My name is kevin butter fooerfi. Im t it is my pleasure to welcome you here tonight on behalf of the mt. Vernon Ladies Association and the Ford Motor Company which each month sponsors a free monthly book talk just like this one, an opportunity for people to the community to come and learn from some of the greatest historians in the field. Thank you so much for being here tonight. Were thrilled to have you. To begin the program, just shortly, well hear a brief presentation from susan swain, copresident , chief executive officer of cspan, and coauthor of the president s which will be discussed tonight. Shell be joined by brian lann, founder and executive chairman of cspan, in moderating an esteemed group of historians in discussing the american presidency. And the american presidency is, as you know, a fascinating subject of inquiry in every possible way. In the constitution theres not as much said about it as you might imagine. Article 1 is quite long. Article 2 much shorter. And the key phrase in it, frankly, is about as short as you can possibly imagine. The executive power shall be vested in a president of the United States of america. Full stop. Thats the first sentence. And the key phrase in the second article of the constitution, which describes the presidency. Much of what we know today as the american presidency has come from experience. From precedent. From action. And were thrilled to have an opportunity to learn about that experience, that action, tonight, from a group of wonderful historians that id like to tell you a bit about tonight. Joining mr. Lamb and ms. Swain, well be joined by Douglas Brinkley, Edna Greene Medford and Richard Norton smith. Dr. Brinkley is currently professor of history at rice university. President ial historian for c flrks nn. Author most recently of a book im excited about. American moon shot john f. Kennedy and the great space race. Also on the panel, dr. Medford. Dean at howard university. Shes the author most recently of lincoln an eemancipation. Richard norton smith. The author of a wonderful book on George Washington called patriarch. Served as a director of five different president ial libraries. The individuals will discuss their new book, the president s, noted historians on the lives and leadership of americas best and worst chief executives. Please join me in welcoming them tonight. [ applause ] good evening, everybody. Nice to see you. Thank you very much, kevin butterfield. I cant think of a more appropriate place to talk about president ial leadership than mt. Vernon. Its a delight to be back here tonight. Brian and i talked about this book for the first time about a year and a half ago. Our motivation was actually cspans 40th anniversary, but what a week we picked for this book to come out on president ial leadership. Terrific time for us to be hearing from historians to get their perspectives on what makes a good chief executive for this country and also to put some Current Events into some context and we hope to do that tonight. Putting this book together, brian and i actually worked on nine of these which are collected works of his interviews, this time, we decided to bring two resources into play. First of all, brian has been doing a sunday night Interview Program for 30 years now and we have an archive thats full of his interviews, in fact, the odometer on our archives is about to hit 250,000 hours later on this month. Not all buy brans, but nonetheless. [ applause ] but among the people brian have interviewed are these three people who have become great friends of ours over the past quarter century and some of the countrys leading contemporary president ial historians. In addition to having this vast archive of this collected work, about 20 years ago, in fact, exactly 20 years ago in 1999, we had done this yearlong project which each of these three folks were involved in, american president s life portraits. I have some cspan colleagues who are nodding thinking about what a big job this was. We took it upon ourselves to go to a liveon location to a president ial history site associated with every single president and do a twohour live program on their lives. Almost killed us, but we made it through, but at the end of it, we thought, we got all this, we need to put some kindtalked to them and decided lets do a survey of historians and take all this biographical material thats anecdotal in nature and put data and Science Behind it, so we gathered them together along with dr. Robert browning, ed head of our archives, Professor John splain, professor at the university of maryland. We got into the debate, what should the tin qualities of leadership be, in order to do a survey of 100 president ial historians so the idea for this book was actually to merge the survey work weve done three times of the president ial historians with the collected content of president ial biographers. The book youre going to hear about tonight is organized not chronologically but where the president s fell if line in that survey, so youre jumping through history but youre also going through a continuum from the very best to the very worst rated leaders in ocountry and learn more about the characteristics and qualities that perhaps put them in that ranking. Let me tell you about the ten qualities we finally agreed on. The first is public persuasion. The second, crisis leadership. And that can come in all sorts of forms. The third, Economic Management. The fourth quality was moral authority. The fifth, International Relations, which includes not only diplomacy, but also war. The next, administrative skills, which includes the assembling of a cabinet and your advisers around you. The next, the allimportant relations with congress, you can have all that and still not get a program done. This one always reminds me of george h. W. Bush. Vision and setting an attend. The next one, pu s rk, pursued justice for all. The tenth is performance within the context of their times. So what we did was send the survey out to 100 historians. This is three times now. And we worked very hard to get people of different demographics and people of different political points on the spectrum. So that we could represent lots of different points of view. This survey is now with the first one was so successful that we now do it every time, excusemy, a president leaves office. So to answer your e question, President Trump has not been rated and we will not formally rate him until he leaves office but certainly it does engender lots about the current occupant of the office. So im going to give you a quick overview on the best and worst and who moved the most, so you have context of what youre going to hear from the historians. So lets look at the top five. First of all, in fifth place from the top, William Hitchcock is the biographer we chose, but the historians rated eisenhower in fifth place and he has actually moved a bit which maybe speaks to the hidden hand theory that has been developing about his presidency. His lowest score is in public persuasion. The next is, number fourth place, is t. R. , and weve got our t. R. Biographer on the set here tonight and we actually chose his wonderful biography called wilderness warrior, and im sure that well learn more from Douglas Brinkley about why he chose that particular aspect of t. R. s agenda to focus on. He scored very well or he wouldnt be in the fourth place. But his lowest score was an 11 in equal justice, pursuing equal justice for all. In third place, Franklin Delano roosevelt. In our book youll find that we chose doris kearnsgoodwins terrific biography on the white house years when they had all the interesting people including Winston Church hiill living on second floor of the white house to help him get through the war years. His lowest scores, number fifth in Economic Management and eighth, theyre both high scores, in pursuing equal justice for all. The next, here we are on his home. In second place was George Washington scoring 1s and 2s across the board by the historians but his single lowest score, im sure the