It wasn't just Texas at play but the entire South that LBJ would have had issues with his new founded love of Civil Rights. And that was just one reason cited by Caro. I haven't read the book in a few years, but he also referenced LBJ's legal troubles, bad advice during the Cuban missile crisis (advocating bombing/invasion), almost total exile from the JFK staff, loss of political power in the senate etc. It would have been a pretty bold move to drop him though. And JFK was not exactly a political maverick. I think he would only have done so if absolutely convinced he had too. I don't recall if Caro made this claim, but I do recall reading somewhere that a potential run by RFK in 1968 could have been a factor in dropping LBJ to set Bobby up as the front runner. I think the results from 1964 election are not particularly relevant since LBJ rode a wave of post-assassination popularity that didn't crash until Vietnam. Obviously, if JFK had lived that wouldn't have happened. Caro makes a good case that in the hundred days or so following the assassination LBJ's presidency was among the most productive in history. There was a wave of good will that came his way that allowed him to get things done. And I suppose that is one reason that CTers are always suspicious of him because he so clearly benefited from the assassination. But alas that is not proof of his involvement. Of which there is none.
True, but it seem to me that it wouldn't matter who JFK had on the ticket with him IF civil rights had passed. After its passage (if it did) he was going to lose much of the South, receive the blame, whether LBJ was still on it or had been replaced. At least the deep/Jim Crow states.
Would JFK had not faced a backlash in the South if he had replaced LBJ with RFK? Or a northerner? Whoever he chose would have had to endorse the legislation.
Frankly, I don't think the legislation would have been passed at that time if he hadn't been assassinated. Not in 1963 or 1964. Maybe if JFK had won a landslide election he could have muscled it through. But the Kennedys were simply not very good working with Congress.
