statewide numbers add up. if you're philly and your vote -- this is like some guy living in the suburbs where the vote is more important. you live in a big city -- never lived in a state that really was a close call. i guess -- the saying about florida? only three kind of people down here, those who vote, those who count and those who can't count. stupid joke. [laughter] >> always had a different number. always say, this thing called -- i'm sorry. gore. >> hi, chris. quick question, i guess, the last one. i'm a big fan of worldwide government, and -- >> what? >> worldwide government. >> federal recallism. >> just a different government in different countries around the world, whether it be in israel, china, different places, watching their government work. >> i always think of that -- my career, ending gold to travel around the worldful see how democracy is doing in different cubs. >> the thing that confuses me about america is the two-party system. do you think we'll get to the place without a two-party system? >> it will be like in israel, one bloc has whole number of people that participate. libby is part of the government now. i like her. and you have lieberman, far right. so, you -- britain, you have the new democrats, you got two parties there. they have -- the torres and the middle of the road party. if you had three parties ubs one would gradually replace the other, just like the republicans replaced the whigs and the laborites replaced liberals in britain. 270 electoral votes to win the presidency, and i you don't it goes to the house. nobody wants to house picking the next president. that's gotten scary. so, we want the voters to pick the president so take 218 to pass the house. i don't want do sound like yesterday but that's the system we got for our lives two parties, but the republican party could change a lot one way or the other. it could change radically. it could go hard right or go back, and of course i want tote go back to the center so i can have a choice. i love having choices, and it's -- i like this guy, christie. we'll see. i like him. something about him that seems real. but i will root for him until he proves to me he is not worth rooting for, because i got root for something on that side, and i'll push him until he blows it, and i just think the country really wants a choice. they don't want hari d hash harry to get a cake walk. the only thing we like about the last election, most of us -- i went crazy. he said to me, at the president, he bumped into me and said, i'm going to mention you in my speech. boy, he did. and when he said chris matthews, and then -- nearly gave me a stroke. the stroke was the first debate last year. i have no idea what was going on there. but he's not perfect. accomplish he is trying, and he has the right values, and it's going to be tough. i wish he had more of a negotiating partner on the other side that were balancing this thing out. if boehner had the cajon questions to do it. he seems like a nice guy but a weak guy. i don't get it. i don't know why he wants that job. you know? why want to be married to marilyn monroe if you're not married to marilyn monroe? why say it if it ain't sew. that what i meant. what do you mean? what do you mean? have to spell it out for you? i want to thank -- >> we're at the end of our program, ladies and gentlemen. >> the voice of god. >> a big round of applause. for chris matthews. thank you. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> this program was part of the 30th annual miami book fair international. for more information, visit miami book fair.com. >> jeffrey frank recounts the personal and working relationship between president dwight eisenhower and vice president richard nixon. mr. frank reports that vice president nixon constantly south eisenhower's approval and president eisenhower was unsure of nixons a ability to assume the presidency. this is an hour and ten minutes. [applause] >> thank you. welcome to all of you, and to insomniacs throughout the united states. i have a -- it's my pleasure to introduce jeff frank. jeff frank is an accomplish it writer, those of you who buy the book today will be blessed in reading the prose. jeff spent 13 years at the "washington post." i'm not sure that's where you learned how to write well but that where is you learned how to get a good story, and by the end he was winning the outlook section, and then he went to "the new yorker," and was a senior edit for 30 years, and that's where you learn to write well and help others write well. besides writing nonfiction, jeff has written four works of fiction. so this is someone who understands the importance of narrative and a good story and he brought those talents for some reason to the relationship between eisenhower and nixon, and i want to begin by asking you, jeff, why did you choose that particular marriage? toe be the focus? >> because it was a great story. it began with two people who really didn't know each other. one was an american hero of the sort we don't have anymore, five-star general. the man given credit for leading the allies to victory in europe. 62 years old, and a 39-year-old orange county congressman who was -- eisenhower ran with nixon but didn't even really choose him as vice president. he wasn't even aware that a presidential candidate gets to choose his vice president. so he later was asked by james ruston, what really happened the night when nixon was chosen, and eisenhower said i had my advisor and six or seven people on the list and nixon was on the list. so so they got together some they had a very strange relationship that went on and on during eisenhower's presidency. it became closer when in the -- which nixon calls his wilderness years and then around 1966, eisenhower's grandson, david, who is going to amherst, began to date julie nixon, who was going to smith, seven miles away, and they completely were crazy about each other. a year later, when they were 20, they were married. and so -- they became one family in november of 1968, they had thanksgiving together, the nixons and eisenhowers, and julie was an eisenhower and that was a great store from beginning to end. >> the topic of tonight's discuss is rethinking nixon. did this experience of writing about this relationship cause you to rethink nixon? >> guest: i thought about nix job a lot. i saw nixon -- never i'm not sure i saw him -- i wasn't doing the nixon presidency. i have an epilogue which deals with what came after but i really only deal in the book with two months of the nixon presidency when he was nag rated and two months later eisenhower was dead. >> host: what sense of the man did you get, nixon? >> guest: he before baffled me and complicated. i was rift vet by the different sides of him. he could be really vindictive and sort of vicious, even long before all the tapes we have all heard, he would refer to -- at one time he referred to his 1960 running mate, henry cabot lodge, you're a knuckleheaded gutless wonder, and yet he could be so kind to people. and so generous. and in ways he didn't have to be. always had a thing about the kens but when he was president, he invited mrs. kennedy and her can two children to see him in the white house. and he spent time with them. they played with the dog and they all wrote him the letters and he wrote personal thank you letters to the two children. they were so touched mrs. kennedy she wrote back, such a sweet thing. she had that side of him and then he had this other side. he completely baffled me. >> host: what struck me is how mean dwight eisenhower was to richmond nixon. it's amazingly -- amazing how mean. you should give us some examples. >> guest: i think a lot of it -- eisenhower wasn't aware of it. he regarded almost everybody who worked for him as staff, and nix wonas lieutenant commander in the navy and eisenhower was a five-star general. to try to get a sense of that today, we don't have any. we have four stars, like david petraeus, but it's a different sort between sort of leading the expeditioner in force in the invasion of normandy or running the surge in iraq. it's a different magnitude. and eisenhower was so big, both parties wanted him to run. jimmy roosevelt, fdrs son, wanted him to run as a democrat. and was talk he could run for both parties and have different vice presidents. he was so beloved. and i -- eisenhower was oblivious to his effect on people, and in some cases there was some deliberate cruelty, and start off in a very bad way. i'm sure you know the story of the crisis which began with his story in the "new york post" saying that nixon was supported bay group of millionaires, secret group of millionaires, and a lot of pressure to get nixan off the ticket, and eisenhower wanted him off the ticket. the long story short, nixon went on television, explained himself for the -- revealed all of this finances, talked about the dog named checkers he wasn't going to give back, and defied eisenhower's order to resign. he side right to the republican national committee, basically circumventing eisenhower's right to remove him from the ticket and won. from that point on in some ways things were never the same. even though they did become closer and worked together. eisenhower -- when eisenhower did to him, nixon wrote was a scar that never healed. julie nixon said september 23rd, the anniversary of the clerks speech, her father was into, what day is this? the anniversary of the speech and never forgot. many episodes of cruelty. trying to get him off the ticket in 1956. he would do things like -- when nixon was finally given a vacation in the summer of '58. he was off with his family in west virginia. i thought -- dick, i want you to come back to washington and fire sherman adams. never any respite. he was not a really kind boss. he wanted his own way. i don't -- some of it was just sort of casual, casual indifference to the feelings of other people. >> we're seeing tonight for some reason all of you decided not to watch the state of the union. but somebody in the country, some people are watching the state of the union, and we're watching now, of course, a dialogue between a resurgent re-elected president and a divided republican party. you wrote about quite a different republican party. >> it was different party. there were sort of -- there were -- the party was totally different. when nixon was -- and eisenhower, it was the civil rights party, the party of lincoln, and the democrats -- >> jackie robinson. >> guest: and so did martin luther king was a big mixon supporter until they had a bad moment in 1950 when nixon didn't come to his aid. and nixon -- the eisenhower administration and -- with nixon in the senate, lobbied for a stronger version of the 1957 civil rights bill, considered a landmark bill at the time. and the two wings of the republican party, a liberal wing and a conservative wing, but the liberal -- the conservative wing were people like oft -- robert taft. an isolationist but supported old age pensions and there were outliers. and senator mccarthy but they were outliers. they didn't speak for the party and in fact eisenhower was eluck tenant to take -- reluctant to get anything on directly, he wanted to get mccarthy excised from the party and put nixon occupy it to. >> host: one of the challenges for somebody writing about richard nixon is that we have an ocean of information about him as president. largely because he decided to leave it for himself. he didn't expect the public to have access to it. don't have as much about him as vice president. how easy or hard was it for you to get to the inner nixon? >> i give a lot of credit to timothy, who was the director of the nixon library. a lot of stuff was open and you could go down there and go through the -- go in the archives and find -- the more time you spend the more thing outside discovered. i became fascinated by the notes that nixon wrote on the famous yellow pads. he would write down -- he was like an a-student. everything he did and saw he would take notes. eisenhower did him a big favor in the fall of 1953 of sending him through asia, and you into see his notes in vietnam he met the emperor and said the only ones that would run -- commies can run a country. he saw the future. didn't like it, but he could see it. and you can see nixon reflecting on -- being resentful when he saw that eisenhower was trying to get rid of him in 1956. he was writing down things like, it's the president's choice, for the good of the party. writing his own sort of death speech. he never said it but you could find all these things, and it's all there but you have to keep looking. the other thing that is so important -- and tim can talk about this -- there's a barrier between the nixon library, which is run by the national eye cifs, and the nixon foundation, far more celebratory part, and i had to wife, them, too, and they were terrific to me. they were -- they decided they were going trust me to be fair, and i hope i was fair, and they put me the touch with one person in particular i was talking to tim about it earlier, woman named marriage acker, the says stance to rose -- rosemary woods, and she was with him when the crisis we spoke about came in the news and nixon was under great pressure. on a train going from northern california to oregon, and major was -- marge and from the foundation side, and the library while tim was there was terrific, open, hopeful. professional archivists. i made eight or nine trips to yorba linda. i saw enough of the olive garden. >> there are other places. >> guest: there were. actually there's a very good sandwich shop nearby. >> host: i've spent a lot of time there. for a celebration of richard nixon's career, historians are problematic and you did a very good job of navigating the shoals and talking to everybody. you interviewed a number of folks who would have been interviewed by the library in the first year or two, but after a while, decided they didn't really want to talk to us. but they talked to you and that important. i would have to say that standing back, the darker side of richard nixon we know from the tapes, do you see hints of that in the '50s or are you among those who believe there was a change, this man actually was traumatized? >> guest: i thought of that a lot. i think i believe there was a change. i don't know where it dates from but probably dates from the very beginning of his relationship with eisenhower. i think he was under constant strain. very much like any employee hired by a sort of really top level corporation and really didn't know whether he has -- whether his job is safe. it wasn't until the 1956 election when nixon realized he had what you would call tenure. except there was still -- eisenhower still had a thumb on him because eisenhower -- needed eisenhower's support to run for president, and after eisenhower's heart aknack 1955, which -- heart attack in 1955, the first time people talked about nixon as an heir to the presidency. this was unusual. vice presidents were not considered heirs to the presidency. no one thought of john nance garner or harry truman. >> vice presidents did not have an office in the white house. >> guest: eisenhower did nixon a great favor trying to keep him informed. he attended cabinet meetings, when eisenhower was there he ran them. the same thing with the national security council, and eisenhower sent him abroad on trips insuring asia. and nixon became close to john foster dulles after eisenhower's heart attack, and dulles suggest nixon should visit africa. so tried to get mixon up to speed. i don't want someone who is just going to bang a gavel in the senate. >> host: you think that -- there are people who will argue that with the experience, the searing experience, of losing such a close election to john f. kennedy in 1960, that was the trauma. you're laying the foundation for an argument it's ike's fault. >> guest: no. no. >> host: ike was father figure and he couldn't please him. >> guest: i'm not getting into psycho analysis. >> host: but it's fun. i don't think richard nixon painted himself in the bathroom. >> guest: no. we were talking about that. wonderful line that we thought he was under the influence of dick cheney but it was actually freud. i agree with tim. 1960 election was hugely traumatic on all kinds of levels. one, i think nixon, who had always regarded kennedy as a friend. he liked kennedy. one of the things that i found -- after nixon's nastiest campaign, his california race against helen douglas, and democrats would forever turn game them. after that kennedy spoke to students at harvard and said i'm glad she lost, wouldn't want to have to work with her. kennedy supported his membership in a country club, and jackie invited the nixons to their wedding, when jack kennedy was laid up with a bad back, nixon helped in the reorganization of the senate and protected him. i won't call them friends. they were politics. no one is really friends in this business -- >> host: tip opeel and ronald reagan were friends. >> guest: right. they were friendly. colleagues, roughly the same age, and suddenly kennedy was playing rough. nothing was held back. and he felt he was really being roughed up by the ken kennedys. a really rough campaign and furthermore, the thought when it was over it had been stolen. he thought he actually on it and people still argue about that. if he had won illinois and texas, johnson he would have won. he always felt that he was really -- got royally stiffed in that election. >> host: there was a interest in richard nixon and i caught some of this when i was in -- at the library, because of george w. bush, because people were looking back to richard nixon and saying, you can have a good government republican, republican who actually wanted the government to be efficient. didn't have to grow, although under nixon it did go to some extent. the republican party is so different now. this was the argument -- because there's no room for good government republican, so there was much more interest in richard nixon's domestic agent. everybody has been interested obviously in the foreign policy side, the opening to china and the end of the war in vietnam. but in the -- i noticed this in the second term of the bush administration there was more interest in richard nixon's domestic policy. it's real problem for historians because on the tapes, richard nixon is not always very happy about his domestic policies. i was wondering, since you were back and looking at the old ever period for richard nixon, would would you put him vis-a-vis the new deal? would you say he is interested in a continuation of the new deal? has he begun to doubt the new deal? what role does he see government playing in society? >> guest: i think he certainly had no desire to undo the new deal. even as a congressman he was very much aware and in favor of some sort of catastrophic health plan. when nixon was growing up, his family wasn't poor bud he had two brothers who tied of tuberculosis, so wasn't very good healthcare. one brother was seven, and the his older brewer died when he was 25. so he was -- so he was very much an internationalist. a big supporter of the marshall plan and voted for it. and he was a lot of his domestic -- even if he didn't love someone, he certainly supported them. the environmental protection agency began under nixon. he brought in pat moynihan to try to -- nixon backed away from it, certain standards were set about the welfare system that you have to give nixon credit for. the philadelphia hiring plan for minorities and so on. so he was a pretty good domestic president. i talked to a guy named paul musgrave at the library. he said the first have to month of the presidency was like other golden agement all of the stuff going on, new policy and new ideas and nixon was interested. if you read the new rub -- new new-pieces, they would sit around for hours loving it so a whole different side of nixon. then it all stopped. >> host: he stopped. he stopped. >> guest: he lost interest it in. >> host: makes him such a puzzle. i'm not suggesting you do this but was getting over a cold over the weekend, and i was watching on c-span some clinches from nixon's state of the union address. i'm not suggesting that this is a way of becoming healthy, but i did it. and i noticed him talking again and again about the environment. and how proud he was that his achievement in cleaning the air and cleaning the water. and he said it, and he was proud of it, publicly, and yet on the tapes, you have him grouse about -- grousing about it constantly, identifying environmentalism with liberals, saying we made a mistake, we shouldn't do this, and if i ever get a choice between jobs and environment, i always go with jobs, and don't ever forget and it fire people who say we should good for the environment. it's so hard to understand. on the one hand he is -- what he said publicly in the state of the union address, not opposite but the times that i listened to -- was what you would want and actually expect bill clinton, if not president obama, to say. but privately he is grousing. now, do you see in the '50s a man who is at war with himself over what he believes? >> guest: i didn't see that. one of the most interesting things i got -- i kept following this thread of nixon and civil rights. i mentioned his trip to africain' 1957, and -- africa in 1957 and that's where he met dr. martin luther king, who was 28 years old at the time, and nixon was -- and they got along, and king had been trying to see nixon to lobby for civil rights in the administration. wanted to get to eisenhower. nixon said, sure, come see me. and they met in washington. nixon's office and stayed in touch regularly, and king really felt -- they had a correspondence. king admired him, and nixon had a certain sensitivity about this. the one black man in eisenhower's white house was fred more row -- morrow, and he fell completely alien -- alienated, and nixon said to him, fred, i don't think you should always be talking about jobs and issues that affect black people. i think you should -- that demeans you, and appreciated the sensitive. baffles me in so many ways but the public nixon was pretty good. the only thing i can say -- i can't explain later ten tapes but presidents vent. the job is terrible, horne, and they have so much pressure on them. harry truman would use the n-word regularly, referred to jews as kikes but there were no tapes going. and you forgiving them for it because it's what they do, what they do that counts. the quote -- the famous john mitchell, watch what we say, not what we do. and i give him pass about the grousing about the liberals wanting more. >> grousing about liberals. the challenge is venting over -- it's the president of the united states, after all, and the president sets the tone. but it's acting on some of the venting. actually acting on this. anger, which is i think when you draw the line between the two. >> guest: to me, the acting -- to me the acting on the anger is vietnam. vietnam and watergate. they were getting into the end to the self-destruction of this presidency, which is not my subject, fortunately. >> host: let me ask you. if he had been election fled 1960, historians say -- counterfactuals, we love them. >> guest: love them. >> host: dinners, conversation, anyway. if he had been electioned in 1960, did this -- who knows. >> guest: would we have had a vietnam war? we wouldn't have a kennedy assassination. it was probably the most -- i think the most traumatic domestic event in the 20th 20th century. still haven't recovered from it in many ways. did a review of the book, he had an interesting counterfactual, digression, saying of what if eisenhower when he had his stroke hadn't recovered? nixon and eisenhower would have been the first from resign and then nixon at age 44 as president. what would he have been like? we'll never know. but he wouldn't have been the traumatized, beaten up watergate deluged president we got. >> oo i was going to say that -- >> host: i was going to say i don't think we would have had the cuban missile crisis. i think nixon, who was supportive of the cuban operation -- it was really vaguely formed before the election of 1960 -- i don't think that he would have let the bay of pig goes the way it went, and i am also pretty convinced you can make a strong argument he would have intervened in laos because he had had a long-standing interest in indo-china. so i think that u.s. military intervention in southeast asia would have started in 1961, actually i can tell you exactly when, when it all collapse inside about march of 1961. so, he would have had -- no cuban missile crisis but disof different crisises to deal with, and the issue for students of presidential biography, is whatever demons he had in him that come out when he is under pressure because of vietnam, and watergate, in the 1970s, were those demons there so when he would have been under pressure in laos in 1961, that they would have come up? at a certain point the public gets tired of war, and the president has to deal with it. you have to be able to dewith some ekwan him in. i love counterfactual history. the think you leave out eisenhower would have been alive and vigorous in 1960. the cuban invasion, would have gone forward in eisenhower style, overwhelming force. eisenhower hated the idea of the ground war in asia. he would have said, dick, don't do it know, same way he kept us out of any real involvement in indo-chinain' 1954. did send money over there, and some arms and probably helped prop up the regime, about whether he would have gone -- i can't imagine, i can't imagine 550,000 american soldiers fighting a gradualist war under anyone except lyndon johnson. >> host: i agree with you at that point. i think 1961 would have played out quite differently had richard nixon been president. fortunately we have the history we have. >> guest: we do. >> host: you think that the kennedy assassination is a major turning point for richard nixon. >> guest: i do. i think the assassination was the worst thing that ever happened to richard nixon. he had a really traumatic loss in 1960. he ran for governor in 1962, at the urging of eisenhower. terrible mistake on his part. nixon wrote a long memo, shy run north run? the cons won the argument but he was -- you could see the temptation, rockefeller is governor, if could be governor, rockefeller was his chief rival in 1960. i could be the governor of the second biggest state. he lost in a big way. but in many pay people say it wasn't that big a day for him. he didn't care about the water supply in los angeles. this wasn't his thing. he wanted to think about big world issues. so, the kids -- he had taken on -- to his credit he had ten on the john birch society here, and he had -- and the primary he defeated a man named joe shell who is not a bircher but a conservative republican who was a rose bowl hero and so his kids, nixon's kids, julie and trisha were being teased bid the kid of birchers. they moved to new york and nixon got a perfect job offer. didn't have to practice much law, can give speeches and be a named partner bringing in business at this wall street firm. and he was -- things were -- they were happy, going to musicals. they were eating at the best restaurants. nixon was having lunch with tom dewey and all these also-rans. walking checkers along fifth avenue, trisha and julie were going to the tape in school in february of 1964 -- >> host: soundses like a frank cap -- cap -- capra story. >> guest: nixon was a happy new yorker in february of 1964, jack parrs daughter got tickets for julie and trisha to see the beatles. and then suddenly kennedy was killed. he met with the republican national chairman the weekend after kennedy is shot, and he told drummond, a big columnist, i'm not going to run again in 1964. i won't run in 1968 or 1972. and anybody who seeks public office again is out of his mind and he meant it. pat nixon was thrilled to be in new york. he would have been bored and restless and an elder statesman but would have had a normal, prosperous, elder statesman life. and then it changed. >> host: but he was in dallas. >> guest: he was -- >> host: no. no. no. i'm not suggesting that. no. no. just -- because i'm wearing black doesn't mean i'm going in that worm hole. but he gives the press conference in dallas before the assassination, of course, and the criticizes kennedys leadership. that's strange for somebody who is enjoying walking his dog in new york. >> guest: he was going to be a big spokesman for the party. he spoke in washington and he was happy to criticize kennedy for the bay of pigs invasion. but it wasn't as if he was running for something. he was a good republican speaking out against the opposition. so, was happy doing that. we would meet with eisenhower, they would just -- eisenhower loathed it. he had contempt for kennedy as truly a young whipper snapper who didn't know what he was doing. >> host: what effect do you think the '60s had on nixon? >> guest: by the '60s -- >> host: let's say -- mark the start of the 1960s with the assassination of john f. kennedy. what do you think the effect of vietnam mounting involvement up to 550,000 troops and then the antiwar demonstrators -- what effect that has on his understanding what it means to be a lead center. >> guest: that was the third -- the other thing that really affected him. he felt for fromme the moment he was inaugurated he felt under siege. his inauguration was never -- never happened before. people were throwing tomatoes and smoke bombs. and then when his president say -- the pentagon papers came out and even though the so-called secret history about the war. nixon felt threatened by it, felt it was a breach of security. and so -- and all -- certainly the counterculture, he had no -- he just didn't get it. something alien to him. i don't -- didn't affect him. i think the 1968 democratic convention, he saw it as a great political opportunity. he didn't have much contact with the counter-cull tour and his children didn't, either. they didn't -- david had friends at amherst who were part of it, but they made fun of him, and julie had friends another smith but it was not part of their lives. so hit him like a stun gun when he was president. >> host: did a good job on laugh-in, though. >> guest: he was coached by a guy names paul keys who nixon met when he was on the jack parr program, and keys was this the outlier in they world of comedy. a real one -- republican. you seek the outtakes, nixon saying, sock it to me, and finally, sock it to me. might have helped him win the election. >> host: one of the things that you had this period of immense domestic turmoil and foreign turmoil, and it would be natural for a leader to feel the -- as you said, i'm wondering how much of that he brought with him? i'm thinking back to, again, the story you lay out so beautifully. he doesn't seem to have a lot of friends in the 1950s. >> guest: no. his friends were -- his california friends, the drowns, and i think bob and carol finch were very good friends, even though finch -- when we worked with him, he was pushed out. but he was sort of a friendless, lonely man in many ways. and particularly -- i think the key to him, the key to his failure as a president -- two things. having great power, which never had before and you can see him beginning to exercise it after he was elected. you can see these loany -- loony memos he would send out. to mrs. nixon from the president. >> host: loving. >> guest: he suggested that someone should talk about the most maligned politician in american history or the great comebacks in history. and where is this coming from? and so you can see the -- this combination of great power and great insecurity. and that's a deadly combination. and i think that's what finally brought him down. >> host: one of the things we did at the library, we started an oral history program because the library had been run privately and the federal government had kept all of president nixon's papers in washington. one of the outcomes of watergate. and my job was to bring it to together and have a federally funded and administered library in california, with the papers. so we started this oral history project 30 years late. it's much better when you get people when they're just out of the administration in one sense, in another sense talking to them years later they had time to reflect and maybe more candid. the really older gentlemen i entered for the library had been with richard nixon in the '50s and you mentioned something about him pushing them out. without exception the men that had been with him in the '50s he pushed away from him when he got to the white house, and he brought close to him younger people. enjoyed having younger people around him. younger people he could mold and shape. and a lot of the trouble that arose was that these younger people were willing to do what he wanted them to do. whereas the older people, the numbers we interviewed, wanted to say no, don't do this. what i'm wondering is, why would he push away the people from the eisenhower period, who might have been a very healthy and mature influence on him when he becomes president? >> guest: he would push away people from the early nixon period. the saddest thing. i talked to a man named don hughes, air force general. wonderful man 0, who had been nixon's militated and loved nix -- military aide. he resigned before watergate, and he said, things were changing you cooperate get -- orders would come down, why there is no catsup, why is this steak overdone? come from hadderman or a deputy but clearly from nixon, and he felt this horrible atmosphere, and they all cleared out. the only one who stayed at the end was rosemary woods. so they went to the eisenhower people who knew nixon and had been with him for yours. don hughes had been with him since the early years of the vice-presidency. rosemary woods when he was in congress. herb cline was his press secretary and they were neutered and pushed away, and nixon let loose his worse side. ray price, was the editorial -- editor of the herald tribune. he was nixon's good speech writer, the good side or the generous side, and pat buchanan, who came in, who had been -- worked as a conservative editorial writer in st. louis, was the other side. pat buchanan wrote the speech, nixon0s most notorious speech before in the invasion of cambodia, the helpless giant, and started shootings at kent statement julie and david couldn't attend their own graduations, and ray price always had the lights on -- until the lights went out but at the end of the presidency, the dark side was clear a -- assentient. >> host: on that happy note we're opening for questions. >> there are two of us going around with microphones so ray your hand if you have way. say your first and last name before your question. we recording this for our web site that will be available tomorrow morning and also c-span is here so you'll see yourselves on national television probably next month. anyone with a question? first question in the back. [inaudible question] >> -- what -- i'm zack ritter. what was taken away from the tape enactor that was rerace -- reerased in i've heard maybe there war some things about the kennedy assassination and people -- that's why he -- partly why he wanted to break in to watergate. >> guest: timothy has heard many more of the tapes than i health i don't think there's any truth that. >> host: we don't know what's on the 18-1/2 minutes. i tell you the national eye cifs -- first of all, court tried to figure out what was on the piece of tape, long piece of tape... >> there was another attempt to look at it and evaluate its but it was also an attempt that bob haldeman was the chief of staff. bet he bet with the president he had a yellow legal pad a attwood note decisions, action items or thinks he would have to do. he did not write transcribes but he did them out the nature of their conversations. that day. so we know from his notes they talked about watergate. we know from what is gone from the tape is almost exactly covering the period they were discussing watergate so it is brilliant if it is an accident. [laughter] from the goats and they were never designed to be a transcript we have a sense of dixon discuss a how to fight back. that is all we have. so the tape itself has provided no new clothes. so with that spectral analysis to see if there is another page ripped out your smiling. people try to figure it out. but nothing the. >> you don't take it is beyond what we already knew? >> what struck me about that tape out it had bid to build was my job at the national archives i wrote the new watergate galleries at the library i had a project analyzing tapes in the way. a unit has turned down this particular tape from june june 20th, the t-72, the first time that dixon and haldimand are talking in the white house. they had talked before in florida but this is the first time next to atp system. that went to cuba david where it was worked on the president's secretary also to keep this gave. there was a number of people who could have been raised its not just richard dixon. my sense is the person who might have done it because it went to florida. what was it to win their? there is no secret evidence i never sought eddied that is a major issue was available. i wish there was more so i could give you speculation but it is just wine. >> i would not ask about conspiracies but it is probably safe to say americans say it is a lot lower over from that 50 years ago how much of that do you ascribe to watergate the end vietnam's? >> i think the credibility gap the whole concept is not of the nixon the johnson administration. and robert mcnamara to thank for that because the white house briefings or pentagon briefings about the situation in debt you have halberstam who are on the ground that it was not going that way. so the public, not that it was naive but will leave to certain level of honesty. and that is johnson. now with the loss of both will shock people about the nature of our political system but i know that is part of its but it is watergate and vietnam. but president nixon 1973 makes a statement where he denies lots of things. one year later evidence comes out that contradicts almost completely what he wrote a 1973. it did not even take a year. as a citizen when during about john said agent max mara now i am lied to about the process in our government's commitment to privacy by nixon who were both democrats a and a republican why should i believe anyone? >> i was that in the event a year and a half ago and bernstein was exercised about the life long after he left of by house to eradicate the list of things that he did. what about your prospectus how good a job he did to make us forget the things he did? >> at his funeral bill clinton said let's not judge there will be a time by his one thing he was in public life 50 years so to take a broader view, it was johnson's war he was so cold warrior it was the tragedy with 50,000 americans died and those dying under nixon the president. but i don't think that he became a valuable counselor in some ways people will never forget what he did. i don't think eradicate is the right word but we will begin to see him for all the darkness the farther away we get with the perspective of the more interesting view. >> i disagree slightly. [laughter] i think there was an effort made to alter public perception. i do believe that richard nixon had a lot to offer president on foreign policy one of those things i have to say about richard nixon is he believed in the of big play or the hail mary pass. he was willing to take huge risks. title was a huge risk so he had a lot to offer but i do believe that there was an effort to make it difficult for the tapes to become available. richard nixon by the way was totally in his right to assume that the tapes belong to him because the national archives did not know that there were kennedy tapes until the nixon tapes were released in the kennedy family said you know, that space in the warehouse? there are tapes their the national archives did not know. president kennedy johnson that the tapes they were making would belong to them. when the accident, ed deal with the overseer of the national archives to get back the tapes to the story within five years congress intervened nixon library is the only library government by one of the preservation act of 1974 that stipulated first of all, that members of the public had the right to get information about abuse of government power and abuse former nixon suited it was a long struggle it took years to the fact only now are the tapes coming out when i was there we really 630 hours there is another to above material this year and it has taken years because of richard nixon in his estate they did not want these tapes to come out. the save with the papers nixon sued the national archives said it would drag out there were 35,000 pages put in there because they were afraid of the reaction but the fact of the matter is richard nixon put too enormous pressure legal ample medical on the national archive in a that drag out the process. i will say one thing, if you care about access to government information then i did not work for them anymore support the national archive it has varied little public support for political support it is important richard nixon is not the only president to put pressure on the national archives to make things difficult. >> i totally agree. i was not talking about the ending to suppress but the p.r. campaign. we really should give nixon but henry kissinger was an old european. but nixon was from the west coast traveling through asia when he first took office. this was all nixon. >> i will read my question i want to get a correct. you mentioned his relationship with moral perhaps more relevant is the relationship with the other two african-americans to serve in congress during his term. who actually to be did nixon in his years as vice president according to an autobiography how the black delegate rose through the administration that was a consistent pattern is very selective powell ever all three were democrats and obviously but that has been the first choice. with the tape time and racial politics to be limited in a circumstance like that to have one of the color -- the divisive how does that affect a legacy of the man who is very divided with the other things that he did. >> eisenhower administration they had no owe 74 brown vs. board of education. that is disruptive when it is a crisis eisenhower did follow the law agent with a five-star general does but he hated the whole thing and he thought powell was a demagogue and they actually liked each other civic the issue was he was influenced in order to make pay a decisive exclusion not to include him so do you feel as though his personal politics toward african americans were negatively affected during bad administration? >> you're talking about president not vice president. >> i am talking about president nixon but under his vice presidential. >> i am not aware. i am sorry. >> i think there's did -- richard nixon attitude to african-american were based by genetics and race with his assumptions which he speaks of on the tapes. it is useful for someone how he thinks about race and how he applies his own genetics and i found it unpleasant. >> the attitudes were not unpleasant but in this case to support those aspirations he wanted african-americans to succeed in in a society but he assumed a ceiling. >> but if he did come itt did in the tapes show that the you would never express it publicly. >> id give shape to the welfare policy. guy came to that conclusion listening to the tapes to see his correspondence with daniel patrick moynihan. i take one way to look at his welfare policy is that way. >> thank you for sharing. >> i am wondering what you discovered about the relationship between richard nixon and ronald reagan during those years? >> there was not much. they -- nixon did not have much respect for begin in did not the key was that a bright. i don't see it he did much the he was more involved with other administrations. i had a personal experience with nixon at "the washington post." this is when the first george bush was president and said maybe he is not getting the arrival of yeltsin he said he will never write for the "washington post" but he wrote a piece and it was pretty good. we called his office the next were warning -- the next morning that he was up all night working on it to and apparently i was told that brent scowcroft white the peace and had an effect of his policy. >> good evening. i have a question about it during the time of the watergate hearings the information as far as the office and not know if it made into it or not but going into the future with the patron actaeon legislation how little of what he got in trouble for now would be legal? [laughter] >> i will tell you agree no about the salzburg bird three. what we know is the president was told by a john who was his chief domestic adviser battles the head of the plot -- the plovers that there had been an operation in los angeles. it was part of what the plumbers were doing. the type b of this call correlate exactly with the operation here. the president himself was not sure if he and other -- never authorize this because he has the action officer if he authorized it. later he set of whether or not he thought it was right because he thought there was a conspiracy leaking information. the patriot act does not allow the government to break kid without a warrant. the area where the patriot act in some of what richard nixon did overlaps was wiretapping there was a period when it was legal to wiretap for national security purpose is without a word to but it had to be. the debate over richard nixon wiretapping did he do this for national security reasons because people who were on the staff. warrantless wiretapping is the reminder not just richard nixon that other presidents could wiretap without a warrant it as a result congress and president ford said president carter signed bills to give more privacy is the patriot act that was the post watergate phenomenon so it seemed we were going back to that period that we did not like when presidents could do this will lead billy. >> that territory is don't buy so reporters to say this was the public life for 50 years the other interesting things to look at. >> i do get into watergate's but there is no point to kick that aren't any more. >> is it the same man? here is the problem. we have almost everything this man did in the white house from 1971 until july 73. imagine in your life under that kind of microscope there is nothing like that for him as vice president the only parts of the diary are that we're in his memoirs. that is not accessible to the materials that we have. >> if you go to the yellow pad of the meetings is also there was interesting section when i tried to get him off the ticket window you take a cabinet post? why a at he thought it was much harder he was writing notes to himself how he would get off the ticket and i do it for the good of the country that was revealing by not knowing but you could find the notes the way he presented himself to talk to the cia you could see the way he would see himself as a did a particular job. he was in the legislative branch a and the executive branch so it is very interesting that there are all lots of files. >> bass said 42 million pages but i did not count. [laughter] >> we have time for one last question. happy hour is about to start then you can ask more questions. also the favorite bookstore. selling books so please join us and picked up a copy and now our last question. >> this is fascinating i always thought with the predecessors of eisenhower isn't johnson and in my experience is seen as the first year he had a permanent campaign model where he with the politics and foreign
