U. S. Capital Historical Society in 2018. Im going to go ahead and start stuff. Excuse me, welcome to our latest lunchtime lecture. Im chief historian here with the u. S. Capital Historical Society. Welcome. Im really pleased today to introduce you, if you dont already know, jeanne and david heidler. Theyve been speakers before for their book on George Washingtons circle, and today were really honored that were one day in to the official existence of their latest book on Andrew Jackson the rise of Andrew Jackson was just released officially yesterday, so were at the threshold of greatness here with the book, and i hope you all consider buying it. Theyre going to be available afterwards to sign it for anyone whos interested, and i also want to point out that the previous book, i said theyve been here before, was washington circle. Were also selling discounted copies back there. Im told that the hard cover that were selling is 0. 05 more than amazons soft cover. So that sounds like a winwin. Anyways, i hope youll have some Great Questions for jeanne and david. This is a hot topic. I assume some of you are familiar faces. Some of you might have been drawn specifically because of Andrew Jackson who has been in the news lately. So lets hear about why, how hes a template for maybe modern politics, and you will be taking q a afterwards, so, again, be thinking of some Great Questions. Ive already got a couple, and with that ill ask you to help me welcome jeanne and david. Thank you [ applause ] hello, everyone, thank you, chuck for that gracious introduction and the boost on the book that just came out yesterday. Can everyone hear me all right . All right. Good. Ill try to keep up the volume hear so that we dont have any problems with that. Its delightful to be back here again. Sefl yea several years have passed and we see some familiar faces and have met some new friends. Today we would like to talk to you about the central aspect that drove the campaign for 1828 in the wake of the one for 1824, which was the charge of the corrupt bargain, and to ask the question how corrupt was it, and thats where we get into this business of smear or truth. Part of this is the natural aftermath of an election, which is always a time of mixed emotions and contrasting moods. You have the elation of the victors and the disappointment of the defeated, and these balance each other after a fashion, which leads to a better perspective on the event and the future and gives proportion, a sense of proportion. The first shock of defeat will subside and elation over victory becomes relief over having attained it. From this, you get an equilibrium if everything works right, which is necessary for sound governance. In the best case the victor is never completely vindicated and the defeated is never completely demolished. A healthy political system preserve serves tthe adversarias a way to check, curb and discourage overwooeaning power. At the same time the extremes of failure and success must be avoided because if they persist, there lies the path to irreconcilable differences and to the heedless exercise of power and to the reckless form of resistance. Fundamental to avoiding all of this is a general belief that good faith is operating as a given in the election and its aftermath. Imagine th imagine, then, the chaos that is likely to ensue if the defeated emerge from the election convinced that they have been cheated, that the process itself was manipulated in bad faith and that the result is illegitimate, that the beneficiaries of it are shallow hucksters at best but possibly evil at worst. Subverting the peoples will, destroying the democratic ideal for the venal gain of power, that would be bad enough. But imagine if the losers did not really believe this but were willing to act as if they did, that they were intent upon convincing as many people as possible that the things they know to be lies are the truth. The damage is such an effort, even if unsuccessful could be incal cuable, if its successful, its certainly to be devastating, and it is that situation that can be broadly categorized as a smear. A smear is a deliberate fabrication at worst or at least a willful twisting of the truth to sully the reputation of the target. Strictly speaking, the truth cannot be a smear. The purpose of it in politics is as a scheme to achieve advantage over an opponent outside of traditional means such as debate over issues of policies or contrasting differences which are presented either in person or through pertinent issues being explored in writing. Candidates and entities resort to the smear because they wish to distract from something. They wish to change the subject. It could be from their own personal failings or foibles or their own records, either in personal matters where they behave questionably or pass political stances that were or have become unpopular. In short, distraction is the operative function of a smear. For a candidate with nearly unassailable credibility, it is an easy way to damage an opponent, and this is where it becomes especially dangerous. Credibility comes from popularity. A sterling deed, an inspiring life story, or even a sense of identification with people that creates a bond for even essentially ephemeral reasons, it is nonetheless in parts authority. The fallacy of arguing from authority is