runner up for his book "the black hearts of men" recounts the book political lives of the abraham lincoln and frederick douglass. and it examines the effect both had on each other. politics and prose bookstore in washington d.c. hosted this event, it is an hour. >> of peg, i like to talk for about 30 minutes and then i will open it up for questions. i want to first give you a brief background about how this book came into being and and i will summarize and sketch up some of the maintain some dramatize a few points hopefully what your appetite so you want to be the whole thing and then thirdly talk a little bit about the legacies of the abraham lincoln and frederick douglass for our

lives today. now i began writing this book shortly after barack obama launched his political campaign and it was published on election day and i feel i have a very good understanding of what i call the obama phenomenon, having immersed myself in both lincoln and douglass and during his campaign. obama has been deeply influenced and inspired by both men which i will talk a little at the end. it is often said that beinart refers we feel as much about them souses their subjects and in my case i plead guilty. i grew up in iowa, nebraska and north dakota and small towns and one of the sensual experiences of my upbringing was moving. i was in nine different schools and there was a time between fifth and tenth grade in which i was in a different school every year and one of the things that

i latched onto in the midst of all these moves was that i fell in love with american literature and history particularly the civil war era. i first read a abraham lincoln and frederick douglass when i was about 14 and they both in different ways spoke to me profoundly and inspired me. i wanted to be like frederick douglass and at certain respects even though i really didn't understand the concept of race in a way that i didn't really understand, i loved the way that they wrote and love to have the figures of speech. that experience having immersed myself in these two men in the literature around it was one of the reasons that have brought me and eventually a tomb in graduate school and my first book that came out of my dissertation focused on, it was called "the black hearts of men", focused on two black into white abolitionists who i argue bonnet -- forged alliance

unprecedented in the civil war era when not be repeated until the civil war rights era. and during that time researching the book i realized that frederick douglass met abraham lincoln three times in the white house, the first african-american to mean a u.s. president on terms of near a quality, the first black to be advised by u.s. president and there is a story that i found a moving dramatic in a story that i wanted to tell. i also both in my first book in even now am very interested in the concept of interracial friendship. for me interracial friendship is the symbolism of democracy, a symbol of democracy because of french champagne throughout most of western culture is to find among other things in terms of near equality so it is a symbol of what is possible in american history. and giants first permutation of

it was that i envisioned as one chapter of as much larger book that i'm still working on interracial friendships in american culture and that story first not published in time magazine when lincoln was featured on the cover in 2005. and i came to realize that the figures, the characters of the douglass and lincoln live so large that it threatens to overwhelm all the other stores i wanted to tell in that book so i thought it was best to tell their story as a separate story which i did and that is really how the book came into being. as i said, i have been researching both douglass and lincoln for a long time and began writing soon after obama launched his political campaign. the book traces on i found in a very surprising way, they're parallel lives that ultimately

converged, the unifying theme is that federick douglass and abraham lincoln are the two preeminent self-made men in american history. most know that abraham lincoln and grew up with very little in a log cabin, to say it was a log cabin was to romanticize, it was actually a three sided hut and one side was open peridot he had less than a year of formal schooling and becomes in my view the greatest president in the united states. and frederick douglass is born a slave, prohibited from reading and writing, and becomes the premature -- preeminent order of his day. is a far better known than lincoln was. lincoln does not become a nationally known figure until 1860, frederick douglass had become famous overnight with the publication of his first autobiography which was published in part because he is such an orator and the people don't believe he had ever been a

slave. and both douglass and lincoln and rows of four and number of reasons but more than anything else there rise stemmed from their ability to use words as weapons in words and language and literacy as a way to define and redefine and reshape themselves. and both her chilean marist, read deeply insane authors before they ever matched -- anyone want to guess what those texts are. the bible is probably the most important. what else? columbian orator -- very good. it is a collection in elocution manual of speeches from the classical era to the 19th century designed for young boys in particular did become toward tourists. this was an age in which public speaking was one of the only forms of entertainment, it was analogous today of being a professional athlete a rock star, a movie star no matter

where you started in line with if you can reach the masses and convert them and speak to them and move them, you can rise to heights that were virtually unimaginable from where you started in. what was another book? shakespeare, the most popular writer of his day, this is a great audience. there are others. aesop's fables, very good. do you know what it was? how to define it? there are morals, technically aesop's fables can be seen as one of the earliest slave narratives. essentially they are oral stories of slaves from classical greece that remain popular today but that is the origin of their tails. aesop's fables. what else? lord byron, after shakespeare the second most popular war and

terror of his day. so these two men essentially the rise in the sixth is robert burns poetry. lincoln in particular loved burns dialect, he identified with burns as a farmer. lincoln had this horrible illinois backwoods accent. in fact, when lincoln was a young boy he would have pronounced his name in his neighbors would have pronounced his name linked cornyn, we are was emphasized. its sound and. in fact, when they were both young boys learning from the columbian orator how to be effective public speakers, one of the things that the editor of the columbian orator said then that it was important to speak in sound like a democratic gentleman, not an ignorant hic. and he taught using examples going all boy back to classical antiquity how to practice a position in your tongue so that

