Documents america story. And on sundays, book tv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors. Funding for cspan two comes from these Television Companies and more. Including comcast. You think this is just a Community Center . No, its way more than that comcast is partnering with 1000 Community Centers to create wifi enabled lift services, so students from low income families can get the tools they need to be ready for anything. Comcast, along with these Television Companies, support cspan 2 as a public service. So, i am going to, this is a panel where we are going to spend some time and each of our panelist is going to spend five or ten minutes introducing a particularly president ial transition and highlight a few of the big takeaways, interesting points, lessons learned. So we will go we wont go and program order, were actually going to go in Chronological Order of the elections that they will be highlighting. We will do that for about 15 minutes or so and then open it up for discussion and conversation and discuss questions. So, i will go forth and introduce everyone at the top and then we will go in turn. So i will introduce, first in the order in which they are going to speak. I love lindsey chervinsky, a senior fellow at the center for president ial history at Southern Methodist university. Shes a historian of the presidency, local government, and the president. Especially the book the cabinet. The first book the cabinet, the president needs to shunts it is now out in paperback. Her next book, an honest man, the inimitable presidency of john adams is on their contract and will be published in the fall, 2024. I like that definitive. Thank you. Yes. Just in time for another election. She will be talking about the transition of elections in 70 76 in 18 hundreds. Second up is ted whitmer, ted is a real writer, librarian, and musician who is honors at currently. He also served doesnt buy should bill clinton animus an advisory to Hillary Clinton when she served as secretary of state. He is has taught at harvard, washington college, director of the library Carlton Brown library and director at the library of congress. His next book is lincoln on the verge, 13 as washington. Hes also 2010 recipient of the guttenberg polish fellowship. It will be talking about the transition after the election of 1860. Its futile, we are choosing good ones. We killed sheldon is an associate professor of history and director of the record civil war era center, at Sea University she specializes the long 19th three and teaches about slavery allocation, the civil war, and constitutional history. Shes the author of washington brotherhood. Politics, social life, and the coming civil war published in 2013 which received Honorable Mention for the best first book on the american civil war. She is also coeditor with Gary Gallagher of a political nation. New directions of the mid 19th century american political history published by uva protests in 2012. Our current book project, the Political Supreme Court examined in the political world of the u. S. Supreme Court Justices from the early 19th century to the 1890s. Rachel will be taking on 1876. Joshua sellers, associate professor of law at the standard in calmer Commerce School of law. Here is a j. D. And ph. D. In Political Science from the university of Chicago Service the article that for the University Law review. He previously taught at University Oklahoma college of law and was opposed doctoral fellow of law at Syracuse Universitys school. Before entering teaching he was a law clerk to judge rosemary bracket of the u. S. Court of appeals for the 11 surrogate in associate at at washington d. C. His principal areas of research of teaching our election law, legislation and regulation, constitutional law, civil procedure. His scholarship has been published in the panel of review, and why you law review, annual of, your stanford law view, among others. Josh will be talking about hanging tads and timorous its white board. Yes, you got, it election embers transition of 2000. Last but hardly least, the remark track is a scholar of and participant in president ial that administrations and transitions at the school of business in dartmouth. In 2020, one he served in the biden ministration the ceo of the u. S. International Development Finance corporation. Mark jack previously served as the director of the nonprofit, Nonpartisan Center for a president ial transition where he worked for the Biden Transition Team transition planning efforts. He also spent 12 years as managing director of the Carlisle Group and held several positions in the Clinton Administration. They will bring us closer very close to the present day by discussing the 2020 transition. With that, i will turn it over to dr. Chervinsky. Thank you so much for being here, i am very excited about this panel which i had the privilege to put together and it was really just an excuse to talk about the things that i am working on and was able to find people who were interested many of the same topics. I am sure all of you recall your history textbook lesson on the election of 1800, this is usually described as the first major transfer of power and light say that that is very wrong. And its very important we look at the election of 70 66 and the elections i come over as two sides to the same coin. And we look at our constitution and what it says about president ial transitions, there are some more statutes about how these things are supposed to go. In 1796, there was almost nothing on the page. So, every single action from how people would enter a room, how the transfer of power would take place, what they would wear, who would you present. Everything had to be crafted from scratch. The context is really essential because