>> lincoln scholar harold holzer reports that lincoln was defendant at using the press to push his political agenda but quick to censor papers he deemed disloyal. >> so, enough about the business of the national archives. let's talk about the business of tonight. it's my pleasure to introduce the two speakers you'll hear from this evening. first, harold holzer, who is a lead are authority on lincoln and the civil war. he is chairman or the abraham lincoln bicentennial organization. honored for his work he has earned second place lincoln prize for "lincoln at keep union" in 2005, and in 2008 was awarded the national humanities medal. he is senior vice president at the metropolitan museum of art.

joining him will be frank bond. frank has produced award-winning document riz on topics ranging from the role of the press in the civil rights movement and the berlin wall. on issues like bias in the media, -- there's none of that, is there -- n two buy graph wall sketches of juniorism. frank was a member of the team that created the museum's new museum gallery an interactive look at the role of media in journalism today. so without further adieu i'm delighted to yield the stage and podium to our guests, harold and frank. please join me in welcoming them to the stage. [applause] >> good evening. and welcome because tonight's program is going to prove to you

that history can be as enticing and sizzling and dramatic as anything netflix can serve up even holiday house of cards." just have to know where to find the stories and then how to tell them and harold certainly does that. in fact, harold help us at the museum with an upcoming exhibit "president lincoln is dead." we'll talk about president lincoln, and his feelings and workings with the press, with newspapers at the time. i think it's important to set the stage by describing the landscape for the spread of news and information in the time of lincoln. that's going to provide a context for really understanding the roles and practices of newspapers and their relations to politics and the people. so first the basic question, how was news moving in and out of washington and at that time, what had the biggest flow from the capital out to the states or from the states into the

capital? >> not surprisingly, from the east coast out and that held true for new york city and from washington, dc. official newspapers of the administration existed for every presidential administration from jefferson through lincoln. naturally i haven't investigated past lincoln so i don't know. their official newspapers carried the word in their editions and then they were copied at first through the mail and then by telegraph so the official information got to newspapers around the country. so definitely these big -- these two big east coast centers of news, new york just by virtue of being the media capital, and washington by virtue of being the capital. >> just to die jess that niece newspapers would wear on their sleeves -- talk about bias in

media today -- eye am a democrat voice or a republican voice, and what sorts of issues did that just come to the fore and people knew which newspaper they would read and listen to. >> imindicate to the fore in everything from election to dog catcher. they -- the famous example of a low-level elected official to president of the united states. newspaper writing and editing and politics were completely intertwined during the lincoln era, from the time lincoln decided to become a politician in the 1830s, through his presidency. and editors were politics. politicians were editors. we can talk later about lincoln's brief foray as a newspaper publisher himself in illinois, which is a pretty bizarre story. the connections were just so

deep and added to that is the fact that people went around carrying a newspaper that is openly signaled their political affiliation. worn as proudly as -- i used to say as we wear meaning you and i -- if it's not done today but wore campaign buttons in our day. touting our support for one candidate or another. if you carried the "new york tribune" under your arm in new york city in the 1850s it was a given that you were a republican and that you were antislavery. if you carried the "new york herald" under your arm it was a given you were a democrat and didn't care much about the institution of slavery, and if you had to choo between union and slavery or business and slavery, slavery would get the second level. people wore it proudly, as proudly as they voted. people were not voting in a pure secret ballot condition in the

civil war era. people voted by streaming to the polls, seeing if people would be comfortable with this today when we cherish our secret ballot when president obama is trying to vote and people are saying don't -- don't kiss my girlfriend, or whatever that was about. but it was even more open and more raucous in the lincoln era. you picked up your ballot before you got inside the polling place, and people off erred you either a republican ballot or democratic ballot. blue ballot or red ballot. so everybody knew who would you vet for, and then you deposited the ball president in gigantic glass bowls. so besides which you were carrying your newspaper around up to for weeks before that so people got it. >> so, at this point, the central government was becoming more powerful than ever in context of america, and by extension, i'm guessing this means that those newspapers were becoming more powerful as well.

