around, i might have got here on my own. each week at this time, american history tv features an hourlong conversation from c-span's a sunday night interview series "q and a," here's this week's encore "q and a" on american history tv. >> this week on "q and a," stories from the history of the senate with richard baker who has just retired senate historian after 34 years on the job. >> dick baker, when you had the reception in the senate for your good-bye as senate historian, what did they give you? >> they gave me a framed senate

resolution that designated me forever and ever senate historian emeritus. so i did some research to find out since there has never been a senate historian emeritus, where is the office space, what about parking, what about an i.d. card. i'm still doing the research, but it was a great honor and i will cherish it to my dying day. >> yeah, but they gave you something else. >> they also agreed to open the senate chamber galleries during the time that the senate is not in session. that has always been the case for 142 years until 9/11, and as one of the unfortunate consequences, of the many unfortunate consequences of 9/11, the galleries were closed when the senate was not in session. so, i had a quiet campaign to try to get that reversed. followed the historical pattern. and so apparently what they did

as a gift was to agree to open the galleries during the month of august, turns out the house galleries are being closed for renovation during that month so it worked out very well, so i'm hoping, you know, hope of all hope that theyies will continue to stay open when the senate is in recess during the hours that the capitol building is open. one disgruntled tourist some years ago said to me, i don't care if they are in session, i just want to see where they spend my money. it's like looking into grand canyon, i want to see where they operate. i remember the days when i used to come in there, even when i first came to washington as a student, just going in and sitting in the empty chamber gallery and just kind of listening to a tour guide explain in great detail what goes on there, so i hope we can bring that back. >> in the end that would mean -- the house had their galleries open during recesses when they weren't in session. what was the reason? >> i don't know. i have no idea. >> how do you quietly campaign

to open the galleries up? >> well, you mention it to various people who might be interested, and many of them are almost uniformly they say this is outrageous. why would they do that? why would they reverse 142 years of precedent, of openness which is key to the senate's very fiber in most cases. and so, you know -- but it's just a matter of getting it all together. so, i'm hoping that, you know, the occasion of my retirement will perhaps spur this on to make it a permanent arrangement, and it perhaps will be. we'll see. >> we've talked many times on this network over the years and people at the network have seen you before, to get down to the basics. what was your first day as senate historian? >> september 2nd, actually, 1975. and my boss, the secretary of the senate, frank valeo, hired me. other people applied for the job, and i had worked previously

for the senate, so maybe i had a little leg up, but he said go do whatever it is that historians who work for the federal government do, but do it smarter. and so i -- first thing i did was stole a lot of the senate library files, going back to the historical reference files, that they were more than happy to turn over to me, because the senate library was the only source of historical information for the 20th century prior to that time. and they're librarians with a strong interest in history and a creative bunch, but they were happy to see an office created of historian to take on the burden. >> and your last day? the 1st lk your last day? >> august 31st, monday august 31st is the last year. >> how many years, 34? >> 34, right to the day. >> let me go back to frank valeo, because i was in your oral histories on the website and anybody watching this program can find. i saw something i never knew,

but don richie, your compatriot in the senate's office, interviewed frank valeo for an oral history in which he told you about -- i'm not sure you know the story, ask if you read it. the sam irvin versus ted kennedy story. do you know that one? >> i do. >> why don't you tell us about it. >> when watergate first became evident as a budding scandal, particularly early in 1973, senator edward kennedy realized that this was going to be big and the senate along with its longstanding traditions should set up an investigative committee to find out what nixon and his friends were up to. mike manfield the senate majority leader with a deep sense of history also recognized that. frank valeo didn't. he said it will blow over. mansfield said, no, we need to put this in very stable hands. not that edward kennedy wasn't, but we don't know where he'll go with it.

