense contracts and a new gymnasium to be built on Harlem park land occupy several campus buildings. They are routed by city police a week later: 150 injuries, 700 arrests.
April 27: An antiwar march in Chicago draws 8,000 people. When the march ends, Chicago police order the crowd to disperse, then wade in with clubs. The unofficial Sparling report criticizes the police and the Daley administration.
Also on this date, Vice-president Hubert H. Humphrey announces his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.
May 6-30: Student demonstrations in France lead to a general strike throughout the country. Ten million workers strike, 10,000 battle police in Paris.
May 10: Peace talks open in Paris with Averell Harriman representing the U.S. and Xan Thuy representing North Vietnam. Talks soon deadlock over the North Vietnamese demand for an end to all U.S. bombing of North Vietnam. More than 2,000 American soldiers die in combat in May, the highest monthly loss of the war.
May 13: In Washington D.C., Resurrection City rises, a demonstration by the Poor Peoples Campaign.
May 14: J. Edgar Hoover, director of the FBI, sends a memorandum to all FBI field offices initiating a counter-intelligence program (COINTELPRO) to disrupt new left groups.
June 5: Senator Robert Kennedy is assassinated in Los Angeles moments after declaring victory in the California Democratic presidential primary.
June 14: Dr. Benjamin Spock and four others are convicted of conspiring to counsel draft evasion.
June 23: A group of Connecticut McCarthy supporters, disgruntled at being under-represented in their state's delegation to the upcoming convention, meet to create a Commission on the Selection of Presidential Nominees. This commission will submit proposals to the convention's Rules Committee calling for an end to the practice of winner-takes-all in state delegations. [The 1968 convention agreed to study the issue. The resulting committee—which in due course would be chaired by Senator George McGovern—made recommendations that were adopted by the Democratic National Committee in 1971 and effectively placed control of the Democratic presidential nomination process beyond the reach of the traditional party regulars.]
July 15: The Yippies apply for permits to camp in Lincoln Park (about two miles north of the Chicago Loop) and to rally at Soldier Field (on the lakefront south of the Loop).
July 29: MOBE applies for permits to march to and rally at the International Amphitheatre (site of the Democratic Convention and about five miles southwest of the Loop) and to march to and rally in Grant Park (just east of the Loop). All permits are denied, except one allowing the use of the Grant Park bandshell for a rally.
August 8: At the Republican National Convention in Miami Beach, Florida, Richard M. Nixon wins the party's nomination for President. At the same time, not far away in the black neighborhoods of Miami, riots result in four deaths and hundreds of arrests.
August 10: Senator George S. McGovern announces his candidacy for the Democratic presidential nomination.
August 21: Soviet tanks and troops roll into Czechoslovakia to crush the "Prague Spring" reform movement.
Convention Week
August 22, Thursday: Dean Johnson, a seventeen-year-old Sioux Indian from South Dakota, is shot dead by Chicago police on Wells Street. Police say he pulled a gun. A memorial march is held later in the day.
August 23, Friday: At the Civic Center plaza (located in the Loop and now known as the Daley Center) the Yippies nominate their presidential contender—Pigasus the pig. Seven Yippies and the pig are arrested.
Almost 6,000 National Guardsman are mobilized and practice riot-control drills. Special police platoons do the same.
August 24, Saturday: MOBE's marshal training sessions continue in Lincoln Park. Karate, snake dancing, and crowd protection techniques are practiced. Women Strike for Peace holds a women-only picket at the Hilton Hotel, where many delegates are staying. At the 11 PM curfew, poet Allan Ginsberg, chanting, and musician Ed Sanders lead people out of the park.
August 25, Sunday: MOBE's "Meet the Delegates" march gathers 800 protesters in Grant Park across from the Hilton Hotel. The Festival of Life, in Lincoln Park, opens with music. 5,000 hear the MC-5 and local bands play. Police refuse to allow a flatbed truck to be brought in as a stage. A fracas breaks out in which several are arrested and others are clubbed. Police reinforcements arrive.
At the 11 PM curfew, most of the crowd, now numbering around 2,000, leave the park ahead of a police sweep and congregate between Stockton Drive and Clark Street. The police line then moves into the crowd, pushing it into the street. Many are clubbed, reporters and photographers included. The crowd disperses into the Old Town area, where the battles continue.
