LBJ’s 1968: Power, Politics, and the Presidency in America’s Year of Upheaval

1968 was a pivotal year in American history. The chaos of Vietnam was reaching a crescendo both abroad and at home, the presidency was in disarray, and young people were turning on the elder statesman. Caught in this whirlwind, with no easy solutions, was LBJ. 1968 would come at a time when LBJ would look at his record in history and decide whether to run again or not, and making the announcement on television was a first as well. This new book by Kyle Longley looks at how LBJ handled 1968 and what led him to declare that he would not seek re-election. This book covers the gamut of the entire year, from the State of the Union until his final days in office after the election. Professor Longley brings out a book that he feels will make it easy for the average reader to follow and understand by making it feel like a work of fiction at times with a lot of quoted material.

And that is generally my problem with books like this in two ways. First, by just examining one year, you have to examine previous years so much that it often loses the plot. Second, by making it with so many direct quotes, it losses its intellectual heft.