i hope at least it's a start and that others will come forward and continue to tell the story. >> you can watch this and other programs on line at booktv.org. >> next kevin mattson recounts the presidential election of 1952 and richard nixon's checkers speech delivered on national television on -- the speech was given in response to allegations that nixon misuse political donations. the author recounts nixon's usage of this family dog checkers to denote his every man status and save his vice presidential nomination. this program is about an hour. >> good evening everybody. before we begin if it's okay to come up closer, it's not church, synagogue or a mosque. mosque. i am very pleased that our friends from c-span are here, so this will be broadcast at some point, sooner than later i am sure. they always do a great job and i want to welcome c-span again to politics and prose. it has added to -- c-span has added to our civil discourse and whatever bookstores you come to, they are generally independent and c-span is really wonderful. i want to welcome tonight kevin mattson. we are celebrating the publication of his book, "just plain dick." how many of you were around when the checkers speech was given? and i am sure many people in the audience tonight will also have been around in the tv audience. it brings back a lot of memories, and it is particularly appropriate that this is the night before an election and this book is about the 1952 election and an american context of the 1952 election and kevin mattson will tell us about it. but you know there is a nice tradition in and politics and prose of having wonderful stuff the night before the election. we were talking 12 years ago with a discussion of arguing the world between a discussion with daniel bell, irving kristol, urban howe, matt glaser and four years ago we had a new york review book and some of the contributors, elizabeth drew, michael tomasky, jonathan krieg landed and others were talking about the problems that whoever the new president would be was likely to face. and anticipating an obama win that night, there was some prescience about the use of the filibuster to block consideration of things. said tonight we will get some historic perspective. i have had the good fortune to read a lot of kevin mattson's books and he is a wonderful historian of post-war liberalism. he tells it in ways that are very perceptive. he avoids fashionable trends to make sure he gets underneath things, so he is not a revisionist. and he writes about other periods as well, including participatory democracy and the progressive era, and upton sinclair. i am sure many of you have read the jungle and we are all too young to remember, and poverty in california his gubernatorial campaign but kevin, kevin provides a rich, rich history of 20th century american history in the context of our larger scheme of things. so let's welcome kevin mattson and "just plain dick." [applause] >> the thanks for that wonderful introduction. it's always a pleasure to be a politics and prose, one of my favorite places to be. what i will do is talk for a little while and obviously be eager to entertain questions that you might have about the book. and about its relationship to contemporary politics and what have you. what brought me to write this book was, i had always heard the trend checkers -- the term checkers throughout my life, checkers speech or something like that and i really wanted to understand what that meant and understand the speech in its origins and also to put it in a kind of wider context. so that is what i really began with. i think in some ways it's one of the most important speeches in post-war american history and it certainly had a lot to do with explaining the rise to richard nixon and that in and of itself tells us that it had a lot to do with a lot about contemporary politics because of nixon and our contemporary political culture. with that said, what i really wanted to do was i wanted to write history in the form of a novel. all the characters are real. the events are real. but i wanted to tell it from a novelist's perspective. it has at its center a madman. in fact i originally wanted to have madman in the title or the subtitle of the book. my editor frowned upon that. i am actually using the term not the way nixon will later use it to describe or in policy but actually in the way that holden caulfield describes it in the classic novel the catcher in the rye which documents itself a progression towards a nervous breakdown. richard nixon is undergoing a nervous breakdown during the story. he is thinking of himself kind of in that sense of being mad and all the connotations that term has any knows that he is on the cusp of either making or breaking his national political career. is the moment in which he rescues his political career from that moment on. it's a real -- feeling to a large extent and i think that has to do with the subject matter. richard nixon is an edwardish character, kind of dark in terms of psychology and i also wanted to kind of call of holiday suspense story again trying to write history as a novelist would ideally do. there is a tight internal structure to the book. it's kind of a slice of history, looking at a moment. it starts with nixon's rise to national popularity and eventually being put on the ticket during the spring of 1952. it follows the conventions of the summer. these conventions were one of the last set of conventions where things were actually determined during a convention even though television is starting to take over conventions and conventions are starting to become more scripted. there is actual serious political decision-making going on at these conventions and i go into the scandal in september that becomes the basis for why nixon has to give this speech. and then obviously the speech itself is kind of a culmination of the book or at least the highpoint of the book because the book then also follows out the election itself, which has some of you probably know was a landslide election for the republican party in 1952. it's clearly a transformative election where the republicans seize the presidency wish they hadn't had for quite some time. nixon undergoes a transformation about the story and begins a kind of nervous, what i called inside -- trying to kind of navigate his way in national politics. humus from being a nervous person, approaching a nervous breakdown to becoming a supreme confidence man. a person who feels confidence in his own salesmanship of politics. is all ideally good novels have, this has a great i think set of secondary characters. nixon is enough to sustain a book but there are also some really wonderful secondary characters. dwight eisenhower himself who comes off as a kind of sad and tragic figure in the book. he starts off as kind of a general on the whitehorse and comes back to redeem the republic and about where she talks about her being a normal suburban housewife. but there is also a fascinating thing about pat nixon and that is that she is weirdly open about the fact that she doesn't really seem to like politics and seems to have some even trepidation about being with her husband. she writes an article, a puff piece for her husband that has a title, a wonderful guy in which she has this quote that i make a lot of which she says dick doesn't do anything in a half-hearted manner so i know we are in for a rugged time. this isn't a piece that is supposedly a celebration of her husband's virtues and yet she is kind of saying she is worried about him, about what her life is going to be and things like that. to get a real sense that with both eisenhower and pat nixon that politics transforms people in sometimes ways that they don't necessarily want. another characters joseph mccarthy. he is running in 1952 for re-election. is kind of tough man veneer, the sort of macho character that he projects is also one that i think in some ways richard nixon wants to a certain extent mimic and invite as his own. it's during this campaign that joseph mccarthy makes one of the most vicious and i think in some ways it's a vicious election and i have that part of the story but with mccarthy, during 1952 election, he comes up with this amazing quote recess if somebody would only smuggle me aboard the time it at a campaign special with a baseball bat in my hand, i teach patriotism to little ad life. that is what he called adlai stevenson and i will get to him. you call them add light or sometimes he called them alger with the idea that he is like alger hiss, communist spy at the time. there is also whittaker chambers and the great american theologian who helped to kind of advise nixon about in some ways his political philosophy so a a lot of behind-the-scenes guys are giving advice to richard nixon to go straight to the media to engage in what we would call telepopulism and there's also this surprise cameo of charlie chaplin who is operated out of the country in 1952 as a part of the larger red scare. nixon wanted him out of the country and was taking his cues from a wild gossip column at the time named had a hopper who was a friend of nixon who enters a little bit in there is also another central character. the foil to richard nixon and dwight eisenhower and that is adlai stevenson himself. he's important in the story to guess he is a proponent. stephenson becomes throughout the course of this it very fade egghead, and intellectual entering politics. he has a very noble vision of politics. i think anybody here will be kind of surprised by them. in his acceptance speech in 1952 convention, he talks to fellow democrats and he says, we shouldn't just worry about winning the election. we have to worry about how it is one, how would we can take advantage. how well he can take advantage of this great opportunity to debate issues sensibly and soberly. better we lose the election than mislead the people. it's time to talk sense to the american people. noble as all get out but also you know kind of sending a softball across richard nixon and dwight eisenhower's plate that they knocked out of the park, which they do. this is also a campaign in which adlai stevenson the democratic candidate is shot from below on the stage and there's a hole in his shoe and grand speculation as to what did the whole in issue mean. he's a guy who never really gets control over the situation in the course in the end toulouse is. the book is written like a novel with the characters entering in and out of the central character undergoing a nervous breakdown. i do make a fair amount of richard nixon psychology and i know that is not fashionable nowadays to psychologizing character but hey it's richard nixon. if anybody deserved to be psychologizing it's richard nixon and in fact i open the book up by trying to imagine myself getting inside the mind of richard nixon, during his campaign. i'm just going to read one paragraph. this is where i'm trying to say, this is what it would have been like if you could read his brainwaves in 1952. i tried to put myself in his mindset. a lot of what is he is experiencing is a career crisis and anybody who also had a career crisis can do some method acting and get into what it must have been like for this young man on the rise. here's the first paragraph of my imagined internal monologue. the want me out. they want to sack my political career. they don't have much on it but they will use what they have. that's how they play in the press. hear him here i am slumping in a chair on my train, just rattling along heading out of california towards the saudi center of oregon and all i'm hearing from that little man is advice and fumes about my enemies is that the press is going with a wild with the thing. the left-wing smear sheet in new york post, secret which man's trust fund keeps nixon and style far beyond his salary. that was one headline. and that in many ways is the point at which the prices being instigated. i'm trying to get into the mindset of richard nixon and tell the story in part through his eyes and his own experience and to a certain extent being sympathetic towards a guy who is undergoing a nervous breakdown and a career killing moment in what he takes to be a very important and we all take to be a very important political career. so i wanted to use the novelistic approach but i also wanted to tease out some themes by telling the story and what i figured i would do now is just kind of tell you about some of the big themes of interest to people who i think go to places like politics and prose and are interested in brought debates about politics and ideas. it's very clear that, i mean, this speech that nixon gives in this moment in american history has a lot to tell the contemporary political world. one thing to keep in mind about the checkers speech is that nixon will be asked later in life, so what do you think about the checkers speech? people still remember you by the checkers speech even after your your presidency is waned and he always said the checkers speech was my moment. it would make or break. if i saw through the other side of that speech and i failed my entire political career was ruined. i would not be on the national political stage. but it's really a very crucial moment in his career and an important and crucial moment in america's history. big theme that you see in this speech and the broader story working through the election are kind of i think a force there will be focusing on and i will be very brief on each of them to give enough time for questions. first off, the obvious background of the cold war and there's a kind of new style of conservative visioning of foreign-policy that i will explain. directly related to that, there is an enormous divide within the republican party in 1952. that shouldn't surprise any of us. this has always been a very divided party but the tension within the republican party that speech in the election are very important. the third thing that i think is perhaps most important is the american tradition of populism and what richard nixon is doing to the populace tradition throughout the election. the fourth and final thing is the kind of -- the subtitle of the book is about the rocking socking election in 1952 and that is nixon's conception of how politics should be. should be about being tough and i think that has a long ranging impact on the way we think about politics today. let me just go through these four issues briefly and kind of elaborate on each bit. with the cold war, there is an obvious background that's going on throughout the book and the obvious thing that is happening is that we are in the midst of the korean war. the korean war is a war that by this point in time is two years old. doesn't seem to have any end in sight and the body count is going up. is one of the many reasons why harry truman is not a very popular president as he is leaving the white house, planning on going to the white house. dwight eisenhower were during the election, during his campaign will make a famous statement in which he says i will go to korea and most people think that's what pushes the election in that direction that he definitely had it sewn up at the time he uses these words. it's kind of similar to what nixon will later do in his career which is in 68, i have a secret plan to end the vietnam or. dwight eisenhower didn't really have anything in mind other than to say i will go to korea and i will settle the war. you don't have to worry about the war if i'm elected president. is also a huge debate going on about how to fight the cold war that this book examines throughout the course of this electoral cycle. i don't deal much with the liberal containment side of this vision. that's a vision of adlai stevenson or jane ashton. that is not as prominent in this book. i'm more interested in sort of the hypercharged emotionalism that conservatives brought to foreign-policy and the way they conceptualize fighting the cold war. you hear this sort of hypercharged emotionalism throughout the story that i tell in this book. mostly when richard nixon is consistently attacking acheson and adlai stevenson. yakir lot of language about rollback and liberatioliberatio n. these are the two big key words and a lot of republican, conservative republican discourse about foreign-policy and in fact white eisenhower uses the term crusade throughout the campaign and some people start thinking, is he alluding to those things like the crusade? is that how he is conceptualizing his uniform policy? to a certain extent guess that he is also trying to tack to the center. one of the key allies of richard nixon, again is discussed here because this big vote comes out during the spring of 1952 is whittaker chambers who writes this melodramatic witness and richard nixon does a great deal when richard nixon was taking down alger hiss. whittaker chambers was the key person providing testimony and nixon does a lot to promote whittaker chambers book. it's interesting to note how chambers conceptualizes the cold war in witness that comes out in 1952 and i will just quote a quote from the book. for chambers to westhead discover and a quote in suffering and pain of power of states which will provide man's mind at the same intensity with the same certainties that communism provided. that is a reason to live in a reason to die. if it fails, if the west fails, this will be the century of the great social wars. if it succeeds this will be the century of the great wars of faith. there's a real attempt to put the cold war onto a religious basis, onto a fervent emotional basis and that is something that richard nixon is very big on in terms of the support of whittaker chambers and his attack on stevenson and acheson. it's clearly articulated by mccarthy at, again another character bring into the narrative who was also a chief ally of richard nixon and to eisenhower is still uncomfortable and awkward around and yet will go in campaign with mccarthy, very willing to do something that some people thought was below him. the way you fight matters more than the fight itself. it's the style, the style in which if it really matters a great deal. you want to hate your enemy heart and one of the things i make a fair amount out of in the book -- though i'm a historian who likes to kind of go you know, i guess i'm something of a political historian but also someone who's interested in pop culture and the way pop culture comes into our politics. one of the chief people to tease out this emotionally charged tough vision of fighting the cold war as john wayne. john wayne goes independent in 1952, breaks from the system and makes it very -- has anyone seen big jim mcclain? it's a great movie to go and cnn fact if you have time tonight, if you go to youtube and click into the box, john wayne beats up commies, you will get the final scene of big jim mcclain and you can watch it. it's truly an enjoyable moment. the storyline of big jim mcclain which comes out during this time the election is kind of heating up and by the way john wayne is a political character. is very big in reelecting mccarthy movement. he is often asked after the tend -- convention, what do you think about the ticket and mccarthy says perfectly, i think dick nixon moment to find vice president. no mention of eisenhower because he doesn't really like eisenhower and doesn't fill comfortable with eisenhower. that is the person that wayne is the biggest and supporter. dick jim mcclain comes in 1950 to come the story of a tough guy, big jim and constantly member -- mentions that his six feet three inches on many occasions. he is working for the house un-american activities committee, big jim and big jim goes out to hawaii to break up a communist spy ring mostly made up of doctors in hawaii. in and what he does is defined for these guys are having their meeting and rushes into the meeting and quite literally beats the communists up using his fists, a big fight. whited in spires is he follows the story out and he says they went back and they -- and i got off. he starts to say something along the lines of you know maybe the constitution isn't all that great. maybe the congressional committees aren't the best thing to do. maybe we should bare knuckle it with the communist. maybe we need to have few less congressional committees investigating and is that style of -- dewayne personifies and mccarthy exemplifies in numerous ways. richard nixon tries to take up and make a part of his own view of the cold war. and in fact when the first scandal breaks that richard nixon is getting money and wealthy businessmen, to fund his campaign, one of the first thing's richard nixon does is hit the communist bloc. these are communists who are out to get me and if i won out and hit it hard against the cons they will come back and get me and you guys are not coming back to get me. most people try to encourage him not to take that tact because there is no basis for it but there are funny things where during a protest, young kid from your old organization, americans for democratic action, pulls up a sign that says anyone who mentions the $16,000 as the communist. that is the tactic at richard nixon takes. ifalpa martyr now they're coming back to get me. that explains why this scandal has emerged away the scandal has emerged. and yet you also notice if you follow richard nixon, this is one of the things i got out of the arcade -- archival research that it did for the book. i came across a speech that richard nixon mates after he had the checkers speech and i will get to that and when he is kind of feeling kind of strong about his standing. he goes to oregon and he has this line in a speech that i don't think gets much treatment in other stories about the 1952 election. he is in oregon and makes us while speech. he says consider where we are in the pacific northwest. let me tell you that other koreans could come even closer. they could reach into our country's heart line. they could bring the bombing in the carnage right here if our disasters and hope to. only dwight eisenhower could stop this obviously. only dwight eisenhower could stop the impending invasion eye of the mouth of the colombian river or one stage out of anchorage alaska. this is a guy who is at his moment where he is becoming increasingly paranoid about what's going on. this is a guy who thinks the invasion of the united states is imminent and he is warning his listeners that this could actually happen. this is the vision of the cold war that i keep trying to trace out by telling a story and i think it's a long-lasting story. this is not a vision of foreign policy that is dropped out of the republican party by party by any means. if anything i think it's gotten in fact much. there's also struggle within the republican party. this is the second issue that i will talk about briefly. it's not just about the foreign-policy debate which there are people who are trying to go towards the left militaristic vision of the cold war and towards the kind of center. it's also a real hard-line, right-wing outlet within the republican party that most clearly survived in robert taft's run for the presidency against eisenhower during the campaign. taft as we all know loses but he is an interesting conversation in which he says to eisenhower after congratulating him, that the theme that he once eisenhower to pursue is that liberty is being threatened by creeping socialism in every domestic field. that there is the kind of totalitarianism that is invading american politics and in fact eisenhower takes this language up much more than i think we really realize, this sort of hard right strip the new deal because the new deal is interchangeable with the version of socialism or totalitarianism. this becomes especially difficult, sort of hard-line language becomes especially difficult once nixon have to face up to the thing that gets him into trouble which is a problem we would put in the category of campaign finance problems that he is taking money by people who have a direct interest in shaping american politics. this kind of tension within the republican party vote on foreign policy but also on domestic policy is a big part of the story. the main part of the story is populace and its popular strain in american politics. this brings us to the heart of the the speech in with a speech i think is in so many ways really about. as you all know, the checkers speech is synonymous with richard nixon richard nixon saying i meant every man, i'm an ordinary guy. these are the lines we remember from the speech, the lines of most people will "back betty was the republican -- code that his wife pat nixon were that the truman administration has been bribed by people bringing mink coats into the white house. i'm an ordinary guy. pat would look wonderful in anything. a lot of the speeches, as some people remember it, sometimes it's hard to remember that a lot of it is just documenting what he has and what he possesses, his car, his house and then of course the dog. the dog is at the center of his kind of attempt to make himself into an ordinary, average male, the central man of the whole speech. checkers the dog is the character that is obviously central to the speech and it's during the speech that when he is giving the speech, i have watched the speech so many times that i can almost do it verbatim. but he has transitioned and he does this thing where he pinches his nodes. he goes like this and he goes one of the thing i probably should tell you because of it don't -- [inaudible] man down in texas and pat mentioned archie answers would like to have a dog. believe it or not the day before we left he got a message from the union station saying they had a package for us. we went down to get it and you know what it was? it was a cocker spaniel dog in a crate that they sent texas, black-and-white spotted in her little girl tricia, 6-year-old girl, named it checkers. kids like all kids love the dogs and i want to say there is this charleston heston that regardless of what they say we are going to keep him. that is of course a central thing that nixon talks about and where it gets a name for the speech itself. nixon was very knowingly taking a line from fdr's famous speech in which he incorporates his own dog and nixon thought it would be great to kind of like make the democrats mad by taking their leader's words and flipping them around. what nixon is doing throughout the speech is very clear to me. he said he is divorcing the populist tradition rooted in the 19th century among small farmers and trying to channel their hatred of banks and especially real estate people, who are kind of keeping the small guy down, keeping the small farmer in a state of being oppressed. nixon has just discovered he is getting money from real estate interests from banking insurance, from oil and so what he does very cleverly and i think with a great deal of success is he makes populism into a style, almost a free-floating style and about appearance and about who he is as a person, his own, who he is then terms of ownership. it's not about policy that would actually tame perhaps the thing the original populace wanted to do something about. he's also very good at tying it into his long-held kind of feeling of resentment. he has always hated eastern elites. he hates the fact he didn't get a chance to go to an ivy league institution and went to at what he considered second-rate institutions because he wasn't considered part of those circles and a tie that into another string, heavy strain of anti-intellectualism. the term egghead is right. it's everywhere and it's the way in many ways adlai stevenson is attached. and what nixon is very good at is presenting himself as authentic and i know this is hard to believe but he really does come across with his speech and the response his speech gets as authentic and sincere, kind of frank capra populism. it's about me and who i am as a person. and it's fascinating because nixon as we all know was a person who was never comfortable in his skim. for nixon to come off as authentic and believe me i have read the telegrams and letter sent in after the speech, this is how he is perceived. he captured my heart. he brought tears tears to my eyes. i knew he was true by watching them on television. this happens throughout the letters that he gets. it's an amazing that a guy like this can pull that off and he does and what's interesting also about this is the whole notion of him being authentic is obviously all acted out on a stage set in a television studio. this whole notion of there being some authentic person itself is already, you have a sense of being staged. in fact "life" magazine wrote a story about the checkers speech in his success later and "life" magazine said it was almost as if the whole thing was scripted by hollywood. but it was too good to be scripted by hollywood. it was too believable and it was really this weird theme of him being authentic and yet also recognizing that his authenticity is setting the stage for the hearts of americans. eisenhower will afterwards say that dick nixon seized the hearts of americans in a speech in which he finally says yes, i'm keeping you as my fice resident and you are wonderful guy. this is the whole idea of the telepopulism. one of the things nixon will do in the speech is not just paint himself as an authentic individual but it knowledgeably goes around the media, a direct address to the american people and he is told very clearly by his advisers and he knows it himself, the media is going to kill you. if you let people come and ask you questions and those are the snooty journalist to come and ask you questions, they are going to kill you. codirecting get around those guys and that is what makes it an incredibly important and emotionally charged moment in political speech making. the final thing i will talk about is the style of politics that comes out after the speeches success and nixon continues to campaign. nixon had always wanted to to run a campaign in a certain way and part of the story i tell us how nixon, this is how we should run the campaign and eisenhower says i'm not sure i'm comfortable with all then by the end eisenhower is taken at his word and wants to run a campaign similar to his. this is the way nixon originally envisioned the campaign, writing something i discovered in the archives as well, a letter to a fund-raiser. this campaign, some people in this campaign to be conducted on so-called high intellectual plane. there is a republican desire to do that and i think that is actually a smack in adlai stevenson's that we should let bygones be bygones and not pulling up the past mistakes of the truman administration. that after all we have two good candidates for president and in short a little nice powder pub dual and that language, there is a lot of -- i mean if you read a lot of language in 1952, there was always this undertone about homosexuality and this notion that adlai stevenson divorced and never got remarried and what's up with that? maybe he doesn't really like the girls too much and that is what nixon constantly plays upon. we don't want it nice powder puff dual between them. we want to give the american people at chance to make an intelligent choice taste on intelligence. richard nixon says this is not the campaign we are going to run. hours will be plain ,-com,-com ma simple straight from the shoulder language that any american can understand with quotations of webster's unabridged dictionary. we are going to have a tough campaign. they constantly try to link up eisenhower nixon constantly try to link up their campaign to football. if there's a college foot wall event going on eisenhower is there. if there's a football event going on nixon is going to be there. they love football and they love the metaphors that football plays for the conceptions of politics. it's right after nixon has given the speech in which eisenhower has said okay you are going to stay on and we are going to fight this together that nixon finally is this moment where he is sitting across from eisenhower in his car, and he says to eisenhower after the speeches gone off and eisenhower has praised him, this is just like war general. our opponents are mounting a massive attack against me and they have taken a bad beating. is at this moment that we fight and we go for the jugular. you don't let up. this is really area much the kind of style of campaigning the richard nixon he came known for throughout his political career, not just them. and this is the sort of thing that i want to tease out with a book, to get at sort of the cultural vision of politics that richard nixon has. i think it's a culture, cultural and political vision that we are still with today, the whole kind of taking populism and divorcing it from any economic vision and making it about a personality about whether or not a person is likeable or an ordinary average american. that is still very much with us, the divisive political campaigning where you are trying to drive your point off the cliff is clearly still with us. is a form of politics that is codified in the checkers speech but also we are still living with today. that is why wrote the book and again i tried to write this in a way that tells it from the point of both a person who is a historian but also someone who is trying to write it and hopefully an entertaining sort of novelistic approach and that's is where. i'm sure knowing the people here that there are some questions that you probably have of me and i'm happy to take what you have to ask. [applause] thank you. >> thank you kevin. we all want to take your questions. i wish that they were at least skyped so that we could mix of politics and the culture. we are going to use the microphone which is over here, so the viewing audience can hear your question as well. these events are recorded so people who couldn't come tonight can also be able to get the benefit of the event. so for those who have questions or a brief comment, please go to the microphone and if you're comfortable, tell us your name. >> i have a request actually for some background, more background on the scandal itself and sort of the atmosphere and all the legal background on campaign financing at that point in time. and how the public felt in general about campaign finance and taking money, getting support, financial support from the people, the rich people and from the industries that the name. what was it like that and, and what was the responsibility of presidential candidates as far as disclosing their sources and so forth? >> nixon has lawyers look at what the fund was really about if he was contributing to it, how they contributed to it, whether or not there were any demands tied into their giving them money. and the lawyers, and of course some of us being relatively -- found he was completely in sit-in and that is what they find. most of the laws about campaign finance were laws that had been passed in the progressive era and you know there wasn't a lot of attention paid to campaign finance. this kind of introduces the campaign finance question very quickly. i don't think there was anything illegal. i don't think it past the smell test. i think people look at it suspiciously. by the letter cloth no he didn't do this and that was clear. one of the parts of the story that gets kind of messy, that adlai stevenson had a fund that was somewhat similar to nixon's fund and once that emerges, nixon taken money from rich guys and makes them exceptional kind of goes away. there was nothing illegal about it at the letter of the law. it doesn't pass the smell test by in most peoples's mind and the question is, is nixon influenced by the money? there are ways you can see connections between those who are giving him the money in the legislation that he had fought for as a senator up to that point in time and is a congressperson. there is clearly some sense that you have kind of pro-real estate, anti-public housing policies that nixon was doing and there were a lot of real estate men giving them money. my argument though is that i think nixon would have done those things without the money. i think this was a guy who was ideologically committed to kind of stripping the new deal as much as he possibly could, getting credit public housing. i think you would have done that without the money at the way it was perceived at the time, i think you know ,-com,-com ma it followed the divisive nature of politics. there were a lot of liberals who showed that nixon was corrupted and he had taken kickbacks. most americans when they're pulling him at this time don't seem to be all that aware of what is happening with this. they have some sense that there is money but there is not a really great detailed understanding. most of the legislation on the books is quite old but he has not ever found doing something that is it legal in something kicks them out of politics. >> what was the response to the charge and what was said about it? >> it's really amazing. the speech itself really is an amazing evasion of the original charges. i mean it is just simply a classic he lied and he doesn't really have anything much to say about the original charges that got them into trouble. so, he immediately kind of takes and says okay you know you have heard these charges about how i am correct. the beginning of the speech again having seen it too many times, he gets really tripped up at the end and starts saying, gamma qualified to do that it wasn't really bad and if someone took money that means they should be kicked out of politics and he starts thinking whoa, he seems to be kind of fumbling by the quickly moves into i'm going to tell you something. i'm doing something that has never been done before. i'm going to in my books and show you what i haven't prove that i'm not a rich man. the charges are quickly jumped over and he is back into, i'm a populist, and the man of the people sort of frederick that the speech is known for. >> thank you. >> yeah, thinks. >> on the campaign finance, i think it's fair to say that it wasn't much of an issue at that time, and there was not any real enforcement of campaign, whatever the campaign finance laws existed had addressed the. and that didn't change until we had real disclosure beginning in the 1972 campaign in which nixon ended up the committee to reelect president nixon ended up violating the law with all sorts of serious ways and try to prevent disclosure that they have some responsibility for. so, what you had here was in the beginning the secret contributions. no one knew who the $500 limited contributions were. >> does turn those over. >> turns it over but in the beginning they didn't know. so the use disclosure as a way of showing his innocence. >> that's right. that's exactly right. he knows that he has -- that he had first tries to say maybe we don't need to tell who these people are and his advisers say, no. you are going to have have to give a list and he gets a list all look like a type of people you would expect to be giving richard dixon money. bankers, oil people and people like that and people who hated the new deal and wanted him to do something about it. >> there is an irony to it too, because like disclosing, it's following the brandeis, that some it is the best disinfectant so he takes his great justice and uses his principle to clear himself of. >> that's right. >> you talked about pat nixon thing my husband is a wonderful guy which from the vantage point of today sums sounds that were campaign whites do. was it unusual? >> i think again one of the things that is funny about this story is that after the speech occurs, though the people who are journalists following the campaign in but they say is it's almost like richard nixon is running for president. he is getting ticker people turning out for him and the reason i say that is because this is a vice president. this is not the presidents wife. i think it's a peculiar thing that she is so prominent for being a vice presidents wife. i don't think there is a lot of examples in which -- i don't think there is a lot of examples where that happens. she is important i think mostly again as kind of a prop. anybody who is asking the question about what was the nature of the relationship, i don't think it's very good. when he goes up to -- she didn't even know he was really going to be potentially chosen and there is a story that she is sitting at a café with her friends watching tv and the announcement comes on. she has just taken a bite out of the sandwich and all of a sudden food flies out of her mouth. oh my god my husband has just been chosen as vice president. i guess i better get back to the convention hall and figure out what's going on. he was asleep and told he has been chosen. he gets into an limousine and gets driven to the convention and they both approached the podium. theirs is moment where his like giving his acceptance way than she comes up to give him a kiss and he just does like that. just completely ignores her. i don't think it's a good relationship but i do think one of the things that nixon's people knew was because stephenson looked suspicious, because he was divorced and his ex-wife had actually during the campaign said i'm going to vote in, because she is doing that and there are questions about why does he come off as being fade and elephant are terms used to describe them. nixon's people know one of the things they should do is to get pad out there and to keep hammering home the sky is normal. he likes to watch football. he does all these things that make him a normal guy so i think there is a real concerted effort on the part of nixon to push him front and center. >> this is a little off track but could you comment on the evolution of the republican party today and how richard nixon might fit into it and also, can't resist asking your impressions about ohio on the state of the election. >> that's my home state. my wife is guilt tripping me for not being in ohio right now i'm working on the campaign, which she is doing a lot of work on right now. it's a good question. it's a great question and one that i think about a lot and as a historian you are often asked, tell us what -- tell us about the day and there's a part of you that says you get a little but a comfortable because it's a very different context. i give that as my forewarning. i personally think this sort of aggressive cold war foreign-policy that's central to this book, the language rollback, liberation, the kind of characterization of containment is being wimpy and defensive, i think you know the central underlying buts of pressed element in that debate between obama and romney on foreign-policy. i think romney, you know i have read in salon about that debate and one of the things i went back and read was from the speech in virginia where he made the kind of bold a statement on foreign-policy. that is a rough speech. that is the speech where he says you know, we should be doing much more about syria and should be keeping more troops in iraq and doing all this sort of stuff. he keeps coming back to this notion that obama is leading this apology tour, that he doesn't really believe in america. i think that language in 1952 about criticizing the democrats as being wimpy on fighting the fight against communism, there is a direct line. on that i feel very safe and there is also direct line about the use of totalitarianism and socialism on the part of the chastised within the republican party and the tea party language of today. so i do think that there's a lot of kind of in similarities but what is remarkable to me is that you know, i guess what is odd to me is that ms. -- mitt romney cannot do what richard nixon did. he can't paint himself as an ordinary guy. he can't go can go back and say look at my car and my house, it's an ordinary house and i have this wife. it's just not going to work. if it had been a different candidate of populace thing would be retried by the republicans but they don't have someone that can fit that bill. if some of the domestic policy arguments. to a certain extent nixon needs to do redux. oh, ohio. [laughter] to a certain extent i think that there is a gentleman who is staying at my house right now who you will probably not be surprised as working for the obama campaign. he is knocking on doors. when he comes back at 10:00 at night, what you hearing? yes will say over and over again, i'm not going to vote for that rich guy. is a central thing that he gets them on and these are targeted voters. not people that would most likely be romney supporters that he is hearing that over and over. my sense in ohio is it seems familiar and feels a lot like 2004 but with not the same scenario. it feels like there are people who are not satisfied with obama. they are satisfied in part because the auto industry rescue change things in ohio. they are happy with that. unemploymunemploym ent is much lower in ohio than other places but they're there are still discontent with obama and his leadership. when it comes to will you make the jump and vote for romney, that is where he is not able to do it. i think of it as similar to with kerry in 2004. i don't like the war and i don't like bush and i don't like all the stuff. are you going to vote for kerry? i don't know what kerry is all about. i i think there is a similarity to that. what i hear is what you hear. it seems to be that obama has held a pretty solid long-term lead over romney that romney has never been of the close that gap and my sense of it on the ground is that strikes me that the polls are probably right that way. but you know, no predictions. >> heaven i want to take you back to -- we love this insight into ohio but i want to take you back to the discussion about foreign-policy in republican party. because in the 52 campaign, george marshall was under tremendous attack and we think of george marshall really as a heroic figure and i think a lot of people thought at the time as well. certainly harry truman did, and eisenhower did not defend marshall when mccarthy attacked him. this was seen as a the trail. and that tension then came out when eisenhower makes an early appointment in his administration and he picks some classy people like chip boland to be ambassador to the soviet union, and the mccarthy crowd fought it. and so, this seems to still play itself out in different ways now. if you look at the new start trading on arms control, which everyone in the military was passionately for, and yet it was very difficult to squeeze out current republican votes for that. we still find different ways that this expresses itself and it may have implications for the next four years. on the foreign-policy question. >> is pretty bold and aggressive and folks i don't think would make the break with the kind of hard right-wing in his own party. i think in 1952 europe salute the right. there are so many stories in this book that i can't do justice to. >> that is why the book should be read. >> it's one of the best stories that eisenhower finds himself faced with two senators who are running that he feels very uncomfortable about. one is the republican senator from indiana. jenner made mccarthy look like a pipsqueak on the attack against martial. he called him a traitor to the country and a person who didn't deserve to have any power whatsoever and he was selling the country out. it's just amazing to watch. eisenhower deeply admired martial and he was completely and absolutely flabbergasted by this and yet it comes time for eisenhower to go to indiana to campaign and jenner is right up there pumping his hand and keeps raising eisenhower's hand to wave to the people and stuff like that. eisenhower's like i don't know if i want to do that but he does it. there's a famous moment when eisenhower has a speech in which he is going to be giving on the
