ABSTRACT

Like kennedy, Johnson also recognized the contributions of religious groups, including Roman Catholics, in helping to pass these landmark laws. Unlike kennedy, however, Johnson entered office without the religious qualms that had accompanied his predecessor’s historic selection. “will you join in the battle to give every citizen the full equality which God enjoins and the law requires,” the new president asked at the university of Michigan in May 1964, “whatever his belief, or race, or the color of his skin?”1