LBJ Got Differing Rights Case Advice

It was June 23, 1964, and President Johnson was given sharply differing opinions on the disappearance of three young civil rights workers in Mississippi, according to taped telephone conversations released by Johnson’s presidential library in Austin. Before the day was over, the trio’s burning car had been found. Their bodies were found 40 days later. Atty. Gen. Robert F. Kennedy told Johnson aide Jack Valenti, before the car was found, that the president should meet with the missing workers’ parents and express “personal concern for them and for their families.” Less than an hour later, Sen. James Eastland of Mississippi told Johnson he believed the whole thing was a hoax.