the times square bomber in 2010 was very close. that would be one. the other would be to not do something like an attack against iran. which would probably also have the potential to spiral and radicalize. those are two elements. the third, very briefly, is the u.s. in discussion right now about moving east to the asia pacific. there has been a new deal strategy -- a new dod strategy which focuses on moving east. the asia pacific is the future. as you look across north africa, the horn, italy, south asia -- you see a range of regimes that are weakening. somewhere, al qaeda has gotten a foothold, and some like syria and in bali, where they are desperately trying, but now is not the time.

we are pulling out marines and putting them into australia. that may not be the time to move also strategically to the east. >> so what you're saying is shrink the footprint, but keep the eye on the enemy. >> i think you said it better than i did. >> i have to say, this was one of the most conference of histories of the last 10 years that i have read all in one book. it was a good read. great to talk to you, thank you very much. >> thank you very much. ..

>> this month as part of book tv college series will visit the university of virginia to talk to present to the professors and doctors. first toe of the author of a government out of sight. this is a little under have an hour. >> the book is called the government out of sight. this tree of national authority. the author is university of virginia professor brian bellows. breezy get the title? >> i get the title from none other than jefferson university, alexander hamilton. and not only get the title : bue

is one of the few -- this is one of the few things to get wrong. hamilton argued that a government, recite would never be appreciated by its citizens. my book is that actually the most effective government by the national government over our history. governance that is hidden in plain sight. >> what is the context of l.a. animal teeth alexander hamilton's or? >> the road to a correspondence. it was in the context of how we get this nation pact to begin to appreciate the importance of government. of course, we have found republican principles, small or republican in government by the people without the trappings of

the crown, strike executive-branch. but hamilton was very interested in how we actually get the people to respect the national government. most importantly to how do we give foreign powers to respect this. you know, if the government isn't highly visible and you don't have a powerful army. if we don't have the trappings of authority people never really buy into government. >> ec was wrong. >> at the key is wrong. if you look at most objective of the government, national governments caught through mechanisms like the tariff tent -- taxation, excise taxes , visible tax collectors.

we used a tariff embedded in the price of goods. sir you cannot see the cost broken out. where did the correct this? literally offshore. literally before ships arrived. we have customs houses, but there were confined to large metropolitan areas. most customs agents were actually out policies meeting ships offshore. >> what used the cover a your book? >> i cover roughly 1770 up through 1910 were so. however, the book has implications for today, i would argue. >> what are some examples of government to incite? >> a lot of examples of government in sight. the best example is the u.s. postal service.

this size of the u.s. postal service absolutely dwarfs who infringe postal service to allow british postal service. index, in the 1830's caught stunned that indies american with people are better informed than in cities in france. they were getting the news carried by the u.s. postal service. in next question the dough is too light didn't americans balk if we don't like government alike invincible government? how can we except that the u.s. full-service. for a couple of reasons. first, the postal service was laundered, if you will, through local officials. the local processor, the person sitting in the store who

collected the no unsold the steps was of the relative of the person in a keep little party. they connected to those locally based political parties. so it was a very much a joint operations with the local officials. even though the funding for this was coming from the national government. second, we have used a lot of contractors. we use the private sector to actually carry the mail which provided a lot of jobs and provided a lot of consumer goods for people that like the postal service. we all know the story of the pony express. who is going to carry the mail, private sector, private entrepreneurs, ingenuity. the pony express was in essence

the fedex job to get the u.s. postal service contracts carrying the mail. the party express was private, but the recent they read those sources all the way out was to get the long-term regulus talk contract to carry the u.s. mail. is that can never want a relationship men between the initial governments, localities, and the private sector. i would throw in that very important factor dutchess to charitable groups. it is working in conjunction with those groups. that is how americans like to be governed. the book argues that their is a strong national presence in all this. >> you write in your book, for most americans living in the mid-19th century there was less government wetzel society that forge a nation. the market to our religion, and americans unique history which

kept government that they, they believed to mike treating national unity. >> that's right. all of those factors were important to. americans thought it was natural . the market. in fact, the market, especially the sooner the, the second half of the 19th century, very much a construction of the national government, especially the national ports system. let's take something as simple as sending processed meat across state lines. we are pretty familiar with this from the late 18th-century, corporate hackers. meatpackers operating in chicago that began to process these

