Hello im the executive director of the leon center for biography. University of new york. And where sponsored by the foundation. Events like this and promote the arts and crafts the biographies. And even the sponsor of the book festival for a number of years. We are here on the session with the 20th anniversary actually of the National Book festival right in the theme this years american ingenuity. Going to be talking tonight with two intellectuals. Harold is one of the countries leading scholars print is currently the director of the Roosevelt Public Policy Institute at hunter college. Ten himself the author of eight books. Professor witmer is in the found guilty of the Honors College and today we will be discussing his latest book lincoln on the verge. The story the 13 date train journey lincoln talk from illinois to washington dc. To be inaugurated as president. These are two very different books. And hold up each of them read this is a mini biography, will not so any. It substantial book but it focuses on 13 days. And this is harold book on the president. Theyre very different books. But they are both about president s. In both authors, and around lincoln and the civil war. Right into my mind the folks have a scene. And that is the notion that american politics is always been deeply partisan and contentious and downright toxic. Toxic. So ted, this begin with you. Youve given us a vivid description of the dangerous train journey that lincoln took part in at one point to refer to it as a toxic climate of 1860. So wanted to ask you for nothing that. Is it worse today. Ted no. Its horrific today but it was was 1960. The such an honor to be here with harold because he literally wrote the book on the lincoln president elect era. As i was writing this new book. And so he has read every newspaper and statement by lincoln and all of his contemporaries. I read a lot of them partied but i think he has read more of them. And as a nightmare. It was the presidency falling apart. James buchanan presidency. It should not of been especially distinguished even in the better years that preceded 1860 but it was, having a strange kind of emulation. Buchanan personally was failing. He was having a lot of trouble making decisions he was trying to please very angry southern members of his cabinet for reading and promising things that he couldnt really promise to the northerners who were getting upset about the southern from people. The treasury did not have very much money. There is plenty evidence of prayer each serious financial corruption rated among his cabinet but also the sending from Northern Forests and armories down to southern installations almost as if the civil war began. Although it had been not yet began. In wild rumors swimming washington about moshe my takeover the government buildings in a moment. And he did not have that much power to affect anything in washington. So as he got on the train, he really didnt know what he was going to find end of the journey or if he would even make it into washington. And as i tried to show, was a close call. He made it but only barely. Since turning to harold. Why do you call what he referred to the endless battle between the white house and the media. Why is it an endless battle. Harold because all of our president s, they go back to george washington. And even in the valley. When when there was a distance between the president and the press, no press conferences. No scrubs. As washington was headed to for the helicopter to go to the golf course. No press secretary. The student partisan progress but in the way resembled the television dichotomy between msnbc fox news. For the extremes of liberal and white wing media on the internet. So at the beginning, washington established the special relationship with federalist journalists and editors who were friendly to his administration and this policy. And sort of to top anything that we hear about today, about leaks. The displeased the current president. George washington had a cabinet member, thomas jefferson. Who have the highest rank of the cabinet to secretary of state. He actually helped create an opposition paper in the capital. Philadelphia at the time. And not only encouraged its creation specifically the policies of george washington. But it gave its editor a job in the state department is a translator in order to help him make his way in a new city. So that in a way, stretch the example of the president s be wary of and sometimes an open hostility against the press. We managed the inaugural journey of lincoln. Within six months of that inaugural journey, and around lincolns administration was encouraging the shut down and approved Democratic Party and keep republican specifically in type volunteerism. Full during the military. Newspapers. He was imprisoning editors. His closing down newspaper offices. So the antipathy, on occasion in American History and as i out in my book. And as ted said, not as bad as it was then. Today, the crackdowns on the complaints are nowhere near that under the john adams or what will wilson. Maybe even fdr. Kai to follow up on that. Why after writing so any books about lincoln, turned to this topic. The press the white house. It wasnt because of the trump presidency. Been particularly hostile relationship with the first 30 to start the school before trump was elected. Kai i started a bit before i would say. But i had written a book about lincoln as long relationship with the press. Both as a journalist with the press and manipulator of messages. A semester technology that helped him get in. I helped him get his message across. Thing was motivated and away way nostalgically by my own career. I started 51 years ago. My first job was a reporter and editor. As the rest of the real professional staff of the way. It is run by very political die was very closely aligned to the kennedy family. You say this is the first time a president has cormack direct conversation with the voters. Unscripted with the Media Standing by. Meaning the reporters were standing there witnessing the conversations lincoln would have with people along the way on the railroad journey. Then they were telegraph those accounts