in his entire life and he didn't really take his daughter back for a few years. how do you explain that? >> it's a really complicated relationship that teddy roosevelt had to sadness and death. i mean, when his father died when he was a sophomore at harvard, he felt then that he couldn't go forward. it was the name he said it was closer to than anybody else in my life, and his only way of dealing with was through action. .. think about it. unlike lincoln who said when he lost his 10-year-old son, willie, felt the best way to honor his life was to keep his scrapbooks and every time somebody came in he which of the palm's willie had. we would share stories because he believed he keep the data lives by talking about them. somehow teddy roosevelt different philosophy webzine got to keep moving forward with

something that happens. when his father died he just got involved in activities. when his wife died in the life is gone out, he died he would never marry again, he goes to the badlands and is just on a horse for 10 hours a day. he said finally bit that night because constant activity prevented over thought and then he did come back and eventually marry and have a fulfilling marriage with edith,'s girlfriend and monitor as much as they could've loved anybody. the little girl who was born when his wife died i think represented the dead wife he couldn't remember and didn't want to remember because he had to move forward. it's a terrible thing in some ways. so we did give ally to his sister for a while but edith, the new wife in old friend brought her into the family. in his memoir he never mentioned the name. and comprehensible and just the opposite of somebody who wants to believe the more you talk about the people you loved, the more you keep them alive, he

just had to keep moving forward. when he was ready to go for the roughriders experience of the spanish-american war, he loved edith know much now come of it if she were on her deathbed, you would have to go because that was his mission in life. so there is a hardness in msl is a sentimental side i could never quite figure out. >> explain this. he was a civilian in the spanish-american war goes forward any volunteers to go down there and lead a troop of civilians. how'd that happen? would have no civilians doing that today. did he kind of exaggerate what he did down there and that led to his becoming governor because of the reputation he developed. without a well-deserved reputation? what was he doing leading a similar group of the mountains? >> in those days you really did volunteer for the army and the lady i was so much less a part of our lives.

similarly the civil war. general started out being politicians and then they became generals. so he offered to raise a regiment, which he did. he was under a general at the beginning but eventually when he went up the hill, he did show courage. there is no doubt about that. when he was a child he said he was afraid of everything and the only way to get away from the fear was to do the things you're afraid of. so they are marching up the hill the spanish on the top of the hill being mowed down by bullets because they are going to slow. so he gets on his horse. he's got a red indiana and he moves the true story. he could've been the best target for the bullet and the journalists there writing about him and eventually they do overtake the spanish. so there was rock urged there. there's no question. but also the fact that what touched the country if you are roughriders and they're both cowboys and add guys in the west

and then there's harvard and yale elites. he brought together this motley group and it captured the imagination of the country. >> he gets elected governor, but is targeting seems a little bit to settle on business so they promote him to maybe being vice president under mckinley and then he becomes vice president, but then he didn't enjoy being vice president? what happens to mckinley? >> is being vice president. he was going back to study law. he was so bored. he said at the time you got your being put into a dead end as the vice president was not the stamping point towards the presidency later become. of course mckinley was shot on september 6 of 1901 and it changes the whole treasure hurry of teddy's life and he becomes the thing he would've always wanted to be, the youngest president of the united states.

>> he becomes president at the age of 42. after that time was appointed by mckinley and he was doing a great job fair. but they admit before and had bonded even though they were different. how did they develop a close relationship with roosevelt was president of what did he do with cast in terms of bringing about iraq's >> what happened when they were both in their 30s for the past was solicitor general and teddy with civil service commissioner, they moved near each other. their children were the same age and the use to walk to work together all the time. it's a wonderful thought of the pictures somebody described teddy walk it with all this energy, taft even then listening to teddy who is much shorter and much more energetic, but they developed in part because they saw in each other the things they didn't have. past telling teddy the fighting spirit might not have had. teddy saw a teddy saw it pass the person everybody loves. he was so kind and so gentle and

so good and when he did become governor general the philippines, the very job he wanted, he definitely would've given up the vice presidency in two seconds to become general of the philippines. taft did a good job. they kept writing letters and he finally brings him back to his cabinet as secretary of war as his most important counselor and he becomes really the closest person to him during his president the and when the time comes yesterday about the presidency because he had promised in 1904 after becoming the first term of mckinley then he wins a second term which would've been two full terms almost that he won't write again in 19 away. he would have cut out his tongue to not make that promise because he wanted to stay in the job. instead he has a successor, taft, he thinks groomed for the job and he's given them all sorts of advice. don't play golf. it doesn't look good to the working class. don't get on a horse.

