Lady Bird Johnson: A Southern, and liberal, Lady

Lady Bird belonged to the other South, the liberal South that confronted the harsh realities of segregation and the monolithic system of power that enforced it. She came to her beliefs gradually and, like many other Southerners, engaged in an internal struggle to remake herself and her legacy.

When President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act, striking down Jim Crow in July 1964, he famously remarked to his young press secretary, Bill Moyers, "We have lost the South for a generation." But he did not intend to give it up so easily. Months later, he sent Lady Bird on a 1,682-mile, eight-state, 47-stop campaign train tour of the South. Her speeches consisted of honeyed and steely words. "I am proud that I am part of the South. I'm fond of the old customs," she said. Then she quoted Robert E. Lee's injunction after Appomattox, "Abandon all these local animosities and raise your sons to be Americans!" And she urged acceptance of the Civil Rights Act. "There is, in this Southland, more love than hate."

Full article, by Sidney Blumenthal, July 13, 2007