begin exploring this rich catalog of c-span resources today. c-spanshop.org is online store and browse through our latest collection of products, apparel, books, home decor and accessories. there is something for every c-span fan. shop now or any time at c-spanshop.org. but we hope this afternoon's panel, lincoln and african-americans with our four distinguished panelists will give you a lot to chat about in your lines. so, we will be able to learn from michelle krowl the reconstruction specialist in the manuscript division in the

library of congress. she is the author of several articles and book chapters on lincoln and the civil war and serves on the board of the abraham lincoln association. she's president of the abraham lincoln institute and secretary of the lincoln forum executive committee. edna greene medford my totals of up lincoln forums and edna is certainly the female winner of coming to the lincoln forum. she's a professor of history and associate at howard university the author of "lincoln and emancipation" and co-author with frank williams of "the emancipation proclamation reviews." a highly sought after speaker and serves on numerous boards related to abraham lincoln and the civil war and is a long-time member and participant in the lincoln forum. lucas morel is professor of politics at washington university where he also serves as chair of the politics department.

he's the author and editor of five books including "lincoln's sacred effort to finding religions while in american self-government" and "lincoln and liberty" and his most recent book "linken and the american founding." last but not least jonathan white vice chair of the lincoln forum and author or editor of 13 books about abraham lincoln and the civil war, including letters to president abraham lincoln which was published last month by unc press and "a house built by slaves" which will be published on lincoln's birthday in february of 2022. let's welcome our panel. >> thank you so much, catherine.

we're going to have a discussion about lincoln and african americans and i want to talk very quickly about these two books that i, one, was just published about two weeks ago and then one will come out in the spring on lincoln's birthday. this is a collection of 125 letters from african americans to lincoln. they wrote to lincoln seeing him as their president. and even as their friend, seeing a personal connection to lincoln. we'll talk about some of those letters as we go through the program. and then in february i'm publishing this book, sort of grew out of the first one. this is a history of visitors to the lincoln white house. and many of those men and women were the same people. and so this is a little collage of some of the men who visited lincoln. i couldn't find any images of the any of the women who met with, or who wrote to lincoln. but some of these faces will look familiar and we'll talk about them. you see frederick douglas at the top right or top center and you

see william flurville next to him who we'll also talk about. some of these men went on to become politicians and members of congress, richard harvey cane would be elected to congress from south carolina after the civil war and then some of the men are less well known. the bottom left, second one up is a guy name randolph who was a magician who wrote to lincoln and met with him. i have not yet figured out what a sex magician is. >> further research. >> further research. it will be a "new york times" best seller i'm sure. don't google search that at work. when these african american men and women and the book includes 125 letters and slightly over 100 of them are from men and about 21 of them come from women. when they wrote to lincoln, they felt a personal connection to him.

they really believed that he was their president and that he would listen to what they had to say. and i want to show you one letter from the library of congress collection of lincoln's papers. this is a former slave namedcox. he sent lincoln a poem that he had copied out of the newspapers, out of "harper's weekly." he wanted to show lincoln how he was learning how to read and write. so this is how he does it. you know this man believed lincoln would see and hold this letter. if you look at the bottom left hand corner there is a small postscript where hannibal cox said, i send this for you to look at, i must not laugh at it. and the feeling of this man wanting his commander in chief to see how he is learning and growing and serving his country but don't laugh when you look at this, because i'm still in the process. i find letters like these to be remarkably touching. i want to tell very quickly one

story that will connect these two books together and then we're going to have conversation together. and this is the story of two creoles from new orleans who brought a petition to lincoln at the white house on march 3rd, 1864. they handed it to him in his white house office and they called for the free light-skinned wealthy black community of new orleans to be given the right to vote. and they appeal to the declaration of independence and they point out that they are serving in the union army, for the union cause, and that their ancestors had fought with andrew jackson during the war of 1812 at the battle of new orleans. and they say they should have the right to vote based on the fact that they are serving the country and that they pay taxes. and in one line of this petition they say, we are men, treat us as such. the petition has 1,000 signatures on it. and 28 of those are veterans of the war of 1812. lincoln welcomed these two men

into his white house office. this is one of them. and i couldn't find an image of the other. but this is arnold burtneau. he says to them his first job is crushing out the rebellion. but he said if giving black men the right to vote became necessary to win the war, he said he would support it. he said, i see no reason why intelligent black men should not vote. he said voting was not a military question and the civil authorities in louisiana should be dealing with it. he assured them if they could show how their request could help restore the union, it would have his support. they go back out of the white house and they sit down and they write out a new petition, one week later, on march 10th. and i can't prove this, but i think they brought it back to the white house on march 12th and gave it to lincoln. and this new petition was very different. rather than only calling for the right to vote for the elite,

white-skinned black wealthy for new orleans, they called for the right to vote for all black men in their city regardless of whether or not they were born into slavery. they said doing this, and this is their words, would give full effect to all the union feeling in the rebel states in order to secure permanence and free loyal governments that were being organized in the south. in other words, the best way to subdue disloyal sentiment in the south was to create a new class of loyal black voters who could outvote ex-confederates when the war was over. this was the rationale lincoln was looking for, that giving black men the vote would preserve the peace. lincoln was persuaded and on march 13th sent a letter, very

