One of the most seminal days of my life was november 22, 1963. As an eightyearold, i learned of the assassination of president kennedy. It isnt unusual for someone like me or anyone of my generation to remember where he or she was, but it seemed to me to change something, and from he developed a fascination. As i grew up, my friends were andrested in captain kirk the new frontier and i was interested in jfk in the old frontier. Lookingdent, i had been , and as a washington correspondent as well, as a way into the kennedy story can story. There were studies, heavy amoirs, there was scarcely part of jfks legacy that had not been dissected and expected inspected and examined. I wondered if there was something new to say. Then i came upon, innocence, these two days in june. We are on the eve of the anniversary. What could i say that was new . When i thought about it, i said to myself, my goodness, two extraordinary speeches, one at in then university morning, one on civil rights in the evening. They would be two of the most extraordinary speeches of what was a rhetorical residency. They are the pillars of the story, but also the parenthesis. Explain,opportunity to illuminate the presidency, hourbyhour, in a granular, atmospheric way to give a reader who did not know much about jfk, like the students i teach, from another generation, what it was like to be jfk. What it was like to be president of united states, and what it was like to make decisions twoed he did on those pivotal issues, civil rights and nuclear arms. When i saw the opportunity of those two days, and when people ask me what todays did you pick, and verily they talk about the cuban missile crisis or the bay of pigs, this to me is the high noon of the kennedy residency. Colleen when the book begins, kennedy is waking up on air force one. He is flying back to washington, d. C. From hawaii, where he has just given a speech, and only a few hours later, he will be at American University giving a monumental speech on foreign affairs. Can you tell us about the substance of the speech and why kennedy wanted to give it at that moment in time . Andrew to give a little bit of context, this is the spring of 1963. John f. Kennedy has been in office 2. 5 years. I think it is fair to say his record was mixed as president. His first year, 1961, he authorized the disastrous bay of pigs, he had a meeting with Nikita Khrushchev in vienna. He watches the berlin wall go up in august of 1961. By the end of that year when a reporter says to him i would like to write a history of your first year in office, kennedy turns to him and says why would you want to write a history about disasters . By 1962, things are changing. He faces down executives that were trying to raise prices. He faces down Nikita Khrushchev in the cuban missile crisis. Feeling confident about his presidency, but he knows that america is at a watershed, a turning point. Both the height of the cold war and civil rights. Lets deal with nuclear war. I mention the cuban missile crisis of 1962. 13 perilous days in the autumn of 1962 where historians still say today we came as close to Nuclear Annihilation as we have before or since. Kennedy was shaken by that and so was Nikita Khrushchev. Kennedy in the winter of 1963, and into the spring, is looking to change the channel. Both of them felt that america and the soviet union, having come to this near nuclear a pocket apocalypse, had to find a way through. The editor of the saturday evening review was involved, and there was an attempt by both parties to come to some conclusion or begin some process that will lower the temperature and begin a certain process of disarmament. In thes big gambit spring of that year is a speech viewed it will be called is a speech. It will be called the peace speech. It is written over 46 weeks. It is not a secret that it is done by a tight circle of trusted aides. Kennedy does not share what hes going to propose because it is almost subversive. He doesnt share with the joint chiefs of staff, doesnt go to the state department or department of defense, does not consult the cia, and he leaves the joint chiefs of staff and congressional leadership. All people he might have consulted, given what would become the Foreign Policy speech of his administration. He is dealing with it that way because kennedy is going to say things about the russians that no american president has said since the cold war. Now 18 years of cold war. He he will in that speech, will arrive at American University at 10 30 a. M. , and as you said, having flown across america, across the pacific, nine hours, having left hawaii the night before. Touching down at Andrews Air Force base, getting on marine one, choppering to the white house. He will be dressed in a gown and mortar board he will not wear for is and he is before an audience in washington, where he makes a speech and talks for the first time about the russians in very human terms. He will humanize the russians, talk about their achievements in industry, in their economy, and science. In american space. Americans are very well aware of what has happened because sputnik has gone up in 1957 and there is a great sense that america has fallen behind the soviets. He will talk about the russianss contribution