Unlike the Kennedy-sponsored tax cut or civil rights legislation, the $947.5 million anti-poverty bill was Lyndon Johnson's own baby. Riding with its fortunes on Capitol Hill was a large measure of presidential prestige. Indeed, when Johnson sent his poverty program to Congress last spring, he expressed his "total commitment" to it. That being the case, there was practically nothing the Administration wouldn't or, as it turned out, didn'tdo to get the measure approved.
In the Senate, the bill passed by a margin of nearly 2 to 1, but only after Administration forces...
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