2013 02 17 13 RN Smith Lincoln

for best picture best actor best director the movie lincoln is up for twelve academy awards next weekend i'm kate mcintyre and today on k pr presents the man behind the movie presidential historian richard norton smith joins us for this look at president lincoln is best known here as the founding director of the dole institute of politics at the university of kansas he left that position in two thousand three to become the director of the lincoln presidential library and museum in springfield illinois he's also been the director of several other presidential libraries he now serves as scholar in residence at george mason university welcome richard think you were going to talk about lincoln in just a minute but before we do so you're actually in town to talk about three other presidents the dole institute's two thousand thirteen presidential lecture series is in the beginning three men who made america the first two in that series on george washington and john adams took

place last week of the dole institute but the third on thomas jefferson will take place tomorrow monday february eighteenth at seven thirty at the dole institute then you're taking the show on the road tuesday february nineteenth and talking about george washington again this time a k use edwards campus in johnson county will be broadcasting all three of those lectures later this year but first tell us a bit about this year's lecture series at the dole institute yeah it i'm well you're only before for the doors are arab member ever climate invite me back after dima dima this id or talk or presidents and i'm thinking the last time we talk about him if you read when mount rushmore great twentieth century president which for which you will select few can you know dishes on our website where you are so thrilled to be able to bring to our listeners are now gone to the other search for

him and gone back to the beginning in the beginning for them picked out the first three presidency to go in his own way obviously created and to find out the office and ah but but then billy singing in his wisdom suggested let's share the wealth and so in addition to those three docks at the goal was to do on the nineteenth speaking at the edwards' campus on george washington so you never get too much george washington so an event that that's the yeah that's the reason for my but from others think historian an interesting when you revisit a president who has been revisited so many times in the past like to say that every entity and two for one i'm a biographer before his story ma'am i mean by that i approach history first and foremost through the personal how would

you find george washington has suffered it in my opinion from people wanna make it relevant or you know humanize him and wind up inadvertently trivialized when i've covered enough about for steven souter fact what was really fascinating is to take washington when he is most vulnerable it has a role we all made in the last ten years whose wife hold to serve his country has its first president the fighting with every action he takes on oil a presidency but in many ways that the republican self lending his own legitimacy to this experiment amid the constitution was a scrap of parchment with no tradition or reverence now behind it henry knock said the sector wars that was of the constitution that helped the union together but it was the character of george

washington so so they'll you have ok you want to get the character of george washington you want to bring this man to life you know he's not one of us you wanna make inaccessible to us and un you know the fact that he is an old man that he is keenly aware of the deficiency of his of his formal education then he yelled really won't public speaking or spontaneous public speaking and in particular that everything in some ways is scripted as a modern day state of the union address for presidential visit the fact is that a lot of time trying to control his temper his presidential secretary said no sound on earth compared with that of george washington's wearing a blue streak i mean i and these bits and pieces of the mosaic of all life brought together begin to see it

personalizing humanize any historical figure and that's that's the image i guess that a biographer hands over say a social historian or or others economic historian of overt about washington just fairly recently and i watched the tv miniseries john adams mini series it did for john adams maybe when this movie isn't telling you it into the culmination of the series in the book of them the books or over two million copies which is extraordinary and adams and been a tough subject in widely ignored but it don't give because genius he did the same thing very true i am in terms of re introducing these these people i am david a friend our room talking about the movie he was very happy with the movie because the producers took very seriously mr often doesn't so if something came up as a script and he said no that didn't happen that way

that wasn't you saw the results were accurate are we suddenly it's very powerful porter and again at the heart of it is this relationship sort of improbable love affair between john and abigail adams who was portrayed so beautifully by laura linney and two hundred years later in all they hear other day of all the founders the adams is in some ways of the most contemporary the most accessible because of the most human you know there's a wonderful and he he laughed obviously better hat and you know for me and what the bitter about you know within weeks of his defeat the first president to be defeated for reelection they felt appreciated i am emily lost their son the alcoholism was a daughter to breast cancer and it goes back to queens at her farm and there's a