in the second world war, 20 million i think. Of all the russians have done as a society. He will put aside the rhetoric of the cold war, of soviet treachery, the big russian bear, the gulags, all that had become the standard, the staple of american politicians. He will do that and carefully word the address under oppressive heat, it was 98 degrees at American University that day. People were wilting and they set up triage stations because people were felt were fainting. He will not only talk about that but he will make an offer. He will invite the soviet states to the united enter negotiations over a comprehensive treaty. It isnt comprehensive in the end, it would be limited, but kennedy is proposing that as the cold war goes on and we both stockpile weaponry that can kilis many times over, kill us many times over, why dont we stop testing so there are no tests in the atmosphere, under the ocean, and space . It is a radical idea that kennedy knows will not go down well with many elements, conservative elements in congress and elsewhere, who are hardline on communist. Jfk is no slouch when it comes to communism. His inaugural address, seen as quite hawkish, and some people said dont judge john f. Kennedy by his inaugural address, judge him by the peace speech. The rhetoric, the tone. When kennedy says in the final analysis, we all inhabit the same planet, we all breathe the same air, we all cherish our childrens future, we are all mortal, he is almost universalist in his appeal. This kind of language had not been heard from the mouth of a president since perhaps Franklin Roosevelt was dealing with stalin. Nikitahristoph cannothev years this, he believe what he is hearing. In,e will be and it goes and six weeks later, just to show you as you know, sometimes things do happen from speeches there will be a limited Nuclear Testing treaty, the most important Foreign Policy decision and achievement of the kennedy administration. Later, a few hours after this transformative Foreign Policy speech that kennedy gives at American University, your book details how heap how he has pivoted two hours later to another major, pressing national issue, concerning governor wallace and the university of alabama. How does kennedy prepare himself to handle this crisis and why did he think it would be a Pivotal Moment in civil rights history . These in the velocity of 48 hours, i called him a feverish 48 hours, he does pivot on both issues. He has to pivot within the day. ,e leaves American University about five or six miles from the white house, jumped into the Lincoln Continental the kennedys had designed and kennedy is using. He goes back to the white house. His thoughts turn from diplomacy and the cold war and nuclear arms to George Wallace, civil rights and the university of alabama. Down in alabama, orchard wallace, the bantamweight, small man with a big complaint, has announced, more than threatened, announced that he will refuse to integrate the university of alabama. He will refuse personally to who theo black Students Court has ordered are to be admitted to the university of alabama. George wallace to make a show of it will stand, as he says, at the schoolhouse door, and physically prevent those two from entering. The court has ordered this, the kennedys know this and sotos wallace, but wallace is determined to make a spectacle of us and the kennedys realize they have to allow him to do that. They will not bring the two students to the front door. They will admit them through a side door. But there will be a confrontation which will also be carried not necessarily on American Television but definitely radio. The kennedys have been preparing for this for some time. As the roots of the peace speech of the cuban missile crisis, the roots of the civil rights speech are what happen seven months earlier at the university of mississippi where the governor of mississippi like wallace refused to integrate the university of mississippi. These are the last of the great, big public universities in the south. All others have been integrated at this point. In 1962, the kennedys have to send in the National Guard to preserve the rights of James Meredith to enter that university. It does not go well and it is quite a disaster. There is a 15 hour riot and two people are killed, including a french journalist. Hundreds are injured. Ross barnett has not done what he said he would do, the kennedys feel betrayed, and they will not let it happen again. Before the show down at the university of alabama, the kennedys, led by Bobby Kennedy, the attorney general of the united states, jackie kennedy, kennedy, as he is called. Robert kennedy has working at the Justice Department to make sure nothing goes wrong. They are gaining scenarios. How will they remove George Wallace if he refuses . Should they hold him in contempt of court because there is an order to the university . How will they preserve the dignity of the black students who just want an education . The kennedys have been preparing for this assiduously. Studied maps provided by the forest service. Position on the edge of campus in case a lynch mob chases the two away. There was a threat of tens of thousands of klansmen outside the gates of the university. This is happening that