you could lose your accent's. i convey a sense of what the young frederick douglass and what the young lincoln actually sounded like and it wasn't particularly pretty when they were young men appear go and how they overtime for able to lose much of their accent although lincoln even in the white house retain this something of the illinois twine much to the shock of harvard and yale educated in easterners'. so one crucial parallel is this rise through literacy. there are others. ironically at the very moment in with both men are aspiring to be intellectuals and falling in love with literature, a crucial turning point in their young lives was a fight -- a pretty brutal fight with an opponent. for those of you who have read a frederick douglass his flight was with a slave operator named edward cody -- this man who is

famous on the eastern shore of maryland for breaking the will of slaves who were seen to be insolent and douglass who was brought back to the eastern shore now litter it was considered insolent because he loved his master in the eye and had the audacity to speak back to him so his master rented him out to cody who tried to break douglass' whale, with him mercilessly every week for six months and he finally stood up and said i am willing to die but i'm going to stand up to him. they had a two hour epic, douglass had the discipline not to kill or seriously hurt company. douglass was six ft. one in an age when the average man was five ft. seven so he towered over him and he whipped him. as he said, he was mastered by a boy of 16. kildee never touch to douglass again and from that moment for an ipo is to find himself, he said from this moment for and

i'll define myself as a free man in form, even if i remain a slave, in fact,. and from that moment he scheme to escape which he eventually did at age 20. as he himself signed, it was the most import our most significant turning point in his young life. on lincoln had a similar fight with an opponent. i think that most historians have romanticized the illinois prairie. it was a brutal and vicious environment in which the defining notion of manhood was the capacity to drink a lot of fight viciously. and when lincoln moves to new salem, illinois, a back was frontier town the local leader was taught by the name of jack armstrong. lincoln was so big and tall he was seen as grotesque, he was six ft. four in an armstrong was threatened by him and wanted to fight lincoln in what was known in the day as a rough-and-tumble which is a kind of no-holds-barred fight in which

was not uncommon to lose a figure, to having no spin-off, to have an ear bitten off, to have testicle's ripped out and for some fighters one of the great prize was to liberate your opponents eyeball and use it as a trophy. armstrong wanted to have a rough-and-tumble and lincoln said i'd want to go there. i will wrestle you in a regulated out which is a little more tamed. they had an epic fight, people came from miles around which was common, evidently armstrong about lincoln, they called a draw and lost money. immediately after the fight lincoln becomes known as a leader in his community. he be friends jack armstrong and within the year lincoln is elected in the captain and his company during the black hawk war and soon there after it begins his term as a politician in the illinois state

legislature. another parallel in their last before they meant was that the women in their lives are absolutely central to their self making i argue. both married, frederick douglass married a free and woman who worked as a domestic and mary. in was because of her money that douglass was able to purchase a train ticket to pass himself off as a free sailor to acquire the equivalent of a passport so he could take a train north two new york city a few days after he reached their and he married anne marie. without hurt his chances of becoming free would have been virtually nil i argued. for a lincoln, mary todd was an aristocratic kentuckians. he to marry up. she was at least as savvy about politics as lincoln was. she was born as to the estate of henry clay who was lincoln's hero as a statesman, and a first

are debating or courting a round of the whig presidential election of 1840. that is how they came together. she advised lincoln in every step of the way until he reached the white house and i would argue that had not been for mary tied the chances of lincoln becoming president would have been a pretty slam. both lincoln and douglass and in assessing their self making the nine that they had control over it. in fact, they both quoted shakespeare's hamlet to an account for their self -- inning by saying there is a divinity that shapes what may be, that they had no control over how far they would rise. douglass a first discusses or mentions abraham lincoln in 1847. douglass after he becomes free worse for a few years as a manual laborer, is already

considered a brilliant or a tariff. douglass has a deep rich baritone and voice and is considered handsome, beautiful, what one admire called majestic in his wrath, and when he moved to new bedford and he joins as abolition societies. in his first vacation he goes to nantucket for this large abolition convention, space in front of the largest crowd of whites he has ever spoken to before and essentially is discovered by william lloyd garrison who hires him on the spot to become a paid a lecturer for the american antislavery society, traveling all over the north in the midwest converting audiences to the cause of abolition. douglass eventually moved to rochester, new york concerns his own newspaper. he was the 19th century longest running black newspaper man in the country and he first mentions lincoln in his

newspaper in 1847 and that appears as kind of a rose gallery of those congressmen, lincoln was a freshman congressman and house from illinois, lincoln appears on the list of other proslavery southerners who oppose a bill to abolish slavery in the district of columbia. in the douglass mentions lincoln's name along with people like alexander stephens, the future vice president of the confederacy. why would lincoln have opposed a bill to abolish slavery in washington d.c. in 1847? lincoln hated slavery, he said that he hated slavery as much as any abolitionist and there's no reason to suggest that he fell differently, but the crucial distinction between an douglass and lincoln and their vision of slavery is that lincoln's mission for ending slavery was immensely gradual and congenial and conservative.