famous, to the governor of louisiana, suggesting that black men who were educated or serving in the army, he said, should be granted the elective franchise because giving them the right to vote, these are lincoln's words, would probably help in some trying time to come to keep the jewel of liberty within the family of freedom. i love this exchange between lincoln and these two black visitors and these two petitions that they hand to him because it shows how lincoln was thinking about the new birth of freedom and that african americans would have to be included as part of the people. now, this was 1864. and that's a very different lincoln in many ways from the lincoln who comes before the civil war. so i want to take us back to the 1850s and start with luke u.s. critics of lincoln often point to some very unfortunate lines lincoln said in the

lincoln/douglass debates. one of them, lincoln said, i have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. there is a physical difference between the two which in my judgment will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of equality. how do we make sense of quotes like this when we think about abraham lincoln? >> yeah, those are troubling, especially to the modern ear. that's were comments that he repeated in carleston and charleston and in jonesboro. this is rarely mentioned today, we don't use the word "statesmanship" much today. that was the laugh line, in other words, of course not, have you seen what we've got in our major parties? but one thing i'm trying to do with my students is get them to

gain a greater appreciation of the art of politics which is not just moral grandstanding. you have to gain consent in this country to get justice done. my great teacher harry joffa once wrote that the mark of statesmanship is gaining as much justice as you can gain consent for. it's not enough to be right and to announce that righteousness. william lloyd garrison was unsurpassed in doing that. he wasn't worried about persuading people, he let god bring his conviction to people. he wasn't running for political office. but to get things done, you have to get into office and pass laws accordingly. and so you have to pay attention, in short, to public opinion. and the state of public opinion in illinois in the 1850s was pretty bad in terms of racial animus towards blacks, it was as

if they were competing with indiana to see who could be more racist. 1853, illinois passed a law banning the emigration of black people into their state, patently unconstitutional, they went ahead and did it. missouri tried to get their constitution passed in 1820, 1821 with a clause like that. and so that's the say the of public opinion. blacks can't serve on juries where whites are defendants, they can't vote, they can't serve in the militia. very few civil rights, no political rights. that's the population lincoln in 1858 is seeking their support to send him to the senate, appointed by the state legislature. so you can't neglect that political reality on the ground. and the fact of the matter was, his career and any hope for progress for civil rights and

black -- civil and political rights for black people in illinois, any hope for that was a political nonstarter if you shot for the top. in other words, what lincoln tried to do is at least shore up the conviction among a pervasively bigoted white population, shore up the conviction that their rights as white people did not owe to their color or race but to their humanity. and it's their humanity that in their heart of hearts they knew they shared with black people. and so to the great dismay of his own political consultants and team, he would bring up, he would say what you said but he would also say, that doesn't matter in terms of their rights as a people, they have the same rights enumerated in the declaration of independence, the rights to life, liberty, and the

pursuit of happiness. if he couldn't get majority white opinion to back that, pursuing the vote for black people would be, you know, a fool's errand. after all, the vote was principally a state matter, not a federal matter. for douglass, he said, you keep freaking out thinking i'm pushing the black vote, why don't you stay here in illinois and run for the state legislature where you can make sure that will never happen while you're alive and you guys can send me to the senate. so -- and just one more thing. so there's the political reality of the overwhelming white population of illinois, 5, 6,000 black people in illinois in 1850, 1860. there aren't a lot of black people there. lincoln of course can't curry the black vote, there is no black vote, by law. so that's whites. but the white person lincoln was concerned about was stephen douglas. stephen douglas, lincoln said, over and over again, what was he doing to racial prejudice in

illinois and in the country? he was reinforcing it. he was a categorical racist. people say lincoln played the race card in the debates. if he did, and i don't think he did, but if he did, douglas played the whole deck. frederick douglass -- that's a freudian slip big time. by the way, stephen douglas' birth name, two s's, he dropped that, i wonder why. anyway, stephen douglas was reinforcing white supremacy and lincoln was doing what he could to shake his constituents loose of that by reminding something they knew in their heart of hearts, that black people had the same rights as white people, because guess what, they're people. >> i'll point that that 1853 law, if an african american moved into the free state of

illinois, got arrested and fined $50, if they couldn't pay the $50, they would be auctioned off and someone could purchase their labor until the debt was paid. and we think about the free state of illinois, it was not really free in the way we would normally think. edna, we see changes in lincoln's policies and positions over the course of his political career. can you talk about that evolution? and how do we account for it? >> it's great that you started with the lincoln/douglas debates of '58. when we talk about that evolution over time, we usually start with the 1858 debates and what lucas just talked about, what lincoln said about black people and their inferiority in that particular -- in more than one place in that debate. we normally dismiss those

comments by saying that he was responding to a true racist, to someone who was a white supremacist, and you understood where he was. he realized the local people were very much in accord with stephen douglas. and so he wanted to convince them that his views were not that inconsistent with theirs. and so he could be forgiven for some of the things he said against a shrewd politician. but it's more than that. we need to remember lincoln was a son of the south. he was someone who shared some of the same racial views as did the average southern white man and woman and northern white man and woman, for that matter, during this era. the difference, however, is, i think, lincoln believed that the inferiority was seeing was a