only matched by the ease of doing so. It is to say that you should believe me because of who i am discounting the need for evidence or even dismissing contradictory evidence as irreleva irrelevant. Hello. At the heart of our story today is the constitutional role of the house of representatives in deciding a president ial election, such as the one in 1824, an election where no candidate received a majority in the Electoral College. This had only happened once before, the election of 1800 when Thomas Jefferson tied with his Vice President ial running mate, aaron burr. And its somewhat odd that it hadnt happened more than one time before because the framers of the constitution actually envisioned it happening pretty frequently. They thought that because they believed that favorite sons from the various states would run in each of the quadrennial elections, and as a result there would be no majority in the Electoral College. That would throw it into the house of representatives. They chose the house because it is considered the peoples house. The frequency of the elections, of course, make it more responsive to the will of the people. This was the mechanism envisioned. Now, if someone did receive a majority in the Electoral College originally, that person would become the president. The person who came in second would become the Vice President , but that election of 1800 obviously illustrated that that wasnt practical, and so the changes brought on by the 12th amendment to the constitution resulted in that 12th amendment. It provided for separate elections for president and Vice President , and in the event that there was not a majority, the top three candidates would then go before the house. The house would vote by states. Each state having one vote. The rationale for that was the same as for the Electoral College. It was to prevent the larger states from dominating the elections. A simple majority in the house would then provide the victor. The physical process of the voting and how it was achieved, how it was counted, thats kind of a story for another day. What is pertinent for us today are the 1824 Election Results. There were simply too many candidates. By the time they got to the election in the fall there were four. Secretary of state, John Quincy Adams of massachusetts, secretary of the treasury, william h. Crawford of georgia, speaker of the house henry clay of kentucky, and senator Andrew Jackson of tennessee. The abundance of candidates assured that no one was going to receive a majority in the Electoral College, and that was apparent by the late fall of 1824. Accordingly, the 12th amendment kicked in. The top three in the Electoral College vote were jackson, adams, and crawford. These would be the candidates before the house of representatives. We do a sort of tag team thing here, you know, like in wrestling one of you could come up and try to keep one of us away from the podium. Jackson men insisted that jacksons plurality in the popular and electoral votes was a decisive factor in determining the outcome of the house election. In a letter in december 19th of 1824 jackson referred to himself as having been supported by the majority of the people, which wasnt the case, but jackson correctly assumed that this wasnt the time for subtlety. So with certitude and tenacity, the message was hammered home. Jackson had won the election because of the popular vote. He had won the election because of the plurality in the Electoral College, and it was incumbent on the house to endorse these conclusions out of a basic fairness. It was the only way, said the jacksonites to truly represent the will of the people. Jacksons managers assiduously tried to elevate the relevance of these numbers and its easy to see why. As expected, jackson came in first. The Electoral College with 99 votes but far short of the 131 majority necessary for victory, but it was jacksons significant lead in the popular vote that animated his supporters. 18 of 24 states in 1824 chose the electors by popular vote. Jackson had more than 40,000 votes than his closest competitor John Quincy Adams and more than 110,000 votes than william h. Crawford the third place finisher. Lost in the comparison of these figures, however, is the reality that not one of these numbers really matters. T only the electoral counts of jacksons 99, adams 84 and crawfords 41 are pertinent to the constitutional prescriptions for referring these men to the question before the house of representatives. The flawed logic in the appeal of the popular vote is made evident by scrutinizing the case of henry clay who had beaten crawford in the popular vote by more than 6,000. But crawford had won louisiana thanks to some skullduggery on the part of the add dams aams a jacks jackson camps and as a result crawford came in first by winning louisiana and as a result became one of the three candidates who was going to go before the house. This fairly clearly shows that comparing the apple of popular votes to the orange of electoral ones was, in short, a pointless exercise. Because of the complicated nature of this question, which im sure you will all agree is fairly complicated at this point, it would prove a highly effective way of manipulating public opinion. Conseque consequently, the pressure to influence house members with these spurious claims was