and for a politician, the president of the united states to say, good-bye, say good-bye to his own base, to do the right thing, by introducing the civil rights act, became the civil rights act, was a phenomenal act of political courage, nobody really has ever done anything like that since. >> it worked. >> they loved abraham lincoln after all. >> look, i was there. i was there. and absolutely it up ended american politics, really, because the power was all in the southern democrats, dixiecrats, who ran the powerful congressional committees who worked as as entrenched as they could be and dead set against integration. and it took a lot of courage to tell your own party, no, we'll do this thing that you absolutely do not want to do. >> lyndon johnson who succeeded kennedy, made a clear