to newspapers across the country. This is the first time there was an instant press conference. I dont think that is too big of the stress on stretch. Nobody use that term but it was volatile. Lincoln understood very well as harolds work has shown how part of the press was. He got unbelievably frustrated and angry with antipathy but also using the power of the press to his advantage and new reporters were listening and reporters were embedded on the train with him from springfield to washington. Talented reporters sometimes they helped him get his message out. The famous farewell message to springfield, he gave the speech, few minutes later after the train started a reporter named henry went to him and asked him to write it out. There is a famous document in the library of congress that shows half of the speech written by lincoln in squiggly handwriting because the train was moving he gave it to his aid who finished it then it was telegraphed by henry and it was made available because of the cooperation of the reporter. He also got angry sometimes the message was distorted. Sometimes reporters wrote things that were not true at all. Down south they were writing the most hateful things. Anything went in the southern papers at that time. Host ted, how did you come to write the book . It emerged out of the New York Times 13 days 13 essays. Tell us about that. Sure. I was an academic historian i thought of serious academic topics you can almost substitute the word tedious. The story crept up on me and it was better for that reason. What is working with friends who were historians or journalists to the story of the civil war day by day into the online section in your times in 2010 that part was not considered that valuable because ten years later it is very valuable. But at the time a list lawn a less significant part. They gave a space it didnt matter. We could write fairly long pieces and harold contributed meaningfully. We spurred each other on. They were very good tellers of stories. I would not put myself in that category but i was lifted up in my till they were doing it. My friend aaron was writing beautifully in the early months. I was looking ahead and i noticed lincoln had the train trip coming february 1861. February 2011 is when i was thinking and they said go for it. So for 13 days in a row i wrote essays of what happened on that day and i fell in love with the story. I had harolds book on my desk and i read the original newspaper accounts from the library of congress and it was and immersive experience. It was an adventure and i had not found adventure in history until this project came along. Host it is a very vivid tail i am surprised at your ability to tell the story with such suspense. I didnt realize how dangerous the journey was to realize indeed there was a serious conspiracy to perhaps lincoln from getting to washington. It reads like a thriller at times. You learn history but it is a narrative driven. I wrote a very long manuscript. You both can relate to this as historians i wouldve published it but fortunately i have a very tough editor and she jumped all over me and made me cut half of it. She died in february but i included a memorial page to her. She was a great editor and helped me to find the story. A great editor help so much. Host coming back to harold you actually have chapters devoted to any number of president s. You had to pick and choose. You dont write about eisenhower or truman how do you pick the president s to talk about their relationship with the press . With that process in the World Without editors it may have written a twovolume book with the chapter feature the president s. There are things to say figures that i decided to do. The 18th and 19th centuries are basically limited the chapters to have the most consequential impact on relationships between the presidency and the media. Washington obviously because he set the tone for everyone. And adams because he was as sour as he was with his political enemies and was forced to sign the sedition law that made it possible for the federal government to consider criticism and those attacks unlawful. Then jefferson who stands out as a hypocrite in his pronouncements of his actions i thought it was a remarkable story. One of the great possible of a free press if you have to choose between the government and the free press we should always choose the press. With that was manipulative and announce a tory of critical journalist and in fact while he opposed the sedition law he did so only because he didnt believe the federal government had rights that superseded the state law. He is also prosecuting the president at libel at the state level and was enthusiastic about that. He commissioned a journalist to write. Republican articles when he refused then calendar turned on him and publish the sally coming story which did more to harm his reputation than anything. I chose the most consequential. Jackson because he imported journalist into his family and made them speechwriters and Kitchen Cabinet members in journalist and lincoln for obvious reasons. I left out coolidge and hurting and hoover although the press didnt like they had to submit. Wilson invented press conferences and while on widescale propaganda during world war i. Teddy roosevelt who preceded him invented the informal back of the white house interview while he was being shaved. And then the president who revolutionized communication in the ability to bypass the press and speak directly to the people by utilizing cutting edge technology. The most obvious in detail was Franklin Roosevelt who use the radio so brilliantly but also newsreels. He was the second or third feature at the movies. His first radio address as president elect was a highlight in movies with i am a fugitive from the chain gaining is shown revealing the depth of the depression. Kennedy with television. Barack obama choosing internet over personal relations with the press i think i comment on how obama emerges in my book and need i stated the obvious for all of his flaws and no matter your position about his politics are leadership abilities, donald trump franks kennedy and Franklin Roosevelt and