August 26, Monday: In the early morning, Tom Hayden is among those arrested. 1,000 protesters march towards police headquarters at 11th and State. Dozens of officers surround the building. The march turns north to Grant Park, swarming the General Logan statue. Police react by clearing the hill and the statue.
At the Amphitheatre, Mayor Daley formally opens the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
As the curfew approaches, some in Lincoln Park build a barricade against the police line to the east. About 1,000 remain in the park after 11 PM. A police car noses into the barricade and is pelted by rocks. Police move in with tear gas. Like Sunday night, street violence ensues. But it is worse. Some area residents are pulled off their porches and clubbed. More reporters are attacked this night than at any other time during the week.
August 27, Tuesday: At 1 PM 200 members of the American Friends Service Committee and other pacifist groups leave a near-northside church to march to the Amphitheatre. Joined by others along their route, the marchers eventually number about 1,000. The police stop the march at 39th and Halstead, about half-a-mile north of the Amphitheatre. The marchers set up a picket line and remain in place until 10 AM the next morning. They are then ordered to disperse and 30 resisters are arrested. This is the only march of Convention Week that gets anywhere near the Amphitheatre—it also gets virtually no publicity.
About 7 PM Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale speaks in Lincoln Park. He urges people to defend themselves by any means necessary if attacked by the police.
An "Unbirthday Party for LBJ" convenes at the Chicago Coliseum. Performers and speakers include Ed Sanders, Abbie Hoffman, David Dellinger, Terry Southern, Jean Genet, William Burroughs, Dick Gregory, Allen Ginsberg, Phil Ochs, and Rennie Davis. 2,000 later march from the Coliseum to Grant Park.
In Lincoln Park, 200 clergy and lay church people, toting a 12-foot cross, join 2,000 protestors to remain in the park past curfew. Again, tear gas and club-swinging police clear the park. Many head south to the Loop and Grant Park.
At Grant Park, in front of the Hilton, where the television cameras are, 4,000 demonstrators rally to speeches by Julian Bond, Davis, and Hayden. Mary Traverse and Peter Yarrow sing. The rally is peaceful. At 3 AM the National Guard relieve the police. The crowd is allowed to stay in Grant Park all night.
August 28, Wednesday: 10-15,000 gather at the old Grant Park bandshell for the MOBE's antiwar rally. Dellinger, Gregory, Ginsberg, Norman Mailer, Jerry Rubin, Carl Oglesby, Hayden, and many others speak. 600 police surround the rally on all sides. National Guardsmen are posted on the roof of the nearby Field Museum.
In the Convention at the Amphitheatre, the peace plank proposed for the Democratic party platform is voted down.
At the bandshell rally, news of the defeat of the peace plank is heard on radios. A young man begins to lower the American flag flying near the bandshell. Police push through the crowd to arrest him. Then a group, including at least one undercover police officer, completes the flag lowering and raises a red or blood-splattered shirt. Police move in again. A line of MOBE marshals is formed between the police and the crowd. Police charge the marshal line. Rennie Davis is beaten unconscious.
At rally's end Dellinger announces a march to the Amphitheatre, while Hayden urges the crowd to move in small groups to the Loop. 6,000 join the march line, but, since it has no permit and the police refuse to allow it to use the sidewalks, the march does not move. After an hour of negotiation, the march line begins to break up. Protestors try to cross over to Michigan Avenue, but the Balbo and Congress bridges have been sealed off by National Guardsmen armed with .30 caliber machine guns and grenade launchers. The crowd moves north and finds that the Jackson Street bridge is unguarded. Thousands surge onto Michigan Avenue. Coincidentally, the mule train of Ralph Abernathy's Poor People's Campaign, which has a permit to go to the Amphitheatre, is passing south on Michigan. The crowd joins it. At Michigan and Balbo the crowd is halted again. Only the mule train is allowed to continue.
Deputy Police Superintendent James Rochford orders the police to clear the streets. Demonstrators and bystanders are clubbed, beaten, Maced, and arrested. Some fight back and the attack escalates. The melee last about seventeen minutes and is filmed by the TV crews positioned at the Hilton. While this was probably not the most violent episode of Convention Week—the Lincoln Park and Old Town brawls were more vicious—it drew the most attention from the mass media.