nearly a 300-point day on the dow jones industrial average. welcome to the "closing bell." i'm kelly evans in for maria bartiromo. bill griffith joins us here in just a second. stocks are kicking off 2013 with one of the biggest rallies we've seen in some time. the biggest, in fact, since 2009. here's a quick look at how we're finishing the day on wall street, waiting for the settle to come through to see if we can hit the three handle on the dow jones industrial average, but we won't be far away from it, regardless. the nasdaq is adding about 88 points, the s&p 500 and, bill, the bottom line, up anywhere from 2.4% to 3% for these averages. >> i'm looking at the board here in the new york stock exchange, and it shows we're up 308 points right now, so we may be seeing a tremendous amount of buying coming in at this moment, and we saw evidence of that early on, and some of the technology may be playing catchup right now. >> you've been pointing this out for the last couple of hours just how lop sided this trade really is. >> the buy imbalance was very strong to the upside, and so here we are finishing about the highs for the day with a gain of 2.35%, and that's not even the best performer of the day. >> right. >> because the nasdaq is up 3%. >> wow. 3.07% is the latest that we're seeing. as you said, as we continue to process all these trades, the strength is, you know, apparent. >> let's break this down with some pros and get their views of this. michael farr from fax miller and washington and michael pento from pento portfolio strategies back with you, and any chan from chase wealth management and our own rick santelli as well. anthony chan, you bothered to come here. we'll ask you first. what do you make of this first day rally? one-day wonder or the beginning of a new trend? >> i really don't think it's a one-day wonder. i think the economic trends are improving, the left tail risk is off the table, not that there's no more worries so whether it's the sequester or debt ceiling, these are problems that are going to be in front of us, but i think it's encouraging, and i'm pretty encouraged by what i saw. >> even with the strength of the buying figures here, that doesn't give you any reason to pause, to say we look at these levels and this is your classic point to sell? >> kelly, every time you see a jump of this magnitude, you're going to see some sort of a correction of some type, but the big question 2013 as a whole, are we going to make progress or have seth backs and my prediction is more progress than setbacks. >> michael pento you said were you buying into this real. how much higher do you think it will go? >> we have about 45 days before we hit the fiscal canyon. the world is dominated by keynesian counterfeiters, shinzo abe grabs the boj and says print 1 million yen and over to europe mario draghi says he'll do whatever it takes to make sure bond yields never rise and greece, the stock exchange is up 33%. and ben bernanke says he's going to keep printing $1 trillion every year until the unemployment rate drops to 6.5% which will never happen unless everybody drops out of workforce so you have to go long here and you have 45 days of cover until we hit the fiscal canyon but they kick that or punt that one down the field again, and we'll have a pretty good year in nominal terms. >> okay. watch out, middle class though. don't go fill up your gas tank. >> michael farr, 45 days, do you agree or jump on here and say you don't fight the fed or don't fight any of these central banks. >> you don't fight the fed, you don't fight the central banks, and i think a shameful result for congress, a shameful result for america in the fiscal cliff that's turned into a fiscal farce, but i think it has all of the sign posts as to a very strong market. because, look, basically you -- the middle class and 99% of americans now know what their future tax rate's going to be and kind of know what the world is going to look like for them. they can spend, and have a sense of certainty and can see a bit into the future, but they don't know -- >> michael farr, they don't know what their real income will be. >> we know -- guys, we know we'll have another two months fighting on the same issues. the only thing -- we get maybe a week of certainty out of this. >> there haven't been great government cuts. americans at citizens now, as consumers, can project a bit of their cost structure better now than they have been able to before, and so it seems with all of this still plus they are going to continue to have $1 trillion in debt spending, deficit spending. i mean, it's absolutely shameful what they have done. they kind of put in the penalties, but they are going to keep the cash available, so i see stocks looking strong just as if the fed had come out. this is a fiscal ease. >> rick santelli, monster real for equities, but the selloff in bonds, treasuries, was modest compared to the buying we saw in stocks. what do you make of that? >> it was open up eight basis points higher, and it's been glued basically to 183, 184 ever since. i think personally there's a lesson to be learned by that. i think that the fixed income market may have higher rates, but i think that that may be a bit overzealous to think that they are going to be significantly high. i mean, we're up 308. all is fixed in the world. the president is somewhere in hawaii yelling four and the cbo is yelling 4 trillion more, and warren buffett's secretary still going to pay higher taxes than warren buffett, but everything is good in the world. >> hey, i've got a great idea. let's borrow trillions of dollars and make sure interest rates are zero percent and everything is going to be great. wait, didn't we try this also, and didn't it end in complete disaster? why do we expect something different this time? >> i'm not sure that you can argue that if you go back and look at what's been happening the last couple of years it's quite clear that in 2009 people were arguing that we were never going to be able to climb out of this fiscal expansion, monetary expansion. those have been the two important levers that have led us here. >> but we haven't de-leveraged as an economy. >> yes, we're de-leveraging, allows the de-leveraging to take place. >> we are in fact de-leveraging. if you look at all the money that's been paid back by consumers, whether it's voluntary or involuntary, we've seen a lot of de-leveraging, but it's not just what the governments are doing. >> wrong, sir. >> a lot of good things. consumer confidence on a daily basis is hovering at one of the highest level in five years and now with the extra uncertainty removed off the table, i think business kez start to take some of the cash off. >> the government is continuing to leverage. >> total non-financial accident 250% of gdp, hasn't changed since 2007, so, no, we have not de-leveraged as an economy because the government debt is our debt. >> michael, the point thoug then becomes that being the case, that stock of debt is still sitting so high, what's the best way to reduce it and, unfortunately, the best way to reduce that. >> austerity. >> austerity that doesn't harm growth prospects in the meantime. that is the holy grail for not just the u.s. but for any major economy. >> where is this magic elixir going to come from. there has to be some pain. where have we become so arrogance and have so much hubris to believe we can't have a recession anymore? >> and we've got to be willing to elect people who will take the necessary steps so that our grandchildren don't get these bills. bob coaching was right. >> that boat's already sailed. >> if you want to talk about why greece's debt to gdp went from 120 to 100, it had a lot to do with their five-year recession. >> exactly. >> and they had the same debate in greece. >> and they also used the euro to borrow a tremendous amount of money using the german balance sheet and we're doing the same thing, abusing our world's reserve currency status, and when that ends, it's going to be very painful. >> the music hasn't stopped. the cash is still flowing so markets will go higher. >> you're right. >> all right. we've got to go at this point. i'm not sure we solved anything, but it was fun somehow. >> we did better than congress. >> that's true. >> at least we didn't curse. >> no f-bombs here at least. see you later. stocks kick off the year on a high note thanks in last part to last night's 11th-hour tax deal in congress. checking with bertha coombs for today's leaders and laggards. >> bill, a day for notable milestones. the dow starting the year up over 2% for only the tenth time in 100 years, the nasdaq's best one-day gain in over 15 months, the s&p starting the year with a sizable gain for the fifth straight year. that's never happened and the russell 2000 hitting a new all-time high. zipcar was the russell's biggest percentage gainer on a $500 million cash deal to be acquired by avis which today hit a five-year high on that deal. on the s&p, u.s. steel the biggest peersage gainer on an upgrade from credit suisse and metlife seeing big cliff relief rallies today. j.c. penney bucking the trend in new year starting the year with a bick bounce after losing 40%, alexion and other biotechs rallying and consol energy and natural gas players among today's decliners with forecasts calling for warmer weather ahead. kohl's and other retailers lower after likely disappointing sales. and emc, disappointing fourth-quarter earnings, and continued pressure for watson phrma after the fda approved a generic version of its adhd drug. a lot of movement today, bill. >> ber, that thank you very much. >> sorry, we've been chatting here. >> bill is making an interesting point. got to look at strength within the market and pay attention to what signals we're seeing. >> and a very strong last few minutes of trading here for the bulls. >> anything to give pause, maybe it's what happened with the euro, not exactly participating. >> exactly. a huge first day of the year msnbc what for the rest of the year? someone who studies these types of things joins us next? >> also, billionaire investor wilbur ross joins us. we'll find out if a tax deal is changing his investment outlook and just what his plans are now that there's some certainty on taxes. >> and if you haven't heard yet, apple reportedly working on another iphone. iphone 6 maybe. what's on tap for the latest incarnation and how crucial that rollout may be for the company's stock. that and much more when kelly and i come back on the "closing bell." change engineering in dubai, aluminum production in south africa, and the aerospace industry in the u.s.? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason over 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing. okay. welcome. if you're just joining us, that's what happened today, a pretty good rally. no since 2008 has the first trading day of the year been a loser for the dow. in fact, in the last 21 years, the dow has record gains in its first trading day of the year 15 times, and that includes today in a very, very big way. what does this first big day of trading in the new year mean for the markets the rest of the year? that's the question, right? >> yes, it is. to explore this, joining us now is market historian jeremy segal investor finance at the university of pennsylvania's wharton school. >> welcome back, jeremy. >> professor, is there a way to isolate how much today's move is fiscal cliff-related and how much might be seasonal or fundamental effects? >> you know, the first day, as just mentioned, is often a good day but there's no -- there's no doubting the fact that the resolution of the fiscal cliff was a huge boost to today's market, and obviously the moving toward that was a huge boost for monday's market. if you combine monday with today, while we've had one of the biggest turn of the year gains in history. >> you have been calling for a rally anyway. i mean, you're among those who felt that this market was undervalued, underowned, however you want to characterize it. how much higher can we go, especially as we get closer to march and we're getting to that debt ceiling discussion that congress is going to have which probably is going to be pretty ugly. >> yeah. i'm not too worried about march. i was more worried about getting the fiscal cliff because if, you know, nothing was done, we were hit with really high taxes everywhere. i just can't believe either the republicans or the democrats are going to stop government so that the social security checks cannot get printed up and sent to people. i think there's going to be a game of chicken, but at the end they are going to sign it. i don't think there's going to be a debt downgrade. you know, i didn't think that the downgrade of the s&p two years ago was real justified to begin with, so i'm not as worried about march. i -- i think this could be a 20% plus year for the dow and the s&p because i see that all the liquidity that the fed has produced, i think it's finally going to be flowing into the market, into the economy, into spending, and bonds, you know, which for a long time i've been saying, you know, interest rates are heading higher. i think this is the year where people finally say, hey, i can't hold my bond fund anymore. >> i want to ask you about one other seasonal effect we've started to see in the last couple of years and that is stocks and other asset classes like oil tend to do well in the first part of the year. i wonder if there's a reason behind that, if you expect that this time around. when you add into that the fact that we will sort of again through the mid-spring period be dealing again with the debt ceili ceiling. >> well, you know, what's interesting is we've seen a real high correlation in recent years between oil and the stock market. generally when people are more optimistic about what growth is going to be, there's more economic activity and when they get pessimistic it goes down. real, what we see in oil is really a reflection of what we see in the economy, and as you know the last few years, the beginning of the year has been good, and then we've hit trouble in the middle of the year. i think that's why we've seen that in oil. that's where your basic correlation is coming from. >> professor, do you expect to see that kind of seasonal pattern play out again, and any idea as to why it's been so predominant the last couple of years? >> there's a lot of theories out. some has to do with the seasonal adjustment of the great recession that we had four years ago. i think this year because of the fact that we do have some tax hikes for the first quarter, a little bit of slow necessary, but i think in contrast to the last two years we're going to see an acceleration of the economy in the second half which probably drives oil and stock prices higher. >> would you buy gold here, jeremy? >> i think gold is too high. honestly, that's either for those who think there's going to be hyper inflation or a financial collapse. i mean, that's when you want to buy gold. >> you don't see either of those? >> i don't think either of those are going to come true this year so my feeling is we'll get disappointing returns in gold this year. >> but a 20% gain in stocks for 2013, that's the forecast from professor jeremy segal at wharton. happy new year. >> thank you very much. >> apple shares are spiking near a one-month high, but question is whether the company can succumb to yeah it if its next generation iphone is a dead? >> will it wow techheads. >> have they have come out with a dud for an iphone? >> maybe this time. this time is different. dangerous words in finance. >> up next, how will the tax deal affect billionaire investor wilbur ross' wheeling and dealing this year. he speaks with us exclusively on the other side of this break coming up. >> have you heard certain deductions will phase out thanks to the tax deal. our own eamon javers tells us what you need to know and how much more you might pay when we come back. going to trade in hong kong. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 after that, it's on to germany. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 then tonight, i'm trading 9500 miles away in japan. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with the new global account from schwab, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i hunt down opportunities around the world tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 as if i'm right there. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and i'm in total control because i can trade tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 directly online in 12 markets in their local currencies. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i use their global research to get an edge. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 their equity ratings show me how schwab tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 rates specific foreign stocks tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 based on things like fundamentals, momentum and risk. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and i also have access to independent tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 firms like ned davis research tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and economist intelligence unit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 plus, i can talk to their global specialists 24/7. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and trade in my global account commission-free tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 through march 2013. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 best part... no jet lag. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 call 1-877-561-5445 tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and a global specialist tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 will help you get started today. mine was earned off vietnam in 1968. over the south pacific in 1943. i got mine in iraq, 2003. usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. because it offers a superior level of protection, and because usaa's commitment to serve the military, veterans and their families is without equal. begin your legacy, get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve. at a dry cleaner, we replaced people with a machine. what? customers didn't like it. so why do banks do it? hello? hello?! if your bank doesn't let you talk to a real person 24/7, you need an ally. hello? ally bank. your money needs an ally. well, it was quite the day in the markets with an over 80% of the s&p 500 rising above their 50-day moving averages, bill. >> is it pedal to the metal tomorrow? we want so much, bob pisani. what do you think? >> oh, brother. listen, i'll tell you. if the retail trader, if you get the big headline, stock's up, fiscal cliff deal and the public starts believing it a little bit, then, yes, we could see something really start building here. remember, first trading day, 70% of the time the s&p in the month of january follows what happens on the first trading day. that actually is one that's worked fairly well. let she tell you what's been going on, folks. had a great day. closed at the highs. heavy volume and it never flagged no. selling into the real, and a lot of people thought there would be. maybe tomorrow, but we didn't see that today of the historic highs. put it up here. the russell 2000, can you buy that and at s&p mid-cap. we're three point away from a five-year high on the s&p 500. how about tech stocks? we were up right across the board, folks. almost 10-1 advancing to declining stocks. tech had a big day and dell here in the hardware. also had some of the other stocks that were up in that group like juniper and the networking group. builders and home builders were all great shape. owens corning, a new high. masako is a new high. not quite high for the new home builders, but they were all strong as well. we did have some laggards though. the important thing, just show you, the hbo's lagged a little bit and concern about medicare cuts down the road and retailer stocks lower. higher payroll taxes impacting discretionary spending. finally, guys, five years in a row, up on the first trading day of the year, and i think that is also a factor in addition to the fiscal cliff deal. guys, back to you. >> yeah. up in a big way. bob pisani, thank you very much, sir. markets may be buying into the deal out of washington. billionaire investor wilbur ross not so much. >> yeah. he says the bill passed by congress last night is mainly a ticket to another fight which we'll talk about, but how does all of this affect his investment decisions for 2013? wilbur joins us now. good to see you. welcome back, sir. >> good to be back, thank you. >> are you encouraged or dismayed by the bill passed last night? >> well, i'm encouraged in one sense in that at least the vast majority of american taxpayers will know what their rates will be, and there's not that much of an increase. for most people the increase will be basically the two percentage points on social security and a little witt higher limit, so from the average person's point of view, that's okay. the disappointing part is that it didn't really deal with spending. there's a ratio of $41 of tax increase to $1 of spending decrease. >> right. >> that's not kind of balance we need to fix the budget. >> wilbur, though -- >> we have to wait and hope. >> the fiscal cliff wasn't about the deficit. it wasn't about the debt. it was actually about stabilizing gdp. i mean, that's the cliff, that's about making sure we wouldn't be thrown no a recession as these various measures went into effect, so from that point view, it's a very different kind of deal that we were expecting or looking for than one that dealt directly with taxes and spending. >> well, we do need to deal with the deficits. we can't keep running trillion plus dollar a year deficits indefinitely because otherwise you'll have the federal reserve balance sheet be miles bigger than the whole economy, and obviously that's not a comprehensible thing, so we really do have to deal with the spending side as well. and most of the measures that would have been dealt with in the spending, like gradually raising the age on social security with have no negative impact on the economyner team in any event. >> by the way, what do you think of today's rally, and it comes, you know, after a pretty good month of december anyway. are we fooling ourselves to see stocks go much higher here when we still have the spending part of the equation to be figured out in the next few month, or is this wall street looking past all of that and guessing that the economy will grow from here? >> well, i think there was so much anxiety built up over the cliff that almost any resolution of it would have brought a sigh of relief. also remember, this is the first part of january. a lot of institutions have an influx of new money that needs to be put to work, so i don't think this is a determinative thing one way or another, but certainly from the point of view of the economy it's much better for the market to be acting well than poorly. >> it does point towards maybe revived growth, prospects that bill was just talking about, but the question remains there's two more months to which could potentially be a nastier fight over the debt ceiling. how worried are you? >> well, i'm less worried about the fight over the debt ceiling than the fight over the sequester. remember, all they did is they pushed the skywestering forward two months. >> right. >> i'd be very surprised if the congress would vote to default on the u.s. sovereign debt. i'd be a lot less surprised if they let the sequester come in. >> well, what is this dysfunctional congress of ours capable of when it comes to spending cuts? mean, we had just a couple of congressmen here, pretty moderate on the republican and democratic side, and they couldn't agree. they couldn't even come close to an agreement on how the spending cuts were going to play out in the next couple of months here. what are your expectations? >> they are not going to know anything more about the arithmetic of spending in two months than they do already. it's just that people don't like to make painful decisions, but as i say, things like changing the inflation measurement, things like gradually extending the social security capability age, things like means testing, i don't really see why those should be very controversial on either party's side, so for the life of me it's unclear why it's so hard to come to grips with those. >> yeah. where are you going to make money this year? >> god only knows. it's too early to tell. we're pretty liquid right now. >> well, you look for distressed asset. that's where you've made your fortune. where do you see that happening right now? what looks attractive to you? >> well, seriously, we continue to be big advocates of shale gas, and if we're talking about the economy, a very easy way for the administration to boost the economy would be to grant the export permits for the 12 or 13 pending lngx-4 terminals, and to make it clear that it's going to be supportive of shale gas. shale gas could transform the whole economy, get us back into the chemical business, get us back into the plastic business, reduce our balance of payments deficit and all without costing the fact a penny, and meanwhile while reducing the carbon dioxide footprint by substituting natural gas for coal. so i think it's a win-win, and, again, it's a mystery to me why there hasn't been more overt support of it. every day that we waste granting another permit for lng export is a day that we'll never recapture. >> and we'll leave it there. >> always good to see you, wilbur. happy new year. >> happy new year to you folks. >> well, is it here we go again? congress has two months to raise the debt ceiling or else the treasury department runs out of money to pay its bill and we risk default. how much one congressman is willing to push spending cuts before we hit the debt ceiling deadline. >> reading the fine print and getting ready to pay the higher taxes. eamon javers tells us whose deductions will be phased out as a result of last night's tax deal. you can't miss that. >> plus. >> there's only one group to blame for the continued suffering of these victims, the house majority and the speaker. >> new jersey governor chris christie crying fowl after putting off a vote for hurricane sandy victims. more on that when we return. deal. more on that when we return. as we all know, last night's fiscal cliff deal was essentially a tax deal. part two is to come now as we set the stage for a new fight on the debt ceiling. we've already really hit the maximum amount the government can borrow giving congress about two months now to raise that ceiling or risk default. last year the fight was brutal. as we all remember, and it led to a u.s. credit downgrade. >> yes, and the president has already said, quote, i will not have another debate with this congress over whether or not they should pay the bills they have already racked up. republicans say they won't consider raising the ceiling again without spending cuts, and on that note joining us now is representative david schweiker, republican from arizona. he voted against last night's deal. representative, welcome. >> hi, kelly. hi, bill. >> as we turn our attention towards the debt ceiling in two month's time, how far are you willing to go to get spending cuts? will you risk a debt default? >> well, first off what, we need to work on our language here. using the word default i think is actually quite a misnomer. we have enough cash flow to cover our bonded indebtedness and actually the vast majority of our entitlement obligations. if you went over and you ran out of borrowing authority, a lot of ugly things happen, but you do not have a default. >> right. >> so we -- we have enough pay to interest, but, i mean, we get that point. we understand what you're saying there. >> but my reason for that is it misshapes the debate here. look, we're in a really ugly shape here. >> all right. >> if you look at both the deal last night and where we'll be by the end of this decade, we're going to be drowning, drowning in debt. >> right. >> and yet we keep pushing off the hard decisions, and many -- >> how far -- >> in many ways the television, the debates here, we scare the public out of being willing to have a stiff back and say let's do what's tough. >> but it is an important issue, and to the spirit of kelley's question, the first question, how far are you willing to go to see these spending cuts in order to get the debt ceiling lifted? >> i am incredibly concerned that the debt markets are going to wake up one morning and begin to punish us, and when that happens god forbid what happens when you consider we're floating, what, 12 trillion of publicly floated debt, 105% of debt to gdp in total debt. just a small spanking from the debt markets, it's a disaster. we need to convince those markets that we're taking this seriously. i am someone who will not vote to raise the debt ceiling unless there's a credible change, particularly in future entitlement spending. if we get, that i'll vote to raise the debt ceiling. >> we should point out that s&p is now out saying the fiscal cliff deal as it stands right now will not affect the u.s. outlook. pretty much same thing moody's said too. >> congressman, you're talking about scaring the american people and the rhetoric you're used to go talk about this potential debt situation is inflammatory. it's not something we're seeing in markets today. if anything, markets, the stock market was worried about the impact to grow from any deal and that will continue to be a concern going forward. >> kweli, just as you had wilbur on a couple of moments ago. do you want elected officials like myself to come on the air and tell you the truth? look at the math. we need to deal with this, and if we soft pedal it, if we walk away from the tough decisions because it's easier, because we're scared of what reporters or our media or even our voters will say, we need to tell the public the truth. >> congressman -- >> this is unsustainable where you're going. >> you're right that the concern is the long-term unsustainability of the current path but the concern is by doing something now to fix that problem we throw the u.s. into a recession so if you're saying we're not going to default on the government debt payments but could risk a government shutdown that will impact growth in the near term. >> but you can't make the market and say that throws you instantly into a recession. the fact of the matter if we demonstrate and can put together a credible debt deal that starts to bend the debt curve i believe the equity markets and the long-term fixed forecast markets will treat us very kindly like that. if we did what we did a year envelope, moody, s&p, substantially spanked us because we did not seem to deal with how we would deal with the debt in the future. >> it did not seem to matter. >> when you have the federal reserve buying half your sovereign debt. >> right. >> you have a completely art official market right now. >> let me ask you on the spending side. would you favor sequestration, just let it go and have those draconian cuts? is that the amount of cutting that you want to see in order to allow the debt ceiling to be raised? >> william, think about what you just said. draconian cuts. the fact of the matter is the cuts in the sequestration are ugly. the only thing that's uglier is not doing it. we have to start bending the debt curve. >> is that a yes, sir? >> oh, of course, and i was pretty clear in that. you let it -- i would -- there's better ways to do it, but it's better than not doing it. >> congressman, real quickly. what would it take for to you agree to the geithner proposal, to give the president the authority himself to raise the debt ceiling? what kind of spending cuts would have to be included in a grand agreement for to you get on board with that, if you would? >> yeah, i doubt i would ever agree to such a thing. it's not spending cuts. it's reshaping the way future entitlements are delivered because that's what consumes every dollar in our general fund in the future. >> sir, i hear you. we certainly hope that it's not as ugly as it was in august of '11 on this debt ceiling debate. >> but we need to toughen up. look, for those folks watching the vix and the market, this is what 2013 is about. we'll have continuing resolutions because we can't get the senate to do a budget. you know, we're going have the debt ceiling. we have pushed off our responsibility for decades. the roosters have come home to roost. >> all right. good to see you, congressman. thank you much for joining us. see you later. new jersey's republican governor has called out gop leaders in the house for failing to call a vote on aid for victims of superstorm sandy, and his words have already prompted action. brian schactman has the latest details for us. >> you know, when chris christie talks, turns out, washington listens. last night when all was said and done on the fiscal cliff, the house adjourned without addressing relief money for superstorm sandy. this absolutely enraged pligtss in the northeast, especially that man peter king from new york and others from new jersey, areas still dealing with the storm that destroyed whole communities in late october. you may recall governor christie stood with president obama after the disaster, and some thought that was a political move. withholding the aid was perhaps another political move but either way christie didn't hesitate to point a finger earlier today. >> there's only one group to blame for the continued suffering of these innocent victims. the house majority and their speaker, john boehner. >> reporter: but 90 minutes later new york representative said two votes for funding are forthcoming, one on friday for 9 billion in flood insurance and one in two weeks on another 51 billion. >> whatever reason the speaker decided not to bring it to a vote this week, obviously we disagreed were that and that's in the past. the bottom line is between friday morning and january 15th, those two votes, will bring in $60 billion that's absolutely necessary for new york, new jersey and connecticut. >> king obviously softening his tone from earlier. clearly some reversal, guys, based on republican reaction to something the republican house speaker could have handled. bill, back to you. >> all right, brian. thank you very much. well, those things, we know that's certain in life, death, taxes and another sequel of a batman movie. another one. our tax code remains far from clear. wait until you hear how much more you could be paying the tax man thanks to the phase out of some deductions embedded in the tax deal that congress just passed. that's coming up next. >> also ahead, our wealth editor robert frank told us who won in the 11th hour tax deal. back after this. st, we understad that if you pick three people, odds are they'll approach everything in their own unique way -- including investing. so we help clients identify and prioritize their life goals. taking that input and directly matching assets and risk preferences against them. the result? 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[ male announcer ] how could switchgrass in argentina, change engineering in dubai, aluminum production in south africa, and the aerospace industry in the u.s.? at t. rowe price, we understand the connections of a complex, global economy. it's just one reason over 75% of our mutual funds beat their 10-year lipper average. t. rowe price. invest with confidence. request a prospectus or summary prospectus with investment information, risks, fees and expenses to read and consider carefully before investing. well, based on today's rally, investors love the tax deal to avert fiscal cliff, but more details are emerging. part of the deal reinstates the phase out of personal exemptions and deductions for singles who earn more than $250,000 and for couples making over $300,000. so what exactly does this mean for your bottom line? eamon javers has been doing the math on the back of the envelope. eamon? >> reporter: hi, bill. well, let's talk about two of the hidden tax increases in this deal it a are going to hit people who make over $250,000. limits on deductions and limits on personal exemptions. there's something called a personal exemption phase out in this law which limits your ability to take tax exemptions such as your kids. those are almost entirely phased out by $500,000 worth of income, and then there's something known as pease which is named after the congressman who invented it, a cap on your deductions for over 250,000, so that they don't have so many deductions they escape tax liability all together. if you make $300,000 a year, you're 50,000 over the threshold and a formula is applied to all of the deductions. in this case you have to subtract about 1,500 bucks off your itemized deduction tote a. that's an across-the-board haircut on deductions so it's going to impact everything you typically deduct, like your mortgage or charitable giving or anything. both of these new taxes hit people well below the much publicized $450,000 limit. that's going to surprise some taxpayers come next year, bill. >> once again, another bill that is a tax accountant employment act. >> absolutely. >> right? >> financial planners, too. >> thanks for understanding pease. >> p-ase be with you. >> if you generate income off your investments, how did you do in this tax deal? our wealth editor robert franks says actually not bad. hi, robert. >> hey, kelly, not bad at all. indeed, the wealthy will see their taxes go up under this cliff deal but not as much as many had feared, especially for investors. let's take a look. we expected that top rate would go to 39.6% from 35%, and, of course, it did, but only for those making $400,000 or more or families making $450,000 or more. now, those folks will see their taxes go up an average of about $20,000. those making more than $1 million a year, they will see their taxes go up by about $120,000. now, that's an average. for people who make more of their money from investments, tax rates will remain much lower. taxes on capital gains, only went to 20% from 15%, but the biggest winner in this fiscal cliff deal were the wealthy investors who make their income from dividends. obama proposed taxing dividends at 39.6%. the current rate is 15%. it didn't happen. it only went to 20% so despite all the talk about the buffet rule and the investors playing lower rates than the salaried rich investment income is taxed at half the rate as ordinary income as a result of this deal. last night's deal didn't solve any issues but it made one thing perfectly clear, the tax system still rewards investments and those who make their money from investments rather than the salary salaried investors. >> will the next iphone be as successful as its predecessor? >> not real, really, and if they are right, what happens to the stock? we'll toss that around on the other side of the break. stay tuned. i got mine in iraq, 2003. usaa auto insurance is often handed down from generation to generation. because it offers a superior level of protection, and because usaa's commitment to serve the military, veterans and their families is without equal. begin your legacy, get an auto insurance quote. usaa. we know what it means to serve. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 after that, it's on to germany. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 then tonight, i'm trading 9500 miles away in japan. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with the new global account from schwab, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i hunt down opportunities around the world tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 as if i'm right there. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and i'm in total control because i can trade tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 directly online in 12 markets in their local currencies. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i use their global research to get an edge. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 their equity ratings show me how schwab tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 rates specific foreign stocks tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 based on things like fundamentals, momentum and risk. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and i also have access to independent tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 firms like ned davis research tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and economist intelligence unit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 plus, i can talk to their global specialists 24/7. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and trade in my global account commission-free tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 through march 2013. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 best part... no jet lag. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 call 1-877-561-5445 tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and a global specialist tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 will help you get started today. shares of apple up more than 3% today. helped in part by reports that the tech giant is testing yet another new iphone. that news website, the next web, says that app developers found references to it but there aren't any clues about new hardware or soft features yet. >> and so we asked the question, what will it mean if these talks turn out to be true. is that a reason to buy the stock? brian white already has his 12-month price target of $1,111 and says a new iphone could help apple further expand its market share in smartstones. so, does that change your price target, brian, or mean that we might actually get there? >> yeah, so, it doesn't change our price target but what it does do, and, you know, we put out a note this morning, really highlighting why we think the next iphone will be very different. and the two factors we highlighted is number one, color. bringing potentially eight different colors to the iphone and form factor. making different sizes available for the iphone, which we really haven't had for the same model. so, with iphone 5, we have a four-inch and that's it. >> okay, there's james brim of come pass intelligence, he doesn't think this is a reason to buy the stock. you think it's overpriced. you made that clear in the past, right? >> yeah, i have. i think he's right that they do need to get different colors and form factors in there. i've talked about that before with you, bill, that they do need to have different form factors out there. but this is just another e vice and how fast you can push your buyers to buy another new product again? we're nearing that saturation point of smartphones in the u.s. over 50% of people that have a phone have a smart phone. so, you know, how often can you get them to churn that device? they need to do things outside of just the iphone. they need to do a lot of different innovative things. >> what do you think? >> well, what i think this will do for apple is that coming out with different size screens will offer different price points. different price points will allow apple to start to penetrate the lower end of the market and the very high end that doesn't exist today. so, for example, i go to china quite a bit and there's a big piece of the market that apple is missing because they don't have something maybe like an iphone mini or a smaller, cheaper type iphone. >> when the ipad mini came out, they didn't price it at the low end. they stayed high end at that point. >> so it will be cheaper priced but not cheap priced. >> apple priced. >> yes. >> still have a premium. >> james? >> bill, one of the things that the chinese market wants, they crave things that are cutting edge, as well. and the iphone, quite frankly, the hardware inside it is not cutting edge. they need to jump ahead and do some of the things that other companies are doing that have leapfrogged them. otherwise, they relegate themselves to the same things that happened to nokia and rim. >> but what -- >> you can't be a one-trick pony. >> what does a masz market device mean for market ability? >> if apple is just gain one percentage point in the smartphone market, that's 9 million units and that's about $2 in earnings. so, if you look at apple today, maybe they will end up this year, 17%, 18% market share in smartphones -- >> but to james' point, eventually, you're playing the commodities game when you play in the smartphone business. so, to maintain margins and to justify the higher apple price, you got to be cutting edge. is there that much left in the cutting edge technology for apple to pursue here? >> i think, look at the pc market and how apple prices themselves at a big premium and look at the market share gains we've seen over the past five years. it's been pretty phenomenal. >> but you think that translates into something more mass oriented like a smartphone business? >> i think it exactly does. the apple ecosystem, there's nothing like it on the planet. the quality of the hardware and the software and how everything connects. and if you can start to offer something at a price point that's more attractive to some of these developing countries, i think you're really going to expand your market share. really, the only competitor out there i see out there is samsung. >> all right. >> and the ipad mini is on fire in china. >> you don't think i should hold out for the blackberry 10? >> we're going to be the last people on earth with one of these. >> and our senior producer over there, too. thank you, gentlemen. happy new year. >> thanks, happy new year. >> happy new year. it was a happy new year on wall street. the dow and nasdaq posting their biggest gains in half a year. >> will stocks keep flying hike tomorrow morning or come crashing down from a bad hangover? two of the streets top money pros will weigh in, coming up pros will weigh in, coming up next. you won't just find us online, you'll also find us in person, with dedicated support teams at over 500 branches nationwide. so when you call or visit, you can ask for a name you know. because personal service starts with a real person. 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millard fillmore had his house vandalized because it did not display warning signs for the president. he felt terrible about the presence murder, but he was actually on vacation. franklin pierce displayed no signs of morning, and he had an angry mob come to this house in trenton and purity comes out and gives a speech in talks about how lazar match theirs despite his political disagreement. you very much joined them in sympathizing with the murder of the president, just on the eve of his triumph in the civil war. appeared poised to be able to reunite the country, to reconstruct the country, to bring it back together, many the only person who could have done separately taken away, very suddenly taken away, the first presidential assassination. now i should probably stop for questions. ten minutes of questions. let's do it. >> can you tell, looking at the modern trend of our former presidents and how they conduct themselves and their research you have done, before presence during civil war, talk a little bit of what you perceive to be the best way to conduct yourself and anything that stuck out and surprise you and how the five former presidents conducted themselves. >> a great question. actually wrote an op-ed in the "washington post" about the nature of the post presidency. george h. w. bush, and the gang is like 90 years old jumping and of airplanes. whereas the u.s.s. george is still the bush has been sent to the persian gulf in response to the possibility of another war to increased american involvement. george w. bush you initiated the conflict just says, must try to criticize my successor. i think the model for the post presidency is to always be available for advice. during the civil war there was actually a great deal of talk about the former president's coming together have a meeting. five former presidents, and get them together. surely they can, but the solution. pierce will try to initiate the meeting. van buren will end up successfully undermining because he knew that pierce was trying to subvert abraham lincoln and his war policy. so being able to a candidly and confidentially give advice. the thing with the ex-president's the is that they have served in the rule. the standing of a former president of the radical in there out of politics. they see no more political office for themselves and are in the best position to just issue candid vice, confidential advice to the president, the country. so i think the president's either support their successors with modest exceptions during election time, speaking about funds excellent speech of the democratic convention in 2012. the election time, the partisan corners and come back, stay out of politics largely. other questions? >> are of a race-based? >> well, all of his fangs, i think pierce just has absolutely zero personal qualms of slavery. he just doesn't care. he was upset when new hampshire passed a law preventing / from coming in and answer. the fact he did not care costs slavery. the danger of having a biracial country. the worst violation of the constitution in history when abraham lincoln used as commander in chief powers to free slaves and the territories and the rebellion. a number of different things about of a him. >> i would like you talk a little bit more if you can. lincoln is elected. did not take office until march. for six months he is still president. seven states received from the union. he does nothing about it. he leaves this problem for lincoln. what is going on there? >> you know, he gets a lot of grief for mystery, but not for the thing that he actually deserves to get grief over. so is da .. issue of .. secession. he is 16,000 troops under his command. arizona, protecting settlers on the frontier. but even all 16,000 together in one place he can't even defeat south carolina with that number much less the nine south. he charged to compromise his way out of it. crenshaw by a state of virginia after serving as an emissary to the president and the confederate states. so they tried to work it out. he think about it, buchanan compromise in 1820, the compromise that ended the first session standoff in 1833. the final settlement. we have all these compromises. so a lot of hope and compromise and legitimately so happened on his watch. so i think this is sitting in waiting he actually did when can a great service in some ways and not in others. he would have driven the united south out of the union. one of the most important things of lincoln did was to preserve the border states. 