1968 by Lewis L. Gould

From the Publisher

A concise and engrossing analysis of the crucial race for the White House that ushered in the Republican ascendancy and left the Democrats divided and torn. Mr. Gould's fresh interpretations, new details, and deft portraits mark this as a distinguished book in a crowded field (Booklist). American Ways Series.

Publishers Weekly

Richard M. Nixon's defeat of Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 presidential election ushered in the Republicans' near-monopoly of the White House for two decades. University of Texas historian Gould's concise and engrossing analysis of this decisive election overturns conventional wisdom on many points, showing, for example, that Robert Kennedy was a less formidable national candidate than people at the time and later historians have believed. Gould maintains that the election's outcome was determined largely by the decline in Democratic loyalty during the '60s. Nixon played up ``wedge issues'' to draw whites with conservative views on race, crime and moral values--a technique, notes Gould, that Reagan and Bush would later exploit. Using unpublished materials at the Lyndon B. Johnson Library, Gould fills in the details of Nixon's attempt to thwart an ``October surprise'' by President Johnson on Humphrey's behalf. As LBJ pushed a peace initiative with the Vietnamese, Nixon worked through Ann Chennault (widow of WW II hero Claire Chennault) to stall South Vietnamese acceptance of a bombing halt until after Election Day. LBJ and Humphrey failed to blow the whistle on Nixon, because doing so would have revealed that they had wiretapped Chennault's phone conversations. (Mar.)

Library Journal

As the torch has been passed to the first president of the Vietnam-baby-boomer generation, Univ. of Texas historian Gould has provided in his analysis of the 1968 presidential election an explanation for Republican successes in the race for the White House in the last 25 years. In a fluid prose that should help this book capture a wide audience, Gould examines the Democratic party dog-fight for the nomination, emphasizing Eugene McCarthy's antiwar entrance into the fray and the decision of Robert Kennedy to throw his hat into the ring. He also chronicles the ``violent spring'' and the antiwar movement that propelled it. While Gould details the debacle that was the Democratic Convention, his work's most lasting contribution may be the pithy chapter titled ``Nixon's the One.'' It examines Nixon's development of his now-vaunted ``Southern strategy'' based mainly on the issue of the desegregation of schools. Nixon's invocations of the forgotten man also resonated well enough for Republicans to use the themes to great advantage for the next 25 years. Well written and easily accessible to large audiences.-- Frank Kessler, Missouri Western State Coll., St. Joseph

Product Details

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents