Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Acton Commentary: The LBJ Curse on the Black Vote
Acton Commentary: The LBJ Curse on the Black Vote
Jun 4, 2025 12:59 PM

Because it is right, because it is wise, and because, for the first time in our history, it is possible to conquer poverty … Lyndon B. Johnson’s Special Message to Congress, March 16, 1964

Anthony menting on the preference black voters showed for President Obama, points out that Lyndon Baines Johnson’s War on Poverty policies “introduced perverse incentives against saving money, starting businesses, getting married, and they discouraged fathers from being physically and emotionally present for their children — resulting in generational welfare dependence — black voters are lured to choose dependence over liberation.” The full text of his essay follows.The full text of his essay follows. Subscribe to the free, weekly Acton News & Commentary and other publicationshere.

The LBJ Curse on the Black Vote

by Anthony Bradley

Gov. Mitt Romney’s devastating loss to President Barack Obama is producing all sorts of interesting discussion. The analysis shows, again, a clear preference that minorities had for Obama. For example, according to exit polling data at Fox News, President Obama received 93 percent of the black vote. Over the years, the GOP made honest attempts to attach racial weight to issues like abortion and gay marriage but to no avail. Those attempts failed for an important reason: For black voters, entitlement programs trump moral-social issues every time. Even if African Americans are more socially conservative on many issues black voters will choose the path of consequentialism at the ballot box. This is the sentiment that the moral worth of an action derives solely from its es or consequences. The GOP seems blind to this fact.

President Obama owes a debt of gratitude to former President Lyndon Johnson for the “War on Poverty” programs he proposed in his 1964 Great Society speech. Johnson was well aware that by federalizing his proposals he was cementing black allegiance to the Democratic Party for years e. In fact, it is reported that Johnson, in an attempt to assuage the fears of southern governors, said that his plan was “to have them n*****s voting Democratic for the next two hundred years.” Johnson’s plan worked masterfully.

Even when there is evidence to the contrary—for example, that none of the entitlement programs introduced by the Johnson administration have improved the lives of blacks in the long-run anywhere in America—race-sensitive warfare rhetoric and the perception of genuine concern for the marginalized ensures that Democratic candidates prevail among minority voters. Even though Johnson’s programs introduced perverse incentives against saving money, starting businesses, getting married, and they discouraged fathers from being physically and emotionally present for their children—resulting in generational welfare dependence—black voters are lured to choose dependence over liberation.

The Johnson administration successfully convinced generations of black voters to believe a two-part narrative. First, none of the challenges in your life are related to any decisions you or your family has ever made and all of your problems have been imposed on you, historically, by others. Second, you are, therefore, entitled to receive money and services through government that will remedy all of your problems. An additional sub-plot advances an evolving conflation of “government” with “society.” Therefore, when the point is made that other institutions in society are better at caring for the differentiated needs of the poor in the long-run, progressives will always interpret that as “not caring for the poor,” “ignoring the poor,” “leaving the poor to fend for themselves,” and so on. An anxious warning results: “If government doesn’t provide for the poor, no one will.”

What remains odd is how easily we have forgotten that the cultural production of evil that oppressed and marginalized blacks in the first place was the work of politics. The trans-Atlantic slave trade, American slavery, the Jim Crow era, the Eugenics movement, the Tuskegee Experiment, and the forced sterilization of black women were all made possible and perpetuated because of concentrated political power. Johnson brilliantly worked to whitewash the historical narrative with a speech and a few pen strokes to view government as the most effective means of remedying the kinds of problems that politics initiated in the first place—problems that are often more moral in nature rather than political. Years after the systemic oppression, politicians courted black voters to elect them to solve the problems catalyzed by previous eras’ self-interested politicians just like them.

It seems plausible, then, that the only way to free black voters from the curse of LBJ is for some group to make the persuasive and factual case that munities are better off when people in munities are in full control of how to solve their own problems. This was the norm in the munity that led to higher black marriage rates and work force participation rates prior to the civil rights movement than after, for example. What should matter for black voters moving forward should not be allegiance to the unfulfilled promises of past proposals but a future that empowers and positions munities to create the conditions for virtue formation, strong marriages, parental control in education, entrepreneurial freedom, and protection from the unchecked power of self-interested politicians lobbied by corporations, so that votes are cast to guarantee the actualizing of liberty rather than the promises of wished-for solutions.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Mark 6:1-6   (Read Mark 6:1-6)   Our Lord's countrymen tried to prejudice the minds of people against him. Is not this the carpenter? Our Lord Jesus probably had worked in that business with his father. He thus put honour upon mechanics, and encouraged all persons who eat by the labour of their hands. It becomes...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Mark 12:28-34   (Read Mark 12:28-34)   Those who sincerely desire to be taught their duty, Christ will guide in judgment, and teach his way. He tells the scribe that the great commandment, which indeed includes all, is, that of loving God with all our hearts. Wherever this is the ruling principle in the soul, there...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Psalm 119:9-16   (Read Psalm 119:9-16)   To original corruption all have added actual sin. The ruin of the young is either living by no rule at all, or choosing false rules: let them walk by Scripture rules. To doubt of our own wisdom and strength, and to depend upon God, proves the purpose of holiness...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on 2 Timothy 3:1-9   (Read 2 Timothy 3:1-9)   Even in gospel times there would be perilous times; on account of persecution from without, still more on account of corruptions within. Men love to gratify their own lusts, more than to please God and do their duty. When every man is eager for what he can...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on 1 Peter 4:7-11   (Read 1 Peter 4:7-11)   The destruction of the Jewish church and nation, foretold by our Saviour, was very near. And the speedy approach of death and judgment concerns all, to which these words naturally lead our minds. Our approaching end, is a powerful argument to make us sober in all worldly...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Psalm 51:1-6   (Read Psalm 51:1-6)   David, being convinced of his sin, poured out his soul to God in prayer for mercy and grace. Whither should backsliding children return, but to the Lord their God, who alone can heal them? he drew up, by Divine teaching, an account of the workings of his heart toward...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Proverbs 3:27-35   (Read Proverbs 3:27-35)   Our business is to observe the precepts of Christ, and to copy his example; to do justice, to love mercy, and to beware of covetousness; to be ready for every good work, avoiding needless strife, and bearing evils, if possible, rather than seeking redress by law. It will be...
Verse of the Day
  Commentary on Today's Verse   Commentary on Psalm 91:1-8   (Read Psalm 91:1-8)   He that by faith chooses God for his protector, shall find all in him that he needs or can desire. And those who have found the comfort of making the Lord their refuge, cannot but desire that others may do so. The spiritual life is protected by Divine grace...
Verse of the Day
  1 Timothy 6:17-19 In-Context   15 which God will bring about in his own time-God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords,   16 who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen.   17 Command those who are rich...
Verse of the Day
  1 Peter 5:10 In-Context   8 Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.   9 Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of sufferings.   10 And the God of all grace, who...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved