Washington in My Turncoat

The enemies of Lyndon Johnson, and they are legion, are rapidly discovering that the time has come to reappraise their nemesis.

For six years, L.B.J. has been effectively sole ruler of the Senate, in which capacity he has been responsible for the enactment--and the emasculation--of more liberal legislation than in any era since the Hundred Days. For both the enactment and the emasculation he has incurred the love and wrath of almost everybody around. He has, as both his defenders and his detractors remind us, "bridged the gap" between North and South, liberal and conservative, Douglas, in a word, and East-land. And by doing so he has kept the machinery running.

But his record is replete with the kind of compromise that infuriates activists on both ends of the spectrum. In order to get the liberal bills through and please the North, he has stripped them of those clauses most offensive to the South. And so on, and so on, and so on. For this he has the respect and mistrust of every one of his colleagues.

The role Johnson has played in the Senate he has also played within the convolutions of the Democratic Party. He has been the embodiment of the price which that party has always paid for Southern votes: seniority, the filibuster, and above all No Liberal Legislation.

Since the nomination for Vice-President, however, there has been a striking change in the demeanor of Mr. Johnson. First there was his support of the Democratic platform, which earned him the hatred of his Texas constituents, and almost lost Kennedy the Texas electoral votes. Four days before the election, he was greeted in Dallas by an angry mob, with signs reading "I dreamed I went to Washington in my turncoat."

Then, the night before the election, there was the "Austin-to-Boston" speech: ten minutes that must have puzzled a lot of people, especially Northerners, who saw Johnson throwing away Southern votes by the carload. "In the first week of the campaign," he began, "the grandson of two Confederates went to Boston. One week later, the grandson of two Irish immigrants came to Austin. The walls are coming down...."

It is likely, it is more than likely, that this was the same old L.B.J. who would do anything to get and keep power. But it is possible, it is just barely possible, that freed from the Texas constituents that had molded him for thirty years, Johnson had broken loose.

He spoke this week at a NATO parliamentarians meeting in Paris. The speech was not terribly important, but it was read closely by many, here and abroad, who were looking for some indication of the tenor of the Administration-elect.

"We are all," he said, addressing legislators of the Atlantic Alliance, "ultimately accountable to history. We are accountable less for the individual approval we may win at the polls than for the responsible leadership we provide, whether it means popular approval at the moment or not." And a little later he spoke of "the courage of the parliamentarians to lead the way, each among his own constituents."

And there was a second remark, far from the essential subject of the speech, but intriguing because of its almost-irrelevance: "I am proud that in our own American elections the electorate has shown the courage to lower the walls of old divisions which too long stood in our midst."

He was talking, in all probability, to himself, especially about courage. But while it is difficult to believe that L.B.J. is actually turning into a liberal, it is hard otherwise to account for his words. He didn't have to say them, any more than he had to throw Boston in the face of Austin.

Time, of course, will be the arbiter. But if the turncoat fits, we hope Mr. Johnson will continue to wear it; with which, we welcome him again to Washington.