folks in mt. Vernon have been working so hard to help us all understand that, 13 in equal justice for all. And the top winner in not only our survey but in every survey ever done of president s really is Abraham Lincoln. The top score was 1,000. Abraham lincoln won a score of 907 among the historians and he had a terrific rating on every single one and, except for relations with congress where he scored a nine. Okay. So who are the bottom five . Whos at the other end of the spectrum . John tyler is at number 39. Tidewater, virginia, native. Our biographer was edward craypol who does argue he has some redeeming qualities. So i invite you to read that chapter. [ laughter ] the man who ended up not having a party, but he did manage to establish the president ial succession because it wasnt written into the constitution. Okay. You wont be surprised at number 40. Warren harding. He scored 360 points out of 1,000. We know so much about the scandals that plagued his presidency. Youll be interested to know the biographer we selected for his chapter is john dean. Yes, that john dean of watergate family who knows a thing or two about president ial scandals and actually he uncovered papers of Warren Harding that were previously unknown to biographers and he argues that he deserves a little bit better than the place that the historians have given. Its up to you to decide. Next, franklin pierce. Oh, poor franklin pierce. New hampshires only president. 41st place. The kansas nebraska act did him in. He also had a bit of a drinken problem. But you might also remember if you have known anything about him that he came into office with a tremendous tragedy. They had three sons. Hed already lost two of them. And the third, a young boy named benny, died in front of his wife and himself as their train capsized on their way to washington. He carried his sons dead body up from the zinaccident. His wife really had a very hard time recovering from that and spent much of the first couple of years in the white house on the second floor in the residence writing letters to her dead son. A very tragic story. In pierces case, he had a hard time focusing and assembling his cabinet, understandably, which put him behind the curve. Next up, Andrew Johnson. 42nd place. And David Stewart is the biographer we chose for him. The tennessee governor who was loyal to the union, but, of course, impeached by the republicans using the tenure of office act. Okay. Guess who is dead last. James buchanan. Im a pennsylvanian, so this one hurts a little bit, and i love the biographer that we chose for this chapter. His name is robert strauss. Its a really fun book. Its called worst. President. Ever. Hes a full 30 points below Andrew Johnson. And all of these people, this is something to think about. This is a Point Richard made. All of them are below William Henry harrison who was only in office for one month, so were i think richard called them all net negative presidencies. Okay. Lets take a look at how the modern president s fared. Ronald reagan was the only one who made it into the top ten. Lou cannon, his terrific biographer who covered him as a underi journalist in california is the chapter he did. He had a lot to say about reagans command of storytelling as he was in the office. Next, george h. W. Bush in 20th place. It will be interesting to see what happens to him now that hes past, now that more records are available and theres a bit of a halo effect once president s leave office. Next time we do it, well see whether or not he remains the k bookended by the two adams president s. Bill clinton came in at 15. We had david marinists bo biograp biography. The Washington Post reporter, youre familiar with his work if you live in this area. Talks about bill clintons duality. That impacted everything he did throughout his career. Okay. How about george w. . Just out of the bottom ten,vy to tell you, his highest score was actual actually he pursued equal justice for all. It will be interesting to see as time progresses how he will do. Hes got some difficult problems to overcome. Hurricane katrina, the economic crisis, certainly the ongoing wars. Well be seeing what the historians have to say as more time goes by. How did our most recent president do . Barack obama, number 12, a good showing for first entry. He got 24th in International Relations and 39th in relationships with congress. So i found it was really interesting to look at these scores as i was reading the chapters, what were hoping you will do, to see what the biographers have to say with how the historians have rated them in certain characters. Okay. This my last set of slides for you. This is kind of fun. Whos up and whos down. All right. Andrew jackson. Which way do you think he went . Down. He, in fact, went over the course of the surveys from 13th place down to 18th. Woodrow wilson. Down. 6 to 11. And you folks are going to have to explain this to me because i have a little bit of a soft spot in my heart for rutherford b. Hayes. He actually dropped six points over the surveys from 26 to 32 spot. And Grover Cleveland, our only twoterm nonconsecutive president went from number 17 in the sir rurvey to 23. So who are the ones that went up . Well, dwight eisenhower. He made it from number 9 spot into the top five. Bill clinton, i told you that he was in the number 15 position, but when he first came into this survey, he was in 21st. That was in 1999 right after the impeachment process. And he moved to 15th by the second time we did it. There he stays in 2017 survey. And finally, u. S. Grant. And edna, youre going to have youre a specialist on this area. Youre going to have to help me understand this one. Grant is the person, the president who changed the most, going up 11 points over the course of our 3 surveys. Id love to hear your perspectives on why historians are looking more favorably upon him. So thats a bit of an overview of how president s rated by 100 historians. Y now you have three fabulous historians, so much a part of cspans programming over the years who are going to add some context to that. Thanks for your attention. [ applause ] this book is what it is because of susans fabulous editing capability, and thank you, susan youre welcome. For this presentation. [ applause ] Richard Norton smith comes to us today from grand rapids. Doug brinkley from austin, texas. And edna medford from howard university. And id like to start off by asking doug because lincoln is number one, he just got back from the Lincoln Library in springfield and richard opened it for us all year, what was that, 2006 . Yeah. Start off with what did you find there . Why do we think everybody should go. Everybody should go visit springfield, illinois, if you can. They built an incredible new library, museum, from Abraham Lincoln, but hes always number o one, as susan pointed out, largely because, you know, no matter how bad other president s think they had it, lincoln had it worse. The fact of the matter was he wasnt on seven states on the ballot to vote for him in 1860. He comes to washington, d. C. , essentially having to have a body double. The executive mansion it wasnt called the white house until Theodore Roosevelt dubbed it that. The executive mansion had very lax security. People could efven graze animal in the front lawn. Lincoln is sitting there so vulnerable. I flew in today from austin and landed in Dulles Airport which is very, very close to the battle of bull run where the confederates won the first battle of bull run. And theres Abraham Lincoln sitting in the white house with half the country putting up confederate flags and trying to find a way to keep america cobbled together. He did in a miraculous way. Im always amazed that were able in our country to hold an election in 1864 and lincolns able to get reelected, but when you think about it, the gettysburg address, lincolns first and second inaugurals, are almost foundational texts. Meaning theyre like the declaration of independence or bill of rights or constitution. They just we arent a full nation without