wonderful wonderful story abigail one day it was our fear she went out i think it remember launch an issue yet so she could hear him muttering under his breath he was swearing he was cursing his political enemies anything that's how he you know somehow that's very human you know that somehow you couldn't even wait to that joke we build memorials to watch an image of reason not in a whole other ways you know we emulate john adams let's jump forward about a hundred years the academy awards are right around the corner and of course is steven spielberg film lincoln is expected to do very well at the at the oscars and what i keep coming back to lincoln well you know that's a great question we keep coming back to linger for a number of reasons in the somewhat the same dr that we keep going back generous because each of the wrong way is

symbolically gives voice him unforgettable words mm mm lincoln's case deeds to what we profess to believe as the essence of freedom as the yemen in some ways the essence of of humanity itself love the fact that people are born with natural rights given to them by their creator that government itself derives its legitimacy from the government the idea of self government which was rare goal in a world dominated by a divine right you know by churches established churches and in lincoln's case we keep going back to him because it's always very mysterious he's he's universally recognized even though beijing or more more

and a few short it a picture of a storm pipe that a beard because other notice but recognition as the present they understand and there is this elusive mysterious call it a lincoln himself from his contemporaries his law partners it was a militia mouth many government and he is in some ways still hiding from us a hundred and fifty years later so you have that element almost of the detective story but you also have in a wider sense of the arc of lincoln's mary lincoln like washington is quintessential american in his capacity for growth he never stopped worrying as president of political military and moral and of course that would bring it to the jewish slavery lincoln said there was never a time in his life

and slavery did not make him miserable but that's not the same by a long shot from entertaining the even more radical notion that there might be some kind of racial equality um so weakens trajectory from a man who takes office convinced that any war if it comes is only a war about constitutional interpretation you know about constitutional rights whether self concede from the union worms away but commensurately in my opinion that in fact that's not what the war is about a role and that the war can only be understood what was justified as war about human rights and along the way you have this marvelous transformation weekend is a transformative president but lincoln undergoes a transformation to his

attitudes know about slavery about slavery didn't change it into the race do change in no small measure because of frederick douglass and the ian hundred eighty thousand african americans who wants emancipation proclamation was issued were recruited to fight for the union to fight for their freedoms in effect out and lincoln who was extraordinarily oh no did rational evidence driven which is a war this notion of the dreamy mistake but the both sides existed weekend was not blind he saul every day what former slaves in many cases were doing what they were capable of doing he saw the currencies all the heroism he saw the sacrifice and he was simply too intelligent

not to derive the obvious conclusion and so by the end of his life the last speech of his life three nights before he was shot to an audience that included john wilkes booth he talks about the most radical idea ribble he gives it was meant to only some form of black suffrage that and that as a result of this war america itself has transformed and as part of that transformation is slavery was ended which course codified in the thirteenth amendment which is part of the spielberg movie bud but even a more radical notion slavery was was there once the war began in many ways but there was no guarantee and indeed we still in many ways in the backwash of the fear here of lincoln's contemporaries to emulate his capacity for moral growth i mean

his his his successor andrew johnson squandered the moral high ground and so ironically took a hundred years to another southern president name johnson compensated per century i love of inequality and in many cases a year of slavery and all that but they so so that's the great central drama in some ways of the american story the incomplete american story and lincoln as the great actor at the heart of that drop it and that doesn't even touch on lincoln and civil liberties in wartime i mean a subject of very contemporary relevance of lincoln really advanced of them the role of the wartime president for better and worse is a lot to debate about when can we can spend portray the next in the steven spielberg movie that has been fortified i think is probably the

best boudreaux why governor sayed ali anyone who sees that movie it can go away with a real sense of if nothing else and this is what matter is that you can you can now imagine what it would've been like to be in lincoln's presidents come and it gets the ultimate test of of any depiction and part of it is a brilliant script a tony for sure that records partners daily woes who is never less than brilliant and so i know that the great surprise to me watching the movie was how good so if you was that murdoch like the thankless role in a lot of ways what else it'd be a shrew you know heckling or alone at this theater in the midst of putting you get this extraordinary uk you could forget their last name you know this is a couple that has been through hell he's lost two children

