Trying to be Both

President Johnson returned from a long holiday weekend in Texas to speak at Daughter Luci's graduation from the National Cathedral School. To the girls of the graduating class he confided some of the problems of the presidency, recalling Henry Clay's declaration that he would rather be right than President. "I must try to be both," said Johnson. "And as President of your country I must act, in this 20th century, often swiftly, always decisively, according to judgment." Returning to his seat, the President stopped, hesitated, then walked over to the white-robed girls to kiss Luci.

While Lady Bird vacationed in a Virgin Islands retreat, the President took Luci with him to a good old-fashioned Democratic fund-raising dinner in Mayor Dick Daley's Chicago. It was the sort of occasion that would ordinarily bring out the rousing Republican baiter in L.B.J. But not this time. Instead, he used it to issue an appeal to the Russian people for friendship, and to declare himself firmly against appeasement. Recalling the lesson of Munich, he said: "In the 1930s we made our fate not by what we did but by what we failed to do. We propelled ourselves --and all mankind--toward tragedy, not by action but by inaction. The failure of free men was not of the sword but of the soul--and there must be no such failure in the 1960s."

Back in Washington, Johnson turned away from foreign affairs, which had dominated every utterance during the week. To the graduating class of mostly Negro Howard University, the President pointed out that even though Negroes are winning the legal battle for equality, Negro poverty remains worse than white poverty. He talked about the psychological scars left on young Negroes, the devastating breakdown in Negro family life, the lack of education. He cited figures to show that the gulf between whites and Negroes is actually widening rather than closing, despite the legal breakthrough.

Johnson announced that as the first step in erasing the gulf he would call a White House conference of scholars, Negro leaders and Government officials; their mission may be to find ways of fulfilling economic, educational and social rights. This mission, he said, is "the glorious opportunity of this generation to end the one huge wrong of the American nation--and in so doing to find America for ourselves with the same immense thrill of discovery which gripped those who first began to realize that here, at last, was a home for freedom."

After the speech, someone praised Johnson for his delivery. The President looked the man in the eye and said simply: "I really meant it."

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