On stage, Marlin Fitzwater, one of the longestserving press secretaries in history and one of three who served under two president s. Marlin got his start in journalism like some of you, as an eighth grade Sports Reporter in kansas. He went on a study journalism at kansas state. After graduation, more than went to washington dc with dreams of landing a job at the washington post. A number oftook government positions including jobs in the department of transportation, the environment of protection agency, and the department of the treasury. In 1981, the white house beckoned and marlin was named a special assistant to president reagan and Deputy Press Secretary for domestic affairs. As the, he was tapped press secretary for george bush in two years later, he was named president ial spokesman bears subsequently, martin remained in the west wing as press secretary to president george h. W. Bush, a position he held until bill clinton moved into the oval office in 1993. Lasted than a decade later the Marlin Fitzwater center for communication was dedicated on this campus. With our guest of honor making if alluest marlon said, communication depends on our ability to transmit ideas from one person to another, let this center spark the intellectual curiosity, the enthusiasm, and the personal integrity to make every person who passes through these holes a beacon unto the world. We are very proud that are stitched a is a lumia trent spiner. Theutive editor of newspaper that hasnt shipped in and National Politics since its founding in 1863. Quickly found his place and his voice up and appear cerro newsroom in the fitzwater center. As participants in the president ially impress program, will work in the newsroom to satisfy your curiosity and find your voice in the Public Discourse of the 2016 president ial election. Fifield fulfilled we have no doubt that you will as well be beacons unto the world. Please join me in welcoming Marlin Fitzwater and trent spiner. [applause] mr. Spiner i want to jump right into it. Part of our mission is to talk , and whatal discourse an important country talking about that in the middle of a historic election no matter which side of the aisle you are on. Lets talk about lets jump off from their. What do you about the state of our political discourse right now . Sec. Fitzwater it has changed a lot since i was an active political player and i know some of you are a couple years younger than me so i would just summarize by saying president 19 89 was in office until and president bush from 19891992 and i was with him during the period. The political theme today is so much faster, so much sharper, so much more difficult, i think, i canlot of reasons, that hardly equate the two. I remember when we started the campaign of 1992 with former tosident bush and he said me, i dont want to hear you ever say a critical word about Hillary Clinton or bill clinton. Nothing about hillary and this is after we had gotten through monica. Doesnt that sound a little quaint today . Now that everybody calls each other names like crazy and he gets pretty ugly. I think i was probably there at the right time. Sec. Fitzwater even people in their own parties mr. Spiner even people in their own parties . Sec. Fitzwater which is crazy to me. Ronald reagan always had the ofe of say no evil will say no evil. You just never did it. Rule of say no evil. Mr. Spiner the idea of the political center. Here in new hampshire, where we have the first the nation primary, you had a democratic socialist the Hillary Clinton by 22 points. Had donald trump win or more than 100,000 votes when there is still Something Like a. Ozen candidates in the field so, do you think do you think that is a sign of how divided this country is or do you see something is happening here . Sec. Fitzwater i think it is a partiesthe division and in the country generally it is also a sign of the technology and communications that we have so many messages coming from so many sources that it generates support and opposition to all the candidates. You have the 17 candidates that is a contributive factor. But, the question is, how do you do with this . I think that is really a quandary for all of the candidates and it shows in this campaign. The republican side hasnt started out with 17 candidates on the stage and i must say that i picked the president from that he was the first one thrown out, so, it is pretty hard to tell exactly how fastpaced it is going. Mr. Spiner what do you think that does . Which is that due to our politics . Sec. Fitzwater first of all of the to greater onus on concentration and really, considering all the angles. That is that reflects on what you read and how you get your information and through television, newspapers, and all the social media. And you have to really do a serious and less asian of the kent analyze nation you have to do a serious analyzation of candidates. They candidates now our personalityoriented, making it even more difficult to really make judgments. Think r what do you if you were a high School Giving advice for a High School Student about someone who was interested in either getting into politics or allring politics given the changes, both in the media and political side, what would be your advice to them . Sec. Fitzwater my first piece of advice is go for it, it is great fun can you imagine . I keep thinking of the students are atanklin pierce who a republican a National Republican and democratic conventions. And all of the candidates all the crazy things that are step back,o, if you and you dont get too involved so your heart is broken everyday , it is the most exciting thing you can do. So, and i advise people that , go, go caps on a campaign spend the six months or a year with a candidate any level because it is really, really exciting today, because of all of this. Now, this instrument makes it exciting to you and who want to work for candidates also makes whorustrating for old folks just want to pick the candidate and move on with other things. So, there is two sides to it, but, i think it is a great opportunity