packages. they wanted to come across state lines. a lot of locals were not so happy about this. and what is -- a number of states argued, this was a healthy. cattle need to be inspected on site in the state. now, state health inspection fear the law extending local and state, it is only when the supreme court decided in the late 18th-century that their interpretation of the interstate commerce clause trump to this law extending state pride if. the supreme court decision. no armor. this is one of the key days

after world war ii. this is one of the key industries. most supreme court decisions to an initial market for something as important as processed beef. we tested think. here is another. about the same time, very relevant today, corporations and people. the supreme court decision, again, like the 18th-century. it interprets the 14th amendment. passed after the civil war and intended to give freed slaves a full set of rights, intended. was that a minute former slaves jack the corporation. and it without even a splaying,

they simply decided the corporation is the person giving them a full due process rights. allowing them to extend their power and create the national market, which i'm not criticizing. national market made america great. the question is how you get around historical states' rights , how do you get around the tradition of individual rights. with that these key supreme court decisions we would have had a national market. >> had did people react to make a veto western pennsylvania are ohio. >> one of the ways -- well, for the two decisions that talked about it was very low reaction to making corporation. even though a longstanding

subleases from corporations being regulated. the big decision for which a lot of protests by local budgets, people who -- you might cite there were not happy about these national meat prices is coming into their market. tirolese speaking the courts system had a mechanism for gaining acceptance by locals. that was called the district court system. a lot of this district court judges, again top products of a political party. the local politics. and you might say split the difference which is some of those nationalists and local sentiment.

as you know, they interpreted key cases in ways that continue to maintain. so what was the effect of the war on national unity, the growth of federal government, the war of 1812, the civil war. a fight to name one factor that was visible growth of the state, there is plenty of that. in the case of the war of 1812i would say two things. before the war, leading a toward jefferson felt that americans would rally around his plea that they remain neutral, that they

not trade. americans perceived self-interest. jefferson needed to impose an embargo. let's think about this. this would be like rick santorum imposing the deep -- draconian income-tax of all americans. jefferson was supposed to be adapted deregulation. what to get government out of the riding. jefferson had to impose this pretty draconian step for you republicans to a supposedly did not like a lot of government interference. after the war, at the, it was even more important. more democrats and republicans

around what we call today the american system. that american system was filled -- build and nestle fundus for roads and canals. it was federal subsidy, national subsidy that really helped create this internal market. it turns out promote one of the things that americans to come together across ideological in support of the strong natural is economic development. in the 19th century we were all about economics. in something else, the national government did in a very powerful way. not entirely visible. that was to make wind secure.

how did the middle and secure? sadly by removing or killing indians. and when we talk about a weak state in the 19th century we forget the powerful role that the national government played in india. that, too, becomes just kind of secondary to the natural extension of populations, the natural extension of the market. pressure for population expansion was not cemented by the government, but it was subsidized by the national government. heavily subsidized. lots of los. the banking crisis today, the credit crisis. what happened to iraq the panic of the 1870's.

although sellers moved up to mississippi and alabama and could not pay back their federal loans. congress voted for an extension. today that would be the equivalent, not just barely at the company's to make would be the equivalent of bailey got individual mortgage. we have no qualms but during that if we felt it was essential to growing our economy. really dealing with the most serious threat is a crisis. >> love, we think about that time, the 19th century, we often think about with their economics and ready individualism. was that the case direction. >> no. we tend to think about what historians call the gilded age,

the time from the endeavor destruction of through the 1890's. and i think that the philosophy of what they share was quite prominent in that timeframe. there was a lot of talk. and it was an effort to implement that. sort of the public and private and create these categories. it failed miserably. business, by the beginning of the progressive era, the beginning of the 20th-century, understood that government need to play overall education. government needed to play a role in transportation. and definitely for policy to ensure that americans preferred regime of free trade remains free trade. opening up trade in places like china.