sam irvin of north carolina, democrat of north carolina, is the guy for the job. he was chairman of the senate government operation committee as it was called back then. and this is government operations. and so irvin didn't -- was reluctant to take the job and finally did. and the rest is history as they say. >> so, what did frank -- what did senator mansfield, the majority leader in the senate, a democrat, see that frank valeo didn't, the deference would have been ted kennedy versus sam irvin, if he'd have headed that committee? >> i think he -- i'm not sure. it's hard to get in his mind, inside his mind on that, but i think he wanted something that would be very methodical, within the fiber of the senate's institutional leadership structure. and i think he thought sam irvin is perhaps the person for the job. this had all kinds of implications for television, you know, of course, the senate as

early as 1947 began televising its hearings. and i remember as a kid the crime hearings, the mccarthy hearings. and so this had all of the makings of a big show in the caucus room of the russell senate office building. and -- >> but it would have clearly been a different deal if it had been senator kennedy in those years back in the '70s versus sam irvin, the southerner, kind of a country lawyer image. >> and, you know, the senate was dominated by southern members. you at power in the eastland of that era, lay with southern senators, and sam irvin was one of them. and they needed to get a majority of the senate to agree ultimately if necessary the house impeached president nixon to go ahead with the conviction. >> is there any way to describe

how you have done your job? i mean, in other words, if we followed you around 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the job part, how did you learn and then turn it -- for instance, did you write all the one-minute historical minute that you can see on the website? >> there are several versions of historical minutes. when bob dole was the majority leader at the time of the bicentennial of the senate, in 1987, 1988, he began each day's session with a senate historical minute, and we worked with him very closely on those. every single day for two years. they were 200 words at the moment. then in 1979 senator tom daschle, the democratic leader of the senate, i was having a casual conversation with him about the history of his office, history of leadership in the senate. he said, i didn't know a lot of that, and i bet my colleagues

would be impressed at hearing some of this in the democratic caucus, so let's just try it out for a couple weeks, having no idea what i might do to embarrass myself and everyone else, he invited me in. so, for the next 12 1/2 years thanks to senator daschle and then senator harry reid i gave these minutes. and originally they were also a couple hundred words, and it's not enough to get the real meat of the story out, to get people's attention. you can't imagine the harder audience than a room full of united states senators who have 15 things on their minds and so forth. so, over the years i made them longer in the tradition of the senate. you need a few more words there up to about 450 words, and i think i can just about tell a story in 450 words. so, over the last 12 years, i've written myself, no one else has done them. i was the guy that was going to stand up and speak them, so you had to have your own pacing and

tempo, i've written about over 300 of them. and then we put 200 of them together in a book. >> i don't know what you were thinking when you wrote this one but this was the 1921 to 1940 ea, february the 7th, 1933, senate fact, sergeant of arms. >> oh, dear. >> fire the sergeant of arms. do you remember this story? >> i do. he'd been a longtime washington reporter, his name was david barry, and he took on the job of sergeant of arms late in his career, and it was a heck of a time to be sergeant of arms because he had to help to prepare for fdr's inauguration in 1933, several senators died at the time, he had to take care of their funerals, but he did an interview with a journal about what he'd seen over his long service in the senate, 30, 40 years. and he said that most -- the senate has changed. most senators these days are not

crooks. they're not corrupt. they're not taking money on the side to help with their campaigns. you know, he said that very much in a positive spirit. >> in 1933. >> that's right. and he was -- his hope, his expectation, it was more than a hope, was that this article would be published, you know, after he retired. well, unfortunately the editor of the magazine thought it was such a great article, they put it in an earlier issue, so it appeared while he was still sergeant of arms of the senate. so, if any staff members' terrible nightmare. anybody that talks to the press, all of a sudden the senate hauls him before the chamber. he's the sergeant at arms. he's the guy that's supposed to be responsible for decorum in the senate chamber and all of a sudden he's the subject of this decorum and they basically hauled him in there, did you do this? and you're fired. ended up being fired about three days before his natural retirement because the party control was twitching from his

