Video: 'President Johnson's Address to the Nation, 3/31/68. MP600.'

(Sunday, March 31, 1968, 9:01-9:41 p.m. EST; during the Democratic Party presidential primaries, 1968: during the Vietnam War, part of the Indochina Wars and the Cold War) — President Lyndon Johnson stunned the country tonight by announcing during a televised address on the Vietnam War from the White House that he would not seek re-election: “I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President.”

Johnson’s withdrawal left Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York and Senator Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota as the only two declared candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Vice President Hubert Humphrey, however, was widely expected to seek the nomination now that his friend and political benefactor is out of the field.

Johnson also announced tonight that he had ordered a halt in the air and naval bombardment of most of North Vietnam and invited the Hanoi Government to join him in a “series of mutual moves toward peace.”

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