consequence of slavery, that that institution degraded black people. it did not give them the opportunity of a fair chance in the race of life, as he put it. and so he was different in that way. and so slavery -- he couldn't abide slavery because it didn't give people the opportunity that he felt everyone deserved. that doesn't mean that he felt that black people could be equal to him, at least not at that time. and if we look at him over the period, from 1858 to the end of the war, we see that he can relate very well to individual african americans. he relates well to fleurville, they're friends, apparently. he relates well to frederick

douglass, they had similar backgrounds, in terms of poverty, in terms of lifelong love of learning, the ability to express themselves and so forth. so he had great appreciation for some individual black people. but if you look at where he was at the end of the war, he still wasn't quite there in terms of the masses, because when he talks in that address, on april 11th, 1865, his last address, where he's talking about extending voting rights to black men, who is he looking at? he's looking those black men who served the union in the war and he's looking those who are better educated. no one is talking about what white men's credentials are. it doesn't matter, you know, how they were born, how poor they were, whether or not they were literal. and lincoln was certainly not saying these people should not serve. but these black men had a different litmus test. and so he's not quite there in terms of believing that black

people now can be full-fledged american citizens. so i think that he may have evolved over time, but when he died, he was not all the way there. >> you mentioned billy fleurville. i'll come over to michelle, and i'll put a picture of him on the screen. michelle, you have the wonderful job of being the keeper of lincoln papers at the library of congress. can you tell us a little bit about that collection? how did it get there, why are seven letters there rather than at the national archives? i put up one from william fleurville on the screen. can you tell us about his letter to lincoln? >> sure. the core or the totality of the abraham lincoln papers in the manuscript division of the library of congress really comes down to one word, is "generosity," because the lincoln papers as it currently stands is separated out into four different series that reflects the provenance of those materials. so i'll talk about series 1

last. series 2 were lincoln materials that were culled from john nikolay's papers, donated by his daughter. we don't cull papers anymore, so this is a long history of how manuscripts, different procedures for that. series 3 and 4 are things that came from a variety of different sources, some donated, some from different avenues. but series 1 is really the bulk of the abraham lincoln papers. and they came from robert todd lincoln, lincoln's only surviving son. to the best of our knowledge, there were the papers that lincoln had in his possession at the time of his death. they were packed up by hay and nikolay by 1865 and they resided in bloomington, illinois until 1874 when they were loaned to

secretary nikolay while hay and nikolay were working on their article in "century magazine" and their biography. to make you understand how amazing it is that these things still survive, nikolay had them until 1901, at his death. they went across town to the state department. so john hay had them, and he was secretary of state. he had them until he died. and then they went back to robert lincoln in chicago, then he moved to washington, dc and vermont because he worked for the pullman car company and had free transportation, they went from dc to vermont, from dc to vermont, from dc to vermont, and finally in 1919, the librarian of congress herbert putnam prevailed upon robert to put them somewhere safe, which was the library of congress. some of you may know that at his request, there was a restriction

on the papers that they were not to be opened to the public until 21 years after his own death. so i hate to say that people were probably wishing him ill at that point, but so they weren't opened to the public until 1947, after his death in 1926. so that's how they get there. and we want to keep them separated so that you know if you're in series 1 of the abraham lincoln papers, that's part of the robert todd lincoln collection of the abraham lincoln papers. and that has the bulk of the papers and some of the richest materials including, you know, various speeches, his farewell address to springfield. actually the two gettysburg addresses and the second inaugural address are technically in series 3 because they came from the surviving children of john hay, and the blind memorandum as well that came from helen nikolay, because they donated them to the library

of congress. that's why i wanted to start with the word "generosity," if you think of the richness and the intellectual and not only financial value of the abraham lincoln papers, these were given to the american people by those family members. and included in that series 1 is that letter from william fleurville who wrote to lincoln on december 27th, 1863, and we know he knew about gettysburg, and lincoln's illness, because it sounds from the letter that this is billy the barber back in springfield who was lincoln's barber and friend and probably confidant as these things tend to go, and he references mutual friends he's spoken to. he refers to being sorry to hear about lincoln's illness. you can also tell that they haven't spoken or been in communication for a while, because he says, i was so sorry to hear about willie's death, and obviously that was back in 1862.

then also gives him news of home. so this is a friend writing to the president of the united states, the dog is kicking, whatever. the two things that are affecting about this letter, more than two things, he starts off, the way he begins the letter is, he says, i having for you an irresistible feeling of gratitude for the kind regards shown and the manifest good wishes exhibited towards me, and also his respect and understanding and gratitude for what he feels lincoln has done for african americans during the course of the war, that he's very complimentary and thankful for lincoln being in this particular position. and he's obviously seeing 1864 coming up, because he says, essentially i really hope that you win a second term because you are the man who will be able to carry this all forward. so this is very much a letter

