frederick douglass in august of 1863, even to the white house and confronts on these issues. and lincoln to douglass essentially black men will eventually get equal pay. i just politically can't do it yet. and as you might imagine if you know anything about frederick douglass, he was not altogether satisfied with that answer, but he did go away. that meeting with an appreciation lincoln treated him as a man, as an equal. shook his. welcomed him into his office. and that lincoln was under constraints. eventually, black men would equal pay, but it would take a year, some and more than a year for those who had been born into bondage. dr. medford set us up for this next letter. yes the pay issue was certainly most important thing that black men had to deal with. they had many other issues to contend. you know, the disease rate among black soldiers was higher than among white soldiers broken down equipment. all the rest but some of men were so frustrated by that, they actually stacked arms. they refused to fight or they didn't accept any pay at all. and those who stacked arms the l

reporter: -- to rename the press room after frederick douglass. is this something you can do as speaker? rep. johnson: i love the idea and that is a great contest. frederick douglass was a great american. we will look into that. reporter: what is in the bill that we have not seen yet? rep. johnson: the fourth bill in the package is israel, indo pacific, ukraine, and the fourth bill which is our national security additional foreign policy measures. that is where you will find the provisions of the rico act, which is the use of the russian sovereign assets that are in the u.s. that will be transferred to ukraine. i think that is a just and right use. using corrupt russian oligarch assets to fund the resistance of the ukrainians is pure poetry in my view. we also have in that package sanctions on iran and russia and china, to try to tamp down on their aggression. we have not done enough of that. the white house and the executive branch has not used its sanctions authority and its discretion in any way close to what it should be. remember, in the last

he thought the mcguffey reader, which he would just read in his log and frederick douglass, my god, if you want any rebuke every morning i do i actually browse rather than read think of frederick. what was the point where he felt most crushed in his liberty? it was when his wicked master told, his mistress, not to teach him to read. and he felt the enslavement of my mind was even greater than the enslavement of my body. and he snuck out and pre and paid boys on the streets of baltimore with bread to teach him to read. and then he got this book, the colombian warrior, which is summed up the classical wisdom with little excerpts, and that inspired him to be the greatest abolitionist of all time and books so precious to them. and and we can do it, too. all we need is the discipline to read. it's absolutely extraordinary we can do it too. except it seems in this age to imagine our political leadership being contemplative, you know, because of beating. and it's not just social and it's not just the coming of age, but it's all that. it's those things and many more things. the whole system se

president stood with us in the first 100 days of our administration to announce his funding for the frederick douglass tunnel and he stands with us today to help the families, clear the channel, lift our people and rebuild this bridge. [applause] with the support of president biden and his team, i know that marylanders of this generation and the next will look up and once again they will see the francis scott key bridge and they will see it standing tall. the state of maryland is honored to welcome the president of the united states to one of the most important cities in the united states. ladies and gentlemen, the 46th president of the united states of america, president joe biden. [applause] pres. biden: thank you, thank you, thank you. please, please, thank you. [applause] >> woo! woo! [applause] pres. biden: by the way, folks, i said to my dad, dad, you are mispronouncing baltimore. [laughter] please sit down. the biden family goes all the way back to being watermen in this bay in the mid-1800s. my father was born and raised here in baltimore. there is a strong, strong connection. i still have fam

he actually helped frederick douglass make his way to new bedford. he led a petition drive to protest the treatment of black sailors in the american south and in cuba. and he sent that petition to the u.s. congress, the person or the group that wrote the most petitions were black bostonians, william cornell and others. they're routinely writing petition after petition after petition, not just about the treatment of black sailors. i mean, they were petitioning everything the state of massachusetts ought to integrate schools. they had to allow interracial marriage. they had to expand, extend the franchise. they should allow black men to join the military. there were petitioning everything all the time. and one of the things that they petitioned was for the protection of black sailors. and it's that last part that's really fascinating, because all those other things that the black bostonians petitioned for, they were petitioning for state rights, not like the whites of states, but the rights that you are that you were given through the state. right. so

his book, the black hearts of men, won the frederick douglass book prize and. his book, giants the parallel lives of frederick douglass and abraham lincoln, was a national bestseller. this introduction could go on much, much longer, but it stops. there because it is a pleasure for me to welcome manisha sinha back to a to welcome john stauffer here for conversation and now over to manisha. thank you, scott, for that very generous introduction and i thank everyone who showed up here in the middle of the week to help me launch this book. i'd really like to begin by thanking all the staff at the american antiquarian society as scott just mentioned, i did much of my research for this book here in the archives and the whole world was shut down because of the pandemic. i had the privilege of being able to research this book, so i'm extremely grateful to the people at the american antiquarian society, and i think it's only appropriate that i'm launching this book here today. i thank nan will return for inviting me to do this program and i thank my good friend who in my

