the newly installed income tax, which was installed at 7%, stood at 77% at the end of world war i, just six years after it had started. and there have also been a huge increase in government intervention and regulation and intrusion into the private market. as the country came out of the postwar period, and entered the 1920s, the economy experienced a very severe recession of 1919 and 1920. and it's interesting to look back at that, given that we are in the midst of such a time now and unemployment was over 20%. as i've mentioned, income tax rates, the top rate was over 77%. gnp was falling rapidly and there were a host of labor

strife and a lot of labor risk. and as the country went into the 1920 election, the country made a real swing to the right and repudiated the progressivism of wilson and the like did a very conservative republican ticket, which was composed of harding, nominated for president and calvin coolidge for vice president. frederick lewis allen only yesterday has characterized the late days, said the nation was spiritually tired at the end of world war i. worried by the excitement of the war and the nervous tension of the big red scare, they hope for quiet and healing. they were sick of wilson in a stock of america's duty to they hoped for chance to pursue their private affairs without government interference, and the result was a g.o.p. landslide.

during this campaign, calvin coolidge made this statement; he said in a free republic, a great government is the product of a great people. they will look to themselves rather than to the government for success. this became a theme of that campaign, and the result was the republicans won a landslide victory. against the backdrop of this severe recession, harding came into office and, contrary to the -- the historical perspective that we normally have of harding, he, i think everyone would agree -- he appointed some very -- made some very good appointments to his cabinet. charles evans hughes was his secretary of state, and andrew

mellon was the secretary of the treasury, and mellon began almost a ten-year reign. in fact, three president served under andrew mellon it was said, and that's a pretty good picture of the 1920s. he began systematically to lower taxes, and recommended to congress to lower taxes, and this policy of reduced domestic spending and lower taxes began to take hold. unemployment started to decline, declined to around 5%, and during the period of the eight years of the harding-coolidge presidency, gnp grew at an astounding annual rate of 4.5%. now, unlike 40 years ago when i was in college, there's finally

a debate. there hasn't been any conclusion among historians, but i think everyone who reads any history these days would agree that there is a good debate going, and the real question about the 1920s is, was it an idyllic period of american history, or was it the babylon that it's been characterized as by so many historians. the -- in addition to what others were wrote, william allen white identified coolidge, unforgettable in his book, the puritan in babylon, edwin wilson called is a feees a.

f scott fitzgerald called it a gaudy period in history. they were repulsed by what thigh they saw as intellectual shallowness. in stark contrast to this, other histories have called it the last arcadia. what the' 20's equate is traps forming luxuries into necessities and spreading them down the class period. what johnson recognized in the 1920s was that there was an economic tide sweeping across the country that permeated the lower income sector of the economy, and was a classic case of rising tide raises all boats. the economic facts, if you look at them, will indicate that

prosperity was more wide-spread and more widely distributed at any time in american history until this point. coolidge prosperity was indeed real, but it wasn't permanent. i think realistically, any kind of economic history would tell you that no prosperity is ever permanent. so, to blame the 1920s for the 1930s, while that's a position that many historians have taken, most economists, even liberal economists, have said that really an unfair characterization, that you really cannot make that link and say, well, the 30's were so terrible. must have been caused by the '20s. hopefully the book will add to this revisionist look at the 1920s, and cause readers to reexamine what has been sort of

a prevalent view, and now there's plenty of other good writings on this, and i hope this will become a part of it. but the second reason i wrote the book was the two men, coolidge and davis, and the focus of the book is -- i think was mentioned in the introduction. for those who haven't read it, it's the 1924 election. so the two major candidates, calvin coolidge and john davis -- is that working? sounds like it's echoing -- the two candidates were calvin coolidge and john davis and it's interesting to look at the similarities of these two men. while they were very different personalities as we'll see in a minute, both were successful politicians, both emerged politically in the early progressive era. both became increasingly

conservative. both exemplified great integrity and permanent ethics, and both reflected the best qualities off their respective regions, coolidge from new england, and davis from the south. davis was a democrat who was dedicated to small government, states rights, individual freedom, and free trade, very much in the tradition of jefferson. and coolidge was conservative republican, who shared many of the same jeffersonian ideas of limited government and individual freedom. it's interesting that in 1924, the old progressive war horse, william jennings bryan, observed at the democratic convention in 1929 that davis was a man of fine character, but added with disgust so is mr. coolidge. there's just no difference between them. i think that pretty well summed