addressing lincolns accomplishment and, of course, the emancipation proclamation that the original sin of the United States is slavery, here lincoln gets to be the person who leads the abolitionist crusade from the white house and put america on a new and better course. Then finally, his assassination. John wilkes booth, schoolkids study it. You realize when lincolns body moved back to springfield, you orange feder originally asked me, brian, hes buried there at a cemetery in springfield, the train went across the country at the exact same moment the Union Soldiers and confederate soldierstheir a coming home as a kind of homecoming. Lincoln is kind of in a category unto his own and if you want to also, if youre a book lover, go to the lincoln book shop in chicago that sells nothing but books about Abraham Lincoln. All scholars want to write a book about lincoln. I never have. If i could write one, id write about lincoln going down the mississippi river, two trips, and discovering slavery markets in new orleans. Dr. Medford, lets pick up from what susan asked about u. S. Grant, and you can throw in your comments on mr. Lincoln, if youd like. Can you explain why general grants done so well in the survey . I think every generation decides how theyre going to rate the president s. How theyre going to interpret president s and at this time in our history, things that really matter to us are integrity. I know this is a scandalfilled administration, supposedly. He has surrounded himself with some people who are not always behaving properly, but he always did. I dont think that theres any real criticism of him, personally, but its also about the fact that during the reconstruction period, hes trying to make sure that the violence thats developing, especially in the south, is quelled and so hes willing to enforce those enforcement acts against the klan, and i think from todays sensibilities, we really recognize how important that was. So i think thats one of the major things with him. We asked each historian if theyd write a special piece for this book. We also have one of the chapters from one of the president s. Richard norton smith writes the opening chapter and he calls it the magnificent lion. Would you like to explain that, sir . Along with author schlessinger, there was a preeminent political scientist in the mid 20th century named clinton roseter and wrote an essay on the presidency, which he described the president as a kind of magnificent lion who was more or less free to roam around the reservation at will as long as he did not egregiously offend congress or the public. That was an essay perfectly attuned to the times written in the shadow of both roosevelts, wilson, truman, president s who were very assertive, who were as some would say, imaginative, in interpreting the range of executive power, but, of course, they had also governed at times of crisis. I mean, the one thing that i mean, any reader of this book i think is going to take away is just how evolutionary an office the presidency is. One of the real challenges that confronts anyone ranking the president s, for example, we all agree that Economic Management in the modern context is a determining factor. In the 19th century, president s were not expected in any way i mean, james monroe presided over the first Great Depression in American History and he was reelected with all but one electoral vote. 100 years later, Herbert Hoover, by contrast, became indelibly personally associated with the Great Depression. In a way that obviously made his second term impossible. What had changed . The nature of government. During that century, beginning with lincoln, and certainly with t. R. , the notion of what the federal government was responsible for, and t. R. In particular, the bully pulpit, the idea that an Administrative Office had become one of advocacy. Particularly moral advocacy. Conservation. Protecting consumers against tainted meat and then Woodrow Wilson and the enormous concentration of power during the war and even by the time hoover became president , people expected vastly more from the federal government. So how do you weigh apples and oranges . Monroes performance as president and hoovers performance. Thats one of the internal whatifs i think anyone who plays this game has to grapple with. And luckily, james plon row monroe, everybody in the audience would know the Monroe Doctrine which is, you know, a great tribute. What do you have Herbert Hoover . So sometimes people only remember a couple things about a president. And so monroe was the beneficiary too i think of being part of the virginia dynasty and having that great connection with washington and the other founders. First of all, you all should know that there are cards on the side if you want to ask questions, we will go to that before too long. This will be a 90 minute evening being together. So we have time. But id like to ask you why the three of you have devoted your life to history and to the study of president s. Ill start with edna. Mine is a long story and ill try to make it short. So is history. Absolutely. I grew up in the birth place of john tyler. And it was a county that was 82 africanamerican when i was growing up. And i noticed that we didnt really have a lot of authority over the county. We could vote, but that was about all that we could do. And as a child, i wondered where i fit into all of that. And so when i went off to college, i did decided that let me be honest. I startsd ased as a biology majd realized i didnt want to spend the rest of my life in a lab. So i switched to history. But i think growing up in that environment and not knowing where i fit in to the history is what propelled me into this. And in terms of the lincoln scholarship, but i studied lincoln, but i dont study all the president s like these two gentlemen do. But i think i became very interested in lincoln because of cspan, because of your filming of the enactment of the Lincoln Douglass debates. And that is when i really started becoming interested in president ial history in general and Abraham Lincoln specifically. Mr. Smith, your story. Well, it is rather bizarre. No where near as inspiring as your. I was a very strange child. Some would say that was a preview of coming attractions. But i was 7 years old watching as the returns came in. And i was that rarity of massachusetts republican, rarer now than it was then, and i think that about the same time id been given a book called abe lincoln log cabin, and three years later in 1964, an author, no relags, dean smith, he published a boom that humanized wilson. And it is a model of smart scholarly readable president ial history. In any event, it was a match and im a life long wilsonian, but also someone i was drawn particularly to the by graph aspect of the presidency. Im not a political scientist. There are a lot of different ways of approaching president ial performance. But i find he have single one of these men may be more interesting than most people do. And we also have to say, this is a wonderful story, the way that David Herbert donald, Great Lincoln scholar, told the story about when he went to the Kennedy White house and jfk was obviously not happy of the days news coverage. And he said nobody, nobody, should pass judgment on a president , not even poor old james buchanan, who has not sat at this desk and looked at the papers that came across it. And i think it was a little bit of special pleading there. And there is only so much that you can do for james buchanan. But it is through the study of every single president is useful and i think will deepen your understanding and appreciation of American History. And of this broad but immenselied a Miles Per Hour only experiment on which were all embarked. And we cant leave you without you telling the story of the trips you used to take with your parents. Well, the Station Wagon from hell you know, people dont do this anymore. There arent Station Wagons. But i guess i must have been about eight. I told you, i was the polite. But i had four long suffering