in lincoln's view emancipation and should be very gradual, very congenial over a long time. in 1858 in his debate with stephen douglas lincoln said his vision for the end of slavery would not occur unless the 100 years, that mark emancipation in 1958. he also advocated for compensation to slaveholders with a loss of their property. and lincoln called for subsidies to encourage pollonization of blacks, to go to africa or central or south america because he had a hard time envisioning blacks living in the u.s. as equal citizens. from douglass' perspective this was outrageous. douglass' primary aim in life was the immediate end of slavery and racial equality under the law and so he saw lincoln as essentially an enemy. although they would become

friends, they were probably furthest apart in 1861 in the immediate wake of the lincoln's first inaugural. why? in lincoln's first inaugural, he does two things that particularly outraged frederick douglass. one, he vigorously defends the fugitive slave law which was a law that virtually the did amidst the kidnapping of northern blacks, and secondly and more onerous from the perspective of frederick douglass, when lincoln gave his inaugural in 1861 congress in an attempt to conciliate the southern states that had seceded and passed the first 13th amendment. most are familiar with it as a minute that abolishing slavery -- congress's first 13th amendment was an interminable amendment that a guaranteed slavery in the states forever part of an lincoln in his

inaugural address as i have no problem with this and amendable amendment. his inaugural address was meant to conciliate with the south, he gave his address with seven states having already seceded, the confederacy having already been formed and he is hoping to keep the upper southern states in the union. douglass was so fed up at that point that he planned to leave the united states, he concluded that there was no way that the nation could never fulfill its ideals of liberty and equality and he planned to go to haiti to scouted out as a possible destination to live a as a free black republican encourage other blacks to go there as well. what prevented him from going there was of the war broke out and douglass recognized that with civil war and the fire on fort sumter it was a golden opportunity for slavery to end immediately. from the outbreak of the war lincoln hirsch -- douglass

hirsch lincoln and the republican administration to end slavery immediately and army's 4 million blacks, in theory bring them to the union cause and it would lead to a swift end of the war and a victory for the union. douglass, a mantra for douglass during the first. a half of the war is matt slaves are of the summit of the rebellion, the slaves in the south are feeding the confederacy, they are doing the dirty work for the confederacy, building the fortifications. what we need to do is to end slavery, emancipate the slaves, bring them to the north, put them on our side and will have a quick end to the war. lincoln eventually comes iran to understand that in order for him to achieve his chief aim as president which and i pulled in the constitution is to preserve the union and when the war lincoln realizes that he needs blacks on his side.

he needs blacks in order for him to win the war and douglass realizes that in order for him to achieve his chief aim at ending slavery he needs the president on his side in. their ultimate conversions rests in part on in the convergence of these two separate ideals. lincoln realizes he needs douglass on his side to win the war in the douglass realizes that he needs lincoln on his side to end slavery and that effectively means to their first meeting in the white house in august 1863. emancipation proclamation had r&d been passed, black troops are already been recruited in the north to help fight, the rebels, frederick douglass had done it richly more than any other individual to recruit black soldiers and yet blacks were receiving half the pay of whites and were not being promoted. so douglass decides he is fed up

with recruiting. he goes to washington dc and please and wants to make his case with lincoln. he doesn't have an appointment. now he arrives in washington d.c. on august 10th of 1863 coming gets there in the morning. he goes to the white house and there is already a long line of whites waiting to see lincoln. lincoln was known as having an open door policy. douglass thinks he is going to have to wait all day, maybe two days before he can see the president. e. sends up his car and and within two minutes lincoln calls douglass up to see him so douglass passes all these wives who are waiting in line many of whom are outraged that he is going pass them to see the president and in this first meeting when lincoln first sees douglass he says, hello, mr. douglas, i know you, how are you? it is good to see you. what can i do for you? they have an hour-long meeting. despite the fact that douglass

and lincoln understand and they don't agree on basic political issues and understand and that their ultimate goals depend upon each other and they also feel genuinely comfortable around each other. douglass leaves that meeting with lincoln saying that there are few white men he had met who treated him as a man as lincoln did a rather than as a black man and douglass was something he was used to hanging around radical white abolitionists. a part of the reason i argue that they felt comfortable around each other is that has such great respect for each other's self-made men. in fact, the very next person that lincoln saw that they he said, i've just had a meeting with frederick douglass who might consider to be one of the most meritorious if not the most meritorious man in these united states. and douglass left that meeting with lincoln referring to lincoln as the king of self-made

men. there is another reason why i feel that they felt comfortable around each other and even after that first meeting despite basic political disagreements douglass is a radical and revolutionary, lincoln nothing more than a moderate or centrist, and that is that both men in essence understood that their concept, their self definition as those who continually remade themselves contradicted the very notion of racism. racism depends on the idea of its south, its fixed and unchanging. it assumes that a wide self or a self zero whiteness or wineskin and that is always in permanently superior two blacks sell or blacks can. end douglass and lincoln saw themselves as people who continually evolve appearing, in fact, if you look at their

lives, 30, 35, 40 and so on, every five years they were completely different man. with is how rapidly they changed so there whole conception of self making which constituted a new conception of self plena contradictive and the idea of race. their next meeting was a year later and in this meeting douglass was even more struck with what he considered to be lincoln's hatred of slavery -- this was an honest and 1864. lincoln called douglass to the white house for an urgent meeting. it's the first time the u.s. president requests the immediate presence of a black man to seek advice. why does lincoln want douglass -- why does he want to speak with them and what is you want him to advise him? because lincoln wilshire he was going to lose re-election, that war was going publicly, public