but as frederick douglass, who had the most reason to know, the country's failures, to assert the hypocrisy of the declaration asked his audience and eight year he asked his audience to imagine a longer history a future for the country. there is consolation, he said, and the thought that america is a young so the question for us is whether we can still conceive of america as young. and in my for this volume i suggest that it may be easier to think that way if we rediscover a feature of democratic politics that was once familiar but is now less often. and that is a tendency democracies to fall into cycles or patterns of institutional dysfunction, popular discontent followed by reform now stated in that way. the point is familiar and they seem bland. but it seems to me that given the patterns of history, the way they deserve promises to free us from some of the dangerous silly self-fulfilling disappointment that can arise from the expectation of a simpler more direct movement in the direction progress. even those who hope that the cycles of discontent and reform spiral upward to follow the ar

deserved a close analysis, a careful the way that we've looked, what lincoln had to say, what frederick douglass grant and other you know, figures from the 19th century had to say. so recovering that that was was an aim. and then one last quick observation, which will help to frame our conversation. longstreet is this is a familiar name to most of you, if not all of you. i know and realize and we longstreet primarily with a particular place in a particular moment and that's gettysburg in 1863 and of course gettysburg is fascinating will have a lot to say about but part of the object my book was to say to understand this man and indeed to understand gettysburg and its legacies, you have to appreciate the other moments, key moments and the other key settings. his life, new orleans in 1867, when he makes a really surprising decision to support reconstruct in gainesville, georgia in the late 19th century not far from here. he settles and writes this memoir and really digs into the defense of his wartime record against critics. atlanta washington d.c. where he is a part of an important republican pol

professor henry louis gates latest book is about the effort by african-american writers from frederick douglass to james baldwin to write and define the black experience. its titled the black box writing the race. and one more new book that's out, we want to tell you about, lawyer and retired harvard law professor alan dershowitz. his latest is called war on woke. why the new mccarthyism is more dangerous than the old. and this is about books, a programing podcast produced by c-span's book tv. in this episode, we're looking at some of the new books that are coming out this spring. here are some by journalists. inpril, chicago tribune investigative reporter gregory royal pratt is releasing his book on the windy city and its former mayor. the title, the city is up r grabs. how chicago mayor lori lightfoot led and lost a city in crisis. and in may, clinton white house communications director and currt abc host george stephan police will release the situate in room the inside story of presidents in crisis. and the newest book from shington examiner political columnist timothy carney is titled famil

last year we got marilyn's economy movingly secured federal investments in the frederick douglass tunnel project. [applause] we ensured the new fbi headquarters will be located in prince george's county. [cheering] we have cap the orioles in baltimore for decades to come. [cheering] [applause] we have delivered over $1.4 billion to small and minority owned businesses through the florida public works. [applause] we provided more than 130,000 laptops to underserved households to narrow the digital divide. [applause] and we work to accelerate the clean energy transition in every part of our state is not just some. now i am grateful, grateful to president biden, or federal delegation all the state and local and municipal leaders who have been fighting for these projects and stay one. [applause] but, together what we showed is and together going forward we will continue to build on our progress. we will invest in industries of the future with funding for life sciences and biotech and data centers and cyber. [applause] we will cut red tape so maryland is the friendliest state in the nation to

professor henry louis gates latest book is about the effort by african-american writers from frederick douglass to james baldwin to write and define the black experience. its titled the black box writing the race. and one more new book that's out, we want to tell you about, lawyer and retired harvard law professor alan dershowitz. his latest is called war on woke. why the new mccarthyism is more dangerous than the old. and this is about books, a programing podcast produced by c-span's book tv. in this episode, we're looking at some of the new books that are coming out this spring. here are some by journists. in april, chicago tribune investigative reporter gregory royal att is releasing his book on the windy city and its former mayor. the tie, the city is up for grabs. how chicago mayor lori lightfoot led and lo a city in crisis. and in may, clinton white house communications directoand current abc host george stephan police will release the situate in room the inside story of presidents in crisis. and the nest book from washington examiner political columnist timothy carney i titled family unf

