we also collaborate with over 100 organizations here in the city and have built those collaborations over the last six or seven years in a way that has helped put us more in the forefront of the activity of the community verses really the perception of the old historical library that is merely a repository of books on a dusty shelf but more the institution that is letting the past teach it to be relevant in the future. >> for more information on booktv's recent visit to providence rhode island and other cities visited by the local content vehicles, go to c-span.org/localcontent.

president of the university of pennsylvania talked to book tv about her latest book "the spirit of compromise." she also talked about her role as the president of the university. this interview recorded at the university of pennsylvania and philadelphia is part of booktv's college series, and it's about 20 minutes. >> you are watching book tv on c-span2, and one of the things we like to do one book tv is visit college campuses. we can talk to professors who are also authors showcasing books that you may not know about otherwise. we are pleased to be at the university of pennsylvania in philadelphia this week and we are joined by the president of the university, amy gutmann coming and she is the call author of this book, "the spirit of compromise why government demands it and campaigning underlines it."

president gutmann come are we a politically compromising nation? >> we were created in compromise. a lot of people think of the revolutionary war, which separated us from our mother country, but if you recall -- i know you weren't there then, what if you recall his slickly speaking, the founding fathers crafted a compromise that created the constitution. they were as polarized as any set of americans had been throughout our country and history. they were pro and antislavery in the compromise. so, yes, we were founded in compromise, but today compromise has become more difficult than ever before. >> what do you mean when you talk about the uncompromised mind set? >> we live in an era that has been compromised as a permanent

campaign where every day is election day, and campaigning and elections make for uncompromising mind is that you stand on your principles and mobilize the base and to roll in and endless amounts of money. the 24/7 news cycle covers politics if it is a race and the horses are on steroids and it is all the money coming in on the campaign, so what we mean by the uncompromised mind set is a mindset that is geared towards elections and not towards governing. >> president gutmann, you write that you and your co-author dennis johnson as we observe the changing scene in american politics we came to believe the general problem could be addressed by concentrating on a particular institution the united states congress. why is that? >> well, if you want to see the problem with the uncompromised might set look no further than

the congress, the 112 congress in washington. gridlock nothing gets passed. the least legislation in the last 50 years, and why? because everybody is campaigning all the time. there is very little relationship across the aisle, and we went out to the brink of the debt ceiling crisis before compromise was reached which was routine in the past. so we thought that by focusing on congress whose popularity is at an all-time low, john mccain said you can account for the 9% popularity of congress during the debt ceiling crisis by blood relatives and paid staffers. we felt by focusing on congress we could both diagnosed the problem and give some prescriptions for how to overcome it. >> which of those prescriptions? >> one of those prescriptions is

very simple, which is congressmen need to exercise leadership by mixing my and sets, by putting aside the campaign mindset won enough to govern, and adopting the compromise and might set. in order to do that, they have to have relationships so they should spend more time in washington and less time raising money. and people would say but that is going to hurt them in the next election. we say politicians didn't enter politics just to stand on principle. very few people think that politicians were attracted to politics because they were the most principled people in the population. they were attracted to politics because they want the government that takes leadership and it takes leadership takes relationship. we have this phrase which is familiarity breeds contempt. it is no accident that ted

kennedy and orrin hatch crafted a compromise is. they were both strong partisans but they had the spirit of compromise. that is our main prescription for compromise. >> but if you look at senator hatch, she was pretty well threatened by the team party in the primary and being ousted from office because some of his compromises. >> true, and the compromise is different, the government is becoming more and more difficult, however, if politicians -- where we remember orrin hatch we remember him for passing grade legislation to protect children's health care from ted kennedy. we are not going to remember politicians for their care cowardice we will remember them from the courage. we are calling our titian's to exercise leadership. we also talk about a set of reforms that would make it easier to compromise.

reforming the filibuster, open primaries rather than closed primaries. limiting the amount of money. the problem is you can't get these reforms without compromise. so we have the favorite reform and the politicians need to mix the mindset, and that is eminently possible. >> new light on restraining the rhetoric a4a strategy of economizing on this agreement is designed to deal with the fact that this agreement would persist on most issues from the space process is and always or even usually yield agreement, let alone general consensus. what do you mean by economizing cracks >> what we mean is that we have a polarized politics right now, and if each side stems on its favorite principles, we will get no compromise, no deals, we will