and was going to hell yeah and just as a character study of that relationship seemed to me the movie is is to court a phrase one for the ages what you think of some of the previous portrayals of lincoln by household were to outlaw i think you're always remember oppressive in the way some good at it i mean raymond massey is it all a lincoln illinois where flights you know of the nineteen thirties and roberts for what the playwright who wrote it on an enemy as he is if he feels like a statue posing for you know posing for his pedestal there's something not quite lifelike it all about a little bit lax in a monumental but then along in the ring and i thought how old work i did a great job i thought sam waterston reads from that got a monumental like going to a more accessible contemporary if you will link and

so i'm i'm melissa gregory peck a boy away given the dollars a share is a booming ready one that you know i kept thinking this is gregory peck with a beard or so by that but he was you know he was he was more like a nasty as atticus finch him to kill a mockingbird but dublin event richardson so fun to listen you share your passion for presidential history not only are you and do you bring that passion into the classroom and to our listeners that you are also sharing your love of history with the traveling public figure about twenty years now i've been doing a leading presidential tours alma and i will he said and point out i receive no preacher neary benefit from the side it's just it's fun to do and we have an awful a repeat visitors which is not it's about a

week were doing two trips in two thousand thirty the first is art as lincoln and civil war it's in a day trip and the virginia pennsylvania maryland and the district of korea thank you and then the second trip which is really sort of the culmination of everything we've learned over twenty years is a deluxe five star new york new england the hudson valley eleven presidents in nine days of fall foliage throw them at me a world class restaurants store coattails you know it's it's a deluxe package but a way people out water no more they go online just a typed in all one word presidents and patriots jewelers dot com presidents and patriots to his dotcom and i'll take him to the website and they can find out everything about these trips again we're visiting with presidential historian richard norton smith who is in town for the two thousand thirteen presidential lecture series at the dole institute of politics at the university

of kansas smith was also the kickoff speaker in the dole institute two thousand nine presidential lecture series on abraham lincoln's legacy in this rebroadcast from two thousand nine smith talks to university of kansas history professor jonathan earle soon sit down we can have packed room again remember the last time what happened when we can affect the room what is it that makes a great president well it's a good question and it's a question that in some ways needs to be asked within the context of the times there a president who could have great presidents but for the particular challenge to confront in the way that herbert hoover had the democrats succeeded as many of them wanted to and nominate the nineteen twenty are the stories that you have been very different and so in response in history would be very different and there are other people like franklin pierce who had been dubbed the modern era when when he was in office in the case of

lincoln there are so many factors i think the contributor to his greatness and they begin before his presidency because i think if you can walk to come up with a single a word that defines this incredibly pretty and figure it's a growth we can never stopped growing now what is the deal was that we'd when he was a young man the age of twenty two a former acquaintance i want is it wasn't going to think that when we die that is the last of us and we can it won't weaken spirituality all afternoon that is something that also grew by the way but it on we can as a young man had a fear when conventional although i would say hyper developed in bishop you famously reset

ended his ambition that was a little engine that you know rest it was twenty three when he first ran for the legislature lost its first election came back two years later i served four terms in norwich torture at forty three rides to work for an un if you heard that weekend on every congress it's not true and right over a much he lost his first race for congress they liked him at forty six shows up in eighteen forty seven in the nation's capital a town of thirty four thousand people with the thirty seven churches and twice as many taverns some things haven't changed but i had a and he immediately established themselves apart at a party we're introduced was called the spot resolutions evidence in the middle of the mexican war we can have principled opposition to the war he believed it was an immoral a war fought the expansion of slavery

but he chose a kind of dog eat trek almost too clever by how he gets approval for the house and he introduces these resolution to require the prisoners days james k polk to identify the precise spot on the map when mexican aggressions occurred thereby justify an american invasion of our southern neighbor well his party in control the house of the resolution's went nowhere but at the same time in doing that he also demonstrated even at that really early age that he was capable of putting principle ahead of popularity and if you fall weekend he had one term one unhappy term in congress more people regarded as a failure it goes home to springfield and nurses and top of his family his law practice disappears for five years and then comes something called the kansas nebraska act which effectively repeal the missouri compromise so the point is these the young he had the opportunity to be great that i'll come back to that