you weigh 350 pounds. it's not good for the horrors. [laughter] incredibly the song at the time which makes no sense was get on a raft with taft. it would be a rather dubious proposition to get on a raft with taft. he was so happy when he won, thinking this is my guy. he will carry up and make us see. then he goes to africa, comes back and begins to question whether taft was the right person to follow him. >> so he goes for about a year. he left his family to go to africa and what did he do in africa? >> you shooting game. a game hunting -- yet all these hobbits of the time he was done partly because he was asthmatic so he became a birder. he later became a hunter. he wrote books. yet more energy and vitality than anyone i've ever written about. so he is collecting things for the smithsonian, but mostly he went away because he knew he had to do some to take away the loss of the presidency.

he loved that job every moment of every day and he had to somehow have excitement and that is what africa matters than it. >> the muckrakers you write about were very influential with roosevelt in a talk to them, listen to them for advice, responded. they supported him, but they turned on taft debate. do you think they're turning on taft is why he turned on taft? >> what happened when teddy was president, what he understood, the one in taft didn't understand, which is the president the past had he defined the word, a bully pulpit to educate the country in the most power in a way the president has and he was brilliant at it. i mean, you would take train rides around the country. six weeks in the spring and fall and he talked about simple language. he said the harvard audis think i talk into folksy language, but i know i reached them. speak softly and carry a big

stick. it summed up his entire administration. he then gave maxwell house a slogan, good until the very next stop. he was able with his relationship, but he was so interesting. he had a mid-a shave. when the barbarous shaving hand, he is answering their questions and they say the barber has to keep up with him as he's moving around. he understood the press was an important channel for him to reach the public and so he would read their articles ahead of time. investigative reporters would be able to criticize him. they would criticize them. ..

>> you owe me one. you have to come and meet me. so taft tried to carry out teddy's progressive legacies. he tried to get a tariff bill through, he tried to deal with making laws out of teddy's orders on conservation, but he hated giving speeches, he waited until the last minute to give a speech. he sometimes said things in the wrong way. he didn't move the congress, and so the presidency was kind of drifting, and the progressives were moving forward, even further forward than teddy was at the time. so there was both his desire to be back in office and his feeling that he had to keep that pressure on the conservative ideology in the country that taft wasn't up to the job that he decided to run against him. >> so he runs against him, and he just barely loses the republican nomination, so he decides to run as an independent on the newly-tomorrowed --

newly-formed bull moose party. and while he is campaigning, he shots. somebody shoots him in the chest. he nonetheless makes the speech even though a bullet is in him. why did he do that? l >> it's just part of him. he was in a car, the assassinitw did shoot him, and it did go into his chest, and they said he can't headache the speech. he says, i have to. he goes into a green room, the o doctor takes his clothes off, he has a big red spot from theis blood, but he says, i can still breathe. i know i'm okay i can still breathe. he says he's going to to give the speech and he goes in and takes the speech out of his pocket and it was like 50 pages of speech, two-hour speech and i was folded over and he realized when he took it out of his pocket that the bullet hole had gone through the speech and it

had also gone through a spectacle glass case which was the only reason he was not killed automatically. so he gives a a speech and he a speech and he starts throwing the pages down finally they keep coming up to him because he's beginning to get woozy. he says i can tell i finish. he says okay take me to the hospital. he's in the hospital for weekend as the sustained the rest of this campaign than i thought he might have had a reaction to the shot but it was i that crazy kind of courage that he showed all of his life that he felt compelled to do. >> he came second in the election. woodrow wilson is elected in 1912. taft came in third. you think i'd have to not become the republican nomination that roosevelt would beat will send? >> guest: yes, do you think so. think roosevelt was still so popular then that i think yes, for sure he would have because roosevelt and taft together got 50% of the vote so i think it would have happened. the sad thing was because he did

this i know, you and i know about this guy. the guy that got so into my emotional head when i was writing this book was a man named archie but who had been a military aide for teddy before becoming a military aide for taft and again for what you look for it as a historian or letters and diaries. this guy wrote letters to his his family of a single danny loves both teddy and taft. he was despairing when it turned out, he stayed on with taft and teddy thought it was fine at first and then went teddy started running against him he felt he was born into and he was so depressed he was beginning to lose some of his vitality so taft said you had better take a vacation. he said okay i'm going to go for a while but i'll be back before this heats up. as it turns out went teddy finally announced that he was running against taft archie but says i can't leave you now. taft says go now, it will be fine, you will be back in time. he goes to europe and comes back

on the titanic and he died. for taft it was yet another blow. he said every time i look in the room i think is coming in. i miss him every single moment but those letters are an absolute treasure in showing how taft especially felt betrayed and saddened by his great friend teddy running against him. >> to me the most poignant part of the book is taft and roosevelt were enemies even though they have been friends for so long so after the election wilson as president. taft and roosevelt don't talk at all and taft tries to talk to roosevelt that roosevelt ignores them and finally they meet by happenstance in a hotel. what happened than? >> i was so happy this happen. what happened is when i finished the book up to 1912 i did not want it ended with a sense of betrayal but i didn't really know what the relationship had been like past that. i followed them in 1914, 15 and 16. people brought them together but taft says it was like an armed