up how these two men stood in their day. so, let's take a quick look at coolidge. he was product of his era, of his region, the new england region, and he was very fond of quoting a new england phrase, which sounds like it could have been a southern phrase, too. the saying was that the education of every man begins two to three generations before he is born, and that's attributed to calvin college he said no coolidge ever went west, and what he meant was as tough a place at vermont is to earn a living, the coolidge stayed there and didn't make excuses and made a go of it. i think in summary of coolidge, it's fair to say that -- and one

of the great things about coolidge -- was that he really was what he appeared. he really was a thrifty, heard-working, honest, unpretentious new england puritan, that's exactly what he was, and that's how he came cramps interestingly, the american people -- how he came across. interestingly, the american people really responsibled to him. you would think he would have a hard time connecting with the public, but the opposite was the case. he had risen steadily in massachusetts from the local level of politics up to the state legislature, lieutenant governor, was elected governor in 1918. in his whole career, only lost one of of i think it was 18 elections, and that was i think for the school board. he was elected governor in 1918,

and in 1919, one event in massachusetts catapulted him overnight on to the national stage. it was the very famous boston police strike. the police force in boston went out on strike. this was in the middle of the whole red scare. the country was on edge, concerned about labor unrest, and what happened in the police strike was very ininstructive and predictive of what was to come in his career. he worked very hard to avert the strike. was almost successful. at the last minute, the national afl leaders came in and sort of bolstered the local union, and they came to a showdown, and a strike was finally called.

and coolidge issued a very famous statement that, quote, there is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anytime, anywhere. and the strike was broken virtually overnight, and the public opinion swung in, in massachusetts and all over the country, and coolidge became a national figure. as a result of that, he came on the national stage and -- i want read just a few excerpts from i think an extremely interesting report. the new york world newspaper sent a reporter to boston to interview coolidge right after the police strike and this reporter i think nail calvin coolidge as well as anybody i have ever seen. he said to one who has never seen governor coolidge of massachusetts, he is a sphynx or

an enigma. he speaks little, and his silence speaks loudest. when you question him, the answer comes back in a tightening of his lean face and the closing of his lips. he has lean and hungry look, and policemen's union discovered that those men are dangerous. contrary to the accepted characterrics of the usual sort of politicians, cal coolidge seldom smiles, hardly ever does any hand-shaking, and has a reputation that his world is as good as gold. i think that's a very good summary of coolidge. it also gives a flavor of the image he presented, which was reality, of absolute integrity. he was willing to, if you will,

talk straight to the people of massachusetts. he didn't sugar-coat anything. he vetoed any bill he thought would not be good for the state. his advisers told him if he tried to break the police strike, it was the end of his political career. he agreed, but said, we have to break the strike. that was true of his whole career as president. interestingly, it resonated well with the american people. if you were to come up with a list of characteristics that any good politician needs to have, or what we think they need to have, coolidge wouldn't have even been considered. but the fact was that he remained very popular throughout his term. with the break of the police strike in 19 -- 1919, coolidge

enter the national arena, he was moved very quickly into a presidential contender in 1920, but when harding was nominated, then coolidge was very quickly selected as vice president, and entered office as vice president under harding. and, again, contrary to our popular perception of harding, the harding administration was showing real progress in getting the country become on the right track. the recession was basically over by 1922. and by the summer of 1923, harding was extremely popular. headed west on a vacation. the coolidges went to vermont for a vacation. and harding very unexpectedly, totally unexpectedly, died out in san francisco, and there was a great outpouring of grief from

the american people. there were stories in "the new york times," believe it or not, about how the was the greatest outpouring of grief since lincoln's death. and anyway, coolidge came into office under these unfortunate circumstances with harding's death. but there was a real question whether coolidge would be able to bring the party together, and he was able to do that in a way and in a very short time period, that i think showed what a masterful politician he was. by the time the republicans met in convention the next summer, 1924, in cleveland, it was virtually assured that cool jim -- coolidge would be

nominated. he established his own credentials as a conservative, and it turned out to be one of the most -- in fact it was billed as the most boring convention in american history, which suited the republicans just fine. they nominated coolidge by acclaimation, and the campaign was launched from there. i'll talk in a minute when we got to davis about how the opposite was true for the democrats, but coolidge did a masterful job of getting ready for the elections. he entered the -- the results of the campaign in 1924 was that coolidge, without question, had been dealt a winning hand-but you'd have to say also in looking at it, he certainly played it flawlessly, and the result was that he won a resounding victory.

