To step up for them and buy 10,000 books tonight, and you want to and new york collaborates with autism. Started the First Charter School in the country for children with autism, and who is now working on Adult Services and adult homes and adult education. New york collaborates for autism. 10,000 books, everybody. Thank you all very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations] youre watching booktv. Heres a look at what is on primetime tonight. We kick off the evening at 7 30 p. M. Eastern with a report on required reading for college freshmen. Then at 9 00, a description of the lives of slaves in the white house. Thats followed by offeredwords with mickal hayden at 10 00 p. M. Eastern. The former nsa and cia director sits down to discuss national security. And we finish up our primetime programming a 11 00 on the influence of big now in politics. Next weekend well discuss all her books and take your questions, tonight on cspan2s booktv. [applause] good afternoon. Im Jean Mccormick and i have the privilege of serving as the president of the edward m. Kennedy institute for the United States senate. Welcome to the heart of the institute. Our replica chamber, where every day, senators in training are debating the issues that matter. Yesterday we had a wonderful eightyearold stand in opposition to something and be very articulate. I always think when i see that, that senator kennedy would smile. We are delighted to have so many of you here with us today for this program which celebrates the new book, lion of the senate by our own board member, Nick Littlefield, and our alumni, david nexon, and welcome to many alumni who served with center kennedy. You may by off the payroll but youre never off the staff. Were happy to have you here and especially happy to have our Board Members here. Barbara, nick, randy cooper. So happy to have you all with us. Were pleased to host this program and have a Remarkable Group of speakers and panelists, all with their own unique thoughts and perspectives on the senator, nat significant period of time that the book talks about, and on bipartisan efforts in what makes them work. We are thrilled to have Doris Kearns Goodwin, vicky kennedy, mike myers, trish knight, all of them together and to have this great Panel Moderated by noted journalist tom oliphant. Were sorry that nick cant be here in this room about he is here in spirit and in ore hearts and he will see and hear us because were streaming this to his computer live. But here to offer words for nick and for his family is nicks wife, jenny littlefield. [applause] thank you. [applause] i want to start by thanking the staff at the institute for making this event possible, with special thanks to kelly who has put up with us for weeks. Now im going to read what nick wrote. Thank you for coming. It means the world to me that you are here. Im sorry i cant be here with you but im enjoying this at home over live video feed. As you all know, if i were there i would be singling out each one of you and describing at great length your help in the creation of this book, your part in all the experiences, and your place in the memories that went into its making. And your contribution to the creation of this beautiful institute, perhaps the most fitting tribute to the incredible man who brought us all together. Senator kennedy and vic can i deserve our eternal gratitude. I cannot fail to mention here the extraordinary leadership of jack connors and lee in bringing this institute to life. My deepest gratitude to david nexon, whose dedication and contributions to at the final stage of writing the book was absolutely essential to making it happen. I also want to thank Doris Kearns Goodwin for her enthusiastic and immediate endorsement of the book and her brilliant introduction, and jim carroll for his invaluable input, support and guidance in the concluding stages of the project. Thank you also to my dear friend trish knight and michael mors, for comping to be on the many and our beloved tom oliphant for leading the constitution. Finally i want to thank my children and my wife who are all here. It was with enormous gratitude and love that i dedicated the book to them. Jenny, of course, wont agree, but i like to say i consider myself not entirely unlucky to have this neurological disease because it makes i can truly sympathize with the 44 million disabled americans whose daily struggle is at least somewhat alleviated by the americans with disabilities ability. I finished the book at the right time [applause] as the situation in washington right now further mirrors the one described in the book, and i hope the history laid out in lion of the senate provides a useful reminder to both sides of the aisle how things did and can work. I understand for example that many of our run republican friends today possibly oppose a riz in the minimum wage and thats a useful chapter about how that worked out in 1994. I began working on the book in 1998. It became at member of our family and we all joked about how long it was taking but every moment of writing brought back to me the excitement of my anytime washington. I was truly able to fulfill the hope of every person who goes to work in our nations capitol, to work hard on issues, surrounded by the best minds in the country to make a difference in peoples lives and have great fun doing it. I am forever thankful to senator kennedy for that privilege. If i could, i would end this by singing to vicki. And then to all of you. I wont ask jenny to take on this task for me. But know that i am watching and singing and filled with joy at this splendid event and the Extraordinary People in my belief who have made this day possible. It is now with great pleasure i want to introduce the man as the mon who a are senator kennedys Senior Healthcare adviser was the driving force behind the legislation in this book and whom i have the great pleasure of calling my coauthor, david