sin linky sin siblings. And in the summer, wed do a trip around the country. And it was always argued around gravesites and battlefields. Only concession that was made to the other, they got a Swimming Pool in the evening, you know. And that was and that was a form of study. I mean, there is no excuse i mean, nothing quite like being there. I dont know how you feel, but, you know, andrew jackson, who is not on my parade of president s nevertheless go to the hermitage and you will walk away from there with a much more vivid sense of who he was, including his limitations. How did you get into this . I was born in atlanta, georgia. And when i was very young, my mom and dad would go to Callaway Gardens and near the gardens was the little white house of fdr estate park. And i couldnt believe that the president had lived in such a small Little Cottage house and that he had he died while somebody was painting his portrait only half done. And that the pools there that i saw and understood polio not being able to walk, and he actually considered himself, you know, handicapped but yet he never acted that he way. And then we moved to ohio and i lived not the just down the road from fremont, ohio, where you have ruter ford b. Hayes home. And we claim seven of the president s. Grant being born down in north bend, ohio. And so we just, you know that was a great bit of pride that ohio produced that many president s. And a little bit like you were saying, we would take our car, a Station Wagon actually, and a 24 foot coachman trailer and go all over the country visiting president ial sites, civil war battlefields, nothings al paat. So i have a lot of photos of when i was young. And i just got really into it. And so when i was going into college, the Ohio State University undergrad, i knew i wanted to be a history major because it was in other words work for me. Id read biographies of great people. And i think that the biographies matter. Edna was mentioning grant. Well, ron chernow wrote a big biography of glant wright after his success with hamilton so there became a new wave of people talking about and rae reassessing grant. And biography. And barack obama would look at all the other president ial writings and the one that stood out was grants memoir which grant wrote with the help of mark dwaytwain. And it is an enduring book, mec memoirs of grant in a kind of live on forever. So i was once director of Eisenhower Center and we always thought ike was going to go up, up, up because fiscal conservatives like him and liberals like him because you the industrial military complex speech and the brown decision and the fact of his general i like ike. And it was always Truman Holding that fifth spot and you are seeing eisenhower come straight up and part of it is a new appreciation of ike as a person being the supreme allied commander in world war ii on dd dday. And while we were talking about lincoln, id like to hear your thoughts on why it is that Abraham Lincoln at number one is book ended by the two worst. Is that circumstance of history, character, what contributed to that distinction between those three men . Actually, i think that we tend to judge these president s based on how they dealt with adversity. So there has to be something extraordinary that is happening during their administration. And with lincoln, it doesnt get anymore extraordinary than the civil war. This is a man who could have done what would yuncaone what w did. But he allowed that the was goig to challenge that. So we judge him much higher. S if it really does matter how one responds. It has to be a person who is decisive. A person who can communicate well and persuade people that this is the right way to go. And i think lincoln more than any other president was able to do that. Richard. Well, you know, is it the time or is it the man. Actually if you look in this context, lynn conditi lincoln c been the greatest president if his immediate predecessors had not been the worst. On the other hand, the saintsed lincoln can be criticized because i decided to broaden his political appeal and put a war democrat renamed Democrat Party the union party and picked a man named afternoon drndrew j. He certainly did not lack for courage. As a war time governor in tennessee, he certainly defended the union. But he arguably turned out to be the best president you could make the case as the worst president. In so many ways he is the unlincoln. Here are two men who both were he reared amidst incredible hardship. And who both overcame that in their own way economically. But Andrew Johnson is defined by his resentiments. His child hood inflicted psychic wounds on him, resentments against aristocrats and also against blacks. He simply failed to agrcomprehe behind the civil war. We talk about reconstruction. Andrew johnson preferred to use the word restoration. The civil war was not fought about. Lincoln was radical enough lincoln outgrew the racist society that produced him. Andrew johnson was incapable of that kind of growth. You know, you never want to have the word impeachment swirl about you too much when you are a president either. And you saw that impeachment had hurt bill clinton but he is kind of he was able to shake it off a little bit as we went on further polls. But Andrew Johnson always has the big eye on him. But yet he tried to redeem himself. He ran for the senate and actually became a u. S. Senator from tennessee after he was president to try to build himself back into good graces. But, you know, an argumecould b for George Washington to be number one. Playing to my home audience here. But we see that how low marks washington got because of slavery and because of the time that he was in. It is hard on that ranking to be rated high so it brings your number down. Lincoln being a child of illinois, never having slaves. That brings his number up quite a bit. But the one thing i mean, i dont think that there is a presidency without George Washington because, you knee and it is important to not be a one termer. It is a new category. When george better heah. W. Bush was died, he was a one tell president. But it is a good sign to being reelected. James monroe did get reelected, so he was is a two termer. And walker did not. With washington, big thing he did was to step down saying i dont want to hold poyer. There something more you powerful than being president and that is being an american citizen coming back here to manhunt vernon and allowing democracy to take root. And that is an irreplaceable, you know, quality that washington had. You he set the tone ever what it meant to be president. Lincoln has become the favorite of all recent president s. Obama launched his cam papaign m springfield. George w. Bush will say my favorite president is lincoln. Nixon would drink ginn and talk to a lincoln posh trit rtrait i white house. And these door roodore roosevel wrote about, incounteri encoun ghost of lincoln. He has a real cast because of the civil war in the end is the crucible time in our countrys history. But really washington could be tied with lincoln. Those are the big two. To what extent though does his assassination really factor into miss phis popularity. He didnt have the opportunity during the zi in the second term to make mistakes. So if he had lived, would we think of him in the same way. Barack obama finished 12 out of the 44. And he is the first president since eisenhower i believe to get 50 of the vote twice, two terms. What is your assessment of why he was able to do that when everybody else from eisenhower up to barack obama had trouble getting over 50 of the popular rote in each election . I think as a nation we like to think of ourselves as very inclusive and i think with obamas first election we show that had a black person could win. In the second election, we attempted to show that it was not a fluke. And so i believe that the kind of response he got from americans was the result of how we see ourselves in terms of our national identity. I also think, again, not to take away anything from obama, it was clear