coolidge's popular vote was approximately 53 or 54%, and davis, who was the democrat, garnered about 30%. and then the progressive third-party candidate got between 16 and 17%, and the title of the book comes from the fact that his was the last time both parties nominated a conservative, and if you look at it in that context, 83 or so% of the popular vote win to the two conservative candidates. coolidge came in, in 1925, with huge popularity, and he immediately implemented, began a

continuation of harding's policies. he and mellon went to the congress for further tax cuts, further reductions in spending. these were -- he was able to secure these because of the republican majority in congress, and he stayed very much on the same message with the american people. the result was the economy performed amazingly during that period, and probably the most amazing thing from a political standpoint was the decided voluntarily to step down, not run for re-election in 1928, and left while he was still hugely, hugely popular. something that most politicians don't like to do. a very quick word about davis. if coolidge has been given very little credit as a president, i think it's safe to say that davis has been shamefully ignored as a candidate.

when you mention john w. davis, most people don't know who he was or don't know anything about him. i'm sorry i don't have more time today to fill in some of those gaps. you'll just have to read the book. davis was very much a product of his region. he was from the south. he entered politics very much -- he was very much put forward by his peers. didn't view himself as a real politician. he was elected to congress in 1910. 1912. and woodrow wilson picked him as his solicitor general. the government's voice before the supreme court. and it was -- this was a very important milestone in davis' career. he argued seven -- 60-some cases

as solicitor general, which is more than any other solicitor general argued personally, and it was during this he secured his reputation as the foremost judicial advocate in the united states by the time the '30s and '40s rolled around. it's interesting to read the comments. virtually every supreme court justice on the court at that time urged wilson to appoint davis to the supreme court. he was -- there were comments like, one of the supreme court justices said that it was impossible to be impartial when davis was arguing a case. that his ability to present a case was just legendary. and it was, again, during this period that his reputation was established.

in 1918, he was offered the opportunity to go to england as the ambassador to great britain, and served a very successful two-year term, where he was the u.s. voice in the post-world war i period. i'll read you just a couple of things i think will give you a flavor for this. he developed some life-long friendships with people like churchill and halifax and other english leaders. the british were quick to share with him their views on the important issues of the day. it was no small compliment when king george v said davis was the

most polite american he met. it was during this two-year period that it very much influenced his thinking as an international -- or his foreign policy views which were important in the election. davis came back with the 1920 election, and woodrow wilson's leaving and harding coming in, davis retired as ambassador to england, came back to the u.s., and this was a refreshing note. he had served in congress, served as ambassador. in those days the u.s. ambassador in england had to foot a lot of his expenses, and unlike what we see today, davis made absolutely no money and arrived back in the u.s., in his words, flat broke, and he joined a major new york law firm, was

elected president of the american bar association, became j. p. morgan's lawyer, was general counsel for at&t. interestingly he turned down an appointment to the u.s. supreme court that was offered by harding. by this time taft has become chief justice, and he persuaded harding to consider davis, but davis decided he needed to stay in new york. he was newly installed in his law firm and turned down the opportunity to join the court. it was from this vantage point as a major new york lawyer that he was amazingly nominated as the democratic nominee in 1924. i think to me one of the most interesting chapters in the book, one of my favorites, is the chapter on then 1924 convention in new york, which i

won't -- don't have time to really talk much about today. but i think it's a fascinating story of -- as the perfect -- this was the longest, most heated divisive nightmare of a convention nat anybody could ever device. went for 103 ballots. the two major candidates, al smith and william gibbs fought back and forth endlessly, tore themselves, the party, the platform, everything to shreds, and finally at the end of three weeks the party staggered towards a compromise and nominated davis, who was very much a conservative, from the conservative wing of the party, but acknowledged by both sides to be a county who could potentially bring the democrats together. the nomination was pretty worthless by that point, and the