opinion essentially in the number one and an end to the war and lincoln to ensure that the democrats would win the election in 1864 and the basic democratic platform was a platform of an immediate end to the war, negotiated settlement, slavery remaining intact. lincoln wants douglass to engage in what he said and referred to as the john brown scheme in which he would collect some hand-picked men and made the south and bring back as many slaves to northern lines as possible. best case scenario, these blacks the new burlington northern pines former insurance and that helped bring about major military victory and a turn the tide of public opinion so that he is reelected. worse case scenario the lincoln loses the election but thousands more blacks are brought into freedom. now, frederick douglass when someone who had been a close

friend of john brown. he was a revolutionary, douglass was on a post to conspiring against the u.s. if he felt it could lead to an immediate end to slavery and now lincoln is urging hammer, requesting him to embark upon a john brown's team after the second meeting. he said that he never understood how much lincoln hated slavery at that moment. another example how an event as lincoln and send controlled them, events transform themselves and held them to transform themselves and their nation. lincoln was not a revolutionary but finds himself presiding over a cultural and social revolution in douglass is a revolutionary and is thrilled with the solution that will lead to the idea of universal freedom for everyone. their third meeting is that the

second inaugural in which douglass has the equivalent of a front-row seat to. he listens to the lincoln's inaugural, the war is essentially over in the lincoln is referring -- he thinks that perhaps god is wreaking his vengeance on a country in retribution for the thousands or hundreds of years of slavery as retribution for the sin of slavery. douglass is invited to the white house for the reception after this extraordinary, brilliant side and inaugural address. he is turned away at the door by two policemen who said blacks are not allowed to enter. he sends his cardin and lincoln sees them and the elegant east room and says mr. douglas, my friend, it's good to see a. i saw you in the crowd today, what did you think of my address? end douglass response, mr. lincoln, that was a sacred

efforts. that was essentially a sermon. there were instances in which lincoln had invited frederick douglass to come with him to have tea at the soldiers,. douglass cut because he already had a speaking engagement. lincoln guys about a month later. had he not died i think their friendship based primarily on militana lane reasons but also stemming from their mutual respect when have flourished in the post in wartime. and so is a story that i think was immensely inspirational. both were inspired by a traveler. is a store that i think has inherent drama in its and it is a story that highlights the degree to which to men can converge and become friends in essence heaney tother four years

earlier, for giving to other for a difference of opinion and understand and that political beliefs to not necessarily correlate into interpersonal behavior. that douglass and lincoln never agreed on everything politically and yet they could come together as friends and people have great respect for each other, who saw them as an equal. i think it is a wonderful inspiration on example of interracial friendships. what is the legacy of them? i think there are numerous legacies lme focus on the legacy as relates to obama. i said at the beginning that obama has been deeply influenced by douglass and lincoln. let me focus a little on frederick douglass because obama has not mentioned or not dwell upon his influence on frederick douglass. y? i think there are two reasons why obama has not emphasized the influence of douglass -- one is especially during the campaign

he knows that if he did opponents are going to quickly say frederick douglass, a revolutionary, obama associating with another terrorist and he doesn't want that. the second reason is that obama threw out his campaign has defined himself in essence in post racial terms. he has defined himself as someone who seeks to move beyond the visions of a race and see for a common understanding between blacks and whites. his speech on race in philadelphia which i consider to be one of the great political speeches of our error is a speech that begins as a speech on race ultimately is on class, about how blacks and whites naturally have a common can an alliance with each other. it is a dazzling speech. frederick douglass comes down today in memory as the

representative african-american para and obama doesn't want to identify with someone who is seen as a kind of emblem that a black figure. what is ironic about this is that douglas himself very much resembled or foreshadowed barack obama -- douglass himself understood that poor whites and poor blacks had a, alliance. there are natural allies. douglass mike obama is a town of a white parent in a black parent. douglass like obama throughout his career sought to move beyond the divide of race and reaching for a common understanding. which is one of the reasons why obama has been influenced by him. another reason is that i think frederick douglass was one of the most brilliant warrantors and performers of his era ended douglass understand the power of art in breaking down racial barriers. that is a phrase that he

essentially used but also said in another context the spotlight can raise the barriers of race, that as an orator when he came on stage and spoke to white audiences he was so eloquent, he was so polished, he was so charismatic that even whites who are otherwise profoundly racist with c. frederick douglass speak in the would be converted, they would say this guy is so good and i can help but agree with tim. and douglass placed great emphasis on this power of art anesthetics as an orator and a politician and performer. i would say obama has done the same thing. obama is one of the great orators and performers of our era one. he is nothing if not immensely discipline like frederick douglass is, his campaign was virtually flawless in my view and the best way to understand

his campaign is the kind of artistic performance and i say that in the best sense. there are numerous examples during the campaign speaking to whites who before they had heard and seen all, i don't think i would vote for a black man and suddenly they see and hear of, and are converted. they shed their racism. obama understands the power of our to breaking barriers. a third factor of the influence of douglas on all, is something that he actually says explicitly and that is from frederick douglass, i learned the power concedes nothing without a fight for both douglas and obama fighting power is using words as weapons. douglass also had to use fists as weapons because the group and marburger community but his chief way of fighting power is with words. from lincoln, obama has

mentioned on numerous occasions he understands the importance of being pragmatic as a politician and president-elect, as reaching beyond various divisions for a common understanding, of listening to voices across the spectrum of political and ideological spokespeople. obama also understands i think from lincoln and the importance of engaging public opinion's. lincoln had a savvy i think, a brilliant understanding of public opinion, and lincoln understood that the relationship between a political leader and the public was a bit of a dialectic, and that one must not only internalize what the public is asking for a and calling for but to inspire the public to push them to reach toward its ideals and i think he also

understands that delicate dialectical balance between both internalization and then inspiring the public two go further rather than say stranglehold and the public. douglass and lincoln i think also highlight in their lives and their self making the degree in and i think this is something obama also recognizes that in remaking themselves they are flawed man. i think that one of the advantages of writing a dual biography allowed me to move the lens to change perspectives so that i can achieve or obtain a richer rounder more complex portrait of each man and knowledge that they made mistakes, that both men were fought and i think to many writers see lincoln as essentially perfect.

