Tonights guest was a fulltime speechwriter for president gerald ford and a consulting writer to george h. W. Bush. He served as founding president of the freedom of Expression Foundation in washington, d. C. He has won numerous awards for his research, including an award for political communication. It is with pleasure that i welcome dr. Craig smith. Would you please welcome dr. Craig smith. [applause] yous nice to be back in lawrence. Back in lawrence. You have written for some of the most powerful people in the world. Can you tell us about your early life and how you got to be a president ial speechwriter. Dr. Smith the way i became a president ial speechwriter could only happen in america. I was an undergraduate, i got a lot of training in how to make cases, how to sift evidence and build arguments. I went on for a phd in communication studies, where i focused on aristotle. All of those things are incorporated in the speechwriting craft. I then became a professor of communication studies, focusing on rhetoric and public address. I wound up after starting at san diego state, i wound up at the university of virginia and i was at the university of virginia in 1976 and i was invited to the university of North Carolina chapel hill to give a guest lecture at 10 00 in the morning. It turned out gerald ford was lecturing on the campus at noon to the future homemakers of america. And so, the liberal faculty turned to me, and i consider myself a legitimate conservative, so rare these days, so we went and we watched gerald fords speech and it was not good. [laughter] dr. Smith i went back to charlottesville and i could not sleep so i wrote a single space, fivepage letter and the next morning i mailed it off to the president , the white house, 1600 pennsylvania avenue, then i could sleep and i did not think anything would come of it. One week later, i was called by the director of white house personnel and was asked to come up for interview. When the letter came in, someone in the mailroom remembered they just fired the speechwriter. My letter was sent up to white house personnel. I came up for the interview, i began my interview with him, he took me to the editor for the speechwriters, i realized that if i screwed up at any point i would be out the front door of the white house, he then took me to the counselor to the president and we went through a long interview. About how i would write speeches if i wrote speeches, so on and so forth. At the end of the interview, he said can you wait here chester minette. His office was the old office that nixons secretary had, the one he came back in and he took me into the oval office and there was gerald ford puffing on a pipe. He said pending security clearance, mr. President , we would like to hire mr. Smith as your speechwriter. The president said professors have not done well here. I said i am not one of those absentminded professors. I write very quickly and i will be efficient and i will do what i can for you. He said please make me speak the language of the common man and that is how i got hired. Starting at the top. I had never written a speech for anyone but myself. As i said, only in america. You mentioned in the interview, you laid out how you would write for the president. How did that bear out in practice . Did you have to adjust your expectations . Dr. Smith the first thing that happened was they put me in a broom closet for an office and they said read all of the president s speeches and testimony when he became Vice President and see if you can come up with a style for the president. I did all that and i went into see Robert Hartman and he said, what you think of the president s style . I said i dont think he has one. It depends on who is writing for him. We have to get consistent with his persona. He said, we have a speech for you. The president have to speak at the Southern Baptist convention in norfolk, convention, following jimmy carter. Jimmy carter was a bornagain christian and the Southern Baptists loved him. You have me, a catholic, writing for the president , and episcopalian, to speak at the Southern Baptist convention. I consulted baptist ministers and worked up a speech and let it sit for a day, and then rewrote it, and then let it sit for a day. The art of writing is rewriting. The roosevelt speeches went through 10, 12 drafts. We did not have time for that when ford was president. We went through five drafts. The speech was done, he went down to norfork to deliver the speech and he was three sentences into the speech and he was interrupted by applause. He was not used to that and he lost his place. [laughter] dr. Smith he recovered quickly and he was interrupted by applause 13 more times during the speech and the Washington Post the next day said president hits homerun in front of the Southern Baptists and my reputation was made. From then on, i had a bigger hand in the process for writing for the president. How many people would check your work . Dr. Smith the editor would go through it, once that passed, the counselor to the president would go through it. Some speeches, peggy writes about this in her book, if it is about agriculture policy, it has to go to the Agriculture Department. If it is on Foreign Policy, it has to go to the state department. The only problem with that, whoever gets to do the staffing and see that the policy is right becomes the speechwriter and they start suggesting things. Why did you use this metaphor . Why did you say United States instead of america . Suddenly, hartman would say take all of that out, ignore that, just to the policy thing. Then the speech would be delivered and the president would be happy with it, the press would be happy with that, and someone and Agriculture Department claimed they wrote the speech. [laughter] dr. Smith he knows about how that works, having been in the cia. You worked with gerald ford during the campaign, how was that different or was it different writing for gerald ford the president versus gerald ford the campaigner . Dr. Smith what you do is adjust the speech to the situation, to the venue. For example, i