result is that, as i mentioned a minute ago, where a landslide for coolidge. with the -- with this landslide defeat in 1924, davis went quickly back to new york to his law firm, and while he still had a lot to say in democratic party circles, particularly after 1932, he was essentially involved in practicing law and developing the firm, which by this time had been renamed davis , polk and woodwell, which is still a leading new york law firm. i would -- i had planned but don't have time to read some of the quotes from davis and coolidge, but i think it's very -- for conservatives, it's

very exciting to go back and read what both of these two men had to say in the election of 1924. it's fair to say that there philosophically were very few differences between davis and coolidge, and that was one of the difficulties davis had in the campaign. he was as conservative as coolidge but wasn't more conservative, and so conservatives voted for -- probably denned to vote for coolidge. then there was the candidate on the far left, and davis was left kind of in the middle without a way to distinguish himself. but his statements are just classic conservativism, very much like coolidge's are, and it's amazing for us to think back to a time when both candidates would make statements like that and i would encourage

you to look for those quotes if you read the book. after the '24 election, davis played a hand in democratic party politics. in fact he was very much involved in writing the platform for the democrats in 1932, which some of you all know was a very conservative platform. a platform on which fdr was elected. called for balancing the budget, cutting government spending. davis' hand was all over it. unfortunately i don't think fdr read it. if he did read it, he certainly disregarded it very quickly. and with the direction the new deal went, davis began to take a very principled stand, and he wound up in 1936 breaking with the democrats. he endorsed landon, a front-page "new york times" article.

they reprinted his whole speech. it was classic defense of conservativism. i wish i had time to read you some of the quotes. he also was involved in forming the liberty league, which was a major counterbalance to the new deal during the 1930s and 40s. and probably most importantly, he argued a lot of cases before the supreme court, many of which were successful in striking down the new deal legislation. by the time davis ended his career in -- shortly before he died -- he died in 1955, but i think his last case was 1954. he had argued 142 cases before the supreme court. more than any other lawyer except daniel webster. and was universally hailed -- the term was lawyer's lawyer.

he was without question the premiere advocate before the supreme court, and won some amazing victories. the most interesting and significant one was the steel seizure case, which davis argued at age 79 before the court, and the court ruled in his favor threw harry truman out of the steel mills. ...on to represent the steel industry, which was really quite a compliment to any one. but to be 79 years old and to accomplish this was really quite a capstone for his career. so in summary, i'm a second

presents writing the book, it was to introduce those two people. both exemplary public servant. and i would hope even if someone was a diehard liberal, he would appreciate the integrity and ability of these two men. i think he should hold coolidge and davis as heroes. now very briefly and i'll be finished, the third reason for writing the book and this was one i didn't have in mind when i started, but when i was thinking about looking at the 1920s and was interested in davis isn't coolidge's men, for which they are two lives intersect was obviously the election of 1924. so it was natural that i would think that would be a good thing to read on. there was nothing that i've been able to find. nothing has been written. only the election in 1924. so that was the reason i decided

to write on it because the two men and the policies that were the issues in 1924. as they got into it, i really concluded that despite the fact that historians haven't recognized it, it really was in one significant way to watershed election. and not for the title the high tide of american conservatism came from. as i think i've mentioned before, it was the last time that both parties nominated to conservatives. we today have lived through roughly 85 years of post-1924 history. and from 1924 and until the day, the gop has been the party at the right and the democratic dirtiest than the party of the left. it was a great quote from fdr in 1924. i guess maybe it was governor of new york at that time.

the lesson that he concluded from 1924, dedicated to the democrats as he said, never again should we -- i think his words were never again should we wear the liberty of the conservatives -- basically we've got to go in the other direction. and that's one lesson that the democrats have certainly learned. history would show that they haven't gone back on that. and the two parties have stayed pretty much in that mode since 1924. but it's interesting to think that it really wasn't all ordained that the republican party would be the conservative party of the democratic party would be the liberal party. if our 1924, each of the two parties had very large progressive and conservative wings. and that was basically the civil war going on in both parties as to who would control each of the parties. while the democrats nominated

the progressive for president, that was o'bryan in 1998. that was teddy roosevelt in 1984. and it's interesting to think that teddy roosevelt was the leading candidate for the gop nomination in 1920, but he died in 1819. if you lived in the nominated in 1920, you could see that the democrats under then server of party or the party that took off on a conservative direction. but of course that was not what happened. and the result after 1924 was the republican progressives gradually left the republican party and migrated to the democratic party. and democratic conservatives gradually migrate, like davis, gradually migrated to the republican party.

