The rise of Andrew Jackson, mitt, manipulation, and the making of modern politics, in which they examine how Andrew Jackson was elected president in 1828. We recorded their remarks that the u. S. Capital Historical Society in 2018. I am going to go ahead and start stuff. Welcome to the latest lunchtime lecture. My name is dr. Man tony, oh chief historian here. Welcome. I am really pleased today to introduce you, if you dont already know, to jean and david heidler. They have been speakers here before for their book on George Washingtons circle. And today, we are really honored that we are one day into the official existence of their latest book on Andrew Jackson, the rise of Andrew Jackson. It was just released officially yesterday. We are at the threshold of greatness here with the book. And i hope you all consider buying. It they will be available afterwards to sign for anyone who is interested. And i also want to point out that their previous book, i said they had been here before, it was washingtons circle. We are selling discounted copies of that back there. I am told the hardcover we are selling is five cents more than amazons soft cover. So that sounds like a winwin. Anyways. I hope you will have some Great Questions for jean and david. This is a hot topic. I assume some of you are familiar, but some may be drawn specifically because of Andrew Jackson, who has been in the news lately. So lets hear about why, how he is a template for modern politics, and we will be taking q a afterwards. I hope you have some Great Questions. And with that, i will ask you to help me welcome jean and david. applause hello, everyone. Thank you for that gracious introduction and the boost on the book that just came out yesterday. Can everyone hear me all right . Good. I will try to keep up the volume here so that we dont have any problems. Its delightful to be back here again. Several years have passed, and we see some familiar faces and have met some new friends. Today, we would like to talk to you about the central aspect that drove the campaign for 1828 in the wake of the one for 1824, which was the charge of the corrupt bargain. To ask the question, how corrupt was it, that is where we get into this business of smear or truth. Part of this is the natural aftermath of an election, which is always a time of mixed emotions and contrasting moods. You have the elation of the victors and the disappointment of the defeated. And these balance each other after a fashion, which leads to better perspective on the event in the future and gives a sense of proportion. The first shock of defeat will subside and elation over victory becomes relief over having attained it. From this, you get an equilibrium. That is necessary for sound governance. In the best case, the victor is never completely vindicated, and the defeated is never completely demolished. A healthy political system preserves the adversarial role as a way to check, curb, and discourage over leaning power. And at the same time, the extremes of failure and success must be avoided. Because if they persist, their lies the path to irreconcilable differences, and to the heedless exercise of power, and to the reckless form of resilience. Fundamental to avoiding all of this is a general belief that good faith is operating as a given and the election and its aftermath. Imagine, then, the chaos that is likely to ensue if the defeated emerge from the election convinced that they have been cheated, that the process itself was manipulated in bad faith, and that the result is illegitimate, that the beneficiaries of it are shallow hugs tours at best, but possibly evil and worst. Subverting the peoples well, destroying the democratic ideal for the venal gain of power. That would be bad enough. But imagine if the losers did not really believe this, but were willing to act as if they did, that they were intent upon convincing as many people as possible that the things they know to be lies are the truth. The damage of such an effort, even if unsuccessful, could be incalculable, if it is successful, certain to be devastating. And it is that situation that can be broadly categorized as a smear. A smear is a deliberate fabrication at worst, or at least a willful twisting of the truth to sally the reputation of the target. Strictly speaking, the truth cannot be a smear. The purpose of it in politics is as a scheme to achieve advantage over an opponent outside of traditional means such as debate over issues of policies, or contrasting differences which are presented either in person or through pertinent issues being explored in writing. Candidates and entities resort to these smears because they wish to distract from something. They wish to change the subject. It could be from their own personal failings or foibles, or their own records, either in personal matters where they behave questionable, even or past political stances that were or have become unpopular. In short, distraction is the operative function of a smear. For a candidate with nearly unassailable credibility, it is an easy way to damage an opponent. And this is where becomes especially dangerous. Credibility comes from popularity, a sterling bead, and inspiring life story, or even a sense of identification with people that creates a bond for essentially ephemeral reasons. It is nonetheless in parts of authority. The