's, perhaps, would love to have gone on my side, but i need kentucky. he cannot win this fight without the border states. missouri, kentucky, maryland, delaware and opted to succeed, the task, with a ben today to accomplish. by waiting and waiting for us out to initiate hostilities he was able to preserve the border states, keep the border states. so i think she really did not have much that he could do. it was not helpful when he kept the secessionists in cabinet or announce that he had no lawful authority to go after stays there were seceding even the recall secession illegal. those things were not helpful, but ultimately he has some new people around him. his attorney general. and he leaves again as well off as almost anyone could have. >> we got rid of lincoln's birthday and washington's birthday at present state. i always hated that because of his two of the subjects of your book, you know, pierce and buchanan are just lonesome characters to me. i mean, not just our we insulting lincoln and washington by taking away their holiday, but do these men deserve to even be respected the history or should we set up a couple the way that they are not part of the president? i was joking. six share your sentiments. there's a holiday. one of the things i learned about this book, they tend to be reviled. they all have their parts to play. i admired millard fillmore, his willingness to stand up for compromise and sign on popular legislation that destroyed his political career in order to prevent a civil war from happening ten years earlier. the south probably -- the decade of 18501860 really was the population and industrial advantage in the north, increasing to the point where there are nearly guaranteed to win any sort of civil war. i will come back to you. look, i mean, they guy was a general and the mexican-american war and served with distinction. you can serve his country more or less steadily for decades. john tyler opened up trade with china for the first time, pretty important issue. pretty important part of our economy. so they all have those things that they did right and it wrong. obviously the solution did not stand the test of time, but you can't understand the united states without understanding the civil war. brother killing brother, dividing families. lincoln's own son. brothers and long were killed on the war, dividing families. the civil war that is with us to the state. you can understand america without it and you can understand civil war without understanding five former presidents. so they all have a good and the bad. my favorite reviews so far on this book is ben that i have no axe to grind with these presidents. represent them as they are let you be the judge. you're certainly welcome to be the decision makers. other questions? >> can you discuss -- just briefly you mentioned tyler and his role within the confederate government and how that may differ -- differentiate it from franklin pierce and his role of being outside and advising. >> yes. both peers and john tyler bofa crew very meddlesome during his presidency. pierce politically so. i make the case in the book. just a continuation of politics by other means. the politics is actually a continuation of war by other means. he think about it, the objective of the war, the length of the war, determined by politics. the political question the administration, enough votes in congress to appropriate money for the war. so there will work hard to elect opponents to lincoln, including george mcclellan, lincoln's upon in 1964. tyler on the other hand, lancaster of a compromise, trying -- even offers to give for sumpter back to south carolina and ordered to give virginia to stay in the end and get the virginia secession commission to go home. tyler will hear none of this. he is all of his influence. so both of them proved to be problematic. lincoln on the inside than one on the outside. other questions? >> yes. >> as you mentioned and seems to repeat itself. a lot of the antics that preceded lincoln's term, it seems like their is a lot of similar activity going on nowadays, especially how it relates to the economy and how much we're spending on tournament. and with the interjection of the two-party, can you draw any more parallels? it is just kind of foreshadowing another civil war? >> no, thankfully. but here is the thing. i was a history jackie and very active in politics forever up the opportunity to register myself. a great opporunity to write three books out. history will be worth it for me to read because it is a great story. some of the most amazing stories ever. you would not believe it is somebody wrote in their novel. too good to be real. that is not a good enough reason i write history because the messages from the past resonant with us today and are applicable we can learn from these things. we can remember a matter how divisive and combat of our politics, remember there was a point when our country went to war with each other and we lost 2 percent of population. two out of every hundred americans, a war that destroyed broad sections of the country, 10,000. and so however bad we think it is, and i like watching tv and hearing, this is the most of my selection ever, the most combative, negative campaign. people's memory goes back about ten years. look at the politics. that scared news. we had a whole host of very serious problems in this country he touched on one of them. $17 trillion in debt that we are passing on to the next generation. maybe a first generation in american history that will be better off than their grandparents and parents. so these are serious issues. remember that america has always found a way out of these problems. the other, we see a series of these lackluster presence who are not equal to the task in front of them, the solution is to not stand the test of time. from that time comes abraham lincoln who is really the most amazing person of this american civilization. so america is frequently been bereft of the warrants. congress and the president are at all-time lows in popularity. easy independence increasing as a share of the electorate. people are frustrated. so america has regularly been without the that reflected the inherent wisdom, goodness, and integrity of the american people . remember, wherever the republicans are really in danger, this hour of crisis in 1861 we turn to abraham lincoln. absolutely optimistic for the future even as i write about a previous time of lackluster leaders. thank you so much for coming. [applause] [applause] >> thank you, sir. thanks to everybody. first and foremost, the book sitting at the table. a couple boxes and anything case we run out. taken up to the registered first and get it paid for. then you get start lining appear. last but not least, if you can carefully hold the chair that you are seated upon, place >> >> but is not under the purview of the department of education to make decisions for themselves a wish to renew a as a went through my a campus soy to prepare for the deletion i wouldn't do work from the addition traders. but had no cause to suspect anything. of was thrilled to see under the leadership ocr listed the schools under investigation but plays compel ocr to publicly busies the names of the schools under investigation and so might experience can be the out where. my partner did not use physical force but in the months and weeks the the up to psychological and emotional abuse. redstarts of as little things a controlled move for the outburst here. will start with the emotional and psychological abuse. they're not little in research shows they are as deleterious is any broking - - broken bone in the 99% also have economic abuse lawmakers agree we do not have the authority to include emotional and psychological and to have a statute stating as much so please state as much. the expectation should not be we into you have of hospitalization under your belt eum. this is just over an hour. >> it is up pleasure tonight to introduce randall balmer a professor of arts and sciences at dartmouth college. i have followed his career for a long time. done at a school where my father was a dean. and my brother joe attended the school at the same time. and randy has turned into one of our great modern american historians. one of the things that makes a great is he really minds the resources of presidential office. he has come to my gone through and found very interesting documents that other people had not seen before. combine with that he has also bind the resources of the archives on the various evangelical organizations that have become involved in politics and in addition to that a talked with his research killed. he is an excellent writer. i have had the privilege of reading many of his books including the one that is just out. i can tell you as much as i have all these subjects in the mile research. if you want to understand the difference the 1970's and 1980's in case you have forgotten there were significant differences. you want to know about the transition to a time when jimmy carter says was president to a time when ronald reagan was president, if you want to understand the role of billy graham's and american politics, the role of the cherry caldwell and american politics, this is the book for you. i highly recommend it. as i say, i read it personally and found it very fascinating. i think all of you will, to. before you rush out to buy the book you have the privilege of hearing some comments by the author of self. i give you randy bomber. if [applause] [applause] >> thank you for that very kind introduction. it is wonderful to be back here. a lot of work here. the last time i was here when you see him being refurbished. it's been more than three hours this afternoon going to an exhibit at 445. i was utterly and grossed. scorned a few things that i did not know before going to the present. want to talk a little bit. tell you first of all as to indicated that went to college, a small college in northern illinois sites. was not good enough to give into wheat college. i went to a small school in the early 1970's. it was during my time that that jimmy carter burst onto the national scene. i had grown up as an evangelical . what was so remarkable to me was that he talked unabashedly about being a born-again christian which is the term we used to describe ourselves except we were always coloring would be did that. and the form of a, a kind of wake-up call. the man who was watching for -- running for president being taken seriously able to talk about his faith in very unabashed and unapologetic terms. and so i began taking notice of that. i followed his terror rather closely. this is all but one point of wanted to write a book. i have to say i have been kind of bring with this idea for probably at least two decades now. over the last decade or so i spent a good bit of time during the research. when my schedule permitted. and i just say that i think i've -- claman's for themselves which maybe is not justified. the first biography, takes his face seriously as a way of understanding of himself, his conduct, but also the very turbulent religious time in which he did. says 1924. some the first president ever born in the hospital. his mother and he was able to be born in a hospital. the first time in american history. jimmy carter went to a place as cool and he was commissioned to into the navy. a submarine program. and then in 1953 his father succumbed to his to package a habit. jimmy carter was granted leave to go back and attend his father's bedside. a revelatory moment because he saw what his father's life admit to some many people to the things that he did not know about his father. the time, for example, that he provided money to of families of a combined enclosed to celebrate their daughter's graduation from high school, something they could not afford to do otherwise . the time that he carried people's mortgages when they were too poor for strapped to do so. the times that he had extended credit to various people in the family. and he returned to his posting in schenectady wanting to have a life much more like his father and to do the kinds of things that his father had done in the community. though center of his decision to leave the navy was rosalynn carter who was not abused by this development. apparently is nearly as i can tell. the cartridge from schenectady new york to georgia was conducted an almost total silence. to a very strong people. jimmy carter, the debate or the arguments. the transition. carter, of course, takes the business, not successful in his first year, less than $200 profit for the carter business interest. then he quickly begins to build this into a growing concern. he also begins to look more broadly and service to the community including servers on the sumter county school board and then on his 38 protect the october 1st 1962 jerry carter gets out of bed and puts on his sunday trousers rather than his work trousers and goes to america for the georgia state summit without having consulted rosalynn before doing so. when i asked about this says about a year ago pieces, i still can't believe i did that. he would not dream of making such a decision like that today without consulting his wife. times were very different in 1962 than they are now. the election, of course, is contested because of the widespread corruption. i forget the numbers. there were something like for some reason an alphabetical order to ounces second and third letters. it was really quite a remarkable day. of course he finds out about this. he is morally outraged. i have to say, my favorite book, turning point as bristles been robbed of his election. and he mounts a campaign when 1963. runs for governor 1966. in georgia at the time. beaten by of all people mad expiry notorious. his seriousness wais. did they after lyndon johnson. the parking lot of his restaurant with an ax handle threatening to. he did not want the desegregated restaurants. he uses this -- the campaign. the vigorous campaigning. in to that campaign. really the fields around planes. just not knowing how to proceed. very often with tears in his eyes. then, of course, carter stapleton, the pentecostal evangelist. he has a recommitment of his life to jesus was does seem to be very transform if. he speaks of that experience not as a born-again experience which occurred back in 1935 at the crest baptist church, but as a regal to weigh rejuvenation of his faith. on the heels of that jimmy carter goes to mission trips, want to lock haven, pennsylvania with other baptists corner and knocking on doors to tell people about jesus and again in springfield, massachusetts a november of that year of the cuban american pastor from brooklyn to. help me out here to believe this program. again, and very formative moment. at the end of their week together carter asks camino, how it is that he has such a strong belief and how he is so effective in dealing with other people. ben cruz stills carter that the secret to a life of faith or being a good question is two things, to love god and to love the person in front of you at any given time. and he repeats this many times over the course of his life as being a former the moment for him. he never loses sight of the georgia state house, and in 1970 he launches it another campaign, this time successful. mr. carter and others. he does "as a gracious vote in his campaign. at that time they could not succeed themselves. he endorses maddox and seeks and when some of the segregation in endorsements. he's uneasy about that even at the time. he tells him at that time, you like my campaign, but you will like my administration. there is some evidence that -- i think it is inconclusive, but there is some evidence that after that campaign carter apologizes to his perry opponent in that campaign, former governor carroll sanders for cars conduct during that campaign. but it was not exactly a sterling moment in the life of jimmy carter, and i think he realizes that and regrets it. he takes office as governor of georgia is january 12th 1971 and famously says the people of georgia the time for racial discrimination is over and this is in part what really estimates in. there is an article about jerry carter and his inauguration as governor, what he said to the people of georgia. within several weeks time magazine put some on the cover as an example of a new style of government, posters of governor perry not to mention the article carter is the one who was on the cover of time magazine. carter almost immediately begins to think about running for president after being governor of georgia. a few days. he begins looking toward larger rises. george mcgovern's cataclysmic loss to richard nixon and the presidential campaign of 1962 cars as tell with hamilton jordan and others and begins to plot out his rise to the presidency four years later. at the end of 1973, the beginning of 1974 to remarkable evidence to place within six months of each other. the narrative is going to virgil little bit more toward religion and faith. the thanksgiving weekend in 1973 in chicago, illinois at the wabash ymca to -- evangelicals, they hammer out a document called a chicago declaration of evangelicals social conservatives. this is a remarkable document the strain of evangelicalism that his offered in this document and available on the web of economic data for yourself, it's part of what are called progressive image of wasn't. takes his mandate from the new testament where jesus talked about having the character to be peacemakers, turn the other cheek. but also historical the the antecedent was evangelicals in the 19th century in the early 20th centuries who were very much concerned about those on the margins of society. in the antebellum time in particular coming out of an event that historians call the second great awakening at the turn of the 19th century there was and evangelicals reform impulse that really did reshape american society over the course of the 19th century. .. in the evangelicals were very much involved as a way for those as a part of society to have a better life. beaches there were a piece crusades in the early part of the century even with than control. all lotis were motivated and animated by a evangelicals to make the world better place. and what unites these is that they were directed to the margins of society. this is the tradition but most people don't know if it that in the 19th century robust tradition that served to rehabilitate and reform the american society the going to the 20th century as well as william jennings bryant three-time democratic nominee for president very conscious about workers' rights to organize and issues of this sort. so the people gathering in chicago 1973 trying to rehabilitate the tradition which had fallen away for reasons we can get into leader. and this document contains statements about militarism and the gap between rich and for and the scandal that people went to bet hungry anywhere in the world and equal rights for women which early '70s was something a radical idea with many religious folks. also they sought to address these things but november 73 at is a leader in athens georgia there was any event at university of georgia law school. called what day. is a tradition where the law school invites dignitaries like supreme court justices and attorneys general and the senators and various people to address them at law day. the senator from its juices senator kennedy was the biggest was the governor georgia. jimmy carter. in the morning kennedy gives the keynote address against richard dixon and carter tresses put it in terms of sinkers to use theologians one he quotes period often since the time of governor a and georgette that since the of a but the second instance was a great and well known theologian bob dylan. tucson that i a.m. marian tories unknown. -- but though lobbyist, the deck was stacked against the ordinary folks. the corporations and particular could hire a lobbyist and mutually themselves appointed to regulatory agencies was businesses and corporations but how about was unfair. georgia's prison population that he had taken an interest in and overwhelming the those men were pork, could not referred presentation but to have the justice system. he ruled up his presentation but through those populist themes he was beginning to rehearse for his presidential run 1976. of course, the journalists in the audience was speaking out and he figured hunter thompson from "rolling stone" magazine was simply going out to a the parking lot to refresh whenever dobra virgin was consuming and actually do is go into his car to retrieve his tape recorder because he wanted to record something extraordinary. a politician and telling the truth. later we describe the speech as a bastard of speech he said it was one of the most respectful or remarkable speech he has heard from a politician willing to take on powerful interest and speak the truth. within the six months period you have a remarkable juxtaposition and ideologies and the social concern and the beams that carter sounded 1974. by the way 40 years ago this month is when he gave this famous address. then he announces his candidacy for presidency december 12th and the month before the gallup organization conducted a poll of interest and presidential candidates and among the of 32 names they listed jimmy carter was not on them that is how dark of a horse he was when he announced his candidacy 1974. of course, he went on to iowa and new hampshire and was able to make a name for himself. was precinct officers the new hampshire with that becomes part of the conversation and in many ways the signal achievements in 1976 was the fact that on march 90 we george wallace in the florida primary thereby effectively ending george wallace's 10 year for the presidency. vanquishing the segregationist from political dive of the day. and then for having done that in 1976 goes on to the democratic national convention and then into the general election and find a high intel he decides he gives an interview to "playboy" magazine a few weeks before the election and this is the famous interview where he a acknowledged he lusted after other women other than his own life under the and remarkable. the press picked up on this and made a huge spectacle and carter began to sink and he lost 15 percentage points with the favorability rating after the playboy interview. desk week by that election over gerald ford and cats the presidency. to talk up the presidency itself not to to address specific endeavors or accomplishments but to focus on the religious situation that is quite remarkable so why is it had evangelical voters in great numbers to than turn against have four years later in 1980. there is a fascinating story try to tell in the book that is often misunderstood. that these evangelicals were exercised over the roe v wade ruling. jerry falwell and others and very often said they are the new abolitionist with the opposition to a portion and evangelicals to slavery and to actually there is a bit of fiction. abortion for evangelical simply was not an issue for most of the 1970's. we have some evidence for this but in 1969 . . >> >> the quick story aristos in particular not to oppose abortion for racial segregation in the issue was the rule of the 1954 budget the civil-rights act of 1864 antheil's except for bade racial segregation in order discrimination. the irs was trying to enforce the provision the act of 1864 in issued the opinion any organization that engages in racial segregation and discrimination is not by definition a charitable organization. therefore it has no claims of tax-exempt status. again i can go into details of the case that cannot of mississippi but it was called segregation academies after the education ruling of 1954. as the irs tried to force the ruling by the way from the district of columbia with the case to an force that provision the irs targeted a fundamentalist school called bob jones university said did not envy it - - shipment of african-americans as a part-time student on the campus of bob jones university and racial mixing did not admit to the student body but still retaining racial policies. that is what got the attention of people like jerry falwell who said it is easier to open a massage parlor of course, jerry falwell has his own segregation academy and this is what gets him and others motivated. as the architect of the religious right has corroborated is emphatic about this point i was trying to kick these people ever since of goldwater campaign and i tried everything i could think of. school prayer, prayer, abortion, nothing got their attention until the school issue and that is what galvanized them into a political movement. the second part of the story , the bob dylan case with the evangelical leaders but was also savvy enough to realize he needed day different issue to have grass roots evangelicals from the religious right and in 1978 the answer finally comes to him and particularly in minnesota and iowa something remarkable there are remarkableg three seats up for office. and the governorship rollup for grabs. and in iowa dick clark was the incumbent and going into the election no poll showed clark ahead by fewer than 10 percentage points during those final. but what happens in iowa and minnesota is pro-life catholics would deflate the church parking lot on the sunday before the election and in iowa clark news is too rare pro-life republican and in minnesota the pro-life republicans capture of three elections. the governorship in both senate seats. all of them on pro-life. when i was doing research at the university of wyoming in the laramie, the correspondence crackled with excitement. because he realizes he has got his issue to galvanize the new movement of the religious right and uses that to the phone advantage of the 1980 election that goes against carter as the evangelicals who was running for reelection against ronald reagan used commercials are more tenuous than carter's. for whatever reagan's quality was the episodic churchgoer and as governor of california passed most liberal abortion bill and the country but by 1980 came around to pro-life of them was good enough for falwell and other leaders of the religious right. but carter's faith politically is also compromised by billy graham's. a lot of people do have a lot of respect for billy graham but he repeated the threat out that 80 campaign gives assurance to carter himself or to his aides of his support but then days later he makes phone calls to people like reagan's campaign share offering to do whatever he could. this is all in the book i just give you a little bit. then of course, carter is defeated it goes back to receive begins to distort his post presidency and i will try to wrap this up quickly to take questions. and we stand here in one glorious manifestation of his post presidential years. and jimmy carter coming from the former president of emory university the only person for whom the presidency was a stepping stone into does capture where jimmy carter has done apparently he is not terribly fond but i do think it has captured. i called the book "redeemer: the life of jimmy carter" for a couple of reasons. in many ways he redeemed the nation after the sins of watergate. i try to impress to the students that they don't quite cast how low we were as a nation from confidence in ourselves and our confidence in institutions with the presidency and johnson lied about the unknown in nixon lied about pretty much everything. and carter comes along and says several never knowingly lied to the american people again. what a radical idea that the president would not my. we were not used to a sort of thing but also jimmy carter has many faults but i try to treat them fairly but no one died of a chess seriously questioned is moral core and they're going to read a few short passages from the epilogue from the claims of june 2nd then mr. carter would do here is is baptist country the roads are bracketed by red soil and buildings sporting names like shiloh variant baptist church, and missionary baptist church and greater good hope baptist church. love jesus no matter what in an end but others did take freeze your savior and to oppose each commandments on the chain link fence for travelers passing through time. those crossing into webster the boyhood home of jimmy carter in the business district in the former seaboard coast with a campaign headquarters in 1976 and known museum. it is no longer the hub of excitement that it was to learn more about the democratic nominee for president and then carter held that the train station and i have the mother who joined the peace corps and one sister races motorcycles another who was so holy roller preacher in their brother then pausing for dramatic effect i am the only sane one in the family. and then talk about going to church but meeting with him after church because he wants to you give me a book because he cannot find a new copy of the book. and then goes on to another event. and then to head out of town also known as old plays high way. said the young jim may carter walked as of bordet to sell for pocket money it has been characterized by the insatiable ambition to rise above his circumstances as the country boy as the navy's midshipmen as a respected world beater and humanitarian and carter had referred to martin luther's notion that each of us is responsible to guide with the ministerial authority actually impeded carter fell to newt the control criticism with the popular understanding to earn salvation protestants are equally susceptible end as i pass it is difficult to escape the impression that carter was driven into almost obsessed by the righteousness. he always believed in the value of work and the farm to sustain profitability it would lead to better opportunities and hard work might wind praise or promotion on the campaign trail working harder than your opponent to shake more hands would lead to victory. with long hours resolve to read every piece of legislation to ensure success and reelection. it disrupted that calculus the retractable odds the chronic energy dependence and the islamic revolution in iran the political opposition from his own party that simply would not yield to hard work for longer hours. that shattering electoral losses in 1980 not only was the end of his political career by repudiation of the notion that if you just work harder and longer for his efforts would be rewarded.
this particular moment, which is fraught with risks in europe resulting from the confrontation in ukraine. it is quite remarkably stupid to close down or to compromise. one of the few platforms for dialogue and dialogue in this particular event is at the ministerial level, not a deputy ministers or lower down. so to handicap, russia is to handicap c o s e. and to deprive us it's possible usefulness in regulating security issues on the continent now as a way, so good to have your company with us here at auto international, the headquarters based here in the russian capital. thank you for joining us. more storage to come anytime you like on our website, r t dot com of course it is 247 for the meantime. we are back soon with with winter often isn't all it is, you know, the china, even in europe, pool is still waiting for alternative energy sources continue to heat their homes the old fashioned way with firewood like young hobbies comes in. as i was going to proceed to schedule 10 popish amend for and talk to the and he trees that he's at. what soon? ok, on coven riley's as a hudson to partition to these. this is, i'm question to, to stay him on to do the classic ask. he's, it's, and by she doesn't say for like the keys are dining cost. last teams feel as if you had mentioned here. and i found out that you know, boss, it's a height on the sort of my fossil can i go into the home now? since last year we will see a high school the tides on the extensive trip this year for lunch. excellent. and all that sign in with blue wanted to seeing how she uses wholesale, sent a call from was, are here. how is potty, honest minor from here on the should be clean citing life. i go on and noticing ratio of into the teams. holton lunch on the cell. essentially, what you, what your house, you shop with fontes for palm mate always for state as they are, she really wants to come on the handle on also called the hot mix. now you have a new phone in your closet kilometer on here. hold on one to leave on all thinks more actually it does automate account information tail. yeah. so for the best edelman, the vin, do you got it on? when i don't know, what is the shooting move on to the point of view is steep side woman of dr. is get to. i'm for finance milk, a normal not often to know middle ah, what's up with? i was curious thing, i'm just, i'm putting you cleaner on to turn off this rec fights finder gospel for them also slammed high by just much, much i guess a bonus type question. i'm not good it by putting this may leaf aah debates. a heated in the bonus tag and also on the streets of european cities. ah, often seen from gas prices is that that's besides owned in thank so no need to pass it to yellows. and john, getting not clear on let's in the here is this got the fed as middle slant, hotels that cost the sand long hitting the sun emiliano of what am feebler space design listen via added the in the d, nato. but ceilings wise, the d. o. after you clean if insisted that it is that okay, does that non by tyler start a name to guns a me and i didn't want on was i'm becker kayden stuts o'neill and want on was like big than dallas could give isn't their country give isn't on give on gas one was against biggest guy. yeah. you know with the influx june, in december for it's ish, by percent pavilion went by 0 percent in this and just trying to keep the service angle. this is fine off to katana dryer, and she had isn't just asked to go, try to dismiss no content here again, like you guys either miss window. you listen to the of a mars who deleted the petroleum current with our food from lead. and i said no, melissa, not sleep. so i out cleaned the misconception. bowen, i met one so i was able to hear man on my own offering, fulfill to him, does kind of depend on you. so i didn't give out. valentine, outdated wound pipeline to ask. no, there are see pipeline funnel, the map point. so fella, but so far. mm . it's a shorter in a geek, one long. yeah. so the, the trust items are for the mentioned visual, i'm going to put them in the vital the keys in or fan norman finish better and just not finished and retrieve them on the site. me. i wish you really tits from the political want to see you on the about and ghastly form on to just know i know form just transports and foam on tagging us avoid diesel oil items shot issues of all our gas from doing this on the notes encounter this keep came out on a tv to also show belief with after the north stream pipeline was stopped for launching and then thrown up in gas and electricity. prices rose, sharpening the energy crisis grid to all of western europe, and prompted to search for the most affordable sources of heat in the run up to the winter. ah, a website. unless because i misty enough is for, with stockwell day, was before it went on with my wits company, there was no gain. as composers that i a big a also does open the door therapy. the lack of gas and other energy sources isn't europe's only problem, whole abandoning nuclear power and relying on so called sustainable systems is led to widespread shortages divisions and society made soaring electricity prices. my mom is different. i'm, when they ask for is it's in a kind of in coughed m m, i totally. how does land, whom am i taught? how hm. a shoe in a visa back land, honestly with love, i live like, and they can with it, come up in. so with michael kima. good, now heidi find that when he's in my seat, i was about warden voice and data. i'd like to denita sherlock. let us see how that truly out is one hardly house vehicle of dimension d n. any, if it is an unlocking lorne does this, our middle of our live is in a shuffling belief in franchise wooded audit. i'm in class online by visiting so tom says that's locked ah resiliency on mode. the only a stages early in the bathroom place. why the mom that you have key cumbersome it? it i see on point children reprimand is jojo speaker. oh chris on. sorry. i put as children for sole patio onique. so what else? yeah. the customer phone cell phone. mm hm. so for both renewal, you know, any food about mid to help me with the story probably came with mm. salters to wind turbines, main disadvantage, thousands of birds and bats get around in leads annually. the environmental damage caused by occasional fan dismantling the gauge. the whole idea of the eco friendly energy source in annoying puerto let donald in a noise and do this with on meter of eisen, the supreme for the he owns the land, but i hands on the cover one falls on lying about a producer cover. one pause and can reflect awesome food like bow. wow. so form lines. get this kind there and zones concept is can nice. and zach van says, almost this kind of like a cycle that would have glimpses and bonfire friendly teaser has an for leaking on dead landon longish tide. this isn't a fan of acres on has all the net gun is torn as creeps, arrogant. anger school is a fine surprise on frenzy really long of named border who buddy hold on up to who prescribe lavine to sacre also agreed on. no less. so if you put you show it in chrissy or before mom to ever know probably wrote as seo saying twisted in nuclear, have a key that more important jewish declares tradition, clear, killer, quoted, a part of my associate was all we should be. some controversy should request on how nuclear hall's michel pretend young taught to do it is not that i peskin more, but anyway, the point picnic don't could sit or people my mom could isn't 100 family put his pediatrician ah ah, i finished midnight j a d o can i get from that point in time? amen. cliff is getting it right. it may be price. i real bad that i had price. expos yawn, goddamn, see it. she really with his work by simply he couldn't get the rebate gang and he found out why it's connie lightning, mom ah, ah, i didn't even so many lots to fight. when you see fit to leave him lie and select the big house cuz i put a few office who needs is a need, a gum, grow speaker i and, and also use the hum concord and the price is dirty. to mail price to desist of ons, him who unto you know to god. so enough there. thank you. play with my daughter's house sponsors was young for in a key and then see if i print it out here. i'm standing in the fax number and on a store, nor does and from from that, 0 one at least one medium noise from one people were dismemberment on for the you know, come off the octave is going to dallas and the little we're not even new off dawslet and they have to do it and the elect, alika. yeah. was mandatory with america dialect won't make you both on the scene to have the media and of course moves will die that with i look in april holt, i will money block at the mine medic can broke price because we show that emotionally adult to mobile occasions high number 5. sure. oh yeah, but the conoco vote for martin even me at aiken and not a bit of a do the bit of the iphone x cause why i'm on with do anything will want to miss all appropriated. that ain't go away from my home. i do cove all of that in and actually a emotional to my ah ah ah ah ah ah ah a bit would per did the p those do, does all you saw and they saw it like that and best. thank you, my dear. when philip hopa unix with us, so i'm going to good mm shes. he had to pick it up. she depressed, got 4 more kick her theory. poopy will actually present mark to all my can poopy no . well, the form was in a jew, i'll look for the gum there. mckenna would lose you and make, you know, so on the home in norton, but a close, old prescott was ordered to select up when he saw ha, my city, can you do the shoes? when notify me where to who i did on? i could, i could to chris, lily, donnie worse that they did fail with missouri was with her. i took 30 always so they get like as actor more. yeah. like get her a result. i want you to had let them look at all sir. it's ms. remember like the challenge is eyes looks of those in june it difficult go. sure, sure. they treasure then. ah to log i call now go. why is it less kid? if would you guess propose for me there will produce in the only like, or fell mail is you can easily in the corner when there was that on poor at the provision, the gossip up call is off to kill phone guys will not to do no, no, up, i don't know where buys a park your but how i say go over there. what would you like the example doctor? i believe a by don't guy by your, by the on more than a pushing ah, ah, look at shows. kimberly owen, them is also a dish with dish all cook felder is all i fish. she saw all kinds of a for go one cycle it with a to a new with lego. a she quoted me as mommy. they pleaded the day all the time. they did go. she doub when she shall, dave would be small. good. she might be small job will or do you we shall rule. plucky girl, my kids love. neil. good left. and i'll be saved from up in nebraska, subject to 3. i grew dale, does it come in the official but a dupree didn't have salt clack, a dollar which was free is issued to me. i think under the pre you judging else y'all, bhaskar and the book of her, but baltimore did a good day. a vicar tempered wash if the to produce your 1st to pick it up, the not clean your in best. do. norman victory. taylor don't. can i call the small did the falmouth kate dear, i'm a u e and forgot me bollard i became just your going la police off pet. all didn't of soccer quantico zep just because it mm not got a very i mean depending on what didn't a ship us. it boggles at a new pre at the starboard in his ashad or dante, wondering if they stopped her. a dupree. that could catch all mcnulty at the condo . yes. joel moultrie, don't normally, dupree don't. if i had to press can only so gay. all the p a to meet you. people do a p member bach law or you do a 5 dollar coin, mika, she vol. that she only to don't j. zunker skis because you know i could produce shoulder keel mondor event vents. episode knox is called her just automatic, as he said, a dip in your e if the issue or solves a christy with the defense like you say, bianca fidelmo, tickers he there is roy because of woocommerce. ah, richard dixon did it is the prescriptive appraiser, oscar. she'll know shipping guys, if you don't pay it, if you don't pay, if you could do. mm hm. papa exemption is your the best interest shell or false. a claim of, as i do, i want to know, does he go the 4 cylinder, something more? could i false edge? it's on 100 because he don't we don't have enough is if the gus is only about you don't, he fails. antoine halls. please don't have to pay compo, phone to the consumers, show anyone don't. yeah. if it's a cooperation engine, teach yogas yet before a symbol. but under the all mean to get a 3 bleak out of the kids. so sanguine only for me with your gas would on the agenda really mean body he'll but i think i me this or this event, a interesting he's been as down what he's kimberly on that as for last. so. 6 out here with god he didn't can you that? yeah, he's be then the son mars. a similar problem is having golf. the whole of western europe, a meat gas sandstone and such do monday via trust in deutschland, in earth that i can feel and on linden, massachusetts. those is tied to some protection of your trust comment at home last note by the gas leaf island meeting. kuhn still not to summon him, they move there. these are still in that these are showing them that mode sent me a revised iran border on fred. you guys said ted here, david mcgee, bones, truck, home boy, maybe a good thing is, was just got on the bus home with the netherlands is one of the few western europe in countries with significant natural gas reserves. a drunken gas field is one of the world's largest, 2740000000000 cubic meters. why did they stop developing it and continue to rely on cheap russian streams? die hunting? is this any a long hospital? no. dordy stats show an actual, sorry to hear, felt our feelings of fear. violette fear to small yards. my dusting mist, the house spinning and late. it'll bonum darling. legacy ad basing it later today. here for house and honing a try to have a float and fail a 2nd order in tune has missing one lunch with results. delafield health on the street. oh no, not much. they have a feel for honish midway on the overhead. if that commands out if a new los close to the school starts and he'll from answer, he'd been neat. no states need her canal with a guy come out from a to them. we haven't opened an ad facing in anc boom. and there's hail, storm your war each. you paid me by more due in depth about booter and donation is didn't add with an inductor down what happened even gone exceptional, made an old and they've been yesterday more than that. i had a low grade, but it isn't it good working rollover that. go back to your l at that lot. flow available or yoshi, persona file for mensa and the van of the for native thing and yeah the active i and that was that a little takes i i look i'm really toward a den delta had the amenities. welcom seen ho jason's had an in house. could you bear to say i get there from mike? i believe for horner toyota in there, i'll show bahamas for the door. the overhead due to message damage to housing. guest extraction was phased out. the ombudsman called it a national crisis for the netherlands. ah ah ah, a particularly what does know in like mid ball with a did really don't get there. do you see the p d doctor that door we've just started on my levy a day. we'll go to that vehicle, who do you have it? by diploma? economic difficulty or facial attic? doll. i could deal devonte city. i'll be all good. do you have to plateau at don't know. so now some of you actually don't. luckily he bodies, dave all golfing loveland. other chip, what rita r o vanya on, if what does, does he do people effective good on, if he did pre shackle or not, he applied caledonia. what aiden was on get out of date, will do. plus those electron roygenia that day. oh practical is it? do we shall general jack done. we'll we'll do. you saw you saw 2nd build. let doesn't news. i know. get going. be new. he goes automatic. mo, the record is on gave. i caught, you know, marty to read critical p k. yet it's all just saw us pick it up. iraqis, partial, who really? tabitha? to train. who do b? one ship october. oh no one you call popular? yeah, that's good. no one would you come in here. ah, ah trip my name when you collect a computer just use your daddy theologically? yep. us good. we have a few audi dish o d k. the model is more, you know, we don't usually it been open till millville. ah lou ah. what we've got to do is identify the threats that we have. it's crazy. even foundation, let it be an arms race group is on often has very dramatic development only personally and getting to resist. i don't see how that strategy will be successful, very political time. time to sit down and talk lou children at st in residential school, suffered nightmarish levels of abuse, torture and child rape. and yet the office of the attorney general suppressed thousands of pages of police and evidence that identified those perpetrators in the school. i was electrocuted twice. i was only 7 years old. first too high for me. so for me to put me in the chair or by the law, i used to run over here be somebody and run here and she kept solution in the whip himself. some of them are, my relatives didn't make it jerking themselves to death over doses. but it made me make me the person i am today because i'm afraid i don't give up with anything. investigations were too often handled differently because the decease was indigenous. so many of the worst criminals got away the bishop's got away. the ones who done most of the damage never got charged . ah, the headlights are on our t. as moscow demands an international investigation into an alleged massacre. russian soldiers who are being held in captivity by ukrainian forces soft, a chilling footage, suggesting a mass execution emerges on the line. also ahead for you this hour with 10 minutes away from your product blog job here is to stabilize patients to stop leading, get them to say, if it's a frontline hospital in the new gods, republic, or russian volunteer doctor's fight to say the lives of wounded soldiers also protested in buckingham fast, so set fire to the french embassy. it made escalating grieve.