neutrality. in 1918 teddy was in the hospital with an operation that taft had once undergone any work undergone any wrote them a letter saying i know how painful this is an teddy wrote him back. it's often things a little bit so it just happened than some months later by happenstance they were both at the blackstone hotel in chicago and when taft checked in the elevator operator told him roosevelt was in the restroom -- restaurant eating alone. taft said bring me down immediately. he walked over to roosevelt and the whole room, 100 people dining in a broom and he says i'm so glad to see you. they throw their arms around each other and teddy says please sit down and the entire restaurant collapsed. entire restaurant collapse. there's a journalist there to record this. i said yes i have my ending and then what happens is only six months later teddy dies. he's only 60 years old and he dies in his sleep at night and has a private funeral. taft is an honored guest at that

private funeral. he comes and stands at the grave longer than anyone else and tells teddy sister i don't know what i would have done if we hadn't come together before he died. i have loved him all my life. it's ridiculous to say you want a happy ending that you want an ending that sums things up. i couldn't bear the idea of lincoln dying in the end so knowing what mattered to him so much was to be remembered after he died from the time he was young, that was his greatest dream that his story would be told. when i found this incredible interview with tolstoy given to new york newspaper yes it shows he remembered him even then. tolstoy went to a remote area of the caucuses where they were barbarians who had never set foot outside the apartment where they were living so he was excited to have tolstoy. he said i told him about the napoleon and alexander the great but before i finish the chief of

the barbarians stood up and said wait,, you haven't told us about the greatest ruler of the mall. we want to hear about the man who spoke with a voice of thunder and laughed with the sunrise. tell us about man, tell us of lincoln. tolstoy told him everything about lincoln and then said what made them so great after all not a great general not a great statesman. a greatness consisted of the integrity of his character in the moral fiber of his being. then i knew, here's ending ending for that book. your eyes looking somehow to make it to make it all come beyrle -- full circle. >> so, what is your next book going to be? >> right now i'm doing two things. i'm working on what might be potential movies about teddy and taft. they bought the rights for "the bully pulpit" maybe even a miniseries. [applause] i'm trying to think about

muckrakers as a miniseries. a ida tarbell is my favorite character in the idea of this great female investigative journalist and then the relationship between teddy and taft but for a book at this stage of my life i don't think i can afford 10 years on millard fillmore or franklin pearce. there's no big person to go back too easily so i'm bringing all my guys in the room at the same time and i'm going to write about leadership. that's really what i care about underneath it all. [applause] oh thank you. i just started it. >> after you finish that book i hope you will do a great service for america by running -- writing an autobiography about your own life because it's quite extraordinary. thank you. [applause] c-span is going to have questions called in from c-span and c-span will now ask from all

over the country some questions of doris. are you ready? >> host: this is the tvs live coverage of the 14th national book festival. you are still might appear. 20 to 202 is area code if you want to get in line here as well we'll be taking questions from the audience as well for doris kearns goodwin live on booktv on c-span2. (202)585-3890 east and central timezones 585-3891 and for those of you in the pacific timezone and the mountain timezone as well we will begin taking those calls in just a minute. go ahead and ireland. live coverage on booktv on c-span2 and we have people in line. we will begin taking those calls as well. ms. goodwin thank you for joining us here on booktv for another 50 minutes worth of calls from our national audience. let's start with this gentleman right over here in line.

>> the relationship between lincoln and frederick douglass in terms of bringing the end of slavery because we often in a sense celebrate the emancipation emancipation proclamation and remarked that anniversary but in a real sense blacks were not freed until they were behind the union lines, so there is that time in 1864 we are now at the 150 mark when there was a temptation to have a compromise which would preserve slavery in the south and not bring the freedom that frederick douglass would want. i guess he was becoming even critical of lincoln in public. so they would have at least two meetings that i know of. >> the meetings between p. and abraham lincoln are extraordinary historical moment.

douglas was the agitator and wanting to move lincoln further. he was the head of the movement and lincoln had to be the political man figuring out how far can i go planned. some of their early meetings i think there was some tension between them but eventually douglass came to a great respect for lincoln and once he finally opened the doors to african-americans to come in as soldiers douglas played a big role in mobilizing them to come into the army. he was upset that they weren't getting the same pay and the same privileges as the whites and they talk to lincoln about that but the great moment really occurs in 1864 when the election of november is coming up and it's august. you are absolutely right to republican politicians are coming to lincoln and they are saying to him the only way you are going to win this election because the north is so weary of this war and there are so many people that have died is to get

this out to the bargaining table and have peace talks and the only way they will do that is if you promise to compromise on slavery. he will still get the union if you compromise on slavery but no way was even thinking about that. in fact he said i will be in eternity if i turn my back on the black soldiers. he turned those politicians out without a second thought. they thought he would lose the election. he thought he would lose the election possibly but it didn't matter. that was his moment of conviction and what happens is despite the despair in the country about the way the war was going sherman takes atlanta and in september the whole mood changes. he wins the election and who does he want the most at his second inaugural but frederick douglas? he brings a man in the first person he says to what did you think of my inaugural, is your opinion i want want. douglas said mr. president if it was a sacred efforts of that relationship between the agitator and the politician had its moments of tension but in the end was an extraordinary positive thing for the men.