that he was an extraordinary candidate, but in 20 2008, he also rode a wave of antibush sentiment. There was no doubt that after eight years people were eager for Something Different and in some ways obama was the unbush. Just as the current incumbent could be said to be the unobama. And in fact perhaps george w. Bush was the unclinton. We have developed this curious habit which i dont really associate with earlier stages in our history. First of all, not since jefferson, madison, monroe have we had three president s elected to two terms. Only once before. But the paradox is we elect this person to a second term and then we look for someone who is the die metticly opposed alternative to take their place. Beyond if there is logic to that. But how much do you think it might be due to overexposure . Oh, god. You know, it is true. The cultive personal i ditperso those who dont have any personality, victims of a cult of personality, the white house is ringed figuratively by satellite trucks. There not enough news to fill 24 hours. And in fact if you watch cable, you are not seeing news. You are hearing, quoit, te, analysis, which is another word for opinion depending on which station that you tune into. But the assumption is that everything that president says or his wife says or his children say, i mean, there is a quasi monar monar monarchi monarchical. He talked about the president with excessive power, but no doubt that chronic overexposure produces on a bipartisan basis you know, we had bush fatigue, clinton fatigue, we had obama fatigue. And dare i say we have trump fatigue. When did that start . Well, you know, i dont know when it started. Because eisenhower could have won a third term in 1960. He was a two termer and he could have i think beaten jack kennedy or Richard Nixon in 60. You know, maybe vietnam when you started seeing the collapse of Lyndon Johnson with the vietnam war and there was the gerald ford pardoned nixon. And there was churning going on there. But i always find consume bens city is a great benefit just to have air force one take you around and have that much infrastructure around you. I think obama who we were talking about is the beneficial and he were of being the first nonwhite president. August these white president s and then obama inheriting a Great Recession which we worked our way out of. Started seeing signs of it by the time of reelection. But also the killing of Osama Bin Laden was a big deal. He was outrecall numblaw number and Ballistic Missile was able to do it on his watch. And the bailing out of general motors. Ble to do it on his watc. And the bailing out of general motors. That helps in michigan and toledo, ohio. Some of the moves that he made in his first term helped him get reelected. But he didnt have coattails. Hillary clinton was tsecretary f state but she didnt have the gas her tank. By six or eight year, people start tiring of the president for sure. Even Ronald Reagan with all of his great breakthroughs started trailing off there, people had kind of had their ray gavin go take. Do we have considereds of people let me go it the people in the audience or people at home. What would you advise them . We at cspan have we wouldnt be doing history if it wasnt for these terrific historians. 44 of them in this book. But what would you advise a younger person do or as a matter of fact somebody that is not so young if they wanted to get started in all of this . Come to my class. Id tell them to read, read, read. Read everything. Not just the kind of history that you are personally interested in. But all history. If i lived long enough, some day im going to write a book. But it has to be beyond just th present. You need to look broadly at history. So i would tell them do that. And also dont necessarily start with the historians. Dont start with the secondary sources. Look at the primary sources. That is what will really get you excited. Because you get it interpret what happened in the past. You are not looking through the eyes of someone else who is bringing certain baggage to the table. So look at those primary sources first. And in addition to all of that, major in history in college. It is a great major. Having humanities education is 2re. A l a lot of worried about jobs. But if you love history, go for it in college and after your four years as a history major, it is a spring board for you go into public fields, you can become a lawyer, you can go into business, it is a fine undergraduate major and you will have history but the rest 6 your life. But you dont have to love history to go to college. The re life. But you dont have to love history to go to college. Truman they ever went never wend he was the most well read that we know of. Getting back to your read, read, read point. And im picking u. S. History, but it applies to the globe. If you can afford it, and get out there, go see places. Come to mount vernon, tour the museums. They are always changing displays, get engaged with the local history site. Whether it is a cemetery, whether the home of somebody, become a friend of one of those historical site that is in your neighborhood or county and so you can start feeling like you can learn from experts and share your ideas with people. Richard, would you tell us where you are at this moment in your research and your writing on gerald r. Ford . Well, the research and writing are different places. Writing i just finished a chapter on the pardon. Which was the longest chapter it took me an obscene amount of time because i kept rewriting it. I have a lot of new material. Ive written 600 pages thus far and i have 400 to go. So i think i have about another year and a half or so. And the book will appear in 2021. Why should we care about a biography on gerald r. Ford . That is a fair question. One, gerald ford in some ways made a career, very shrewdly on his part, of being under estimated. To most people he seemed for example, he is kind of a company today coda to the nixon administration. An accident of history. Ny coda to the nixon administration. An accident of history. I discovered that his presidency is much more about the future than it is about completingia a. For example, economic deregulation, something that we take for granted, maybe argue about it. But nevertheless, it is part of our lives. It started under ford. Because ford asked a question, do we need an interstate Commerce Commission in 1974. And that led to other questions being asked. And ultimately they deregulated the services and tried to deregulate airline. And it is interesting because jimmy carter picked it up and became a bipartisan and then a global Margaret Thatcher gave it a new name, privatization, but it started very modestly and that is typical. And there is the bottom line is there a lot of unknown History Associated with the ford presidency. And the nice thing is, it turns out to be he turns out to be a much more interesting, much more complicated fer complicateed person. And i thought i knew him pretty well. But ive learned some things that i suspect he did not know about himself. By the way, tomorrow morning if you are watching it live at 9 00, tlooes thr these three fo on our callin show. And ive got . Great o some great ones. Kennedy and nixon are the twos lifetime. How do you rang them and why . I rank him pretty high. Created the peace corps and he was trying to inspire young people to work in government. And also his interest in science. In 196 0 scientists were chosen as times people of the year. And so john kennedy said not just lets go to the moon and we did it with our apollo program, and you had six successful mercury astronauts, but he was starting to pursue mapping of our soeocean floors and embrace the silent spring which gave birth to theenvironmental movement and nixon had some successes, i mean, when he won in i added in the nixon tape, late 72, nixon just beat mcgovern in the biggest land slide in men history and on tape you can hearer nixon saying somebodys got to do a book about 1972, i am the best president ever, i just won the