especially the president and that becomes lineman but a man. as humans we may mistakes and i feel as though we appreciate douglass and lincoln all the more for and knowledge in their mistakes and flaws and seeing how they were able to rise above them and move beyond them. i think ultimately douglass and lincoln come to us in terms of their legacy as great sources of inspiration. i started this talk by saying i was inspired by both douglass and lincoln and i was a 14 year-old and reading them and wanted to identify with people that i read i think there remain a great source as an inspiration for us as a nation peridot they inspire us to work to bind up the nation's wounds to seek to fulfill the ideals of freedom and equality of opportunity for

all americans in which they themselves ought to do. thank you. [applause] >> and thank you for your contribution to his dog every in terms of looking at lincoln and douglass. one impacted benjamin qualls book on the douglass have on your project and on election night sea and and it basically beamed at william to the studio to a hologram, but if frederick douglass could be beamed through a hologram to the cnn studios on election night what you think this tape would be on obama? >> great question. benjamin coral's was probably the single most important source remain. in reading lincoln and obama.

he is one of the great scholars of the 20th-century african-americans riding on now. some american history and immensely sympathetic. he is on for showing dead. i would have loved to have met him and never dead but he wrote a book on lincoln and the negro, he wrote a biography of frederick douglass in 1946 when it was first published which two this day remains one of the greatest books on frederick douglass. chorals was not only a rigorous researcher and scholar and as i said an immensely compassionate nomothetic scholar and he i feel avoided the tendency to romanticize or mythologize lincoln especially. one of the things that i hope that "giants" does is elevate and show people the significance

of frederick douglass. i think too many people in the united states today still cannot know frederick douglass that well. and i think that's a shame. they need to. that is the answer to that first part of your question. the answer to the second part of the question, and that douglass could be beamed down when he sank to barack obama, the whole historic moment -- you say, praise the lord. [laughter] douglass, the other common interests, another common denominator between douglass and lincoln and barack obama is an immense sense of hopefulness. douglass while he still is a slave in baltimore, he is reading his column in orator, he joins this debating club among free blacks in baltimore, the only slam allowed to shine and

is allowed to join because he is such a good orator and he is in this debate club called the baltimore mental improvement association. [laughter] after one debate in which he is victorious against his opponents, he vows in front of on his friends that he's never going to stop growing until he is a u.s. senator. and he is a slam at the time. the sense of hope, the sense of possible is what is extraordinary. another example of a douglass' hope is that the second autobiography, also a best-selling autobiography published 1955, it is a year in which slavery is spreading among the kansas nebraska act has opened a the northern territories to slavery, the nation has and i believe been transformed into a slave republic, and douglass last sentence of that book frederick douglass is saying it is the faith of my soul that this anti

slavery congress must soon triumph. that is an extraordinary sense of hopefulness so i think he would say god be praised, god bless us, he wouldn't be as surprised as i think many of us are because he would see the potential and i think douglass and also say the brilliant artist obama was sincerely along this person can become president. other questions? >> i recently got to see james oakes speak about his book, the radical and republican, so how does that work? you call him and say, don't talk about this because in chapter three i'm going to talk about it that very same thing so you guys communicate? >> we have communicated. in fact, i'm going to see him in january. he wrote a book called the rep.

at the radical and republican and came out when i was halfway through writing my book. i immediately called my publisher and send it should i just scrap the project. i felt in he'd felt i shouldn't because our basic approaches were different -- oaks project was a really to look at the political history and that beginning in the late 1850's in the civil war era and to trace out and use speed, as markers for radical views of american politics and republican use of american politics i think is a good buck but hopes nash with was not the so many of these two individuals and that was my pre unconcerned. i am fascinated and continue to be fascinated with the concept of self making and as i said i believe that these of the two pre-eminence self-made men and i wanted to understand how they

were able to make in a remake themselves, the dilemmas they faced, how that related to their ultimate conversions. so our products while there are some overlaps, i think they complement each other and we both admitted this in e-mail to each other. >> i am puzzled by one aspect of the relationship between the two men in that dave erred herbert donald mentioned in in his biography of lincoln and that douglass supported john fremont as independent candidate for the presidency in august and september 64 and so my question is, if lincoln is moving toward a douglass' position on forming blocs, pushing the 13th amendment, why doesn't douglass

support lincoln as president before fremont drops out? can i great question. douglass when fremont runs as a more radical candidate in 1864 frederick douglass light fremont a locked because in the beginning of the war fremont issues of first emancipation proclamation in august 1861, lincoln rebel said and done was initially as the champion of fremont because fremont is his political views better than lincoln us. after douglass' meeting with lincoln he is profoundly moved to the degree to which lincoln headed slightly more than douglass imagine, for the next few weeks douglass continues to support fremont and doesn't try to hide it from lincoln. i think is a characteristic of their friendship. he did that with is very close