was in charge of the bicentennial speeches, the six bicentennial speeches forgave during the campaign but we did not want use those for political reasons. I wrote the speech i was the main writer on the speech on valley forge, when the president went to monticello, which traditionally every year has a ceremony for immigrants and welcoming them to this country. That process was very highminded, very much a celebration of the declaration of independence and we wanted to move it away from the political campaign. When we went over to the arena for the acceptance speech in 1976, that was a political speech. That speech begins on a note where president ford challenged jimmy carter to debate him three times and that got a lot of headlines. That was a political speech and it was very different. Today, there is more of a melding of the political and statement side of speeches. How did you connect with george h. W. Bush . You work for him for a long time. Dr. Smith yes, as a consulting writer. After we lost the election to carter, i went into exile in alabama. I created a Communication Department at the university of alabama birmingham. I was yearning to get back into politics. I had potomac fever. At that time, in 1977, only 6 of alabama residents identified as republicans. That is the change we went through in the south. We needed to raise money and get people to come into birmingham and raise money for the republican party. We asked john connolly, he said no. Ronald reagan, no. We asked george h. W. Bush if he would come over. He was friends with a family and he agreed to come over. I was at a table at a fundraiser and there was this nerdy, blonde young man next to me and he said, i understand you were a speechwriter for president ford. I said yes. He said evaluate this for the table, we wont tell anyone. I said all right. George bush got up and gave the speech and then the nerdy little kid said, what did you think . I said the man is obviously sincere, he is authentic but he needs organization. There are stylistic devices he can use. He looked at me and said, my name is karl rove. I work for him. I said oh my gosh, i am sorry. He said how would you like to come up and have a cocktail with him . We heard from gerald ford you are a good writer and he would like to have a word for you. That is how i got on and it was coincidental. Talk more about working with president bush. Dr. Smith george h. W. Bush was my favorite. I had to clear with some of his other friends, jennifer fitzgerald, i was flown to houston to do another interview at the house. I showed up at the bush mansion in my threepiece suit and the door opens on the side of the house and outcomes george bush in a tshirt and he looks at me and said if you will get out of that silly vest, i will cook you breakfast. That was the kind of guy he was. Magnificent. We he gets me a cup of coffee, i go he gets me a cup of coffee, i took my kitchen and coat off and my vest off and he is cooking eggs. Comes barbara bush, she looks at me, she looks at george, she looks at me, she looks at george and says george, if that man spells a drop of that coffee on the floor i will never forgive you because the chinese delegation is coming into stay with us tonight for dinner. I do not know what came into me, but i looked at her and said, maam, i came to your door in a threepiece suit, i dont spill anything. [laughter] dr. Smith she laughed, he laughed, and i spent the rest of the day with them. He was such a gentleman. He was so highminded and so wonderful to work with, she was so supportive of the staff, very protective of him, and that is understandable. She was on the side of the better angels who were around george bush, or around any president , there are also some darker angels and you have to fight with them. That is always fun. They were wonderful people. Did you ever see what you thought was a good speech go bad . Dr. Smith none of mine, [laughter] dr. Smith of course not. I cant think of one, actually. There were glitches. There was one time president ford was delivering a speech i wrote in the white house, and it was for the pennsylvania delegation on the way to the convention. The pennsylvania delegation was up for grabs and eventually Ronald Reagan would name a senator has his vice as his Vice President ial candidate trying to steal the delegation. Ford got up to give the speech and he suddenly deviated from the text to tell a personal story, which she rarely did. He rarely did. Then he went back to the text. I had written the personal story in the text, so he repeated it. Everyone knew what happened. He recovered and he laughed and he went on. Eventually Nelson Rockefeller got up, applauded and got him off the stage. As a speechwriter, you have input over the venue or any other production details . Dr. Smith once you get credibility as a speechwriter, the glory of it is you can sometimes influence policy. I began to suggest certain campaign changes that the president speak less, but speak on certain topics very in depth. I thought his strength was on the issues, whereas carters strength was transcendent. There was a debate over my proposal between various people in front of the president and the president said i am going with what craig wants. It is stunning. He wrote me a note. He said thank you for that suggestion. The note said when we win this election, i will move you to the political division, which would have been nice, but we did not win the election. You have to be credible first. You have to have successful speeches. What would you say was perhaps the biggest challenge related to writing for the president . Dr. Smith it is a collaborative operation. The speechwriters want the president to be as effective as possible. The political people want him to say what adjusts to the poll data. There is a tension between those two things. We think there are certain things said a certain way, they think they should be said a different way. There is always that tension, but i talked to a friend of mine who was a writer for richard nixon, and the nixon people the writers were very good adapting