Note (Back) — CHAPTER 23

The 1964 presidential election was at hand to test this consensus. Given the Republican candidate's vehement opposition to the Civil Rights Act, Lyndon Johnson's overwhelming victory was among other things widely interpreted as a national plebiscite for the new law. The President, however, preferred a broader interpretation. Believing that "great social change tends to come rapidly in periods of intense activity before the impulse slows,"[23-26] he considered his victory a mandate for further social reform. On the advice of the Justice Department and the Civil Rights Commission, he called on Congress to eliminate the "barriers to the right to vote."[23-27]