HR0778 98TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

HR0778 LRB098 19465 MST 54633 r

HOUSE RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, The War on Poverty is the unofficial name for legislation first introduced by President Lyndon B. Johnson in January of 1964 in response to a national poverty rate of 19%; and

WHEREAS, As part of his "Great Society", President Johnson believed in expanding the government's role in education and health care as poverty reduction strategies; and

WHEREAS, Major initiatives of the War on Poverty included the Social Security Act of 1965, the Food Stamp Act of 1964, the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964, and the Elementary and Secondary Education Act; and

WHEREAS, This legislation had a dramatic effect, and in the decade that followed the 1964 start of the War on Poverty, poverty rates in the United States dropped to 11.1% in 1973; they have remained between 11% and 15.2% ever since; and

WHEREAS, Despite their positive effects, the popularity of War on Poverty legislation waned after the 1960s; an ideological shift occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, reducing federal aid to impoverished people; and

WHEREAS, As of 2014, The poverty rate in the United States has stood at 15% for 3 consecutive years; this is the first time this has happened since the mid-1960s; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE NINETY-EIGHTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we recognize the 50th anniversary of President Johnson's War on Poverty and sound a renewed call to fight to make Illinois and the United States a more fair and just society.