nexon. [applause] well, its certainly a wonderful pleasure to be here with so many friends so many friends of nick so many friends of the senator. Thanks to Jean Mccormick and the Emk Institute for put on the event, and jenny, thanks for the lovely introduction. Anyone who has been close to project knows without jenny there would be no book to talk about today. [applause] the institute is a wonderful place to discuss this book. Because of nick. And as has been mentioned, nick was not only extremely close to senator kennedy but he has been a key factor in bringing this wonderful the senators wonderful vision for this place into a reality. Now, i think almost everybody here knows that nick was snore kennedys Labor Committee staff director, and his poly adviser from 1989 to 1998. He had truly remarkable insiders view of the events we focus on in the book during the critical years 1995 do 1997. His role as staff director and his closeness to senator kennedy put him at the center of the action, and also placed him in private meetings with the president , with other senators, with outside leaders. The book benefits tremendously not only from the dedication and insight he brought to it from that but from the special access he was able to talk about and reflect inside the book. As jenny mentioned the book had its origin as nick said in his own statement the book had it origin when nick left the senate in 1998 and wrote the first draft over the ensuing two years. I join the project in 2012 and worked with nick to put the book in shape for publication, aswell assed a michigan and material based on my own knowledge in involvement in the events in the book. Those who know nick, and most of them peer here do an article in the Boston Herald about him. Know what tremendous Health Challenge he faced in completing this document. Its really an inspiring story. And i feel privileged so have worked with him as i did to work with him on the senators staff. We had several objectives in the book that were part of nicks original vision, and one that really evolved late in the process. First if it was tribute to senator kennedy. Not just by singing his praises as so many have, but by showing him at the height of his powers in the fight of his life, for the causes he had worked for all his life. Using the government as a positive force to improve peoples lives, to secure social justice, to help those who are most vulnerable, all the things that were threatened by the gingrich revolution. Second we wanted to create an exciting narrative about how the resistance of the gingrich agenda evolved. How it seemed an irresistible right wing tide was ultimately stopped and hour senator kennedy, even in that hostile environment, was able to pass major progressive legislation and increase in the minimum wage, groundbreaking Health Insurance reform, and the child Health Insurance program. When the victorious republicans swept into town in january 1995 no one would have believed that enacting this bills was anything more than a fantasy. No one except senator kennedy. The third thing we wanted to show in the book is how the senate worked from nicks up close and personal viewpoints. The book is told in the first person, and it gives a vivid account of the senate, the unique ways in which it operates, and what its like to be a staff member there, and nick has got a real gift for narration, which comes out very clearly in this book. Fourth we wanted to explain the senators strategic for formula for success in enacting not only progressive legislation but really any major legislation. None of us who worked with senator kennedy believe anyone will ever be his equal, but any legislator and any citizen can learn from how he accomplished what he did. Finally, at things worked out as a result of the books long gestation it has special lessons for today and gave a special urgency to our work in finishing the project. Know doris is going to talk about this a bit more but i did want to emphasize that as we completed this work we were very aware that the situation today is extraordinarily similar to the one senator kennedy faced in 1995, and the way he handled it as invaluable lessons for all of us today. Today has been republicans control boths hows of congress, they confront a democratic president , they espouse a radically consecutive conservative view of the role government and identical to the one congressman gingrich failed to enact. They used the budget process and the threat of a government default as a lever to try to force through the changes they want. The congress seemed gridlocked. Progress seems hopeless. But as senator kennedy showed, it doesnt have to be that way. Those are the main goals we had in writing the book but theres a lot more in it i hope readers will enjoy. The role of music and the incredible relationship between senator kennedy and senator hatch, nick and patrick kennedys mad dash to the Arlington National cemetery to get soil from the kennedy gravesite to take to the ranin funeral. The way senator kennedys efforts to pass the minimum wage tied senator dole up on the senate floor and sunk his president ial campaign. The senator is largely unknown but very important roll in the passage of the Affordable Care act, the genuses of the ryan white a. I. D. S. Care bill and much more. Before i introduce Doris Kearns Goodwin id like to close by reading from the conclusion of the book, few paragraphs, which i think says what we thought as we really when nick undertook the endeavor and we finished it. Kenneleds life and legislative career are the stuff of history. But the challenges we faced as we make our own history never end. As senator kennedy said in his speech to the Democratic Convention in 1980, the work goes on, the cause endures, the dream shall never die. There can be no greater tribute to his memory than to continue to fight for that enduring dream, and no better model for success than