intense and persistent. The house would not take up the question until february 9th, 1825, which gave not only the supporters of jackson but those of adams and crawford more than two months to cobble together the simple majority in the house necessary for victory. They also courted one another with promises of seeking pledges of support, the operatives moving between the operatives of the other two, bending the truth, and lying when truthfulness didnt seem to work. The Practical Applications of all of this become evident as a result of what happened in january of 1825. Henry clay, speaker of the house was strongly inclined to support John Quincy Adams as soon as he knew clay knew that he had lost the election, and he knew this in the fall. He knew it before louisiana. He was deducing that he was not going to go before the house of representatives. As he became aware of that, he only wanted to make certain that adams was supportive of his program, of the clay program for national improvement, before throwing his support to him. To that end, he had an extended interview with adams on the night of january 9th, 1825. It is possibly one of the most pivotal events in american political history. The details of the meeting are never theyve never been made clear. Adams usually recorded things voluminously and completely in his diary. He does not for this. What is clear is that the results of the meeting were to be devastating to the reputations of both of these men because clay was going to use his enormous influence after this as speaker of the house in the cause of John Quincy Adams. Now, there were certainly problems with this meeting. Its context was unfortunate for it took place in the midst of a whirl of proposed deals by all the parties concerned including the jacksonites. Let me read a couple of passages from our book to illustrate how some of this deal making was going on. Ohio congressman john sloan found himself sitting across a dinner table from sam houston, an important jackson operative, who mused between bites that ohio would surely go for jackson in the house vote. Sloan was an experienced politician in his mid40s, a jeffersonian who had preferred clay, and his response to houston was measured. He had not spoken to the others of his dell gas, he saegation, guardedly. Sloan believed houston looked anxious as he spoke about what a splendid administration it would make with old hickory as president and mr. Clay as secretary of state. Later, as houston bade sloan farewell, he made doubly sure his offer had not been misunderstood. Well, i hope you from ohio will aid us in electing general jackson, sloan recalled him saying, with a winking repeat of the proposed deal, and then your man, meaning mr. Clay, can have anything he pleases. And then there was the case of daniel cook of illinois. Old hickorys men heard the distressing news that the young illinois congressman, daniel p. Cook intended to vote for adams. At 30 years of age and in frail health, he suddenly found himself at the center of an unsettling effort to influence his vote. Illinois was a relatively new state, and its small population granted only one representative, but since each state had one vote in the house election, dan cook by himself was as important as all of new york or pennsylvania. Illinois had mostly gone for jackson, and old hickorys men forcefully demanded that those general Election Results do more than guide cook in the house vote. He should accept them as the verdict of the people or else. Pennsylvania, jackson man samuel ingam took this tact with cook. A rumored alliance of adams and clay would be unpopular he muttered darkly to cook, and it would hurt cooks career to join it. Ingam watched the young man absorb this threat and saw someone nodded all weighing his options to cut his loss not at all weighing his options to cut his losses. Ingam switched his mood and smiled benevolently. Cook said ingam could be territorial governor of arkansas if his vote helped Andrew Jackson become president. For daniel p. Cook, the offering of the whole world was insufficient to purchase his vote at the cost of his integrity. But arkansas . Ingam knew when to drop it. Now, henry clay was courted by the jackson and crawford man as well, and the murkiness of these overtures encouraged significant misunderstandings at the time and massive ones later. Clay enjoyed the attention and prolonged it, which was unwise. It would be unfortunately easy to conclude in this setting that clay in meeting with adams was arranging a quid pro quo for his support. Now, as the february 1825 vote approached, expectations were high on all sides, and there was also a lot of discussion about how should the house consider the candidates. Clearly, the intention of the constitution was to have it act independently of all general Election Results. What, after all, did the framers of the constitution intend . If the house were merely to ratify an Electoral College plurality, why have the house vote at all . An Electoral College plurality would be sufficient to select a winner if that was the case, but that was explicitly not the case per the constitution. Rather, the top three finishers in the Electoral College came before the house equally entitled with none favored over the others by any previous election result. The constitution clearly meant