for young people. Mr. Spiner what about your time in the white house . You spent 10 years at the White House Press secretary under two beingents, 10 years of grilled by helen thomas in the front row. Which, by the way, i dont may the audience dont know about helen sec. Fitzwater thomas if you want to give him a quick . She is not alive you get a couple years ago in would love to she hear that i have been asked to describe her and she cannot be here to respond. [laughter] the fitzwater but she was dean of the press corps and she really integrated washington the lastm for women in 40 years, starting with eisenhower, when eisenhower didnt want to give her a seat in one of his press conferences and she spoke up and said, no, i want to be sitting with the boys, and then she really National Presss Club and started her on Womens National press club, was president obama them, and she always sat in the front row, she worked for United Press International which fed stories andll the rest of the media it quickly became that she was sitting at the press corps formade the rose, really, how a president and his press secretary relate to the press and i miss those rules they really disappeared about 15 for a lot of reasons that we can go into, but she the rules about telling press what you are doing about openness, about transparency, about honesty, about what is fair and what is not fair about playaper rules and how to the game, and so, i have a great regard and respect for helen, but every morning at 7 00, there she would be, sitting on my credenza. Helen and i do really know how to describe health and redically accept she wore plastic boots up to about her knees and a black dress, often with black toreador pants, so she was a sight would at 7 00 in the morning, and she would sort of well, what are you doing in latvia last night . I said, latvia . I wasnt in latvia last night, and we would go from there. Mr. Spiner there is a segment where you talk about how she would be waiting outside of your office at 7 00 and you had to get passage of the safety of your office before you can prepare for your morning briefing the sec. Fitzwater thats right, she always had a question. I would say, helen, just give me in it to have a cup of coffee and she, ok, fine, one minute she would sit there and time it had mr. Spiner and i bring that up and you brought up the point of the rules between the press and the people that they cover and it certainly seems like the rules have changed. We have seen even in this election the democratic side, Hillary Clinton has not really held many press conferences. On the republican side, donald trump has vilified the press at some of his events and it really seems like that level used to be a cordial relationship while he were press secretary and that has changed. Do you think that is true and you think that is good or bad or . The fitzwater i think that relationship has changed between the press and the press secretary. A gradual basis, really, over it tracksf time, but the growth of social media and the internet and the satellites and all of the changes that it has made in communications and i would just say that the biggest single factor, i think, was when president clinton was impeached, because his presidency was threatened and he was threatened, personally, and he told people told his press secretary, told others are offy, too, all bets with the press i would do anything it takes to survive this and the old rules that helen thomas made up about not putting on stories in the middle of night, not putting out stories late on friday night when the press couldnt handle them or not playing for weekend audiences those all went out the window, whatever i remember asking mike mccurry, ae press secretary about subpoena from a federal grand jury for president clinton and the lawyer said, dont tell the press, dont tell anybody about it, and they held it secret for over one. 5 weeks in the white house that sort of thing would not have happened before. It happens now that people kind of overlook it because clinton was in serious trouble. But since then, the rules have been basically ignored by everybody. George w. Bush came in with not as much respect for the press as he might have because he was resentful of the way his father was treated with the way he perceived he was treated. It just got worse from there. Today, the press corps has really got to fight for their lives to get through a day and to get the information they want. Mr. Spiner you brought up social media. A lot of campaigns now focus on and not that entirely only be able to reach out to their supporters but to target those supporters so that they know they can spend money on reaching undecided voters and maybe not spend as much money on people who have already decided to vote one way or another. What you think about the growth of social media and what do you think it does to our politics . Of all,zwater first let me say a word in defense of hillary. In this campaign she has not talked to the press, but in previous campaigns come even back to reagan and bush when i was there, the rule was always do not hold a press conference once you start the official campaign, which is basically september through november. The reason is simple when you have a press conference, the agenda goes to the press. They get to as the questions in what they decide is important is what you have to talk about. But candidates have a message and have a position they want to present to the american people. Easier and more efficient to do it by other or televisionhes, ads or so forth and that is why they do not hold press conferences. It is not because they do not like the press or do not talk tsipras press, but they do not want to give them the right to set the agenda. That is really all hillary is doing. So anyway, to get to the Technology Side of it, it is so fast today that we have talked the cable newsed services because they are 24 hour operations. Fox news, cnn news, bbcs, those kinds of places. But they were nothing really compared to the demand from the bloggers, which makes