biggest land slide, i did the breakthrough to china. And he went on all the things that he did. And the next month the watergate is hounding him and his pep due tags has been destroyed by the combination of those tapes with antisemitic slurs and the watergate fiasco. So nixon hasnt been able to tag. You wont see him ranked so high and the tapes killed his presidency. Because they were the smoking gun. And they also are hurting him from rising history. And the assassination in dallas will always be the great young man gunned down in his prime. We will never see an old john f. Kennedy. And like he had that was mentioning the lincoln assassination and the drama with that, it is a lot of what if kennedy would have lived. What would our country have been. And so there is almost a mythological underpinning because before those untimely deaths. Lets go to richard. It is interesting, we talk about overexposure. It started in 1960. And it is not his fault. John f. Kennedy was a Brilliant Television performer. He was arguably the first celebrity. In some ways he was so good that he set the bar terribly high and very few of his predecessors could plamatch it. But also it was divisions plea occupation with the presidency. The footnote to that to get to nixon, we think of jfk as the First Television president. Trs ofpresidency. The footnote to that to get to nixon, we think of jfk as the First Television president. Trs of but it was next on who had the enormous power of that medium, young, untested, to move people. Overnight Richard Nixon became something riks arrestchard n unique because he had a personal a following because of that speek. Before he ever talked about the silent majority, those were the people that he was appealing to in 1952. And in effect he took the division out of ikes hands with staying on the ticket which was pretty shrewd. And then later, Richard Nixon very skillfully used television in the white house for example of the vietnam demonstrations in washington and the silent majority speech, Richard Nixon was one of the last president s who could ensure himself with a phone call that he would have 70 Million People that night sitting in front of him. You can all remember an oval Office President ial address was a unifying event. And the only counter to it was, you know, offering instant analysis on cbs. Today we dont see many oval office addresses. When we do, before the president finishes the first sentence, there are 20 Million People who are self appointed twittering their instant analysis. Isnt that good for free speech. Kennedy was certainly more beloved. In my house when i was growing up, the only people whose images were on the wall were the kennedy, jackie and john. Everyone else on the walls were relatives. My father who was a republican, dont tell anyone, became a democrat when kennedy ran for office. But he still had an admiration for nixon. He felt that he was a great president until watergate. He never changed his democratic of aful ya affiliation. But i find nixon to be more interesting than kennedy because nixon was so flawed. Your book really spells it out. It comes out loud and clear. This is a man who was very insecure, who probably would have liked to have done the right thing, but just couldnt because it was just in his ba background or whatever. But i think that we can identify more with nixon in terms of his flaws than we can with kennedy who was supposedly perfect and we now know that he was not. I want to make sure that you know in the 44 chapters in this boom, there is a different author, different historian writing each one of them and plus we have a website set up for a general alist like me reading this book andrer enter viewing these authors, it sent me to find all of what i didnt know. R enter viewing these authors, it sent me to find all of what i didnt know. Enter viewing these authors, it sent me to find all of what i didnt know. Enterviewing these authors sent me to find all of what i didnt know. And robin wants to know which president was the best writer . I like Theodore Roosevelt. He wrote over 35 books, 150,000 letters, and his writings about americas outdoor scenic wonders are remarkable. He was an avid reader also. Spoke foreign languages. And he may not be quite the intaellectual intellectual, but i put tr at the very top. Id say lincoln. In a utilitarian way. Lincoln is the original great communicator. And there was no Public Opinion polls. You know, he was sort of flying by the seat of his pants. And the exposure that he had to people which he went out of his way even in the war time to make sure was possible. But if you look at the second inaugural address, i would argue that it is the greatest sermon in American History. Absolutely. And i also think maybe the second greatest speech by a president is wilsons war speech in april of 1917 when wilson who had been very reluctant to take america into the war finally decided he had no choice. And then it was as if he became a crusader. And he wrote just an extraordinary speech. I recommend everybody take a look at it. And i have to agree. Lin c lincoln hands down because of the second inaugural address. But his Public Private letters to his friend, and to republican allies, were really extraordinary as well. He said so much in those letters to them. And he meant them to be public. He may have been doing it privately, but he knew that they would come out. So i think that there is no other president that was able to communicate as well as he was if he was a able to just with the word. Just extraordinary. Sometimes very complex. Able to word. Just extraordinary. Sometimes very complex. Able to word. Just extraordinary. Sometimes very complex. At the front of our book is the picture of Peter Drummey at the massachusetts historical society. And peter is looking closely at the John Quincy Adams diary, which those of you who have never read it or seen it, it is just a magnificent thing. And that is in front of our book. This is from paul in the audience. We know from our work at cspan he has been a White House Reporter for 11 years. And he is distressed with the attacks on the press that are happening right now and fear the average anger and distress endure long after the trump administration. How do we restore trust . One thing that is clear, every president has had a problem with the press. You can find it chapter after chapter. And you talked about it in the podcast we did about how these are not new things that were going through. Is the relationship with the press worse now than it has been at any point in history . I think the problem is that when we deal with alternative facts, when we deal with enemies of the people, when we use terms like that, it does erode trust in a near sacred american institution. So although weve had those issues in the past with president s and the press, i dont think that it has been quite the way it is now. Americans have learned to distrust what they are reading. And that is not necessarily a bad thing. But when you believe that the press is out to get someone because that is what you hear all of the time, that becomes problematic. And i dont know that we are ever going to get back to that point where the American People actually believe that the press is working for them as opposed to against them. What about the sedition act . I was just going to say he had a list of reporters that he wa want doed for do away with but nixon got them in the end. Most president s dont like journalism meaning in the sense they dont like the stories being written about them. Jack kennedy wanted to be a journalist but went after david haverstem who wrote for the new york sometitimes. Reagan road above it. You cant listen to everything because you start getting hatred in you and you start going after reporters by name. And im afraid nixon and trump both do that this puts them on a bottom ranking on how they are with press relations. Theodore roosevelt would invite in you to the room. His trick was to tell the reporter you how great their article ever was. And they all