>> let's take another question from the audience right over here. >> hi. i was interested that you met with barack obama and of course i know he read team of rivals. i wish you would have read the roosevelt book because my biggest frustration with barack obama has been his lack of using "the bully pulpit." i mean i feel whether it's health care or syria or any other issues it seems during elections to have that ability to be verbal and inspire people and then you know i just miss that from his presidency. why do you think that is some also i wish you would eventually do a book about him because i think he has a head full of interesting ideas. >> you know it's a very interesting question i think to ask, to what extent is "the bully pulpit" today as powerful as it was in earlier times? when you think about it when lincoln was speaking to the contrary, the written word was

king so the fact that he was such a good writer was very important because the speeches would be pamphlet sized and everybody would read the full speech in the newspaper. if obama were in that time it would have been more suited for him because when you read his speeches they often read better than sometimes the delivery because the teleprompter hasn't been friendly with him in a certain sense and by the time teddy roosevelt came along he was perfect for the technology at this time because he was able to speak in a colorful language that made headlines. fdr comes on an age of the reader with the perfect conversational voice and then reagan and jfk are writes for the age of television. what happens now is even when a president gives a speech on mike earlier times when only three networks would cover it they would break away for pundits sometimes like myself criticizing the speech before it's half over. you are only watching your favorite channel and they only hear parts of the speech. breaking news comes in within minutes so it's harder to

sustain a conversation now on an issue but i also do think the lessons of teddy roosevelt a speaking simply and explaining things over and over and over again when he went out on those train trips and i wish obama would go out in the country more and talk in little village stations and get the message simply especially on health care to have explained in the first place what it meant to the country might have taken some of the rumors about it away. so i think it's harder in this day and age and i think that's part of it but i think learning how to use "the bully pulpit" and get out of the white house more. it's harder again with all the vices that take place but to be out in the country is the key and that is what teddy did. on those train trips it was incredible. he would stand for hours waiting and waving to people just so they could see their president. even one moment when he was disappointed because he was waving at a group of people and they didn't respond in any way

until he found out there was a herd of cows. [laughter] i think there are lessons to be learned about speaking simply, saying your message over and over again, using metaphors that people understand whether the arsenal of democracy or the fire hose or the square deal in knowing you have to reach the masses of the public, not just with the words that you use that might sound better but may not stick as much. >> we are here in washington d.c. in the next call comes from san diego. this is david in san diego. hi david. doris kearns goodwin. >> caller: good evening. i enjoyed all of your books. i wanted to ask you if you have ever thought, ever given any thought to writing a history

book for high school or even elementary because you have an actor bringing history alive. it's not something that most people -- young people today understand. >> thank you so much for that question. in fact one of my sons michael goodwin is a history teacher and an english teacher and so we have talked about the importance of having history at that level be brought to kids. once you capture them then, for the rest of their lives they will love history. they may not become an historian and he has done a wonderful job in our town in concord. we have all those sites, those revolutionary war sites in all the literary people al alcott and thoreau and emerson. he has created this experiential semester long program where he takes the kids out to all the sides during the semester long program and they become lovers of not only history that anguish and even math science and art because he shows how it all

comebacks -- connects. education is the most important thing still in this country for opportunity. when we worry about what's happening in the inner cities and when we worry about the fact a lot of a lot of people don't have the same opportunities that they do even in other countries that they are not getting out of poverty education is the key. that's only one piece of it to make it love in high school the subject has to start much earlier and make them love school. america's democracy depends on it. it's the most important thing. [applause] >> i just wanted to thank you for writing your book about the brooklyn dodgers and explaining, explaining how about you and your father closer together. my father gave that book to me in brooklyn. he gave it to me shortly before he died and that it brought us closer together so thank you. [applause] i cannot thank you enough for

that. thank you so much. what happened is ken burns did a documentary on the history of baseball and came to interview me and it was a lot about the brooklyn dodgers and the red sox, these two teams that almost always one but almost always lost in the end. these beloved teams so i'd saw this program. somebody asked me whether you write about a? i never would have thought about writing a memoir and it meant so much to me because my parents died when i was young. my mother died when i was just 15 and my father died when i was in my 20s. i had never really gone back to my hometown. i eventually grew up in long island but the book allowed me to go back home and meet my old friends again. most importantly i spend my life bringing peace presence to live to bring my father and mother back to life and bring this team that we loved so much, the dodgers, back to life. as i is that a thousand times the way i think i love history was from my father teaching me when i was six years old the

mysterious art of keeping score while listening to baseball games so i could record the history of the afternoon's brooklyn dodger game. he comes home at night without letting me know he even knows what the score is and of course he does. i recount every played every inning. he makes me think i'm telling a fabulous story. i'm convinced i learned the narrative of art because i would blurt out the dodgers one of the dodgers lost. there was too much drama in the two hour telling away. i learned you have to tell the story from beginning to middle to end. i have boys and i love the red sox. i sometimes go to those games imagine i'm a younger with my father. it means that's how you keep memories alive. i am sure you being close to your data and talking to him again talking to them again he's alive at this moment just like my parents were when i i wrote that book so thank you so much. [applause]