get grid lock, economic disaster, and economizing on your principles mean finding places where you can concede something to the other side by finding ways in which your principles intersect with there's. it is what some people call common ground, but what we say is it is not all common ground. it is agreeing to things together side believes in that are consistent with moving the ball forward according to your own principles. so we do this all the time when we make deals outside of politics. you look to what is most important for you to gain coming and you also give something to the other side. stomachs president gutmann, does the president of the united states have a role in this compromise? >> i thought you were going to ask, the president of the united

states definitely has a role, and again, the president has a point in the direction of his party principles, the president also has to show by words and deeds that he's going to make a good compromise, and i believe president obama has in fact done that. how? >> the president has said and reached out across the aisle on various things with regards to economic reform, tax reform, immigration reform. i think -- while i don't have a crystal ball, i think there is little doubt that the president would be willing to compromise if the other party is willing to meet him part of the way. now the other party's job is to see how much it can get from its side of come and given the

issues we've been through such as the fiscal cliff, the fact is there is no way out of these issues without compromise, but i do think that we would see compromise on something like immigration reform because demographics is destiny, and the republicans as well as the democrats recognize that they have to show some support for immigration reform if they are not going to in the case of the republicans move the hispanic population permanently to the republican party. so, the president has already shown willingness to compromise, and all of the data shows that republicans are the party that moves further to the right and the democrats moved to the left although both parties have moved to the extreme, so i think we are going to see the president because he won the election being tougher rhetorically about

not compromising although saying that he's open to compromise in order to see how far the republicans are willing to move. >> we are taking this interview in the middle of the so-called siskel cliff debate. how do you see a january 1st? how would you like to see january 1st, out? >> it is clear that the vast majority of americans are with the majority of americans on this would like to see a compromise before the end of 2012. otherwise a lot of bad things will start to happen. it's clear to me, it's not clear whether there will be one although they stand to lose if there is and and that is a good recipe for compromise. but it is clear to me that if there isn't a compromise before, there will have to be after so better sooner than later.

>> president gutmann, does a president from the university of pennsylvania, does a ceo, as a family member have to compromise on a daily basis? >> absolutely has to compromise. with her on a daily basis, that's -- one doesn't want to compromise, one shouldn't want to compromise. one should be willing to compromise when necessary to achieve one goal, and that's true in personal relationships as well as in politics, and it's certainly true all the time in the professions. edmund burke, the great conservative philosopher said all human relations are based on compromise, and i think he's right. >> back to the spirit of compromise one problem with rejecting compromise in the hope of a better one to come is that the rejection itself becomes an obstacle to reaching the future compromise to get

>> that is so true today about politics the continual rejection of compromise and the continued demonization of one's political opponents in the political campaign has made compromise very difficult even when it's entirely and absolutely obviously necessary. >> what about the supreme court, do they ever compromise? >> you know, one of the interesting things about the supreme court is that while they give reasons for their opinions, we don't get a window into the back chamber negotiation. it is clear that they sometimes compromise, and indeed, the decision on the affordable health care act where the judge chief justice robert cited with the liberals on the court, many people think it may have been a compromise.

now, whether the justices would ever speak of it as a compromise is doubtful. but if you look at how the justices came down and the pressure to craft a majority opinion is very plausible to think that that decision was a compromise between interpretation of commerce clause and of holding of the affordable care act and any other decision on the court looks like compromises. >> who is dennis thompson? >> my wonderful co author who is a professor of political science and political philosophy at harvard many years ago when we were both at princeton university we taught a course on ethics and public policy and that led to lescol offering several books on the deliberation and democracy. >> in the spirit of compromise, president gutmann, you give to

legislative examples, 1986 tax reform health care act. if you would, walk us through those. >> this is a tale of two compromises, and it begins with ronald reagan's presidency, where tax reform was a hugely important issue and hugely difficult issue to get done between republicans and democrats. those of us that live through the years recognize that people thought they were very polarized. tip o'neill was a staunch liberal democrat and ronald reagan's staunch republican. yes they crafted a bipartisan compromise with bill bradley and bob packwood being a part of the movers of this compromise. fast forward to the affordable

care act it was arguably even more difficult to craft a compromise within one party, the democratic party because of the permanent campaign and how not just polarized, but resistant to compromise the parties were. so the comparison between the tax reform act and the affordable care act helps us see how much more difficult compromise now is and how much more important it is for the two parties to get together to craft the kind of compromises on immigration come on tax reform, on many other issues the country now needs. >> was there or is there a golden age of compromise to the crisis, 9/11, will work to limit themselves to political compromise? >> compromise is always tough,

