Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book TV In Grand Rapids MI 20160917

Historian and author Richard Norton smith is working on a new biography of gerald ford. We caught up with him at his homing in grand rapids home in grand rapids, michigan. A Baptist Missionary put down roots, and a year or two later on the east side a friend be frenchspeaking intend tour showed up who was eager to sell liquor to the indians to save their sols, and it their souls, and it set the pattern ps in some ways for the two faces of grand rapids, west side and east side. Both sides of the river banks more for most of the 19th and 20th century were covered over with factories, furniture factories, back when grand rapids was the furniture capital of the United States. Theyre gone now, but the city that has replaced them in many ways was seated by that building, the ford museum was seeded by that building, the ford museum, which was opened in 1981, located downtown at president fords insistence in the hope that it might, in fact, spark the beginnings of an urban renewal, a genuine urban renewal. When i decided that i had another book in me, there were some folks here in grand rapids who were interested in having a big, comprehensive david mcculloughesque biography of gerald ford. Anyway, one thing led to another, and so a year and a half ago after publishing the rockefeller i had the opportunity to move back to grand rapids, and i have been working on the ford biography ever since. Theres so much to ford personally and publicly. I mean, the ford presidency, the popular notion is nothing much happened during those two years. And there are people who tend to skip over ford. I mean, its like nixon and then carter and reagan. And if you step back, its true. I mean, he seems out of his depth. Hes preceded by these three shakespearean figures. I mean, kennedy assassinated in his prime, therell always be a sense of what might have been; johnson, tormented by war; richard nixon, you know, with a soaring vision in International Affairs but a selfdestructive nature. I mean, those are figures worthy of shakespeare. Ford actually is a bridge between nixonian pragmatism and Ronald Reagans more doctrinaire conservativism. But because reagan was reagan, because reagan was such a largerthanlife figure, because he was so telegenerallic, because he was witty, because he was, you know, in his own way like john kennedy before him, master of the media in a way that ford never was, ford tends to get overshadowed at the very least sitting at the desk, looking down on the ford museum and on the fords grave site which is located just a few hundred feet from here. Speaking of books, this is what a book looks like before its a book, basically. These are tip of the iceberg, but this is essential Research Material for the next six months to nine months, you know . There are piles of oral histories set off by themselves, but theres a whole section well, there are several piles dealing with his congressional career. Theres a pile just devoted to the contest in which he became House Republican leader in 1965 with reminiscences from people like don rumsfeld who were instrumental in managing that campaign. I think he was much more one of the things ive learned, gerald ford was much more ambitious than he let on. I think he was perfectly willing rather like Ronald Reagan to be underestimated, including intellectually. There are much worse things in politics strategically than to be underestimated. And anyway, in 1948 he went into the race underestimated as a political force, but he outcam a a outcampaigned the incumbent all his life. Extraordinary physical stamina. Loved campaigning, loved rubber chicken, loved, you know, stale oratory. I mean, just was at home. You know, unfortunately, when he became republican leader in the house, it really exacted a toll on the family, on mrs. Ford and on the children. Because at that point he was on the road over 200 nights in the year, and i think well, i think he felt guilty, you know, in later years about that. But, you know, he was a young man, and he was climbing the ladder, and he could see his lifes goal which was to be speaker of the house in front of him. This is, first and foremost, a work space, and my work tools begin with what any writer relies upon. These are books on european and american history. I am an autograph collector, and at one point in time had managed to assemble a complete set of the president s which i liquidated a number of years ago. And ever since then have been collecting sporadically people who are either heroes or just objects of fascination. And this wall illustrates both. Orson welles, foster cain and above him another authentic genius, charles dickens. Well, its sort of a homecoming in some ways. I lived here for six years when i was director of ford museum and library which is over in ann arbor. And went away, did a couple other libraries and institutions and then wrote the rockefeller book, and but i knew even before id finished that when some days i wondered if i ever would finish that, that there had to be a life after rockefeller. And fortunately, the president s mother was a pack rat. She saved everything. He saved everything. But she kept scrapbooks, and they grew and they grew and they grew over time. And there are about 65 immense scrapbooks. And they are absolutely an invaluable source. And whats, what is so exciting to be in my