Inside the Amphitheatre, presidential nominations are underway. Senator Abraham Ribicoff, in his speech nominating George McGovern, denounces the "Gestapo tactics on the streets of Chicago." Mayor Daley's shouted reaction was on-camera, but off-mike. Lip-readers later decoded a vulgar rage. Hubert H. Humphrey wins the party's nomination on the first ballot.
500 antiwar delegates march from the Amphitheatre to the Hilton; many join the 4,000 protestors in Grant Park. Again, protestors are allowed to stay in the park all night.
August 29, Thursday: Senator Eugene McCarthy addresses about 5,000 gathered in Grant Park. Several attempts are made to march to the Amphitheatre. A group of delegates try to lead a march but are turned back with tear gas. Dick Gregory invites all the demonstrators to his house, which happens to be in the direction of the Amphitheatre. This too is turned back, at 18th Street.
Near midnight, the 1968 Democratic National Convention is adjourned. The arrest count for Convention Week disturbances stands at 668. An undetermined number of demonstrators sustained injuries, with hospitals reporting that they treated 111 demonstrators. The on-the-street medical teams from the Medical Committee for Human Rights estimated that their medics treated over 1,000 demonstrators at the scene. The police department reported that 192 officers were injured, with 49 officers seeking hospital treatment.
August 30, Friday: During Convention Week, 308 Americans were killed and 1,144 more were injured in the war in Vietnam.
September 9: In a press conference, Mayor Daley makes a now-famous slip of the tongue: "The policeman isn't there to create disorder, the policeman is there to preserve disorder."
October 1: The House Committee on Un-American Activities convenes hearings to plumb the extent of Communist subversion in the Convention Week protests. Testifying over the course of the hearings are: Lt. Joseph Healy and Sgt. Joseph Grubisic, both of the Intelligence Division of the Chicago Police Department (the Red Squad); Robert Pierson, a Chicago police officer who went undercover and was Jerry Rubin's bodyguard; Robert Greenblatt, national coordinator of MOBE; Dr. Quentin Young of the Medical Committee for Human Rights; and soon-to-be-indicted Tom Hayden, Rennie Davis, and David Dellinger. (The hearings recessed on October 3rd and were concluded December 2 through 5.)
November 5: Nixon is elected, defeating Humphrey by 500,000 votes. George Wallace receives about 13% of the vote nationwide and wins five Southern states.
December 1: Public release of Rights in Conflict, commonly called the Walker Report. The National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence, charged with studying and reporting on urban riots, formed a Chicago Study Team headed by Daniel Walker, to investigate the Convention Week disturbances. They reviewed over 20,000 pages of statements from 3,437 eyewitnesses and participants, 180 hours of film, and over 12,000 still photographs. The Walker Report attached the label "police riot" to the events of Chicago '68. Read an excerpt—the summary to Rights in Conflict.
1969
March 29: Rennie Davis, David Dellinger, John Froines, Tom Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin, Bobby Seale, and Lee Weiner are indicted on Federal charges of conspiring to cross state lines with the intent of inciting violence and with individually crossing state lines to incite violence.
The same Federal grand jury that returned these criminal indictments also charged eight Chicago policemen with civil rights violations for assaulting demonstrators and news reporters. None of the policemen were convicted. (Forty-one officers of the Chicago Police Department were disciplined after internal investigations, and two resigned, for infractions like removing their badges and nameplates while on duty during Convention Week.)
June 8: Gradual withdrawal of U.S. forces from Vietnam begins as Nixon announces that 25,000 troops will be withdrawn.
June 18-22: SDS holds it national convention in Chicago. The organization splits into at least two factions—the Progressive Labor Party and the Revolutionary Youth Movement (RYM).
August 15-17: The Woodstock music festival—the "Festival of Life" a year late—convenes and communes in upstate New York.
September 24: The Chicago 8 conspiracy trial begins in the courtroom of Judge Julius Hoffman.
October 8-11: The Weatherman faction of SDS—which split off from RYM—holds its National Actions—the Days of Rage—in Chicago. As if seeking revenge for Convention Week, pipe-wielding Weathermen race through the streets, attacking police, windows, and cars.