and the way that we should judge the ability of our politicians to compromise is what are the goals that if they have succeeded in getting that they couldn't have without compromise so the golden age, if there was one, and i am inclined to think there was never a golden age, but there was a very important age of compromise which found that this country so i would go back to the constitution for all it's worth, and it had more than a war, it had an eagle slavery. the constitution made it possible to abolish slavery. you have to remember was the article of federation that preceded the constitution and with them every state had a veto power over all legislation, so it was actually the establishment of the constitution of the united

states that was just published and compromised and made the abolition of slavery ultimately possible. >> speaking of compromise, if the so-called fiscal cliff talks do not come to any kind of a conclusion, it's implemented have you looked at how you have to compromise the university of pennsylvania, how it will affect the university of pennsylvania? >> if we were to go over the fiscal cliff and even more so if there isn't a compromise that really establishes for the american financial system on solid grounding, then there will be many ways in which we as a university in the free university in this country will be compromised in the sense of

compromising our quality. we will -- we depend upon the funding of the idea of medical research to spur innovation in this country that will try yep. we are committed to making it affordable for all of our graduates, and that costs about $181 million a year. that's twice the amount it cost eight years ago because we've ramped up financial aid and the more unemployment there is in this country the more we spend on financial aid, and it would be a tragedy if this country lives in a direction to make education less affordable. so we as a university are very dependent and very concerned about the fiscal health of this country. >> amy gutmann, are you also in the classroom here at the university? >> i do enjoy teaching and i

take every opportunity to meet with students to talk to students and to teach in my spare time. >> how long were you at princeton? >> i was at princeton 28 years from the time i got my ph.d. to the time i came to ten and i was the university faculty of princeton and the provost chief academic and financial officer at princeton said the provost works very closely with the president. >> what is the learning curve on being the president at the university? >> the learning curve is steep for anybody and it's also very exciting. estimate how many students at the university of pennsylvania? >> it has 10,000 undergraduates approximately and 10,000 graduate students. we have about 4500 faculty

members where we have a great school of medicine as well as a great school of arts and sciences and ten other schools. we have 32,000 employees with the largest private employer and the belfield and we like to think of ourselves as ben franklin university. a university which is the least but not a leader, we are not an ivory tower. we believe an integrated knowledge to maximize social impact and we are an economic engine of innovation for our city, for the region, and for the country in the world. estimate is this the of original location in the area? >> we are in the university city in which philadelphia. pennoyer originally started in what was then 83 sluve ball downtown city of philadelphia and moved to west philadelphia and what we call the university

city which helped make into a very vibrant cultural. >> once again come here is the book. the spirit of compromise why government demands it and campaigning undermines it. amy gutmann and dennis thompson are the co-authors. this is book tv on c-span2. from book tv recent visit to providence rhode island author and to the surprise when a journalist michael stanton talks about his book the prince of providence the rise and fall of america's most nefarious -- notorious mayor. >> it's the story of the body anthony, the longest serving mayor in rhode island history.

he was lovable and had transformed the city in providence through a city that was rated in the publications and he also presided over the breathtaking corruption over three different decades that ultimately landed in the present and he's a very colorful character. i called him america's longest act because he would be in the city in the limousine he would have a cup of hot cut in one hand and a cigarette in the other and the key to the city when i set out to write a book about him he was the embodiment of american politics and he

reflected providence as one of the oldest cities to embody the political story. then he grew up in kind of a privileged background brough and he grew up in a private school in the university and became a lawyer, she became a prosecutor in the democratic irish city she then ran for mayor in 1974 and he basically upset the providence democratic machine and became this republicans the nine in the 70's and attracted the attention of the white house gerald ford was the president and he was taken with him and he saw it as a way to kind of anybody with the republicans are trying to capture and it is a vote that is usually democratic but then he had a future role

speaking of the 1976 convention. he was a guy that was seen as potentially going places. he was articulate, she was a champion of the cities and urban renewal, and some people audaciously even said he could be the potential vice presidential candidate order to the u.s. senate where he could have a very long and successful career. but then some problems in sood. of course gerald ford lost the election is an investigation in the 1980's he had characters like jack and bobo running around the city public works department stealing manhole covers and city office fault, cutting all kinds of things selling city trucks to private owners and that sort of thing and then there was corruption

they never got to him because they drafted him out and went to prison themselves, but they were caught up in a personal dispute. he went through a nasty divorce and basically suspected this friend of his who been sleeping with his wife and the heldman prison for several hours and tortured him with a lit cigarette and through an ashtray at a certain point, but that forced the resignation in the 1984 and that seemed like a that was the end of the political career and was only the first act and he spent the next six years on talk-radio he was a talk-show host in 1990 he ran for the mayor again with the slogan that he never stopped