journalists out of 300 million people. Theyre are always after information, they create stories , blogger stories feed to the regular news and so forth. The satellite, for example, now makes it possible to get pictures from every place in the with nol the time correspondents around, no one to tell you what is going on. But those pictures are there and therefore we see war, conflict, we see governments fall and rise. Often a correspondent is 1000 miles away in london or some other place. So, there is just no limite to t limit to the pressure on the white house to answer questions about that. And i think that really is a major problem. Now we have the development of social media twitter accounts youtube, social media, facebook and those things which are a clear advancement. Low and behold, donald trump shows up, who is an inveterate twitter person, and the whole country is seeing a whole new. Evel of twitter users almost every day twitter is used to establish the issue we are doing with, the timetable, the nda, and there is no rule there is an old rule in politics of the person who sets the agenda wins. Hillary has has has had to keep up with that, but it clearly has changed the way candidates campaign. Book, one ofn your my favorite lines is at the beginning when you call the press a pack of wolves, and i do not think you were joking about that. Sec. Fitzwater lets say i was. [laughter] you know, obviously that is the relationship the press is supposed to question the administration. There have been polls that have showed recently that American Trust in the immediate is at the lowest point it has ever been. Which, i think as the editor as it of a newspaper, is a dangerous thing. Later in the book you go on to say that the press are good people and they have jobs to do. What do you think about that stat, that the American Public does not trust the media anymore . At some point, even being vilified. I tend to think it goes back to the issue you started this discussion with on divisiveness in the country. The political opposition, the two parties and so forth. The divisiveness is so tough that basically on any issue you raise, you have half the country for its and half the country against it. The problem is if you are in half of the country that is against the issue or against the valence position prevalent position, you think everything you read is wrong, so immediately people are saying the press do not know what they are talking about, these are all lies, these are all wrong, because you do not agree with it. On the other hand, the other half thinks you are pretty honest. What they read is consistent their point of view. It goes back and forth. The end result is the press is always on the end of getting beat up by at least half the country at any given time. Think,isiveness is, i dangerous in that sense in what it does to the media and how people perceive the media. Time, watch fox all the for example, you do not believe anything you here on cnn because you know that has the liberal point of view and fox as the conservative point of view. One of the problems is fox has been so successful, made a lot of money and they are the highest in ratings. Now the print media is doing the same thing because that is the road to getting the money, and you have to follow that. People to haved to think differently about what they are hearing, about their sources of information. Some do a better job of that than others. Of them pretty forgiving press, themselves, although they have become advocates on both sides just like everybody else. At it is intellectually tougher game for everybody involved. And i do not really know he do that, i think it has to be worked out. Reasons i for good think rather than bad, is kind of a selfcorrecting profession. Media growtht the historically and the change in the last 200 years if you want to go back that far, you see in the a 50 year changes way they operate over that period of time. We are going through a really to tumultuous really period in time. Mr. Spiner heres a followup question. You have the media, less trusted sidesver before both are more disliked than any other candidate running for president in the past. What do you think we do to fix it, or does it not need to be fixed . Well, i do not think there is any quick fix. I do not think there is any magic button you can push. Think it is first of all, you need to get candidates who understand there is a problem there and read and then to exploit it, they tried to be responsible and more straightforward in the frommation they put out, that point of view. I think the press is trying to fix it. The president is going through this incredible change now social print media and media and a number of the Boston Herald editor said yesterday, i am told, that his paper reaches more people through the social media that it does imprint does in print. Prince becomes a backup and so forth. I know he has had a lot of success moving towards a social media. But i think there is a role for and i think that will be worked out in terms of how much time and money you put on the print side, how much time and money do you put on instagram or youtube or whatever you are using. It just takes time. Mr. Spiner sure. Not only to be thinking about a breaking news story how do we break that . Out onant to put it social media or our website, and how do we do it . Sec. Fitzwater and it is a big money issue. It is a big business. Journalismeat facing is how to make social media pay, how do you make the internet produce wealth. It is coming, but it is slow. Some are more successful than others. There was a paper that went bankrupt in maine last week while i was here. So, the News Business is having trouble. But i do not think that means journalism is going to have trouble. I think journalism is just going to change, it needs better people and it needs 5 million Franklin Pierce graduates. [laughter] speaking of changes in the media, when there is a there was a big event and the a. P. Reporter was running to get to the phone. They pulled the headset out of the payphone