the effects of which continue to reverberate across today's political landscape we all think we know that that history is well written and well-spoken for but now irwin gelman has become america's contemporary leading authority on the 1960 election, and he's the first historian to truly use mounds of material from the archives to tell a more complete account of the 1960 election including unused sources. such as the fbi surveillance logs of then candidate john f kennedy and the papers of leon jaworski and henry cabot lodge, jr. gilman is a scholar of 20th century presidential history whose two prior books have documented the congressional and vice presidential periods of richard nixon's life. and his third entitled the campaign of the century kennedy nixon and the election of 1960 does not disappoint. gilman is joined in conversation this evening with another renowned 20th century presidential historian, dr. luke nichter who holds the james h cavanaugh endowed chair in presidential studies at chapman university dr. nichter is a new york times bestselling author who's credits include two volumes of the nixon tapes with historian, doug, brinkley. a biography of henry cabot lodge jr. and nectar is now at work on a history of the 1968 presidential election. ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in welcoming irv gelman and dr. luke nichter. here. thank you. now first of all, i'd like to thank you all for coming. i appreciate it. i hope you enjoy the evening, but i'd like to spend. two minutes maybe and thanking my wife gloria gay for tricking me to come to the nixon library. i had absolutely no intention to write a book on richard nixon. let alone now three books on richard nixon. but nobody else will do it. is a project the most historians especially academics won't do you just can have tenure promotions. or anything when you write about darth vader and to many academics nixon is darth vader. which is unfair untrue etc. but i was married to gloria gay for 29 years until she passed away. she was a wonderful wonderful person. and i just want to let you know that i wouldn't be here. if it wasn't for her tricking me into coming. a couple of other things some of you have i know have been friends for years john and ruth ann. evans have been incredibly kind. paul and candy took me out for dinner and more importantly and most importantly there's two people sitting over there. one has gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard as name is joe dimalowski. drink the other is susan nolte who was the chief archivist for years and years and years and is not only brilliant but as a sweetheart. and the reason why i wanted to point it out was my beginning of my book has acknowledgments. and these aren't just names to me. they're important people they make me better than what i am. they helped me more than i deserve to be helped and it's a great kindness that they've done. so when you read my knowledgements, you'll find out that there are a truckload of people like susan and like joe that have helped me and i really appreciate it, but i wanted to give you a picture of what these people look like at how kind people can be to research historians. so again, susan joe. thank you. here well, thanks very much for that that welcome and in particular to the nixon library and the richard dixon foundation and also to c-span viewers who are joining us virtually. as starting a little bit. more personal before we dive into the book. it welcome back to the west coast. you know, i think for for many years. this was probably a second home or a home for you. how many years did you spend here? and do you miss it? i spent with susan nolte. seven years going through documents day by day week by week year by year. this volume here is a mere two and a half million pages of research and that's what i do. and since you asked that question, i have a plot another plug that i forgot to give a year from now luke victor will be sitting in this seat. he is finished a study of the election of 1968 and we'll show that the anish adult incident had virtually nothing to do with the election of 1968. so if you're here now come back for luke a year from now and find out what really did happen in 1968 and we can just be an opposite seats at that point, but but juxtapose that experience of turning presidential for seven years. with the fact that with with sort of where you came from, i think i once heard you talk about or describe yourself as a slum kid from baltimore. and so how does someone in that situation go on to get a phd in american history from indiana university and ultimately come to write not a book but a series on the subject. i was very lucky. i didn't spend my life in jail. i have a 19-inch knife scar on my shoulder. the guy was kind enough to crack a building building brick over my head. and walking home from school. it was always a kindness if i had less than four people beat me up. how in the world i got out of it? i'm guessing it was sheer luck. and how i ended up getting a doctorate writing books. i still have to pinch myself. i i guarantee you. if any of you think that i'm not good. truly, i'm not that good. so we're here to talk about a book, but some know and some may not know that it's also part of a larger series. and so you when you're doing show and tell of nixon books, it's never easy to carry them around, but i'll sort of briefly introduce each book and maybe have you say a word or a line or two about each one to sort of just properly tease them for the audience. so the first book in the series richard nixon the contender the congress here is 1946 to 1952. the basis of the book is that nobody ever really seriously did the research that susan nolte helped me with and the remarkable thing that i found about it was the charges of nixon beating jerry voorhees for his first congustial election in 1946. that nixon smeared voorhees as a communist never happened. it was all made up. and the real story was not here at the nixon library. it was and the jerry vorhees papers and pomona and the second thing that i found remarkable. was that nixon smeared helena hagin douglas as a pink pink lady in the 1950, california senatorial contest. the problem was the only time he ever referred to her as pink was in a private conversation between him and his political relations person. but as far as the reason why she lost can be found in norma, oklahoma and her archives at the university of oklahoma. so the whole nature of how nixon was darth vader in these two elections are fundamentally flawed. and moving forward in time and nixon's career the second the biggest thickest of the series the president and the apprentice eisenhower and nixon 1952 to 1961. that one is basically nixon's vice presidency and how he ran for the vice presidency. and again once more the story is so flawed. one of the stories came from an oral history interview. where dwight eisenhower was watching nixon give what was known as the fund's speech of the checker speech and slammed his hand into what he was writing on and talked tore the paper. the only problem was is i found a copy of the speech. and there was no tearing there was nothing. it was just a normal piece of paper. and then even better than that was that nixon and eisenhower didn't get along that really eisenhower didn't like nixon. and i'm saying to myself self. how in the world can dwight eisenhower? be president for eight years and have nixon has his vice president for eight years and they didn't get along. quite frankly they get along fine. and once i wrote the corrective, i know this is going to shock you. but people stop talking about that. is it an amazing that you can lie? just so much until you get caught and then you just stop you don't apologize. you're basically intellectual cowards. and so then the with the latest installment of the series, which we'll dive into here in a moment campaign of the century kennedy nixon and election of 1960. how many years would you say you've been formally or informally working on this collection of works? 25 years and how many pieces of paper pages of records do you think you've examined red turned or investigated? i read about 800 pages a day. that's why. and i could do that with comprehension. the fact is i didn't think it was a book. i don't i was a fan of theodore white the making the president 1960. i thought he told everything. i know i started to do the research. and again the surprise you i was wrong. there was and has been up until i wrote this. nobody had ever read archival research. when the great debates of 1960 of kennedy's catholicism of 1960 the fraud in 1960 all of that stuff had never been done. and had been mentioned maybe but not have had ever been done in a serious archival way. so i looked at all this material and i discovered. but rather the theater white who by the way in his memoirs claimed that i'm writing or i wrote. the making the president 1960 purposely purposely in his memoirs. making kennedy the hero and nixon a villain. well, that's not the way you write history. and so this is basically not only a corrective fear or white but to basically say that the entire story of the 1960 election has been seriously flawed. so having that is background, let's take a look at what the critics say in reviews of these books. all three of these books have been reviewed in the new york times as well as many other places. i think that alone signaling that these are books worth paying attention to but i think the critics in the reviews have no shortage of things to talk about. and i i went through in preparation. i read all three of the reviews in the time times these three books. and i'd like to go through so just sort of the very top 20 outtakes. from these reviews and get your thoughts. and these are comments direct quotes either about the author his the work in question being reviewed or about the works characterization of richard nixon. refers to the works as a forgiving judgment richard nixon he acquits nixon of all charges. he takes one side. more polemical than persuasive he distorts the views of those he would rebut. there he says the rancor the rancor filled prejudices against his own clear-eyed distillations. your naive you're not persuasive. they're a feast that leaves one hungry. simplistic bland i'm not done. a sympathetic glow in no way substantiated nixon friendly spin adds nothing here, but fresh outrage. a hit job lacking nothing new and circumstantial so my old boss at c-span was brian lamb and so to sort of channel brian lamb he would say. urban off galman, what you doing wrong? i keep on telling you. i am a lot less than you think i am and even with these people i'm even lesser than you think i am. the the one review i got in the new york times for this book said nothing new everything i've written is --. well, he didn't say --, but he meant -- and that quite frankly if you read the book you're an idiot and that appeared online in the new york times and my sales went up four times. it then made the sunday edition of the new york times and my sales went up three times. and then the week after it appeared in the new york times sunday edition. to show you how crazy the new york times is i became an editor's choice. so the the editors of the new york times repudiated their own reviewer. so it just goes to show you if any of you are familiar out here with fairhaven. i probably am a reject from fair haven. and i'm not sure where to go with a question after that. but i think what i would ask is. what? why is writing about richard nixon still so controversial? there are several reasons, but i think the main reason is one of the reviews that i received which was a nice review. it wasn't bad it. it said i can't see it. i mean dixon was so bad and kennedy was so good. there's no way that this book that is written as well as it is written and the arguments that are made are so reasonable. it just it just it just can't be. and one of the reviews i got from a syndicate in canada was an important book in your water read it, but 60 years they've gotten it wrong gilman's narrative is like swimming upstream. so the general tenor of nixon being a despicable individual one of the the greatest things that i remember as i was writing. the second volume was that just about every liberal commentator. hold the speech maudlin. and maudlin is not a good term. i found in the adley stevenson papers. at princeton about a hundred and twenty letters. that were favorable to stevenson and unfavorable to the chucker. speech. the only thing i left out was there were about three million pieces of paper that went into the republican national committee saying how wonderful the speech was. and yet to this day many people believe that the checker speech was modeling when in fact, it was a great speech that was considered by an overwhelming number of people just imagine three million people wrote in to say how good the speech was and yet you remember a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty letters. by people probably who didn't even listen to the speech on how awful it was. now something seems to be a little out of balance there when a hundred plus people can say it's he was awful and three million people can say he was great. i think that we have become generally speaking so conditioned to things that never been challenged. people don't challenge what they don't think about in many cases. and what i did was not so much to record what i personally thought. but what the record showed and the record showed something quite different than what's been published and i think that for one of a better. rationalization or reasoning that the fact the people have accepted this nonsense so easily is because they just want to well, i think that theme of sort of the many myths and misunderstandings in the nixon era is a theme that resonates throughout the book here. and so i've highlighted i call them myths or misunderstanding about seven of them that come to me reading the book and i have some photos that will help to illustrate the myths that we'll click through here, but for each one, i think what i'd like to do is sort of state the conventional wisdom or the myth and misunderstanding just as it's existed in the literature over the decades and allow you to respond to each one. so i think number one the role of eisenhower that nixon perhaps lost in 1960 because eisenhower didn't do enough. that sort of nixon was on this ill-fated ticket that didn't have eisenhower's support. he might not have been eisenhower's choice to run and there's lots of mythology about exactly what eisenhower's role was during this year and it's something that you address in the book. once more you you write what you think people want to read rather than write what really happened? just imagine for a second. that nick that eisenhower absolutely hated nixon. can any of you seriously hear believe that eisenhower would want? a senator with no legislative experience with no legislative record to beep his incumbent vice president who would carry on his role? the whole idea that eisenhower and nixon did not get along or to not have a good relationship. is is flawed by the very nature of all the things eisenhower had nixon doing going on foreign trips. helping with legislation being invited to all of the various meetings that eisenhower and nixon chair together it makes no logical sense when you talk to people and you say how could all of this happen? and eisenhower in nixon not get along for eight years. they made faces and one another. well, i couldn't choose just one eisenhower photo. i like this one because it gets in pat nixon. could you say you know as we in 1960 election has been called kind of one of the first modern campaigns? can you talk a little bit about even in 1960 the role that patent nixon played and the role of women in the campaign? i'm sure all of you already know all the the numbers of voting but remember. how charismatic? kennedy was and remember how women smoot. the election of 1960 for the first time in american history more women voted than men and you'll never guess. what the breakdown was between this wonderful charismatic kennedy and women voting it was 51:49. oh, i made one small error 51 for nixon 49 for kennedy. pat nixon took the position that this is what her husband's was. she was very ambitious like her husband very very smart. a very attuned to what he was doing the the ultimate defender. and she and mimi eisenhower and dwight eisenhower. had a very good relationship and if you look at the letters between dwight eisenhower and richard nixon again, big surprise just about every one of them said say hello to pat. i really appreciate her help. doesn't sound like the eisenhower and his wife mamie did not get along with -- impact. the second misunderstanding or myth of the campaign is that nixon and lodge were sort of ill-suited together on the ticket and that lodge was the downfall for richard nixon that year. what do you say? on january 7th 1960 dwight eisenhower wrote a secret memo to his own file his presidential pick was richard nixon. his vice presidential pick was henry cabot lodge, jr. it wasn't so much nixon picking. large it was eisenhower were picking lodge. and at the time lodge was you and representative? for the united states and was the main person who talked about the russians being evil and made a tremendous amount of television time. he had the ability. he was a boston brahman. and by the way you may not know the person that wrote the biography of henry cabot lodge jupiter. it's luke victory. it was not a self-serving question. i promise. so third misunderstanding, i kind of highlight about 1960 on the democratic side. also interesting that so many senators current or former in 1960 senator john f kennedy, senator lyndon johnson the i so how about this one that kennedy would not have been elected president without johnson because it was really eisenhower be kind of chip away at the south, louisiana. he took in 56 virginia both campaigns really began to eat away at the traditional democratic south would kennedy have won the presidency do you think without lyndon johnson from texas to hold down hold down the democratic south as we would say in the most area that terms not a snowball's chance of hell. what lyndon johnson brought to the table? was what ronnie duggar who was a famous texan journalist said that every election that johnson and the rest of the people that ran for elections in texas during the timeframe up to 1960 was competitive corruption. it was just depending on who could steal more votes. and johnson ran in 1941. and lost because he didn't steal the votes. but in 1948. he won by 87 votes and received the wonderful nickname landslide linden. now imagine for a second imagine and no election. that johnson ran it did he win without corruption? and yet every author every major biography of lyndon johnson. talks about the fraud in 1941. and in 1948 multiple chapters one book major biography on the election of 1960 says oh, by the way. there was nothing about fraud in 1960, so i'm not going to talk about it since there was no fraud why talk about it. and in another book it didn't even make a half a sense and made footnote on the next little last page and the volume. and it basically said there was no fraud in illinois because authors listen to junior said there was no fraud a fairly impartial guy that worked for john kennedy and was the ultimate member of the democratic party and in addition to that. there was no fraud in texas. and the reason why there was no fraud in texas is because leon jaworski said, you can prove it. so obviously the answer to the question is there was no fraud because people who had a great stake and saying there was no fraud was no fraud. the only problem with that is they liked? we will return to the topic of fraud in a few more questions. next misunderstanding or myth of the campaign. this is a nixon arriving in in hawaii. you can see kind of the aloha sign there and his arrival and giving a speech there at that. stop that brief campaign stop. so another myth and misunderstanding that it was a mistake for nixon to pledge to campaign in all 50 states. and again all the people that write about the election especially people that write about how wonderful that kennedy was and how brilliant his campaign was and how in the world could nixon be so stupid as to run it all 50 states? none of them mentioned the kennedy campaigned in 45 states, i guess he was five states less stupid the next one was. the nature of the way that both of them ran. and if you want to take a look at this in the most objective way is that nixon had just as many votes. as kennedy had so i'm guessing since they both had the similar just about the same amount of votes. the kennedy must have run a much better campaign than nixon did the only problem again with that is how in the world if both of these guys got the same amount of votes that one ran a far superior campaign than the other it just it the logical inconsistency is undeniable and yet folks don't want to talk about our next myth or myth understanding. is that the arrest of martin luther king that fall in 1960 was decisive in the election outcome. so could you in the and while answering that charge? set up a little bit the relationship between nixon and king. what kind of background there was and what role that played during the campaign? martin luther king jr. by 1960 was a major player. not the major player. what was a player in black society. and the nature of the campaign with blacks was the story better yet the fable is that king was arrested. for violating a minor parole violation i was sent to a hard georgia prison. and one of nick kennedy staff said called kennedy and said you should call coretta kid. and and offering something and he did. and that's just about all he did was offer sympathy because jack kennedy was the last democratic candidate. that actively solicited white voters in the south. jack kennedy, you know solicited white votes in the south. absolutely. that's what he did. story gets better. according to the story after the call greta blacks went crazy and they changed their vote enormously. and according to the black newspapers five million blacks went to the polls. 50% of all black voters went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly for jack kennedy. and the democrats sent out. trailway bosses across the united states. i mean, isn't this a great story across the united states handing out ballasts the people to vote. for jack henry there's only one small problem. it never happened. there were no trailway bosses. there were no massive amount of literature there weren't five million black voters the best number i have is somewhere between two and a half million to three million blocks. that's 25 to 30 percent. of all eligible black voters and by the way from 1936 when blocks changed dramatically for the electing democrats the elect two-thirds go to democrats and one-third go to republicans through the 1960 election. let me think. kennedy received 68% about of the black vote nixon received 32% of the black vote now. i'm not real good when numbers like like john evans but 32% sounds like a third. 68% sounds like 2/3. so nothing changed as far as the numbers went the story has become so exaggerated and so out of line. and it's still to many people. unbelievable change in the election and quite frankly it never happened. we have two more to go the next myth or myth myth understanding whether the issue of religion and kennedy's catholicism. and the extent to which the candidates used religion as a political issue. in the campaign of 1960 whether that was the decisive. whether that was decisive in the outcome. no one has ever done. research on the influence of catholicism in the 60 election it's there's two books on it. and they were so actively researching that none of them did archival research. it's again. it's so much powerful the course that you just write where you feel like writing with no no material to support it. kennedy one with 53% of his vote from catholics. over half of his votes over 17 million votes came from catholics. according to the republican national committee somewhere between four to six million. more catholics voted in 1960 than ever before. the nature of that meant that kindly could not have won the election. without the catholic vote in addition to that in 1952 and 1956. eisenhower got 62% of the protestant vote in 1963 apartment in 1950 in 1960 to show you how much of this has changed it went from 62% all the way up. a great jump to 63% it literally didn't change material at all. and yet the way the story is told is fundamentally wrong because the kennedy machine was talking they were really going to smear nixon and a landslide and when the landslide didn't happen the most convenient reason was too many. too many bigots the only thing they don't mention is in 1956 nixon the plumbing eisenhower got almost 50% of the catholic vote. the only number that significantly changed in 1960. was that kennedy received 78% that's an increase of 29% and yet no one ever mentions it. and what i think one of the ancillary charges, of course the photo billy graham with president kennedy and in the oval office the after was over. that so can ancillary to that as sort of that that nixon. used religion in a dirty way during the campaign to exploit this this idea. that was america ready to elect its first catholic hit of course, you know talk about al smith or you know, the previously did you find evidence of this either side using religion in in this kind of harsh political way 60 there were some there were there were some fundamental bigotry where certain evangelicals and others did not want a catholic in the white house because they didn't want the pope running the federal government, but by and large what happened in 1928 with al smith had significantly changed. the the amount of adversarial relations between catholic voting and non-catholic voting had mellowed a great deal. so the idea of the charge that nixon was dirty because he was encouraging bigotry. sable nixon stuff you don't have to prove it. all you have to do is say it. we've already talked a little bit about fraud but let's close on that topic nowadays. we see i think every political election in these red. and blue maps of the outcome from 1960 and the version of it that i like to best because you really get into some more regional trends is the one by county. of course red being republican blue being democratic and so i guess when you see a map like this comment a little bit on a couple things. what do you see when you see a map like an outcome like this? for its own sake but also kind of compared to what eisenhower began to do in the south. and then ultimately the big question was their fraud and if so, was it decisive? the numbers that i ran first of all say that nixon had every likelihood of winning, texas and illinois. how do you want, texas and illinois he would have been president of the united states in 1960. but what i see when i look at the entire map. is a precursor of what we are experiencing now. the nation is starting to divide. fundamentally into two sections the urbanites and the nature of certain block voting black voting jewish voting labor voting etc becoming fundamentally democratic. and suburbia and rural becoming very much republican. and what you have now, i think is the most extreme of that where people simply of one ilk or another won't talk to one another. there's there's virtually no intercourse they simply are so extreme and their partisanship is it? bodes well for partisan voting which is fundamentally 40% republican now and 40% democrat now. but in 1960. the remarkable thing is nixon receives almost 95% of the republican vote pretty hard to believe somebody so evil as nixon could get 95% and our hero jack kennedy. received 84% of the democratic vote all kennedy had to do. was to keep his base. there were 17 million more democratic registrants than there were republicans. 40 40 million democrat republican registrants and 57 million democratic presidents if henry had simply kept his base. he couldn't even do that. and the nature of the election was not only so close. it was even closer than anybody believed because again, nobody bothered to run any numbers. it's it's amazing how incorrect the results of the election have been told ie kennedy won the election by a hundred and twelve thousand votes. i ran the election results for different ways. one way the best he did was about 107,000 votes. the next way i ran it he went by 27 but thousand votes. the next way i ran it nixon won by 130,000 votes and the final way. i wrote it ran it is nixon won by 56,000 votes. and yet people to this day continually run these numbers as if they were gospel. without evaluating what really happened? well, there's plenty more we can get into i haven't even asked you about the debates. so maybe if we have time we'll get into that. but for now though, i i'd like to go to the audience we have time for some some q&a. that'll be a lead here with a microphone coming around and we'd love to get here your questions here. before we begin with the q&a. let's get a round of applause for mr. gilman and dr. nichter. we will open the floor for questions if you have a question, just raise your hand or signal to me and i'll come and get you. but the first question is i would like to ask if myself what advice do you have for young researchers? and where do you think they should start? do that again. what advice do you have a young researchers? and where should they start? well professor nick dr. and i are lucky we already have established records the problem for young people and i talked to my editor at yale about this. 20 years ago to now the amount of material written has increased by 10% the amount of books that are published now. is three times? as many very few pages increased but the number of publications have increased three times. it's very very difficult. a break into writing if you are or able to get published. it is. more power to you some of us get lucky some of us don't but if i were any of you i would try to. write letters to the editors right in newspapers or magazines or anything you could do to get your name in or i would find somebody that really knows what the hell they're doing. and ask them to help. but generally speaking it is incredibly bleak for young people even if they do brilliant research to find a publisher. thank you to your left over here. thank you, dr. gelman. i learned a lot. i had a lot of questions that you clarifying but the question for you you mentioned a couple of times you repeated the words evil nixon. and you reason why some of the perceptions? were inaccurate flawed but you also said that inaccurate. flawed precepts were as if they were facts. so what was causing this? why? why did people? feel the way they did. ordinarily people don't believe things that are so easily contradictory like, you know more women voted for kennedy the nixon. well, that's not true. and but did they believe that? that's just an example. the answer is is so complex. one first of all democrats harry truman virtually hated the ground that nixon walked on. eleanor roosevelt felt the same way. adley stevenson hayden nixon with a passion. the leaders of the democratic party one the fundamental extreme one because nixon was vulnerable and two because eisenhower was not you didn't talk the great man, because it was a waste of your time. so you went after someone that they thought was possible to go after but what is worse than that? is today in newspapers magazines television, you have some of these people who are commentators that i nicely call idiots. and they will tell you material that makes no sense at all and one day one thing and one day the exact opposite thing. but back in the day in 1960. you had a bevy of famous calmness of newspaper reporters that simply wrote what happened? whereas kennedy had these great energetic audiences. election had awful. nobody was there. and if you saw a pictures kennedy had good audiences and surprise nixon had good audiences. did nixon have people that thought he was charismatic? absolutely the kennedy have people that thought he was charismatic. yeah. but theodore white for example, and i quote this in the book goes on to nixon's train in october of 1960. wearing a win with kennedy lapel button. key, can you get and yet these people behind the scenes behave poorly? and to to give you my my own personal experience. when i taught especially after i started writing about richard nixon. people would talk to me. i could apply for grant after grant after grant and have superb grants and get thank you so much. no. and the nature of writing about nixon anything other than saying he was darth vader. was not publishable. and for one of a better word publishers are greedy. they want to make money and if they can't sell books. they don't publish now the campaign of the century and my other books have sold pretty -- well, but what it what it means is is either i'm fooling a lot of people or that there is a a certain amount of belief that the material that's been written so long so wrong. i'll tell you one last thing i was nominated for a thing called the plutarch award and 2015 for the best biography of the year. and i got a call from a high up in the thing and said they're 257 books nominated. they're going to narrow it down to the top 10. irv, don't feel bad you're not going to make it. two months later i get a call from the same guy saying earth. i got to tell you you made it to the top 10, but now it goes down to the top four. there's no way you're going to be a finalist forget being the finalist. a month later i get a call irv. you got to sit down for this. you're a finalist. so i have on my wall hanging, you know, finalists for the plutarch award. go figure i have i was very pleased it's always nice to be knowledge. but the man that was telling me this was on the inside knew everything was going and there was not a prayer. i didn't have a chance. and yet sometimes it changes. thank you robert behind. yes, dr. gelman, i as a communications major. i'm just curious. could you speak to the televised debate? to let the televised debate that we so much about nixon looked angry and well, we already moved tan and we all know what happened. he was poorly. tanned, you know kennedy looked wonderful, you know, it was it was a match from the very start well and though that those who watched on television thought kennedy one, but those who yes and done radio and those the one or watch listen doing radio thought nixon won all that's nonsense. it never happened. it was just a story. that was done. no one in 60 years has done any serious research on the great debates. do you know what happened? what happened was far easier? in 19 the night before the first debate. nixon is talking to eisenhower and says, you know. i'm going to follow. i'm not going to be the adversarial nixon. i'm going to be a kind and gentle or nixon. and so the next night he goes on the first debate. and he's the kinder gentler nixon. and all the people that were watching as partisans for the kinder gentle or next we're saying what the hell is wrong with you, you know go get them you so the basic thing is if you listen to the first debate. nixon says in some way or another 16 times. i agree with you. and his people didn't want nixon agreeing and the following three debates. nixon was nixon. and was adversarial attacking kennedy for where he was weak and doing a quite good job. but after the first debate as a communications major, how do you think that the newspapers responded? thing it was a tie. it becomes untie over 60 years. and it becomes kennedy winning the first debate by a mile, but the initial reaction in all of the newspapers was that there was no difference between the two of them. they both did equally well or equally bad the whole story of the kennedy being this wonderful guy, but what did happen? what did happen and what i didn't say was the greatest thing that john kennedy did was run for office. he was a wonderful campaigner. and by staying up and not making any massive mistakes in the first debate. what happened was is democrats said? this guy is a lot better than we thought and might be able to do a good job. so they rallied around the flag. and henry got more. adulation after that first debate because it didn't blow it not because he did great because he didn't do badly. we got one last question over here. dr. clearly senator johnson helped senator, kennedy and his campaign. how much did ambassador lodge helped vice president nixon given that lodge was from massachusetts and clearly kennedy was going to win his home state. well, first of all the man that really should answer the question is the pro. well, i'll let you answer most of it, but i would just simply say. you know, i think that i wonder about you know if the nixon lodge ticket had effectively been four ordained if you want to call it that eisenhower's wishes. i mean, i think after eight years as president. the two people that eisenhower owed the most to after eight years were richard nixon and henry cavill launch for all that. they did during his own presidency. and so i think he eisenhower began to groom both of them beginning in about 1958 59 various ways of winning up to 60. and when you look at the schedules of the four top the two top democrats and two top republicans. lodge actually was the the only one of the four not to miss a day of campaigning due to illness or injury or something else. and in fact, i found in lodges papers in boston, he's repeatedly crying out to the people on the nixon side of the campaign saying use me more i can do more. you know, i'm not being effective because i can't control my schedule. my schedule is being made entirely by the nixon side and you're not i'm not even approving events in advance. so i think large wanted to be used more during that campaign and the last thing i was saying you can fill in any where i'm where i've gone astray. here is lodge also was was older. i mean, he was older more like an eisenhower figure. you got to figure lodge was born in 1902. he was a full 15 years older than john f kennedy. he was six years old in lyndon johnson 11 years older than richard nixon. you know we have this idea of the vice presidential candidate being kind of the attack talk, you know, they got and do the things that are unprecedential or the stops that the top at the top of the ticket doesn't want to go and do and i think that's been locked that more often than not that's been the pattern in the last 50 years. that was it was different then i think lodge was really a way of ensuring direct continuity from the eisenhower presidency to hopefully the nixon presidency. so i think that was really the role the larger brought a certain kind of stability and maturity that nixon don't forget how young he was still in 60 47 years old. hey run for president. you've been vice president for eight years. you lose the run for the presidency. and you're still just turning 48 years old. that's not so bad and you have options in the future. so i think lodge i think as a running mate with nixon. it was really a different era. and the only thing i have to add to that is what's better? the real story is as professor victor says or the fable that lodged in campaign. he was lazy etc if you don't look at the record. you can lie. all you want to the fact is that my examination of what lodge did at the 1960 campaign remember nixon was in the hospital for two weeks. lodge was the guy carrying the campaign and surprise surprise was campaigning all over new york when nelson rockefeller. and sweating and going to the beach, etc, etc, and doing well, but because people picked up on the story after the word in time magazine that lodge had to take a nap every day and get into pajamas. what would you rather have that he was in pajamas and campaigning like hell or that he was him in pajamas not doing anything. it's it's it's it's literally. naughty what you can get away with if you don't do the research. no, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking doctors gelman and nichter? you did, okay. the book is the campaign of the century and dr. gelman will sign copies of the book tonight in the lobby. thank you for being here and get home safe in the rain.