from a friend. it's a friendly voice from home. i think where jonathan also wanted me to go with this is how things end up in the personal papers versus somewhere else. if this had been more of an official document, then it might have ended up in the national archives eventually. there's no national archives in lincoln's day, that's much later, or if it needed to be acted upon by a cabinet member or another thing then he probably would have docketed it on the back and sent it on to the appropriate department. that's the difference usually between the national archives and library of congress, is national archives contains the official record of the government and its operations, whereas in the manuscript division we tend to have people's personal papers. a letter from billy the barber is going to be a personal communication to lincoln that he obviously decided to keep or set aside, not knowing he was going to die in 1865. so this is a friendly voice from home. and giving you news of

springfield. so you can almost imagine lincoln sitting in the office thinking, oh, that guy, and oh, so and so is married, i'm glad to hear about the dog, just a reminder of a place that he was familiar with and loved. what's also striking about the letter, compared to some of the others you may see in jonathan's book and elsewhere, and particularly in presidential papers, is billy is not asking for anything. and that, to be honest, is a very big deal. you can imagine that was another relief to lincoln, that billy's not asking for the postmaster ship of springfield, because our presidential papers are now all online, and if you care to go peruse them, you'll see the bulk of presidents' papers are people asking them for jobs. it's a lot of patronage.

in garfield's first week, you see him saying, will these people ever leave me alone. he's complimenting him and giving him a boost, i feel you're doing something good for african americans, for the nation, and you're the man for the job. that has to have been a nice break for lincoln that day. >> you mentioned garfield, he ignored charles guteaux. >> oh, charles guteaux, that is a whole other story. >> the library of congress has been digital advertising dozens of civil war collections and they are available. and it's democratizing research. any of us can go on. i found 21 letters from african americans to lincoln in this collection and it's because i could look through it online. now, lucas had a kind of funny faux pas earlier where he inadvertently mixed up stephen and frederick douglass. >> keeping it up, john.

>> if you follow lucas on twitter, his handle is "lincoln/douglass" with two s's. >> not a freudian slip. >> lucas, douglass was very critical of lincoln into 1864. can you talk about douglass's criticisms of lincoln as president during these first few years? >> sure. douglass had been following lincoln since the lincoln/douglas debates, very aware of a growing movement in the united states at least towards antislavery if not abolitionism, and there is a distinction between the two, especially in lincoln's mind, especially in terms of their understanding of the constitution and what congress can do vis-à-vis slavery and the states. but that said, douglass, i can't say often enough, douglass is an abolitionist. so for him, the lens through which he is judging aassessing

lincoln's statesmanship during the war is all through that lens. we need to arm the black man as soon as possible, turn the war into an abolition war. to the extent lincoln resists doing that, to the extent lincoln wants the constitution as it was, the union as it is, which was a favorite saying at the time, he fell short of what douglass saw as a growing movement towards eventual emancipation. so whether it's lincoln's first inaugural address where he quotes the republican platform and then his own opening debate speech in ottawa, 1858, where he says i have neither the power nor the inclination to touch slavery where it exists, the fact that lincoln was only willing to, quote, stop the spread of slavery, douglass thought, that's just half the job, surely we can do better

than that. and then of course massively disappointed when lincoln meets with a group of black leaders from the dc/maryland area, july of -- august of 1862, he's already got the emancipation proclamation drafted, he makes sure a reporter is present, where he essentially says, if it wasn't for the presence of blacks in the united states, we wouldn't have this war. douglass thought, what? how can you possibly blame us for you shooting at each other? in that speech, lincoln utters support for colonization, black immigration, voluntary, from the united states. the word "deportation" is used but for lincoln it was always voluntary. lincoln is try to get these local black leaders to get the ball rolling on seeing if he can get black immigration from the united states to become more popular. and there were, by the way, black leaders who were in favor

of colonization. augustus washington wrote one of the best essays on this in the early 1850s. but when douglass was not one of the local black leaders who met with lincoln in '62, he met with him briefly in '64 and '65, douglass is furious, lincoln blames black people for the war and says if we just leave the country, all will be well? i teach douglass every year, i lecture on douglass. we have to add some important speeches that come later, especially after the war, and especially his 1876 speech at the dedication of the memorial to get an assessment from a rock ribbed abolitionist, frederick douglass, who grew to appreciate the task lincoln had and grew to

appreciate even more, the consent, the support he needed from especially white northerners and out west, to win the war. but for that, there would be no emancipation. early in the war and in fact throughout the war, douglass is one of lincoln's fiercest critics, no doubt. >> they met in august of 1863 where douglass challenges lincoln on black pay and the protection of black p.o.w.'s. douglass sends lincoln this letter. michelle, can you talk about this second meeting with frederick douglass and the letter that douglass sent? >> right, and the letter that douglass sends is august 29th, 1864, if anybody wants to check it online, it's there. they meet in the white house, and the thing that you have to understand about the context, because many of you will also be familiar with the blind memorandum of august 23rd, 1864. this is a period where lincoln

has been renominated by the republicans but things look very dire in terms of his reelection chances. so he writes, you know, it doesn't look like this administration will be reelected. and on one level he's offering to cooperate with the next president to try to save the union because whoever the democrat would have been will not be able to save it, either emancipation is off the table or there will be two nations. at the same time he's concerned if he doesn't win reelection, that those millions of enslaved people still within the confederacy who have not had the chance to escape to union lines or elsewhere will remain enslaved as a result. so meets with frederick douglass and basically proposes a plan or asks, there are enslaved people who don't -- who may know about the emancipation proclamation but don't realize the situation we're in and how dire this may be, so can you talk to some