day. Kennedy on monday is preparing for this. The confrontation wont take place until tuesday. On monday, he is gaming this. One advantage i had in writing this story is and i did not know it until well into it there is a documentary filming candy in the white house, led by robert drew, one of the early cinema verite filmmakers. I had access to the raw footage held in hollywood. I could watch the negotiations, the consultations going on in the white house both on monday after the peace speech, june the 10th, and the morning of june 11. You see how seriously the kennedys were taking this and preparing for the competition confrontation with wallace. Youeen in your book, as explained earlier, it is about two days, but you really use those days as a lens into some of kennedys most intimate and personal and most political relationships he maintained. One person you feature in the book extensively is ed sorensen. Ted sorensen. Can you tell us about ted sorensen and why decided to profile him in the book . Andrew he deserves a biography of his own, which i have started to write and hope to return to. He is kennedys speechwriter. Leaves nebraska and arrives in washington and jack kennedy goes to the senate and 1953. Sorensen does not know kennedy. He is interviewing with Henry Jackson from washington and he is interviewing with jack kennedy. Angela sling interestingly, the speechwriter is interviewing the senator. Time in his, at the early 20s. Jacksonvised to go with but chooses kennedy. There begins an association of isyears which i would argue the most Extraordinary Partnership between a president and an associate in the history of the modern presidency. That tedt anything sorensen will not do for jfk. He reveres him. He is a master craftsman and wordsmith. He works for jfk, who values writers and had written with Ted Sorensens help, profiles and courage. He admired writers and called them his friends. He appreciated eloquence and made eloquence and rhetoric a centerpiece of the style of the kennedy administration. With sorensen, and kennedys sense of occasion and sorensens pen, they were magic. At this time, ted sorensen is not just writing the peace speech, he is writing a number of speeches, including the one he will give in berlin two weeks later. He will be writing under different circumstances that i am sure we will get to, the civil rights speech from june 11. They are and extort and combination, which doesnt mean they are friends. They dont socialize together. Sorensen is devoted to jfk. Will destroy his marriage and ravage his health and shake at times his selfconfidence. He will never recover from the death of john f. Kennedy five and half months later. But while they are together, and on these particular days, it the height for me in looking at this administration, and administration where words rattered, the height of thei rhetorical flourish. Colleen another player you highlight regarding jfk decision on the university of alabama . Liked toed sorensen say he was the third most important man in washington because Bobby Kennedy was second and no one could displace bobby. Bobby is a lot younger than jack. By josephbeen drafted p kennedy, the kennedy patriarch, to serve his brother. Bobby did not want to be attorney general in 1961 and Bobby Kennedy center jack, you will make bobby your attorney general. But jack famously said i see no reason not to give him a little experience for he goes to practice law. He was a wonderful attorney general. The best on some of legal thinkers in america. He is more than a lawyer in more than an advisor to jack kennedy, particularly over these two days. Minister othere days, this day he is a field marshal. When it comes to handling what is going on in mississippi, bobby is executing the moves through the Justice Department. One of his trusted colleagues is tallerson the gangly, road scholar who appears in pictures towering over George Wallace, kept in the sunshine while wallace was in the shade they are stage managing everything. That is the kennedy response to wallace. Is dictating everything on a phone from his office and there is a film crew to record it. One with Bobby Kennedy, one with George Wallace and the students in alabama. Bobby kennedy is something of a showrunner before the word was used. He is a choreographer. Nobody knows how all of this will unspool. Insured that he has thought of everything and nothing will go wrong if you can help it. He does think of everything and nothing does go wrong. The university, after George Nicholas ins away the morning, the kennedys federalized the National Guard, they arrive at 3 30, and at 3 30 in the afternoon in alabama, 5 30 in washington, the university will be integrated. Students dont want to overthrow the system, they just want to join in. They will enroll at the university of alabama. Then the thinking is what is next . The next is the civil rights speech that night. Colleen can you tell us a story of the speech on june 11, 1963 . How was it drafted and also why does kennedy think this is the time in which to include the moral argument about civil rights . Andrew this speech is written entirely differently from the careful drafting of the peace speech the day before. It is extraordinary. There had been talk of