Moyers on Martin and Lyndon

Bill Moyers discussed Lyndon Johnson and Martin Luther King, Jr., in his
Bill Moyers essay of 01/18/08 on his weekly Journal show. For all his faults, Johnson really cared about the needs of ordinary people. And acted on it. The video includes Johnson's famous "We shall overcome" moment, a phrase from an old hymn that civil rights activists frequently sang in an arrangement by Pete Seeger.



Moyer's conclusion of the essay:

Of course the movement had come first, watered by the blood of so many, championed bravely now by the preacher turned prophet who would himself soon be martyred. But there is no inevitability to history, someone has to seize and turn it. With these words at the right moment — "we shall overcome" — Lyndon Johnson transcended race and color, and history, too — reminding us that a president matters, and so do we.

Tags: bill moyers, civil rights movement, lyndon johnson, martin luther king jr.