barack obama as the genius of a particular form of communication through twitter. It is extraordinary not only the volume and intensity of communication but the uncanny ability to do the news of the day with the morning tweet and the ability to do anything but follow his lead during the day. Roosevelt and obama and reagan and now trump, which of those were most effective to manipulate the press . Guest Franklin Roosevelt who befriended them ingeniously and got them to ignore and not write about or photograph is disability. Began as a gentlemens agreement since they like the guy and ended with unchallenged rules of him in his wheelchair even taking unflattering photographs so he could censor while he remained the good guy. 198 press conferences were held in his 12 years as president. He was remarkably transparent about the wheels of government and decisionmaking although many things were off the record reporters could ask them to make them on the record and he often did that. Thirtysomething fireside chats that was such a pervasive part of the culture in the thirties and forties saul bello remember walking in chicago on a hot summer day during a traffic jam to hear a continuous fireside chat open car window to open car window without interruption. He was everywhere and a genius of communication. Host along the way in your story, you talk about the press in their coverage of lincoln has humanized him for the first tim time. Of course this is a very delicate moment trying to get to washington to be inaugurated and it is on the verge of what we know to become the civil war. And lincoln suddenly becomes flesh and blood. And the press does this and how it happened. Guest i agree. The curiosity about him i would say larger than that had followed any president on his way into office. It was overwhelming. Lincoln had come almost out of nowhere because the Lincoln Douglas debates raised his file in illinois and with the Cooper Union Speech the profile went up a little more but it was still an outside shot at the nomination i think of that nominating convention had not happened in chicago that everyone realized he had beaten the more established candidates William Seward especially but a tremendous curiosity. What does he look like . What does he think . His home appears and weekly newspapers and thats important. So as a political celebrity, that word was being used and has been used in other context and then the biggest celebrity america has known gets on the train to come to the capital to take charge of a government falling apart all of these things, the fear, the excitement, the hope, the criticism, everyone wanted to cover it. There were tens of thousands. This was a very Literate Society in the north and the upper midwest so he would bring in any reasonable distance all the reporters were watching it with physical descriptions of a guy who was unusual looking. Not only his height but they change moods quickly, a twinkle in the eye to a melancholy expression and all the strange ways in which he spoke. He spoke of the western and southern accent growing up in Southern Indiana he sounded 20 and rustic to the new york audience. Just as his face is capable of different expression so were his words. He could write something seriously looking into the origins of the problem of the United States government. Thats the cooper union address. He could give me speeches. He ran out of material he had one serious speech per day. He had to improvise and moments are like standup comedy he says whatever comes into his head. Hes a quick thinker and a journalist convey that to the northern audience hanging on every word. Host talk about the conspiracy. This is not my period of history but i was shocked how serious the conspiracy was. Harold, i assume you have written about the early conspiracy . Guest i did write about the conspiracy in my book and i thought i backed up the historical understanding of on lincoln and his aides became aware of it. Ted backed it up even further and made some terrific discoveries about why this trip was so dangerous. He did a terrific job with that. I just wanted to say that. Thank you. Guest also hes on this trip. Thats a great point a remarkable change the way he looks now he is changing dramatically the way his face looks. A lot is happening like he is girding himself for battle. Guest but the conspiracy has been known. There is a great book from the early fifties uses a lot of materials at the library but the famous Railroad Detective roach multiple versions of all of this and there were some controversies of the lincoln entourage that they knew different things. But it was known in the 18 sixties he passed through something very dangerous. But i was surprised most people i talked to knew relatively little about it it wasnt in the general knowledge we found it somewhat uplifting because we know the tragic end of the presidency and his life but his nearness to escape death allowed me to realize we got four years of an extremely consequential presidency. If we hadnt gotten those we could be two countries instead of one right now. Right. Host harold, how is the Research Process different from this book and your previous work . I have seen you interview Newt Gingrich and you got bill clinton to answer written questions. But interviewing these famous reporters was fun. Guest the obvious difference for me i had never written anything about living people before in a book. It opened new possibilities. It was a little bit scary. I did ask several ask president s to discuss things but the only one that did was president clinton im happy to report. I spoke to a number of journalist. I have the last interview with jim lehrer before he passed awa away. He interestingly had no malice or anger about the fact at one of the more famous interviews president clinton gave on the threshold of his exploding scandal over Monica Lewinsky he did not tell the truth to jim lehrer. His conclusion was the greatest communicator he had ever seen in his entire career. My research was aided by the fact a modern president had written extensively about their own presidency and relationships to the press and in the oral histories