Check out the best Lyndon B. Johnson quotes that reflect his commitment to social justice, progress, and the pursuit of excellence.
Lyndon B. Johnson, often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969 during one of the most transformative periods in American history.
Born on August 27, 1908, in Stonewall, Texas, Johnson began his political journey in the U.S. House of Representatives before rising to the U.S. Senate.
He later became Vice President under John F. Kennedy and assumed the presidency following Kennedy’s assassination in 1963.
LBJ is best known for his ambitious “Great Society” programs, which aimed to eliminate poverty, improve education, and promote racial equality.
Under his leadership, landmark laws like the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were passed, forever changing the American social landscape.
He also championed health care reform, resulting in the creation of Medicare and Medicaid, which gave millions of Americans access to affordable medical services.
Despite these achievements, his presidency was deeply affected by the escalating Vietnam War, which led to widespread public criticism and protests.
Here are the most famous Lyndon B. Johnson quotes that offer timeless lessons on leadership, civil rights, courage, and change.
Top 10 Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes
- “The noblest search is the search for excellence.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes - “You aren’t learning anything when you’re talking.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Quotes From Lyndon B. Johnson - “A man without a vote is a man without protection.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson Famous Quotes - “Education is not a problem. Education is an opportunity.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Famous Quotes By Lyndon B. Johnson - “We can draw lessons from the past, but we cannot live in it.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
LBJ Quotes - “If we must disagree, let’s disagree without being disagreeable.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson Quote - “Peace is a journey of a thousand miles and it must be taken one step at a time.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Best Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes - “The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson Sayings - “There are no problems we cannot solve together, and very few that we can solve by ourselves.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Best Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes
- “The fifth freedom is freedom from ignorance.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “A President’s hardest task is not to do what is right, but to know what is right.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Better to have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Books and ideas are the most effective weapons against intolerance and ignorance.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Never miss an opportunity to say a word of congratulation upon anyone’s achievement.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “If two men agree on everything, you may be sure that one of them is doing the thinking.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “The guns and the bombs, the rockets and the warships, are all symbols of human failure.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Doing the right thing is not the problem. Knowing what the right thing is, that’s the challenge.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Lincoln was right about not fooling all the people all the time. But Republicans haven’t given up trying.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “The Great Society is a place where every child can find knowledge to enrich his mind and enlarge his talents.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “We must open the doors of opportunity. But we mūst also also equip our people to walk through those doors.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “If one morning I walked on top of the water across the Potomac River, the headline that afternoon would read: ‘President Can’t Swim.’” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “I am going to build the kind of nation that President Roosevelt hoped for, President Truman worked for, and President Kennedy died for.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “This right to vote is the basic right without which all others are meaningless. It gives people, people as individuals, control over their own destinies.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Until justice is blind to color, until education is unaware of race, until opportunity is unconcerned with the color of men’s skins, emancipation will be a proclamation but not a fact.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Famous Quotes From Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Freedom is not enough.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Every man has a right to a Saturday night bath.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “I want to make a policy statement. I am unabashedly in favor of women.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “This administration here and now declares unconditional war on poverty in America.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “We live in a world that has narrowed into a neighborhood before it has broadened into a brotherhood.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Being president is like being a jackass in a hailstorm. There’s nothing to do but stand there and take it.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “We have the opportunity to move not only toward the rich society and the powerful society but upward to the Great Society.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “A man can take a little bourbon without getting drunk, but if you hold his mouth open and pour in a quart, he’s going to get sick on it.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “The land flourished because it was fed from so many sources—because it was nourished by so many cultures and traditions and peoples.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “We have talked long enough in this country about equal rights. It is time now to write the next chapter—and to write it in the books of law.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson Quotes And Sayings
- “I will do my best. That is all I can do. I ask for your help – and God’s.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “I want real loyalty. I want someone who will kiss my ass in Macy’s window, and say it smells like roses.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “A rioter with a Molotov cocktail in his hands is not fighting for civil rights any more than a Klansman with a sheet on his back and mask on his face.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “Justice requires us to remember that when any citizen denies his fellow, saying, ‘His color is not mine,’ or ‘His beliefs are strange and different,’ in that moment he betrays America, though his forebears created this nation.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
- “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘you are free to compete with all the others,’ and still justly believe that you have been completely fair.” — Lyndon B. Johnson
Conclusion
What are your favorite Lyndon B. Johnson quotes and sayings listed above? If there is a quote that we’ve missed then let us know in the comments section below.
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