The Johnson Years, Volume Two: Vietnam, the Environment, and Science

by Robert A. Divine (Editor)

Stretching from November 1963 to January 1969, the administration of Lyndon Baines Johnson was marked both by division and tumult and by significant accomplishments. In this volume, Robert Divine has brought together seven senior scholars who, in new essays, explore aspects of domestic and foreign policy during the Johnson years. This collection is a sequel to Divine’s earlier volume (originally published as Exploring the Johnson Years).

The seven essays that compose Volume Two, together with Divine’s incisive and perceptive historiographical overview, offer new insights into Johnson’s complex character and leadership style. The LBJ that emerges from these pages is a very human figure who understands the corrosive, pervasive impact of the Vietnam War on his administration and who struggles to try to preserve the domestic programs he fought so long and hard to achieve.

In exploring the antiwar movement, tax and foreign economic policies, environmental and health care questions, and the space program, these essays demonstrate how domestic issues were critically affected by the Vietnam War and provide a fuller understanding of Johnson’s vital but flawed legacy to the nation.

Open access edition funded by the National Endowment for Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Humanities Open Book Program.

401 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 15, 1987

About the author

Robert A. Divine joined the faculty of the University of Texas in 1954 as a professor of history. He served as Chairman of the Department of History and the Committee on International Studies, and a member of the interim committee that helped with the organization of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University. In addition, he served as president of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations and authored eleven books. He retired in 1996.