friend, derrick smith coming 1850's, a radical political abolition candidates for president in 1856. douglass was a close friend of carrots in a sense that i'm going to vote for fremont because he seems more pragmatic, no offense, and the nature of their friendship with such in which there its mouth set i completely understand. that lasted after douglass' meeting with lincoln only a couple weeks because as soon as sherman concord atlanta fremont backed off and douglass actively embraced lincoln. in fact, one of two campaign for lincoln in 1864 but the republican politico's said no because they felt of a black man campaigning for lincoln one for a republican in would just further insight into a racist sentiment and that election was a profoundly racist election. an election in which the term

miscegenation first enters the language because democrats are saying that republicans platform is really the desire for every white women to be married to a black man. there is a vreeland amount of racism and republicans to not want them feeling that further. there was an overlap really of only about a week for two weeks there. >> thanks very much. >> thank you for your. lecture and talk. which i think really it captured some of the energy that exists in this setting now since november 4th and a sense of hope since the obama election so i appreciate that very much. i am struck by the relationship between it lincoln and douglass

and i want to ask you in terms of obama, obama the pragmatist, obama with a sense of vision, obama with a sense of moral imperative -- there is a constant tension in that when you are an office holder particularly of president so i'm not asking you to name but talk about the quality is that obama needs to reach out to to have his set of douglass'. >> it's a great question. [laughter] it is a great question. i think that the central strand of that point about being able to keep in this healthy tension, both a sense of moral imperative and a pragmatic willingness to compromise and to understand that those two aren't always intention and should always be

intention and should be dependent upon specific contacts is absolutely crucial and i think obama so far has revealed the so consciousness about maintaining that healthy tension. nettie explicitly -- two essentially summarize what he says in on bassanese potopourri wow and the question is will he be able to maintain that and how will he be able to maintain that. i can speak in broad and vague ways. i think one of the ways in reached in based i perceive him in seeking to maintain that held the attention now is drawing on some real insiders, some well-known democratic mainstream figures who are very different from all, when he was on his campaign, was an allied air in a

dark horse. was his grass-roots campaign for the first year or so. most democratic pundits were saying he doesn't have a chance and so part of this maintaining this tension is being able to retain a kind of healthy balance between the grass roots people that he brought to his side and who offered him wise advisor in the campaign but also heating and listening to some people who were in a sense his enemies during the campaign. the other thing that i would say about that is obama you still understand the difference between asking for advice and heeding the advice of someone who is more experienced. i think that lincoln, for example mistakenly heeded the

advice of a william seward in revising his first inaugural address, and address that lincoln wrote sen and i love the constitution the way this. and steward was the one the senate you need to conciliate for more than your original address and i know say this in the book but i imagine sp one when he actually delivered the inaugural address having to buy his tongue when he said i don't have a problem with this proposal to the 13th amendment -- he had huge problems but he heeded the advice of william seward. i think obama needs to understand it is one thing to solicit -- solicit advice across the broad spectrum and another thing to weigh that as opposed to the advice very carefully. in a way that maintains that tension and in a way that is very sensitive. >> thank you, i'm glad these talks are recorded.

[laughter] >> i don't know if i am. >> first an unsolicited plug, those in the audience who have not been two douglass' house must go there. it repeals the incredible genius and is a real eye opener, and even when fermi with stated thank you. >> make a pilgrimage there. >> also is a question on a self-made men, people in the 19th century. at the walter reed medical history museum, another place worth going to come and they have some civil war letters of soldiers with a fifth grade education who are writing incredibly beautiful prose, we're having now high-school graduate can write a semi coherent paragraph. [laughter] was a traditional are common to

be self-made? >> great question. lincoln and douglass came of age during the heyday of self-made man, the very term was invented by henry clay in 1832. end douglass and lincoln it knowledge and make the point of saying they were lucky in many respects. douglass was lucky to have born in maryland rather than alabama, for example. had he been born in mississippi no way he would have made it. lincoln almost falls off a horse, both were lucky to be born when they were. both because they were born in an age when self-made man was a reality, it was not an all uncommon for men to be born poor and to rise up to peer respectable stations. most men did not start as low as

they did and i also were born early enough so that they were older when the civil war broke out. if you wear a man born in 1835 or 1840 your chances of living and living as having a whole body 1865 was pretty slim actually. there are born in the periods in which a self-made man was a reality in their old enough that they avoided the apocalypse which is frankly what most americans referred to as the war. after the civil war was a time in which ironically the concept of self-made men becomes far more widely circulated. is ironic because that is a time in which self-made men becomes large and largely a myth. why is that? it is because of the rise of big business, the rise of what the scholar allen trachtenberg has referred to as the incorporation of america, far greater

inequalities of wealth, the first killed in age is very similar to the gilded age that we have just lived through that is apparently ended. it has been much more difficult for someone born with virtually nothing to rise up when the inequalities in as great. said they were lucky to have been born when they were and to have those opportunities to rise up. the other thing that i would say and it is your point about civil war soldiers and letters -- if you read the common soldiers letters of the civil war, world war i, world war ii, vietnam, and iraq, the trend line is a pretty steep decline in terms of not only eloquence and elegance as writers but basic literacy. i think there are a number of reasons for this -- even if you only have three or four books, the three or four books you