position is to be able to almost day by day trace the evolution, the growth of this individual, of this young man, his first serious love affair was with a supermodel, a covergirl for cosmopolitan and other magazines, a woman named Phyllis Brown. Who, as i say, played pig pygman in reverse. She was the worldly sophisticate who introduced him to new york, took him to the rainbow room. They went to the theater frequently. She taught him bridge, she taught him to ski. And, in fact, the two of them famously were featured in a sixpage spread in look magazine in 1940. But Phyllis Brown was very much of that eastern establishment, if you will, set. Gerald ford spent more time at yale than he did at the university of michigan. It really was the chrysalis out of which he emerged as, you know, hed never been east of ohio before, before he went to yale, and it was, it was the school in many ways. He was offered legal jobs in new york and philadelphia, but he knew even then he wanted to come back to grand rapids because, i think, he knew even then that he had his eyes set on a political career. Bill lis, on the other hand phyllis, on the other hand, did not see herself leaving her glamorous modeling career in new york to live in grand rapids, so they agreed amicably to go their separate ways. But it was, you know, it was about which not a great deal has been written but which i think was actually pivotal in reshaping the man that she herself referred to as the hayseed from grand rapids. The popular notion of gerald ford is vanilla. Congressman, west michigan. We dont really know a lot about him. And gerald ford was a man of, as i say, great Party Loyalty and could be a fervent partisan. But he a also embodied he also embodied civility and respect for his adversaries. I mean, he literally went to his grave believing he didnt have an enemy. The picture on the wall actually was signed, believe it or not, by all four president s at the time of the dedication of the bush library. If you notice, two of the signatures gerald ford and president bush himself have all but disappeared. The president s used to complain, understandably, about being besieged for autographs. And above all, every time they got together and there are group photos taken, there are literally hundreds of people who wanted them to sign these. And so i believe that it was president fords idea that they would all sign 400 copies of in this photo and no more, and then each of them would have 100 to distribute as he saw fit. So, i mean, any book to have credibility has to be, quote, critical in the broadest sense of the word. Thats actually, and i must say i fought long and hard i thought long and hard about this book because i wondered if i was perhaps perceived as being too close to ford. You know, id run the ford museum, i actually delivered one of the eulogies, at his request, at his funeral. And, you know, the time has come. The president has passed on. And and, indeed, mrs. Ford had passed away. Enough time has gone by, enough paper has been opened, supplemented by hundreds of interviews that i was doing and that others had done that i had access to for the first time. And above all, the timing was right. I found buried in his, in his writings a great line which, actually, im using as the epigraph for the book. And it jumps out at you because, like most politicians, he wasnt particularly reflective. He said my whole philosophy of life is i dont assume somebody is trying to screw me. Now [laughter] think about that. Think about that in the context of todays politics. Think about that in the context of the politics of watergate. He took office with his hands tied behind his back. The ford nixon relationship was close. I mean, close in a way that, you know, politicians always talk about my friends, and they almost devalue the word. They were, they were friends. They were friends, they were allies. He believed richard nixon. He and i think he literally, the thing that i wont say he never forgave him, but he never forgot, nor did he ever get over his disappointment and surprise that that nixon lied to him. John mitchell lied to him. The weekend after the watergate breakin, ford happened to be in a meeting with mitchell, and when they were alone, he said, john, whats going on here . You know . Do you know anything at all about . And mitchell swore up and down he didnt. And ford accepted it until he couldnt accept it. One things not known; after he lost the 76 election bill simon, who was his treasury secretary, came to him and asked him if he would pardon mitchell who had been convicted of watergaterelated offenses in the meantime. And ford said, no. It was almost as if one pardon was enough. But, you know, there were limits to what he would forgive. And mitchell had lied to him. Now, some would say thats, you know, you spent 25 years around washington, official washington, and youre surprised that people fudged the truth . But, you know, for better and worse that was, that was ford. I mean, he in my eulogy i said emotionally he never left grand rapids. Service just a wonderful town, a place of fewer than 200,000 people but blessed with several civicminded billionaires who have been extraordinarily generous and whose generosity is reflected in some world class medical facilities, research facilities, the convention center. Lets see here, the hotel, several hotels that have sprung be up along the river. President ford was