, like frederick douglass, i think i'm going to lose reelection. let's see if we could get together a clear decision group to go in and free as many people as we can. and some like underground army. right. so he was really trying to do this. he changed. he was not about that life early on, but towards the end, lincoln had to have had some moral revelatory moments. all right. so so let's let's look at how ilana responded to the beginning of the war this is this is your city. this is your city. and see how your predecessors, what they would talk about in when the war began, the local newspapers were about what the war portend for the city and the region i quote upon point, he is perfectly plain. atlanta intelligencer newspaper wrote about lincoln. he decides war. we are prepared to meet it. we are united and homogenous. this as a people every man. the south is a soldier unquote. the paper wrote in classic form the 44% of the state's population that was black and almost entirely held in chains, or the 35% of people in the region south in similar condi

first african-american professional musician, marie williams, to perform at the white house and frederick douglass introduced her. she also invited other black music groups, including students, to sing at white house events. helen nellie taft, who's in the bottom left hand corner, developed an appreciation for cultural diversity when they were in the philippines and. that taft was the governor general of the philippines at the time. she found that there was a color line and that the soul pianos were not being invited to events. well, she changed all of that. and they really considered her to be very egalitarian. she also looked at the plight of african-american immigrants who were in washington, d.c., and tried to do some things for them. and she invited them to white house open houses, which had not been done before, and added african-americans to the staff. she believed that education was a great equalizer, and she supported the start of kindergarten classes for black children. well, she's best known for bringing the cherry trees to washington. her civil rights activities are lesser known, but t

. >> fred looked -- frederick douglass, the stories he must have. [ simultaneous talking ] >> what isca. >> cutting edge. >> i love that movie. >> blazing saddles. >> what is your favourite old-fashioned arcade game? >> pac-man. >> gallagher. >> pac-man. >> miss pacman. >> do you have a good sense of direction? is. >> yes, i do. >> no. >> not really. >> my husband would say no. >> i have amazing direction. enough said. if your pet how to human job, he or she would be a. >> a special forces operator. >> a doctor. >> gigolo. >> you have to say while not one >> homeless. my animals are lazy. what is the worst hairstyle you ever had? >> when i had it short with a tail. >> i had a part right here for a long time. >> jerry curl. >> you had a curl? >> he did not. i got a bob when i was 18. >> my football coach convinced me to get a flattop. on a long trip would you rather have with you a book or your phone? >> a book. not lying. >> a book. to get it together. >> a phone and i would download the book. >> same thing. all right. one more thing is up next.millir protection package. >> enroll now

the great black leader, frederick douglass, who watched lincoln deliver his speech and later discussed it him at a white house reception. the popular actor john wilkes booth, who evidentlytalked lincoln at the inauguration. the great american pt walt whitman, who was covering the inauguration for the new york times, the angel of the battlefield, clara barton, who spent that week trying to meet lincoln and finally greeted him at the reception. and, of course, there was the vice president elect, andrew johnson, who showed up at the inauguration embarrassingly drunk. and the perception of these very different people provide a powerful and moving view of what that war was about and what lincoln was up against on that rainy, muddy day in washington. and i tried to weave those all into the story. at the center of it all. of course is abraham lincoln, who can anding in the this crowd reading his speech just about above the table, a glass of water on it. he did something that day, as i mentioned, that no other no other politician would. on the cusp of victory after, four years of a brutal devi

. >> tyrus: frederick douglass. >> emily: harriet tubman. >> tyrus: what is your favorite movie to watchge." >> tyrus: "blazing saddles." i love breaking this record. what is your favorite old-fashioned arcade game? pass! >> emily: pacman! >> jesse: i got pac-man, too. >> tyrus: ms. pac-man. >> jesse: even better. >> tyrus: she's faster. >> tyrus: do you have a good sense of direction? >> emily: yes, i do. >> tyrus: harold? >> jesse: not really. >> tyrus: that's why you have a driver, jesse. i have amazing direction. enough said. all right, if your pet had a human job, he or she would be a... >> emily: duchess would be a special forces operator. she passed away appeared >> harold: a doctor. >> jesse: gigolo. >> emily: don't have to say why on that one. >> tyrus: homeless. my animals are lazy. can't live on the water. what is the worst hairstyle you ever had? >> emily: worst and best in the '80s, short with a tail. >> harold: i had a part right here for a long time. >> tyrus: jesse? >> jesse: curl. >> sandra: i had a bob when i was like 18. >> emily: that's cute. speed through my football

and also for a far more egalitarian reading of the constitutional order, as frederick douglass did, douglass, one of douglass's key, written, vocal and political accomplishments in the decade before the civil war, was to embrace the idea that there was an emancipate true potential in the american revolution and to kind of push that and to turn that, as it were, on on on his audience. what douglass understood it was that unless you could harness the the moral value of what douglass understood was that by harnessing the moral value of the revolution and that instinct to preserve it, he could most effectively advocate for the end of slavery. so really, the question then about preservation of the revolutionary settlement was not really about whether the federal constitution, the revolution was pro or anti-slavery, but about how much slavery it tolerated or unknown what in what circumstance says. so a lot of the debate in the in the period we're talking about in the run up to the civil war was about what had been the nature of the compromises that had been made back in the 7080s. now, of course,