about the 1960 presidential election. the effects of which continue to reverberate across today's political landscape we all think we know that that history is well written and well-spoken for but now irwin gelman has become america's contemporary leading authority on the 1960 election, and he's the first historian to truly use mounds of material from the archives to tell a more complete account of the 1960 election including unused sources. such as the fbi surveillance logs of then candidate john f kennedy and the papers of leon jaworski and henry cabot lodge, jr. gilman is a scholar of 20th century presidential history whose two prior books have documented the congressional and vice presidential periods of richard nixon's life. and his third entitled the campaign of the century kennedy nixon and the election of 1960 does not disappoint. gilman is joined in conversation this evening with another renowned 20th century presidential historian, dr. luke nichter who holds the james h cavanaugh endowed chair in presidential studies at chapman university dr. nichter is a new york times bestselling author who's credits include two volumes of the nixon tapes with historian, doug, brinkley. a biography of henry cabot lodge jr. and nectar is now at work on a history of the 1968 presidential election. ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in welcoming irv gelman and dr. luke nichter. here. thank you. now first of all, i'd like to thank you all for coming. i appreciate it. i hope you enjoy the evening, but i'd like to spend. two minutes maybe and thanking my wife gloria gay for tricking me to come to the nixon library. i had absolutely no intention to write a book on richard nixon. let alone now three books on richard nixon. but nobody else will do it. is a project the most historians especially academics won't do you just can have tenure promotions. or anything when you write about darth vader and to many academics nixon is darth vader. which is unfair untrue etc. but i was married to gloria gay for 29 years until she passed away. she was a wonderful wonderful person. and i just want to let you know that i wouldn't be here. if it wasn't for her tricking me into coming. a couple of other things some of you have i know have been friends for years john and ruth ann. evans have been incredibly kind. paul and candy took me out for dinner and more importantly and most importantly there's two people sitting over there. one has gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard as name is joe dimalowski. drink the other is susan nolte who was the chief archivist for years and years and years and is not only brilliant but as a sweetheart. and the reason why i wanted to point it out was my beginning of my book has acknowledgments. and these aren't just names to me. they're important people they make me better than what i am. they helped me more than i deserve to be helped and it's a great kindness that they've done. so when you read my knowledgements, you'll find out that there are a truckload of people like susan and like joe that have helped me and i really appreciate it, but i wanted to give you a picture of what these people look like at how kind people can be to research historians. so again, susan joe. thank you. here well, thanks very much for that that welcome and in particular to the nixon library and the richard dixon foundation and also to c-span viewers who are joining us virtually. as starting a little bit. more personal before we dive into the book. it welcome back to the west coast. you know, i think for for many years. this was probably a second home or a home for you. how many years did you spend here? and do you miss it? i spent with susan nolte. seven years going through documents day by day week by week year by year. this volume here is a mere two and a half million pages of research and that's what i do. and since you asked that question, i have a plot another plug that i forgot to give a year from now luke victor will be sitting in this seat. he is finished a study of the election of 1968 and we'll show that the anish adult incident had virtually nothing to do with the election of 1968. so if you're here now come back for luke a year from now and find out what really did happen in 1968 and we can just be an opposite seats at that point, but but juxtapose that experience of turning presidential for seven years. with the fact that with with sort of where you came from, i think i once heard you talk about or describe yourself as a slum kid from baltimore. and so how does someone in that situation go on to get a phd in american history from indiana university and ultimately come to write not a book but a series on the subject. i was very lucky. i didn't spend my life in jail. i have a 19-inch knife scar on my shoulder. the guy was kind enough to crack a building building brick over my head. and walking home from school. it was always a kindness if i had less than four people beat me up. how in the world i got out of it? i'm guessing it was sheer luck. and how i ended up getting a doctorate writing books. i still have to pinch myself. i i guarantee you. if any of you think that i'm not good. truly, i'm not that good. so we're here to talk about a book, but some know and some may not know that it's also part of a larger series. and so you when you're doing show and tell of nixon books, it's never easy to carry them around, but i'll sort of briefly introduce each book and maybe have you say a word or a line or two about each one to sort of just properly tease them for the audience. so the first book in the series richard nixon the contender the congress here is 1946 to 1952. the basis of the book is that nobody ever really seriously did the research that susan nolte helped me with and the remarkable thing that i found about it was the charges of nixon beating jerry voorhees for his first congustial election in 1946. that nixon smeared voorhees as a communist never happened. it was all made up. and the real story was not here at the nixon library. it was and the jerry vorhees papers and pomona and the second thing that i found remarkable. was that nixon smeared helena hagin douglas as a pink pink lady in the 1950, california senatorial contest. the problem was the only time he ever referred to her as pink was in a private conversation between him and his political relations person. but as far as the reason why she lost can be found in norma, oklahoma and her archives at the university of oklahoma. so the whole nature of how nixon was darth vader in these two elections are fundamentally flawed. and moving forward in time and nixon's career the second the biggest thickest of the series the president and the apprentice eisenhower and nixon 1952 to 1961. that one is basically nixon's vice presidency and how he ran for the vice presidency. and again once more the story is so flawed. one of the stories came from an oral history interview. where dwight eisenhower was watching nixon give what was known as the fund's speech of the checker speech and slammed his hand into what he was writing on and talked tore the paper. the only problem was is i found a copy of the speech. and there was no tearing there was nothing. it was just a normal piece of paper. and then even better than that was that nixon and eisenhower didn't get along that really eisenhower didn't like nixon. and i'm saying to myself self. how in the world can dwight eisenhower? be president for eight years and have nixon has his vice president for eight years and they didn't get along. quite frankly they get along fine. and once i wrote the corrective, i know this is going to shock you. but people stop talking about that. is it an amazing that you can lie? just so much until you get caught and then you just stop you don't apologize. you're basically intellectual cowards. and so then the with the latest installment of the series, which we'll dive into here in a moment campaign of the century kennedy nixon and election of 1960. how many years would you say you've been formally or informally working on this collection of works? 25 years and how many pieces of paper pages of records do you think you've examined red turned or investigated? i read about 800 pages a day. that's why. and i could do that with comprehension. the fact is i didn't think it was a book. i don't i was a fan of theodore white the making the president 1960. i thought he told everything. i know i started to do the research. and again the surprise you i was wrong. there was and has been up until i wrote this. nobody had ever read archival research. when the great debates of 1960 of kennedy's catholicism of 1960 the fraud in 1960 all of that stuff had never been done. and had been mentioned maybe but not have had ever been done in a serious archival way. so i looked at all this material and i discovered. but rather the theater white who by the way in his memoirs claimed that i'm writing or i wrote. the making the president 1960 purposely purposely in his memoirs. making kennedy the hero and nixon a villain. well, that's not the way you write history. and so this is basically not only a corrective fear or white but to basically say that the entire story of the 1960 election has been seriously flawed. so having that is background, let's take a look at what the critics say in reviews of these books. all three of these books have been reviewed in the new york times as well as many other places. i think that alone signaling that these are books worth paying attention to but i think the critics in the reviews have no shortage of things to talk about. and i i went through in preparation. i read all three of the reviews in the time times these three books. and i'd like to go through so just sort of the very top 20 outtakes. from these reviews and get your thoughts. and these are comments direct quotes either about the author his the work in question being reviewed or about the works characterization of richard nixon. refers to the works as a forgiving judgment richard nixon he acquits nixon of all charges. he takes one side. more polemical than persuasive he distorts the views of those he would rebut. there he says the rancor the rancor filled prejudices against his own clear-eyed distillations. your naive you're not persuasive. they're a feast that leaves one hungry. simplistic bland i'm not done. a sympathetic glow in no way substantiated nixon friendly spin adds nothing here, but fresh outrage. a hit job lacking nothing new and circumstantial so my old boss at c-span was brian lamb and so to sort of channel brian lamb he would say. urban off galman, what you doing wrong? i keep on telling you. i am a lot less than you think i am and even with these people i'm even lesser than you think i am. the the one review i got in the new york times for this book said nothing new everything i've written is --. well, he didn't say --, but he meant -- and that quite frankly if you read the book you're an idiot and that appeared online in the new york times and my sales went up four times. it then made the sunday edition of the new york times and my sales went up three times. and then the week after it appeared in the new york times sunday edition. to show you how crazy the new york times is i became an editor's choice. so the the editors of the new york times repudiated their own reviewer. so it just goes to show you if any of you are familiar out here with fairhaven. i probably am a reject from fair haven. and i'm not sure where to go with a question after that. but i think what i would ask is. what? why is writing about richard nixon still so controversial? there are several reasons, but i think the main reason is one of the reviews that i received which was a nice review. it wasn't bad it. it said i can't see it. i mean dixon was so bad and kennedy was so good. there's no way that this book that is written as well as it is written and the arguments that are made are so reasonable. it just it just it just can't be. and one of the reviews i got from a syndicate in canada was an important book in your water read it, but 60 years they've gotten it wrong gilman's narrative is like swimming upstream. so the general tenor of nixon being a despicable individual one of the the greatest things that i remember as i was writing. the second volume was that just about every liberal commentator. hold the speech maudlin. and maudlin is not a good term. i found in the adley stevenson papers. at princeton about a hundred and twenty letters. that were favorable to stevenson and unfavorable to the chucker. speech. the only thing i left out was there were about three million pieces of paper that went into the republican national committee saying how wonderful the speech was. and yet to this day many people believe that the checker speech was modeling when in fact, it was a great speech that was considered by an overwhelming number of people just imagine three million people wrote in to say how good the speech was and yet you remember a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty letters. by people probably who didn't even listen to the speech on how awful it was. now something seems to be a little out of balance there when a hundred plus people can say it's he was awful and three million people can say he was great. i think that we have become generally speaking so conditioned to things that never been challenged. people don't challenge what they don't think about in many cases. and what i did was not so much to record what i personally thought. but what the record showed and the record showed something quite different than what's been published and i think that for one of a better. rationalization or reasoning that the fact the people have accepted this nonsense so easily is because they just want to well, i think that theme of sort of the many myths and misunderstandings in the nixon era is a theme that resonates throughout the book here. and so i've highlighted i call them myths or misunderstanding about seven of them that come to me reading the book and i have some photos that will help to illustrate the myths that we'll click through here, but for each one, i think what i'd like to do is sort of state the conventional wisdom or the myth and misunderstanding just as it's existed in the literature over the decades and allow you to respond to each one. so i think number one the role of eisenhower that nixon perhaps lost in 1960 because eisenhower didn't do enough. that sort of nixon was on this ill-fated ticket that didn't have eisenhower's support. he might not have been eisenhower's choice to run and there's lots of mythology about exactly what eisenhower's role was during this year and it's something that you address in the book. once more you you write what you think people want to read rather than write what really happened? just imagine for a second. that nick that eisenhower absolutely hated nixon. can any of you seriously hear believe that eisenhower would want? a senator with no legislative experience with no legislative record to beep his incumbent vice president who would carry on his role? the whole idea that eisenhower and nixon did not get along or to not have a good relationship. is is flawed by the very nature of all the things eisenhower had nixon doing going on foreign trips. helping with legislation being invited to all of the various meetings that eisenhower and nixon chair together it makes no logical sense when you talk to people and you say how could all of this happen? and eisenhower in nixon not get along for eight years. they made faces and one another. well, i couldn't choose just one eisenhower photo. i like this one because it gets in pat nixon. could you say you know as we in 1960 election has been called kind of one of the first modern campaigns? can you talk a little bit about even in 1960 the role that patent nixon played and the role of women in the campaign? i'm sure all of you already know all the the numbers of voting but remember. how charismatic? kennedy was and remember how women smoot. the election of 1960 for the first time in american history more women voted than men and you'll never guess. what the breakdown was between this wonderful charismatic kennedy and women voting it was 51:49. oh, i made one small error 51 for nixon 49 for kennedy. pat nixon took the position that this is what her husband's was. she was very ambitious like her husband very very smart. a very attuned to what he was doing the the ultimate defender. and she and mimi eisenhower and dwight eisenhower. had a very good relationship and if you look at the letters between dwight eisenhower and richard nixon again, big surprise just about every one of them said say hello to pat. i really appreciate her help. doesn't sound like the eisenhower and his wife mamie did not get along with -- impact. the second misunderstanding or myth of the campaign is that nixon and lodge were sort of ill-suited together on the ticket and that lodge was the downfall for richard nixon that year. what do you say? on january 7th 1960 dwight eisenhower wrote a secret memo to his own file his presidential pick was richard nixon. his vice presidential pick was henry cabot lodge, jr. it wasn't so much nixon picking. large it was eisenhower were picking lodge. and at the time lodge was you and representative? for the united states and was the main person who talked about the russians being evil and made a tremendous amount of television time. he had the ability. he was a boston brahman. and by the way you may not know the person that wrote the biography of henry cabot lodge jupiter. it's luke victory. it was not a self-serving question. i promise. so third misunderstanding, i kind of highlight about 1960 on the democratic side. also interesting that so many senators current or former in 1960 senator john f kennedy, senator lyndon johnson the i so how about this one that kennedy would not have been elected president without johnson because it was really eisenhower be kind of chip away at the south, louisiana. he took in 56 virginia both campaigns really began to eat away at the traditional democratic south would kennedy have won the presidency do you think without lyndon johnson from texas to hold down hold down the democratic south as we would say in the most area that terms not a snowball's chance of hell. what lyndon johnson brought to the table? was what ronnie duggar who was a famous texan journalist said that every election that johnson and the rest of the people that ran for elections in texas during the timeframe up to 1960 was competitive corruption. it was just depending on who could steal more votes. and johnson ran in 1941. and lost because he didn't steal the votes. but in 1948. he won by 87 votes and received the wonderful nickname landslide linden. now imagine for a second imagine and no election. that johnson ran it did he win without corruption? and yet every author every major biography of lyndon johnson. talks about the fraud in 1941. and in 1948 multiple chapters one book major biography on the election of 1960 says oh, by the way. there was nothing about fraud in 1960, so i'm not going to talk about it since there was no fraud why talk about it. and in another book it didn't even make a half a sense and made footnote on the next little last page and the volume. and it basically said there was no fraud in illinois because authors listen to junior said there was no fraud a fairly impartial guy that worked for john kennedy and was the ultimate member of the democratic party and in addition to that. there was no fraud in texas. and the reason why there was no fraud in texas is because leon jaworski said, you can prove it. so obviously the answer to the question is there was no fraud because people who had a great stake and saying there was no fraud was no fraud. the only problem with that is they liked? we will return to the topic of fraud in a few more questions. next misunderstanding or myth of the campaign. this is a nixon arriving in in hawaii. you can see kind of the aloha sign there and his arrival and giving a speech there at that. stop that brief campaign stop. so another myth and misunderstanding that it was a mistake for nixon to pledge to campaign in all 50 states. and again all the people that write about the election especially people that write about how wonderful that kennedy was and how brilliant his campaign was and how in the world could nixon be so stupid as to run it all 50 states? none of them mentioned the kennedy campaigned in 45 states, i guess he was five states less stupid the next one was. the nature of the way that both of them ran. and if you want to take a look at this in the most objective way is that nixon had just as many votes. as kennedy had so i'm guessing since they both had the similar just about the same amount of votes. the kennedy must have run a much better campaign than nixon did the only problem again with that is how in the world if both of these guys got the same amount of votes that one ran a far superior campaign than the other it just it the logical inconsistency is undeniable and yet folks don't want to talk about our next myth or myth understanding. is that the arrest of martin luther king that fall in 1960 was decisive in the election outcome. so could you in the and while answering that charge? set up a little bit the relationship between nixon and king. what kind of background there was and what role that played during the campaign? martin luther king jr. by 1960 was a major player. not the major player. what was a player in black society. and the nature of the campaign with blacks was the story better yet the fable is that king was arrested. for violating a minor parole violation i was sent to a hard georgia prison. and one of nick kennedy staff said called kennedy and said you should call coretta kid. and and offering something and he did. and that's just about all he did was offer sympathy because jack kennedy was the last democratic candidate. that actively solicited white voters in the south. jack kennedy, you know solicited white votes in the south. absolutely. that's what he did. story gets better. according to the story after the call greta blacks went crazy and they changed their vote enormously. and according to the black newspapers five million blacks went to the polls. 50% of all black voters went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly for jack kennedy. and the democrats sent out. trailway bosses across the united states. i mean, isn't this a great story across the united states handing out ballasts the people to vote. for jack henry there's only one small problem. it never happened. there were no trailway bosses. there were no massive amount of literature there weren't five million black voters the best number i have is somewhere between two and a half million to three million blocks. that's 25 to 30 percent. of all eligible black voters and by the way from 1936 when blocks changed dramatically for the electing democrats the elect two-thirds go to democrats and one-third go to republicans through the 1960 election. let me think. kennedy received 68% about of the black vote nixon received 32% of the black vote now. i'm not real good when numbers like like john evans but 32% sounds like a third. 68% sounds like 2/3. so nothing changed as far as the numbers went the story has become so exaggerated and so out of line. and it's still to many people. unbelievable change in the election and quite frankly it never happened. we have two more to go the next myth or myth myth understanding whether the issue of religion and kennedy's catholicism. and the extent to which the candidates used religion as a political issue. in the campaign of 1960 whether that was the decisive. whether that was decisive in the outcome. no one has ever done. research on the influence of catholicism in the 60 election it's there's two books on it. and they were so actively researching that none of them did archival research. it's again. it's so much powerful the course that you just write where you feel like writing with no no material to support it. kennedy one with 53% of his vote from catholics. over half of his votes over 17 million votes came from catholics. according to the republican national committee somewhere between four to six million. more catholics voted in 1960 than ever before. the nature of that meant that kindly could not have won the election. without the catholic vote in addition to that in 1952 and 1956. eisenhower got 62% of the protestant vote in 1963 apartment in 1950 in 1960 to show you how much of this has changed it went from 62% all the way up. a great jump to 63% it literally didn't change material at all. and yet the way the story is told is fundamentally wrong because the kennedy machine was talking they were really going to smear nixon and a landslide and when the landslide didn't happen the most convenient reason was too many. too many bigots the only thing they don't mention is in 1956 nixon the plumbing eisenhower got almost 50% of the catholic vote. the only number that significantly changed in 1960. was that kennedy received 78% that's an increase of 29% and yet no one ever mentions it. and what i think one of the ancillary charges, of course the photo billy graham with president kennedy and in the oval office the after was over. that so can ancillary to that as sort of that that nixon. used religion in a dirty way during the campaign to exploit this this idea. that was america ready to elect its first catholic hit of course, you know talk about al smith or you know, the previously did you find evidence of this either side using religion in in this kind of harsh political way 60 there were some there were there were some fundamental bigotry where certain evangelicals and others did not want a catholic in the white house because they didn't want the pope running the federal government, but by and large what happened in 1928 with al smith had significantly changed. the the amount of adversarial relations between catholic voting and non-catholic voting had mellowed a great deal. so the idea of the charge that nixon was dirty because he was encouraging bigotry. sable nixon stuff you don't have to prove it. all you have to do is say it. we've already talked a little bit about fraud but let's close on that topic nowadays. we see i think every political election in these red. and blue maps of the outcome from 1960 and the version of it that i like to best because you really get into some more regional trends is the one by county. of course red being republican blue being democratic and so i guess when you see a map like this comment a little bit on a couple things. what do you see when you see a map like an outcome like this? for its own sake but also kind of compared to what eisenhower began to do in the south. and then ultimately the big question was their fraud and if so, was it decisive? the numbers that i ran first of all say that nixon had every likelihood of winning, texas and illinois. how do you want, texas and illinois he would have been president of the united states in 1960. but what i see when i look at the entire map. is a precursor of what we are experiencing now. the nation is starting to divide. fundamentally into two sections the urbanites and the nature of certain block voting black voting jewish voting labor voting etc becoming fundamentally democratic. and suburbia and rural becoming very much republican. and what you have now, i think is the most extreme of that where people simply of one ilk or another won't talk to one another. there's there's virtually no intercourse they simply are so extreme and their partisanship is it? bodes well for partisan voting which is fundamentally 40% republican now and 40% democrat now. but in 1960. the remarkable thing is nixon receives almost 95% of the republican vote pretty hard to believe somebody so evil as nixon could get 95% and our hero jack kennedy. received 84% of the democratic vote all kennedy had to do. was to keep his base. there were 17 million more democratic registrants than there were republicans. 40 40 million democrat republican registrants and 57 million democratic presidents if henry had simply kept his base. he couldn't even do that. and the nature of the election was not only so close. it was even closer than anybody believed because again, nobody bothered to run any numbers. it's it's amazing how incorrect the results of the election have been told ie kennedy won the election by a hundred and twelve thousand votes. i ran the election results for different ways. one way the best he did was about 107,000 votes. the next way i ran it he went by 27 but thousand votes. the next way i ran it nixon won by 130,000 votes and the final way. i wrote it ran it is nixon won by 56,000 votes. and yet people to this day continually run these numbers as if they were gospel. without evaluating what really happened? well, there's plenty more we can get into i haven't even asked you about the debates. so maybe if we have time we'll get into that. but for now though, i i'd like to go to the audience we have time for some some q&a. that'll be a lead here with a microphone coming around and we'd love to get here your questions here. before we begin with the q&a. let's get a round of applause for mr. gilman and dr. nichter. we will open the floor for questions if you have a question, just raise your hand or signal to me and i'll come and get you. but the first question is i would like to ask if myself what advice do you have for young researchers? and where do you think they should start? do that again. what advice do you have a young researchers? and where should they start? well professor nick dr. and i are lucky we already have established records the problem for young people and i talked to my editor at yale about this. 20 years ago to now the amount of material written has increased by 10% the amount of books that are published now. is three times? as many very few pages increased but the number of publications have increased three times. it's very very difficult. a break into writing if you are or able to get published. it is. more power to you some of us get lucky some of us don't but if i were any of you i would try to. write letters to the editors right in newspapers or magazines or anything you could do to get your name in or i would find somebody that really knows what the hell they're doing. and ask them to help. but generally speaking it is incredibly bleak for young people even if they do brilliant research to find a publisher. thank you to your left over here. thank you, dr. gelman. i learned a lot. i had a lot of questions that you clarifying but the question for you you mentioned a couple of times you repeated the words evil nixon. and you reason why some of the perceptions? were inaccurate flawed but you also said that inaccurate. flawed precepts were as if they were facts. so what was causing this? why? why did people? feel the way they did. ordinarily people don't believe things that are so easily contradictory like, you know more women voted for kennedy the nixon. well, that's not true. and but did they believe that? that's just an example. the answer is is so complex. one first of all democrats harry truman virtually hated the ground that nixon walked on. eleanor roosevelt felt the same way. adley stevenson hayden nixon with a passion. the leaders of the democratic party one the fundamental extreme one because nixon was vulnerable and two because eisenhower was not you didn't talk the great man, because it was a waste of your time. so you went after someone that they thought was possible to go after but what is worse than that? is today in newspapers magazines television, you have some of these people who are commentators that i nicely call idiots. and they will tell you material that makes no sense at all and one day one thing and one day the exact opposite thing. but back in the day in 1960. you had a bevy of famous calmness of newspaper reporters that simply wrote what happened? whereas kennedy had these great energetic audiences. election had awful. nobody was there. and if you saw a pictures kennedy had good audiences and surprise nixon had good audiences. did nixon have people that thought he was charismatic? absolutely the kennedy have people that thought he was charismatic. yeah. but theodore white for example, and i quote this in the book goes on to nixon's train in october of 1960. wearing a win with kennedy lapel button. key, can you get and yet these people behind the scenes behave poorly? and to to give you my my own personal experience. when i taught especially after i started writing about richard nixon. people would talk to me. i could apply for grant after grant after grant and have superb grants and get thank you so much. no. and the nature of writing about nixon anything other than saying he was darth vader. was not publishable. and for one of a better word publishers are greedy. they want to make money and if they can't sell books. they don't publish now the campaign of the century and my other books have sold pretty -- well, but what it what it means is is either i'm fooling a lot of people or that there is a a certain amount of belief that the material that's been written so long so wrong. i'll tell you one last thing i was nominated for a thing called the plutarch award and 2015 for the best biography of the year. and i got a call from a high up in the thing and said they're 257 books nominated. they're going to narrow it down to the top 10. irv, don't feel bad you're not going to make it. two months later i get a call from the same guy saying earth. i got to tell you you made it to the top 10, but now it goes down to the top four. there's no way you're going to be a finalist forget being the finalist. a month later i get a call irv. you got to sit down for this. you're a finalist. so i have on my wall hanging, you know, finalists for the plutarch award. go figure i have i was very pleased it's always nice to be knowledge. but the man that was telling me this was on the inside knew everything was going and there was not a prayer. i didn't have a chance. and yet sometimes it changes. thank you robert behind. yes, dr. gelman, i as a communications major. i'm just curious. could you speak to the televised debate? to let the televised debate that we so much about nixon looked angry and well, we already moved tan and we all know what happened. he was poorly. tanned, you know kennedy looked wonderful, you know, it was it was a match from the very start well and though that those who watched on television thought kennedy one, but those who yes and done radio and those the one or watch listen doing radio thought nixon won all that's nonsense. it never happened. it was just a story. that was done. no one in 60 years has done any serious research on the great debates. do you know what happened? what happened was far easier? in 19 the night before the first debate. nixon is talking to eisenhower and says, you know. i'm going to follow. i'm not going to be the adversarial nixon. i'm going to be a kind and gentle or nixon. and so the next night he goes on the first debate. and he's the kinder gentler nixon. and all the people that were watching as partisans for the kinder gentle or next we're saying what the hell is wrong with you, you know go get them you so the basic thing is if you listen to the first debate. nixon says in some way or another 16 times. i agree with you. and his people didn't want nixon agreeing and the following three debates. nixon was nixon. and was adversarial attacking kennedy for where he was weak and doing a quite good job. but after the first debate as a communications major, how do you think that the newspapers responded? thing it was a tie. it becomes untie over 60 years. and it becomes kennedy winning the first debate by a mile, but the initial reaction in all of the newspapers was that there was no difference between the two of them. they both did equally well or equally bad the whole story of the kennedy being this wonderful guy, but what did happen? what did happen and what i didn't say was the greatest thing that john kennedy did was run for office. he was a wonderful campaigner. and by staying up and not making any massive mistakes in the first debate. what happened was is democrats said? this guy is a lot better than we thought and might be able to do a good job. so they rallied around the flag. and henry got more. adulation after that first debate because it didn't blow it not because he did great because he didn't do badly. we got one last question over here. dr. clearly senator johnson helped senator, kennedy and his campaign. how much did ambassador lodge helped vice president nixon given that lodge was from massachusetts and clearly kennedy was going to win his home state. well, first of all the man that really should answer the question is the pro. well, i'll let you answer most of it, but i would just simply say. you know, i think that i wonder about you know if the nixon lodge ticket had effectively been four ordained if you want to call it that eisenhower's wishes. i mean, i think after eight years as president. the two people that eisenhower owed the most to after eight years were richard nixon and henry cavill launch for all that. they did during his own presidency. and so i think he eisenhower began to groom both of them beginning in about 1958 59 various ways of winning up to 60. and when you look at the schedules of the four top the two top democrats and two top republicans. lodge actually was the the only one of the four not to miss a day of campaigning due to illness or injury or something else. and in fact, i found in lodges papers in boston, he's repeatedly crying out to the people on the nixon side of the campaign saying use me more i can do more. you know, i'm not being effective because i can't control my schedule. my schedule is being made entirely by the nixon side and you're not i'm not even approving events in advance. so i think large wanted to be used more during that campaign and the last thing i was saying you can fill in any where i'm where i've gone astray. here is lodge also was was older. i mean, he was older more like an eisenhower figure. you got to figure lodge was born in 1902. he was a full 15 years older than john f kennedy. he was six years old in lyndon johnson 11 years older than richard nixon. you know we have this idea of the vice presidential candidate being kind of the attack talk, you know, they got and do the things that are unprecedential or the stops that the top at the top of the ticket doesn't want to go and do and i think that's been locked that more often than not that's been the pattern in the last 50 years. that was it was different then i think lodge was really a way of ensuring direct continuity from the eisenhower presidency to hopefully the nixon presidency. so i think that was really the role the larger brought a certain kind of stability and maturity that nixon don't forget how young he was still in 60 47 years old. hey run for president. you've been vice president for eight years. you lose the run for the presidency. and you're still just turning 48 years old. that's not so bad and you have options in the future. so i think lodge i think as a running mate with nixon. it was really a different era. and the only thing i have to add to that is what's better? the real story is as professor victor says or the fable that lodged in campaign. he was lazy etc if you don't look at the record. you can lie. all you want to the fact is that my examination of what lodge did at the 1960 campaign remember nixon was in the hospital for two weeks. lodge was the guy carrying the campaign and surprise surprise was campaigning all over new york when nelson rockefeller. and sweating and going to the beach, etc, etc, and doing well, but because people picked up on the story after the word in time magazine that lodge had to take a nap every day and get into pajamas. what would you rather have that he was in pajamas and campaigning like hell or that he was him in pajamas not doing anything. it's it's it's it's literally. naughty what you can get away with if you don't do the research. no, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking doctors gelman and nichter? you did, okay. the book is the campaign of the century and dr. gelman will sign copies of the book tonight in the lobby. thank you for being here and get home safe in the rain.
about the 1960 presidential election. the effects of which continue to reverberate across today's political landscape we all think we know that that history is well written and well-spoken for but now irwin gelman has become america's contemporary leading authority on the 1960 election, and he's the first historian to truly use mounds of material from the archives to tell a more complete account of the 1960 election including unused sources. such as the fbi surveillance logs of then candidate john f kennedy and the papers of leon jaworski and henry cabot lodge, jr. gilman is a scholar of 20th century presidential history whose two prior books have documented the congressional and vice presidential periods of richard nixon's life. and his third entitled the campaign of the century kennedy nixon and the election of 1960 does not disappoint. gilman is joined in conversation this evening with another renowned 20th century presidential historian, dr. luke nichter who holds the james h cavanaugh endowed chair in presidential studies at chapman university dr. nichter is a new york times bestselling author who's credits include two volumes of the nixon tapes with historian, doug, brinkley. a biography of henry cabot lodge jr. and nectar is now at work on a history of the 1968 presidential election. ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in welcoming irv gelman and dr. luke nichter. here. thank you. now first of all, i'd like to thank you all for coming. i appreciate it. i hope you enjoy the evening, but i'd like to spend. two minutes maybe and thanking my wife gloria gay for tricking me to come to the nixon library. i had absolutely no intention to write a book on richard nixon. let alone now three books on richard nixon. but nobody else will do it. is a project the most historians especially academics won't do you just can have tenure promotions. or anything when you write about darth vader and to many academics nixon is darth vader. which is unfair untrue etc. but i was married to gloria gay for 29 years until she passed away. she was a wonderful wonderful person. and i just want to let you know that i wouldn't be here. if it wasn't for her tricking me into coming. a couple of other things some of you have i know have been friends for years john and ruth ann. evans have been incredibly kind. paul and candy took me out for dinner and more importantly and most importantly there's two people sitting over there. one has gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard as name is joe dimalowski. drink the other is susan nolte who was the chief archivist for years and years and years and is not only brilliant but as a sweetheart. and the reason why i wanted to point it out was my beginning of my book has acknowledgments. and these aren't just names to me. they're important people they make me better than what i am. they helped me more than i deserve to be helped and it's a great kindness that they've done. so when you read my knowledgements, you'll find out that there are a truckload of people like susan and like joe that have helped me and i really appreciate it, but i wanted to give you a picture of what these people look like at how kind people can be to research historians. so again, susan joe. thank you. here well, thanks very much for that that welcome and in particular to the nixon library and the richard dixon foundation and also to c-span viewers who are joining us virtually. as starting a little bit. more personal before we dive into the book. it welcome back to the west coast. you know, i think for for many years. this was probably a second home or a home for you. how many years did you spend here? and do you miss it? i spent with susan nolte. seven years going through documents day by day week by week year by year. this volume here is a mere two and a half million pages of research and that's what i do. and since you asked that question, i have a plot another plug that i forgot to give a year from now luke victor will be sitting in this seat. he is finished a study of the election of 1968 and we'll show that the anish adult incident had virtually nothing to do with the election of 1968. so if you're here now come back for luke a year from now and find out what really did happen in 1968 and we can just be an opposite seats at that point, but but juxtapose that experience of turning presidential for seven years. with the fact that with with sort of where you came from, i think i once heard you talk about or describe yourself as a slum kid from baltimore. and so how does someone in that situation go on to get a phd in american history from indiana university and ultimately come to write not a book but a series on the subject. i was very lucky. i didn't spend my life in jail. i have a 19-inch knife scar on my shoulder. the guy was kind enough to crack a building building brick over my head. and walking home from school. it was always a kindness if i had less than four people beat me up. how in the world i got out of it? i'm guessing it was sheer luck. and how i ended up getting a doctorate writing books. i still have to pinch myself. i i guarantee you. if any of you think that i'm not good. truly, i'm not that good. so we're here to talk about a book, but some know and some may not know that it's also part of a larger series. and so you when you're doing show and tell of nixon books, it's never easy to carry them around, but i'll sort of briefly introduce each book and maybe have you say a word or a line or two about each one to sort of just properly tease them for the audience. so the first book in the series richard nixon the contender the congress here is 1946 to 1952. the basis of the book is that nobody ever really seriously did the research that susan nolte helped me with and the remarkable thing that i found about it was the charges of nixon beating jerry voorhees for his first congustial election in 1946. that nixon smeared voorhees as a communist never happened. it was all made up. and the real story was not here at the nixon library. it was and the jerry vorhees papers and pomona and the second thing that i found remarkable. was that nixon smeared helena hagin douglas as a pink pink lady in the 1950, california senatorial contest. the problem was the only time he ever referred to her as pink was in a private conversation between him and his political relations person. but as far as the reason why she lost can be found in norma, oklahoma and her archives at the university of oklahoma. so the whole nature of how nixon was darth vader in these two elections are fundamentally flawed. and moving forward in time and nixon's career the second the biggest thickest of the series the president and the apprentice eisenhower and nixon 1952 to 1961. that one is basically nixon's vice presidency and how he ran for the vice presidency. and again once more the story is so flawed. one of the stories came from an oral history interview. where dwight eisenhower was watching nixon give what was known as the fund's speech of the checker speech and slammed his hand into what he was writing on and talked tore the paper. the only problem was is i found a copy of the speech. and there was no tearing there was nothing. it was just a normal piece of paper. and then even better than that was that nixon and eisenhower didn't get along that really eisenhower didn't like nixon. and i'm saying to myself self. how in the world can dwight eisenhower? be president for eight years and have nixon has his vice president for eight years and they didn't get along. quite frankly they get along fine. and once i wrote the corrective, i know this is going to shock you. but people stop talking about that. is it an amazing that you can lie? just so much until you get caught and then you just stop you don't apologize. you're basically intellectual cowards. and so then the with the latest installment of the series, which we'll dive into here in a moment campaign of the century kennedy nixon and election of 1960. how many years would you say you've been formally or informally working on this collection of works? 25 years and how many pieces of paper pages of records do you think you've examined red turned or investigated? i read about 800 pages a day. that's why. and i could do that with comprehension. the fact is i didn't think it was a book. i don't i was a fan of theodore white the making the president 1960. i thought he told everything. i know i started to do the research. and again the surprise you i was wrong. there was and has been up until i wrote this. nobody had ever read archival research. when the great debates of 1960 of kennedy's catholicism of 1960 the fraud in 1960 all of that stuff had never been done. and had been mentioned maybe but not have had ever been done in a serious archival way. so i looked at all this material and i discovered. but rather the theater white who by the way in his memoirs claimed that i'm writing or i wrote. the making the president 1960 purposely purposely in his memoirs. making kennedy the hero and nixon a villain. well, that's not the way you write history. and so this is basically not only a corrective fear or white but to basically say that the entire story of the 1960 election has been seriously flawed. so having that is background, let's take a look at what the critics say in reviews of these books. all three of these books have been reviewed in the new york times as well as many other places. i think that alone signaling that these are books worth paying attention to but i think the critics in the reviews have no shortage of things to talk about. and i i went through in preparation. i read all three of the reviews in the time times these three books. and i'd like to go through so just sort of the very top 20 outtakes. from these reviews and get your thoughts. and these are comments direct quotes either about the author his the work in question being reviewed or about the works characterization of richard nixon. refers to the works as a forgiving judgment richard nixon he acquits nixon of all charges. he takes one side. more polemical than persuasive he distorts the views of those he would rebut. there he says the rancor the rancor filled prejudices against his own clear-eyed distillations. your naive you're not persuasive. they're a feast that leaves one hungry. simplistic bland i'm not done. a sympathetic glow in no way substantiated nixon friendly spin adds nothing here, but fresh outrage. a hit job lacking nothing new and circumstantial so my old boss at c-span was brian lamb and so to sort of channel brian lamb he would say. urban off galman, what you doing wrong? i keep on telling you. i am a lot less than you think i am and even with these people i'm even lesser than you think i am. the the one review i got in the new york times for this book said nothing new everything i've written is --. well, he didn't say --, but he meant -- and that quite frankly if you read the book you're an idiot and that appeared online in the new york times and my sales went up four times. it then made the sunday edition of the new york times and my sales went up three times. and then the week after it appeared in the new york times sunday edition. to show you how crazy the new york times is i became an editor's choice. so the the editors of the new york times repudiated their own reviewer. so it just goes to show you if any of you are familiar out here with fairhaven. i probably am a reject from fair haven. and i'm not sure where to go with a question after that. but i think what i would ask is. what? why is writing about richard nixon still so controversial? there are several reasons, but i think the main reason is one of the reviews that i received which was a nice review. it wasn't bad it. it said i can't see it. i mean dixon was so bad and kennedy was so good. there's no way that this book that is written as well as it is written and the arguments that are made are so reasonable. it just it just it just can't be. and one of the reviews i got from a syndicate in canada was an important book in your water read it, but 60 years they've gotten it wrong gilman's narrative is like swimming upstream. so the general tenor of nixon being a despicable individual one of the the greatest things that i remember as i was writing. the second volume was that just about every liberal commentator. hold the speech maudlin. and maudlin is not a good term. i found in the adley stevenson papers. at princeton about a hundred and twenty letters. that were favorable to stevenson and unfavorable to the chucker. speech. the only thing i left out was there were about three million pieces of paper that went into the republican national committee saying how wonderful the speech was. and yet to this day many people believe that the checker speech was modeling when in fact, it was a great speech that was considered by an overwhelming number of people just imagine three million people wrote in to say how good the speech was and yet you remember a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty letters. by people probably who didn't even listen to the speech on how awful it was. now something seems to be a little out of balance there when a hundred plus people can say it's he was awful and three million people can say he was great. i think that we have become generally speaking so conditioned to things that never been challenged. people don't challenge what they don't think about in many cases. and what i did was not so much to record what i personally thought. but what the record showed and the record showed something quite different than what's been published and i think that for one of a better. rationalization or reasoning that the fact the people have accepted this nonsense so easily is because they just want to well, i think that theme of sort of the many myths and misunderstandings in the nixon era is a theme that resonates throughout the book here. and so i've highlighted i call them myths or misunderstanding about seven of them that come to me reading the book and i have some photos that will help to illustrate the myths that we'll click through here, but for each one, i think what i'd like to do is sort of state the conventional wisdom or the myth and misunderstanding just as it's existed in the literature over the decades and allow you to respond to each one. so i think number one the role of eisenhower that nixon perhaps lost in 1960 because eisenhower didn't do enough. that sort of nixon was on this ill-fated ticket that didn't have eisenhower's support. he might not have been eisenhower's choice to run and there's lots of mythology about exactly what eisenhower's role was during this year and it's something that you address in the book. once more you you write what you think people want to read rather than write what really happened? just imagine for a second. that nick that eisenhower absolutely hated nixon. can any of you seriously hear believe that eisenhower would want? a senator with no legislative experience with no legislative record to beep his incumbent vice president who would carry on his role? the whole idea that eisenhower and nixon did not get along or to not have a good relationship. is is flawed by the very nature of all the things eisenhower had nixon doing going on foreign trips. helping with legislation being invited to all of the various meetings that eisenhower and nixon chair together it makes no logical sense when you talk to people and you say how could all of this happen? and eisenhower in nixon not get along for eight years. they made faces and one another. well, i couldn't choose just one eisenhower photo. i like this one because it gets in pat nixon. could you say you know as we in 1960 election has been called kind of one of the first modern campaigns? can you talk a little bit about even in 1960 the role that patent nixon played and the role of women in the campaign? i'm sure all of you already know all the the numbers of voting but remember. how charismatic? kennedy was and remember how women smoot. the election of 1960 for the first time in american history more women voted than men and you'll never guess. what the breakdown was between this wonderful charismatic kennedy and women voting it was 51:49. oh, i made one small error 51 for nixon 49 for kennedy. pat nixon took the position that this is what her husband's was. she was very ambitious like her husband very very smart. a very attuned to what he was doing the the ultimate defender. and she and mimi eisenhower and dwight eisenhower. had a very good relationship and if you look at the letters between dwight eisenhower and richard nixon again, big surprise just about every one of them said say hello to pat. i really appreciate her help. doesn't sound like the eisenhower and his wife mamie did not get along with -- impact. the second misunderstanding or myth of the campaign is that nixon and lodge were sort of ill-suited together on the ticket and that lodge was the downfall for richard nixon that year. what do you say? on january 7th 1960 dwight eisenhower wrote a secret memo to his own file his presidential pick was richard nixon. his vice presidential pick was henry cabot lodge, jr. it wasn't so much nixon picking. large it was eisenhower were picking lodge. and at the time lodge was you and representative? for the united states and was the main person who talked about the russians being evil and made a tremendous amount of television time. he had the ability. he was a boston brahman. and by the way you may not know the person that wrote the biography of henry cabot lodge jupiter. it's luke victory. it was not a self-serving question. i promise. so third misunderstanding, i kind of highlight about 1960 on the democratic side. also interesting that so many senators current or former in 1960 senator john f kennedy, senator lyndon johnson the i so how about this one that kennedy would not have been elected president without johnson because it was really eisenhower be kind of chip away at the south, louisiana. he took in 56 virginia both campaigns really began to eat away at the traditional democratic south would kennedy have won the presidency do you think without lyndon johnson from texas to hold down hold down the democratic south as we would say in the most area that terms not a snowball's chance of hell. what lyndon johnson brought to the table? was what ronnie duggar who was a famous texan journalist said that every election that johnson and the rest of the people that ran for elections in texas during the timeframe up to 1960 was competitive corruption. it was just depending on who could steal more votes. and johnson ran in 1941. and lost because he didn't steal the votes. but in 1948. he won by 87 votes and received the wonderful nickname landslide linden. now imagine for a second imagine and no election. that johnson ran it did he win without corruption? and yet every author every major biography of lyndon johnson. talks about the fraud in 1941. and in 1948 multiple chapters one book major biography on the election of 1960 says oh, by the way. there was nothing about fraud in 1960, so i'm not going to talk about it since there was no fraud why talk about it. and in another book it didn't even make a half a sense and made footnote on the next little last page and the volume. and it basically said there was no fraud in illinois because authors listen to junior said there was no fraud a fairly impartial guy that worked for john kennedy and was the ultimate member of the democratic party and in addition to that. there was no fraud in texas. and the reason why there was no fraud in texas is because leon jaworski said, you can prove it. so obviously the answer to the question is there was no fraud because people who had a great stake and saying there was no fraud was no fraud. the only problem with that is they liked? we will return to the topic of fraud in a few more questions. next misunderstanding or myth of the campaign. this is a nixon arriving in in hawaii. you can see kind of the aloha sign there and his arrival and giving a speech there at that. stop that brief campaign stop. so another myth and misunderstanding that it was a mistake for nixon to pledge to campaign in all 50 states. and again all the people that write about the election especially people that write about how wonderful that kennedy was and how brilliant his campaign was and how in the world could nixon be so stupid as to run it all 50 states? none of them mentioned the kennedy campaigned in 45 states, i guess he was five states less stupid the next one was. the nature of the way that both of them ran. and if you want to take a look at this in the most objective way is that nixon had just as many votes. as kennedy had so i'm guessing since they both had the similar just about the same amount of votes. the kennedy must have run a much better campaign than nixon did the only problem again with that is how in the world if both of these guys got the same amount of votes that one ran a far superior campaign than the other it just it the logical inconsistency is undeniable and yet folks don't want to talk about our next myth or myth understanding. is that the arrest of martin luther king that fall in 1960 was decisive in the election outcome. so could you in the and while answering that charge? set up a little bit the relationship between nixon and king. what kind of background there was and what role that played during the campaign? martin luther king jr. by 1960 was a major player. not the major player. what was a player in black society. and the nature of the campaign with blacks was the story better yet the fable is that king was arrested. for violating a minor parole violation i was sent to a hard georgia prison. and one of nick kennedy staff said called kennedy and said you should call coretta kid. and and offering something and he did. and that's just about all he did was offer sympathy because jack kennedy was the last democratic candidate. that actively solicited white voters in the south. jack kennedy, you know solicited white votes in the south. absolutely. that's what he did. story gets better. according to the story after the call greta blacks went crazy and they changed their vote enormously. and according to the black newspapers five million blacks went to the polls. 