fallacy of arguing from authority is only matched by the ease of doing so. It is to say that you should believe me because of who i am, discounting the need for evidence or even dismissing contradictory evidence as irrelevant. Hello. At the heart of our story today is the constitutional role of the house of representatives in deciding a president ial election, such as the one in 1824, an election where no candidate received a majority in the Electoral College. This had only happened once before, the election of 1800, when thomas jefferson, tied with his Vice President ial running mate aaron burr. It is somewhat odd that it hadnt happened more than one time before, because the framers of the constitution actually envisioned it happening pretty frequently. They thought that because they believed that favorite sons, from the various states, would run in each of the quadrangular elections, and as a result there would be no majority in the Electoral College, that would throw it into the house of representatives. They chose the house because it is considered the peoples house, the frequency of the elections make it more responsive to the will of the people. This was the mechanism envisioned. Now, if someone did receive a majority in the Electoral College originally, that person would become the president. The person who came in second would become the Vice President. But that election of 1800 obviously illustrated that that wasnt practical. And so the changes brought on by the 12th amendment to the constitution resulted in net 12th amendment, and provided four separate elections for president and Vice President. And in the event that there is not a majority, the top three candidates would then go before the house. The house would vote by states. Each state having one vote. The rationale for that was the same as for the Electoral College. It was to prevent the larger states from dominating the elections. A simple majority in the house would then provide the victor. The physical process of the voting and how it was achieved, how it was counted, that is kind of a story for another day. What is pertinent for us today are the 1824 Election Results. There were simply too many candidates. By the time they got to the election in the fall, there were four. Secretary of state John Quincy Adams of massachusetts, secretary of the treasury william h. Crawford of georgia, speaker of the house henry clay of kentucky, and senator Andrew Jackson of tennessee. The abundance of candidates assured that no one was going to receive a majority in the Electoral College, and that was apparent by the late fall of 1824. According lee, the 12th amendment kicked in. The top three in the Electoral College votes were jackson, adams, and crawford. These would be the candidates before the house of representatives. We do sort of have a tag team thing here. Like in wrestling, one of you could come up and try to keep one of us away from the podium. Jacksons men insisted that his plurality in the popular and electoral votes was a decisive factor in determining the outcome of the house election. In a letter to john over ten on december 19th of 1824, jackson referred to himself as having been supported by the majority of the people, which wasnt the case. But jackson correctly assumed this wasnt the time for subtlety. With servitude and tenacity, the message was hammered home. Jackson had won the election because of the popular vote. He had won the election because of a plurality in the Electoral College. And it was incumbent on the house to endorse these conclusions out of a basic fairness. It was the only way, said the jacksonites, to truly represent the will of the people. Jacksons managers assiduously tried to pump these numbers, and its easy to see why. He came in first in the Electoral College, but far short of the hundred 31 majority necessary for victory. But it was jacksons significant lead in the popular vote that animated his supporters. 18 to 24 states and 1824 chose the electors by popular vote. Jackson had more than 40,000 votes than his closest competitor, John Quincy Adams, and more than 110,000 votes than william h. Crawford, the third place finisher. Lost in the comparison of these figures, however, is the reality that not one of these numbers really matters. Only the electoral counts of jacksons 99, adams 84, and crawfords 41 are pertinent to the constitutional prescriptions for referring these men to the question before the house of representatives. The flawed logic in the appeal of the popular vote is made evident by scrutinizing the case of henry clay, who had beaten crawford in the popular vote by more than 6000. But crawford had won louisiana thanks to some skulduggery on the part of the adams and jackson camps in the legislature. Louisiana chose the electors, and as a result, crawford came in the by winning louisiana, and as a result, became one of the three candidates who was going to go before the house. This fairly clearly shows that comparing the apple of popular votes to the orange of electoral ones was, in short, a pointless exercise. Because of the complicated nature of this question, which i am sure you will all agree is fairly complicated at this point, it would prove a highly effective way of manipulating public opinion. Consequently, the pressure to influence house members with these spurious claims was intent