for the house to start its considerations from scratch, and then the vote was held. John quincy adams won on the first ballot. Now, there are enormously complicated reasons why this happens, and we wont talk about them today. We need only be aware that adams was elected on the first ballot to everyones surprise, mostly to the jacksonites. Jackson at first was magnanim s magnanimous, which strikes us perhaps as an act. Then the very night after the house vote, jackson and adams came facetoface. Again, from the book. The monroes held their weekly reception, and while everyone seemed drained by the experience, they were also grateful that despite the angry talk, broad recriminations and a grandi grinding apprehension, the election in the end had been decided with a calm dignity. The president s gathering was not festive, but it was uneventful, which was pleasant for people weary of events. A Kindred Spirit pervaded the whole scene the National Intelligencer reported. The friends of the different candidates mingled together, and conversed with a good humor and frankness contrasted with the vier ewe lens and ma lig nenty which in some parts of the country had attended the discussion of question. President elect John Quincy Adams stood near the center of the room in the midst of oppressive people offering congratulations. He received them with a drawn smile and stiff bows. He felt another press of people behind him and turned just as Andrew Jackson turned to face him. The president s reception fell silent. Guests suddenly became conscious of the cramped space and instinctively backed away from the two men to create a small empty circle with them at its center. The last bit of stray laughter and murmuring voices went quiet in the corners of the room. Adams looked up at the gaunt face. Andrew jackson bowed low. He extended his hand. Adams took it. The bow at the reception, that seemed promising as did the handshake, but jackson was actually seething, and then the announcement came that John Quincy Adams had named henry clay as his secretary of state. This set off the explosion. Jackson wrote to a friend, was there witness such a barefaced corruption in any country before . So you see the judas of the west has closed the contract and will receive the 30 pieces of silver. His end will be the same. Now, a smear can only work if the behavior being decried is exclusive to the target, but this was not the case. Weve already seen jackson operatives had been working night and day to secure votes for jackson. The example of sloan and cook are just two of a number of instances, and then the activities of James Buchanan nearly did them all in. James buchanan was an insignificant pennsylvania congressman in 1824, 25. He strongly supported jackson and wanted to do something, anything, to get the hero elected. Therefore, he took it upon himself to become a power broker by going to jackson and indicating that clay men might support old hickory if jackson agreed to make clay secretary of state. Jackson refused to commit, and there it seemingly ended, at least until after the election when jackson chose to use that interview with buchanan as proof that clay attempted to sell his support to jackson before turning to adams. Buchanan never supported this version of events and finally he flatly in the press denied it saying that he had never been an emissary from henry clay. This didnt presented a problem for the jackson side. It must not be so. Jacksons insistence that this is precisely what happened gives the impression that jackson truly believed that buchanan had done what jackson claimed despite buchanans denials. Jackson continued to insist that clay had sent buchanan. It also points to a strangely unique sense of self and rectitude that guided jackson. Adams and clay were bad, so anything necessary to bring them down was excusable, even laudatory. Now, there were a lot of people that did not believe this smear. Some of them were actually in the jacksonite movement, martin van buren, for example, who actually ran the last part of jacksons 1828 successful campaign, but he always remained very friendly with henry clay. There is also thomas hart benton, an enthusiastic jacksonite, but he was also mrs. Henry clays first cousin. And then theres Thomas Richie, a late comer to the jackson camp who had actually been a friend of henry clay back when they were teenagers in richmond, virginia. This picture was taken about 1850, which was the year that during a dinner party Thomas Richie actually admitted to clay that he had never believed the corrupt bargain smear. They all, however, in the late 1820 fell into the same camp as jacksons supporter Richard Mentor Johnson who said at the time that old hickorys men would oppose adams and clay, even, quote, if they act as pure as the angels that stand at the righthand of the throne of god. Well, in conclusion, lets recall that the nature of a smear is either to fabricate a believable lie or bend the truth to the purpose of making credible otherwise unsupportable allegations. In that regard, the construction of a smear is by necessity counter factual. A truth becomes an obstacle to the smears purpose or it is made malleable and thus becomes a tool to advance its purpose. At some point in this process, and as a result of it, the smear becomes a soulless and corrosive project