a speech the day before, that perhaps if things went well at the door and the crisis subsided, jack kennedy would make a speech. After all, the kennedys recognized the crisis and they would not let a good crisis go to waste. But really, they were not persuaded they were going to do that. On junein the afternoon 11, wednesday, jack kennedy turns to sorensen and says i think we will give that speech tonight. Sorensen says what speech . There is no speech. The president says i have booked all three networks so i guess there has to be a speech. Bobby kennedy, alone among the circle of kennedy advisors, wanted his brother to make that speech. He felt it was time. And the kennedys were much criticized for their gradualism on civilrights. , when kennedy is flying back, he has early editions of newspapers as he is flying back from hawaii, and the front page of the New York Times , Martin Luther king is castigating kennedy for his record. He says all you have done is offer an an adequate performance for a miserable one, which would be dwight eisenhower, kennedys predecessor. Kennedy is new to civil rights. When he arrives in 1961, his focus entirely is the cold war. If you look at his inaugural address, there are three words about domestic united states, three words about human rights at home. Not even civilrights rights, human rights at home. Kennedy is preoccupied as the freedom writers riders are getting on the bus in 1961 and mississippi and alabama are beginning to tremble as the Civil Rights Movement is beginning to gain traction, that will accelerate in 1962. Explodes inn in birmingham, alabama in may, this is considered to be the education of jfk. Is a whiter, jfk irishman from boston. He does not know people of color. He is from hyannis port and brooklyn and georgetown and palm beach and harvard and the choque school and the allwhite navy and the allwhite congress. He is slow and unaffected innocence by this Great Movement that is convulsing america. By may, he understands it. People told me how physically revolted he was when he saw the images that we have all seen of the snarling dogs and highpressure water hoses that were turned on black men, women and children in birmingham. In his education has begun. In three weeks his and bobbys, by the way. Bobby is confronted at his apartment in new york by members of the black community, including the rain hansberry and James Baldwin and Kenneth Clark the psychologist. Kennedy for three hours listens to the raw, impassioned pleas of black americans they were not just raw and impassioned, in many places they were so emotional that they attacked kennedy in a way he could not expect. One in particular does that. Lorraine gets up and leaves. Kennedys left sullen and silent but aware. His education begins. It is now june the 10th. Kennedy realized that having turned wallace back from the door, he has an opportunity to Say Something and do something. Because the speech will not just be about rhetoric, as the speech the day before was not just about rhetoric. He will that night introduce the Civil Rights Act of 1963. It will become the Civil Rights Act of 1964, he will not live to see it. The most sweeping piece of social legislation since the emancipation proclamation. That night, he will do it, and he used the language that have not been used by an american president , and kennedy, as he humanized the russians the day before, will attempt to humanize egro, as theyn are called, the next day. He will talk about the black american. It was to have less chance of finishing high school, almost no chance of going to college. Making less money. More susceptible to disease. Expectancya life seven years less than a white person. Kennedy does this and language stirring that and people cannot believe that this white irish man from boston is saying this, but he does. He used a word he used earlier two or three times in the speech he talks about morality. The speech was barely finished. Ted sorensen is scribbling away in his office at 7 00. Bobby kennedy is concerned that there will not be a speech be he and speech. He and jack begin working on their own version of the speech. Kennedy does something hes not done before, he goes to sorensens office the president doesnt go to the speechwriters office. He says how are you doing . Ted says it is coming out of the typewriter right now. It was not. He has to scramble to find the words. By the time kennedy is sitting in the oval office he has a draft from sorensen without a real ending. He has what he and bobby are going to do. Some of it is on pieces of paper in front of him. When the light goes on, kennedy talkss masterful, and he in an impassioned way for 11 minutes. By 11 minutes, he arrives at a speech. E begins to improvise if you have the speech in front of you, you could see it, but if you didnt, you probably would not. Has talked about the morality of civil rights. As old as is captures and clear as the constitution. When Martin Luther king sees, hears the speech, he says i cant believe that white man just stepped up to the plate and hit it out of the park. Question, welast have a lot of great audience questions and i want to make sure we get to them our last question has to do with what you learned from writing the book. There