kind of fleeted up with them and then he would invite cartoonists to the white house and get them to write a negative cartoon about his opponent or the fireside chats. But trump and nixon arent alone in hating a certain journalist. It is just the way that both of them responded to it and in a destructive way. Well, i would remind you that the president who probably has the best relations with working reporters was a former newspaper editor named Warren Harding. Enough said. On the other hand, i have to say, the president ford liked reporters. He actually liked them. When plans were being brown up f drawn up for his funeral, tlp two must. He wanted to include jimmy cart carter. They had become very good friends p friends. And he wanted a journalist. The president called up tom brokaw and said will you do this as a favor. Tom started out his career as a White House Correspondent in the ford presidency. So he was one of the speakers. But ford when he lived in alexandria, when he was a Republican House leader, his phone number was in the book. And his private number every reporter in town had it. So he used to call peter, that late gate report frert dai the late great reporter, who said that you break equal number of windows on each side. And to change the tone, someone asked was sense of humor considered one of the important attribut attributes. And with that in mind, where did Calvin Coolidge rank. Coolidge didnt say much, but what he said was funny. Grie Grover Cleveland who true story, cleveland had very few friends on capitol hill particularly in the talkative guild that calls itself the wor worlds greatest deliberative bead. B b body. But late one night, she woke him and said there are thieves in the hus and 14e7d she said no, thieves in the senate. Harry truman said without a sense of humor, a man would go crazy. Is there is a lot of truth on that. Ronald reagan kept notes on jokes. It could be dogs or s or kiwani sichlt clkiwanis clubs. And he was all about hugmor. It is a key quality. There are exceptions. But overall, president s have to show a robust sense of humor because if you take yourself too seriously, you become a bore in the end. And was lincoln funny . Incredibly so. But he sometimesoff d overdid i his cabinet members were a little annoyed because he didnt seem as serious as he should be. So yes, when he was telling a joke i mean i remember the movie lincoln, that was so true you. You know, in the middle of somethings happening and lynn coming decides to tell a story and he was told pretty much shut up, this is an important time. L coming decides to tell a story and he was told pretty much shut up, this is an important time. But i think the human or had more do with helping the man than it did with winning over the people. Certainly with lincoln. You know, he said i believe, at least he is purported to have said, if i couldnt laugh, i would cry. In a profession where your values can get distorted, it is proof that you are as tr would say, grounded. Two people asked the same question. They want to know who is the mostoff ra overrated pld an rar most underrated. Well, i will just say weve mentioned james monroe. I think that he is underrated. I think richard was giving write and the book of era of good feelings earlier. But monroe has not had that big seminole bying a grief t aing i. And i think that he could be understood more. The most underrated, that is hard. I dont think the top group are overrated. I think it might be that we overinflate modern president s because they are part of our own time and we lose sight of some of the president s from the 19th century because we dont know them as well. So there might be inflation going on here. And i dont even remember when i gave that thank goodness that you did because otherwise we wouldnt have a chapter. But he could have done more during that period. He is in an era where there is so much happening in terms of n abolitionism. They are supposed to let others know where they stand and move the country in what they think is the best direction. I dont think that filmore did that so maybe he shouldnt be rated at all. To me the most underrated at least until fairly recently is Linden Johnson because we still give kennedy the credit for all of the civil rights legislation, but it really was Lyndon Johnson who pushed that. Richard. I would say the most overrated president , not the entirety of his life, is Thomas Jefferson. People tend to forget the second term was a disaster. He imposed something called the embargo which was designed to prevent war with europes warring powers. And it pretty much blew up in his face and had to be can i as tie down all miles per hoameric . In effect they did. New england was the maritime heart of the country. Down all a . In effect they did. New england was the maritime heart of the country. And it was already suspicious of jefferson. But it actually africanamericaned africanamec divisions in the union. And the most underestimated in some ways i would say the least known who deserves to be better known i would say is William Mckinley who before tr in many ways could be said to be the first modern president , sort of straddles the 20th century. Somewhat against his will. Took america on to the world stage and not only in the spanish american war, but also is the first president without congressional approval to send troops in this case to the boxer rebellion in china. And also remember, mckinley was elected in the midst of a depression. He was sold as the prosperity. And so mccan i bekinley has a l for him. Im going to defend Thomas Jefferson. Because i think that the Louisiana Purchase alone 1803, doubling the size of our country and the westward expansion idea 6 jefferson wi of jefferson of lewis and clark, i think that that act is so large and also you talked about lincolns writing, but man, you read Thomas Jefferson on religious freedom, i once read a letter he wrote to a nun that will give you chills on how advanced his thinking was on the importance of religious freedom. So i get some of the problems with jeffersons presidency, but i would still rank him quite high. And i have two very similar on lincoln and the emancipation proclamation. Because it freed only slaves in territory that he did not control, and didnt free those in areas that he did, is it correct to call him the great e emans pay thor or was it just for his time and times afterwards . I think that one can be tied to emancipation without taking all of the credit for it. There were many people and groups who were bothered [ inaudible ] and the freedom of enclaslaved people. And lincoln freed those folks in the con fed city. But that title implies that he is doing it alone. And he would never even have suggested that he was doing it line. Srn t certainly the Union Military are a part of it and the africanamericans are part of it because they are walking away from slavery long before the proclamation. The cloproclamation does give people the license to leave, but they are leaving because he does that. But to suggest that he is the only person involved in emancipation is unfortunate. And you did a book on jimmy carter. And on this list, he has gone down a couple, but 26th, fair . Fair. A great american. Won the nobel prize. Habitat for humanity. But when he passes, he is in his 90s and he is confronting brain cancer right now, people will look at the camp david, peace accord, human rights, recognizing peoples republic of china, panama canal, he is the president who officially recognizes china. I mean, there is a group of things that carter did that are quite significant. But ala one tes one term presidd for generations no such thing really as a carter democrat. So he doesnt have the political legs of even Something Like bill clinton did with hillary and projecting decades down the line. You did a book on Herbert Hoover and he is 36. Favor . I would say hoover and will yard howard taft are unique. Men who were fabulously successful as Everything Else they did. And that is significant. Hoover saved more live, fed more