for those who promote it and those who believe it. Those who promote it and know its origins and purpose must make a Faustian Bargain at the outset, and that is the most corrupt, thoroughly corrupt bargain of all. The rationalization that the sacrifice of integrity is justified by the higher good of righting a wrong or stopping an injustice. Jacksons uncanny ability to weave and then don such rationalizations was strange and wonderful indeed, but those duped into believing the smear because of their trust in those promoting it have an investment in both the life, or both the lie and its authors that is as emotional as it is political, and that, too, becomes an enemy of the truth. The consequences of a lie given life by desire, necessity and most strangely of all, righteousness, butt resed by circumstance, the lie becomes something more terrifying than an antitruth. It becomes received wisdom. As received wisdom it turns into lore, not a fabulist tale but a fable. A divide to understanding what happened and a warning about the understandings deeper meaning. It is a myth, then, that a lie is a Fragile Foundation upon which no structure can safely stand for long, let alone forever because a lie properly bolded and persistently told can last as long as people are willing to believe it, and at some point it becomes immortal because people go beyond their willingness to believe it to a reflexive embrace of it. The lie of the corrupt bargain outlived John Quincy Adams and henry clay and all the others still lives today in the musty cars of our american historical memory. At the time, though, when it was fresh and vibrant and finding its legs, the charge that there had been a corrupt bargain in january of 1825 worked enough malice for a lifetime. It called into question the method of carrying out the election, one established by the constitution and sanctioned by all the participants in the election process until. That sort of potency jurn mines t undermines the rule of law. It defames the opponents as unfit, and corrodes discourse sometimes to the point of violence. All of those consequences destabilize the process of democratic rule. Object lessons abound and Cautionary Tales are rife in this episode, one that remains highly relevant to our own time beyond its value as a telling episode from our past. It is worth remembering as a guidebook for navigating a perilous future. Thank you. [ applause ] well, well take questions now. So you say that the lie was immortal. You certainly still read about it, but what role did it actually play in the subsequent elections, the election in 1828 and 32 . Well, the it was used to energize the jacksonite movement, the notion that they had been illegitimately deprived of the prize in 24 by the virtue of the house election in 25 gave a great deal of animation to their efforts and a sense of righteousness to them as we point out that pervades every conversation that occurs in the wake of it. Theres hardly an article in a jackson paper that does not work in some way the corrupt bargain into the into the narrative, and as a result it becomes a pervasive, pernicious, and completely ubiquitous occurrence that that becomes code words. People could say those two words to anyone in the country and automatically knew what they meant, and by virtue of that, they target John Quincy Adams, who ironically was probably one of the most probative and had the most integrity of anybody who ever held the office of president becomes a scheming corruptionist, and henry clay, who was a statesman of long standing with a fine reputation as a diplomat, a legislator, a grand lawyer who took on unpleasant cases for the good of the country and for the good of individuals was painted as a libertine. There were duals fought over this. Clay fought john ra randolph wh he was sitting secretary of state. The motivational factor behind this is incalculatable. It does assume immortality to this day. Does that make sense . I warned you i was going to ask you this so you cant act surprised. What really jumped out at me is i see you doing a tag team thing, i wanted to know how and there were differences in your styles, jeanne seemed to really relish the drama of the moment, and david, youre laying out the methodology of your approach and so on, and when you get to writing, how does that dynamic play out . As cowriters, you know, im interested in this as fiction but as a historian, im interested in it as a piece of history. How do two historians sit down and write a book together . And i might point out when youre husband and wife. Im sure that affects the dynamic. For 37 years. Well, each book we have approached a little differently, like, for instance, our biography of henry clay, which we will never do it this way again, i started at the beginning, and he started at the end, and we tried to come together. We didnt come together exactly the way we thought we should, so that took a little bit of work in the middle. The Washington Book and then this book, we wrote to our st t strengths, the things that we had been most interested in. One of us would write maybe that section, ask then we always edit each others book, and i will freely admit david is a much better writer than i am, and you are. I am a much faster writer than he is, and so what we would do after writing a section, wed edit each