October 15: An estimated 2 million people across the country participate in the first Moratorium against the war.
November 5: The Chicago 8 becomes the Chicago 7, when a mistrial is declared in the case of Bobby Seale and a new, separate trial is ordered. After repeatedly asserting his right to an attorney of his own choosing or to defend himself, Seale had been bound and gagged in the courtroom. He is sentenced to four years for contempt of court; the sentence is later reversed. Seale is never convicted of any Convention Week charges.
November 15: A MOBE-organized march draws 500,000 people to Washington, D.C.; 150,000 attend a march in San Francisco.
December 4: In an early morning raid, Chicago police fire nearly 100 shots into a west side apartment. Illinois Black Panther Party Chairman Fred Hampton and Party member Mark Clark are killed. One or two shots were fired by the Panthers.
1970
February 18: The Chicago 7 conspiracy trial ends. All defendants are acquitted on conspiracy charges. Froines and Weiner are acquitted on all charges. Davis, Dellinger, Hayden, Hoffman, and Rubin are each convicted of individually crossing state lines to incite violence; each is sentenced to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. All the defendants, plus their lawyers William Kunstler and Leonard Weinglass, are given contempt citations ranging from 2 1/2 months to four years. Defendants are freed on bail pending an appeal.
March 6: Three members of Weathermen are killed when the bomb they are building in a New York townhouse explodes.
April 30: American troops cross over the border into Cambodia to destroy enemy camps and supplies. Student strikes shut down hundreds of college campuses over the next few days.
May 4: Four students are killed and nine injured by National Guard troops during protests at Kent State University in Ohio. In the aftermath, demonstrations spread to more than a thousand campuses and 100,000 rally in Washington, D.C.
May 15: At Jackson State College in Mississippi, two students are killed and twelve are injured when city police and highway patrolmen fire on a dormitory building.
August 24: A homemade bomb explodes in a stolen van parked at the loading dock outside the Army Math Research Center on the campus of the University of Wisconsin at Madison. A graduate student is killed and five are injured. The Army Math bombing is the first loss of innocent life caused by antiwar activists and divides the Left into those who condemn it and those who justify it.
1971
June 13: The New York Times begins publication of the History of U.S. Decision Making Process on Vietnam Policy, better known as the Pentagon Papers—a secret Defense Department study, prepared in 1967-69, of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. The Pentagon Papers were leaked to the Times by Daniel Ellsberg, a former Defense Department analyst. Go to an excerpt from the Pentagon papers.
1972
May 11: Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals reverses most of the contempt citations of the Chicago Seven and their attorneys; jail time is voided for the remainder of the citations.
June 17: Five men are arrested in a break-in at the Democratic National Committee offices in Washington's Watergate complex.
November 1: Seventh Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals reverses the conspiracy convictions of Davis, Dellinger, Hayden, Hoffman, and Rubin.
November 7: Nixon is re-elected to a second term as President, defeating George McGovern.
1974
July 27-30: The House Judiciary Committee votes three articles of impeachment against President Nixon in connection with the Watergate burglary.
August 9: Facing possible impeachment and eroding public support, Nixon resigns.
1975
April 30: The last American personnel in Vietnam leave via helicopter from the roof of the U.S. Embassy as Saigon becomes Ho Chi Minh City.
Johnson Says He Won’t Run
Surprise Decision President Steps Aside in Unity Bid- Says ‘House’ Is Divided
By Tom Wicker
Special to The New York Times
Washington, March 31 – Lyndon Baines Johnson announced tonight: "I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party as your President."
Later, at a White House news conference, he said his decision was "completely irrevocable."
The President told his nationwide television audience.
"What we have won when all our people were united must not be lost in partisanship. I have concluded that I should not permit the Presidency to become involved in partisan decisions."
Mr. Johnson, acknowledging that there was "division in the American house," withdrew in the name of national unity, which he said was "the ultimate strength of our country."
"With American sons in the field far away," he said, "with the American future under challenge right here at home, with our hopes and the worlds’ hopes for peace in the balance every day, I do not believe that I should devote an hour or a day of my time to any personal partisan causes or to any duties other than the awesome duties of this office, the Presidency of your country."
Humphrey Race Possible
Mr. Johnson left Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York and Senator Eugene J. McCarthy of Minnesota as the only two declared candidates for the Democratic Presidential nomination.