50% of all black voters went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly for jack kennedy. and the democrats sent out. trailway bosses across the united states. i mean, isn't this a great story across the united states handing out ballasts the people to vote. for jack henry there's only one small problem. it never happened. there were no trailway bosses. there were no massive amount of literature there weren't five million black voters the best number i have is somewhere between two and a half million to three million blocks. that's 25 to 30 percent. of all eligible black voters and by the way from 1936 when blocks changed dramatically for the electing democrats the elect two-thirds go to democrats and one-third go to republicans through the 1960 election. let me think. kennedy received 68% about of the black vote nixon received 32% of the black vote now. i'm not real good when numbers like like john evans but 32% sounds like a third. 68% sounds like 2/3. so nothing changed as far as the numbers went the story has become so exaggerated and so out of line. and it's still to many people. unbelievable change in the election and quite frankly it never happened. we have two more to go the next myth or myth myth understanding whether the issue of religion and kennedy's catholicism. and the extent to which the candidates used religion as a political issue. in the campaign of 1960 whether that was the decisive. whether that was decisive in the outcome. no one has ever done. research on the influence of catholicism in the 60 election it's there's two books on it. and they were so actively researching that none of them did archival research. it's again. it's so much powerful the course that you just write where you feel like writing with no no material to support it. kennedy one with 53% of his vote from catholics. over half of his votes over 17 million votes came from catholics. according to the republican national committee somewhere between four to six million. more catholics voted in 1960 than ever before. the nature of that meant that kindly could not have won the election. without the catholic vote in addition to that in 1952 and 1956. eisenhower got 62% of the protestant vote in 1963 apartment in 1950 in 1960 to show you how much of this has changed it went from 62% all the way up. a great jump to 63% it literally didn't change material at all. and yet the way the story is told is fundamentally wrong because the kennedy machine was talking they were really going to smear nixon and a landslide and when the landslide didn't happen the most convenient reason was too many. too many bigots the only thing they don't mention is in 1956 nixon the plumbing eisenhower got almost 50% of the catholic vote. the only number that significantly changed in 1960. was that kennedy received 78% that's an increase of 29% and yet no one ever mentions it. and what i think one of the ancillary charges, of course the photo billy graham with president kennedy and in the oval office the after was over. that so can ancillary to that as sort of that that nixon. used religion in a dirty way during the campaign to exploit this this idea. that was america ready to elect its first catholic hit of course, you know talk about al smith or you know, the previously did you find evidence of this either side using religion in in this kind of harsh political way 60 there were some there were there were some fundamental bigotry where certain evangelicals and others did not want a catholic in the white house because they didn't want the pope running the federal government, but by and large what happened in 1928 with al smith had significantly changed. the the amount of adversarial relations between catholic voting and non-catholic voting had mellowed a great deal. so the idea of the charge that nixon was dirty because he was encouraging bigotry. sable nixon stuff you don't have to prove it. all you have to do is say it. we've already talked a little bit about fraud but let's close on that topic nowadays. we see i think every political election in these red. and blue maps of the outcome om 1960 and the version of it that i like to best because you really get into some more regional trends is the one by county. of course red being republican blue being democratic and so i guess when you see a map like this comment a little bit on a couple things. what do you see when you see a map like an outcome like this? for its own sake but also kind of compared to what eisenhower began to do in the south. and then ultimately the big question was their fraud and if so, was it decisive? the numbers that i ran first of all say that nixon had every likelihood of winning, texas and illinois. how do you want, texas and illinois he would have been president of the united states in 1960. but what i see when i look at the entire map. is a precursor of what we are experiencing now. the nation is starting to divide. fundamentally into two sections the urbanites and the nature of certain block voting black voting jewish voting labor voting etc becoming fundamentally democratic. and suburbia and rural becoming very much republican. and what you have now, i think is the most extreme of that where people simply of one ilk or another won't talk to one another. there's there's virtually no intercourse they simply are so extreme and their partisanship is it? bodes well for partisan voting which is fundamentally 40% republican now and 40% democrat now. but in 1960. the remarkable thing is nixon receives almost 95% of the republican vote pretty hard to believe somebody so evil as nixon could get 95% and our hero jack kennedy. received 84% of the democratic vote all kennedy had to do. was to keep his base. there were 17 million more democratic registrants than there were republicans. 40 40 million democrat republican registrants and 57 million democratic presidents if henry had simply kept his base. he couldn't even do that. and the nature of the election was not only so close. it was even closer than anybody believed because again, nobody bothered to run any numbers. it's it's amazing how incorrect the results of the election have been told ie kennedy won the election by a hundred and twelve thousand votes. i ran the election results for different ways. one way the best he did was about 107,000 votes. the next way i ran it he went by 27 but thousand votes. the next way i ran it nixon won by 130,000 votes and the final way. i wrote it ran it is nixon won by 56,000 votes. and yet people to this day continually run these numbers as if they were gospel. without evaluating what really happened? well, there's plenty more we can get into i haven't even asked you about the debates. so maybe if we have time we'll get into that. but for now though, i i'd like to go to the audience we have time for some some q&a. that'll be a lead here with a microphone coming around and we'd love to get here your questions here. before we begin with the q&a. let's get a round of applause for mr. gilman and dr. nichter. we will open the floor for questions if you have a question, just raise your hand or signal to me and i'll come and get you. but the first question is i would like to ask if myself what advice do you have for young researchers? and where do you think they should start? do that again. what advice do you have a young researchers? and where should they start? well professor nick dr. and i are lucky we already have established records the problem for young people and i talked to my editor at yale about this. 20 years ago to now the amount of material written has increased by 10% the amount of books that are published now. is three times? as many very few pages increased but the number of publications have increased three times. it's very very difficult. a break into writing if you are or able to get published. it is. more power to you some of us get lucky some of us don't but if i were any of you i would try to. write letters to the editors right in newspapers or magazines or anything you could do to get your name in or i would find somebody that really knows what the hell they're doing. and ask them to help. but generally speaking it is incredibly bleak for young people even if they do brilliant research to find a publisher. thank you to your left over here. thank you, dr. gelman. i learned a lot. i had a lot of questions that you clarifying but the question for you you mentioned a couple of times you repeated the words evil nixon. and you reason why some of the perceptions? were inaccurate flawed but you also said that inaccurate. flawed precepts were as if they were facts. so what was causing this? why? why did people? feel the way they did. ordinarily people don't believe things that are so easily contradictory like, you know more women voted for kennedy the nixon. well, that's not true. and but did they believe that? that's just an example. the answer is is so complex. one first of all democrats harry truman virtually hated the ground that nixon walked on. eleanor roosevelt felt the same way. adley stevenson hayden nixon with a passion. the leaders of the democratic party one the fundamental extreme one because nixon was vulnerable and two because eisenhower was not you didn't talk the great man, because it was a waste of your time. so you went after someone that they thought was possible to go after but what is worse than that? is today in newspapers magazines television, you have some of these people who are commentators that i nicely call idiots. and they will tell you material that makes no sense at all and one day one thing and one day the exact opposite thing. but back in the day in 1960. you had a bevy of famous calmness of newspaper reporters that simply wrote what happened? whereas kennedy had these great energetic audiences. election had awful. nobody was there. and if you saw a pictures kennedy had good audiences and surprise nixon had good audiences. did nixon have people that thought he was charismatic? absolutely the kennedy have people that thought he was charismatic. yeah. but theodore white for example, and i quote this in the book goes on to nixon's train in october of 1960. wearing a win with kennedy lapel button. key, can you get and yet these people behind the scenes behave poorly? and to to give you my my own personal experience. when i taught especially after i started writing about richard nixon. people would talk to me. i could apply for grant after grant after grant and have superb grants and get thank you so much. no. and the nature of writing about nixon anything other than saying he was darth vader. was not publishable. and for one of a better word publishers are greedy. they want to make money and if they can't sell books. they don't publish now the campaign of the century and my other books have sold pretty -- well, but what it what it means is is either i'm fooling a lot of people or that there is a a certain amount of belief that the material that's been written so long so wrong. i'll tell you one last thing i was nominated for a thing called the plutarch award and 2015 for the best biography of the year. and i got a call from a high up in the thing and said they're 257 books nominated. they're going to narrow it down to the top 10. irv, don't feel bad you're not going to make it. two months later i get a call from the same guy saying earth. i got to tell you you made it to the top 10, but now it goes down to the top four. there's no way you're going to be a finalist forget being the finalist. a month later i get a call irv. you got to sit down for this. you're a finalist. so i have on my wall hanging, you know, finalists for the plutarch award. go figure i have i was very pleased it's always nice to be knowledge. but the man that was telling me this was on the inside knew everything was going and there was not a prayer. i didn't have a chance. and yet sometimes it changes. thank you robert behind. yes, dr. gelman, i as a communications major. i'm just curious. could you speak to the televised debate? to let the televised debate that we so much about nixon looked angry and well, we already moved tan and we all know what happened. he was poorly. tanned, you know kennedy looked wonderful, you know, it was it was a match from the very start well and though that those who watched on television thought kennedy one, but those who yes and done radio and those the one or watch listen doing radio thought nixon won all that's nonsense. it never happened. it was just a story. that was done. no one in 60 years has done any serious research on the great debates. do you know what happened? what happened was far easier? in 19 the night before the first debate. nixon is talking to eisenhower and says, you know. i'm going to follow. i'm not going to be the adversarial nixon. i'm going to be a kind and gentle or nixon. and so the next night he goes on the first debate. and he's the kinder gentler nixon. and all the people that were watching as partisans for the kinder gentle or next we're saying what the hell is wrong with you, you know go get them you so the basic thing is if you listen to the first debate. nixon says in some way or another 16 times. i agree with you. and his people didn't want nixon agreeing and the following three debates. nixon was nixon. and was adversarial attacking kennedy for where he was weak and doing a quite good job. but after the first debate as a communications major, how do you think that the newspapers responded? thing it was a tie. it becomes untie over 60 years. and it becomes kennedy winning the first debate by a mile, but the initial reaction in all of the newspapers was that there was no difference between the two of them. they both did equally well or equally bad the whole story of the kennedy being this wonderful guy, but what did happen? what did happen and what i didn't say was the greatest thing that john kennedy did was run for office. he was a wonderful campaigner. and by staying up and not making any massive mistakes in the first debate. what happened was is democrats said? this guy is a lot better than we thought and might be able to do a good job. so they rallied around the flag. and henry got more. adulation after that first debate because it didn't blow it not because he did great because he didn't do badly. we got one last question over here. dr. clearly senator johnson helped senator, kennedy and his campaign. how much did ambassador lodge helped vice president nixon given that lodge was from massachusetts and clearly kennedy was going to win his home state. well, first of all the man that really should answer the question is the pro. well, i'll let you answer most of it, but i would just simply say. you know, i think that i wonder about you know if the nixon lodge ticket had effectively been four ordained if you want to call it that eisenhower's wishes. i mean, i think after eight years as president. the two people that eisenhower owed the most to after eight years were richard nixon and henry cavill launch for all that. they did during his own presidency. and so i think he eisenhower began to groom both of them beginning in about 1958 59 various ways of winning up to 60. and when you look at the schedules of the four top the two top democrats and two top republicans. lodge actually was the the only one of the four not to miss a day of campaigning due to illness or injury or something else. and in fact, i found in lodges papers in boston, he's repeatedly crying out to the people on the nixon side of the campaign saying use me more i can do more. you know, i'm not being effective because i can't control my schedule. my schedule is being made entirely by the nixon side and you're not i'm not even approving events in advance. so i think large wanted to be used more during that campaign and the last thing i was saying you can fill in any where i'm where i've gone astray. here is lodge also was was older. i mean, he was older more like an eisenhower figure. you got to figure lodge was born in 1902. he was a full 15 years older than john f kennedy. he was six years old in lyndon johnson 11 years older than richard nixon. you know we have this idea of the vice presidential candidate being kind of the attack talk, you know, they got and do the things that are unprecedential or the stops that the top at the top of the ticket doesn't want to go and do and i think that's been locked that more often than not that's been the pattern in the last 50 years. that was it was different then i think lodge was really a way of ensuring direct continuity from the eisenhower presidency to hopefully the nixon presidency. so i think that was really the role the larger brought a certain kind of stability and maturity that nixon don't forget how young he was still in 60 47 years old. hey run for president. you've been vice president for eight years. you lose the run for the presidency. and you're still just turning 48 years old. that's not so bad and you have options in the future. so i think lodge i think as a running mate with nixon. it was really a different era. and the only thing i have to add to that is what's better? the real story is as professor victor says or the fable that lodged in campaign. he was lazy etc if you don't look at the record. you can lie. all you want to the fact is that my examination of what lodge did at the 1960 campaign remember nixon was in the hospital for two weeks. lodge was the guy carrying the campaign and surprise surprise was campaigning all over new york when nelson rockefeller. and sweating and going to the beach, etc, etc, and doing well, but because people picked up on the story after the word in time magazine that lodge had to take a nap every day and get into pajamas. what would you rather have that he was in pajamas and campaigning like hell or that he was him in pajamas not doing anything. it's it's it's it's literally. naughty what you can get away with if you don't do the research. no, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking doctors gelman and nichter? you did, okay. the book is the campaign of the century and dr. gelman will sign copies of the book tonight in the lobby. thank you for being here and get home safe in the rain.
about the 1960 presidential election. the effects of which continue to reverberate across today's political landscape we all think we know that that history is well written and well-spoken for but now irwin gelman has become america's contemporary leading authority on the 1960 election, and he's the first historian to truly use mounds of material from the archives to tell a more complete account of the 1960 election including unused sources. such as the fbi surveillance logs of then candidate john f kennedy and the papers of leon jaworski and henry cabot lodge, jr. gilman is a scholar of 20th century presidential history whose two prior books have documented the congressional and vice presidential periods of richard nixon's life. and his third entitled the campaign of the century kennedy nixon and the election of 1960 does not disappoint. gilman is joined in conversation this evening with another renowned 20th century presidential historian, dr. luke nichter who holds the james h cavanaugh endowed chair in presidential studies at chapman university dr. nichter is a new york times bestselling author who's credits include two volumes of the nixon tapes with historian, doug, brinkley. a biography of henry cabot lodge jr. and nectar is now at work on a history of the 1968 presidential election. ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in welcoming irv gelman and dr. luke nichter. here. thank you. now first of all, i'd like to thank you all for coming. i appreciate it. i hope you enjoy the evening, but i'd like to spend. two minutes maybe and thanking my wife gloria gay for tricking me to come to the nixon library. i had absolutely no intention to write a book on richard nixon. let alone now three books on richard nixon. but nobody else will do it. is a project the most historians especially academics won't do you just can have tenure promotions. or anything when you write about darth vader and to many academics nixon is darth vader. which is unfair untrue etc. but i was married to gloria gay for 29 years until she passed away. she was a wonderful wonderful person. and i just want to let you know that i wouldn't be here. if it wasn't for her tricking me into coming. a couple of other things some of you have i know have been friends for years john and ruth ann. evans have been incredibly kind. paul and candy took me out for dinner and more importantly and most importantly there's two people sitting over there. one has gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard as name is joe dimalowski. drink the other is susan nolte who was the chief archivist for years and years and years and is not only brilliant but as a sweetheart. and the reason why i wanted to point it out was my beginning of my book has acknowledgments. and these aren't just names to me. they're important people they make me better than what i am. they helped me more than i deserve to be helped and it's a great kindness that they've done. so when you read my knowledgements, you'll find out that there are a truckload of people like susan and like joe that have helped me and i really appreciate it, but i wanted to give you a picture of what these people look like at how kind people can be to research historians. so again, susan joe. thank you. here well, thanks very much for that that welcome and in particular to the nixon library and the richard dixon foundation and also to c-span viewers who are joining us virtually. as starting a little bit. more personal before we dive into the book. it welcome back to the west coast. you know, i think for for many years. this was probably a second home or a home for you. how many years did you spend here? and do you miss it? i spent with susan nolte. seven years going through documents day by day week by week year by year. this volume here is a mere two and a half million pages of research and that's what i do. and since you asked that question, i have a plot another plug that i forgot to give a year from now luke victor will be sitting in this seat. he is finished a study of the election of 1968 and we'll show that the anish adult incident had virtually nothing to do with the election of 1968. so if you're here now come back for luke a year from now and find out what really did happen in 1968 and we can just be an opposite seats at that point, but but juxtapose that experience of turning presidential for seven years. with the fact that with with sort of where you came from, i think i once heard you talk about or describe yourself as a slum kid from baltimore. and so how does someone in that situation go on to get a phd in american history from indiana university and ultimately come to write not a book but a series on the subject. i was very lucky. i didn't spend my life in jail. i have a 19-inch knife scar on my shoulder. the guy was kind enough to crack a building building brick over my head. and walking home from school. it was always a kindness if i had less than four people beat me up. how in the world i got out of it? i'm guessing it was sheer luck. and how i ended up getting a doctorate writing books. i still have to pinch myself. i i guarantee you. if any of you think that i'm not good. truly, i'm not that good. so we're here to talk about a book, but some know and some may not know that it's also part of a larger series. and so you when you're doing show and tell of nixon books, it's never easy to carry them around, but i'll sort of briefly introduce each book and maybe have you say a word or a line or two about each one to sort of just properly tease them for the audience. so the first book in the series richard nixon the contender the congress here is 1946 to 1952. the basis of the book is that nobody ever really seriously did the research that susan nolte helped me with and the remarkable thing that i found about it was the charges of nixon beating jerry voorhees for his first congustial election in 1946. thaton voorhees as a communist never happened. it was all made up. and the real story was not here at the nixon library. it was and the jerry vorhees papers and pomona and the second thing that i found remarkable. was that nixon smeared helena hagin douglas as a pink pink lady in the 1950, california senatorial contest. the problem was the only time he ever referred to her as pink was in a private conversation between him and his political relations person. but as far as the reason why she lost can be found in norma, oklahoma and her archives at the university of oklahoma. so the whole nature of how nixon was darth vader in these two elections are fundamentally flawed. and moving forward in time and nixon's career the second the biggest thickest of the series the president and the apprentice eisenhower and nixon 1952 to 1961. that one is basically nixon's vice presidency and how he ran for the vice presidency. and again once more the story is so flawed. one of the stories came from an oral history interview. where dwight eisenhower was watching nixon give what was known as the fund's speech of the checker speech and slammed his hand into what he was writing on and talked tore the paper. the only problem was is i found a copy of the speech. and there was no tearing there was nothing. it was just a normal piece of paper. and then even better than that was that nixon and eisenhower didn't get along that really eisenhower didn't like nixon. and i'm saying to myself self. how in the world can dwight eisenhower? be president for eight years and have nixon has his vice president for eight years and they didn't get along. quite frankly they get along fine. and once i wrote the corrective, i know this is going to shock you. but people stop talking about that. is it an amazing that you can lie? just so much until you get caught and then you just stop you don't apologize. you're basically intellectual cowards. and so then the with the latest installment of the series, which we'll dive into here in a moment campaign of the century kennedy nixon and election of 1960. how many years would you say you've been formally or informally working on this collection of works? 25 years and how many pieces of paper pages of records do you think you've examined red turned or investigated? i read about 800 pages a day. that's why. and i could do that with comprehension. the fact is i didn't think it was a book. i don't i was a fan of theodore white the making the president 1960. i thought he told everything. i know i started to do the research. and again the surprise you i was wrong. there was and has been up until i wrote this. nobody had ever read archival research. when the great debates of 1960 of kennedy's catholicism of 1960 the fraud in 1960 all of that stuff had never been done. and had been mentioned maybe but not have had ever been done in a serious archival way. so i looked at all this material and i discovered. but rather the theater white who by the way in his memoirs claimed that i'm writing or i wrote. the making the president 1960 purposely purposely in his memoirs. making kennedy the hero and nixon a villain. well, that's not the way you write history. and so this is basically not only a corrective fear or white but to basically say that the entire story of the 1960 election has been seriously flawed. so having that is background, let's take a look at what the critics say in reviews of these books. all three of these books have been reviewed in the new york times as well as many other places. i think that alone signaling that these are books worth paying attention to but i think the critics in the reviews have no shortage of things to talk about. and i i went through in preparation. i read all three of the reviews in the time times these three books. and i'd like to go through so just sort of the very top 20 outtakes. from these reviews and get your thoughts. and these are comments direct quotes either about the author his the work in question being reviewed or about the works characterization of richard nixon. refers to the works as a forgiving judgment richard nixon he acquits nixon of all charges. he takes one side. more polemical than persuasive he distorts the views of those he would rebut. there he says the rancor the rancor filled prejudices against his own clear-eyed distillations. your naive you're not persuasive. they're a feast that leaves one hungry. simplistic bland i'm not done. a sympathetic glow in no way substantiated nixon friendly spin adds nothing here, but fresh outrage. a hit job lacking nothing new and circumstantial so my old boss at c-span was brian lamb and so to sort of channel brian lamb he would say. urban off galman, what you doing wrong? i keep on telling you. i am a lot less than you think i am and even with these people i'm even lesser than you think i am. the the one review i got in the new york times for this book said nothing new everything i've written is --. well, he didn't say --, but he meant -- and that quite frankly if you read the book you're an idiot and that appeared online in the new york times and my sales went up four times. it then made the sunday edition of the new york times and my sales went up three times. and then the week after it appeared in the new york times sunday edition. to show you how crazy the new york times is i became an editor's choice. so the the editors of the new york times repudiated their own reviewer. so it just goes to show you if any of you are familiar out here with fairhaven. i probably am a reject from fair haven. and i'm not sure where to go with a question after that. but i think what i would ask is. what? why is writing about richard nixon still so controversial? there are several reasons, but i think the main reason is one of the reviews that i received which was a nice review. it wasn't bad it. it said i can't see it. i mean dixon was so bad and kennedy was so good. there's no way that this book that is written as well as it is written and the arguments that are made are so reasonable. it just it just it just can't be. and one of the reviews i got from a syndicate in canada was an important book in your water read it, but 60 years they've gotten it wrong gilman's narrative is like swimming upstream. so the general tenor of nixon being a despicable individual one of the the greatest things that i remember as i was writing. the second volume was that just about every liberal commentator. hold the speech maudlin. and maudlin is not a good term. i found in the adley stevenson papers. at princeton about a hundred and twenty letters. that were favorable to stevenson and unfavorable to the chucker. speech. the only thing i left out was there were about three million pieces of paper that went into the republican national committee saying how wonderful the speech was. and yet to this day many people believe that the checker speech was modeling when in fact, it was a great speech that was considered by an overwhelming number of people just imagine three million people wrote in to say how good the speech was and yet you remember a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty letters. by people probably who didn't even listen to the speech on how awful it was. now something seems to be a little out of balance there when a hundred plus people can say it's he was awful and three million people can say he was great. i think that we have become generally speaking so conditioned to things that never been challenged. people don't challenge what they don't think about in many cases. and what i did was not so much to record what i personally thought. but what the record showed and the record showed something quite different than what's been published and i think that for one of a better. rationalization or reasoning that the fact the people have accepted this nonsense so easily is because they just want to well, i think that theme of sort of the many myths and misunderstandings in the nixon era is a theme that resonates throughout the book here. and so i've highlighted i call them myths or misunderstanding about seven of them that come to me reading the book and i have some photos that will help to illustrate the myths that we'll click through here, but for each one, i think what i'd like to do is sort of state the conventional wisdom or the myth and misunderstanding just as it's existed in the literature over the decades and allow you to respond to each one. so i think number one the role of eisenhower that nixon perhaps lost in 1960 because eisenhower didn't do enough. that sort of nixon was on this ill-fated ticket that didn't have eisenhower's support. he might not have been eisenhower's choice to run and there's lots of mythology about exactly what eisenhower's role was during this year and it's something that you address in the book. once more you you write what you think people want to read rather than write what really happened? just imagine for a second. that nick that eisenhower absolutely hated nixon. can any of you seriously hear believe that eisenhower would want? a senator with no legislative experience with no legislative record to beep his incumbent vice president who would carry on his role? the whole idea that eisenhower and nixon did not get along or to not have a good relationship. is is flawed by the very nature of all the things eisenhower had nixon doing going on foreign trips. helping with legislation being invited to all of the various meetings that eisenhower and nixon chair together it makes no logical sense when you talk to people and you say how could all of this happen? and eisenhower in nixon not get along for eight years. they made faces and one another. well, i couldn't choose just one eisenhower photo. i like this one because it gets in pat nixon. could you say you know as we in 1960 election has been called kind of one of the first modern campaigns? can you talk a little bit about even in 1960 the role that patent nixon played and the role of women in the campaign? i'm sure all of you already know all the the numbers of voting but remember. how charismatic? kennedy was and remember how women smoot. the election of 1960 for the first time in american history more women voted than men and you'll never guess. what the breakdown was between this wonderful charismatic kennedy and women voting it was 51:49. oh, i made one small error 51 for nixon 49 for kennedy. pat nixon took the position that this is what her husband's was. she was very ambitious like her husband very very smart. a very attuned to what he was doing the the ultimate defender. and she and mimi eisenhower and dwight eisenhower. had a very good relationship and if you look at the letters between dwight eisenhower and richard nixon again, big surprise just about every one of them said say hello to pat. i really appreciate her help. doesn't sound like the eisenhower and his wife mamie did not get along with -- impact. the second misunderstanding or myth of the campaign is that nixon and lodge were sort of ill-suited together on the ticket and that lodge was the downfall for richard nixon that year. what do you say? on january 7th 1960 dwight eisenhower wrote a secret memo to his own file his presidential pick was richard nixon. his vice presidential pick was henry cabot lodge, jr. it wasn't so much nixon picking. large it was eisenhower were picking lodge. and at the time lodge was you and representative? for the united states and was the main person who talked about the russians being evil and made a tremendous amount of television time. he had the ability. he was a boston brahman. and by the way you may not know the person that wrote the biography of henry cabot lodge jupiter. it's luke victory. it was not a self-serving question. i promise. so third misunderstanding, i kind of highlight about 1960 on the democratic side. also interesting that so many senators current or former in 1960 senator john f kennedy, senator lyndon johnson the i so how about this one that kennedy would not have been elected president without johnson because it was really eisenhower be kind of chip away at the south, louisiana. he took in 56 virginia both campaigns really began to eat away at the traditional democratic south would kennedy have won the presidency do you think without lyndon johnson from texas to hold down hold down the democratic south as we would say in the most area that terms not a snowball's chance of hell. what lyndon johnson brought to the table? was what ronnie duggar who was a famous texan journalist said that every election that johnson and the rest of the people that ran for elections in texas during the timeframe up to 1960 was competitive corruption. it was just depending on who could steal more votes. and johnson ran in 1941. and lost because he didn't steal the votes. but in 1948. he won by 87 votes and received the wonderful nickname landslide linden. now imagine for a second imagine and no election. that johnson ran it did he win without corruption? and yet every author every major biography of lyndon johnson. talks about the fraud in 1941. and in 1948 multiple chapters one book major biography on the election of 1960 says oh, by the way. there was nothing about fraud in 1960, so i'm not going to talk about it since there was no fraud why talk about it. and in another book it didn't even make a half a sense and made footnote on the next little last page and the volume. and it basically said there was no fraud in illinois because authors listen to junior said there was no fraud a fairly impartial guy that worked for john kennedy and was the ultimate member of the democratic party and in addition to that. there was no fraud in texas. and the reason why there was no fraud in texas is because leon jaworski said, you can prove it. so obviously the answer to the question is there was no fraud because people who had a great stake and saying there was no fraud was no fraud. the only problem with that is they liked? we will return to the topic of fraud in a few more questions. next misunderstanding or myth of the campaign. this is a nixon arriving in in hawaii. you can see kind of the aloha sign there and his arrival and giving a speech there at that. stop that brief campaign stop. so another myth and misunderstanding that it was a mistake for nixon to pledge to campaign in all 50 states. and again all the people that write about the election especially people that write about how wonderful that kennedy was and how brilliant his campaign was and how in the world could nixon be so stupid as to run it all 50 states? none of them mentioned the kennedy campaigned in 45 states, i guess he was five states less stupid the next one was. the nature of the way that both of them ran. and if you want to take a look at this in the most objective way is that nixon had just as many votes. as kennedy had so i'm guessing since they both had the similar just about the same amount of votes. the kennedy must have run a much better campaign than nixon did the only problem again with that is how in the world if both of these guys got the same amount of votes that one ran a far superior campaign than the other it just it the logical inconsistency is undeniable and yet folks don't want to talk about our next myth or myth understanding. is that the arrest of martin luther king that fall in 1960 was decisive in the election outcome. so could you in the and while answering that charge? set up a little bit the relationship between nixon and king. what kind of background there was and what role that played during the campaign? martin luther king jr. by 1960 was a major player. not the major player. what was a player in black society. and the nature of the campaign with blacks was the story better yet the fable is that king was arrested. for violating a minor parole violation i was sent to a hard georgia prison. and one of nick kennedy staff said called kennedy and said you should call coretta kid. and and offering something and he did. and that's just about all he did was offer sympathy because jack kennedy was the last democratic candidate. that actively solicited white voters in the south. jack kennedy, you know solicited white votes in the south. absolutely. that's what he did. story gets better. according to the story after the call greta blacks went crazy and they changed their vote enormously. and according to the black newspapers five million blacks went to the polls. 50% of all black voters went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly for jack kennedy. and the democrats sent out. trailway bosses across the united states. i mean, isn't this a great story across the united states handing out ballasts the people to vote. for jack henry there's only one small problem. it never happened. there were no trailway bosses. there were no massive amount of literature there weren't five million black voters the best number i have is somewhere between two and a half million to three million blocks. that's 25 to 30 percent. of all eligible black voters and by the way from 1936 when blocks changed dramatically for the electing democrats the elect two-thirds go to democrats and one-third go to republicans through the 1960 election. let me think. kennedy received 68% about of the black vote nixon received 32% of the black vote now. i'm not real good when numbers like like john evans but 32% sounds like a third. 68% sounds like 2/3. so nothing changed as far as the numbers went the story has become so exaggerated and so out of line. and it's still to many people. unbelievable change in the election and quite frankly it never happened. we have two more to go the next myth or myth myth understanding whether the issue of religion and kennedy's catholicism. and the extent to which the candidates used religion as a political issue. in the campaign of 1960 whether that was the decisive. whether that was decisive in the outcome. no one has ever done. research on the influence of catholicism in the 60 election it's there's two books on it. and they were so actively researching that none of them did archival research. it's again. it's so much powerful the course that you just write where you feel like writing with no no material to support it. kennedy one with 53% of his vote from catholics. over half of his votes over 17 million votes came from catholics. according to the republican national committee somewhere between four to six million. more catholics voted in 1960 than ever before. the nature of that meant that kindly could not have won the election. without the catholic vote in addition to that in 1952 and 1956. eisenhower got 62% of the protestant vote in 1963 apartment in 1950 in 1960 to show you how much of this has changed it went from 62% all the way up. a great jump to 63% it literally didn't change material at all. and yet the way the story is told is fundamentally wrong because the kennedy machine was talking they were really going to smear nixon and a landslide and when the landslide didn't happen the most convenient reason was too many. too many bigots the only thing they don't mention is in 1956 nixon the plumbing eisenhower got almost 50% of the catholic vote. the only number that significantly changed in 1960. was that kennedy received 78% that's an increase of 29% and yet no one ever mentions it. and what i think one of the ancillary charges, of course the photo billy graham with president kennedy and in the oval office the after was over. that so can ancillary to that as sort of that that nixon. used religion in a dirty way during the campaign to exploit this this idea. that was america ready to elect its first catholic hit of course, you know talk about al smith or you know, the previously did you find evidence of this either side using religion in in this kind of harsh political way 60 there were some there were there were some fundamental bigotry where certain evangelicals and others did not want a catholic in the white house because they didn't want the pope running the federal government, but by and large what happened in 1928 with al smith had significantly changed. the the amount of adversarial relations between catholic voting and non-catholic voting had mellowed a great deal. so the idea of the charge that nixon was dirty because he was encouraging bigotry. sable nixon stuff you don't have to prove it. all you have to do is say it. we've already talked a little bit about fraud but let's close on that topic nowadays. we see i think every political election in these red. and blue maps of the ocome from 1960 and the version of it that i like to best because you really get into some more regional trends is the one by county. of course red being republican blue being democratic and so i guess when you see a map like this comment a little bit on a couple things. what do you see when you see a map like an outcome like this? for its own sake but also kind of compared to what eisenhower began to do in the south. and then ultimately the big question was their fraud and if so, was it decisive? the numbers that i ran first of all say that nixon had every likelihood of winning, texas and illinois. how do you want, texas and illinois he would have been president of the united states in 1960. but what i see when i look at the entire map. is a precursor of what we are experiencing now. the nation is starting to divide. fundamentally into two sections the urbanites and the nature of certain block voting black voting jewish voting labor voting etc becoming fundamentally democratic. and suburbia and rural becoming very much republican. and what you have now, i think is the most extreme of that where people simply of one ilk or another won't talk to one another. there's there's virtually no intercourse they simply are so extreme and their partisanship is it? bodes well for partisan voting which is fundamentally 40% republican now and 40% democrat now. but in 1960. the remarkable thing is nixon receives almost 95% of the republican vote pretty hard to believe somebody so evil as nixon could get 95% and our hero jack kennedy. received 84% of the democratic vote all kennedy had to do. was to keep his base. there were 17 million more democratic registrants than there were republicans. 40 40 million democrat republican registrants and 57 million democratic presidents if henry had simply kept his base. he couldn't even do that. and the nature of the election was not only so close. it was even closer than anybody believed because again, nobody bothered to run any numbers. it's it's amazing how incorrect the results of the election have been told ie kennedy won the election by a hundred and twelve thousand votes. i ran the election results for different ways. one way the best he did was about 107,000 votes. the next way i ran it he went by 27 but thousand votes. the next way i ran it nixon won by 130,000 votes and the final way. i wrote it ran it is nixon won by 56,000 votes. and yet people to this day continually run these numbers as if they were gospel. without evaluating what really happened? well, there's plenty more we can get into i haven't even asked you about the debates. so maybe if we have time we'll get into that. but for now though, i i'd like to go to the audience we have time for some some q&a. that'll be a lead here with a microphone coming around and we'd love to get here your questions here. before we begin with the q&a. let's get a round of applause for mr. gilman and dr. nichter. we will open the floor for questions if you have a question, just raise your hand or signal to me and i'll come and get you. but the first question is i would like to ask if myself what advice do you have for young researchers? and where do you think they should start? do that again. what advice do you have a young researchers? and where should they start? well professor nick dr. and i are lucky we already have established records the problem for young people and i talked to my editor at yale about this. 20 years ago to now the amount of material written has increased by 10% the amount of books that are published now. is three times? as many very few pages increased but the number of publications have increased three times. it's very very difficult. a break into writing if you are or able to get published. it is. more power to you some of us get lucky some of us don't but if i were any of you i would try to. write letters to the editors right in newspapers or magazines or anything you could do to get your name in or i would find somebody that really knows what the hell they're doing. and ask them to help. but generally speaking it is incredibly bleak for young people even if they do brilliant research to find a publisher. thank you to your left over here. thank you, dr. gelman. i learned a lot. i had a lot of questions that you clarifying but the question for you you mentioned a couple of times you repeated the words evil nixon. and you reason why some of the perceptions? were inaccurate flawed but you also said that inaccurate. flawed precepts were as if they were facts. so what was causing this? why? why did people? feel the way they did. ordinarily people don't believe things that are so easily contradictory like, you know more women voted for kennedy the nixon. well, that's not true. and but did they believe that? that's just an example. the answer is is so complex. one first of all democrats harry truman virtually hated the ground that nixon walked on. eleanor roosevelt felt the same way. adley stevenson hayden nixon with a passion. the leaders of the democratic party one the fundamental extreme one because nixon was vulnerable and two because eisenhower was not you didn't talk the great man, because it was a waste of your time. so you went after someone that they thought was possible to go after but what is worse than that? is today in newspapers magazines television, you have some of these people who are commentators that i nicely call idiots. and they will tell you material that makes no sense at all and one day one thing and one day the exact opposite thing. but back in the day in 1960. you had a bevy of famous calmness of newspaper reporters that simply wrote what happened? whereas kennedy had these great energetic audiences. election had awful. nobody was there. and if you saw a pictures kennedy had good audiences and surprise nixon had good audiences. did nixon have people that thought he was charismatic? absolutely the kennedy have people that thought he was charismatic. yeah. but theodore white for example, and i quote this in the book goes on to nixon's train in october of 1960. wearing a win with kennedy lapel button. key, can you get and yet these people behind the scenes behave poorly? and to to give you my my own personal experience. when i taught especially after i started writing about richard nixon. people would talk to me. i could apply for grant after grant after grant and have superb grants and get thank you so much. no. and the nature of writing about nixon anything other than saying he was darth vader. was not publishable. and for one of a better word publishers are greedy. they want to make money and if they can't sell books. they don't publish now the campaign of the century and my other books have sold pretty -- well, but what it what it means is is either i'm fooling a lot of people or that there is a a certain amount of belief that the material that's been written so long so wrong. i'll tell you one last thing i was nominated for a thing called the plutarch award and 2015 for the best biography of the year. and i got a call from a high up in the thing and said they're 257 books nominated. they're going to narrow it down to the top 10. irv, don't feel bad you're not going to make it. two months later i get a call from the same guy saying earth. i got to tell you you made it to the top 10, but now it goes down to the top four. there's no way you're going to be a finalist forget being the finalist. a month later i get a call irv. you got to sit down for this. you're a finalist. so i have on my wall hanging, you know, finalists for the plutarch award. go figure i have i was very pleased it's always nice to be knowledge. but the man that was telling me this was on the inside knew everything was going and there was not a prayer. i didn't have a chance. and yet sometimes it changes. thank you robert behind. yes, dr. gelman, i as a communications major. i'm just curious. could you speak to the televised debate? to let the televised debate that we so much about nixon looked angry and well, we already moved tan and we all know what happened. he was poorly. tanned, you know kennedy looked wonderful, you know, it was it was a match from the very start well and though that those who watched on television thought kennedy one, but those who yes and done radio and those the one or watch listen doing radio thought nixon won all that's nonsense. it never happened. it was just a story. that was done. no one in 60 years has done any serious research on the great debates. do you know what happened? what happened was far easier? in 19 the night before the first debate. nixon is talking to eisenhower and says, you know. i'm going to follow. i'm not going to be the adversarial nixon. i'm going to be a kind and gentle or nixon. and so the next night he goes on the first debate. and he's the kinder gentler nixon. and all the people that were watching as partisans for the kinder gentle or next we're saying what the hell is wrong with you, you know go get them you so the basic thing is if you listen to the first debate. nixon says in some way or another 16 times. i agree with you. and his people didn't want nixon agreeing and the following three debates. nixon was nixon. and was adversarial attacking kennedy for where he was weak and doing a quite good job. but after the first debate as a communications major, how do you think that the newspapers responded? thing it was a tie. it becomes untie over 60 years. and it becomes kennedy winning the first debate by a mile, but the initial reaction in all of the newspapers was that there was no difference between the two of them. they both did equally well or equally bad the whole story of the kennedy being this wonderful guy, but what did happen? what did happen and what i didn't say was the greatest thing that john kennedy did was run for office. he was a wonderful campaigner. and by staying up and not making any massive mistakes in the first debate. what happened was is democrats said? this guy is a lot better than we thought and might be able to do a good job. so they rallied around the flag. and henry got more. adulation after that first debate because it didn't blow it not because he did great because he didn't do badly. we got one last question over here. dr. clearly senator johnson helped senator, kennedy and his campaign. how much did ambassador lodge helped vice president nixon given that lodge was from massachusetts and clearly kennedy was going to win his home state. well, first of all the man that really should answer the question is the pro. well, i'll let you answer most of it, but i would just simply say. you know, i think that i wonder about you know if the nixon lodge ticket had effectively been four ordained if you want to call it that eisenhower's wishes. i mean, i think after eight years as president. the two people that eisenhower owed the most to after eight years were richard nixon and henry cavill launch for all that. they did during his own presidency. and so i think he eisenhower began to groom both of them beginning in about 1958 59 various ways of winning up to 60. and when you look at the schedules of the four top the two top democrats and two top republicans. lodge actually was the the only one of the four not to miss a day of campaigning due to illness or injury or something else. and in fact, i found in lodges papers in boston, he's repeatedly crying out to the people on the nixon side of the campaign saying use me more i can do more. you know, i'm not being effective because i can't control my schedule. my schedule is being made entirely by the nixon side and you're not i'm not even approving events in advance. so i think large wanted to be used more during that campaign and the last thing i was saying you can fill in any where i'm where i've gone astray. here is lodge also was was older. i mean, he was older more like an eisenhower figure. you got to figure lodge was born in 1902. he was a full 15 years older than john f kennedy. he was six years old in lyndon johnson 11 years older than richard nixon. you know we have this idea of the vice presidential candidate being kind of the attack talk, you know, they got and do the things that are unprecedential or the stops that the top at the top of the ticket doesn't want to go and do and i think that's been locked that more often than not that's been the pattern in the last 50 years. that was it was different then i think lodge was really a way of ensuring direct continuity from the eisenhower presidency to hopefully the nixon presidency. so i think that was really the role the larger brought a certain kind of stability and maturity that nixon don't forget how young he was still in 60 47 years old. hey run for president. you've been vice president for eight years. you lose the run for the presidency. and you're still just turning 48 years old. that's not so bad and you have options in the future. so i think lodge i think as a running mate with nixon. it was really a different era. and the only thing i have to add to that is what's better? the real story is as professor victor says or the fable that lodged in campaign. he was lazy etc if you don't look at the record. you can lie. all you want to the fact is that my examination of what lodge did at the 1960 campaign remember nixon was in the hospital for two weeks. lodge was the guy carrying the campaign and surprise surprise was campaigning all over new york when nelson rockefeller. and sweating and going to the beach, etc, etc, and doing well, but because people picked up on the story after the word in time magazine that lodge had to take a nap every day and get into pajamas. what would you rather have that he was in pajamas and campaigning like hell or that he was him in pajamas not doing anything. it's it's it's it's literally. naughty what you can get away with if you don't do the research. no, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking doctors gelman and nichter? you did, okay. the book is the campaign of the century and dr. gelman will sign copies of the book tonight in the lobby. thank you for being here and get home safe in the rain.