caring for he was elected in a three-way race and he came back and this was the 90's when providence was undergoing this remarkable renaissance and it was being ripped up. as we see now the display on the rivers and the beauty of the architecture and he was a champion of that and he became a really hot mayor. things were going well for him and just as he was celebrating becoming the longest my year in providence history, the corruption and reared its head again and the fbi found this local businessman who had agreed to go undercover in a city hall he wore a wire and have a hidden camera and handled the briefcase and he taped various aides including his top aide taking the bribes of the city offers the contracts and favors and this became known as a federal

fbi case called operation founder bellmon run by an agent named dennis aiken who was originally from mississippi and he had this investigation that resulted in the conviction. >> the city will never get people to convict him. he had 67% of the voters thinking that he had done a good job even though they got he was guilty and when but he was sentenced in jail, they talked about how she was to people, dr. jekyll and mr. hyde. what he was convicted of is racketeering conspiracy but not actually being physically involved in any of the underlining acts. and he kind of frame it.

he became a boss that was able to stay directly out of the line but he knew everything that was going on. she was the kind of guy that said how many rolls of toilet paper there were in the city hall. but he really didn't. so that was the defense but he didn't play out with the journey and he went to prison and relinquished his famous to pay, what he called his dead squirrel. he did his time and went out on talk radio to lead providence has changed a lot to be more

like a queen to uncle you have a round of holidays but most of the people in providence who live here don't live here when he went to prison which is there are a lot of latino voters and strong voters and we have a strong population and choosing the succession the mayor that followed him as the first openly gay mayor of a large american city. david cicilline nei that is now in congress and the mayor that followed him in the city's hispanic mayor reflecting that population. i compare him to huey long in the sense that they're both incredibly charismatic figures. they were both petitions beloved and in spite of their flaws and the corruption that went on in the administration they had a populist evangelical fervor that

spoke to their ability and he was seen as a potential to become a potential presidential candidate and as of the issue since it seems he was seen as somebody that could be a national figure in washington. and in this pivotal moment in a career in the 1970's, he was in his first term as the mayor and there was a seat that opened up in rhode island, and he thought about whether he should run or not and he wound up being outmaneuvered by john who went out to the legendary senate career, and a lot of people think the was a turning point because if he'd gotten out of providence the ultimately to lead him down and that is to excuse his culpability and they've gone to washington where you can be on the national stage. remember he spoke of the republican national convention in 1976. and again in 1980.

he actually went out before the 1990 election he went out and that was ronald reagan and he pitched himself as a potential running mate, and while he was out there he went to palm springs and he visited the jerry ford who had been good friends of his when he was president. and when he was there he also got invited to have dinner of frank sinatra's house. so she's having dinner at frank sinatra's house and tells the story, you know, he sees a picture telling him you're from ryland and that crosscurrent in his life to encounter and the buddy had a kind of an interesting relationship as i wrote this book because the one thing about body the things that matter our power and control, and of course money and she didn't have the control over this book and he didn't get the

money and he couldn't control his legacy and he didn't like some of the things i found about him, but i tried to be fair to him because there are two sides to decline and that is what makes him so compelling. but they wanted to write his own book and he later did a few years ago called politics and pasta to refine going to write my own memoirs and i'm not going to talk she and i'm going to write about my own insight stories. it was a summer afternoon, quiet, and as we were sitting in his office, he starts to you know, say how about you read about your contract with random house and we write a book together. i will get you immediate six-figure advance. how much are you getting? i said i'm not getting that much but i am getting enough to make it fair. it's about more than money to me to tell you a good story.

and he looked at me and he says how could you sell yourself so cheap cracks at that point a thunderstorm started to come around city hall. there was a loud crash of thunder and he said you know, tell him bring this book about me and my inside stories. it's kind of like the founder without lightning. >> this says that american politics is a blood sport. but it's very entertaining. both when he was first elected mayor, she was the republican candidate, he was championed by kind of the upper crust of liberals that lived up on the east side of providence on brown university. they were the eletes, people that didn't need things from city hall that didn't meet patronage or contracts. they were looking for good government. and, you know, he had a political scene even though he was the champion when they were elected he had a good government let's get good government and you come down from, you know,

