Mutual Contempt: Lyndon Johnson, Robert Kennedy, and the Feud That Defined a Decade

by Jeff Shesol

Book Overview

After the death of John Kennedy, LBJ and RFK were the dominant political figures of the 1960s, each fighting for the spotlight, each struggling to emerge from the other's shadow. Their arguments echoed across the nation, as "Johnson men" and "Kennedy men" waged political turf battles and the press portrayed every disagreement as a claim on the legacy of the fallen JFK. By 1968, two men who were once allies had become bitter rivals for the presidency...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393318559
• ISBN13: 9780393318555
• Release Date: October 1998
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 622 Pages
• Weight: 1.98 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.1" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

A work that will stun, sadden and amuse - a tremendous study

This extraordinary work will ignite the reader's imagination, and he will never be able to think of Robert Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson the same again. The vague historical references to this feud can never fully express the emotion and passion that fueled it. Robert Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson were inextricably tied throughout the 1960's and, indeed, this book superbly records their eternal connection. Though the author is clearly Kennedy-partisan, the work is a fair study of both players. The reader will find himself on an emotional rollercoaster, filled with varying degrees of anger, shock and sympathy toward both men. This book chronicles beautifully a real life Shakespearian tragedy as it unfolds and progresses toward its all too sudden finale.

An excellent study of the effect of power on personality.

What comes to the fore in this book is that power influenced both LBJ and RFK negatively -- especially with respect to their treatment of each other. During the 1960 presidential campaign and then during the JFK administration, Robert Kennedy's innate dislike and scorn of LBJ was put into practice by his uniquely powerful position within JFK's cabinet. Clearly, RFK held the upper hand from 1960 through 1963, and he used his influence to shut LBJ out of important meetings and events and to make sure that LBJ's role was little more than that of "water boy." LBJ, for his part, fumed at the repeated slights from RFK during JFK's tenure, and -- as Shesol well demonstrates -- allowed the hurt and resentment that had built up during those three years to play much too large a role in his decision-making calculus during his own administration. If anything, LBJ's well-documented personal insecurities (which may have reached the level of clinical paranoia by the time he left the presidency) and mastery of the political game made his ostracism of "all things RFK" even more effective than RFK himself had ever been able to manage. What all this means is that the personal animosity that these two important men felt toward one another was best effected by each during his own time of greatest power and influence. As a result, the talents and resources that each of these two great public servants had available to contribute were underutilized (at best) or squandered (at worst) at a time when the country desperately needed both men to help see it through some of its most difficult times. To the largest extent, Shesol does not ascribe greater fault or worse judgment to either man, and indeed he cannot, as each took advantage of his own personal power to minimize the influence of the other. That is the sad theme underlying Shesol's important and fascinating book.

A must read for anyone interested in the 60's . . .

Shesol approaches the LBJ/RFK relationship as history - he doesn't carry any of the baggage that people, historians, voters would have if they lived during the 60's as participants. The Kennedys were the reason I became fascinated with politics and American history, but LBJ has always been the President (and Senator) I've most admired and studied. My personal library has some 35 volumes on LBJ. MUTUAL CONTEMPT shows that the relationship between LBJ/RFK was very complex and certainly played a significant role in events, policies and Democratic politics in the 60's and beyond. Shesol concludes that in many ways the two powerful leaders were similar at the core and both sides spent too much time on petty things and failed to completely unite for the national good. The what ifs will haunt us for many years to come. What if LBJ had not become bogged down in Vietnam, what if RFK gained the nomination in 1968 or waited until 1972? A great book can lead to great discussions. Only if we had solid leaders such as LBJ and RFK today!

Clearly the best of the recent JFK/LBJ/RFK/White House books

Recent months have seen the publication of a spate of books regarding presidential politics in the turbulent decade that was the 1960s. Taking Charge, The Kennedy Tapes, Shadow Play, LBJ's War, Kennedy and Nixon, The Walls of Jericho, The Living and the Dead, Guns and Butter, Dereliction of Duty, The Other Missiles of October---all these books offered some insight into the thoughts, beliefs, actions and geopolitical decisions of the men (and they were all men) who ran our country during that difficult and often painful period. Many of them are well-researched, some are well-written, a few have become best-sellers, but all of them are missing a vital piece of the puzzle, a flaw which leaves each of them, for all af their research and erudition, strangely unsatisfying and incomplete. This magnificent new book supplies that vital missing piece and, in doing so, paradoxically renders each of the others both more valuable and at the same time obsolete. Shesol's thesis, which he amply substantiates with tapes, documents and personal interviews, is that the feud between RFK and LBJ was pivotal not only in the later stages in their respective political careers, but also in a wide range of policy decisions taken by Johnson, as President, and Kennedy, as Attorney General and then as Senator from New York. He enlivens his book with commentary and anecdote from a variety of important figures of the time, inclding Arthur Schlesinger, who is also quoted approvingly on the dust jacket. This is both an important piece of historical research and a thoroghly enjoyable read. This delightfully written, important, book is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the Vietnam War, the Johnson Presidency, the catastrophic results of the Great Society which we are still living with today, or, indeed, the 1960s in general. It should certainly be read in preference to any of the other books mentioned above.

Vulgar, but irresistible

We were assigned this rather repellent book for an advanced graduate seminar on the role of the presidency in post-war US history. Our professor raved about it (probably because the author quotes him approvingly on several occasions), saying that it would "force a radical reappraisal of the Johnson presidency". Both he and Shesol (the author) somewhat overstate the case-- I find it hard to believe that a US President, even one as monstruously egotistical as Johnson, could really subordinate policy decisions to personal vendettas to the extent claimed--but Shesol certainly builds a strong argument from presidential documents and personal interviews. Whether or not his case is as solid as he would like to think, Shesol certainly entertains mightily while making it. The book is a rollicking good read, full of hillarious anecdotes, mainly (though not entirely) at Johnson's expense. My favourite was about an Oval Office tape, now in the Johnson library, which, in an earlier era, had been transcribed as the President finishing a telephone call with the words "I have to go now: I have to meet the f--king b---ard". A Johnson biographer had interpreted this as a reference to Bobby Kennedy, but Shesol, with a keen ear and Johnson's appointment list for the day in hand, realised that what the President actually said was "I have to go now: I have to meet the Pakistani Ambassador" !!!!!! Another fine tale bites the dust.... But not to worry, for there are plenty more in this irresistably vulgar, but simultaneously thought-provokingly erudite, book.