finally, let me just leave you with a quote that's at the end of the book, where -- which we try to maybe give the book a little bit further than for today. often a national change of political course is justified because of economic emergency. the most severe emergencies of the past economic urgencies for 1920, 1932 and 1980. the conservative policies that were adopted after 1920 and after 1984 very different from the liberal policies followed after 1932. and the economic results was equally dissimilar. in the years immediately following both 19201980, harding, coolidge and reagan sharply cut taxes and returns federal spending while roosevelt

did the opposite. the 1920s and the 1980s were growth of economic press dirty, while the 1930s was a period of prolonged deflation and economic stagnation. coolidge's record and his well reasoned speeches in support of those 1920 policies. and davis has brilliantly argued rebuttal to the liberalism for significant chapters in history of american conservatives. americans found that policies and reaction to what is their first economic emergency of this century. it would do well to examine the 1920s and i think to consider the lives of the word and the warnings of two of america's greatest conservatives, john davison, coolidge. thank you. [applause]

and i hope i have not talked above our question time. but we've got time for a few, i'd be happy to say as long as everybody wants. >> you didn't mention your convention to davis biw nl and the professor i think the advance would be interested in not. >> now, the way i personally got interested in davis was he was a graduate of washington lake, which is where i went and i had a great friend who is a retired in there who have known david for years. and i remember him talking about him. and it was about the time i graduated that the one good biography of davis came out and taught as a lawyer. and they gave me a copy in a red day. and i hadn't had that contact. i probably would've never done that davis was.

>> 1924 democratic convention is fascinating. i wonder if you could kind of talk a little bit about the personalities involved and mother of one of the other two gentlemen, certainly not smith, if not to do had been nominated, probably not him as well, you have been able to call this book quite the same title. so which is a real flip a accident that this is the high tide of american conservatism. because of the contentious and virtuous. >> that's a very good question. and again, i think the story that convention's actually been a book with non-to rebalance or something like that. but again, i think it's one of the most interesting chapters in the book. the nomination was fiercely

contended in makkah do and al smith was the two candidates. and now smith was more conservative. not to do as progressive as the son-in-law of woodrow wilson. and it's hard for us to relate to the two big issues. the two big issues in the country and sort of the big social issues and that time with the and interestingly to us in the south at that time, the kkk had a national reach. it was midwest, mid-atlantic state. new jersey had a big kkk influence. midwest, upper midwest, southwest. and it was a very hot issue. and many of the kkk borders were also mcabee supporters. and of course the kkk was very anti-immigrants, anti-catholic.

the other big hot button issue as prohibition. and many of the prohibitionists were also populist progressives. and of course al smith was a classic northeastern immigrants. but more conservative on some other issues. those were all things at the convention in new york, believe it or not, the texas delegation burned a cross out in front of madison square garden. and according to mcabee, savas prohibition reporters were drunk at the end. and they're all kinds of stories of what went on there. and walter lippman wrote a very interesting column about the results of that. any talk about how that convention brought out the worst

in human nature. the worst in a political party and the worst in everything. but somehow when the party almost went over the edge, they somehow pull themselves together and nominated a great man, john davis, which was an interesting one. and i think he made the comment that davis nomination was morcheeba to his personality. it wasn't, to your point, wasn't an indication they decided they wanted to be as conservative as davis. they just looked over the edge and said we'd better get somebody who's a good candidate and his credible or we're going to really go over the edge here. he was the best compromise candidate. >> does the research give you any insight into its coolidge had run and then elect good, would he have done things and prevented the crash at the beginning of the depression.

and of course he would've continued to 1932 what he would've done after that >> that is certainly a fascinating question. the honest answer is no one can be 100% sure. but i think something that's very important that most people don't realize -- i think the popular perception is that there was harding, coolidge and hoover. and hoover is lumped in with harding and coolidge and the historical accepted view was that they were all very conservative and probably caused the market crash and the great recession turned into the great repression because of the policy. the fact is that even though hoover was in the harding administration and the coolidge administration, he was a very different kind of republican from either party and are coolidge. he was from the progressive wing of the party.