>> phil you are on with the doris kearns goodwin. >> caller: i want to thank you very much for making history come alive. it wouldn't be the same if you hadn't written your incredible books. i have one question related. between the two crucial events between lbj, jfk and lincoln who do you think felt the most stress link lincoln with the emancipation act or jfk with the cuban missile crisis and lbj dealing with vietnam all important in the history of the u.s.. >> whoa that's an incredible question. i think lincoln later said that if he had ever known the stress that he would be under from the time he was elected in november of 1868 to fort sumter in the middle of april of 61 he wouldn't have felt he could have lived through it. the idea that the country was

splitting apart, that he might be the last president of the union, that he had to make a decision about whether to put re-provisions of fort sumter he couldn't have imagined he could have withstood the pressure. i think the only way he did in some ways was that he had known adversity all of his life and come to so many failures and difficulties before that there were some deep inner confidence. i suspect in some ways nothing quite matches that. probably that moment of the cuban missile crisis decision when jfk has to decide what he's going to do and he knows a nuclear war might have been a possibility, those 13 days that bobby kennedy talked about probably pretty much equal the sum of what lincoln was but maybe not quite as much. probably the most emotional pressure that somebody felt was lbj. think about it, we are now celebrating so much of what he did in those first years of his presidency.

the civil rights act, ending segregation in the south of voting rights act providing the precious right to millions of black americans open housing medicare aid to education and public television. he had a legacy almost unequaled up to his great hero fdr and then got into vietnam and watched in those last years of his life that legacy being cut into and not knowing how to get out of vietnam and getting stuck in it and getting worse an

>> some insacred bl questions that no one's ever asked me before, so you did it. >> host: next question over here. >> caller: thank you very much for your wonderful work. i can't think of anybody who has greater insight into the presidency, the use of presidential decisions, choosing assistance to lead you through it. and i wonder if you've ever thought of yourself becoming a leader of the country, because can't think of think about whorl field be better.a le >> guest: well, thank you.yb >> like a combination of all the greatest presidents you'veion researched. [laughter] >> guest: if i were younger. when i was young, i did think about going into public life. because i think still however we may disparage politicians nowadays given the dysfunctionk of our legislature in washington, there is still p something so rewarding about

being in public life and knowing that you can make a difference for people. and i love being with people be, so i know i'd love all that pary of it. being with people so i know i would love that part of it but not having done it when i was younger just means those experiences that you had hoped to gain over time of leading and knowing what it's like to take that responsibility, one thing that's in my head and i'd like to believe i would know what to do but i think probably at this age if i had started 50 years ago it might have been something i would have loved to do. but i think now i had better just stick to writing about it and hopefully giving advice to other people who might be taking it on. hopefully the best result of people reading these histories like when i was signing books there were some young people who came to the line who say they begin to like history through summaries. if they not only began to like history but going to public life and want to do something in this country than i will feel i

really have -- the next generation. >> we want to acknowledge our public officials james billington the longtime librarian of congress right here in the front row. [applause] and the next question for doris kearns goodwin comes from glenn in freehold michigan. hi glenn. it's this. >> caller: thank you all very much. my question is about the national media then and now. back then there was the spanish-american war and warned that teddy roosevelt was -- and 100 years later we had the iraq war and we will probably be getting back into that again soon. my question for you with the muckrakers a lot of the national

media is -- for whoever's in power. [inaudible] >> thank you sir. we got the point. >> i think it's both better and worse. it's hard to know. you are right to the tablet influence on the spanish-american war when those mass-market newspapers are coming out really did get us into war that maybe there was no real reason for us to get into. on the other hand the muckrakers that i wrote about were a very different brand of journalists and they investigated their subjects weather was standard oil or the railroad abuses or meatpacking plants with such integrity that their story still stands up today. the worry i have a twin then and now is that those stories that they wrote wrote were red and gobbled up by people, 10,000

word stories in magazines and they would become part of the conversation. today i don't know who would be supporting investigative reporters for two years as mcclure did to do that real research. they wrote it would we be reading it given the attention span that is so fragmented today where people are not even reading the full newspapers much less magazines and they are reading blogs on facebook. i don't know we would be able to have sustained long conversations about butter issues in the public are. entertainment gets into issues and it's not just the media's fault. it's our fault. i think of spectators today but it's really critical especially now as we face this potential threat with isis. if we are going to get deeply involved were more deeply involved there has to be a national dialogue. it has to be a congressional debate about it. we have to really understand what it's all about. half of us don't know exactly what's going on.