and persistent. The house would not take up the question until february 9th, 1825, which gave not only the supporters of jackson, but those of adams and crawford more than two months to cobble together the simple majority in the house necessary for victory. They also courted one another with promises, seeking pledges of support, operatives moving between the operatives of the other two, bending the truth, and lying when truth didnt seem to work. The Practical Applications of all of this become evident as a result of what happened in january of 1825. Henry clay, speaker of the house, strongly inclined to support John Quincy Adams as soon as he knew, clay knew, that he had lost the election. And he knew this in the fall. He knew it before louisiana. He was juicing that he was not going to go before the house of representatives. As he became aware of, that he only wanted to make certain that adams was supportive of his pro gram for National Improvement before throwing his support to him. To that end, he had an extensive interview with adams on the night of january 9th, 1825. It is possibly one of the most pivotal events in american political history. The details of the meeting have never been made clear. Adams usually recorded things voluminously and completely in his diary. He did not for this. What is clear is the results of the meeting were to be devastating to the reputations of both of these men, because clay was going to use his enormous influence after this as speaker of the house in the cause of John Quincy Adams. Now, there were certainly problems with this meeting. Its context was unfortunate, before it took place in the midst of a whirl of proposed deals by all the parties concerned, including the jacksonites. Let me read a couple passages from our book to illustrate how some of this deal making was going on. Ohio congressman, john sloan, found himself sitting across a dinner table from sam houston, an important jackson operative, whom used between bites that ohio would surely go for jackson in the house vote. Sloan was an experienced politician in his mid forties, a jeffersonian, who had preferred clay. And his response to houston was measured. He had not spoken to the others of his delegation, he said guardedly. Sloan believed houston looked anxious as he spoke about what a splendid administration it would make with old hickory as president and mister clay as secretary of state. Later, as houston bed farewell, he made doubly sure his offer had not been misunderstood. I hope you from ohio will aid us in electing general jackson, sloan recalled him saying with a winking repeat of the proposed deal. And then your man, meeting mister clay, can have anything he pleases. And then there was the case of daniel cookeville annoy. Old hickorys men heard the distressing news that the young illinois congressman, daniel p cook, intended to vote for adams. At 30 years old and in frail health, he suddenly found himself at the center of an unsettling effort to influence his vote. Illinois was a relatively new state. Its small population granted only one representative. But since each state had one vote in the house election, dan cook by himself was as important as all of new york or pennsylvania. Illinois had mostly gone for jackson, and old hickorys men forcefully demanded that those general Election Results to more than guide cook in the house vote. He should accept them as the verdict of the people, or else. Pennsylvania, jackson man Samuel Ingram took this tact with koch. Theyve rumored alliance of adams and clay would be unpopular, he muttered darkly to cook. And it would hurt kochs career to join it. He watched the young man absorb this threat, and saw someone not at all weighing his options to cut his losses. He according lee switched his mood and smiled, benevolently. Cook said he could be territorial governor of arkansas if his vote helped Andrew Jackson become president. For daniel p cook, the author of the whole world was in sufficient to purchase his vote at the cost of his integrity. But arkansas . In gum knew when to drop it. Henry clay was courted by the jackson and crawford men as well. And the murkiness of these overtures encouraged significant misunderstandings at the time, and massive ones later. Clay enjoyed the attention, and prolonged it, which was unwise. It would be unfortunately easy to conclude in this setting that clay, in meeting with adams, was arranging a quid pro quo for his support. As the february 1825 vote approached expectations were high on all sides. And there was also a lot of discussion about how should the house consider the candidates. Clearly, the intention of the constitution was to have attacked independently of all general Election Results. What, after all, did the framers of the constitution intend . If the house were merely to ratify and Electoral College plurality, why have the house vote at all . And Electoral College plurality would be sufficient to select a winner, if that was the case, but that was explicitly not the case per the constitution. Rather, the top three finishers in the Electoral College came before the house equally entitled, with none favored over the others by any previous election result. The constitution, clearly met for the house to start its considerations from scratch. And then the vote was held. John quincy adams one on the first