offered a site, a very nice site on the outskirts of town to build the museum, and he thanked the wouldbe donor, but he always envisioned putting it downtown. I mentioned election day 1976 when the fords came back. The night before there was a torchlight parade, oldfashioned parade. And the secret service were very worried. In fact, they didnt even know if they could authorize the parade because there were so many empty storefronts, so many vacant buildings on the main street in grand rapids, they werent sure that they could adequately protect all of them. Well, the spark that led to todays grand rapids, which is a world class city any way you look at it and is still reinventing itself, in some ways was struck that night. Five years later, in 1981, on the same day that they opened the museum. I have a daily nonroutine which is i basically dont sit down at the same time every day and do things methodically. I often will get up in the middle of the night and work for a couple hours when i cant sleep. And i can, you know, make that up later in the day or, you know, in the afternoon. I mean, i in some ways i wish i was more conventionally disciplined. But in the end, the other thing that does surprise people is im technologically illiterate, and i write everything longhand. I write the first draft longhand. Gerald ford is a surprising figure. The fact that he wasnt just a party loyalist, but that he started his career as an insurgent and ended his career as an insurgent. At the end of his life, he and mrs. Ford were really marooned in a Republican Party that was increasingly hostile to the prochoice views, for example. He told someone not long before he died that people had better prepare themselves for the coming of samesex marriage. He expected it to be the norm, and in relatively short order hes the First American president , actually, to sign his name to a petition for gay rights. I mean, he again, most of us as we get older, you know, our attitudes harden along with our arteries, you know . And we often get, we become more conservative. And at the same time, you know, nostalgia, you know, yesterday was better than today. I mean, all of those factors come into play. He wasnt like that. He liberal is too simple, i mean, but he was remarkably openminded and compassionate. The schedule im working on will allow me to basically recreate the ford presidency in something very close to realtime. A little over two years or so. But beyond that, i mean, im living with them, as i say, in the kind of unique intimacy that any biographer has with his or her subject. And theyre never far from your thoughts. Booktv is visiting grand rapids. As we explore the citys nonfiction literary culture, up next we speak with gordon olson about the citys history through his book, thin ice. So do you know what would really be a great book, would be a whole selection of articles that we knew about, i knew about, some contemporary writers that we would invite to join us about growing up in grand rapids. Was it different . Was it much very similar . What was the story about growing up in grand rapids . What we then put together was a collection of stories from different periods reflecting on growing up in this community. And always in the background was the other story about the citys growing and changing and becoming something different. The interesting thing we quickly discovered is that each generation has its own version of the story, and we were able to go back all the way to the earliest days of the city. We found a native american fellow, a potowatomie, from the 1830s who wrote about being a young man here and invited to go to a mission school. And basically get what he called a white mans education. And he did. And he learned he became a piano player, he became a singer, he became a writer, and then he thought, well, ill go back to my people, and i will show them how we can integrate and become part of the newcomers. He did an essay, he called it trapped between two worlds. He came back with all the education, he became a teacher, and then something really tragic happened. First of all, he became Close Friends with a young woman in the community not a native american and was told by her father in no Uncertain Terms that that was going to go nowhere, and he had to stop immediately. Then he went back to his own people, and they looked at him with suspicion. Youre not one of us anymore. So heres a welleducated young man with high ideals, and instead ended up sort of between both worlds and no longer comfortable in either one. And that, thats part of growing up. Thats what a lot of people encounter as they move from one place to another, one generation to another. His was extreme, but it happens to a lot of people. And that became one of the really generating ideas as we put thin ice together. Well, as we looked through who do we talk to, one name kept popping up, and we really knew we had to do it. So we looked around and, sure enough, both gerald and betty ford, president gerald ford and the first lady, betty ford, had written biographies. We said, well, maybe well find something. Theyre going to be writing mostly about their years in washington. Not so much. They both had very good insights, and i think probably as they were putting their biographies together wanted to make sure that their hometown was very much included. And the story that caught my eye, the one that we used among others, because we