coolidge and mel and couldn't understand that coolidge called of wonder boy and thought he was a busy body. and the joke around washington was that hoover was secretary of commerce and undersecretary of everything else. [laughter] and when hoover was select in 1928, and the market crash occurred, which the monetary policies famously were all wrong. they had contracted liquidity instead of expanding it in the congress passed a huge tariff, which demolished foreign trade. but the thing that's not widely remembered is that coolidge -- i mean, hoover substantially raised taxes and increased government funding. and in fact, the deficit -- the

government spending deficit led to 1932. that was the reason the democrats had a platform that said we want to run on a balance budget. davis was pushing him to go to the right. and in fact, davis wrote a famous letter to walter lippman, where he identifies hoover as the start of the new deal. in his view, hoover was the one who really started to new deal and roosevelt chose picked it up and ran with it abandoned. so it's -- there's no way to know for sure what he would've done, but i think the odds were very high that he would've continued his lower taxation. lower spending. i don't know whether he could have influenced monetary policy or prevented the increase in

tariff, but his spending and his tax policies they think would've been different. >> there are a lot of comparisons between our recession and the one in 1920. can you speak to how unemployment was then as compared to now? it supposed the night. but if you go with six if somewhere around 17%. what is more like how they calculate? >> you know, i really don't know the answer to that. i would bet that there probably were some differences. but i know the stated rate did get well over 20%. and it was a very sharp, severe but short-lived session. and i know paul johnson's -- has written about it, that it was

the last recession that was treated purely from a laissez-faire or purely conservative policy, where taxes and spending were drastically reduced. in the interesting game was that it was such a short -- it was very painful and did what arguably every session should do in the economy. but it wasn't long before the economy really bounced back. and i think part of that was the fact they had a secretary of the treasury who was very clear that the tax rates were going to be lower next year than they are now and people were willing to invest. >> okay, one question. anyone else? you all have been very patient.

examines the relationship between john wilkes booth and his older brother edwin booth. border british actor what siblings as player to become actors as well. edwin succeeded and was one of the stores tuesday ten john struggled in the craft. ms. nora titone describes the rivalry and the possible role it played in john wilkes booth assassination of president abraham lincoln at ford's theater on april 14th, 1865. nora titone present herber de bagram lincoln presidential museum in springfield illinois. the program is one hour from

>> good evening. e the scene and ford's theatre on april 14th, 1865 is stamped in national memory. there was the gunshot, the acton jumping from a balcony to stagee flashing a month before the footlights. lincoln thea lee kit, slumped in a chair. wage of the union victory, andth hatred efor lincoln for lincoln drove john wilkes booth to pull the trigger. the story has been told many times. but there is more to the story of john wilkes booth and the assassination of lincoln than the familiar facts we all know. it is a story largely unexplored , a story had been in

private letters, diaries, memoirs and manuscripts. and it is the story of a remarkable and dysfunctional teatro family, the booths. but above all, it is the story of john wilkes and the man who was his rival and competitor, his older brother, edwin. edwin booth's name is forgotten now, buried by his brothers and from his steed. but a century ago, she was the actor kane, the greatest most influential start of the american stage. four years older than john wilkes, edwin was a dramatic genius, a prodigy who earned colossal national fame before the civil war began. during the war, edwin booth owned his own theatre on

broadway where he could earn in a week the civil war equivalent of $200,000 he gave generously of those profit to the union war effort. he called himself corporal edwin booth. he called his act tears the federal dramatic quarter and together they raised thousands church are the performances of shakespeare for the widows and orphans of u.s. soldiers and from military hospitals. but the crowning moment in the wartime career of this feature out it got there was when he was summoned to washington to give command performances for his beloved president lincoln on a special occasion, the third anniversary of lincoln's inaugural.