have been a lot of books about jfk. Did you learn something that surprised you . And did your opinion or viewpoint on john f. Kennedy change when you were researching and writing the book . Andrew it did change. I began as an admirer. Not everybody was or is. Investigative 1997alist Seymour Hersh in when i was a correspondent in washington, and he was writing a book, and investigative book and not a flattering would flattering one called the dark side of camelot. With a motion, he pulls a memo from his files and puts it in front of me and says here is my jack. His jack is somebody who was not the person i was seeing. Was not a person of honor and ability, was somebody else. I said you have your jack and i have mine. Mine, i would like to think, i have brought some kind of cautiousness in this book. It is a jfk who changes. Who understands the two great forces pressing on him and his generation in 1963 the threat of nuclear war and the arrival of civil rights. How is he as president get ahead of that . He finds ways and he is not afraid because he, after all, is a student of history, someone who has read history, written history, and more than anything wants to make history. When he thinks about the cold war, its not using the same rhetoric as before. He doesnt want to win the cold war, he wants to end it. With civil rights, he wants to recast it as a new question. Precedentim a moral moral president with flaws. The book is not uncritical of president critically resident kennedy, as i follow him hourbyhour. But it is the Sheer Velocity of the presidency, how much he doesnt one day. Tos not that he is chained his desk at 6 00 a. M. Or that he doesnt go for a nap or swim twice a day. He is desperate to run out the clock. By 1960, kennedy had had several brushes with death and he did not think he would have a long life. He thought he would finish the presidency but did not think he would have a long life. On more than one occasion, he had last rights administered to him and he is racing against the clock and calendar. Asry day and if you look i did, these 48 hours, and one of the advantages of being someone who can hover over two days, 48 hours, and find all kinds of things that perhaps people have missed before because it is a luxury to be that close you see what he was doing. His appetite for change, what he and jackie are thinking about, not just Great Affairs of state but how can we save Lafayette Square . How can we redesign the white house . How can we develop a new air force one . What if we send americans into space and return them to earth before the decade is out . Why dont we send Young Americans into the developing world and something called the peace corps . He will not miss an occasion to do anything. My respect for him grew, not just and his sense of time and morality, that commitment to the job. This is someone who loved what he did. Not all president s love being president. President ,ing because of what he could do with the power he had. Colleen now we will go to some good audience questions. The first is from steve. Everyone can quote a line from kennedys inaugural but not from the pieces speech. Do you have a favorite peace speech. Do you have a favorite line . Andrew i may not get it right, but i said it earlier. In the final analysis, we all inhabit the same planet, we breathe the same air, we all cherish our childrens future and we are all mortal. The russians and americans and everyone else live on the same planet. An early,st environmental since of the world, but they called it universalist. I would urge everybody to go to youtube i think we put up pictures of jfk that day at American University. Watch and read the speech and you will find lots of memorable lines. Colleen from marshall, Vice President johnson was often the point of contact for the administration when dealing with the south. Can you speak of any role he played during those two days . Andrew none at all. Agonyas a source of real to Lyndon Johnson. It was a set of the vice presidency is it is where you went to die. It certainly was when teddy to mckinley,ame vp but then the president died, and that is what happened to lbj. Lbj was not happy as Vice President. Kennedy had isolated him not so much jack but bobby, there was a raging contempt for each other. Because bobby was closer to jack, Lyndon Johnson was shut out and he is not part of these two days. Although he makes a very memorable speech about 30 days before in which he uses morality and talks about the morality of the american presidency and what it should be doing for the american black. But these two days he is not present and he is not much present beyond the space program. This is an extremely difficult time for him. Als with this. He was shrunken in a most invisible in the kennedy administration. Jackie kennedy did try jack kennedy tried on several occasions to make him feel at home but he did not trust him as much as he could have. Lyndon johnson would become the great civil whites president civil rights present within a year. Rick, do you believe the assassination of medgar evers one day after kennedys june 11 speech was some kind of statement to jfk . Andrew well, it was. Be the, 1963 may well singular, single most important day in the history of