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Indeed, L.B.J. was so often out of the U.S. that speculation inevitably arose that J.F.K. was just trying to keep him out of the White House's way. Things got to the point where Kennedy recently had to deny at a press conference that he was planning to "dump" Lyndon in 1964.
Not Far Apart. In fact, despite differences of background, personality and political technique, Johnson and Kennedy were not far apart in their basic policy views, and the 36th President is generally expected to carry out the programs of his predecessor. Some views recently expressed by Johnson with which Kennedy would have concurred:
∙ PEACE. "Reciprocity is the key to peace. If the Soviets want America's cooperation, they can earn it. If the Soviets want America's hostility, they certainly can provoke it."
∙ NUCLEAR TEST BAN TREATY. "We are not taking any needless risks for peace. But neither are we foreclosing the future. We have no desire to perpetuate the burdens and dangers of the cold war, no ambition to doom mankind to the accumulated folly of an intensified arms race, no wish to convince the Soviets that even reasonable proposals will be rejected by us without fair or adequate consideration."
∙ CUBA. "We shall not be content until the last of the Soviet forces are with drawn from Cuban soil."
∙ SPACE. "We are not reaching for prestige in space; we are reaching for peace. We do not know—and the Soviets do not know—what the stars will tell us. We do know that to defaul-the exploration of the universe of space would surely be as catastrophic in its consequences as if we had defaulted exploration of the universe of the atom."
∙ CIVIL RIGHTS. "Unless we are willing to yield up our destiny of greatness among the civilizations of history, Americans—white and Negro together —must be about the business of resolving the challenge which confronts us now. Until justice is blind to color, until education is unaware of race, until opportunity is unconcerned with the color of men's skins, emancipation will be a proclamation but not a fact."