in 1796, the last transition that most americans had witnessed was the french revolution. Which was, of course, characterized by heavy use of gilles teen and blood running through the streets. So, not a great model to follow, ideally. Everyone presents, everyone aware, everyone participating in this situation was acutely aware of the fact that this is pretty much unprecedented. Never been done, it required extraordinary care and attention in detail to make sure that it went right. John adams wrote in his letter to his wife that he was gratified and surprised that washington and showing up. That was not a guarantee. His presence was essential to giving the stamp of approval and he walked out of the room, behind john adams. I dont know that washington walked out of a room behind anyone in at least eight years, if not much longer. So that entire process was one of crafting something from scratch. Crafting something with really no model to follow. Having to be very thoughtful and attentive about those details and everyone that was president in the room revived later and how remarkable it had been that one stunt had risen in another had set and it had all been done peacefully in the nation hadnt fallen apart. That sounds kind of hyperbolic, because we know how it all went and we know the nation survived and it was there were other elections, but they meant it. They were not being mellow traumatic at that moment. A few now, its just to sort of remind us of the timing of the transition and how this worked at that time because there is no social media, because there is no cnn, there was no decision desk. There is no theyve saying ive seen enough. They werent really sure what the results were going to be. They feel confident enough on december 30th, 1976, several months after the auction had begun to write back to abigail that he knew the outcome but that he wasnt sure, he wasnt sure until he himself opened the results on february 8th, 1970 1897 and claims of the winner. That actually left him just about a month for the actual transition. The timeline, i think, is essential there. Fast forward four years, of course the result was a little bit different. By the time he came around to opening the by the time Thomas Thomas jefferson open the result in 1801, it was pretty clear that everyone knew that john adams had lost. It wasnt clear who had actually won. Just a bit of a refresher, of course, erin burr and jean pence gemstone tied in the election, took 36 ballots to select who was indeed going to be the next president , and in that process john adams, Thomas Jefferson, in aaron burr were all invited to meddle in that process. To put their thumb on the scale to determine who is going to be the right person. As these deliberations are taking place, john adams invited Thomas Jefferson to a dinner with the white house and it was deemed the white house at this point because he had just moved in. They committed to each other they would not meddle in the election they were the time to side who isnt going to be the next president. It must have been a spectacularly awkward dinner, because at this point they hated each other and had spent months criticizing one another and their supporters writing terrible things in the newspapers. Analysts, they committed to this peaceful transfer of power and it was the first transfer from one party to another. A couple of takeaways from this to these two elections together. Peaceful transfer the power dont happen. They require attention, care or, they require commitment to that principle and the participants in 1796 and 1800 understood that. They understood how fragile these institutions were and they did not take peacefulness for granted. I think one of the greatest gifts to the people that came after them where that we could take it for granted, at least until 2021. So that commitment to ensuring the central peace of democracy, though i yet when i say that. A democratic republic. The commitment to ensuring that central piece was essential in and understood by early participants and i think one of the things that we have lost a bit and one of the takeaways i would like to bring up in our discussion. Thank, you lindsay. Nice to see you david, who i talked with a lot a euro go and have not yet met in person but im happy to be here virtually with david and physically with all of you. Ill talk about 1860, which i think is still the worst transition of alltime. It is close. We may have a spirited debate and i think the verdict is still up in the air and after last night it was trump all over again there wasnt a guillotine in washington on january 6th. Rachel is also an expert on 1860 infused in mind me that i was moderator a year ago on a panel on which she was the expert on the 1860 transition. That was supposed to happen on january 6th it was scheduled for them. At the massachusetts detour historical society. So why was it so bad . It revealed a fatal flaw in the architecture of our system, which is that the losers of an election would accept the result. In 1860, as in 2020, a significant part of the population refuse to elect but they didnt claim the election was rigged they simply left the United States of america. That is the simple version of what happened, but at every level it was very, very complicated as the government slowly fell apart and was rebuilt by a complete outsider who, a little under a year under was so visible to people that in 1859 the book which listed the 21 most likely people to give the nomination in 26 failed to contain a rambling instagram. Thats one the many things i discovered in a whole lot of research that was really on only 13 days of lincolns train trip at the end of the transition. In order to do all that research, i had to look at what the country