ballot. There is enormously complicated reasons this happened, but we only need be aware that adams was elected on the first ballot to everyones surprise, mostly to the jacksonites. Jackson at first was magnanimous, which strikes as perhaps as an act. Then, the very night after the house vote, Jackson Adams came face to face. Again, from the book, the monroes held their weekly reception, and while everyone seemed drained by the experience, they were also grateful that despite the angry talk, broad recriminations, and a grinding apprehension, the election in the end had been decided with a calm dignity. The president s gathering was not festive, but it was an eventful, which was pleasant for people weary of events. A Kindred Spirit pervaded the whole scene, the national intelligentsia reported. The friends of the different candidates mingled together and conversed with the good humor and frankness contrasted with the virulence and malignancy, which in some parts of the country had attended the discussion of this question. President elect, John Quincy Adams, stood near the center of the room in the midst of a press of people offering congratulations. He received them with a drawn smile and stiff back. He felt another oppressive people behind him and turned just as Andrew Jackson turned to face him. The president s reception fell silent. Guests suddenly became conscious of the cramped space and instinctively backed away from the two men to create a small, empty circle with them at its center. The last bit of stray laughter and murmuring voices went quiet in the corners of the room. Adams looked up at the gaunt face. Andrew jackson bowed low. He extended his hand. Adams took it. The bow at the reception seemed promising, as did the handshake. But jackson was actually see the thing. And then, the announcement came that John Quincy Adams had named henry clay as his secretary of state. This set off the explosion. Jackson wrote to a friend, was there witness such a bare faced corruption in any country before . So you see the judas of the west, has closed the contract and will receive the 30 pieces of silver. His and will be the same. Now, a smear can only work if the behavior being decried is exclusive to the target. But this was not the case. We have already seen. Jackson operatives have been working night and they to secure votes for jackson. The example of sloan and cook are just to have a number of instances. And then, the activities of James Buchanan nearly did them all in. James buchanan was an insignificant pennsylvania congressman in 1824. He strongly supported jackson and wanted to do anything to get the hero elected. Therefore, he took it upon himself to become a power broker, by going to jackson and indicating that claim and might support old hickory if jackson agreed to make clay secretary of state. Jackson refused to commit, and there its seemingly ended, at least until after the election, when jackson chose to use that interview with buchanan has proof that clay attempted to sell his support to jackson before turning to adams. Buchanan never supported this version of events, and finally flatly in the press denied it, saying that he had never been and emissary for henry clay. This denial presented a problem for the jackson side. It must not be so. Jacksons insistence that this was precisely what happened gives the impression that jackson truly believed buchanan had done what jackson claimed, despite buchanans denials. Jackson continued to insist that clay had sent buchanan. It also points to a strangely unique sense of self, and rectitude that got it jackson. Adams in clay were bad. Anything necessary to bring them down was excusable. Now there were a lot of people that did not believe this summer. Some of them are actually in the jacksonites movement. Martin van buren, for example league who actually ran the last part of the jacksons 18 28th successful campaign. They always remain friendly with henry clay. Theres thomas hard bitten. Enthusiastic jackson night. He was also mrs. Henry clays first cousin. Then there is thomas richie. A latecomer to the jackson county. A friend of henry clay when they were teenagers. Richmond virginia. This picture was taken about 1850, which was the year that during a dinner party, thomas admitted to clay that he had never believed the bargain they all however, in the late 18 twenties, fell into the same camp as jackson supporter richard mentor, johnson, who said at the time, that old hickorys men would oppose adams and clay, even quote, if they act as pure as the angels that stand at the righthand of the throne of god. In conclusion, lets recall that the nature of the smear is either to fabricate a believable lie or bend the truth to the purpose of making credible, otherwise and insupportableuubdcallegations. In that regard, the construction of the smear is by necessity counter factual. A truth becomes an obstacle to the smears purpose, or it is made malleable and becomes a tool to advance its purpose. At some point in this process and as a result of it, smear becomes a socialist and corrosive project for those who promoted, and those who believe it. Those who promoted and no its origins and purpose must make about bargain at the outset. That is the most corrupt, thoroughly corrupt bargain of all. The rationalization that the sacrifice of integrity is justified