catch your eye teeth on on the bible in shakespeare and lord byron, you can't help but be great writers or good writers because to read and appreciate and securities into those texts is to be awakened to the beatty, the power of language. i think that if television were banned, for example, that would transform literacy rates in. [laughter] i mean, reading and writing are crass. they are active and -- it is an active engagement. it is a skill, it is a craft that one acquires through constant repetition and it is something that is a craft almost an art that is no longer values in our culture today in the way that it was in lincoln and

douglas as day. lincoln and douglass u.s. seven year-old boy is even though douglass was this lady understood it that if i can be a good orator i can't even imagine how far i can tell which is why during the debate he said as a slave i'm not going to stop growing until i reached u.s. senator. that is extraordinary in terms of a the power of remaking themselves to more than anything else language and literacy. >> you are a cool dude. [laughter] >> i have a very brief question of. i'm always very curious about the impact that particularly child experience is in the physical sense informative and transformative and many personalities and characters and of thinking as talking about these two people that they lived

in that age you were talking about the self-made man but more particularly violence, rough-and-tumble -- i think of theodore roosevelt's and his need to overcome his town of physical infirmities and so forth. i wonder when you're looking at these two characters and comparing to our contemporary politicians obama in particular, there's a big contrast to seems to me. people coming from that era lived in a very rough physical world. i can say in the case of obama who did not grow up in the ghetto and i don't mean that us something qualifier, i don't have the sense that he was exposed to that kind of sense of physical danger early in life and maybe i'm wrong. >> sunland compared to douglass and lincoln. >> and i wonder how you see this in terms of drawing personalities of douglass and lincoln together maybe as forming part of their bonding experience and compared to obama

and mccain who was in vietnam war veteran -- what you see that role playing in their relationship? >> in the book as in just that part of the way in which both douglass and lincoln are lucky was they happen to have a good genes in the sense that they both grew to a very tall big men in which a culture of physicality and even violence was important, that had douglass and lincoln been a 5-foot two or five ft. three the chances of them ever becoming with a war would have been virtually nil because their size, their physical strength coupled with their intellectual and verbal strength and help them to imagine themselves as the cheerleaders and self-made men even when they were essentially slavish and with most people referred to lincoln as poor white trash. that was absolutely crucial. for someone like mccain, very

much uc even in his actions although he has been permanently injured and has limited mobility of his shoulders, the way he moves his body is someone who is used to a culture of farmer physicality than someone like obama in the sense of almost like a dancer and not contact kind of art form and mccain moves like a football player. i think it manifest itself differently particularly the medium of television for or tears in public speakers and politicians is not as sympathetic to that more physical culture or as for lincoln's, karen stephen douglas , the little giant. john quincy adams referred to stephen douglas, he was little

but one of the reasons for his comparative success is that the journalists everywhere compare him to a pugilist when he goes to speak. .. [applause]

>> john satuffer is the chair of history of the university. he is the author of several books including the black parts of men which was the cowinner of the 2002 frederick douglass prize and runner-up for the lincoln price. for more information, visit johnstuafferbooks.org. >> in your book you argue modern conservatism was founded in the south. why? >> well, the reason i make that claim is i think often people talk about a southern strategy and capture of the south by the gop after the 1960's beginning with goldwater and then in mix since '72 election but i think in some ways the situation is the reverse that southerners played a key role in development of both, first in the conservative capture of the republican party itself, and then republican ascendance nationally.

i think in certain ways a combination of southern segregationist politics and northern economic conservatism were blended over time by various political actors in a way that allowed a national language of kind of racial resemblance and a position to federal-state power and the democratic party generally. >> to questions arise from that answer. number one, how did they blend and we did did this begin? >> i think it begins decisively in the 1940's. in the 1930's in congress there's a conservative coalition that comes together after 1936 to resist some of fdr's political imperatives. but really it's after world war ii when during the truman administration he begins to push for federal employment commission and the desegregation of the military which would have southern political needs. suddenly declared independence from the national democratic

party and first running a dixiecrat, dixiecrat revolt and 98 the strategy was to try to get electoral college votes in the south to throw the national election in to the house of representatives which didn't quite work but began a process of separating southern democrats from national democrats generally and the growing racial liberalism of the democratic national party and i think than what happened is conservatives in the north frustrated with eisenhower, frustrated with what they saw as the me tooism began to look southward for allies and kind of a coalition to rebuild the conservative party and pushback against the new deal. so, the "national review" magazine for instance begins inviting segregationist writers and journalists and others to do editorials and articles for the

conservative republican strategists began to try to build a republican party which had notay been a viable party. certainly not after reconstruction so both the level of intellectual discoupq÷ and party strategy begins in the 50's northerners begin to look southward. >> the interests were economic? >> economic and racial i think. partly it is southern segregationists who saw eletes salles they were going to remain regional as long as they could find allies outside the region as long as they were quite loyal to the new deal they needed to abandon their to the critical to the politics the would resist the racial liberalism and national party. so it's part of that part lubber also didn't have a stake prior to the fifties began to see how