Vice President Humphrey, however, will be widely expected to seek the nomination now that his friend and political benefactor, Mr. Johnson, is out of the field. Mr. Humphrey indicated that he would have a statement on his plans tomorrow.
The President informed Mr. Humphrey of his decision during a conference at the latter’s apartment in southwest Washington today before the Vice President flew to Mexico City. There, he will represent the United States at the signing of a treaty for a Latin-American nuclear-free zone.
Surprise to Aides
If Mr. Humphrey should become a candidate, he would find most of the primaries foreclosed to him. Only those in the District of Columbia, New Jersey and South Dakota remain open.
Therefore, he would have to rely on collecting delegates in states without primaries and on White House support if he were to head off Mr. Kennedy and Mr. McCarthy.
Former Vice President Richard M. Nixon is the only announced major candidate for the Republican nomination, although Governor Rockefeller has said that he would accept the nomination if drafted.
Mr. Johnson’s announcement tonight came as a stunning surprise even to close associates. His main political strategists spent much of today conferring on campaign plans.
They were informed of what was coming just before Mr. Johnson went on national television at 9 P.M., with a prepared speech on the war in Vietnam.
As the speech unfolded, it appeared to be a strong political challenge to Mr. Kennedy and Mr. McCarthy, announcing measures that they had been advocating.
The President thus seemed to be acting in the political tradition of his office- demonstrating that his was the power to act while his critics had only the power to propose.
But Mr. Johnson was really getting ready to place himself in a more obscure tradition- that Vice Presidents who succeed to the Presidency seek only one term of their own. Before him in this century, Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge and Harry S. Truman followed that pattern.
‘Willing to Pay Any Price’
Mr. Johnson ended his prepared speech and then launched into a peroration that had not been included in the printed text and that White House sources said he had written himself.
He began by quoting Franklin D. Roosevelt: "Of those to whom much is given- much is asked."
He could not say that no more would be asked of Americans, he continued, but he believed that "now, no less than when the decade began, this generation of Americans is willing to pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty."
This quotation from a celebrated passage of John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address of Jan. 10, 1961, appeared to be a jab at Senator Robert F. Kennedy, who now is campaigning against the war in Vietnam.
The ultimate strength of America, Mr. Johnson continued, in the rather funereal voice and with the solemn expression that he had maintained throughout his 40-minute speech, is not powerful weapons, great resources or boundless wealth but "the unity of our people."
He asserted again a political philosophy he has often expressed- that he was "a free man, an American, a public servant and a member of my party- in that order- always and only."
In his 37 years of public service, he said, he had put national unity ahead of everything because it was as true now as it had ever been that "a house divided against itself by the spirit of faction, of party, of region, of religion, of race, is a house that cannot stand."
Mr. Johnson spoke proudly of what he had accomplished in the "52 months and 10 days" since he took over the presidency, after the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Tex., on Nov. 22, 1963.
"Through all time to come," he said. "I think America will be a stronger nation, a more just society, a land of greater opportunity and fulfillment because of what we have all done together in these years of unparalleled achievement."
"Our reward," he said, "will come in a life of freedom and peace and hope that our children will enjoy through ages ahead."
But these gains, Mr. Johnson said, "must not now be lost in suspicion and distrust and selfishness and politics….I have concluded that I should not permit the Presidency to become involved in the partisan divisions that are developing."
And so it was that the man who won the biggest political landslide in American history, when he defeated Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona in the Presidential election of 1964, renounced the idea of a second term.
In American politics, a "draft" could override even words as strong as Mr. Johnson’s, and he did stop short of the ultimate denial- the assertion that he would not run if nominated nor serve if elected.
But the first reaction of close associates and of other political observers here was that he meant what he said. Moreover, the candidacies of Senator Kennedy and Senator McCarthy would make a draft even of an incumbent President virtually impossible.
Roosevelt Move Recalled
Still, if Vice-President Humphrey does not enter the race, suspicion will undoubtedly be voiced that Mr. Johnson is only trying to stimulate a draft.
Some observers with long memories recall that in 1940, President Franklin D. Roosevelt had Senator Alben W. Barkley of Kentucky read the Democratic National Convention a message in which Mr. Roosevelt said that he had "never had and has not today, any desire or purpose to continue in the office of President, to be a candidate for that office, or to be nominated by the convention for that office."