by the higher good of writing along or stopping and injustice. Jacksons uncanny ability to weave and don such raju is a shuns was strange and wonderful indeed. But those duped into believing smear because of their trust in those promoting, have an investment in both the life, or the lie and its authors, and is as emotional as it is political, and that too becomes an enemy of the truth. The consequences of the given life by desire a necessity and most range we, righteousness. The lie becomes something more terrifying then and untie truth. It becomes received wisdom. As received wisdom, it transforms into laura, not a fabulous tale but a fable. Both obstructive and cautionary. A guide to understanding what happened in warning and the understandings of deeper meaning. It is a myth then, that a law is a Fragile Foundation upon which no structure can safely stand for long, let alone forever. Ally properly molded and persistently told can last as long as people are willing to believe it. At some point, it becomes a mortal. Because people go beyond their willingness to believe it to a reflects of embrace of it. The light of the corrupt bargain on outlived quincy adams and clay and still lives today in our american historical memory. At the time the, when it was fresh and my brit vibrant and finding its legs, that there had been a corrupt bargain in january 1825, was enough muellers for a lifetime. It called in question the method of carrying out the election. When established by the constitution and sanctioned by all the participants in the election process. Until. That sort of potency undermines the rule of law. It defames opponents as unfit and currents discourse. Sometimes, to the point of violence. All of those consequences destabilize the process of democratic rule. Object lessons abound a Cautionary Tales in this episode. One that remains highly relevant to our own time beyond its value as a telling episode from our past. It is worth remembering as a guidebook for navigating a perilous stick journey. Thank you. applause well. We will take questions now. So you would say that inaudible what role did actually play in a subsequent elections . It was used to energize the jacksonites movement. The notion that they have been illegitimately deprived of the prize and 24 by the virtue of the house election in 25. Gave a great deal of animation to their efforts in a sense of righteousness as we pointed out. It provides every conversation that occurs in the wake of it. Theres hardly an article in the jackson paper that does not work in some way the corrupt bargain into the narrative, and as a result, it becomes a pervasive and pernicious, and completely ubiquitous occurrence, that becomes people could slate those two words anyone in the country. And automatically knew what they meant. By virtue of that, they tarred the people khamenei people targeted John Quincy Adams who ironically was probably one of the most khoury had the most integrity of whoever held the office of presidency. He became a scheming corruption assist. A fine reputation as a diplomat, a legislator, a grand lawyer. Week he took up unpleasant cases. For the good of the country, for the good of individuals. He was painted as a libertine and a poll truman. There were duels fought over this. Look at while he was sitting secretary of state, john was senator from virginia. They bought the motivational factor behind this is incalculable. As a result, it is assume immortality. The last of its day. Does that make sense . I warned you i was going to ask you this, so you cannot act surprise. What really jumped out it means they see during your tag team team thing i wanted to know how there were differences in your styles of teaching. You seem to really relish the drama of the moment. David, you are laying out the methodology of your approach, and so on. When you get to writing, how does that dynamic play out . As coal writers i am interested in this as fiction, but as a story i am interested in it as a piece of history. How did to historians sit down and write a book together . And i might point out, your husband and wife. Changes the dynamic. For 37 years. Weve each book weve approached differently. For instance, our biography of henry clay, which we will never do it this way again. I started it at the beginning. He started at the end. We tried to come together. We didnt come together exactly the way we thought we should. That took a little bit of work in the middle. The Washington Book and then this book, we wrote to our strengths the things we had been most interested in. One of us would write maybe that section, and then we would always edits each others book. I will freely admit. David is a much better writer than i am. You are. I am a much faster writer than he is. So what we would do after writing a section, we would edit each other. So that voice sounds the same. It sounds like one person wrote the book. We have never had anyone come to us and say, oh i know you wrote this section. I know he wrote that section. It has never really happened because of the editorial process that we go through. Then of course our editor at the press has a lot to say about what is included and some of the language, and so that helps bring one voice as well. Does that answer questions . Thank you. What does this tell us about the Electoral College . We have indirect