to the poll data. Nixon had a 24 hour Polling Group in 1968. One question was what was the most important problem facing america . Once the person answered, they went to a second step and asked what was the suggested solution . In 1968, number one was vietnam, number two was the economy, number three was crime. The solutions, half the people wanted to withdraw from vietnam, half the people wanted to escalate. What the nixon writers did for his speech, he spent four long paragraphs on the problem of vietnam, meeting the expectation of the audience, but he does not suggest a solution because the audience is divided. He said because we are in negotiation and paris, i cant undercut our operations, but i promise you peace with honor. He transcended the division. When he went to the economy, it is one short paragraph on the problem and a lot of solutions, because he has 75 of the audience on his side, same thing with crime. People were nodding as they went through that. At the end of that speech, if you ever flash back to it, there is a wonderful at the end about hearing trains at the night and the American Dream and nixon comes to embody the American Dream. The speechwriters get to go full force at the end of the speech by giving into the pollsters at the beginning of the speech. When everything clicks together, it is really wonderful. Our last program, we talked about great president ial speeches. Would you weigh in on what might be your greatest president ial speech . Dr. Smith for me, i think the second inaugural of lincoln is really wonderful. It is compassionate, healing, calling for bringing the country together. I think that is a wonderful address. I think one of the addresses that is a little underrated is jeffersons first inaugural. The election had been horribly better between jefferson and bitter between jefferson and john adams. The federalists and the antifederalists, all kinds of dirty politics had gone on. If you think it is bad now, it was really bad back then. Jefferson said it one point, we are all federalists, we are all antifederalists. He tries to unite the country. That is an awfully good president ial speech. What speech of yours is your favorite . Dr. Smith i think the speech during the bicentennial at valley forge, where i start by talking about the soldiers surviving with their rag bound feet around the fires, starving and eventually surviving at valley forge. But then looking forward to what that tells us about sacrifice and how sacrifice has worked for america, particularly for its soldiers and how we need to honor that moving forward. I was very proud of that speech. We talked about speech writing during a campaign in for a sitting president. You have written speeches or language for people involved in debates. How does that relate to speechwriting and what is your preparation like . Dr. Smith the debate thing is an entirely different world. It is very difficult. I coached the president for the debates, along with other people. I coached dan quayle for his debate in 1988 and i can tell you about that experience. [laughter] dr. Smith you just dont know what is going to happen. It is all about the expectation. When ford went into the first debate with carter, the expectation was ford would lose because carter was this Nuclear Engineer when he went to annapolis. Ford attended to bumble and mispronounced words. Ford came out of that debate beating expectations and carter and suddenly the race was dead even. Then we went to the second debate, we knew questions would be on Foreign Policy, it was at the palace of the arts in san francisco. We prepped the president. Remember, Ronald Reagan criticized fords policy with the soviet union. Reagan wanted a tougher policy. We knew that was going to be in question. The question came from the New York Times and the reporter said president ford, how would you defend your policy with the soviet union when they are such a brutal nation . Ford said yugoslavia has never given into them. Romania is moving toward freedom. They dont dominate poland. He had a followup. Did you say the soviet union does not dominate poland . He said yes, that is what i said. After the debate, we went up to the president and said you said the soviet union does not dominate poland. You need to hold a press conference and immediately say you misspoke. He said i did not say that. Whatd you think he said . What we rehearsed. What was that mr. President . The soviet union does not dominate the hearts and minds of the polish people. I wish you had said that. [laughter] dr. Smith Henry Kissinger came up and said what is going on . We explained the situation and the president immediately needs to hold a press conference and say he misspoke and kissinger said you cant do that. I am trying to get that man out of the soviet union. If you insult the soviet unit, union, our talks will collapse. They debated him for five days and finally in california, ford corrected the record but it was too late. The election slipped away. These debates are mindbogglingly tense. When lever hearst debates with dan quayle come the person who stood and was his colleague from the finance committee, bob packwood. He is an excellent debater. He did very well. Dan quayle got into the senate by winning a debate against someone who is no slouch. We thought he would be ok when he went into the debate with lloyd benson. During our practice session, Marilyn Quayle interrupted what was going on and said, you need to tell them you are more qualified than john kennedy was when he was running for president. You are just running for Vice President. Lee atwater was there and said you cannot say that. You cant compare yourself to john kennedy. He is a saint and a martyr. Whatever you do, dont do that. The debate goes forward and we are all watching what is happening. Outcomes dan quayle. Coach, youa debate have seen this. Intohe first time you get a round and it is like a deer in the headlights. They are stunned and they cannot say anything right. Dan quayle was a little discombobulated. It is the bright lights. He recovers and gets going. Then