people and find out how do we get the word out, how do we encourage as many slaves to escape as they can. so the letter you see on the screen, which is in series 1 of the abraham lincoln papers, is basically frederick douglass saying, i've gone and talked with some people and we've come up with some general ideas. and when you read the letter, they really are very general ideas about, let's send agents down and make sure they keep good records and not necessarily, as i was rereading it, i was thinking, okay, so how are those agents actually getting there and who is going to walk into -- and say, okay, you're free, let's go? you and what army, basically, is what it amounts to. but i think what's important about this letter, and obviously douglass, you know, he's thanked him for the interview, that he agrees with lincoln, this is i think one of the times where if you're doing kind of up and down charts of where douglas is with

lincoln, this is, hey, this guy has just suggested that we organize an effort to take slaves out of the confederacy. and for a u.s. president to do that, that's both showing what position he thought that he was in, but also this is frederick douglass and abraham lincoln working together to get as many slaves out of the confederacy as possible. i think that's the most important thing about this document is what it represents in terms of their relationship, of where lincoln was, of what he thought he had to do, not so much what frederick douglass's counsel thought were a good way of sending agents into the confederacy. >> yeah, we often think about the emancipation proclamation as a military necessity. the remarkable thing about this plan which douglass likened to john brown, how are we going to

do this, like john brown. >> hopefully with a better result. >> hopefully with a better result. douglass came away with a new appreciation, because this had nothing to do with military necessity, for lincoln this was about making freedom as broad and permanent as possible before he was out of power. douglass wrote, what he said on this day showed a deeper moral conviction against slavery than i had ever seen before in anything spoken or written by him. and douglass said, he treated me as a man, he did not let me feel for a moment that there was any difference in the color of our skins. the president is a most remarkable man. i love this moment, as lucas -- i think it was lucas -- or no, you said, michelle, this was one of the high points in their relationship. one of the issues that was really contentious at the first meeting for douglass was the issue of soldier pay, and then also this confederate policy that the confederates said they would enslave or murder any black prisoners caught in arms against the confederacy.

edna, can you talk about lincoln's attitude towards the use of black soldiers, how that changes over time, and then also the hurdles and the inequalities that they had to face. >> sure. at the very beginning of the war, african americans volunteered their services. they really wanted to get into the fight, because they believed that if they fought for the union, for the nation, as they saw it, then no one could deny them the rights of full citizen ship. and it also proved that they were men, that they were not property, that they were not inferior, but they were equal to all americans. but lincoln and congress were not ready to have black men serve. and the reason why they didn't was because they didn't want to make this a war about black people. lincoln wanted the union preserved. he didn't at that point at least want emancipation to occur. also, he understood that by

arming black men, he would lose certain states. and he was very much concerned about that. but of course the war wore on for much longer than lincoln and congress had anticipated. and as northern white men got fed up with this long war, and understandably so, they didn't quite understand why black men weren't serving as well. and so lincoln and congress decided that if they were going to win the war, then black men would have to be enlisted. and so he said, that point, that lincoln issues the emancipation proclamation, i think it's for two reasons. it's to make certain that the union has enough men to fight for this cause. but i think it also was an opportunity for lincoln to really get rid of the one thing that was causing the war, and that was slavery. by the time that the proclamation was issued, he understood that that was really what was causing the war. and unless something was done

about slavery, the nation would find itself right back where it was within a few years. and so the emancipation proclamation does have a clause that authorizes the enlistment of black men in the army. they had already been in the navy. but since the 1790s, they were restricted from being in the army. the problem with them after their enlistment was that they were not treated equally. they had been promised $10 a month, which was less than what white men of the same rank were getting. in fact all black men, whatever the rank, got the same thing, $10 a month with $7 -- excuse me, $3 deducted for clothing allowance, while white men were getting $13 a month with an additional $3 for clothing allowance. black men were getting broken

down equipment. they were assigned to fatigue duty. they were digging ditches for the trains and everything else. and they were not initially allowed in the war to fight. and black men wanted to fight. douglass was in the white house in 1863 asking that lincoln intervene in terms of making certain that black men got equal pay. lincoln's response was, i understand, i agree, but you have to remember that it was hard enough just to get approval for black men to serve, and so you have to be patient, this will come eventually. and it did come, just before the war ended. and in the meantime, there were black men who simply refused to take any pay at all. and that's a very serious thing for black men, because they had families that were not supported.

there were some states that were supporting white families. black families were not supported in the main. and so when a black man refused his pay, whatever that pay was, it means that his family was suffering enormously. there was also the issue of the confederacy treating captured black soldiers as if they were slaves in insurrection. so they believed they had the right to shoot them down if they wanted to or reenslave them, or in the instances where these people had never been slaves, just to sell them into slavery. lincoln responded very positively to that, he declared if that policy continued, he would retaliate against these confederate prisoners of war. that slowed down the process a little bit. but it didn't end it, because keep in mind, shortly thereafter, you have the fort

pillow incident where men under the command of nathan bedford forrest actually murdered black men and white men who were attempting to surrender. so it didn't solve the problem totally. but lincoln certainly understood the value of black men to the service of the nation by august of 1863 when his friend conklin wrote to him, asking him to come to springfield, to speak to a republican group. lincoln wrote back and said he couldn't attend because the war was keeping him occupied. but he did send a letter. and this is part of what the letter said. lucas, could you hold that for me just a second. this new-fangled technology, i'm not sure, i'm hoping i'll be able to actual this up. i'll put my specs on.