The convention nevertheless nominated Mr. Roosevelt for a third term, and he won.
Mr. Roosevelt was not opposed for nomination by any candidate considered as powerful as Senator Robert Kennedy, however. In addition Senator McCarthy appears likely to win the Wisconsin primary on Tuesday, after having made a strong showing in New Hampshire.
The low point to which Mr. Johnson’s political fortunes have fallen was dramatized in a Gallup Poll published today. It showed that his conduct of his office had the approval of only 36 per cent of those polled, while his handling of the war in Vietnam was approved by only 26 per cent.
The war was unquestionably the major factor in Mr. Johnson’s slump in public esteem. He began a major escalation in February, 1965, by ordering the bombing of North Vietnam, just a few months after waging a Presidential campaign in which he had convinced most voters that he would not expand what was then a conflict involving only about 16,000 noncombatant American troops.
Over the years since then, the war has required a commitment of more than half a million combat troops, an expenditure of about $30-billion a year and heavy American casualties.
It limited Mr. Johnson’s expenditures for domestic programs, alienated many of his supporters in Congress and provoked a widespread and sometimes violent dissent- including draft card burnings, a march of thousands on the Pentagon last year, and ultimately the candidacies of Senators Kennedy and McCarthy.
‘A Nasty Fight’ Seen
Nevertheless, a close political associate of the President said tonight that Mr. Johnson had by no means been "forced" out of the race by his opponents, nor was it yet clear that he would fail to win renomination.
"It was going to be a nasty fight but he had a good chance to win it," was his summation of the political situation. He said that one factor in Mr. Johnson’s decision probably was that "this war’s upset the hell out of him" and as a result he "really didn’t have his mind on his politics."
There was some speculation tonight that Mr. Johnson might believe he could work more effectively for peace in Vietnam if he were not a partisan candidate for re-election- despite the "lame duck" status that would confer on him.
Senator Albert Gore, Democrat of Tennessee, an old antagonist of Mr. Johnson, said the withdrawal as "the greatest contribution toward unity and possible peace that President Johnson could have made."
To achieve peace, he said, will require "concessions and compromises which would subject a candidate for public office to the charge of appeasement, surrender and being soft on the Communists."
In support of this thesis, Mr. Johnson’s speech on Vietnam- which came before his withdrawal announcement- was notably conciliatory, although Senator Gore pointed out that "the President did not reveal a change in war policy tonight. He discussed only tactics- a partial bombing halt."
In the wake of the President’s announcement, some observers here were recalling signals that they had failed to recognize.
Theodore White the journalist interviewed Mr. Johnson earlier this week and is reported to have said later that the President’s remarks had a "valedictory" tone.
Others who have talked with the president lately have detected a note of "they can’t take this away from me" when he discussed his domestic and other achievements.
There was little insight here tonight on why Mr. Johnson chose to announce a withdrawal rather than to fight for renomination. One clue may have been in the theme of national unity on which he chose to base his announcement.
Almost since he took office, and at least until the political pressures generated by the war in Vietnam became intense, Mr. Johnson had sounded that same theme of unity.
Early in his Presidency, he seemed to have built a "consensus" of Americans that was reflected in the more than 60 per cent of the vote he won in 1964.
As a reflection of that vote, he could work in 1965 and 1966 with a heavily Democratic, remarkably liberal Congress that passed some of the most far-reaching social legislation of the post-war era- medical care for the aged, voting rights for Southern Negroes, Federal aid to education, and a sweeping civil rights package.
Unity Theme Recalled
Mr. Johnson campaigned on a unity theme in 1964 and as far back as when he was the Democratic leader in the Senate, from 1952 to 1960, he frequently appealed for "closing ranks" and for "working together."
In 1964, typically, he appealed to the voters to gather in "one great tent" to work together for progress and prosperity and peace.
Thus he was eminently qualified to say, as he did tonight, that "as President of all the people, I cannot disregard the peril to, the progress of the American people and the hope and the prospect of peace for all people. So I would ask all Americans whatever their personal interest or concern to guard against divisiveness and all of its ugly consequences."