elections here in the united states. Obviously, and going back to that election that you discussed this afternoon. When the voters in louisiana voted, they voted for the electors. But you put up a popular vote count. Could you maybe explain that whole process . Sure. The democratization of politics was well underway before the war of 1812 and continue to accelerate afterwards. So that the broadening franchise, a lot more people could vote. They drop property qualifications. Occurred in tandem with the notion to popularize the electoral choice. The period before this, the majority of states legislatures elected electors, where they did senators. That changes. I think i mentioned that there were 18 of the 24 states in 1824 that had popular votes for electors. Louisiana was not one of them. That is how they were able to control louisiana as much as they did. They were able to detain people from going to vote in baton rouge, they were able to stop them. When state got there from voting, or had pledged to, deals were made. Largely between the adams and crawford people at the encouragement of jackson. Because jackson was strong and louisiana. Clay was very strong. They used adams and crawford to blunt his strength and give the vote to crawford, who is very much a long shot. That kind of manipulation was possible at state legislators legislatures, where it was not in the popular vote. So the tendency by 1828, its even more, and then by the end of the period, as we move to the civil war, the only state by the outbreak of the civil war that still does legislate legislature choices south carolina. All of them go through a popular vote as part of the democratization project of the american political system. Especially in the second American Party system. The Electoral College is a wonderful mechanism, because it does prevent populous states from dictating to others. To less populous states. It is idea that the federal system imparts the sovereignty and importance to both large and small states that otherwise would be removed in the absence of that. A National Referendum is essentially it would give you a National Executive based on about three or four highly Populated Areas in the west of the country. That would be a recipe for division. Ultimately, disunion. The constitution does not provide the delegates, as i understand it. They were pledged. Pledged to whom . In this election, for example. You had clay supporters, jackson supporters, crawford supporters. Those people within the legislature, for instance, with vote for electors who were pledged. They were the ticket. They were the ticket for clay or they were the ticket for adams. Same thing in the popular vote. May i interject . When the book, we have one of the illustrations is one of the tickets. What they would do is they would distribute these whether they were popularly elected or if it was for the legislature choosing. They would distribute the stick its so that the voters, lets say if it was a popular elected, they would know which men were pledged to a certain candidate. They did not have to vote the way they pledged, and they still dont. But that would be a recipe for of wind career. If you pledged that you were going to vote for jackson in the Electoral College, and then you voted for adams. Then the voters who voted for you would want to exact some revenge on you, whether it was political or business, or whatever. Generally speaking, electors have always voted, most of the time, for those people that were pledged to. There are defections. Its not unheard of. Very rare. New york had some defections. Yes. Madison had quite a number of defections in 1812. From various states. They just didnt vote for him. They voted for other candidates. So but it is remarkable bad faith in the eyes of the people who actually cast votes. And what the jacksonites dead after 1825, they used the 1826 elections as a referendum on the 1824 election. And those members of congress, the house of representatives who came from states that had voted for jackson, and yet voted for adams instead, those legislators, congressman, they were punished. A lot of them were defeated in the 1826 midterms as a penalty for what the jacksonites said thwarted the will of the people. Trump in debates had said that the election, would he respect the results of the election would depend on who won. Did you see any parallels as you were writing this . I realized that you wrote this probably most of it before the last election. But were using parallels with modernday tensions . Jackson never publicly said that adams did not win the election. In other words, he did not challenge the legitimacy of the election on a legal level. So i dont see a similarity in that way at all. Yes, his argument was that the numbers had been rigged. Obviously, adams won the house vote on the first ballot. And it was close. He took the necessary 13 and that was it. And new york was the decisive one in that decision. That was never the question, and jackson was actually fairly magnanimous, as jean mentioned, in the aftermath of this for about 24 hours. And then, it dawned on them that something had gone on that was not right. Its almost as though after the election, jackson and his people were trying to figure out what to do next. It was obvious that what had happened was sanctioned by procedure and prescriptions in