The Senate Preparedness Investigating Subcommittee was a subcommittee of the United States Senate Committee on Armed Services.
It was created in 1950 during the Korean War and its inaugural chairman was future President Lyndon B Johnson. [1] Johnson was aware of the previous work of the Truman Committee in raising the profile of Harry Truman and looked at the committee as a similar way to raise his profile. [2]
It conducted investigations of defense costs and efficiency. [3] These investigations demanded actions that were already being taken in part by the Truman administration, [2] although it reinforced the need for changes. Johnson gained national attention through his handling of media. Johnson ensured that every report was endorsed unanimously by his committee. [4] He used his political influence in the Senate to receive broadcast licenses from the Federal Communications Commission in his wife's name. [5] [6] After the 1950 general elections, Johnson was chosen as Senate Majority Whip in 1951 under the new majority leader, Ernest McFarland of Arizona, and served in this capacity from 1951 to 1953. [7]
Hearings of the committee held in the 1960s helped to popularize the Vietnam stab in the back myth.
Lyndon Baines Johnson, often referred to as LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He became president after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, under whom he had served as the 37th vice president from 1961 to 1963. A Democrat from Texas, Johnson also served as a U.S. representative and U.S. senator.
James Oliver Eastland was an American attorney, plantation owner, and politician from Mississippi. A Democrat, he served in the United States Senate in 1941 and again from 1943 until his resignation on December 27, 1978. Eastland was a segregationist who led the Southern resistance against racial integration during the civil rights movement, often speaking of African Americans as "an inferior race." Eastland has been called the "Voice of the White South" and the "Godfather of Mississippi Politics."
The 82nd United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C., from January 3, 1951, to January 3, 1953, during the last two years of President Harry S. Truman's second term in office.
Carey Estes Kefauver was an American politician from Tennessee. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1939 to 1949 and in the U.S. Senate from 1949 until his death in 1963.
Richard Brevard Russell Jr. was an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 66th Governor of Georgia from 1931 to 1933 before serving in the United States Senate for almost 40 years, from 1933 to 1971. Russell was a founder and leader of the conservative coalition that dominated Congress from 1937 to 1963, and at his death was the most senior member of the Senate. He was for decades a leader of Southern opposition to the civil rights movement.
Henry Styles Bridges was an American teacher, editor, and Republican Party politician from Concord, New Hampshire. He served one term as the 63rd governor of New Hampshire before a twenty-four-year career in the United States Senate.
Master of the Senate is a book that deals with the Senatorial career of Lyndon B. Johnson by the American writer Robert Caro.
Theodore Francis Green was an American politician from Rhode Island. A Democrat, Green served as the 57th Governor of Rhode Island (1933–1937) and in the United States Senate (1937–1961). Green was a strong supporter of Wilsonian internationalism during the administrations of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. He served as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 1957 to 1959. At the time of his retirement in 1961, he set the record at age 93 of the oldest person to serve in the Senate; the record was subsequently broken by Strom Thurmond.
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, which along with the United States House of Representatives—the lower chamber—comprises the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. Like its counterpart, the Senate was established by the United States Constitution and convened for its first meeting on March 4, 1789 at Federal Hall in New York City. The history of the institution begins prior to that date, at the 1787 Constitutional Convention, in James Madison's Virginia Plan, which proposed a bicameral national legislature, and in the controversial Connecticut Compromise, a 5–4 vote that gave small-population states disproportionate power in the Senate.
Sam Houston Johnson was an American businessman. He was the younger brother of President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Earle Chester Clements was a Kentucky politician. He represented the Commonwealth of Kentucky in both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate and was its 47th Governor, serving from 1947 to 1950, after serving in the state Senate. For 25 years, he was the leader of a faction of the state's Democratic Party that stood in opposition to the faction led by two-time governor and senator A. B. "Happy" Chandler.
The 1956 Democratic National Convention nominated former Governor Adlai Stevenson of Illinois for president and Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee for vice president. It was held in the International Amphitheatre on the South Side of Chicago from August 13 to August 17, 1956. Unsuccessful candidates for the presidential nomination included Governor W. Averell Harriman of New York, Senator Lyndon B. Johnson of Texas, and Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri.
The Years of Lyndon Johnson is a biography of Lyndon B. Johnson by the American writer Robert Caro. Four volumes have been published, running to more than 3,000 pages in total, detailing Johnson's early life, education, and political career. A fifth volume is expected to deal with the bulk of Johnson's presidency and post-presidential years. The series is published by Alfred A. Knopf.
Robert Gene Baker was an American political adviser to Lyndon B. Johnson, and an organizer for the Democratic Party. He became the Senate's Secretary to the Majority Leader. In 1963, he resigned during an investigation by the Democratic-controlled Senate into his business and political activities. The investigation included allegations of bribery and arranging sexual favors in exchange for Congressional votes and government contracts. The Senate investigation looked into the financial activities of Baker and Lyndon Johnson during the 1950s. The investigation of Lyndon Johnson as part of the Baker investigation was later dropped after President Kennedy's assassination and Johnson's ascension to the presidency.
Harry Cummings McPherson Jr. served as counsel and special counsel to President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson from 1965 to 1969 and was Johnson's chief speechwriter from 1966 to 1969. McPherson's A Political Education, 1972, is a classic insider's view of Washington and an essential source for Johnson's presidency. A prominent Washington lawyer and lobbyist since 1969, McPherson was awarded American Lawyer magazine's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008. He died February 16, 2012, in Bethesda, Maryland.
The 1948 United States Senate election in Texas was held on November 2, 1948. After the inconclusive Democratic Party primary in July, a hotly contested runoff was held in August in which U.S. Congressman Lyndon B. Johnson was officially declared to have defeated former Texas governor Coke R. Stevenson for the party's nomination by eighty-seven votes. The state party's executive committee subsequently confirmed Johnson's nomination by a margin of one vote. The validity of the runoff result was challenged before the U.S. Supreme Court due to allegations of irregularities, and in later years, testimony by the parties involved indicated that widespread fraud occurred and that friendly political machines produced the votes needed for Johnson to defeat Stevenson. After years of desultory opposition to Democrats during the post-Reconstruction years of the Solid South, Republicans vigorously contested the general election by nominating businessman and party activist Jack Porter, who waged an aggressive campaign. Johnson won his first term in the Senate, but by a closer margin than usual for Texas Democrats.
James H. Rowe Jr. was an American lawyer and New Dealer who was selected by President Harry Truman to work on the Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government, commonly known as the Hoover Commission. He was a political strategist in the Democratic Party and is best known for his memo to Truman on re-election strategy. He was an advisor to both Lyndon B. Johnson and Hubert Humphrey.
The Johnson desk is a mahogany partners desk that was used by U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson in the Oval Office as his Oval Office desk. One of only six desks used by a president in the Oval Office, it was designed by Thomas D. Wadelton and built in 1909 by S. Karpen and Bros. in Chicago. The desk was built as part of 125 seven-piece office sets for senators' offices in the Russell Senate Office Building, and was used by Johnson during his terms as U.S. Senator, Vice President, and President. It is currently located at Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum as part of a replica Oval Office.
Let Us Continue is a speech that 36th President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson delivered to a joint session of Congress on November 27, 1963, five days after the assassination of his predecessor John F. Kennedy. The almost 25-minute speech is considered one of the most important in his political career.
Horace Wooten "Buzz" Busby Jr. was an American opinion journalist, speechwriter, consultant, and public relations expert. He was considered one of Lyndon B. Johnson's closest confidants before and during Johnson's term as President of the United States.