republican party, the democratic party. >> i guess the good news in your case the senate isn't in session so they can't fire you before it's time for you to go. >> the interview is not over yet. >> let me read exactly what he said in that article. he explained, quote, there are not many crooks in congress, that is, out-and-out grafters. there are not many senators or representatives who sell their vote for money. and it is pretty well known who those few are, but there are many demagogues of the kind that will vote for legislation sole i had because they think that it will help their political and social fortune. anything changed? >> you're kidding me? a lot has changed. this is not the senate of 1932-1933. >> name a few specifics that really have changed the whole place. >> well, the number one thing, of course, is 24/7 coverage. television coverage gavel to gavel of the senate. before june 2nd, 1986, most

americans had no clue as to what the senate chamber physically looked like. probably a whole lot of them didn't care either. but their image of the senate came out of advise and consent and mr. smith goes to out of hollywood where they used a phony chamber, as a matter of fact. so, it was, you know, a real communications gap that it was fixed really as a result of televising the proceedings in 1986. but beyond that, just the internet, the web, instantaneous communication. and also the enormous cost of campaigns. and particularly television media markets, which put -- and it really began to kick in in the 1960s, senators realized it was no longer a matter of a lobbyist bringing a brown paper

bag filled with dollar bills to his favorite senator and saying, here's $200, think it will make a difference in your campaign? now $200 wouldn't be able on get you car fare. and so the senate starting in the mid-1960s created a framework to help its members do the right thing. it created a committee on standards of official conduct which in the late 1970s became the senatetic i ethics committe they developed a whole code of ethics rules. all right, mr. senator, here are the rules and here's the committee that's responsible for interpreting these rules. and the book of interpretation of those rules is that thick. and so it is easier now for senators not to have to do it by the seat of their pants and decide, well, can i take this money, can i take this money. they follow the guidelines. and if they get off the straight and narrow a little bit, the

ethics committee can say, we'll look into it. charges have been made against you, and we're going to have an investigation, and in recent years the investigations have sometimes lasted an entire year. large amounts of staff time going through thousands of documents and the result is either a letter saying you shouldn't have done it or, you know, you're okay. but you and your colleagues ought to keep these matters in mind for future behavior. >> here's another one of your minutes. senate considers banning dial phones. this is from 1930. let me just read the whereas to the resolution. whereas dial phones are more difficult to operate than are manual phones and whereas senators are required since the installation of dial phones in the capitol to perform the duty of telephone operators in order to enjoy the benefits of telephone service and whereas dial phones have failed to expedite telephone service, therefore, be it resolved that the sergeant of arms, sergeant

at arms of the senate, is authorized and directed to order the chesapeake and potomac telephone company to replace of manual phones within days after the adoption of this resolution, all dial phones in the senate wing of the united states capitol and in the senate office building. what are they talking about? >> i love it. i love it. it's so good. what they are talking about is political compromise. some senators couldn't figure out how the dial phones worked, how some of us approach latest internet technology, twittering and tweeting and all the rest of it, and so they had their secretaries actually dial for them and then hand them the receiver when the party was on line. it just undid a lot of the older senators, and they said we want to go back to the old phone, you pick it up, you get an operator on the line, you tell the operator what you want and you're in business. but there were the young turks who said, no, we have to be atentive to modern technology and we have to go ahead with the dial phone.

and so basically what they ended up doing after they wanted to throw out all the dial phones is they compromised and the compromise was we can bring in a special kind of telephone that you can either dial or you can pick it up and you can get an operator. beautiful political -- >> i got to read what washington state senator clarence still said about this whole business, and you hear some of this today maybe? well, you can tell me. he says, in his experience the dial phone, quote, could not be more awkward than it is. one has to use both hands to dial. he must be in a position where there is good light, day or night, in order to see the number, and if he happens to turn the dial not quite far enough, then he gets a wrong connection. >> you feel his pain, don't you, in terms of operating more modern communications devices? >> i've got a whole bunch here of stuff you've written. george norris, nebraska's george norris, you wrote, the man many