the constitution. What they did is they seized on the appointment of clay, and secretary of state, as a mechanism to promote the idea that some corrupt deal had been made. That way, they could question the legitimacy of the election through it being rigged to thwart the will of the people. Thats how they work that out. And thats not an unusual thing in the aftermath. It was unusual at the time. It was an innovation. And its one of the modern politics aspect that we explore in the book. That and others. That is not unusual. Afterwards it was highly unusual at the time. And thats why it really did baffle adams and clay for quite some time. Why anyone is taking this seriously, because it didnt make any sense to them. So when it became apparent that it was being taken seriously, they reacted rather reflexive lee and in ways that, in some respects were unhinged. That gave more credence to the charge. Is the story true that at the inauguration, adams went to shake jacksons hand and jackson was flanked by children and said my hands seem to be full . Thats one. Thats 1825, in march. And that was the last thing he ever said to John Quincy Adams. They never spoke again. Even though adams would be in congress during jacksons presidency. They never exchanged pleasantries. And in 29, adams did not attend the inauguration. And that was fine with jackson. He developed a loading of adams that matched clay. I could give you the exact moment, at least within the hour, that clay and jackson came to figurative blows and loggerheads and never had anything to do with each other. It was the afternoon of january 18th, and he stepped down from the speakership and criticize jackson for invading florida. In a three hour address, it was masterful. It was embittered and made an enemy out of him. Im surprised those two never dueled. There was a lot of talk that jackson would challenge clay over that speech. But it was considered bad form to challenge someone to a dual first saying something in congress. Because you are supposed to have freedom. Clay actually broke that tradition when he challenged john rand olive. Because he had actually made an accusation on the floor of the senate in 1826 accusing clay of essentially being the cheat. So that was unusual. They fought the dual and clay rand off had decided, at least the night before, and probably a few days before, that he was going to fire it clay. That was partly because friends had tried to talk with him. Mrs. Clays first cousin was among them and had spoken with him. And he was determined not to fire. Clay was very angry and he tried to kill john randall. In fact, one of his bullets, rand off was wearing a very billowy coat, for a good reason, so that they wouldnt have a clear target. And one of the bullets went through the coat. He was trying, but then when rand olive had his next shot, he shot in the air. And that ended it. In fact, they shook hands and seemed to be bosom buddies for about five minutes. As long as it took rand off to come back over here. And if you think we have interesting news, you can imagine the newspapers covering a duel between the secretary of state and the sitting u. S. Senator. Did the fight happened for years . They had been enemies forever. Wasnt clay the one who ordered randall stocks out of the house . That would have been a standard indulgence for rand all. He would bring his mastiff sin and they would lays about and jump around. And when clay became speaker, he leaned over to the sergeant of arms and rand all came in and said get the dogs out. And he was furious with him for that. But he never brought the dogs back. I think you should do a biography of john randolph. He is a fascinating person, but a lot of his papers have not survived, whether he destroyed them or family members destroyed them. There are some, but there is not a really good collection from start to finish. But he is a fascinating person. He took opium and drink brandy in excess. He would ride his horse pounding down to the plantation, which was zero in oak. Oddly enough, he hailed from bizarre, which was a plantation of his youth appropriately enough. And he would wander the halls of this magnificent dwelling with wallpaper peeling offense hateful act and everything, with a single candle saying mcbath had murdered sleep. There was probably lead in the paint. Thank you so much for joining us. applause inaudible weeknights this month, we are featuring American History tv programs as a preview of whats available every weekend on cspan three. On friday, a look at ronald reagan, who served as the nations 40th president from 1981 to 1989. Nine days after taking the oath of office for his first term, president reagan met with the press in the Old Executive Office building next door to the white house. Questions about the recently resolved iranian hostage crisis and its aftermath dominated the discussion that ranged from Domestic Affairs to the new administrations Foreign Policy priorities. Watch friday night, beginning at eight eastern. And enjoy American History tv this weekend every weekend on cspan three. A net gordon read talks about her biography of the 17th president , andrew johnson, who took office after president lincolns assassination. She argues that he was unable to provide leadership to a nation still recovering from the civil war. This was recorded at the philadph