the Civil Rights Movement. We have the university of alabama and integration. Introduction of the Civil Rights Act of 1963. And in the early hours of june 12, 12 20 a. M. , medgar evers, the unsung hero of the Civil Rights Movement, shot from behind in his driveway, in his home, in a segregated subdivision in jackson, mississippi. Day had ended and he was asleep. He woke that morning to find, and a sense, perhaps the reason he had given that speech and the consequence of that speech. Byronhink kennedy de la beckwith had heard the felt theut kennedy fires of frustration in American Cities and how this kind of thing could unleash them. This kind of thing he did not know medgar evers, medgar evers had tried to get his attention, but when he heard about this, he drafts a letter to misses evers, he uses his office to persuade the family that mager evers should be buried at Arlington National cemetery, which as a veteran he was entitled to. He invites mrs. Evers to the white house with charles evers. He talks to them about civil rights any later sister arthur and your, i cannot understand the south and how it things. Evers, there is an element out there that got your husband and will probably get me. Five and half months later, it did. Colleen a question from jackie was think misses kennedy involved in restoring Lafayette Square. What would she or jeff k think of the events of the last week jfk think of the events of the last week . Andrew they saved Lafayette Square as we know it. If you can see Lafayette Square today and are able to walk there, and i understand the barricades prevent you from entering the president s park, as it was called. It is a very elegant, 19thcentury array of townhouses. Head of thee General Services administration tells jfk, we need to build new Office Buildings for the growing federal government and we will put them in Lafayette Square. Kennedy says really . Jackie says really . That means you will have to tear down these townhouses. The way kennedy did things, he sibley intervenes he simply intervenes. As the story goes, a friend of his who was an architect happened to be visiting washington around this time. He was brought to jfks attention. He said what you think of the plans . This was an architect of some renowned at that time. He goes to the library and meets jfk the next day and places in the cabinet room an array of visuals and shows jfk what the square was, what it could be, and what the plans are to turn it into pure jfk thanks him and the next day the General Services commission calls him and says the president wants something new and he asks you to design it. Much theigns very square we see today. There are federal buildings behind it, but the kennedys, had they not intervened in 1962, it would not be the square as it is today. As for what they have k things of what is happening today, he would be appalled. Of whathat jfk thinks is happening today, he would be appalled. Turning the white house into a fortress would have embarrassed him. The was a decorated hero of second world war, someone for whom physical courage was never in question, who felt the president should be close to the people, who when told by the secret service maybe you should not be in an open car, said i have to be. If someone wants to get me, they will get up in a Tall Building and get me with a highpowered rifle and they will. That is what happened. But he never would have burrowed into the white house or gone to a white house shelter. He would have said i am sorry, i am not doing it. Colleen we have one more question. We are running out of time. The last question is from jonathan. Do you believe the Civil Rights Act would have passed had kennedy survived . Johnson used kennedys memory to put pressure on legislators to pass it. Andrew i believe it would have happened, but taken longer. There is no doubt that as a legislator, Lyndon Johnson was far more skilled than jfk. , a great, of course element of sympathy and a feeling this was an initiative business. Credit that all the for piloting,ed navigating, guiding the civil rights bill to passage in july of 1964. But i think kennedy deserves credit. The bill had cleared committee in the house of representatives by the day that jfk was killed. Jfk had made an alliance not with the democrats but midwestern republicans. He had reached out to them and they were supporting it, particularly in the senate. He had gone to Everett Dirksen and others. I think it would have gone through, maybe not then, but eventually. It mightve taken to 1965 through 1965. But full credit to Lyndon Johnson for doing it when he did. I dont think he could have done it with the same success without the death of jfk. Colleen andrew, thank you so much for joining us this evening. June. K is two days in it is a terrific read. And it is beautifully written, an extra bonus for people who like to read books that have a little bit of prose. Washington to george w. Bush, every sunday at 8 00 p. M. And midnight eastern, we feature the presidency, a weekly series exploring the president s, politics, policies and legacies. Youre watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan3. President s, available now in paperback and ebook. 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