this is what fdr did so well in those years leading up to world war ii. he knew there was an isolationist sentiment in the country that he thought he had to be involved in what's happening in europe. step-by-step the educated us through peacetime draft to the lend lease program until finally even before pearl harbor we were beginning to mobilize. if we are going to get involved and engaged in these places around the world we have to know a lot more than we did when we went into iraq. we often know more if we are going to get above the middle east with what's going on. that's part of journalists responsibility that part of our leaders but the person in the congress to get a big debate going before we flowed into something that we don't want to get into. [applause] >> thank you both for your books but also just your presence in the way you speak with the audience is really wonderful.

you have looked at the president in the 19th century in the 19th century in the 20th century and now in the 21st century. for the first time we may at some point have a woman as president. what does that mean as you think about this book on leadership? how might it be different? what are the lessons they would take and what would be different for them? >> it's a great question that i'd love to be able to think about. in fact in the book on leadership that i'm going to be working on right now i think i'm going to have a separate chapter on eleanor roosevelt just because in a certain sense she got her power originally from her husband's position then after he died and she could afford to be when he was in power much like frederick douglass the agitator constantly pressuring him to do more than he could do. he had to be political and pragmatic and once he died she had to incorporate into herself a politician in the agitator. she became a figure in her own

right the way that a woman president would be now. i have been reading studies from harvard business school on the differences in female leadership and male leadership. they still talk about females being more collaborative, more emotional intelligence at some point but the dual problem that women have if they are to competent and they are aggressive they are looked down upon. if they are too kind they are looked down upon for being weak so how to forge themselves with the strength that women have from not having been in power for long time and from being collaborative and working with families and being the smoother overs without losing that decisiveness that they need is going to be interesting as more and more women get into power. all i can say is versus a country it certainly is about time. we are so far behind the entire world. [applause] >> this is his booktv on

c-span2. doris kearns goodwin the 14th annual national book festival. kelly and lost all of those california you are on the air. >> caller: thank you so much for your presentation. the question i was looking at a target announced that i want to say thank you for the response you gave to point to go about the importance of what's going on in the world today and the need for us as active as to speak out and voice the problems that we see. thank you. >> you are very welcome. in fact it's interesting the clue or the guy i wrote about in "the bully pulpit" what he was concerned about citizenry and the importance of activism. he said in the end it's down to all of us and without citizens taking on an active role in our country we despair over what's happening in washington, the

dysfunction of the legislature and tribal problems with one another. we despair over money and politics which i think is the poison in the system. if i were younger that's what i would be doing is leading a constitutional amendment to get money out of the system. [applause] it's all up to us and we can't wait for somebody else to do it. >> i want to take it back to "the bully pulpit" for a minute. you talk about technology being a factor in president's ability to harness "the bully pulpit" lets say and what occurs to me that the last democratic president is that they were so brilliant in their campaign in harnessing "the bully pulpit" and had such a difficult time as president is doing the same thing. why do you think that is? is easy to say it's much easier to run a campaign than it is to rule but how was it that people who seem so proficient and brilliant at it as they are

campaigning for office seemed to lose that ability completely want to get into office? >> it's an important thing to try to understand. part of it is that when you are campaigning you get energy back from the people, and so it's not just a question of you saying things. you are feeling vibrations from the people and what happens is when they get into the white house they get too cordoned off. they see people but they don't have that same energy that comes from seeing them every day the way they do in a campaign. then they get in a teleprompter in the teleprompter is a pretty cool device. people like reagan who had been an actor before knew exactly how to do it to make it seem like was most of them, i think, feel compelled to read from a real script because they're so afraid they might say something wrong. a gaffe becomes the thing that everybody talks about. but it means there's spontaneity that's lost that's there during

a campaign. and it's almost like they have a girdle on them when they speak before a teleprompter, and they lose some of that naturalness which is, again, why i think those addresses from the oval office, much as they may be necessary at times, it would be so much better if the presidents got out, and they were in trains, and these speeches are being given in front of people. each when f -- even when fdr gave these fireside chats, he had people there so he could pretend that he was actually talking to them even though he was talking to the people in their living rooms. so i think somehow they have to keep that vital connection with the country, and the white house still has become too insulated from all of our recent presidents other than their campaigning. and i think that's part of the difference besides, you're right, it's easier to promise in a campaign than to make decisions and have to explain them when there's people who don't like you, etc., etc. but there's something about