in a second because you mention that he served one term in a national office in congress the whig party which was his party didn't even re nominate him to succeed and self the next the next or what about this rather meager preparation preparing lincoln to the president during our nation's greatest crisis if he ran today and you can almost write the opposition's attack ads three o'clock in the morning is no not exactly no international experience little formal education out of that you know i think we can agree that he truly was it would get to go at sixty had any set of circumstances under which he was not an archery would be nominated today with that with that background he probably would have been killed off in the yard and the dog eat dog world of arc of american primary politics but what happened by eighteen six he was the country was about to come apart at the seams the democratic party was it really only national

institution and it was breaking up so it meant that the republican nominee this is only the second time republicans would nominate someone for president republican party was born eliminating fifties in opposition to see when i was in the kansas nebraska act most republicans believed but they all believe that slavery was an evil that was something that had the control that it was something that had to be restrained many of them believe that was something that had to be ended and the question was exactly when and using what powers of government when he was a relative moderate on the question but he believed fervently that the spread of slavery to the directors had to be halted and the timing calming effect of drawing the same his advantage at sixty was that he was rolling on no he was not a blank slate the teachers are way is a lack of experience actually turned out to be his greatest asset because the more prominent republican candidates have long records they had been outspoken they had

quotes that could be bright red backpack that means they had made enemies and so he was someone in some ways a dark horse ah who could unite the party and take advantage of this unique split that existed within the democratic party what very few people seem to have seriously contemplated was howling could actually govern and again back to just ask a similar question that i understand and work on this in my own research how he got nominated even how he got elected but what about his his own biography prepared him for the type of leader should challenges he was confronted with immediately we look at what president obama's had to contend with and is it really as first moments in office it was so much worse the already sick of the first hundred days i don't i don't mean that i mean the president's immediate i recall as we can summon to remain in this is that you go on tv to talk about the first fourteen days no i know i kind of

i probably at six or maybe work on such an artificial construct an edited ronald reagan's first hundred days and the jury would've gotten a passing grade well it's interesting when we need law partner we learned in court in the most shook about me and i never knew himself responding for billboard providing quote autobiography and at sixty said there's not much to it the reason i suppose there's not much to me i'm the last true words were never spoken there was a great deal to him that lincoln was an extraordinarily cautious on community to have armed careful made that i think went back to his own to his origins you one of the great myths of american history is it weakens that is what i'm celebrating his humble origins that is he spent a lifetime escaping what what lincoln's political philosophy paid tribute to it seems to me it was a system of government a free

society in which the ten dollar a month flat open court through his own efforts racist asian in life and provide for his family and i had become a rubber contributing citizens one factor is really controversial one factor uniquely the prepared we can for the presidency was on happy marriage i'm one of those who thinks very top when things got bad press our own here's a woman who was three of her children far as the assassinated her sole surviving son you know had her committed to redwood situation cut the little bit of slack is an administration where we were she she was either the lincolns are a classic case of opposites attracting and then propelling

and the call i actually seriously believe that because weekend was accustomed to conflict in his whole house in it you're sort of way he was rattled by conflict in the white house and that that's coordinating things you don't often have in the big buyer is he does have this this preparation from his law practice from his marriage from from learning how to get noticed in the new republican party and how the politician was was lincoln the reason why i think we can as the president gets to more there's a major first and foremost because he was the most brilliant politician ever occupy the white house any he could play politics know it could play a cunning use a combination of the two he's reluctant against the odds my immediate sixty four and frederick douglass said we give the last days or his best days and he was referring

specifically to wake of politicking on behalf of the thirteenth amendment to the constitution remember we could have written an issue the emancipation proclamation as it is an active military necessity i had no constitutional barrier it could in theory have been repealed by the next president to give the president happened the joint call the man ran against lincoln eighty six before we can do that the earth's later there was only one way to permanently eliminate the stain of slavery pro american soil and that was amended the constitution well you know the house was going to do it just because it was a good idea or more weight admirable idea the president twisted enough arms to that impasse by jacquie three votes now there's a classic case and about making get reelected he and sit back to wait for the bones to claim it in those as a court candidates how did what can pay so lincoln brought voters to the white house he practically brought groups of soldiers to the white house and they