other so that the voice sounds the same, so it sounds like one person wrote the book, and weve never had anyone come to us and say, oh, i know you wrote this section or i know he wrote that section. Thats never really happened because of the editorial process that we go through. And then of course our editor at the press has a lot to say about whats included and some of the language, and so that helps bring one voice, too. Does that answer your question . Yeah, thank you. What does this tell you about the Electoral College . I mean, we have indirect elections here in the united states, obviously, and going back to that the election that you discussed this afternoon, so when the voters say louisiana voted, they voted for the electors. Theres no direct election, but you put up a popular vote count. Could you maybe explain that, the whole process . Sure, the democratization of politics was well underway before the war of 1812, and it continued to accelerate afterwards, so the broadening franchise, a lot more people could vote. They dropped property qualifications, occurred in tandem with the notion to popularize the electoral choice. The period before this, the majority of states legislatures elected electors the way they did senators. That changes, and i think i mentioned that there were 18 of the 24 states in 1824 that had popular votes for electors. Louisiana was not one of them, and thats how they were able to control louisiana as much as they did. They were able to detain people from going to vote in baton rou rouge. They were able to stop them once they got there from voting the way they were supposed to or had pledged to. Deals were made largely between the adams and crawford people at the encouragement of jackson, the jackson men because jackson was strong in louisiana but clay was very strong, and so they used adams and crawford to blunt his strength and give the vote to crawford, who was who was very much a long shot. That kind manipulation was possible in state legislators legislatures where it wasnt in the popular vote. And so the tendency by 1828, even more and then by the end of the period as we moved to the civil war, the only state by the yo outbreak of the civil war that does legislature choice is south carolina. So all of them go to a popular vote as part of the democratization of the american political system. The Electoral College is a wonderful mechanism because it does prevent populous states from dictating to others, the less populous states. The idea that the federal system imparts a sovereignty and an importance to both large and small states that otherwise would be removed in the absence of that. A National Referendum would give you a National Executive based on about three or four highly Populated Areas and the rest of the country could have to live under that. The framers saw that would be a recipe for division and ultimately disunion. The constitution does not bind the delegates. Theyre pledged to whom . In this election, for example, what you have clay supporters, jackson supporters, crawford supporters, and those people within the legislature, for instance, would vote for electors who were pledged they were the ticket, they were the ticket for clay, or they were the ticket for adams. Let me interject. In the book we have one of the illustrations is one of the tickets. Yes. And what they would do is they would distribute these, whether they were popularly elected or if it was for the legislature choosing, they would distribute these tickets so that the voters, if they were popularly elected, would know which men were pledged to a certain candidate. They didnt have to vote the way they were pledged and they still dont. But that would be a recipe for a ruined career, if you pledged that you were going to vote for jackson in the Electoral College and then you voted for adams, then the voters, who voted for you, would want to exact some revenge on you, whether it was political or business or whatever. So generally speaking, electors have always voted, most of the time, for those people they were pledged to. There are defections. Its not unheard of. Very rare. New york had some defections. Yeah. And madison had quite a number of defections in 1812 from various states that didnt vote for him. But it is remarkable bad faith in the eyes of the people who cast the votes. After 1825, they used the 1826 elections as a referendum on the 1824 election. And those members of the of congress, of the house of representatives, who came from states that had voted for jackson and jyet voted for adam instead, they were punished. A lot of them were defeated in the 1826 midterms as a penalty for having to what the jacksonites said. Trump in the debates had said that the election would he respect the results of the election while dependent on who won. Did you see any parallels as you were writing this, i realize you wrote this probably most of this before the last election. Were you seeing parallels with modernday tensions . Well, jackson never said publicly that adams did not win the election. In other words, he didnt challenge the legitimacy of the election in a legal sense. I dont see a similarity in that way at all. He believed the numbers had been rigged. Obviously adams won the house vote on the ballot and it was close. He took the necessary 13. 