hungry people during and after two world wars than hitler, stall lys stch talin combined. He didnt have a political bone in his body. He acknowledged did. He didnt h in his body. He acknowledged did. He should not have run for an office that is political. On the other hand, we can play games. Office that is political. On the other hand, we can play games. Roosevelt wrote a letter saying that they wished that they could nominate hoover for president. Both were interested because of his record in world war 1. If hoover had been elected instead of Warren Harding, if Franklin Roosevelt had been elected in 1928, you know, it is a game. But i mean, it just illustrates the element of chance. But in the sense of hoover, he would always have been burdened by the fact that his dna was just absolutely lacking in the political instinct. We have seven minutes left. How would you like to use them . Do you have anymore questions . Jonathan wants to know would nonincumbent parties have as many primary candidates in previous times as we seem to have had the last two cycles. So geetting close 20. And dems. I think 17 republican candidates. Primaries are relatively recent. It is part of the progressive era. And it really i would say the late 40s, 50s, that primaries so let me ask did we select better candidates in the smoke filled rooms than question do through twe do through the primary process . Sure, except for harding. Est do through the primary process . Sure, except for harding. Would you like to go back to that . As opposed to primaries . Yes. The problem with the electoral process today, it is so stylized, so scripted, it frankly performed with that camera in mind. And that has distorted our democracy arguably any other single factor. I think that is the big point. It is television. In 1952, they started covering the conventions and then there became the birth of a tecandida and now it is about brand building and name recognition. And they are building their branding, their twitter its unfortunate. Also we seem to be running these president ial elections like two and a half years long. Its just become a very long drawnout process, which i think is unfortunate, but i dont know how its going to stop. Can i follow up . How do you feel about multiple millionaire president s . What do you think its doing to the presidency . Its almost inevitable. Again, its that camera. You want us to turn that off . I dont care. He doesnt either. Youve given up your life for four years or eight years. Youve compromised your health. You have angered half of the population most of the time. Dont you deserve something after all of that is over . Youve given up your youth. Look how these people age during the presidency. Dont they deserve something at the end of that . Not necessarily the millions and millions of dollars they get for speeches. They deserve something i think other than the pension. Jimmy carter refuses to sit on corporate boards. There are examples of president s not wanting to cash in so to speak on the presidency. The amount of money you get for a memoire now youre talking over 10 million. In your research have you found out why its fairly obvious. Why did jerry ford start getting money for speeches . Because he went broke. Why did harry truman go home and stay home . Thats a fair question. Theres a myth that the presidency changes people. You knew that Richard Nixon would leave office and as soon as he could would spend every breath trying to rebuild his reputation, particularly through foreign affairs. He would do everything he did. You knew when jerry ford left office he would play as much golf as he could. And he would sit on boards because he happened to believe in the private sector. What people didnt pay much attention to, he did 200 College Campuses free of charge. I mean, he enjoyed that. No, theres no doubt the first week he was president he asked someone he said when do i get my first check because he was literally living from check to check. In the last couple minutes we have talking about this same thing mt. Vernon is paid for entirely by private money run by the mt. Vernon ladys foundation. Rutherford b. Hays has a statefunded library. Every other library is funded by tax dollars. What is it about George Washington that its paid for by private money . Because hes George Washington. Its as simple as that. We wouldnt be here, we wouldnt be having this discussion. I think you could make a good case there would not be an American Republic if not for George Washington. Certainly his presidency is about restraint. Theres assertiveness, but ultimately its about restraint. Its about walking away from power. Its about not confusing yourself with the office or the country of which you are a temporary steward. That example alone, it seems to me, is likely to generation the kind of Financial Support that mt. Vernon has earned over the years. Why is this the single most successful president ial site in the United States . Because of the mt. Vernon ladys association. [ applause ] it really is. I think we have to give them credit for all theyve done over the years and ive seen this place evolve over the last couple of decades. Theyve done a terrific job. They can go a little further. We would like to push them in that direction, but i think theyve done an incredible job. Part of the fundraising is because of them and their dedication. Final comment . Virginians do and all they do for the state. Its a great state to do president ial history, tourism. Whether youre studying the American Revolution or the civil war, you can go to Woodrow Wilsons home in virginia. Its an extraordinary state. This is the anchor , the flag ship. Its the crown jewel of what virginia does. You want to wrap it up, susan . I would love to. I want to thank you. You have been a terrific audience. Special thanks to the staff and management here at mt. Vernon and the mt. Vernon ladys association. What better place to start a conversation about president s than here at George Washingtons home. Thanks these three folks for all they do. [ applause ] while i cannot invite all the people watching live tonight on cspan, im delighted to vote all of you here for a coffee and Dessert Reception in the lobby. See you out there. This is American History tv on cspan 3. Each weekend we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nations past. We bring the Democratic Political bot to boil by announcing his nomination for president. He said it makes no difference if president truman decides to run again or not. A oneman single engine world tour after a flight of 35,000 miles. Peter f. Mack junior complete c the last leg of his trip. He returns with a new concept of International Relations. Mrs. Franklin roosevelt visits this branch of the family. The mayor presents a document making the widow of our late president an honorary citizen. He congratulated her on her work on peace. It was from here in 1924 than an ancestor left this place to settle on manhattan island. The carrier fdr is the first naval ship to visit spain. Jet fighters are maintained at combat readiness. Hospitable by nature they made the fleet seem at home. Sunny spain says [speaking foreign language] this is American History tv featuring events, interviews, films and visits to college classrooms, museums and historic places. Exploring our nations past every weekend on cspan 3. During this election season the candidates beyond the talking points are only revealed over time. Since you cant be everywhere, theres cspan. Our campaign 2020 program differs from all other political coverage for one simple reason. Its cspan. This year were bringing you an unfiltered view of the people seeking to steer government this november. In other words, your future. This election season go deep, direct and unfiltered. See the biggest picture for yourself and make up your own mind with cspans campaign 2020 brought to you as a Public Service by your television provider. So you are now currently on the property of mr. Howard hankins. Its an Industrial Recycling area. Mr. Hankins owned