gave gerald ford in particular good coverage was when he talked about, first of all, hes adopted. His mother remarried, his birth father had not been a part of his life. And then when he was maybe 16 years old in high school and he worked during the noon hour at a little cafe across the street from the high School Waiting tables and all of that, one day he looks up, and this fellow comes in and says im your father. The man that he really did not know. And it turned out it was his birth father who lived in wyoming, but he happened he had gone to detroit to buy a car and was on his way back to wyoming and said, well, lets go by grand rapids, and ill talk to my son. Well, he got there. Ford sat down with him as he puts it in the book for about 15 minutes, and we talked. But he said i was not interested in getting to know this man, i was not interested in what he had to say. He basically had abandoned my mother and me for all that time. And so, and he said very clearly and to the people of grand rapids it was the right testimony, the one they wanted to hear because they knew his adoptive father as an outstanding member of the community in many different ways. And he said, you know, my father was gerald ford, not leslie lynch king. He said im gerald ford jr. , not someone else. And so once again here was our chance to get real insight into, in this case, a very prominent man but a story about his life that i dont know how detailed it had ever been told before, but there it was. He was quite happy to have us use it, gave us as did a lot of these people who had published parts of their story almost without exception. There were some cases. But they gave us permission to use with no restrictions really. I think it was a book they wanted to be a part of. One of the things we were conscious of and took to some looking took some looking and searching, and i would confess we should have done more was looking for not the story of the winners who always get to write the history, but all those who are part of the history and those who are at one time called minorities, they get more broadly or more specifically characterized by their nationality, whatever i, whatever, now. So we were looking. And we found al green, because his biography was new at the time, and i was i have to say pretty excited to find it. Good stuff, i i thought. And i was right. Al green came here from arkansas as a youngster, i guess, maybe around 10, about to enter junior high. And the neighborhood he moved into was a pretty rough neighborhood. But they were not receptive to newcomers, you know . Why should this family from arkansas be well received in our city . I mean, every group feels that way. The outsiders are always the outsiders. You may feel like you look like those are here, but youve got to earn your stripes. So al, not the biggest kid, and he got bullied and pushed around. And finally one day the biggest bully pushed him way too far, knocked him down, kicked him, shoved him, really worked him over, and he came home that night, and his mother cleaned him up and said what happened. Ill take care of it, mother. Didnt want to tell her what had happened. I think he fell on playground. Well, big fall. [laughter] he went out the next day determined to set things right. Dont treat you well, you have to respond and he was difficult. His father trained him, green brothers, a sinking group in church, he said i knew about turning the other cheek but sometimes you have to assert your self and you have to be strong and he was, his whole existence in school changed from that point on. We use it because we know stories like that. A lot of us may have been bullied or may have been the bully. This is another part of growing up, another piece of thin ice, another story to tell. We use that one as well. We found other writers. We knew other writers. But didnt have the larger audience. One we selected, a vietnamese refugee, father came here after the fall of saigon and all that, she came as a little girl, somewhat precocious little girl, she was a good student, and she came, and if you study hard you will get the recognition you deserve. She was put into a classroom, in grade school, a young girl and she studied hard and she knew she was getting the best grades or competing with another girl for the best grades. One particular teacher had stuff stuffed animal that got passed around, and the goal as a student was to one day win that prize, have that teddy bear or lien sitting on her desk and she knew she deserved it. That was not the issue. It never came to her until the last week of class, she kept holding out hope that one day it would be hers but she walked out of that class with a degree of bitterness about the whole experience and then reflected on it in a book about growing up in grand rapids, living in grand rapids has a later adult in a city that prides itself on how it deals with refugees. We have some good programs in place, she is able to point out there are flaws in the system, and they cant always bring themselves to the right behavior. This is true of the city and other cities as well. Then there is levi whitaker, a friend of mine and he would never cry but the first payment, his first skill was writing. He does a good job but is also involved in native american activities and activism, he wrote a piece called although i wasnt raised in india and it became a bookend for an early story of a man trapped between