so that their competition could not make the call. Obviously that does not make sense now because anyone can be a reporter and anyone can live slurring livestream hd video. That has gone away. What is the most surprising change you have seen since you left the white house in terms of the media . What is the biggest thing that shocked you . Sec. Fitzwater that is really tough, but it is the speed. How fast things happen. We have a great story here, maybe you have already heard it, that we had students at the two conventions. They were at the republican sittingon and they were by a woman who stood up to protest. I was watching the election on television and i thought, here is trouble. You could see the guards coming in to get here. But what i did not know and found out later was that three Franklin Pierce students that were sitting right in front of her and they immediately stood up, together cell phones and shot pictures. That presence of mind i am so proud of it. In my day, i would have been running to the bar. Im getting out of here. [laughter] journalism today is changing, it is getting faster. Understand if news breaks out three feet away from you, go for it. And i think all of journalism i remember, ladies and night trenthe spiner one outstanding graduate from this university. Nightexecutives were in the aue and trent said i do not know exactly what im going to do but my resume is right underneath your chairs. [laughter] sec. Fitzwater they look down and, by god, there was [laughter] sec. Fitzwater anyway, that is the kind of quick thinking that journalism has to have, and thankfully we have people doing it. And i was offered a job, so that works. We are running out of time here. It has been 15 years in a story that i love to hear, and i have heard of several different times the former president of ,ranklin pierce had this idea his strategist said i will give him five minutes between flights. He flew down at Reagan National airport and pitched him on this idea. Lets raise a bunch of money and dedicate a center to helping students become politicians, orters, members contributing members of society. That was 15 years ago since the center started. What do you think is in store for the next 15 years . Am. Fitzwater well, i really so amazed every time i come at the quality of the students. We have so many of you sitting here, and many of you are prospective students. Eightu are all very counted, although this is not a surprise all a very talented group. Although that is not a surprise to you. Youre all very capable. Secondly, there has to be a mission and leadership in university to move into the problems of journalism and of the new age. Sureake them on and make one of the things i own is thought was so special about Franklin Pierce was the amount you had to do your own thing, to get involved. You wanthe newspapers to work on, television or whatever it was. Severalp every year times and every time i come there is a different person behind the camera. And i love that. Involved and that they are taking the issue to themselves. The other thing is that there was a point in that 15 years when i realized they knew more. Han i did students had moved into the social media age when i hadnt. Maybe that makes me a little more excited about what thinkre doing, but i Franklin Pierce would be wellpositioned. I think we have a very good group and good leadership, and that is where you have to go. Mr. Spiner last question and i want to help some of the young reporters help break the news. If you want to bite on it who do you think is going to win in november . Sec. Fitzwater that is always the issue. , he saidrst came here major butions is our it is in the basement of the library, and we need another building. I said that is good, what are we going to do . He said that is up to you. I went home and i wrote this memo which i read every once in a while just to remind myself of how things were and how much we had moved add that moved a head. But one of the things i said is i promise you i will not be actively involved in politics, i will not do anything partisan. But they had every reason to expect i would be a political person. But i would never push one party or another over anybody. On the other hand, i am a republican, i did work for two president s. Know that ill to yearn for the old days of the secret ballot. But i guess that is gone forever like everything else. Mr. Spiner that is our headline right there. Thank you. But give them a round of applause. [applause] round ofgive him a applause. [applause] sec. Fitzwater thank you all very much. It has been great fun. We now have a 15 minute break between sessions, and there are still some refreshments in the back. Thank you. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] announcer youre watching American History tv, 48 hours of programming on American History every weekend on cspan3. Forow us on twitter information on our schedule and to keep up with the latest history news. All weekend, American History tv is featuring denver, colorado. It is exactly one mile above sea level, giving it the nickname the mile high city. We recently visited sites showcasing the citys rich history. Learn more about denver all weekend here on American History tv. Ms. Field people in denver drive past the denver mint all the time. It is right in downtown denver. It is on a major thoroughfare, but people dont know very much about its history, and it has a fascinating history, and its a story that needed to be told. Colorado experienced a gold rush in 1859, when gold was discovered in the mountains. 