thank you, lucas. just one second. i'm always so impressed with the way he says this. he says, peace does not appear so distant as it did. i hope it will come soon and come to stay. and so come as to be worth the keeping in all future time. it will then have been proved that among free men, there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet and that they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case and pay the cost. and then there will be some black men who can remember that with silent tongue and clenched teeth and steady eye and well-poised bay on bayonet, some

white men will be unable to forget. these are powerful words and it does convey what lincoln thinks of what black men are doing during this period. and of course black men go on to help to win many major battles. by the time lincoln is writing this, black men had already proven themselves. port hudson has occurred, what's the morris island thing, fort wagner has occurred with the 54th as well. so these are black men who have proven themselves not only to be loyal to the union but to be brave and courageous. and lincoln was not so certain that they could do that initially. in fact he had said if we bring black men into the army, they

will not be able to stand on the battlefield against their former owners. and so they will run. and throw down their weapons along the way. so this is a major transformation from where he was early in the war to summer of 1863 once black men had served successfully in the union army. >> you know, one of the earliest letters from an african american to lincoln that's held at the library of congress is a black new yorker who offers his services to help recruit soldiers. and that is ignored in april of 1861. it's interesting, another letter where he's not asking for something, but he's offering. and this issue of pay was ubiquitous in the correspondence from african americans. i have a whole chapter in the book on this pay issue. these soldiers, they say, the bullets and cannonballs have no respect of persons when it comes

to who they hit. and they're quoting -- there's one letter, they're quoting the dred scott decision there, where roger tawny said the black man has no rights which the white man is bound to respect. they're putting that back to lincoln's face and saying, these bullets have no respect, we deserve equality. and the letters from the mothers and the wives back home are just heart-wrenching to read. you mentioned fort pillow, and this will be the last question that i'll ask the panel, then we'll open it up to q&a. i want to ask michelle about this one letter that is written in the wake of for there pillow. this is at the library of congress. can you tell us about this? >> sure. you'll have to kind of follow me on this one. it's a little -- can be a little convoluted. so the white commander of black troops at fort pillow was major lionel f. booth. there was another point of

contention with black troops, they were under white commanders, some noncommissioned officers that were african americans. major lionel booth was killed by a confederate sharpshooter at fort pillow along with some of his soldiers. major booth's window, who is white as well, went to abraham lincoln in may of -- may 19th, 1864, to advocate on behalf of the widows and children of her husband's fallen soldiers. so, again, a little convoluted as to what all is happening here. she goes and says, these folks should be treated equally to any other dependent wives and dependent children of soldiers. i'll read this really quickly. so, abraham lincoln agrees with her and i'll explain a little bit once we get to the end of it, and he writes a letter of introduction for mrs. booth to take to charles sumner who is

going to be very sympathetic to anything involving african american rights. so his letter -- the other thing i want you to notice, and this is why it's important to have the original materials still as well as transcriptions, because if you know lincoln's handwriting, you'll see this as rushed handwriting and you get a little bit of emotion in it. it says the bearer of this is the widow of major booth who fell at fort pillow. she makes a point i think wore think of consideration which is widows and children in fact of colored soldiers who fall in our service be placed in law the same as if their marriages were legal so that they can have the benefit of the provisions made the widows and orphans of white soldiers. please see and hear mrs. booth, yours truly, a. lincoln. and for the teachers in the group, this is a great little document to be able to unpack a

lot of material in something that your students may not know, because the reason that he has to say widows and children in fact, is that for african american soldiers who had been enslaved before the war and had wives and children before the war, black -- slave marriages are not legally valid. so if you are a widow of a union soldier who wants to apply for a pension for you and your children, you have to prove that you were the legitimate or, you know, the legal wife and children of that soldier. but you can't do that if your marriage was never solemnized, was never made legal. so you were widows and wives and children in fact but not in law. and so this is what mrs. booth is pointing out, that essentially i can go get a pension because i've got a

marriage certificate or i have it somewhere that i married lionel booth. the widows of my husband's soldiers are denied that equal treatment in terms of pensions because they had nothing to be able to prove it other than the community acknowledgement that they were the wives and children. and so that's the point that lincoln is making. and he said, i think this is a worthy point, they deserve to have the same benefits as every other, you know, widow and child of a fallen soldier. but because of this legacy of slavery, they being denied it. and when you start looking at the legal, you know, congressional debate about some of this or what happens in congress, that same year in 1864, equal pay is starting to come up, and there is a provision that essentially if a soldier had been enslaved or was in an area where legal marriages