two worlds, levi wrote about growing up in a family of parents and grandparents, impressed upon him the need to assimilate. And he did in a lot of ways. Those who know levi know he can move in many different circles but as he got older he began thinking more and more about being a late of american. In later grades the assignment was to read the declaration of independence. Like anyone who read that he liked the first part about created equal but then later in the declaration he had to point this out because i dont remember reading it, references to the savage warfare of the native americans, the savagery. Weight a minute. Am i not created equal . That took him on a personal journey he is still on of learning his own heritage, learning it better and at the same time making sure others know it as well, these things to repeat but as they repeat there are always new nuances, new parts to the story, new ways to respond lose the fact of all the social media gives us a host of ways to respond to issues we deal with. One thing i never talked about but the book does is the role of religion, the importance of that to this community and a specific religion, the coeditor, truth be known, reiner told a story about growing up in a religious family in which his father decided the children shouldnt be going out on halloween which is not a christian holiday and begging for candy and all that. His father decided his children would reenact Martin Luthers mailing of 95 theses on the church door in germany. Not a lot of people know that story. That is what they did and he was martin luther, the oldest and all that, he pairs down the 95 thesis and they get burned, made it up to the kids in the alley behind their house and acted out the whole story. That tells us real insight into the strength of different religious communities and the strong feelings they have about preserving their particular version of christianity in this case and that goes into the stories as well. A probably more than other communities although im sure folks who live in the south would point out the baptist are prominent as the calvinists are in grand rapids. What does it mean about growing up in grand rapids . In part a reminder that the kids here just like everywhere, are going to go through a period where they will be challenged, making choices and their parents wont be there to help them make the choice. Their job is to train them, prepare them but those choices will become there is and how they get through that and move on to later stages in their life is an important part of the growing up process. In grand rapids we concluded we are not that different but had a nice microcosm, a lot of insight we could pull together and tell a story that was specific because the names of the people were specific, this is grand rapids but also we hope had meaning beyond grand rapids, going through the same experience. You are watching booktv on cspan2. We visit grand rapids, michigan to talk with local authors and toward literary sites with the help of local cable partner comcast. Next we hear from professor Gordon Andrews about Gordon Andrews, who fought for racial equality prior to the civil rights era. Charles hamilton huston is one of the least well known members of the Civil Rights Movement that Everybody Needs to understand. If you are going to talk about civil rights you cannot talk about civil rights without a discussion of Charles Hamilton huston. The book is semibiographical approach to investigating the themes of labor and race between 1995, and 1950. The history of the Civil Rights Movement there is a discussion among historians about how to view the Civil Rights Movement, the Civil Rights Movement, traditionally people tend to learn more popularly across the country the Civil Rights Movement from brown versus board moving forward and Charles Hamilton huston at life from 1895, passed away in 1950, is really responsible for laying the groundwork for of brown versus board and this was the seminal biography, a fantastic work by itself. As a doctoral student of labor history, i started to look into his cases and dig more deeply into them, a number of cases really were about labor in one form, fashion or another. That is how i dug into this as a project. When you examine what the status of race and labor was like in the 1890s, you have to talk about plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court decision that gave sanction for segregation. Throughout american society, in the 1890s in louisiana, talk a little bit about homer plessy because homer plessy from the new orleans area and the members of new orleans in the community, really looking for a way to challenge the increasing number of encroachments on africanamerican life as it dealt with segregation. We are coming out of reconstruction, democrats who were labeled by people of the time as the redeemers were coming back to reestablish White Authority over africanamericans and these laws, one after another, are being passed, then to segregate society, cut africanamericans out of integrated society. That really informed houston hustons early upbringing, born in 1895. Huston becomes interested in the law by confronting plessy for the first time as a young man. He leaves, graduates at 16, prepped at one of the best high schools in the country, in washington dc and goes on to amherst and graduates come loudly and did not experience the kind of segregation and the