13 and that was it and new york was the divisive one in that decision. That was never the question. And jackson was fairly for about 24 hours and it dawned on them that something had happened that was not right. Its almost as though after the election, jackson and his people are trying to figure out what to do next. Because it was obvious that what had happened it was sanctioned by procedure and prescriptions in the constitution. What they did is, they seized on the appointment of clay as secretary of state, as a mechanism to promote the idea that some corrupt deal had been made and that way they could question the legitimacy of the election through it be rigged to that wa thwart the will of the people. Its one of the modern politics aspects that we explore in the book, that and others, that that is not unusual afterwards. It was highly unusual. Thats why it baffled them for quite some time, why anyone was taking this seriously. Because i didnt make any sense to them. And so when it became apparent it was being taken seriously, they reacted rather reflexively and in ways that in some respects was unhinged which gave more credence to the charge sort of thing. Is the story true that at the inauguration, adams went to shake jacksons hand and he said, im sorry, mr. President , my hands seem to be full. Yes. And that was the last thing that he said to adams. They never spoke again. Even though adams would be in congress during jacksons presidency. They never exchanged pleasantries. In 29, adams did not attend the inauguration. Which was fine with jackson. He developed a loathing of adams that matched clay. He hated clay. I can give you the exact moment at least within the hour, of when clay and jackson came to the belows and logger heads and never had to do anything with each other. It was in 1819. And clay criticized jackson for invading florida. In a threehour address, it was masterful, but made an imbittered and durable enemy out of him. Im surprised they never went to duelling. There was a lot of talk that jackson would challenge clay over that speech. But it was considered bad form to challenge someone to a duel for saying something in congress. Because you were supposed to have the freedom. Now, clay actually broke that tradition when he challenged John Randolph because that was randolph had made an accusation on the floor of the senate in 1826 accusing clay of especially being a cheater. And so he challenged him. That was unusual. Did they fight it . Randolph had decided at least the night before and probably a few days before that he wasnt going to fire at clay. Partly because friends had tried to talk with him mr. Clays first cousin had spoken with him and he was determined not to fire. Clay was very angry and he tried to kill John Randolph. In fact, one of his bullets randolph was wearing a billowy coat so they wouldnt have a clear target. And one of the bullets went through the coat. He was trying. But when when randolph had his next shot, he shot in the air. And that ended it. In fact they shook hands and seemed to be buddies for about five minutes. As long as it took randolph to go back over to the senate. And then he went after them again. If you think we have interesting news, you can imagine the newspapers covering a duelling because the secretary of state and the sitting u. S. Senator. Didnt that fight happen for years and years they had been enemies forever. Wasnt clay the one who ordered randolphs dogs out of the house. Yeah, that had been a standard indull jins. When clay became speaker, he learned over to the sergeantatarms and randolph said get the dogs out. And randolph was furious with him for that. But he never brought the dogs back. Never brought them back, yeah. I think you should do a biography of John Randolph. Hes a fascinating person. But a lot of his papers have not survived, whether he destroyed them or family members destroyed them. Theres some. But theres not a really good collection from start to finish. Hes a fascinating person. Yeah, he would he was he took opium and drank brandy in excess, would ride his horse pounding down to his plantation which was in roanoke. He hailed from bizarre which was a plantation of his youth. Appropriately enough. And he would wander the halls of this magnificent dwelling with the wallpaper peeling off and paint flecked and everything with a single candle saying macbeth took sleep. Thank you so much for joining us. Blauz applause [ applause ] thank you, chuck. It was a pleasure. Weeknights this month were featuring American History tv programs as a preview of whats available every weekend on cspan3. Tonight a look at Ronald Reagan who served as the nations 40th president from 1981 to 1989. Nine days after taking the oath of office for his first term, president reagan met with the press in the Old Executive Office buildings which is next door to the white house. Questions about the recently resolved iranian hostage crisis dominated the discussion that ranged from Domestic Affairs to Foreign Policy priorities. Enjoy American History tv this week and every weekend on cspan3. Youre watching American History tv. Every weekend on cspan3, explore our nations past. Cspan3, created by americas cable Investigation Companies as a Public Service and brought to you today by your television provider. Annette gordonreed talks about her biography on andrew