>> well, the central newspapers were becoming more pearl for several reasons. the washington ones because if you had a official status from the administration you got the inside scoop. you got the story first the president's statement first, or down to the mayor of washington's statement. when lincoln got to congress the mayor of washington was the editor of the whig paper, and that is -- this is not atypical in that period. the new york papers the tribune, the herald, and later in 1851, "the new york times," had national editions, and these national adoptions circulated all -- national editions circulated all over the country and made the tribune and herald particularly powerful national engines for political thought. >> let's tuck about the men behind them. start with horace agreeley, who famously said go west but that wasn't until after the civil

war. here's a newspaperman who was very muff steeped in many of the issues of the day, whether it's encouraging women to pursue women's rights abolition, that sort of the thing. tell me about horace greeley and the influence he had. >> when i began this project i wanted to fall in love with horace greely. unfortunately as i progressed in the research and then writing i realitiesed he was -- i realize it hi was -- i don't know how to put it -- inconstant. he could not support an issue for more than 45 minutes without moving to the next issue itch don't know -- he had some sort of institutional add. he was a crusader. and he was a genius about promoting himself. the think abolition was a key issue for him for the greater part of his life.

when you get to to the civil war era he is willing to throw lincoln in and cancel emancipation for peace in a weak moment. so greely total american average, as familiar to people by himself appearance almost as lincoln was when lincoln became elected. wore battered hats white linen caughts down to his ankles. would walk around new york city with his trousers in one boot and then the other trouser leg was outside of the boot. papers falling another of his pocket wander from one side of the street to another. people would meet him and say mr. greely, where are you off to? and he wouldn't remember. i don't know if it was an act or he was general lynn win absent-minded. but in addition to women's rights, which was dangerous when he began advocating it, he was a big advocate of brand cereal. vegetarianism, spiritualism,

utopian socialism, he lived in a house where there was no smoking, no drinking, no eating meat. people would go out of their shocks -- the way the environment in which he lived. but, again, wildly popular influential. he had several moments in the civil war where he buckled. after bull run and as the 1864 re-election of lincoln, 150 years ago, this month i think greely was reliably supporting abraham lincoln as any republican editor would, but a month and a half before he had again off the reservation. that's my greely summary a character and sort of lovable. add one other thing not to bee labor greely. i feel like i must apologize for not loving him. he and abraham lincoln had so much in common. both, is a point out at the

begin of the book, both began their adult journeys the same year in the same season, under the same circumstances. practically walking from their parents' home, or in greely's case from his first job, to their -- each man's new headquarters in life, alone on foot allegedly both carrying all their belongings in a kerchief kid to a string. they were both born in log cabins. they both escaped or endured the dep privilege racings of their -- -- they met at a convention once and then met in congress. greely was the wad correspondent and the congressman at the same time, they just never hit it off. always something that kept them from being allies.

and that was unusual for lincoln because he courted newspaper men the way -- well, i'll leave it at that. >> two more character is want you to describe because these other characters really helped to define lincoln. help to us understand what we -- i'll try to be briefer. >> henry raymond of "the new york times" and his connections to the republican party and abraham lincoln. >> well, this is a -- the typical politician editor of the mid-century period. he was a young man who loved newspapers as well, tried desperately to get horace greely to notice him when greely was commuting to albany, new york our state capital, to put out a campaign newspaper, which he needed to provide money to sustain his newspaper in new york city. greely final hi hired him for the "new york tribune," and

raymond was very talent very hard working, very dogged very capable and was soon the managing editor but greely was a cheapskate, among his many gifts, and railed told him i can't take it, join another newspaper, ultimately got backing from the williams seward faction, republican new york politics founded "the new york times" in 1851. he would be less prone to faddish causes and distractions more hewn to the party dogma than horace greely. greely was furious. anyone who carried "the new york times" will not carry the tribune, and then the news boy said okay. and he said didn't mean it exactly that way. anyway, raymond was speaker of

the new york state assembly when he was managing editor of another paper in new york. a member of the assembly and lieutenant governor of new york while he was editor of the "new york times." that beats even greely, and here is 150 years ago if you were alive 150 years ago you would have sea henry raymond has done the hat trick. he is editor of the "new york times," chairman of the republican national committee, and he is running for congress as a republican from manhattan in new york city. and just in his spare time, he writes a campaign biography of abraham lincoln about 700 pages of lincoln's speeches with commentary, which is the equivalent of campaign biographies where are very important in the 1850s and '60s so that's the equivalent of actually producing the television commercials for the candidate. so that's all in a day's work for the editor of "the new york