losing that connection to the public. that's why lincoln was so great. every morning he had people come in who were ordinary people, and they could just talk to him about whatever they wanted, and after a while his secretaries said, lincoln, you don't have time for these ordinary people. he said, you're wrong. if i ever forget the popular assemblage from which i come, i will lose my strength. and i think that's what they lose in the white house. and when they lose that, they lose their ability to communicate in the same way they did when they were on the road. [applause] >> host: calling in from newport news, virginia. jim, you're on the air. >> caller: yes. my question is what is the most fascinating thing you learned about abraham lincoln? >> guest: you know, i guess, you know, i knew that he was a great statesman, but this isn't a thing, but i don't think i realized what a great politician he was. and that was the great pleasure in seeing how he was able to

deal with people, seeing how he was able in the middle of, you know, a tough cabinet meeting to reach over and tell a funny story and make people laugh, how he sensed the mood of the country and sensed what was happening, had a great sense of timing, knew when to do what. i mean, those were political instincts that, you know, somehow when you see him, you think of him as this wooden figure because of the pictures. in those days when you take pictures, they can't even smile because they're clamped to a back. the only way to get their pictures taken, their head was clamped to a chair. i had no idea how funny he would be, i had no idea how much i would enjoy laughing with him every day because we know he had that sad temperament. i think it was so pleasing to tell those stories that he would laugh so hard that he would be convulsed with laughter, and so would the people. i remember once when i was on

colbert or stewart, and i said to them -- and it's true -- if he were atoday -- alive today, he would be that quick, that funny, and i wouldn't have guessed that before i started. humor and laughter is such an extraordinary emotion. it makes people better. it makes them relaxed. it makes them last longer. and lincoln had that side of him that i was not as of aware of, and it was pretty great. >> host: let's go to this gentleman. >> was taft just as vigorous as teddy roosevelt in his trust busting? >> guest: yes. taft was even more vigorous than teddy in his trust busting. taft really did believe that -- [inaudible] itself was a problem. teddy really felt that you should bust the corporations that were not living by the rules of the game, but he didn't think -- and this is one of the debates we're having today -- that bigness alone was a problem unless they were using unfair,

unethical means to gape their power -- to gain power than their competitors. he really believed in the importance of keeping small business and keeping the vitality of the business world going by not letting large corporations swallow up too much. and i don't think it's been given enough credit for that side of him, because that was a very strong part of him. >> host: the next question comes from diane in walnut creek, california. go ahead, diane. >> caller: hi, doris. i just want to thank you for "the bully pulpit," and i've got a lot of reading to catch up with. [laughter] i loved it so much, and i have to read everything you've written. the question is about nelly taft. i thought she was fascinating, and i thought it was sad in a way that she was so strong that she prevented it taft from doing what he loved to do and what he would have been so very good at.

do you have some further thoughts about her? have you made any personal judgments about her? >> guest: this is so interesting that you ask about nelly, because i think, actually, she's one of the more intriguing first ladies that i've read about or learned about. here's a young girl growing up this cincinnati who has dreams when she's young of having her own ambitions realized, and yet her brothers go to harvard and yale, and her parents tell her she's supposed to come out in society. and even then she just loves going to the local bars and talking to working class people and wanting to do something herself. she becomes a teacher and thinks she'll never get married because she wants to have the sense of layoff. she just was born too early in a way. but then she meets young will taft, falls in love with him and knows she will be his partner because he tells her, i need you. and he is stronger in some ways, she certainly loves politics more than he does. and your question rightly

suggests that at certain times he was offered a job on the supreme court which he'd wanted ever since he was on a child in the way. at first he felt he couldn't leave the philippines, and then he knew he was in line for the presidency which she really wanted, so he turned those jobs down and did become a political candidate more probably in some ways to please her and to please teddy roosevelt than to please himself, and that was part of the problem. but then, sadly, you wonder what would she have become as first lady had she not had a stroke months into the presidency. she already had started doing things for working class people. she brought the cherry blossoms to washington, she opened potomac park for people who could come for concerts at night free, and she had great thoughts for what she would be a public perp. and then though never having been unhealthy, suffered a terrible stroke into his presidency within months and was never able to speak in a connected sentence again. and when i think about what

happened to taft's presidency, it's not simply that he wasn't a public leader, that he didn't know how to speak to the public and use the bully pulpit, but he loved this woman so much that he spent hours and hours with her trying to teach her to speak again so she could be at public receptions and say glad to see you, happy you're here, and it shadowed his entire presidency, without a question. luckily for taft, much later in 1921 he does get appointed supreme court chief justice, and the last decade of his life he's probably happier than he's ever been before. he said, i forgot that i was president. and i think nelly realized in those last years that this is what he wanted. but it's not like she didn't want it only for herself, i think she honestly thought he'd be great at it without absorbing fully that unless you love that job, presidency's hard enough unless you love and want to be in the limelight and want to be the decision maker, it's going

to be a really rough time as it turned out for taft. but finally he becomes a really respected and beloved chief justice of the supreme court. >> thank you for answering these questions, dr. goodwin. you've already touched on this quite a bit, especially you talked about how teddy roosevelt and other presidents were able to harness the media in order to get their messages across to the american public. but i was wondering what it was about that time, the teddy roosevelt's time as president, that led to such a growth in investigative journalism, and in addition to that i was wondering what you thought of in our current time we see media democratizing to a great extent. but at the same time, that's undermining to some ec tent investigative journalism. how do we keep investigative

