Medicare and Medicaid: The Past as Prologue

On July 30, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Social Security Amendments of 1965 into law. With his signature he created Medicare and Medicaid, which became two of America's most enduring social programs. The signing ceremony took place in Independence, Missouri, in the presence of former President Harry S. Truman, as if to indicate that what President Truman and other Presidents before him had tried to get done had now been accomplished. Yet, for all of the appearance of continuity, the law that President Johnson approved differed in significant ways from the law that President Franklin D. Roosevelt would have passed in the thirties or President Truman would have signed in the forties. The very idea of national health insurance underwent a major transformation between the beginning of the century and 1965. Even as the passage of Medicare became assured late in 1964 and in 1965, the legislation remained fluid, with important matters related to consumer choice and the basic design of the program in constant flux.