so a government out of sight to monday that kill the h, that era of economics that we think about as kind of the baseline from our american political context is actually one of the most exceptional moment some in american. if he go back you will have hundreds of regulations. >> we have all kinds of social regulation. a lot of economic regulation. the regulations are unfair prices when you go back to colonial times. you move forward in the 20th century. we have the emergence, especially after world war ii, we call the midst -- mixed economy. the government takes something like computers. i'm sure you have a laptop. you probably have a smart phone.

computers were the product of the research and development during world war ii. the internet's is the product of the defense administration research programs. they developed an internet because they wanted to talk -- of zurich, the developed internet because they wanted to be able to communicate during a nuclear strike. we need to send these messages. i am here to tell you and talk about gore did not invent the internet. the military invented the internet. the vote -- >> had appointed we stopped referring to ourselves as pennsylvania's and virginians as but to refer to ourselves as americans? >> well, here in the coming off

and not sure we ever stopped him. you're talking about handling the vast majority of americans. but the americans began to really think of themselves as american service somewhere between the spanish-american war and the late 1890's in the end of borrow one. by the end of world war one, that national intervention. most americans thought of themselves. what is really powering that, it corresponds to the same time from. the rise of the american economy. the growth of these corporations and nurtured in the 19th century on a domestic national market. there are now expanding overseas. and a more continuous engagement

with the world, and stealing more continuously. we are more likely to think of ourselves in contrast to that world. the other factor, and this is a little early. the telegraph. especially something from the wire services. the ability of the associated press in the late 18th-century to carry the same story pretty quickly to mississippi and new hampshire. really had a pretty important impact on americans, beginning to think of themselves as one nation. nothing like the impact that television ad. cable and satellite television which brought with it a kind of 247 coverage. as we get to that right now,

take ourselves as americans because we're so connected to what is going on in the middle east war effort unbowed by. instantaneous basis. if not c-span then websites, blocks, twitter. >> we are talking with university of virginia professor brian balogh. government out of sight. the mystery of the national party in 19th century america publishing by cambridge university press. we are on the campus of the university of virginia. >> the grounds. >> here on the grounds of the university of virginia. professor, how does the role of the federal government use such a political issue during this time we're talking about? roughly 1770 to 1910. >> there was no more -- there was only one issue that was

debated more regularly and hundley then the of all of the national government through 1865, and that was slavery. second, made no issue was debated more than the proper role call is this the the proper role and of the national government. that debate started in a united states bake. it continued all the way through the end of the 19th century and sell what really constitutes a corporation and kenbei conduct commerce across state lines. welfare, sure minnesota representative provide welfare? these are incredibly highly debated issues should provide

pensions to survivors and of the civil war. had we decided to do that, and treated that in very magnanimous fashion, but implicit in that decision was we're going to provide to the north and not to the south. really dividing the support. >> what is on the cover of your book? >> the cover of the book is the national capital in the early 19th century. is definitely an artist's rendition. it did that really like that imposing. so i wanted to pick them this that would contain the feel of this living presence. even among this living presence, if you look at the bottom half of this book first deasy trees.

in a fence. if you look in the bottom quarter their cows grazing along . naturalize the role some of the national government, if you will >> what do you teach yet been received? >> i teach u.s. history. pretty recent history. and teaching a lecture class, digitizing america, 1980 to the presence. it is looking at some of the key developments of 1980 through the lens of the intermission revolution. >> you are teaching contemporary american history, you're writing about 19 century the. >> enclave where. as set out to write an introduction to a book about the 20th century. our member, a fellow at the woodrow wilson center. they had a number if of

illustrious scholars. i was not one of them. gordon would call wonderful historian. i said to i'm writing this book about the 20 century to let and a real injection about the role of governments in the 19th century and i was wondering if you could recommend a few bucks for me. he said those during rut the 19th century, you'll never get to the charges century. proved prophetic. this book and never did get to the 20th century, but if they buy the book, then they open the pages cover his ears and remains to address the very real the dates that we're having today over the proper role of government and trying to put that in historical perspective.

>> the author of this book caught the government out of sight, mystery of national authority in 18th-century america. this is book tv and c-span2. >> you're watching a c-span2 un book tv. forty hours of nonfiction authors and books every weekend. >> here is a look at some books that are being published this week.