"In the spring of 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson had a decision to make. Just months after moving into the White House under the worst of circumstances--following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy--he had decide whether to run to win the presidency in his own right. He turned to his most reliable, trusted political strategist: his wife, Lady Bird Johnson. The memo she produced for him, long overlooked by biographers, is just one revealing example of how their marriage was truly a decades long political partnership and emblematic of her own political acumen. Perhaps the most underestimated First Lady of the twentieth century, Lady Bird Johnson was also one of the most accomplished. Managing the White House in years of national upheaval, through the civil rights movement, and the escalation of the Vietnam War, Lady Bird projected a sense of calm and, following the glamorous and modern Jackie Kennedy, an old-fashioned image of a First Lady. In truth, she was anything but. As the first First Lady to run the East Wing like a professional office--and one with a significant budget--she took on her own policy initiatives, including the most ambitious national environmental effort since Teddy Roosevelt. Occupying the White House during the beginning of the women's liberation movement, she hosted professional women from all walks of life, encouraging women everywhere to pursue their own careers, even if her own style and official role was to lead by supporting others. Where no presidential biographer has understood the full impact of Lady Bird Johnson's work in the White House, Julia Sweig draws on Lady Bird's own voice in her White House diaries to place her at center stage and to reveal a woman ahead of her time--and an accomplished politician in her own right"-- Provided by publisher.
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