make these wonderful gem like little speeches but about him about what they were fighting for and was all about combating war weariness in the south are unit director of the country but in addition to that he also way you operate a deal to be made is a man named james gordon bennett who was a new york newspaper hated lincoln scouts arm was on the bane of his existence and lincoln or to get another country offering the ambassadorship to france so i mean and also he went even general sherman know the president would have no objections that general sherman would what soldiers under his command go home to vote in a critical state elections so you have someone who elevates politics its young lincoln that young lincoln running for congress it was all about achieving a kind of personal immortality over time weaken outgrew that just as in my opinion he outgrew

the racist society the producer we talk about like the lyndon johnson treatment the way lyndon johnson got results by physically leaning over people in commanding them only seen george w bush have a certain way of getting his own ideas of legislation to grant was there lincoln style or that it's kind of a different strategy for each political situation like you mention i would've myself you know and i think that i think the reason we can stop but i don't think it's a i think it's a it's a remarkable versatility i think we it had an extraordinary capacity for sort of principled other people's shoes and therefore decide what it was would persuade or convinced or scare the hell out of the other person he was something to read is one of the letters in it early in his career when he's in congress on its very own research issues and point straight from behind the scenes is not altogether admirable but it's it's that skillful

storytelling we can use stories are detained people sometimes to change the subject when he wanted to but also to make a point and effective that you use them as a as a means of persuasion of impressing upon someone that maybe they are to their interpretation of an issue was maybe a little bit off and that he seemed to have a story for almost every occasion and i'm not going there and they're relevant stories they're not just you know i'm pulling a story and in the most worthy it weakens the region of reykjavik we can is the greatest communicator american history the great they're solving mysteries about this man you know how did someone with your story or to write the most imperishable pros so we ever buy american or an american president is weekend thunderstorm instinctively while before teddy roosevelt boy pope reporter for harry truman said the key job

them on president is persuasion weaken understood in his soul that the most important thing that a president could do politically wartime was to educate people i am and the fact is the war that he began we look at the first inaugural address read the first inaugural address in new orleans might be dissatisfied open to and not in my is the is responsibility for great civil war what lincoln did very skillfully from the very beginning was to put the onus on of the south he knew that when the attack came the north would have the moral high ground and rapper warren beatty over every rock these public letters that mean we think that all of your record reached the wide audience that you know some of them would reach a wider audience through newspapers they would watch a president to address on television in the american wine today he can get this incredible sixth sense about

what needed to be said they'd waited to be said and how to say it and that was the case when we speak to millions of temperament lighting fires under members of congress or more on one those are great great ways to answer that question richard do you think it takes extraordinary times to make a great president you seem to live that with wit with herbert hoover although coover who i think have the potential to be a truly excellent president seemed i'm able to grow into the crisis that that was the great depression i've heard bill clinton lament about this is well they would be a great crisis for the times present he could've really showed his leadership the stop and think about time so let's think about the big ego that that that that that that exhibits what you're saying is your family had the war it all right or or a question and certainly would've been wasted on say calvin coolidge's terms of where i'm sure there are big things that happen in the in the mid twenties obama i stopped

the nineteen nineties and has no yeah well they were so so so could there been a great president were nothing big happening and do you need a crisis like this award to be one of our great leaders traditionally i'm a dove better or worse and i actually i take issue with his big effect the matter is the act of an injury for most of the last several years is untried a single model the presence of what i would call the new deal and it it puts that in some ways is that it's a bit like teddy roosevelt way it says that the president is the national agenda for the president determines really we will be going as a people the presidents of mix in many ways a legislative program in the nineteenth century presidents were administrators in chief now other advocates for it all things in general amr that but what the new deal more presupposes the powerful to washington and the power is personalized the presidency