for six nights in 1864 at the national theatre, by special arrangement with lincoln and the first lady, edwin booth played hamlet, mcbeth and other shakespeare plays to deafening ovation. this was john wilkes booth with the older brother. so how could it have happened? one brother come the 19th century's most notorious assassin and the other a loyal supporter of the union and that century's brightest star. the answer lies in part in their relationship. they were competitors in the profession of act team. and they are political opponents. their rivalry would shape both their lives, but it would prove particularly disastrous for john

wilkes. the record of this brothers conflict is not hard to find. it is in playbills, dramatic reviews and especially in the booth family's private papers. many of them here at the presidential library. this assassination of the president, while serious activity confederate sympathizer and he conspirator can also be understood as the tragic finale of the tangled family story. i started researching the brothers at a place called the players. this is a private club, founded by edwin booth himself in 1888 in new york with his very close friends, marc twain and u.s. president grover cleveland. the club still stands today. it still has a membership and

upholds the most rare portions of the booth papers. the room were edwin lived until the last days of his life is carefully preserved. and when you walk in, nothings been changed. on the wall near his desk is a sign he hung there is a warning. it's a motto, taken from the tomb of shakespeare at stratford on avon. and i'm going to read it to you. good friend, for jesus sake, forebear to dig the dusk in posted here. must be the man that spares these stones and cursed be he that moves my bones when i read that coming in to do research, because i was there to move those bones. that was the morning.

and the book i wrote, "my thoughts be bloody" as a result of my excavating. and tonight i'm going to tell you some episodes from this family's remarkable story. but before i do, i'd like to say that the booths for the premiere theatrical dynasty of the 19th century. edwin and his father, junius were considered towering geniuses and they stood at the center of our nation's cultural life for 60 years. from the 1820's through the 1880's. so for the early decades of our republic to the end of the gilded age, the booths lived in the spotlight of the national public eye. they were tragic. they were scandalous. they were eccentric. they were dysfunctional and haphazardly endowed with genius. they were strivers.

they wanted wealth and they wanted to be figures of national prominence. and as public figures, they witnessed or participated in defining moments in the century in the sentiment of the last of the california gold rush, from john brown's execution to the 1860 presidential election and of course to the years of the civil war. so in many ways, the booth story is our national story and the night in century. the story begins with this man, junius reduce booth, father to edwin and john spokes. he arrived on american shores in 1821 on a ship ironically enough called to brothers. junius was a shakespearean actor. he was an international starter.

his bizarre volcanic and sensational interpretations of shakespeare sparked riots in london. he belonged to a circle of famous men, rent-a-car does ben included lord byron and the poets, shelley and keats. junius was a radical nonconformist. he rejected christianity. he dabbled in islam and hinduism. he was a vegetarian in the 1820's which was late in a lunatic. he was an opponent of slavery and he was a genius who could write poetry, sculpt marble, speak 10 ancient and modern languages and act. bruce had what you like to call the gesture if you're honest for it, mind. he believed he was a rare beam. someone separated from the rest

of humanity by his incredible talent and american audiences agreed, booth was huge here. he toured nationally every year. he was admired by presidents from john quincy adams to andrew jackson. and he raised his two sons, edwin and john wilkes to believe that same was a marvelous prize. mind or genius he told these boys, happily belonged to no age, climb, or condition. instant since the fed can be quoted when even from the most despised classes, genius develops itself and towers above all the circles of the human race. powerful words to tell adolescent boys. and despised classes were the key words. for junius have an important

reason to leave england and come to america. the threat scandal. he had come here, not with his wife who he left in london, but with his pregnant mistress. and over the next two decades the couple had 10 children, all of them illegitimate including edwin and john wilkes. it was when the boys were in their early teenage years that junius' wife came to baltimore from london to hunt her husband's second family down. she pursued edwin, john wilkes on their mother through the streets of baltimore, shouting harlot, scarlet woman, at the boy's mother and saying even worse things to children. she wanted to establish in a very public way the illegitimacy of the american booth children because she was bringing a suit for divorce before the courts of

baltimore. this noisy, public scandal, humiliated the booth family and the hefty divorce suit bankrupted them. in court, junius brutus booth high to testify before a judge that his son, edwin and john wilkes were the first on the vulture as liaison. a father so famous and so infamous afflicted his sons, leaving them both with driving ambition as they grew older, but also a burden of shame. and that early legacy was a challenge for edwin and john, that's edwin later acknowledged with the end of his life when he wrote, i am glad i have not sons, for when a man becomes