Great Society: Programs

On May 1964, Lyndon Baines Johnson named his national idea the Great Society during his speech at the University of Michigan. It was meant to end racial discrimination and poverty. The Congress passed 206 bills that were for the Great Society.  Between 1965 and 1966, Johnson thought of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 because he thought education was the key opener of the Great Society. The act provided over $1 billion in aid to help public schools buy textbooks and any new library materials. The Great Society also changed the way we looked at healthcare. Johnson and the Congress established Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare gave low-cost medical insurance and hospital insurance to any American over the age of 65. Medicaid helped extend health insurance to most of the people under welfare. The Great Society has also changed housing. The Congress had given enough money to build around 240,000 units of low-rent public housing. It also helped families with low income to pay for better private housing. Around the same time, they established the Department of housing and Urban Development with Robert Weaver as the Secretary. He was also the first African-American to obtain a cabinet seat.The Great Society even had an effect on immigration. The first two bills were the Immigration Act of 1924 and the National Origins Act of 1924. They were meant to build  immigration quotas to about 150,000 people annually. Though, it dsicrimated against the southern and eastern Europeans as well as the Asians. For the environment, the Congress passed the Water Quality Act of 1965 which required states to clean their rivers. Johnson also ordered the government to find the biggest polluters in the nation. There was also consumer protection along with the Great Society. Companies were fiven standards before they sold their products.