his example. [applause] now, let me introduce Doris Kearns Goodwin. I think most of you here today know that doris the author of seven wonderful books, including the fitzgeralds and the kennedys and the team on rivals about Abraham Lincolns presidency. She is a frequent and incisesive commentator on politics and policy and was a friend and frequent source of wonderful advice for senator kennedy. Nick and i were deeply honored when the decided to write the introduction to lion of the senate. Doris . [applause] history at its best, i believe, is about telling stories, stories about people who lived before, stories about events in the past that create the contures of the present. I think we have to hope that by studying the lives those who lived before us we can learn from their struggles and their tie umps, and what makes this book, the lion of the senate, so compelling, is it tells a story, story beginning with the gingrich revolution of 1994, that brought in this transformation 0 of control to the republicans in the house and the senate. The New York Times noted at the time this is a shift of major proportions, it said. Republicans have not been in control since 1954. 50 years earlier 40 years earlier when the dodgers were still in brooklyn, and when the postage stamp was only three kent cents. The story carries us from the devastating mood that enveloped the democrats. Lost committee members, lost staff, lost the chance to set the agenda, lost office space to Teddy Kennedys rallying the troops to block the worst of the republican agents but to pass positive legislation on minimum wage, childrens Health Insurance, affordable Health Insurance, and to do it on a bipartisan basis. The story is not only historically significant, but it offers powerful examples for leaders today when we despair over our broken washington. What makes so it rich in detail is that nick had the presence of mind to actually write notes after each one of these meetings that he would go to. He took the time, which we so rarely do to reflect on them even at that momentum. Historians treasure more than anything diaries and letters. I couldnt have written the books ive written without the diaries that people kept at the end of the day, without letters they wrote to their wifes and families. I worry what will happen to people, historians 200 years from now, trying to recreate our lives. Have so much stuff, theyll see how we walked and talked, watch what we said on twitter but wont know the intimate details from the verbatim understanding that comes fruit letter or diary or notes taken at the time. So, nicks notes become a treasure source that makes this book so real in life. The ultimate key that the book shows is that the success that Teddy Kennedy achieved was due to the relationships he had built over time, so carefully, in the senate. Nurtured over the years. From such relationships i fear are in such short supply today, senators, congressmen dont have the time to spend time with each other. Theyre racing home on thursdays, they want to raise funds that money is the poison in the system theyre spending so much time on. Theyre spending time on facebook, not even talking to staff, much less to one another. But in Teddy Kennedys time he understood that relationships were the key to everything. And he youll see the Great Stories in here about orrin hatch. Had had gone to teddys mothers funeral. Teddy had gone to hatchs mothers funeral, and hatch loved to inning and he would make up songs and played the tapes of his songs, and so at one point, teddy had nick, with that beautiful, once on broadway voice, sing one of hatchs songs, and finally hatch had to give in. He had to give in to whatever teddy wanted. Nice move, teddy, he said. Knowing that he had been bested. And then when teddy wanted funds to restore the house at longfellow in cambridge and needed the support of senatorbird, the chairman of the progresses committee, he memorizes longfellows famous poem, the Midnight Ride of paul revere, and continuing to say it over and over again until finally i think senator bid said, okay, ill give you the funds. And then theres a great story of inviting senator thurmond to dinner at teddys house and they asked him how did you say in such great shape, and at 89 years old he pant mimes his whole gym routine every morning with the grunts and things going up and down those relationships are what makes things work in life as well as in the senate. And in a certain sense i think what the book shows is a love that Teddy Kennedy had and that nick and david had, for this institution of the senate. I worry sometimes that today the people who are there in these congress and senate seats, do they really recognize the history of the senate . Of the institution, whatted did . Thats why this room is so incredible. This institute is so incredible. If you feel it, you feel like you have come home, as i think Teddy Kennedy often did. He felt like the senate was his home. He understood its rules and quirks and rituals. He recognized that seniority was a big deal in the senate. Should what does he do when he wants to get somebodys support . He goes to that Persons Office rather than the other way around. When he wanted someone in congress to come with him on something he would walk over to the house, defying that sense of hierarchy that too often paralyzes things. He hung out at the elevator at times just sort of waiting for some senator to come by so he could buttonhole him. At a certain point when he wanted to stiffen the spine of president clinton he got himself involved with a group of mass troopers that were coming to a white house ceremony. He sat in the front row and how could clinton do otherwise than say, hello, senator, and the next thing you know theyre hav 45 minute talk and something is happening. Horse trading happened the those days. Now we have a sense its transparent and you shouldnt bargain, shouldnt trade, y