racial politics would animate northern audiences and began to peel off segments of the white working-class and others from a kind of hegemonic democratic party. so it's kind of both i think. >> who are some of the leaders of this movement? >> i trees in the 1940's to certain dixiecrat leaders. charles polis collins in particular -- >> who is he? >> the intellectual group of the dixiecrat revolt, who is a supremacist segregation leader but one who seeks to convince strom thurmond, john graves and other southern eletes that they really have to articulate a conservative anti-government politics, business conservatism as well as a kind of racial anti-government politics. so he's one of the leaders. in the 19 -- 1950s and 60's, buckley, william f. buckley, who it's not often remember that he

really makes dramatic efforts to bring southerners and to the conservative coalition. he tends an editorial in 57 arguing that the denial of the vote to black citizens in the south is perfectly justifiable because these people have not reached a level of civilization that would allow them to participate democratically. so bulkeley is a mother figure. goldwater clearly is someone when he runs in 64 outside his own state of arizona only wins a handful of deep south states, no where else in the nation is he a strong figure. >> and why did he win those states? >> and non-1964e election of the major issues was the civil, the great civil rights bill that johnson had proposed and goldwater's opposition to the civil rights bill was one of the things that was used by the southern supporters over and over to try to get his -- to get

votes for himself really it was civil rights in the south for him articulate as a strong constitutionalism and states' rights and individualist kind of ideology. >> joseph lowndes, what is the southern strategy? how would you define that? >> when people refer to the southern strategy they begin with either goldwater or nixon, and the idea is number republicans hope to win over southern voters and win southern states and national elections by pushing the race issue, by articulating kind of either coated or open language for nixon's antidustin, for goldwater its opposition to the civil rights bill. so that's what people refer to when they talk about the southern strategy. but again, what is missed in that is the agency and activity of southerners themselves who

help is on the table and provide a language of racial politics that will play not just in the south but in, you know, gary, indiana and the troy, michigan, and in baltimore, maryland and philadelphia, pennsylvania where issues of open housing, open unions, other anti-discrimination measures and things that are focused directly on race potentially can reap a broad white audience. >> so how do you get from the new deal to the new light today? >> to the new deal to the new right today? am i began by -- the store i tell is looking at elements in and outside of the new deal. southern democrats and northern republicans, conservative republicans and western republicans who began to bring their political perspectives together in opposition to the new deal and to finally place

where by 1980 ronald reagan wins decisively and body for even more so. in the beginning of a national realignment, national regime change, which is what we are i think at the end of now. >> well, ronald reagan kicked off his 1980 campaign i believe in mississippi. why was that significant? >> welcome it wasn't just the mississippi, it was in missile county mississippi, where for this line of the three civil rights workers, james, chaney, andrew goodman and michael donner had been slammed by klansmen and 1963. so, this was a place that plus steeped in racial history, steeped in meeting for mississippians. it was trent lott who brought him to give a speech there and reagan says in that speech like you, i believe in states' rights, which is any number of things but clearly a certain message was carried forth. >> what is the state in your

view of today's new light or conservative movement? >> i think we are at the twilight of the reagan revolution and in fact many of the soldiers of the revolution say the same. pat buchanan, new gingrich and others. i think what happens in american political history is that certain ideas dominate and certain political imperatives shape the landscape and then over time they start to weigh in as new political questions arise and circumstances are royce and new players come onto the scene to try to change political identities. and i think now in some ways like democratic liberalism in the 1970's the republican right has kind of run out of gas or is an era of splintering and major internal fights over the future direction of the party. i mean, it was interesting to see in the primaries, the

republican primaries you have a whole range of candidates, neither of whom could credibly claim conservative credentials and yet all of them invoking reagan over and over. >> and what does that mean for the south? >> you know, the south is very much in play in a way that it has not been in a generation. in this last national presidential election you saw it in north carolina and south carolina, georgia, mississippi, across the south i think black voters are playing a more sensitive role and a half. previously latino voters are playing a decisive role in fighting white voters themselves are much more fragmented and part has to do with changing political identity and part has to do with strong enforcement on the voting rights act in the south more so recently which has opened at a lot of territory to exciting change. >> now this is your first book. what is your day job? >> my day job as a political science professor university of oregon.

>> what are you teaching? >> american politics. right now i'm teaching a course of comparative conservatism, with my great colleague and i teach a course right now on racial politics from the mid-20s to center to the present. >> when it comes to comparative politics between the u.s. and europe and conservatives, what's the difference? >> one difference is that america was founded on kind of liberal ideas, classic liberal ideas in a way that european states don't have. and so here if you look at the origins of american conservatism you see strains of hamilton, hamilton's ideas about the manufacturer and capitalism and markets and centralized power a and jeffersonian notions of antistate is some and pastoralism are kind of blending together into a conservative movement in the 20th century so here there is no clear tradition. whigs lacked either aristocracy

to fight or all live with or amount to defend against and so, in some ways you don't have feudal traditions in the same way. >> professor joseph lowndes of the university of oregon, "from the new deal to the new right" race in the southern origins of modern conservatism jeffrey perry recounts the life of a few bird harrison who lived from 1883 to 1927. mr. harrison was a public intellectual, activist and founder of the new negro movement. if i even hosted by barnes and noble and new york city is 45 minutes. [applause] >> thank you very much, lou and i would like to thank marrec and komozi who helped arrange this activity and i would like to speak for you all for coming. thank you very much.