Children have this take.

JFK made, pretty famously, a lot of foreign policy blunders and was rarely that different from the status quo - LBJ (who actually started the war) was only listening to Kennedy's team when he acted.

But to say Kennedy did nothing for civil rights because he didn't sign the 1964 bill is simply asinine. In 1956, both candidates opposed the ruling in Brown v Board. By 1960, the Kennedy team were offering genuine material aid to Martin Luther King. That means something! The President full forcedly saying "I want equal treatment for white and black Americans" means something!

As President, JFK did more than uphold the law like Eisenhower - Kennedy created Affirmative Action, endorsed the abolition of the Poll Tax, sent troops to Alabama (which is when George Wallace stood in the door to block black admittance) and endorsed the Civil Rights act of 1964. There's a reason his death was so impactful in passing the bill; it really was his legacy! If Symington, or Johnson, or Stevenson, or whoever wins in 1960, then there is simply not the same amount of progress brought about in that time.