so that's the moral that has become a shrine the problem with that it seems to me as ii to the postwar reagan you could actually work that alternative models you can look at i think one reason why a neighbor jackson has been dusted off today or even why people now work at coolidge more seriously there are alternative morals which are appropriate for the airtime and the worst thing that a historian of all people could do is to forget here is to try to impose our convention's up on every generation i often thought you was a michael which stop and think if you'd been you know my age in nineteen twenty three as an adult you will live through the assassination of a very popular president hu had also been the first president take american overseas we evacuated spanish american war you'll live through to young reinvented the president

everywhere you look at you would've lived through the split in the republican party as tiara taft but the war that you brought and woodrow wilson the first in thirty is the first democratic president thirty years we thought were won who transformed the role of american government greater disillusion and after the war and then you would have gone through the hardy administration teapot dome and the death of a president or by nineteen twenty three in twenty years you were gone to all that cost trajectory you would probably be pining for little bit for equality a little bit of dwight eisenhower ok or a little bit a couple of the fence i can think however i agree that that the office has changed so much that i don't think you could have an excellent pass a president today so i think and i think that might be where if i can try to defend president clinton that that might be where you go and i think george p bush also seem to understand that that he was present during very important to her and to knock life changing times i know i

will i will challenge is your characterization record his past in a sense everyone knows about teddy roosevelt's stewardship theory of the presidency to read the side here basically that the president is empowered to do anything that the constitution does not explicitly prohibited from doing well i mean now that now when you're when you interpret that as conservation and fighting for our meat that isn't tainted and your aunt your drawings i mean in the in the progressive era that makes perfect sense it is obviously a subject you abuse calling his theory of the presidency is very different he basically says i'm a steward for the taxpayer not for endangered species or you know whatever and that basically the president is your one who can protect the taxpayer for these organizing is groups who come to washington with good intentions and helped the chain's so it's a it's a it's a it's a radically different

moral the presidency but nobody should be dismissed or any other law silent power of war or make him a subordinate is but here's a fact a matter were having our presidential lecture series curator don't stick up dedicated to abraham lincoln not accomplish as good as he may be why they continued fascination with this name on with this figure with his character on above all else and we have had some other compelling presence and the jacksons an obvious when george wash and sometimes you know comes back a little bit and then and i think he really has what is the number is you alright every generation there are very few historical figures and in jefferson's probably has his clothes in terms of people who go to the heart of what it means to be an american and therefore get rediscovered certainly every generation were the important things i think about that's russell lincoln is often tends to tell us as much about ourselves and our current

preoccupations and when goals of cultural fashion so you know you have lived as i say you know generation of brokeback lincoln and your project and in the sixties you addicted awaken and race is on even remember how many we are and what obama first of two american president who from what we get his groove here are thirty years ago forty years ago it was almost concurrent with the civil rights movement it was a very significant effort on the part of all of some after american scholars to basically ripped a wall off of lincoln they say he was no regrets a predator to quote back things that he said in the context of the tea parties that seemed shockingly races today is not part of my latest quarterly came from but that's one reason i think is why it's your question we get is so rich a figure and lincoln's evolution is so profile but there're also other reasons one week it's

finally here we can't make linkages funny when you know there was a whole series of presidents who we defended bigger pipes will look like you're stiff necked figures a weekend has a sense of ridiculous and that never changed and it was probably his greatest medicine during the war look at win win story begins and word at the great ending the essence of america what is it that if if nothing else what are a credible dazzling diversity is one thing that unites us as americans and that is we believe that the conditions of one's birth do not win it or strain the possibilities of one's life that in this country whether you're an immigrant from honduras was just arrived or you know your ancestors came over on

the mayflower arm it seems to me that's the civic religion to which we already here and no one including washington or jefferson or like you know one in bodies that more than weight and then and then not finally but one more comedic it's the great passion play of american history the civil war as it's no accident that there are still want to people go to savour roundtable's is no accident that hundreds of books have been published in conjunction leading up to this bias bicentennial that they're being bought that they're being read you know and like you have some talc is you have some of the best authors coming do not miss people like michael burlingame and brown and ron white mean they they really are the theory cream of the crop and they have contributed

