LYNDON JOHNSON, THE PASSAGE TO POWER................... A RARE INSIGHT INTO THE PSYCHOLOGY OF A MAJOR POLITICIAN

I read “The Passage of Power” by Robert Caro, volume four in an eventual five volume life of Lyndon Johnson by Robert Caro, over Easter. I had read two of the three previous volumes , and this is the best so far.

              

It covers the period from 1960 to early 1964. 

Senator Johnson’s entry to the contest against JFK  for the 1960 Democratic nomination was left too late, and he relied too heavily on influential friends in Congress, whereas Senator Kennedy had already locked up delegates,  one by one, in a professional way and by taking part in the primaries which Johnson avoided because he was too busy as Leader of the Senate..

Surprisingly, Johnson accepted the vice Presidential nomination from Kennedy, and thereby helped Kennedy win a few vital southern states. Without Johnson on the ticket, Nixon would  probably have won Texas, Louisiana and South Carolina, and thereby the Presidency .

As vice President, Johnson had no power, and adopted a policy of staying silent at the relatively few meetings to which he was actually invited by the President. In this way, he gave the President apparent loyalty, but not much real help.

In particular, he was little help to Kennedy, when he could have made a difference, in calming the hawks in Congress, who wanted an invasion of Cuba during the missile crisis.

But when Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963, Johnson showed uncharacteristic tact and judgement in the way he took over, calmed the frantic public mood, and worked behind the scenes to maintain the continuity of his predecessor’s team, and policy programme.

He was able to use the aftermath of Kennedy’s death, and his own incomparable legislative skills, to ensure passage of Civil Rights, as well as tax and expenditure cuts, with a speed that Kennedy could never have matched.  

Johnson’s big challenge was getting this legislation, hitherto bottled up in committee by southern Democrat Senators, who totally opposed the very idea of Civil Rights, voted upon. He succeeded in this where Kennedy had failed. When the Civil Rights Bill was finally voted through in the Senate, it had more Republican Senators voting for it than Democrats.

His relationship with John Kennedy has been  good enough, if wary and distant.

But Robert Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson hated one another. This went back to amusing stories Johnson had told about how Roosevelt had fooled, and then dismissed Robert’s father, Joe Kennedy, as Ambassador to London, during World War Two.  Joe Kennedy was an appeaser and was about to back Roosevelt’s opponent in the Presidential Election of 1940, so Roosevelt had to get rid of him, but Johnson took undue pleasure in it.

While John Kennedy could forget this sort of thing, Robert could not.

The book gives an excellent insight into the way a minority in the US Congress can block Presidential business. Stalling legislation in the Rules committee, excessively prolonged hearings, and filibusters were all used by opponents of Johnson’s Civil Rights legislation. Johnson used patronage, emotional blackmail, and threats to overcome these tactics.

He did so because he was deeply committed to racial equality, something his liberal critics could never bring themselves fully to believe.

His own troubled childhood, during which his father lost a lot of money and respect, hardened Johnson for political battles, but also gave him a degree of sympathy for the dispossessed,  that was rare among his colleagues.

PUTIN IS SPLITTING THE EUROPEAN UNION, AND TEARING UP EUROPE’S POST WAR SECURITY ORDER

Russia’s tactics in Ukraine have torn up the assumptions, on which the relationship between the West and Russia had been based since the end of the Second World War.

Forcible annexations of neighbouring territory, a reality in the 1930’s, are now a reality again, thanks to what has happened in Ukraine.

Power politics and spheres of influence of great powers have replaced international law and respect for sovereignty as the motive forces of European security.

Already, the EU is visibly divided on how to respond, even though international law on this matter is clear.

On the 1 August 1975, the then Irish Taoiseach, Liam Cosgrave was one of the signatories of the Helsinki Final act governing relations between European states. He signed along the United States, all other European countries (except Albania), and the USSR, which at the time encompassed both Russia and Ukraine.

Article one of the Helsinki Final Act said that the signatory states would

“respect each other’s sovereign equality, juridical equality and territorial integrity”,

and that they would refrain from the 

“use of force or the threat of the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state”.

As a small militarily neutral European state, Ireland has a greater interest, even than has a state which enjoys the comfort of a military alliance, in ensuring that these clear interstate principles are respected.

As Taoiseach, I happened to have been invited to address the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on the very day the Assembly was voting to admit the Russian Federation to membership of the Council. I spoke in favour of Russian accession. Russia became a member on 28 February 1996. The Council of Europe is the source of a dense and comprehensive network of treaties on many topics, including human rights. The Council of Europe, and its Treaties, only have meaning to the extent that its members are willing to abide by international law.