america's contemporary leading authority on the 1960 election, and he's the first historian to truly use mounds of material from the archives to tell a more complete account of the 1960 election including unused sources. such as the fbi surveillance logs of then candidate john f kennedy and the papers of leon jaworski and henry cabot lodge, jr. gilman is a scholar of 20th century presidential history whose two prior books have documented the congressional and vice presidential periods of richard nixon's life. and his third entitled the campaign of the century kennedy nixon and the election of 1960 does not disappoint. gilman is joined in conversation this evening with another renowned 20th century presidential historian, dr. luke nichter who holds the james h cavanaugh endowed chair in presidential studies at chapman university dr. nichter is a new york times bestselling author who's credits include two volumes of the nixon tapes with historian, doug, brinkley. a biography of henry cabot lodge jr. and nectar is now at work on a history of the 1968 presidential election. ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in welcoming irv gelman and dr. luke nichter. here. thank you. now first of all, i'd like to thank you all for coming. i appreciate it. i hope you enjoy the evening, but i'd like to spend. two minutes maybe and thanking my wife gloria gay for tricking me to come to the nixon library. i had absolutely no intention to write a book on richard nixon. let alone now three books on richard nixon. but nobody else will do it. is a project the most historians especially academics won't do you just can have tenure promotions. or anything when you write about darth vader and to many academics nixon is darth vader. which is unfair untrue etc. but i was married to gloria gay for 29 years until she passed away. she was a wonderful wonderful person. and i just want to let you know that i wouldn't be here. if it wasn't for her tricking me into coming. a couple of other things some of you have i know have been friends for years john and ruth ann. evans have been incredibly kind. paul and candy took me out for dinner and more importantly and most importantly there's two people sitting over there. one has gotten a haircut and trimmed his beard as name is joe dimalowski. drink the other is susan nolte who was the chief archivist for years and years and years and is not only brilliant but as a sweetheart. and the reason why i wanted to point it out was my beginning of my book has acknowledgments. and these aren't just names to me. they're important people they make me better than what i am. they helped me more than i deserve to be helped and it's a great kindness that they've done. so when you read my knowledgements, you'll find out that there are a truckload of people like susan and like joe that have helped me and i really appreciate it, but i wanted to give you a picture of what these people look like at how kind people can be to research historians. so again, susan joe. thank you. here well, thanks very much for that that welcome and in particular to the nixon library and the richard dixon foundation and also to c-span viewers who are joining us virtually. as starting a little bit. more personal before we dive into the book. it welcome back to the west coast. you know, i think for for many years. this was probably a second home or a home for you. how many years did you spend here? and do you miss it? i spent with susan nolte. seven years going through documents day by day week by week year by year. this volume here is a mere two and a half million pages of research and that's what i do. and since you asked that question, i have a plot another plug that i forgot to give a year from now luke victor will be sitting in this seat. he is finished a study of the election of 1968 and we'll show that the anish adult incident had virtually nothing to do with the election of 1968. so if you're here now come back for luke a year from now and find out what really did happen in 1968 and we can just be an opposite seats at that point, but but juxtapose that experience of turning presidential for seven years. with the fact that with with sort of where you came from, i think i once heard you talk about or describe yourself as a slum kid from baltimore. and so how does someone in that situation go on to get a phd in american history from indiana university and ultimately come to write not a book but a series on the subject. i was very lucky. i didn't spend my life in jail. i have a 19-inch knife scar on my shoulder. the guy was kind enough to crack a building building brick over my head. and walking home from school. it was always a kindness if i had less than four people beat me up. how in the world i got out of it? i'm guessing it was sheer luck. and how i ended up getting a doctorate writing books. i still have to pinch myself. i i guarantee you. if any of you think that i'm not good. truly, i'm not that good. so we're here to talk about a book, but some know and some may not know that it's also part of a larger series. and so you when you're doing show and tell of nixon books, it's never easy to carry them around, but i'll sort of briefly introduce each book and maybe have you say a word or a line or two about each one to sort of just properly tease them for the audience. so the first book in the series richard nixon the contender the congress here is 1946 to 1952. the basis of the book is that nobody ever really seriously did the research that susan nolte helped me with and the remarkable thing that i found about it was the charges of nixon beating jerry voorhees for his first congustial election in 1946. that nixon smeared voorhees as a communist never happened. it was all made up. and the real story was not here at the nixon library. it was and the jerry vorhees papers and pomona and the second thing that i found remarkable. was that nixon smeared helena hagin douglas as a pink pink lady in the 1950, california senatorial contest. the problem was the only time he ever referred to her as pink was in a private conversation between him and his political relations person. but as far as the reason why she lost can be found in norma, oklahoma and her archives at the university of oklahoma. so the whole nature of how nixon was darth vader in these two elections are fundamentally flawed. and moving forward in time and nixon's career the second the biggest thickest of the series the president and the apprentice eisenhower and nixon 1952 to 1961. that one is basically nixon's vice presidency and how he ran for the vice presidency. and again once more the story is so flawed. one of the stories came from an oral history interview. where dwight eisenhower was watching nixon give what was known as the fund's speech of the checker speech and slammed his hand into what he was writing on and talked tore the paper. the only problem was is i found a copy of the speech. and there was no tearing there was nothing. it was just a normal piece of paper. and then even better than that was that nixon and eisenhower didn't get along that really eisenhower didn't like nixon. and i'm saying to myself self. how in the world can dwight eisenhower? be president for eight years and have nixon has his vice president for eight years and they didn't get along. quite frankly they get along fine. and once i wrote the corrective, i know this is going to shock you. but people stop talking about that. is it an amazing that you can lie? just so much until you get caught and then you just stop you don't apologize. you're basically intellectual cowards. and so then the with the latest installment of the series, which we'll dive into here in a moment campaign of the century kennedy nixon and election of 1960. how many years would you say you've been formally or informally working on this collection of works? 25 years and how many pieces of paper pages of records do you think you've examined red turned or investigated? i read about 800 pages a day. that's why. and i could do that with comprehension. the fact is i didn't think it was a book. i don't i was a fan of theodore white the making the president 1960. i thought he told everything. i know i started to do the research. and again the surprise you i was wrong. there was and has been up until i wrote this. nobody had ever read archival research. when the great debates of 1960 of kennedy's catholicism of 1960 the fraud in 1960 all of that stuff had never been done. and had been mentioned maybe but not have had ever been done in a serious archival way. so i looked at all this material and i discovered. but rather the theater white who by the way in his memoirs claimed that i'm writing or i wrote. the making the president 1960 purposely purposely in his memoirs. making kennedy the hero and nixon a villain. well, that's not the way you write history. and so this is basically not only a corrective fear or white but to basically say that the entire story of the 1960 election has been seriously flawed. so having that is background, let's take a look at what the critics say in reviews of these books. all three of these books have been reviewed in the new york times as well as many other places. i think that alone signaling that these are books worth paying attention to but i think the critics in the reviews have no shortage of things to talk about. and i i went through in preparation. i read all three of the reviews in the time times these three books. and i'd like to go through so just sort of the very top 20 outtakes. from these reviews and get your thoughts. and these are comments direct quotes either about the author his the work in question being reviewed or about the works characterization of richard nixon. refers to the works as a forgiving judgment richard nixon he acquits nixon of all charges. he takes one side. more polemical than persuasive he distorts the views of those he would rebut. there he says the rancor the rancor filled prejudices against his own clear-eyed distillations. your naive you're not persuasive. they're a feast that leaves one hungry. simplistic bland i'm not done. a sympathetic glow in no way substantiated nixon friendly spin adds nothing here, but fresh outrage. a hit job lacking nothing new and circumstantial so my old boss at c-span was brian lamb and so to sort of channel brian lamb he would say. urban off galman, what you doing wrong? i keep on telling you. i am a lot less than you think i am and even with these people i'm even lesser than you think i am. the the one review i got in the new york times for this book said nothing new everything i've written is --. well, he didn't say --, but he meant -- and that quite frankly if you read the book you're an idiot and that appeared online in the new york times and my sales went up four times. it then made the sunday edition of the new york times and my sales went up three times. and then the week after it appeared in the new york times sunday edition. to show you how crazy the new york times is i became an editor's choice. so the the editors of the new york times repudiated their own reviewer. so it just goes to show you if any of you are familiar out here with fairhaven. i probably am a reject from fair haven. and i'm not sure where to go with a question after that. but i think what i would ask is. what? why is writing about richard nixon still so controversial? there are several reasons, but i think the main reason is one of the reviews that i received which was a nice review. it wasn't bad it. it said i can't see it. i mean dixon was so bad and kennedy was so good. there's no way that this book that is written as well as it is written and the arguments that are made are so reasonable. it just it just it just can't be. and one of the reviews i got from a syndicate in canada was an important book in your water read it, but 60 years they've gotten it wrong gilman's narrative is like swimming upstream. so the general tenor of nixon being a despicable individual one of the the greatest things that i remember as i was writing. the second volume was that just about every liberal commentator. hold the speech maudlin. and maudlin is not a good term. i found in the adley stevenson papers. at princeton about a hundred and twenty letters. that were favorable to stevenson and unfavorable to the chucker. speech. the only thing i left out was there were about three million pieces of paper that went into the republican national committee saying how wonderful the speech was. and yet to this day many people believe that the checker speech was modeling when in fact, it was a great speech that was considered by an overwhelming number of people just imagine three million people wrote in to say how good the speech was and yet you remember a hundred and twenty or a hundred and thirty letters. by people probably who didn't even listen to the speech on how awful it was. now something seems to be a little out of balance there when a hundred plus people can say it's he was awful and three million people can say he was great. i think that we have become generally speaking so conditioned to things that never been challenged. people don't challenge what they don't think about in many cases. and what i did was not so much to record what i personally thought. but what the record showed and the record showed something quite different than what's been published and i think that for one of a better. rationalization or reasoning that the fact the people have accepted this nonsense so easily is because they just want to well, i think that theme of sort of the many myths and misunderstandings in the nixon era is a theme that resonates throughout the book here. and so i've highlighted i call them myths or misunderstanding about seven of them that come to me reading the book and i have some photos that will help to illustrate the myths that we'll click through here, but for each one, i think what i'd like to do is sort of state the conventional wisdom or the myth and misunderstanding just as it's existed in the literature over the decades and allow you to respond to each one. so i think number one the role of eisenhower that nixon perhaps lost in 1960 because eisenhower didn't do enough. that sort of nixon was on this ill-fated ticket that didn't have eisenhower's support. he might not have been eisenhower's choice to run and there's lots of mythology about exactly what eisenhower's role was during this year and it's something that you address in the book. once more you you write what you think people want to read rather than write what really happened? just imagine for a second. that nick that eisenhower absolutely hated nixon. can any of you seriously hear believe that eisenhower would want? a senator with no legislative experience with no legislative record to beep his incumbent vice president who would carry on his role? the whole idea that eisenhower and nixon did not get along or to not have a good relationship. is is flawed by the very nature of all the things eisenhower had nixon doing going on foreign trips. helping with legislation being invited to all of the various meetings that eisenhower and nixon chair together it makes no logical sense when you talk to people and you say how could all of this happen? and eisenhower in nixon not get along for eight years. they made faces and one another. well, i couldn't choose just one eisenhower photo. i like this one because it gets in pat nixon. could you say you know as we in 1960 election has been called kind of one of the first modern campaigns? can you talk a little bit about even in 1960 the role that patent nixon played and the role of women in the campaign? i'm sure all of you already know all the the numbers of voting but remember. how charismatic? kennedy was and remember how women smoot. the election of 1960 for the first time in american history more women voted than men and you'll never guess. what the breakdown was between this wonderful charismatic kennedy and women voting it was 51:49. oh, i made one small error 51 for nixon 49 for kennedy. pat nixon took the position that this is what her husband's was. she was very ambitious like her husband very very smart. a very attuned to what he was doing the the ultimate defender. and she and mimi eisenhower and dwight eisenhower. had a very good relationship and if you look at the letters between dwight eisenhower and richard nixon again, big surprise just about every one of them said say hello to pat. i really appreciate her help. doesn't sound like the eisenhower and his wife mamie did not get along with -- impact. the second misunderstanding or myth of the campaign is that nixon and lodge were sort of ill-suited together on the ticket and that lodge was the downfall for richard nixon that year. what do you say? on january 7th 1960 dwight eisenhower wrote a secret memo to his own file his presidential pick was richard nixon. his vice presidential pick was henry cabot lodge, jr. it wasn't so much nixon picking. large it was eisenhower were picking lodge. and at the time lodge was you and representative? for the united states and was the main person who talked about the russians being evil and made a tremendous amount of television time. he had the ability. he was a boston brahman. and by the way you may not know the person that wrote the biography of henry cabot lodge jupiter. it's luke victory. it was not a self-serving question. i promise. so third misunderstanding, i kind of highlight about 1960 on the democratic side. also interesting that so many senators current or former in 1960 senator john f kennedy, senator lyndon johnson the i so how about this one that kennedy would not have been elected president without johnson because it was really eisenhower be kind of chip away at the south, louisiana. he took in 56 virginia both campaigns really began to eat away at the traditional democratic south would kennedy have won the presidency do you think without lyndon johnson from texas to hold down hold down the democratic south as we would say in the most area that terms not a snowball's chance of hell. what lyndon johnson brought to the table? was what ronnie duggar who was a famous texan journalist said that every election that johnson and the rest of the people that ran for elections in texas during the timeframe up to 1960 was competitive corruption. it was just depending on who could steal more votes. and johnson ran in 1941. and lost because he didn't steal the votes. but in 1948. he won by 87 votes and received the wonderful nickname landslide linden. now imagine for a second imagine and no election. that johnson ran it did he win without corruption? and yet every author every major biography of lyndon johnson. talks about the fraud in 1941. and in 1948 multiple chapters one book major biography on the election of 1960 says oh, by the way. there was nothing about fraud in 1960, so i'm not going to talk about it since there was no fraud why talk about it. and in another book it didn't even make a half a sense and made footnote on the next little last page and the volume. and it basically said there was no fraud in illinois because authors listen to junior said there was no fraud a fairly impartial guy that worked for john kennedy and was the ultimate member of the democratic party and in addition to that. there was no fraud in texas. and the reason why there was no fraud in texas is because leon jaworski said, you can prove it. so obviously the answer to the question is there was no fraud because people who had a great stake and saying there was no fraud was no fraud. the only problem with that is they liked? we will return to the topic of fraud in a few more questions. next misunderstanding or myth of the campaign. this is a nixon arriving in in hawaii. you can see kind of the aloha sign there and his arrival and giving a speech there at that. stop that brief campaign stop. so another myth and misunderstanding that it was a mistake for nixon to pledge to campaign in all 50 states. and again all the people that write about the election especially people that write about how wonderful that kennedy was and how brilliant his campaign was and how in the world could nixon be so stupid as to run it all 50 states? none of them mentioned the kennedy campaigned in 45 states, i guess he was five states less stupid the next one was. the nature of the way that both of them ran. and if you want to take a look at this in the most objective way is that nixon had just as many votes. as kennedy had so i'm guessing since they both had the similar just about the same amount of votes. the kennedy must have run a much better campaign than nixon did the only problem again with that is how in the world if both of these guys got the same amount of votes that one ran a far superior campaign than the other it just it the logical inconsistency is undeniable and yet folks don't want to talk about our next myth or myth understanding. is that the arrest of martin luther king that fall in 1960 was decisive in the election outcome. so could you in the and while answering that charge? set up a little bit the relationship between nixon and king. what kind of background there was and what role that played during the campaign? martin luther king jr. by 1960 was a major player. not the major player. what was a player in black society. and the nature of the campaign with blacks was the story better yet the fable is that king was arrested. for violating a minor parole violation i was sent to a hard georgia prison. and one of nick kennedy staff said called kennedy and said you should call coretta kid. and and offering something and he did. and that's just about all he did was offer sympathy because jack kennedy was the last democratic candidate. that actively solicited white voters in the south. jack kennedy, you know solicited white votes in the south. absolutely. that's what he did. story gets better. according to the story after the call greta blacks went crazy and they changed their vote enormously. and according to the black newspapers five million blacks went to the polls. 50% of all black voters went to the polls to vote overwhelmingly for jack kennedy. and the democrats sent out. trailway bosses across the united states. i mean, isn't this a great story across the united states handing out ballasts the people to vote. for jack henry there's only one small problem. it never happened. there were no trailway bosses. there were no massive amount of literature there weren't five million black voters the best number i have is somewhere between two and a half million to million blocks. that's 25 to 30 percent. of all eligible black voters and by the way from 1936 when blocks changed dramatically for the electing democrats the elect two-thirds go to democrats and one-third go to republicans through the 1960 election. let me think. kennedy received 68% about of the black vote nixon received 32% of the black vote now. i'm not real good when numbers like like john evans but 32% sounds like a third. 68% sounds like 2/3. so nothing changed as far as the numbers went the story has become so exaggerated and so out of line. and it's still to many people. unbelievable change in the election and quite frankly it never happened. we have two more to go the next myth or myth myth understanding whether the issue of religion and kennedy's catholicism. and the extent to which the candidates used religion as a political issue. in the campaign of 1960 whether that was the decisive. whether that was decisive in the outcome. no one has ever done. research on the influence of catholicism in the 60 election it's there's two books on it. and they were so actively researching that none of them did archival research. it's again. it's so much powerful the course that you just write where you feel like writing with no no material to support it. kennedy one with 53% of his vote from catholics. over half of his votes over 17 million votes came from catholics. according to the republican national committee somewhere between four to six million. more catholics voted in 1960 than ever before. the nature of that meant that kindly could not have won the election. without the catholic vote in addition to that in 1952 and 1956. eisenhower got 62% of the protestant vote in 1963 apartment in 1950 in 1960 to show you how much of this has changed it went from 62% all the way up. a great jump to 63% it literally didn't change material at all. and yet the way the story is told is fundamentally wrong because the kennedy machine was talking they were really going to smear nixon and a landslide and when the landslide didn't happen the most convenient reason was too many. too many bigots the only thing they don't mention is in 1956 nixon the plumbing eisenhower got almost 50% of the catholic vote. the only number that significantly changed in 1960. was that kennedy received 78% that's an increase of 29% and yet no one ever mentions it. and what i think one of the ancillary charges, of course the photo billy graham with president kennedy and in the oval office the after was over. that so can ancillary to that as sort of that that nixon. used religion in a dirty way during the campaign to exploit this this idea. that was america ready to elect its first catholic hit of course, you know talk about al smith or you know, the previously did you find evidence of this either side using religion in in this kind of harsh political way 60 there were some there were there were some fundamental bigotry where certain evangelicals and others did not want a catholic in the white house because they didn't want the pope running the federal government, but by and large what happened in 1928 with al smith had significantly changed. the the amount of adversarial relations between catholic voting and non-catholic voting had mellowed a great deal. so the idea of the charge that nixon was dirty because he was encouraging bigotry. sable nixon stuff you don't have to prove it. all you have to do is say it. we've already talked a little bit about fraud but let's close on that topic nowadays. we see i think every political election in these red. and blue maps of the outcome from 1960 and the version of it that i like to best because you really get into some more regional trends is the one by county. of course red being republican blue being democratic and so i guess when you see a map like this comment a little bit on a couple things. what do you see when you see a map like an outcome like this? for its own sake but also kind of compared to what eisenhower began to do in the south. and then ultimately the big question was their fraud and if so, was it decisive? the numbers that i ran first of all say that nixon had every likelihood of winning, texas and illinois. how do you want, texas and illinois he would have been president of the united states in 1960. but what i see when i look at the entire map. is a precursor of what we are experiencing now. the nation is starting to divide. fundamentally into two sections the urbanites and the nature of certain block voting black voting jewish voting labor voting etc becoming fundamentally democratic. and suburbia and rural becoming very much republican. and what you have now, i think is the most extreme of that where people simply of one ilk or another won't talk to one another. there's there's virtually no intercourse they simply are so extreme and their partisanship is it? bodes well for partisan voting which is fundamentally 40% republican now and 40% democrat now. but in 1960. the remarkable thing is nixon receives almost 95% of the republican vote pretty hard to believe somebody so evil as nixon could get 95% and our hero jack kennedy. received 84% of the democratic vote all kennedy had to do. was to keep his base. there were 17 million more democratic registrants than there were republicans. 40 40 million democrat republican registrants and 57 million democratic presidents if henry had simply kept his base. he couldn't even do that. and the nature of the election was not only so close. it was even closer than anybody believed because again, nobody bothered to run any numbers. it's it's amazing how incorrect the results of the election have been told ie kennedy won the election by a hundred and twelve thousand votes. i ran the election results for different ways. one way the best he did was about 107,000 votes. the next way i ran it he went by 27 but thousand votes. the next way i ran it nixon won by 130,000 votes and the final way. i wrote it ran it is nixon won by 56,000 votes. and yet people to this day continually run these numbers as if they were gospel. without evaluating what really happened? well, there's plenty more we can get into i haven't even asked you about the debates. so maybe if we have time we'll get into that. but for now though, i i'd like to go to the audience we have time for some some q&a. that'll be a lead here with a microphone coming around and we'd love to get here your questions here. before we begin with the q&a. let's get a round of applause for mr. gilman and dr. nichter. we will open the floor for questions if you have a question, just raise your hand or signal to me and i'll come and get you. but the first question is i would like to ask if myself what advice do you have for young researchers? and where do you think they should start? do that again. what advice do you have a young researchers? and where should they start? well professor nick dr. and i are lucky we already have established records the problem for young people and i talked to my editor at yale about this. 20 years ago to now the amount of material written has increased by 10% the amount of books that are published now. is three times? as many very few pages increased but the number of publications have increased three times. it's very very difficult. a break into writing if you are or able to get published. it is. more power to you some of us get lucky some of us don't but if i were any of you i would try to. write letters to the editors right in newspapers or magazines or anything you could do to get your name in or i would find somebody that really knows what the hell they're doing. and ask them to help. but generally speaking it is incredibly bleak for young people even if they do brilliant research to find a publisher. thank you to your left over here. thank you, dr. gelman. i learned a lot. i had a lot of questions that you clarifying but the question for you you mentioned a couple of times you repeated the words evil nixon. and you reason why some of the perceptions? were inaccurate flawed but you also said that inaccurate. flawed precepts were as if they were facts. so what was causing this? why? why did people? feel the way they did. ordinarily people don't believe things that are so easily contradictory like, you know more women voted for kennedy the nixon. well, that's not true. and but did they believe that? that's just an example. the answer is is so complex. one first of all democrats harry truman virtually hated the ground that nixon walked on. eleanor roosevelt felt the same way. adley stevenson hayden nixon with a passion. the leaders of the democratic party one the fundamental extreme one because nixon was vulnerable and two because eisenhower was not you didn't talk the great man, because it was a waste of your time. so you went after someone that they thought was possible to go after but what is worse than that? is today in newspapers magazines television, you have some of these people who are commentators that i nicely call idiots. and they will tell you material that makes no sense at all and one day one thing and one day the exact opposite thing. but back in the day in 1960. you had a bevy of famous calmness of newspaper reporters that simply wrote what happened? whereas kennedy had these great energetic audiences. election had awful. nobody was there. and if you saw a pictures kennedy had good audiences and surprise nixon had good audiences. did nixon have people that thought he was charismatic? absolutely the kennedy have people that thought he was charismatic. yeah. but theodore white for example, and i quote this in the book goes on to nixon's train in october of 1960. wearing a win with kennedy lapel button. key, can you get and yet these people behind the scenes behave poorly? and to to give you my my own personal experience. when i taught especially after i started writing about richard nixon. people would talk to me. i could apply for grant after grant after grant and have superb grants and get thank you so much. no. and the nature of writing about nixon anything other than saying he was darth vader. was not publishable. and for one of a better word publishers are greedy. they want to make money and if they can't sell books. they don't publish now the campaign of the century and my other books have sold pretty -- well, but what it what it means is is either i'm fooling a lot of people or that there is a a certain amount of belief that the material that's been written so long so wrong. i'll tell you one last thing i was nominated for a thing called the plutarch award and 2015 for the best biography of the year. and i got a call from a high up in the thing and said they're 257 books nominated. they're going to narrow it down to the top 10. irv, don't feel bad you're not going to make it. two months later i get a call from the same guy saying earth. i got to tell you you made it to the top 10, but now it goes down to the top four. there's no way you're going to be a finalist forget being the finalist. a month later i get a call irv. you got to sit down for this. you're a finalist. so i have on my wall hanging, you know, finalists for the plutarch award. go figure i have i was very pleased it's always nice to be knowledge. but the man that was telling me this was on the inside knew everything was going and there was not a prayer. i didn't have a chance. and yet sometimes it changes. thank you robert behind. yes, dr. gelman, i as a communications major. i'm just curious. could you speak to the televised debate? to let the televised debate that we so much about nixon looked angry and well, we already moved tan and we all know what happened. he was poorly. tanned, you know kennedy looked wonderful, you know, it was it was a match from the very start well and though that those who watched on television thought kennedy one, but those who yes and done radio and those the one or watch listen doing radio thought nixon won all that's nonsense. it never happened. it was just a story. that was done. no one in 60 years has done any serious research on the great debates. do you know what happened? what happened was far easier? in 19 the night before the first debate. nixon is talking to eisenhower and says, you know. i'm going to follow. i'm not going to be the adversarial nixon. i'm going to be a kind and gentle or nixon. and so the next night he goes on the first debate. and he's the kinder gentler nixon. and all the people that were watching as partisans for the kinder gentle or next we're saying what the hell is wrong with you, you know go get them you so the basic thing is if you listen to the first debate. nixon says in some way or another 16 times. i agree with you. and his people didn't want nixon agreeing and the following three debates. nixon was nixon. and was adversarial attacking kennedy for where he was weak and doing a quite good job. but after the first debate as a communications major, how do you think that the newspapers responded? thing it was a tie. it becomes untie over 60 years. and it becomes kennedy winning the first debate by a mile, but the initial reaction in all of the newspapers was that there was no difference between the two of them. they both did equally well or equally bad the whole story of the kennedy being this wonderful guy, but what did happen? what did happen and what i didn't say was the greatest thing that john kennedy did was run for office. he was a wonderful campaigner. and by staying up and not making any massive mistakes in the first debate. what happened was is democrats said? this guy is a lot better than we thought and might be able to do a good job. so they rallied around the flag. and henry got more. adulation after that first debate because it didn't blow it not because he did great because he didn't do badly. we got one last question over here. dr. clearly senator johnson helped senator, kennedy and his campaign. how much did ambassador lodge helped vice president nixon given that lodge was from massachusetts and clearly kennedy was going to win his home state. well, first of all the man that really should answer the question is the pro. well, i'll let you answer most of it, but i would just simply say. you know, i think that i wonder about you know if the nixon lodge ticket had effectively been four ordained if you want to call it that eisenhower's wishes. i mean, i think after eight years as president. the two people that eisenhower owed the most to after eight years were richard nixon and henry cavill launch for all that. they did during his own presidency. and so i think he eisenhower began to groom both of them beginning in about 1958 59 various ways of winning up to 60. and when you look at the schedules of the four top the two top democrats and two top republicans. lodge actually was the the only one of the four not to miss a day of campaigning due to illness or injury or something else. and in fact, i found in lodges papers in boston, he's repeatedly crying out to the people on the nixon side of the campaign saying use me more i can do more. you know, i'm not being effective because i can't control my schedule. my schedule is being made entirely by the nixon side and you're not i'm not even approving events in advance. so i think large wanted to be used more during that campaign and the last thing i was saying you can fill in any where i'm where i've gone astray. here is lodge also was was older. i mean, he was older more like an eisenhower figure. you got to figure lodge was born in 1902. he was a full 15 years older than john f kennedy. he was six years old in lyndon johnson 11 years older than richard nixon. you know we have this idea of the vice presidential candidate being kind of the attack talk, you know, they got and do the things that are unprecedential or the stops that the top at the top of the ticket doesn't want to go and do and i think that's been locked that more often than not that's been the pattern in the last 50 years. that was it was different then i think lodge was really a way of ensuring direct continuity from the eisenhower presidency to hopefully the nixon presidency. so i think that was really the role the larger brought a certain kind of stability and maturity that nixon don't forget how young he was still in 60 47 years old. hey run for president. you've been vice president for eight years. you lose the run for the presidency. and you're still just turning 48 years old. that's not so bad and you have options in the future. so i think lodge i think as a running mate with nixon. it was really a different era. and the only thing i have to add to that is what's better? the real story is as professor victor says or the fable that lodged in campaign. he was lazy etc if you don't look at the record. you can lie. all you want to the fact is that my examination of what lodge did at the 1960 campaign remember nixon was in the hospital for two weeks. lodge was the guy carrying the campaign and surprise surprise was campaigning all over new york when nelson rockefeller. and sweating and going to the beach, etc, etc, and doing well, but because people picked up on the story after the word in time magazine that lodge had to take a nap every day and get into pajamas. what would you rather have that he was in pajamas and campaigning like hell or that he was him in pajamas not doing anything. it's it's it's it's literally. naughty what you can get away with if you don't do the research. no, ladies and gentlemen, would you please join me in thanking doctors gelman and nichter? you did, okay. the book is the campaign of the century and dr. gelman will sign copies of the book tonight in the lobby. thank you for being here and get home safe in the rain. cs cspan.org/history. >> good evening. i'm associate professor and chair of the presidency program