the college hill when you cross the providence river you have to cut deals and do things like that to get things done. he came in as the mayor the first time and remember he was a republican so she had elected a republican since the great depression. he was the first american mayor in new york city that had been in decades and he had a city council but was committed to his destructions just like the republican congress was committed to barack obama's downfall and his first term and he had to work with those guys and he did work with them and also the machiavellian outlasted them and he outmaneuvered them. they refused to confirm the appointments and then there was the famous massacre they had a meeting because there were three members who had been arrested or indicted or convicted of the crimes such as insurance fraud and fixing races at a local

track. to better use that to kind of enter the two that he took over the city council and they came to town and wrote on the future and said that in the general population if they said something like tendrils some of the province of the city council. the genius was that he could connect with people. he had charm, charisma, she could walk into the room and if there were 100 people there and 99 left and he would go to the one that hated him and when that person over and they believed he could. they would say that he would go to the opening of the envelope and she would just show up in any event and i remember being a young reporter providence journal not covering him at the time, not covered in the city hall and there were other reporters we were sitting in the backyard of the house of drinking beer and he pulls up in his limousine as them a year and she was there for hours.

he was a champion of the providence. it was a downtrodden city. it was really popular. they figure we've always had corruption in the predates him but at least he made us feel good about ourselves. he helped put providence back on the map. so that's why some people loved him. >> senator sheldon whitehouse is next from providence rhode island. this book is on virtues quotations and insight to live a full truly american life. >> we were coming on that dreadful field and passing it in the open ranks in the country. we were ragged and we had no

shoes. there were less than 8,000 with farms and our hands though they were burned still. this is a book that is a somewhat personal and quirky book, but it's one person's look through history and through what people have said in the past to call out things that have meaning that i think still have meaning in the modern life. i collected things i liked from my own views and then as i got more into it i thought this was an america that i could pass on to my children and i ran on to a college friend and he saw the book and he said you know, this is pretty good. you ought to consider publishing it and he knew an agent and it went from there.

so my sore left hand written old book has now been turned into -- and this is my second thing. i started collecting quotes when i was working for the governor, and then when i went on to the u.s. attorney's office, the attorney general's office and so forth, i kept adding to the in the end of the reason was twofold to keep the record distinguished to me. the other was for things i thought would be useful in arguments and debates and discussions to make things like that so the lawyers looking at this book will flip through it and see there are a lot of quotations from the supreme court cases and i try to assemble them into the same sort

of package so that you get the point and you can move on to other things. but there is a piece of this that was about being a better lawyer and advocate as well as being a better person and citizen. in life you don't always succeed but you can try to. when i try to remember something that was and at, and there are examples of courage and of parallels some and faith and strength in a diversity and holding firm through difficult circumstances and implementing them. i quote from isaiah the lord said who shall i send and who should go for us?

here i am, said me. i think the here i am spirit is one that i was brought up with, and i try to show that as a principle that i care about and live by in my own life. i did want to resource that i could go back to that and have things that meant something to me, and it still is that resource. i used the quotes in speeches and the senate when the bush administration was trying to justify its use of torture i used a quote from winston churchill about how it looks good at the beginning, but go down that road and it's bad, and he talks about a staircase leading down and its brightly lit and carpeted at the top and the carpet in this and the tread

feels and it crumbles beneath your feet. that can make a difference in an argument. i am very, very exposed and engaged in rhode island's life, so you know, things like our revolutionary war nathaniel greene saying i get beat, i rise and fight again. good rhode island in the court from the synagogue wrote a letter to george washington asking that it should always be the policy of the united states to give to the persecution of no assistance. washington with a politician's gift for good faith steel's eight out of the letter and writes it back to him to the congregation, and those with a

number of offers are good rhode island history. some of it is a lot more personal. john chafee my predecessor in the senate never said never tease the crocodile until you cross the stream and that is something if you are in the legislative business you don't want to annoy them too much you go on with your business and then whatever else you have to do, so there is a lot of rhode island history and a lot of my experience. that is one of the things in the quote that defines the truly american life is my sense that a truly american life includes being engaged as a citizen, be engaged as a voter, the engaged as a public voice, be engaged in office, in your community. however you choose to do it, i think it's very inherently american to see ourselves as citizens and as having an active and a full role in our

community, our society and our politics. and so, a lot of these quotes focus on that relationship, the structure of the government, how it works. its frustrations from its occasional moments of glory, what people who've spent a lot of time have thought and set about it. i hope the book encourages a little bit of patience with our politics, but also a heightened engagement. what puts - part i hope is not just a reference work. it's not the place you go to look for a quote to open a speech. it's more something that somebody can flip through if they are thinking about issues in their life and if they are worrying about their engagement as citizens, if they are facing some suffering or uncertainty, and i think th