1859 was when denver was founded. It was a wild west town. It was a tense city with lots of saloons and bordellos. The miners would come down from the mountains with their bags of gold dust and go into the saloons, and in the saloons, the bartenders would reach their hands into the gold dust bags and take out a pinch of gold to pay for the miners whiskey. So clearly, having fat fingers was a major job requirement for a bartender in early denver. But a city cannot really survive on a pinch of gold dust economy, so denver needed a mint. An office that could mint reliable measures of gold for both commerce and for shipment back east. We are in front of the denver mint, which was built in 1904. Coinage began in 1906, and it has been the pride and joy of denver ever since. By the 1880s, denver itself had gotten rich from mining, and it wanted to become the queen city of the plains, the center of commerce, the leader in the western united states. And the city fathers at that point decided that a mint they could be proud of was going to be part of that process. There wasnt a federal facility. Denver was just the frontier, it was the wild west. So private industry, private banks stepped in to fill that void. Clark and gruber were bankers out of leavenworth, kansas, and they came to denver and set up a private mint. The federal government did not appreciate private bankers minting coins, but it was not illegal, so they could not do anything about it. So, they bought clark and gruber in 1862 and took over the office and began manufacturing gold bars at the first denver mint facility. So, in 1895, Congress Passed an act to form a mint at denver, and that language will become very important years later. The mint was modeled on a Florentine Villa that was owned by the medici family, a prominent banking family in florence, in europe, for centuries. And the opulence and the expense and the grandeur of the facility was expensive even in its day. Having such a facility, such a beautiful grand facility that was also a u. S. Federal mint put denver on the map of western commerce and industry. The denver mint has been robbed twice. The first time, it was an inside job. Orville harrington worked in the mint for many years. He was a trusted worker. So, in 1920, orville had been working at the mint for many, many years, handling gold every single day, but he knew he would never make more than about 4 a month, and it frustrated him. Orville hatched a plan. He planned to steal one gold bar a day from the denver mint, and he was going to do it between inventory periods so that no one would be really be aware of the embezzlement. To dispose of the gold, he planned on renting or leasing a gold claim in victor, colorado, melting the gold down and selling it back to the mint, claiming he had mined it himself. It was an ingenious plan and it just might have worked. But orville stole one too many bars. One day, a coworker noticed him behaving suspiciously and alerted authorities, in this case, the secret service. And they watched orville, they watched him steal a gold bar and they confronted him at a bus stop right outside of the mint, and orville confessed he did in fact have a gold bar on him. He was sentenced to prison and he spent years in leavenworth, kansas, in the federal prison there. In the 1930s, the federal government decided to move the gold reserves that were stored in San Francisco to denver. They did it for a couple of reasons. Probably first and foremost was the fact that they wanted to put 1000 miles of desert and mountain terrain between our gold reserves and the coast. While fort knox was under construction, virtually all of the countrys gold reserves were stored at the denver mint. There has never been a greater assemblage of gold ever in the history of the planet than there was at denver in this facility during the great depression. During world war ii, the denver mint went to war just like every other factory in the country. The men who had been operating the presses went off to fight, and women filled their places. Now, this was always a manufacturing job that was considered a mans work. They didnt think that women could to this kind of work. However, women excelled at it. The denver mints production of coins actually rose during world war ii, and of course, after world war ii, the men came home and they came back to their jobs at the denver mint, and the women went home. Over the years, there have been several superintendants of the denver mint who were women. So, while women were not working on the manufacturing floor, they were running the place. In the 1960s, the federal government thought they needed a new mint facility and they wanted to move this mint, the denver mint, away from downtown denver. Well, you can imagine that congressmen from all over the country were clamoring to get the mint in their district. So, there was a move afoot to take the mint out of denver. Denvers leaders decided they didnt want to lose the mint, they wanted to keep the mint right here. So they played a card from the 1895 declaration which called for a mint at denver, not a mint at texas, or a mint at unincorporated jefferson county, but a mint at denver. A huge fight erupted as denvers leaders tried to keep the mint right here in denver. And over the course of that fight, congress ultimately decided it did not need a new mint facility at all, but that mint facility at all, but that the mint could stay right here and be upgraded. Announcer this weekend, we are featuring the history of denver, colorado, together with our Comcast Cable partners. Learn more about denver and other stops at cspan. Org ci tiestour. You are watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan3. App makes it radio easy to continue to follow the 2016 election wherever you are. It is free to download. Get audio coverage and uptotheminute Schedule Information for cspan radio and television, plus podcast times for our popular Public Affairs book in history programs. Stay uptodate on all the election coverage. Cspans radio app means you only have always have cspan on the go. Each week, american artifacts visits museums, archives, and historic places. Next, a visit to the National Security archive at George Washington university to learn about the history of the freedom of information act. Johnson had lyndon to be dragged kicking and screaming into signing the bill because the bill said any person, not just a citizen, by request could get out of their government any records the government held as long as they were not damaging to National Security or a