The Path to Power (The Years of Lyndon Johnson #1)

by Robert A. Caro

Mortified though they were at the injustice of the new rule (far from not needing money, Puls needed it badly; he had been counting on the Pedagog salary to pay his tuition; without it, he would have to drop out of college), they had no inkling at first that it had been devised solely to make them ineligible—and they had no inkling that Lyndon Johnson had done the devising. Kyle was especially shocked to learn the truth. He and Johnson were very different young men—the slender, bespectacled, studious Kyle was a voracious reader, a brilliant student who received in reality the A’s that Johnson only said he received, a brilliant debater who, undefeated during his junior year, won in reality the debating victories that Johnson only said he won—but they shared an interest in politics (although Kyle was more interested in the science than the practice). They argued constantly in history and social-science courses—Kyle, a professor says, could argue Johnson “to a standstill”; he had read the books that Johnson only said he had read—but Kyle had enjoyed those arguments, had thought the give-and-take of ideas was what college was all about, and he had believed that Johnson enjoyed them, too. During Johnson’s pre-Cotulla days at college, Kyle says, “I befriended him when no one else would have anything to do with him,” and Johnson had apparently reciprocated, inviting him to his home to meet his parents. During Johnson’s post-Cotulla days, he had needed the support of “townies” for...