kind of cruelty associated with the racialized nature of the United States that the turnofthecentury but he is aware of it and there are times he is not able to socialize, invited to the same Group Activities so he is very conscious of it. Hard not to be and certainly not naive. For young man, an old, loved music, loved piano, played really well, very well read and after his experience at amherst he goes back home, kind of knows what he wants to do, father secured a job for him and teaches english class and whatever he can teach at the time, young person working at a very elite university, howard university, then world war i comes along and world war i, he knew it was coming, the Wilson Administration is talking about neutral, we will remain neutral, not getting into the war, war is coming, as the momentum builds, and once war is declared there is an immediate issue about the draft because now the military is segregated and here you have a young man with a wonderful education, brilliant mind, clearly belongs in the officers core but there is no black officers core. He leads the way with a number of other colleagues and students at historically black colleges to advocate for a black officer corps. The way the administration framed it, fighting to save the world for democracy. Big sign on all the newspapers, saving the world for democracy. It would be nice if we had a little democracy at home, starting with a black officer corps. They the administration helped make that happen. He is part of the first africanamerican officer corps in the history of the United States. This will be a trend with houston all along, he is a trailblazer, first in a number of areas and at the end, a reputation for being egalitarian when it came to issues of race, meet the soldiers as they are ready to disembark and head home at the end of the war. Rather than lowering the service or applauding the accomplishments, the sacrifice that was made he essentially tells the black soldiers that they need to go home, get jobs, he goes home. Almost shaking his head. You can see in the way he is writing about the experience that it is another in the steps of a young man confronting issues of race and segregation and injustice and inequality and wondering how best to confront and in this last moment on the way to dc he and a friend are sitting on a train in philadelphia ready to go back home and sitting there in uniform, a white gentleman to the side sort of shaking his head and he ordered lunch, he winds up getting up and moving, very conscious of it. He gets up on his way out, did you move because of us, cant help the way i was raised. And huston walked away and mentioned in his writing he was damn glad he didnt die the surface of a country that could treat people like this and he is now beginning to formulate a more mature understanding of what he wants to do and when he comes back, he winds up being accepted to harvard law school. He will become the first africanamerican to graduate as a doctor of Political Science from harvard law and the first africanamerican editor of harvard law. He wants to be able to understand and teach the history of the constitution which he is a constitutional lawyer but he wants to be as well prepared as he can to go on and prepare a cadre of lawyers who could then go out and do the good work that needs to be done in the United States because there are woeful numbers of africanamerican lawyers in the United States in part because of plessy v. Ferguson and no access to education to prepare yourself to be a lawyer. Those are the seminal moments as he confronts plessy that prepare him to become the Charles Hamilton huston that we all know. When you look at his professional working career from 1925 to 1950, when you look at the 25 year period it is enviable by any measure and one of the real tragic elements of hustons life is he was born with a congenital heart defect. He was aware of it as he was getting older but even into the 30s and 40s particularly in the 1940s his doctor was telling him to slow down. It is a testament to the motivation of Charles Hamilton huston and the dedication of Charles Hamilton huston that he felt so compelled to do the work that was needed to undo plessy, make the world a better place for the people of the United States, white and black, those suffering under the egregious nature of segregation and his activities, this is what i argue in the book too, were in three different areas because he has a 3part strategy that unfolds from 1925 to 1950. It was a critical part, he demanded the strategy go forward on legislation, he spent inestimable time upon the hill. When you read his congressional record, congressional testimony, it is fascinating, humorous in the way he plays people because he sets them up like a skilled lawyer can do. He is not only involved in himself but encourages people within the legislative community to write legislation, he is involved, the first africanamerican on the federal committee, works in that capacity under two president s, roosevelt and truman, resigns under both because of integrity. They werent being true to their word, he let them know that and resigned. Under fdr he resigned when the president knocks it and jumps back but also encouraged the development at the state level so he wants to see a ground swell. A perfect example is out of the encouragement new york state has a Fair Employment Practice Committee to outlaw