could not take place, then as long as you can essentially prove community understanding and recognition that you were the wife of that soldier, that will stand in as the proof that you were the wife and then you can apply for pensions. and so there's so much that's going on in there with the legacy of slavery, and again, kind of as, you know, professor janey was talking about, all these unanticipated things that come out of the war. and i'll also mention that, you know, if you ever have a chance to do work in civil war pensions, do it, because they're really fascinating records. but what you'll also find is that because slave marriages were not legal, if a man was understood to be the husband of a woman on one plantation or one place and was sold, one of the two was sold away, and he or she took another wife, after the war, sometimes you find competing widows, because they were both recognized as wives

and dependent children. and not to be flippant, but sometimes i remember sitting in the national archives thinking, i can just imagine these white pension commissioners' heads exploding, trying to untangle all of this. but they're incredibly rich records. if you're interested in african american history and genealogy, because then they have to have people come in and give depositions and, you know, oh, i remember this, and so it's a wealth of information if you can do it. but it's also one of those legacies of slavery that hinders equality of treatment and something that abraham lincoln was also recognizing was unfair and needed to be rectified. so all of that from that tiny little letter is, you know, one of those wonderful things to be able to look at. >> i love to think that when lincoln gave his second inaugural and he talks about him

that's borne the battle as well as his widow and orphans, that's black widows and orphans as well. there are mics on in either aisle if anyone has any questions for the panel. >> should i start? >> should you, go right ahead. >> hi, eileen gravner, arlington, virginia. more of a comment, but i work closely with majority whip jim clyburn of south carolina. and he was just telling me last week, he introduced a bill with congressman seth moulton which provides some gi benefits to african american world war ii veterans' families who were

denied those benefits after world war ii. so this is still going on. any comments? they were denied educational and housing benefits after world war ii. so whip clyburn and congressman moulton and senator warnock in the senate are trying to make amends to these families. >> does anyone want to comment? >> i know that some were denied benefits. some actually were very fortunate and they were able to use those benefits. i remember my physics professor in high school, who was a world war ii veteran, was educated because of the benefits he received through the gi bill. >> over here. >> two creole letters that you

have that lincoln would have expanded as the creole letters had expanded in who can vote and that the 13th amendment, giving the south more votes now that the three fifths rule, would need all the black votes he can get out of them. >> yeah, so i think lincoln comes to see that black voters are going to be essential to the reconstruction process. lincoln all along says, i'm fighting this war to prove that government by consent works. i mean, that's what he says in the july 4th message, 1861, to congress. that's what he says throughout the war. now african americans are going to be part of the people. and he's only working behind the scenes beginning in march of 1864. it's not until, as edna pointed out, april of 1865 that he comes out publicly. it's impossible to know how lincoln's views might have changed after his death. we just can't know. but members of congress were

certainly thinking about this and section 3 of the 14th amendment, essentially tried to diminish representation of southern states in guess if black men were not given the right to vote. and essentially if the voting population is not what it should be, then southern states lose representation in congress. that didn't work. and so then they had to do the 15th amendment in 1870 to guarantee the right -- that the right to vote would not be denied on account of race, color, or previous condition or servitude. i don't know if that completely answers your point, but thank you. >> i'm with the center of lincoln studies any university of springfield. i'm glad you brought up the black clause because i feel like in our state we don't talk about them enough and many students who go through our school system are not educated on illinois black laws and that they even existed. so that's something we're trying

to bring back to actually discuss more so that people realize. but my question is, i spoke to dr. morel about this before i came to listen to your panel, and that is trying to create civil conversations with groups of individuals with diversity on campuses, and asking them what they think about abraham lincoln. and i actually asked the director of our diversity center on campus and asked him and he said, you don't want to know my answer. and i said, well, i want you to feel comfortable talking to me about it. and so please let me know. and he goes, well, we don't believe that lincoln was the great emancipator, and we feel like the emancipation proclamation didn't really do anything. so what i would like to ask our panelists is, in working on college campuses and dealing

with the diversity issue and the comments that are coming up in regarding lincoln and his views, how do you suggest that different college campuses speak with students about lincoln and their upbringing and how they developed their views on abraham lincoln? >> i'll go for it. one thing that i think that you can do is -- because the great emancipator makes it sound like it's only abraham lincoln. and i think it's so important that teachers or educators or people working in your field highlight how many other people were part of this, that it isn't just lincoln woke up one day and said, i think i'll free the slaves today. it was hundreds of years of people agitating to end slavery,

and people whose names we know and people whose names that we don't know, and whites and african americans. there were a lot of people who were part of this. and it also didn't end in 1865 either, that it continued on, that freedom, you know, freedom -- freedom continues to evolve too. and so i think that's something that you can do in terms of, you might not have had -- you probably wouldn't have had emancipation during the civil war if it hadn't been for abraham lincoln, but he had to be pushed there, and other people had to be brought along. i think that's one thing that lucas pointed to with frederick douglass, frederick douglass wasn't running for president so he could say what he felt and what he thought, and that pushes things forward. and lincoln can follow when he feels it's politically -- you know, they're ready to do it or for him it's, i can justify this for military necessity. unfortunately that is a really long conversation to have with