significantly to this generation it would somehow it would sometimes see there's not anything else that one could say about abraham lincoln and then here are coming to the lawsuit we have we have for scholars really sure who are breaking new ground and finding things to say i do now and i love to talk about illinois is is that you start with this idea of lincoln's goats he really doesn't change over time a better way that i loved and so i began studying women's rights where the republicans head over time and listen to some of that one of those guys again where those tools of the early on yeah i know we get any guess what he's lost about his trip to germany who thought seems they were rebecca movie about darwin's yeah cause i'm not an audi and jack's flow once again he's not likely we're talking about a

biography of the reason why there are only candidate anybody except for jesus christ is that the story does progressive change again because of the story you can find i don't care who you are you can find something in the story to inspire you there were some things about lincoln that don't change admirably under other things it drew admirably he was ninety one he was an infant when his parents are joining an abolitionist branch of the baptist church it was seven years old nine years old when they left kentucky for india in part because they didn't want women slaves that he was nineteen years old we took a flat bow down the mississippi to the war once which on one he and dazzle me this is the road that was the first city to ever see em down but he also shares the border slave auction that he was horrified and never forgot it all the site so from an early age we get a heated sleeve

he said there was never time in my life and slavery did not have the power to make me miserable that's a very different thing for embracing what you and i would call racial equality council and the fact of matter is when i talk about lincoln's capacity to grow and it is most dramatically i think it was traded up that it hadn't happened when he became president it happen in the course of his presidency as he came painfully learned that this was not a war of the constitution that this was a war about human rights this was a war to remove the stain that the power is left in the constitution when they accepted slavery and the relationship between lincoln and frederick douglass you know there a lot of water a lot of new books but if you want to be right they're collectibles what we get and frederick douglass and that relationship will tell you what that almost any other about lincoln's capacity as an adult would've been elected president serious art to see the error of his ways to see the

crime committed by his fellow countrymen he didn't demonize the south and he didn't personalized toward jefferson davis and if you read the second inaugural address that i think is a speech even greater the gettysburg it is the greatest waste or woman in america from a man who was been criticized for not being a church member alice really a sermon almost a jeremiad directed at his fellow countrymen not at a time of celebration you've re elected they would have told the ex the haitian for the sin of slavery that we as a people have confidence but not exactly thought that that's a good segue from me and talk about the president's spirituality and i agree with you that he did become more spiritual over the court was like an especially as president but would you agree that when abraham lincoln took the oath of office he was one of our the least

spiritual musical is presidents we've had no i wouldn't agree with that i would serve a groove you that he was he was a church member it was a dog he was once a credence by i think he was a skeptic he was also the presenter is straight to the bible better and effect one reason why we can one of the key it's understanding lincoln's prose was you know you once said i never finished a novel he said i picked up on a widespread indignation it here but he well shakespeare are at what the king james bible a record both had inferred i don't but he was also remember he was a warrior and it was no ordinary water he was he had the most of the year we want to go rational mind when he has to go on the circuit of the judicial circuit carol white they're these wonderful reports a thankless by if you like herndon his war part one out of the pub at the weekend died of we

can wake up in the middle of the night sharing a bed as was the custom in those days reading euclid geometry that was the why don't we pick up with him for pleasure or you quit which does use about how his mind operated now so it's not surprising when you factor all that in every drop of the other kentucky frontier superstitious place he'd seen all sorts of loan exaggerated hi no dramatic approaches to religion after he lost his mother as a boy he was a sister a few years later he was just haunted he was his first leader and i actually one of those i think that in writing wherever it was in fact his first true love because we're all this lost any can reconcile with the notion of a loving god which isn't an eternal forces with people obviously continue to debate but up but i think by the time he

became president and the decoys they were weaker the man who was held responsible for this ocean of blood that was the sheer he became human way spiritually on fire in some way what does he does it again he changes over time what does it come from some of the relationships and lincoln's life that were the most important you mentioned ann rutledge is his first love other people talk about it as his friend died joshua speed his law partner rights attorney who who were the people who affected in the most of it first of all you have to really get is like franklin roosevelt and i would say to make and surprise of the rewrite ah great presidents who could speak from erie to millions and millions of people as my friends and yet whoever was no friends armed with you i would consider that

