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From: Paul S Person <psperson@old.netcom.invalid>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: Politics OT-Re: Books Banned in Utah.
Date: Sun, 25 Aug 2024 08:29:46 -0700
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On Sat, 24 Aug 2024 18:32:03 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:

>Paul S Person wrote:
>> On Fri, 23 Aug 2024 19:11:16 -0400, William Hyde
>> <wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
>>=20
>>> Paul S Person wrote:
>>>> On Thu, 22 Aug 2024 16:57:51 -0400, William Hyde
>>>> <wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Paul S Person wrote:
>>>>>> On Wed, 21 Aug 2024 14:32:41 -0700, Bobbie Sellers
>>>>>> <blissInSanFrancisco@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> <snippo>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Back in the 80's, my mother (a knee-jerk Republican: mention =
"Kennedy"
>>>>>>>> and her right knee would jerk and she'd say "Chappaquiddick") =
confided
>>>>>>>> in me that the only reason FDR served four terms was because the=
 Dems
>>>>>>>> had /suspended the two term limit/ so he could do so. The =
reality, of
>>>>>>>> course, is that the two-term limit came later, mostly to prevent=
 a
>>>>>>>> recurrence of a four-term Presidency.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> As I've said before about the Republican Party: the rot runs =
deep,
>>>>>>>> very deep indeed.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> 	I think I have covered that.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> 	But the Democratic Party was racist until Kennedy Time.
>>>>>>> He was the only president I ever bothered to gaze upon in
>>>>>>> San Diego not long before I got kicked out and he got murdered.
>>>>>>> My friends in Sacramento were absolutely destroyed by the
>>>>>>> assassination but I was too intent on surviving with a UD. And
>>>>>>> so once more I was out of step with the mood of the time. I
>>>>>>> am really good at that.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> The Southern Democrats ("Dixiecrats") were. How badly that tinged =
the
>>>>>> rest of the party I have no idea.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> As Caro describes it in "Master of the Senate" the Southern =
Democratic
>>>>> Caucus was segregationist, with (IIRC) twenty two votes, with at =
the
>>>>> time two southern democratic senators being against segregation.
>>>>>
>>>>> That was not enough to avoid cloture of a filibuster.  But they cut=
 a
>>>>> deal with western (but not west coast) republicans.  In return for
>>>>> southern support of federal funding for western infrastructure, the
>>>>> western and midwest republican senators would not support a cloture
>>>>> vote, thus giving the south the power to filibuster anything.
>>>>>
>>>>> It was this alliance that killed, e.g. the original 1957 civil =
rights
>>>>> bill, though it was supported by east and west coast republicans,
>>>>> northern democrats, by Eisenhower and Nixon.
>>>>>
>>>>> Humphrey, Jackson, and other liberal senators were glad to get =
something
>>>>> called "civil rights" passed, and LBJ needed it for his =
presidential
>>>>> ambitions, but in actual fact the act achieved nothing.
>>>>
>>>> Actually, I read an article (how long ago and in what source I do =
not
>>>> know) that LBJ fought to get the provisions on voting tried in
>>>> /Federal/ courts rather than /State/ courts. The jury pools were
>>>> different, and the Federal juries were less likely to side with the
>>>> accused when African-American voters were being suppressed.
>>>>
>>>> IOW, he (and others) ensured that the law had some /teeth/.
>>>
>>> LBJ was in a tough situation.  He owed everything, even his senate =
seat,
>>> to deeply conservative democrats.  He had the strong support of the
>>> segregationist caucus.  To be president he needed some liberal
>>> credentials, and this bill was a major part of that.  But 90% of the
>>> original bill had to be discarded to gain the acquiescence of the
>>> southern democratic caucus.
>>>
>>> It failed, though.  Liberals and moderates did not take to him.  He
>>> never understood that when you destroy people as he did Leland Olds, =
for
>>> example, other people actually remember. So he had zero chance of the
>>> nomination in 1960.
>>>
>>> Caro was not able to find a record of any prosecutions under this =
law.
>>> Certainly there weren't many.
>>=20
>> I wouldn't have been able to comment on it if someone else hadn't
>> brought it up. Bing was obsessed with the Civil Rights Act of 1965
>> (which, IIRC, LBJ was also instrumental in getting passed, this time
>> as President).
>>=20
>> The article considered the 1957 bill to be an important step. I don't
>> recall if it discussed how it was used.
>
>
>It was an important step indeed.  First, because powerless as it was in=20
>application, it was the first civil rights act passed since 1875. The=20
>segregationists would never have let it pass did they not think that LBJ=
=20
>was one of their own.
>
>And while its provisions may never have been enforced, they were now=20
>there in law, which made their expansion a possibility.  It may well be=20
>that simply by existing it had some effect on potential malefactors.  I=20
>don't know.
>
>Also, the original 1957 bill formed much of the material of the 65 bill.
>LBJ would have liked to pass the 57 bill as it was originally written -=20
>and that would have gone a long way to repair his reputation among=20
>moderates and liberals - but that was quite impossible then.

All this is very interesting.

1957 was, of course, back when politics was the art of the possible.

Now it is the art of screaming, yelling, and
holding-my-breath-till-my-face-turns-blue.

I hate to sound like every other ancient curmudgeon, but that appears
to be where I am.
--=20
"Here lies the Tuscan poet Aretino,
Who evil spoke of everyone but God,
Giving as his excuse, 'I never knew him.'"