someone -- it's not going to be a 30-second elevator ride. but i think if people understand that there are many people as part of a long continuum of emancipation and freedom, that maybe people can see lincoln's part in emancipation, not that he was responsible for it, if that helps. >> and if i may add, there also needs to be a broader conversation, not just about lon lincoln, but about the civil war in general, what it was about, why it occurred, and what role various groups of people are playing in that war. and until we are willing to sit down and talk about that, we're not going to get beyond this whole thing about whether or not lincoln was the great emancipator. we need to learn to talk to each other. >> you do know i teach at

washington and that lee university. this is my 23rd year and i haven't been hung in effigy yet. i teach a seminar on lincoln every winter. i wish i got more haters of lincoln so it would be a more interesting discussion. we read abolitionist, the pro-confederate, the pro-slavery side, in fact. one thing i think about, about lincoln the free slaves or did the slaves free themselves? the answer is "and," it's both. we have it in lincoln's own writing, in the proclamation he announces a hundred days from now, he's going to issue the emancipation proclamation. in that proclamation he says to the effect, i don't know the words exactly, but in any efforts they may make for their freedom or liberation, lincoln

actually is inviting the enslaved to escape. but here's the thing. but for his army and navy and his authority as president of the united states, that escape would be fruitless. it would be fruitless. proof. frederick douglass publishes his autobiography. do you know how long it is before he has to leave the united states? a few months. why? because he's a fugitive. he's an escaped slave and now he's announced that he's an escaped slave and his legal master back in maryland is not happy. frederick douglass may have translocated himself, he may have physically fled his legal owner, but in the eyes of the law, he's an outlaw. he's outside of the law's protection. he goes to the united kingdom

and for two years he's there giving speeches, selling copies of his autobiography. it's not until friends of his on both sides of the pond pay 150 pounds sterling, 700 and some odd dollars in american cash, it's not until in the eyes of the law he has been manumitted, that she's been able to return and live as a free man. there's still a fugitive slave act, of course, and in 1850 it makes it incredible difficult for a free black person to be secure in his freedom, for all the reasons we know. but the point is, you need the law. you need the government to do its job. and so it's both lincoln as the great emancipator making it a part of the war effort and, as he puts it in the emancipation proclamation, an act of justice. so you have to have the action and the initiative of the enslaved liberating themselves physically but you also had to

have the union army or navy. after all, and alan does a great job of this, in his book where he talks about the emancipation proclamation, the first chapter begins with a story about a slave who steals a boat and steals a boat and rows his way to freedom because he heard lincoln was elected, way before the emancipation proclamation, not james beauchanon but this guy is, this side of the political party is on the side of the slave. this is before the process but i got to show you it's just got to be both to happen. >> we are out of time, but please join me in thanking our panel. [ applause ] >> during a recent interview of the 31st president's great

grandson, allen hoover the third talks about how the presidential library and museum evolved in the future. >> i remember being a boy with different glass cases and papers everywhere, and then in 1992, the hoover presidential foundation called the hhpla back then, along with director richard smith led an effort to make the museum new again. and i remember the first time i visited the library after that renovation. i remember i felt that all the glass cases were gone and i felt i was transported into hoover's life as i walked through the galleries and walked through his life so that was terrific for 1992. but i think what i've just shown you is perfect for 2022, 2023,

and beyond. as we hope it creates a new feeling of wonderment and inspiration so the world can learn about these great americans and for hoover presidential foundation this is our dream and it is time for this dream to become reality. well, fortunately, we have a dedicated board of trustees that are looking towards the future. late last year, the management of arts completed a design i've just shown you today, you may seen their work at the presidential library in springfield which is terrific, if you haven't, i encourage you to look at it. it's really amazing. we'll we are early in the process but the goal is to have an updated, interactive and immersive museum to engage all visitors about herbert hoover

and the museum can be made new again by new generations seeing it for the first time, some with a new experience. young people can become inspired and become the next leader to save americans, like from the flood my father, or the first to provide famine relief efforts to save 10s of thousands of lives like in world war i and ii or simply like great granddad said, in the discussion today, just to learn from history so we're not condemned to repeat it. >> all episodes of american history tv's presidency series available to watch online anytime at c-span. org/history. >> at least six presidents recorded conversations in

office, hear many of those conversations on c-span's new podcast, presidential recordings. >> season 1 focuses on the presidency of lyndon johnson, you'll hear the 1964 civil rights act, presidential campaign, gulf of tonkin incident, march on selma and war in vietnam. not everybody knew they were being recorded. >> certainly johnson's secretaries knew because they were tasked with transscribing many of those conversations, in fact made sure the conversations were taped as johnson would signal to them through an open door between his office and theirs. >> you'll also hear some blunt talk. >> jim. >> yes, sir. >> i want a report of the number of people assigned to kennedy when he, the day he died and the number assigned to me now and if mine are not less, i want them less right quick. >> yes, sir. >> if i can't ever go to the bathroom i won't go, i promise i won't go anywhere, stay right

behind these black gates. >> presidential recordings, find it on the c-span now mobile app or wherever you get your podcasts. >> c-span shop.org is c-span's online store, browse through products, apparel, books, home decor and accessories, there's something for every c-span fan and every purpose supports our non-profit operations, shop now or anytime at c-span shop.org. >> welcome back to session three of the 2121 lincoln forum, i am edna green medford and am delighted to moderate this