The European Union also rests on the foundation of respect for international law. The EU only EXISTS because there is an assumption that international Treaties will be respected in ALL circumstances. The EU has no force to govern its own members beyond the force of international law in the form of EU Treaties.  The European Court of Justice interprets these Treaties and its rulings are accepted by all EU states.

Dividing the EU has been a long standing Russian goal, and President Putin’s aggressive tactics appear to be succeeding in the goal of dividing the EU, in a way that previous Russian efforts have failed.

At one end of the spectrum, countries like Bulgaria, Cyprus, Greece, Spain, Italy and Hungary are relatively accommodative towards what Russia is doing, while others, like Lithuania, Poland, Estonia and Latvia are alarmed and looking for resolute action. The bigger EU states are, painfully and unsuccessfully, trying to balance commercial interests against professed principles

Talks are taking place in Geneva, but one wonders what there is to talk about. The two sides have no assumptions in common, unless of course Russia succeeds in getting the EU to validate what it is doing.

As recently as 1994, EU countries, including Britain and France, reached an international agreement with Russia guaranteeing Ukraine’s frontiers, in return for the non trivial matter of Ukraine abandoning its nuclear weapons, and thereby weakening its deterrent security capacity in an important way. That agreement has now been put in the bin.

It appears to me that the European Union is not only unprepared militarily and economically for what is happening now. It is also unprepared intellectually. Its theory on international relations does not encompass what President Putin is doing.

Putin is moving fast, while Europe is still scratching its head.

If the EU is not to have its policies dictated in the Kremlin, as a result Russian pressure on energy supplies, it needs to make a radical change in its own energy policies.

It needs to build a proper energy union in Europe, independent of Russia, with complete inter connection of its energy distribution grids. That will require a lot of investment, and the diversion of funds from current consumption. 

THE ODD THING IS NOT THAT MARTIN MCGUINNESS WENT TO WINDSOR CASTLE...... BUT THAT SINN FEIN MPS STILL REFUSE TO DO THEIR WORK IN THE PARLIAMENT TO WHICH THEY SEEK ELECTION

I was in England last week for some of the celebrations attending the State visit of Ireland’s President Higgins to the United Kingdom.

Although Ireland and the United Kingdom have lived in peace beside one another since 1921, and have both been members of the EU since 1973, this was, remarkably, the first state visit by an Irish Head of State to the United Kingdom. 

The Treaty of  1921, which brought the Irish Free State into existence, accepted the fact of continuing UK jurisdiction over Northern Ireland. The Irish constitution of 1937 also accepted this fact too, but asserted a right to reunification of the national territory which was deemed to include Northern Ireland.  My understanding is that the existence of this territorial claim, which was not pursued in any serious way as a legal claim, was an obstacle in the minds of some Irish leaders to normal state to state relations. They seem to have felt that reciprocal state visits at head of state level would have constituted full acceptance, as of right, of UK jurisdiction in Northern Ireland. 

This barrier was removed in 1998, sixteen years ago, when the relevant articles ( 2 and 3) in the constitution were removed by a referendum vote of the Irish people, as part of the package of measures that made up the Good Friday Agreement.

The coverage of the visit in Ireland was enormous and focussed on President Higgins and the queen and their many visibly cordial interactions throughout the visit.

Unfortunately, in sections of the media in Britain, much attention was focussed on the attendance of Martin Mc Guinness, a former member of the IRA, who now Deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland ( which remains in the United Kingdom) at the dinner in Windsor Castle. To my mind, it is unexceptional that Mr McGuiness would receive and accept such an invitation, given the office he willingly holds.

What remains exceptional is the fact that members of Mr Mc Guinness’ party, Sinn Fein, put forward members to be elected as members of Parliament in Westminster, who then refuse to take their seats there(although they draw their pay and allowances). If they attended they could work to affect the legislation that governs their constituents. That is what MPs do. 

It seems that, in some way, Sinn Fein do not attend because they do not accept the jurisdiction of the UK Parliament (although they are happy to receive and spend money raised and voted by that Parliament).

If that is the case, they are not accepting the will of the Irish people, who accepted the Good Friday Agreement in full, including the change in articles 2 and 3 and the  renunciation of any refusal to accept UK jurisdiction in Northern Ireland, unless and until the people of Northern Ireland itself decide to join a united Ireland.