Having just finished An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s by Doris Kearns Goodwin, I am reminded of the importance of history.1 To review where we have been from all sides, not just the myopic view of the present, we can start to make some sense of past circumstances and behaviors that pitted countries against countries, neighborhoods against neighborhoods and people against each other. We can analyze what factors were real and what factors were perceived. Yet far too often, such an exercise is viewed with the blinders of the present and an ignorance or deliberate avoidance of the truth. This latter path further complicates our ability and our resolve to improve our lives and the life of our communities.
Doris Kearns Goodwin is a superb historian. One of her many books, A Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, highlights President Lincoln and his cabinet.2 He chose a group of men that could logically be considered to be rivals in the political arena, but he decided that the country needed a team of men that could do the difficult work of leading at a time when the country was on the brink of collapse. Ms. Goodwin details the work, the personalities, the schisms, and the path forged with great aplomb, showing how the lessons of Lincoln’s legacy exhibit a better way forward today if only we could use the examples provided. More on Lincoln later.
This present book recounts the turbulent 1960s both from her perspective and that of her late husband, Richard (Dick) Goodwin. Dick Goodwin was present at almost every pivotal political event in the 1960s – campaigning and speechwriting for John Kennedy, speechwriting and policy making for Lyndon Johnson, splitting from Lyndon Johnson over the Vietnam War, joining forces with Eugene McCarthy, and finally working with Robert (Bobby) Kennedy up until his assassination in 1968. These consummate historians lay out the pivotal moments of the 1960s with the exactness of an historian and the humility of a citizen witnessing history. Let me highlight just a few of moving passages in the book-
- In the wake of JFK’s New Frontier agenda and promise of a New Hope in America, Lyndon Johnson resolved to carry JFK’s work forward after his death in November 1963. With great persistence and the usual arm-twisting of recalcitrant legislators, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed. President Johnson stated – “We believe that all men are created equal. Yet many are denied equal treatment. We believe that all men have certain unalienable rights. Yet many Americans do not enjoy those rights. We believe that all men are entitled to the blessings of liberty. Yet millions are being deprived of those blessings—not because of their own failures but because of the color of their skin. But it cannot continue. Our Constitution, the foundation of our Republic, forbids it…Morality forbids it. And the law I will sign tonight forbids it.”
- A year later to promote the Voting Rights Act of 1965 during a national address, Johnson again noted, “There is no constitutional issue here. The command of the Constitution is plain. There is no moral issue. It is wrong—deadly wrong—to deny any of your fellow Americans the right to vote in this country. There is no states’ right or national rights. There is only the struggle for human rights…What happened in Selma [AL] is part of a far larger movement which reaches in every section and state of America. It is the effort of American Negroes to secure for themselves the full blessings of American life. Their cause must be our cause too. Because it’s not just Negroes, but really it’s all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice…AND…WE…SHALL…OVERCOME.”
- In the aftermath of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in April 1968, Bobby Kennedy abandoned a planned rally, hopped on the back of a flatbed truck and offered extemporaneously, “In this difficult day, in the difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask what kind of nation we are and what direction we want to move in. For those of you who are black—considering the evidence there evidently is that there were white people who were responsible—you can be filled with bitterness, with hatred and a desire for revenge….Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love.”
These three passages are just a sampling of the historical events of the 1960s. The signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the promotion of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the impromptu speech about the impact of Martin Luther King are all vital cogs in the fabric of the 1960s and reemphasize how progress can be made in the midst of significant adversity. Those lessons are timeless.
Why am I so fascinated with the 1960s? Well, an obvious answer is that that decade was my second decade of life and formative to much of my life to follow. Plus, the issues of the 1960s were crucial to the America of today. What still plagues us today that was unresolved back then? Why does it still plague us? What can we do better to eliminate those risks going forward? The three examples noted above are eerily similar to modern-day issues with significant divisiveness — 1) the attacks on wokeness,3 2) voting law changes, and 3) the murder of George Floyd. History can repeat itself when we let it. We don’t erase history, but we should learn from it.
This is where I want to provide the last example from Goodwin’s book. In the Epilogue, she reflects on the changes and turmoil of 60 years ago and our current opportunity to improve. She uses 28-year-old Abraham Lincoln’s address to the Young Men’s Lyceum in Springfield IL. Lincoln was troubled by “the mood of the country, a tendency to substitute passion for judgment, to engage in mob action in disregard of laws.” When substituting passion for judgment, the environment is fertile for a dictator and a perversion of the rule of law and negatively affecting our democracy.
Have I overexaggerated this comparison, that Lincoln’s concerns are present today? I don’t think so. I think this comparison is right on as the passion for consuming lies has severely compromised rational judgment.4 The persistent claim of election fraud or a stolen election has led to violence on multiple fronts and erosion of trust in our time-honored system of free and fair elections and the peaceful transfer of power. When our social fabric is twisted or torn, we can be unfortunately pitted against each other and ignore the lessons of history.
So, history is the path forward if we choose to improve our lives, improve the lives of our families, and the life of our communities. History, when applied with integrity, helps us help each other. If we let its lessons go unheeded, we have wasted the noble work of so many and the sacrifice of so many. If we let its lessons go unheeded, we have let our better angels go silent. Those that chose to ignore history do so at their own peril but, more importantly, do so at our peril. Our historians can help us move forward, not backward.
- Goodwin DK. An Unfinished Love Story. A Personal History of the 1960s. Simon and Schuster; 2024.467 pp.
- Goodwin DK. Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Simon and Schuster; 2006. 966 pp.
- https://mychildrenschildren.com/woke-im-in/
- https://mychildrenschildren.com/the-cost-of-lies-2/