was great. others thought blaine was doing what they called waving the bloody shirt again and here the nation was moving away from the war and reconciliation seemed to be moving forward and why was he provoking this dispute again? >> we have about five minutes left. independence, iowa, this is joe. hi, joe. >> caller: hi. unlike joshua chamberlain, ulysses s. grant, william mckinley, blaine had no military record in the civil war but his running mate general john a. logan had one and was the first president of the grand army of the republic, that great republican organization throughout the states and logan gave us memorial day, decoration day. can you speak to the fact was thaw a ticket-balancing move in some sense or did it cover the fact that blaine had not served? >> i think there's no question but what that was a political balance on the ticket.

logan was very well known the veterans' vote was a very powerful force in the post-civil war period in america. blaine because he was very much involved in an emerging political career when the civil war broke out he was speaker of the house in maine, the maine house of representatives and he was about to run for congress so he did what many men did at the time and he actually bought a substitute. it cost about $300 to have someone else go in your said the. cleveland had done the same thing so it was a very interesting situation that prior to the 1884 campaign you always had someone in office in the presidency, grant and hayes and garfield who had been civil war officers. but blaine and cleveland were not. >> so which ever one of them had

one it would have been the first generation -- >> it would have been a break in that generation, yes. >> we had a viewer who asked about his death so will you now tell us the story of his death? >> yes, well, as has been mentioned, he was a man who was prone to illness all through his life, i think both real and imagined. there was always mentioned that he might have been more hypochondriac than reality but by the same token, by 1892 he was exhausted both physically and mentally and in fact the campaign of 1892 was looming. there was talk of his being nominated for president but he really wasn't up to it and he bowed out, he gave only one speak during the campaign on behalf of the reelection of harrison and then early in 1893 he died at his home in

washington. >> where is he buried? >> buried here in augusta. originally buried in washington as was his wife and then the state of maine brought mr. and mrs. blaine's remains back to augusta and they reside in beautiful blaine memorial above the cemetery in augusta. >> how long did his wife live after him, do you know? >> in the 1903. another ten years. >> we have very little time but we have a local caller. augusta, maine, this is jonathan. >> caller: yes, this is question might be answered by earl shutt shuttleworth, there. what was the relationship of mr. blaine towards the native population state? i mean native american population because we know there were natives in the civil war, had their own regiments and what not in the south. >> thank you, jonathan, i'm going to jump in because our time is short. big question but short time. >> yeah, i'm not sure that i

have a quick answer for that. >> is that right? any place to go far? is there material available? >> i would look to neil's book to start out with and also the state library, very good reference at the state library. >> i'd like to close. we have just really a minute left and ask you the question, support our thesis. what was the legacy, what's the importance to america today of james g. blaine having been the politician here? >> i think his influence as secretary of state was very important. it's a great legacy and his desire to build some kind of cohesion between the north americ american, south american and central american states. >> i think there's that and also if you look back across his long career in public life it is that he is one of the key builders of the republican party in the 19th century. he's there at the beginning in 18 are 54 and still there almost

40 years later as probably their most powerful and identifiable figure. >> and maine today has a republican governor and two republican senators, congressional delegates here is democrat, is that right? >> correct. >> oh, the congressional democrat but our state legislature is all republican. >> we are out of time. i want to thank a number of people as we close here. governor paul lepage and the lepage family for hosting us and the director of the blaine ho e house. the maine preservation commission, thank you for your help and also to our cable affiliate, our wonderful cable affiliate here, time warner cable of augusta for all of their help and support for bringing c-span to the community. we'll close the program the same way we opened it. we'll give you a look at the campaign memorabilia and

listening to a group called the independent silver band as they sang in 1884 blaine/logan victory song. thank you for being with us tonight. ♪ hurrah, hurrah, hurrah for blaine, for logan and victory ♪ hurrah, hurrah >> our profile of presidential candidates continues wednesday night on american history tv with a look at williams jennings bryan. he served as secretary of state under president woodrow wilson. that's at 8:00 p.m. eastern on

c-span 3. book tv on c-span 2. 48 hours of non-fiction books and authors every weekend. here's featured programs this weekend. saturday at 10:00 p.m. eastern on "afterwords" kimberly strassel argues the left is using tactics to usurp the political process in her book "the intimidation game how the left is silencing free speech." she's jond by jenny thomas, contributor to the daily caller. >> government abuse is largely one sided. when i started this -- i care about free speech and the first amendment. i'm a libertarian when it comes to this and i don't think -- you know, i have no allegiance to one party or the other and i went into this -- i'd written a lot about the abuses on the left for my column in the "wall street journal" but i assumed going in that i was going to

find a bunch of stuff on the right, too. i didn't. >> on sunday, live with legal analyst jeffrey toobin who will take your call, text and e-mail questions from noon to 3:00 p.m. eastern. mr. toobin will discuss his latest book "american heiress, the wild saga of the kidnapping, crimes and trial of patty hearst t." he's also the author of "the oath, the bob white house and the supreme court." "the nine, inside the secret world of the supreme court." "too close to call, the 36-day battle to decide the 2000 election" "a vast conspiracy, the real story of the sex scandal that nearly brought down a president," "the run of his life, the people v. o.j. simpson" and "opening arguments, a young lawyer's first case, united states v. oliver north." join in the conversation on c-span 2. then at 7:00 eastern, dinesh d'

souza looks at the impact a hillary clinton presidency would have on america in his book "hillary's america, the secret history of the democratic party." go to book tv.org for the complete schedule. c-span is touring cities across the country exploring american history. next, a look at our visit to the blaine house in augusta, maine. you're watching american history tv all weekend every weekend on c-span 3. i want to welcome you to the blaine house. since 1919 the home of maine's governors and their families. the house was actually built in 1833 by a captain james hall from bath, maine. for those of you who know maine, bath is a major shipbuilding and seaport town and captain hall

decided in 1830 to retire from the sea. he bought this very strategically located peace of land right across from the statehouse that year, 1830, and in 1833 he finished construction on a very handsome two-story hipped roof federal house which was to be his retirement home. one of the early features that survives in the house from his time is this beautiful winding staircase and i think it's a tribute to the architecture of the staircase that subsequent owners of the house and subsequent generations have never changed it. it goes right back to the 1830s. in 1862, james g. blaine and his wife acquired this property. blaine lived here until his death in 1893. mrs. blaine kept the property until her death in 1903 and then