was like before the election, during the election, and then in the very long aftermath between the election of number from her sixth, 1860, and lincolns first inaugural of march 4th, 1861. It is just an extraordinary drama and i learned to my surprise how much of it was already planned and it was kind of akin to what we are hearing on tv about how concerted the plan was well before the election to a siren article in the enquirer saying that if a socalled black republican is elected we will simply leave the country and we will take the armaments and we will conduct a new country from richmond and its similar to what happened in richmond of 59, lincoln gives a speech and he is an extreme outside of this point. He says, if they fail to accept the result of illegal election, we will have to deal with them as we have just dealt with john brown. Because john brown because lincoln was just on stickler for the lawn concert it before, during, and after years the transitional legal to secede from the union. So, there are these two amazing dramas happening at the same time. In 1861, the actual shattering of the union and the rise of a political supernova who was barely known. I think we overstate his popularity after the Lincoln Douglass debates of 1858, but it really is an extreme outsider and there are all of these very slight ways in which the doors open for him to walk through, one of which also happen 18 the Republican Party leadership voted by one vote to have the nominating convention in chicago and not in st. Louis. If it had not been in chicago, lincoln probably would not have received the nomination. So he isnt on course, he gets the nomination and its an Extraordinary Campaign even before the election. Theyre actually four people running, the Democratic Party split and a half. Into, it has a north south divide like the entire country. Stephen douglas is the candidate of the northern Democratic Party and he violates a taboo by traveling and giving campaign speeches. So, i think for the first time in American History, lincoln stays our home and it is clear to all observers that he will win. The electoral strength in the midwest in north is such that think it is going to win the election even before it happens. Then we enter the strange and he does. Snowy interchange highlighted for difficult month when its not clear how the unites its government is going to keep together. There is a president , james from cannon, who is a weak president coming in in late 1860 he is really falling apart. It is a situation kind of the opposite of trump in 2020, it was the president just isnt doing anything. The schism of the country, of the body politic, seems to sundays are verse to also be happening inside of his actual body. His facial tics, trouble making up his mind even the smallest decisions. It is a bit like Woodrow Wilson at the end of his presidency. His cabinet is split, also there are a few northerners. There is a very strong southern wing. There are three cabinet members especially who are actively involved in dismantling the United States government under their charge to get ready for whatever is coming next. The second the zoning john boy descending are minutes into the south island there is cobb from georgia who is essentially bankrupting the United States treasury and the secretary of the interior is a mississippian named Jacob Thompson who is traveling around the southern part of the night states drumming up support for secession. He is also one in washington, reporting on cabinet meetings and sending all of the information back to the secessionists in South Carolina planning to leave the country. It is, if i dont want to overstate the comparison to 2020, but it is as if there is another country ready to start and the people in the final months of the government are putting all the strength they can in to this country that doesnt quite exist yet. Theres a lot of activity in the south, especially in charleston, South Carolina where they leave no doubt about their intention to secy succeed and theres a lot of militia activity. There are people Walking Around with rifles and interestingly, again in 2020 contacts, they talk a lot about 1776. They call themselves minuteman. The guards dont flag, the dont tread on me flag, is flown by them. I think we might, as historians do, need more work to connect very strange appropriation of the American Revolution on january 6th with what is also going on in the south in 1860 and 1861 as they are doing the opposite of the American Revolution. They are tearing the country apart. South carolina sends a diplomatic to washington to begin negotiating for most favored nation status. Larry, for a short time, South Carolina is thinking that it is a country unto itself called the palmetto republic and its the seeds on december 20th, followed by mississippi, alabama, georgia, louisiana, and texas. Seven seats have gone out of the union by the 1st of february which is still over a month before blinken can get to washington. There is just a general panicky feeling in washington. The social quality of the city has evaporated, northerners and southerners cant even go to the same parties together. There is some violence, a congressman from new york is beat up while walking home from the capital one night. What a scariest is this winter, henry adams who is a very perceptive observer called a great secession winter, what a scariest is a feeling that washington is really extremely vulnerable in a military way to southern militias that might come over from virginia, which is still in the union, but has a lot of hot heads who are pro south or maryland which is also full of hot heads. Washington, d. C. It surrounded on all sides by slave territory and it wouldve been a matter with militias of