Existing comment:
As a presidential candidate in 1960, John F. Kennedy was moved by the levels of poverty he saw in states such as West Virginia. Once he was elected president, books on poverty, including Michael Harrington's The Other America, influenced Kennedy's decision to create an antipoverty agenda.
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson immediately became president and he adopted Kennedy's antipoverty platform. Declaring a war on discrimination and poverty, President Johnson launched a domestic agenda known as the Great Society, which expanded federal benefits for retirees, the disabled, widows, and students through Medicare and Medicaid, employment programs, and federal support to elementary and secondary schools |