term it had wanted to reframe and his wife the debt was joshua speed i don't think lincoln was day i don't think joshua speed was gay i think is there's a lot of politicking on on behalf of that theory are and again it's it's it's so easy for us to lose our sense of otherness when it comes to the past and it's so unfair to the past to see to look back over our shoulders and history being made as opposed to going all the way back and see history as something that's about apple are the fact is if you read women's letters and the nineteenth century correspondence was it was much more about it was much more emotionally open it's just a different emotional culture and as for it was reversible on the party or view it people or roman three bands as well so they have to get

you know so i'm i think that the problem is in between write about halfway between here and there some amazing and forty i came along and down but if you can if you consider race for you from your conscience then you can begin to approach it weakens time on lincoln's terms but i think that justice be for example of the great the great evidence of the writ of the state was when problems sure joshua speed wanted as that phone was hopelessly love and white men since time immemorial i hung it worried about how to make her welcome back i am down worried about marriage and intimacy and who did he turned to offer advice and his is good for labor and wicca and you should read the letters the marvelous wonders back and forth

between lincoln and speed at this time because we can have been going through a very difficult period so we're very top who was so you know he was he was loosely engaged to marry at the beginning of eighty four he won and out they didn't happen i don't think he joined the recovery i don't think it's quite as no dramatic but clearly the relationship broke and up and yet this very tall and his friend joshua speed was about to leave waken and go back to kentucky and get married it is writing him for advice and we can use and she says she's marvelous and so and that's of course we had the opportunity to return the flavor when friends brought lincoln and mary back together again as they did and they were married in november at forty two and by the way i want to get married you know he was a way for several months every year and that is judicial circuit leaving her with the

children in the house she's the lookout something new about the house's water out stories and she added that house to see today is two mass torts what he added she added the early edition to accommodate a growing family she and in fact i would say that at their daughter mary we can pursue i don't think it would've been a president like audience will her mission also was was she was as ambitious as you are great problem was she was born in the wrong quarter to retire it was in many ways a hundred years ahead of her time she wasn't politics her father's great friend was henry clay and require was lincoln's political euro as it does a henry clay was the matchmaker abroad may be married together and mary paid a price because the culture would allow well as a woman you know to run for office or to be really openly interested even in public affairs

five years ago we had a really good week we have found jean baker come from going to college has written a wonderful biography of mary todd lincoln and now my friend catherine clinton has a new and i haven't read it yet but so they're telling him continues to be a fascinating said you know what there is no other there's no fraternity was fraternal lincoln scholar an attacker with iraqi people they are very good paul who will not sit on the same stage that is that is what level they carry this be careful what you say it's actually a hard question i'm sorry to do this but i'm trying to give specific examples of the way president reagan handled certain specific crises during his term his term in office and what we ended in the current the current president can learn from someone is really being tested on the job by by fire well almost every day he was now people still debate when he says that at his corpus

was that dictatorship embryo om i think we can respond brilliantly he basically said look i'm suspending because of the constitution to preserve the introduction and then the linkedin marvelous come home we phrase he said sometimes a whim has to be educated to save a life but it's never wise typically a wife to save the leg but one thing we can get which is fascinating too warnings every week you can walk into the white house you comfortable astonishing middle of a civil war and the secret service no security numbers you can walk off the streets and into the white house welcomed as hundreds of people get more small stickers and they just up outside the president's office was your house now weekend two mornings a week with dropping the doors to meet with anyone who wanted to the one in the winter and the process of the city of ways to retire you have more boring thing to do your in your

ear a teenager your health and all the people want something from you and we couldn't refuse and i was interesting there were no public opinion polls in those days obviously we can refer to those meetings as his public opinion bats and it tells you something about someone who did you forget where he came from no more pointed out to get with the legitimacy and power of his office was ultimately ground that's presidential historian richard norton smith from the two thousand nine presidential lecture series at the university of kansas dole institute of politics the dole institute is in the midst of that two thousand thirteen presidential lecture series in the beginning three men who made america smith will speak on the presidency of thomas jefferson tomorrow monday february eighteenth capital institute he'll speak on the presidency of

george washington tuesday evening february nineteenth at the university of kansas edwards campus in johnson county i'm katie mack entire k pr percent is a production of kansas public radio at the university of kansas