On that note, Mr. Johnson took his own personal step to "guard against divisiveness."
He surprised everybody, the way he always likes to do, and it probably pleased him most that the news did not leak out before he announced it himself.
Lowenstein was also linked to VVAW members working on the McCarthy campaign. Brinkley's bio of Kerry mentions that earlier, before going to Vietnam and before joining the VVAW, Kerry had been inspired by Lowenstein's speeches at Yale.
From the Communist-infiltrated antiwar group SANE, from the Massachusetts branch of which grew the Vietnam Moratorium Committee, linked to both the young Clintons and Kerry.
>>>>April 4: Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., is assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Riots break out in more than a hundred cities. On the west side of Chicago, nine blacks are killed and twenty blocks are burned.
>>>>About 7 PM Black Panther Party Chairman Bobby Seale speaks in Lincoln Park. He urges people to defend themselves by any means necessary if attacked by the police.
Jesse Louis Burns AKA Jesse Jackson Jesse Jackson was born as Jesse Louis
Burns on October 8, 1941 in Greenville, SC.
Almost right after Jesse was born, his father, ran out on the family never to
return again. His mother in time remarried and in 1956, Jesse assumed the
last name of his stepfather, Jackson.
Jackson's hatred of white people started at a young age. Horace Nash, a
classmate of Jesse's recalls his contempt for White's:
"He [Jackson] made up foolish jokes about Whites, about how stupid they
were," remembers Nash. "He used to turn things around, and he actually looked
down on White people."
Jesse Jackson admitted in a November 1969 "Life" magazine interview that when
he worked during the 1950's as a waiter in a Greenville, South Carolina hotel
he spat into the soups and salads of White customers. "[Spitting into the
food] gave me a psychological gratification," Jackson said.
In 1959, Big Jesse was admitted to the University of Illinois, only to
transfer to North Carolina A&T University in 1961. Jesse Jackson graduated
from NC A&T in 1964, near the bottom of his class.
He went to the Chicago Theological Seminary in 1964, but never finished.
Jesse Jackson in 1963 married Jacqueline Lavinia Brown and had five children,
Sanitita Jackson, Congressman Jesse Louis Jackson, Jr., Jonathan Jackson,
Yusef DuBois Jackson, and Jacqueline Lavinia Jackson.
Also in 1963, Jesse Jackson was arrested in Greensboro, SC after trying to
get blacks to riot and disturb the peace.
During the 1960's Jesse Jackson became a leader of the Black Panther
movement
out of Chicago. Jackson was hired in 1965 by Martin Luther King, Jr. to be a
full time worker on the communist lead black disruptions during that time
period.
In 1966, King Jesse became Head of the Operation Breadbasket, a militant
black organization that was in the guise of a food bank.
He claimed in 1968 to be right next to Martin Luther King, Jr. when he was
assassinated, but other eyewitnesses and pictures dispute that claim.
Jackson founded PUSH, another black militant organization in 1971. That group
today still exists within Jackson's "Rainbow Coalition".
In 1984, King Jesse became the first black to run a semi-serious campaign for
President. Although it was a total failure, he was able to divide the
Democratic party so much; Ronald Reagan won every state in the Union during
the general election except for Walter Mondale's home state of Minnesota.
He would run again in 1988, and had a little bit better success but still the
Republicans trounced the Democrats in the General Election. Ever since then,
the Democrats have been urging Jackson not to run for President.
In 1984, Jackson also anointed himself God over the his own group, the
Rainbow Coalition, a combination of communist, gays, blacks and liberal
trash. Jesse Jackson kissed up to Communist Fidel Castro and was able to get
the release of American prisoners in Cuba.
Jesse Jackson was elected Shadow Senator of Washington, DC in 1990, a
position he holds today, although he rarely ever shows up in Congress for any
work.
In 1998, the NAACP snubbed Jesse Jackson when they anointed Kwasi Mfume
President and not Jackson. Jesse Jackson has a secret war going on with them
ever since. His latest was trying to upstage the NAACP's boycott of South
Carolina, with one of his own from Georgia. Needless to say, no one cared.
Today Jesse Jackson is a race hustler, talk show host for CNN, President of
the Rainbow Communist Coalition, and continues to fight for the rights of
black felons and thugs worldwide.