consider the greatest united states senator, i wanted to stop there because you also in one of the other things i read in the website is that henry clay was the greatest united states senator in history. daniel webster was the greatest. how do you call anybody the greatest? >> john f. kennedy had that task in front of him in 1955 and '56 when he was appointed the chair of a committee to decide who the five greatest united states -- actually, they threw out the word "greatest" and said outstanding. and statesmanship, transcending state and party borders ended up being their definition of great or outstanding. >> why george norris, what was he so good about? >> well, george norris, any senator who worked with him realized very quickly that he was a committee senator, not a floor senator, that he did his work in the committees behind the scenes. he shaped issues in such a way that you didn't have to force senators to vote for or against them prematurely. he worked the issue. he was certainly the father of

the tennessee valley authority. a lot of other major new deal legislation. and when john f. kennedy was chairman of that committee to select outstanding senators, who was the number one vote getter? george norris. the number -- that is, they polled about 160 historians, political scientists around the country and even former president harry truman as to who they thought should be on the five faces on the senate reception room wall and norris got the greatest votes. >> you gave us some insight in the business of how people are designated this way. you said when the senate established a special committee in 1955 to select five outstanding former members whose portraits would be permanently displayed in the senate reception room, that panel solicited recommendations from 160 distinguished american historians and biographers. who determines who's distinguished? >> primarily publishing output, biographers who have written

about senators and other public officials at the time. and back in those days when political history was sort of the mainstay of a lot of history departments around the country, it was pretty easy to identify who those people were, and senators would throw in, you know, the name of a professor that they had from -- in their state or whatever to this list and, you know, it started off as really small list. and as you said, it got up to 160 people. >> now, somebody came to you and said, tell me, dr. baker, which i'm about to do, your five favorite historians. not senate historians, just five favorite historians. can you his them? >> oh, boy. i mean, certainly hitting both fields, robert cara with his book "master of the senate" on lyndon johnson, the third volume of his lbj biography would be one. david mccollough would be another. >> why? >> for sure. he brings life and vividness and

color, you know, into the story. you don't want to put the book down even though it is, you know, a thousand pages in some cases, it just drives you on. and it makes you -- i'm speaking only for myself, but obviously others as well, you want to read collateral works. you want to know not only about john adams or harry truman but the people they -- who with their contemporaries. and so it drives history publications. >> who would be the third? >> well, i like -- i like the work of robert mann who is at louisiana state university, who wrote a book a few years back called "the walls of jericho" about a fight for civil rights legislation in congress from 1954 on through 1965. and focusing on hubert humphrey, lyndon johnson, and richard russell. robert mann then did a more recent book. he's done an abridgement of that book probably for classroom use

and then he did a more recent book on russell lawn of louisiana, nice biography of him. >> anybody else? >> oh, i like -- in terms of institutional history, i like my friend ross baker, no relation, up at rutgers university, who has written two very good books on the senate. one in the 1980s called "friend and foe in the senate" about the nature of friendship in the senate. and he really does a lot of interviews. he doesn't attribute who told him what, but he got into the fiber of the institution. and he's done another work probably for classroom work, "the house and senate" the differences between the two profoundly different bodies. i like the work of barbara sinclair a professor at ucla who has made a career of analyzing as a political scientist the inner working of the senate. >> how is writing for you? hard, easy? when you have to actually write.

>> easy. which is dangerous. i mean, writing these historical minutes which they are limited in words, i usually start off with 600 words and then it's like getting rid of your children, you kind of boil it down to 450. but if i think i know what i'm talking about and i'm excited about the subject, it's pretty easy. >> how much time will you put in for 450 words? >> a lot. a lot. more than i probably should confess in public. >> go ahead, confess. >> as many as seven or eight hours. >> what would you be doing for the seven or eight hours? >> first shaping the subject, to try to make it a good story. and then trying to think how am i going to keep the attention of this audience of the united states senators throughout the four minutes that it takes me to read it. and what i really learned and what i didn't do very well at the beginning was i should have a good punchy conclusion. a conclusion that kind of leaves