journalism alive in our country today and also how might leaders harness the new media in order to reach the people? >> guest: those are really important questions, i think. i mean, i think what happened at the turn of the century is a lot of people who went into journalism were already being affected by the mood of reform that was spreading not just in journalism, but it was in churches, it was in the academic world, it was this the settlement houses. there was a common sense that something had to be done about the problems of the industrial order to, and they all came from a place where they wanted to have an impact. and so journalism became the place for them. and then once you get a group of journalists, as there were at this one magazine, who become so respected and they become national figures, then more magazines want to do it, and it has a multiplier effect.

in some ways, that was the subtitle of the book, "the golden age of journalism." there's still the tabloids out there, but this group is lionized in history still. and, clearly, there are people who still go into journalism with that desire today. and in some ways perhaps even though i talked earlier about the diminishing attention span that our common internet brings to us, it also is a platform for people that allow their stuff to get out there with less cost perhaps once their job is done and reach more people, the social media people. just as long as you've got the integrity of the process of the investigative journalism. and we do have places, you know, propublica's there, there are laces that are doing these things -- places that are doing these things. i just think we need a hot more of it, and we need the credibility that when we read these stories, the facts are such we can't just look at them in a partisan lens and say we

don't just like this newspaper, we have to believe it. they have to be that hard hitting as these guys were at that time where you couldn't deny the facts they were producing. >> host: joe, staten island, new york. iraq? [inaudible] >> host: do you know what? if we could put joe aside, i'm sorry about the -- >> guest: yeah. something's in the air. >> host: it's not very clear. we'll go to this young lady over here. >> oh, i love you for saying i'm young, thank you. [laughter] my name's carrie, i am a real investigate ior, and i am a real journalist. >> guest: hooray. >> but i'm so happy, you're being tag teamed accidentally. social media has changed our world. every pda we have, every moment is now a potential public embarrassing moment. my focus, though, is the intellectual property and the theft of what we create. and how it's taken, and we're not compensated.

i'd love to have you opine on that, please. >> guest: i wish i could, but i'm not sure i know what you mean. so give me an example. >> your book is reproduced overseas, loss of income, your alias, your identity is taken, infringements of your right of privacy. >> guest: well, i mean, there's no question that these copyright things and publishers are going to have to keep up with the times, you're absolutely right. i mean, what was so much simpler to protect in an earlier time. and you're right, when books get into other languages, sometimes we don't even know that they've been sold to those countries and they're there. and i don't know enough about what the answer is, but i think vigilance at that time and authors are banding together in all sorts of ways right now for what's going on, and they need to know more than i know, because your question raises a problem that i haven't thought about, and i should.

>> host: doris kerns goodwin's publisher is simon & schuster, and she dedicates the book to her publisher -- >> guest: and, indeed, simon and schuster today, those people i sign books for, the aperback edition -- paperback edition isn't even coming out for a couple of weeks, so this is its first baptism at this very place today. >> good oning, and thank you for being so gracious with your time. >> guest: oh, i'm glad to. >> if you were to write about president obama, what would be your central theme and why? >> guest: i guess one to have reasons why it would be hard for me now to write about him is i need the distance of time to be able to read the stuff of the moment. like, i'd need to know the memoirs of the people who were working with him. i'd need to see the letters that he wrote. i'd need to put in perspective

where the health care thing is going to be 20 years from now, need to understand more about winding down those wars in iraq and afghanistan or whatever's happening now that i can't see at the moment -- which is the only reason why, except for my relationship with lbj which i felt the need to try and capture, because it was so intense and so emotional at the time -- i haven't been able to write about anybody recent. so i think, you know, if i were to live, you know, a couple decades from now, it would be a fascinating period to write about. i mean, first of all, obviously, no matter what the fact that we broke that barrier and the fist african-american became -- first african-american became president will be a shining moment in our history. and i know him somewhat well. i've been able to have a series of historians' dinners. we do once a year my fellow historians, mccullough or mr. brand from texas or doug

brinkly, edmund morris, and we come as our historians and give him advice. and it's really been fun to watch him absorb those past lessons of history. and so i think as a person i've read his, obviously, his autobiography which was extraordinary, and i suspect when he writes his own memoir, it will be something. but it will have to be some younger historian looking back 20 years from now, i think, that will capture him fully. maybe you. [laughter] >> host: john's calling in from san diego. john, you're on the air. >> caller: yes, good afternoon, ms. goodwin with. i read your book also regarding your growing up in brooklyn and your love for your father and the great brooklyn dodgers. as you know, the personality of that whole team was the great jackie robinson, and i don't think there's ever been a definitive biography on him. i'm wondering if you would ever take up