them gasping for breath. one conclusion at one story it was a happy day for me when the senator burst out, oh, my goodness! at the very end of it. she was extremely surprised by the twist of events. >> can you remember what that story was? >> yes, it was a plagiarism story. when aaron burr as vice president left the senate in march of 1805, he made one of the most famous farewell addresses anybody recalls. the senate is a citadel, this concept of a citadel, comes right out of that speech, of democracy, of law, of order. if our constitution ever is to perish, its expiring agonies will be witnessed on the floor of the united states senate. great speech. so, meanwhile, flash forward in time to the 1840s. the house speaker was retiring, a speechwriter on his staff took

the aaron burr speech and put it in there almost verbatim, and the speaker didn't know that. he gave the speech. he subsequently learned that indeed it was a plagiarized speech and he subsequently committed suicide. now >> what was his name? >> i've forgotten. but it -- hitting that, committing suicide over -- everybody is concerned about plagiarism. it happens. it can happen easily. it can happen without much thought sometimes despite the fact it shouldn't. and i think every senator kind of realized, you know, we have staff people writing for us and i'm getting up there and i'm going to give a public speech, it could happen to me. >> is it known he committed suicide over this fact? >> not precisely, but strong presumption that it was. >> who was the woman senator that gasped? >> i shouldn't -- i can't say. i should not -- i need --

because these are all closed-door meetings. everything goes on behind those closed doors has to stay there so -- >> so, how many years ago did she gasp? >> not going to work. >> there's 17 women in the united states senate, am i right about that? >> you're right about that. >> and when was the -- when was her only -- i remember when i first came to town, margaret smith. >> that's right. and when she was defeated by william hathaway in 1972 from that time to 1978 there was no woman. >> was the gas. in the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s? >> in a person that arrived during that -- >> yeah. >> not going to trick me into that one. >> oh, gee. unfortunately i failed. anyway, on the website, on the senate.gov website center front right as you come on the front page, henry clay in the u.s. senate, and it's really somewhat

indepth about a painting. did you have anything to do with it? >> only peripherally. >> we can show the audience. there are things you can do, including snapping -- taking your cursor and going over the painting to see what it looked like before they changed it until now. tell us what you can about it. >> it's a great success story. this painting was discovered two years ago in le roy, new york, in the historical society up there. the painting itself was originally pointed in 1866. and it's a big, large painting of henry clay. it was commissioned by the state senate of kentucky to memorialize henry clay, and they had a competition. well, there were two entries to the competition and this was the loser. and look at the two side by side as i think you can do on the website, you'll see that this probably was the better, except that the artist ignored his

instruction which was -- which were just have henry clay in the picture, and what the artist did was have i think 12 other senators in the old senate chamber. so, it lost. it went off into storage. it ended up in a boys school in a gymnasium. you can see the marks of basketballs that were thrown on the surface of the canvas. it had cracked and so forth. so, the historical society donated it to the senate. and the senate then arranged to have it conserved, restored, and just several short months ago, they placed it on a wall in the capitol in one of the staircases that comes down from the senate chamber outside the foreign relations committee meeting room, and it's a great, great picture. and so a good website along with it. >> why do we care about this? and who paid to have it restored? >> i suspect probably taxpayers paid. it was i think -- it was given

at no cost to the government. and it -- the reason it's important -- there are a lot of images of henry clay around the capitol, but not one as big as this. and the -- it's not only -- it's one of the rare paintings of a scene in the old senate chamber. there were no photographs taken in the old senate chamber before they moved out of there in 1859. and henry clay, if nothing else, is sort of the iconic symbol of compromise. and it's important for senators to kind of walk by that every day and realize that, particularly in the senate where one member can kind of gum up the works very quickly with an objection to a unanimous consent agreement. that compromise is vital in a minority-based institution. >> i'm looking at another story, the senate censures the president and it involves henry clay. it said in the mid1830s nume rs