segregation and unable pay. Part of what i tried to argue in this book is one of the reasons we dont know huston as well as we know his student and later Supreme Court Justice Thurgood marshall is because most americans learn about civil rights from 1954 forward, we dont hear about huston. Even though people knew him at the time referred to him as the father of the Civil Rights Movement when you talk about huston and his role, there was a wonderful speech from doctor king in 1959 making a speech to lawyers, in it he lauds the career of charles houston and Thurgood Marshall, people will know the name of Charles Hamilton huston and Thurgood Marshall for the rest of time but it is a great example of how learning and the conversations we have about civil rights have been impacted by how it gets frames, people like doctor king and Thurgood Marshall understood the role of Charles Hamilton huston but you cannot have a conversation about the Civil Rights Movement without an inclusion of the work of Charles Hamilton huston. During booktvs recent visit to grand rapids we spoke with myers supermarket ceo hank meijer about arthur h. Vandenberg, who made the switch from isolationism to internationalism. I propose that no other nation shall have a chance to use our silence as an alibi for carrier designs. I propose action instead of words. I propose action now before it is too late was i propose it for the sake of a better world but i say again and again and again that i propose it for our own american selfinterest. Arthur h. Vandenberg first came to notoriety as one of the leading isolationists. He was the crusader for world war i and american involvement following Woodrow Wilson when wilson declared war on germany. Like so Many Americans was disillusioned with what happened after that and totalitarian states, mussolini and then hitler were becoming belligerent in europe, arthur h. Vandenberg said we got burned once already, we dont want to be involved again so he argued for a strict neutrality act to keep the United States out of what looked like it might become a european war. In that way he was a leader in the fight with Franklin Roosevelt as roosevelt was trying to engineer aid for Great Britain and people who would become our allies against hitler and after the war in 1945 or late in the war arthur h. Vandenberg came forward and said things have to change, in effect reversed his own position and that isolation was no longer for the us as a global power, we had to take leadership on the world stage or relinquish it to darker forces. By making that shift in the last month of world war ii he pulled a lot of American Public opinion with him and helped enable the changes in americas rise to leadership. As someone who grew up in grand rapids with an interest in politics i had always been curious about arthur h. Vandenbergs life, one of these ambitious kids with a thriving business that nearly went broke in the panic of 1893 when arthur h. Vandenberg was young, doing odd jobs and things that support the family but once he was in high school he was editing the School Newspaper and thrived on political news, gave a speech that won him a second place in 1900 when he was a senior in high school on the peace conference in the hague so already he is thinking about Foreign Policy as a teenager. He claims he started reading the congressional record when he was 15. We have no record of this but that is what he thought of himself, four years before he built his house at the age of 22, he was editor of a mediumsized daily newspaper so from then on he is covering every republican Political Convention and his mentor, part owner of the paper, is senator William Alden smith, michigan senator best known for having chaired the titanic investigation, first hearings held in the senate caucus. Arthur h. Vandenberg has a mentor like that and in 1911 arthur h. Vandenberg chair the campaign to put a statue michigan had coming to it in statuary hall in the capital. And be on a back bench for a while. No sign of humility, which didnt sit well with some of his colleagues. He was kind of cocky about things. And people really resented that. You know, there was two or three generations ago there was this understanding that if youre a freshman, youve got to wait your turn. And he wasnt willing to do that, so that rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. And then when the depression comes along, he really is, hes accused of vacillating because hes sometimes supporting roosevelt and sometimes not. So his fellow republicans arent sure what to make of him. And hes certainly trying to weave a fine political line as michigan tilts more and more away from being a purely republican state, but it also means hes not entirely reliable in the eyes of his fellow republicans. Because he had been so visible before the war fighting american involvement, he became, in effect, the republican spokesman in Foreign Policy. After the death of one of his mentors, william bora, vandenberg was unquestionably the voice of the Republican Party in foreign affairs. And as the election was coming up, the republicans had a big conference in northern michigan, and vandenbergs challenge was to unify the party around a platform for the 1944 election. Because in 1940 it had been torn apart with Wendell Willkie and robert taft having two different visions of what the republicans should stand for. So vandenberg puts the group together at macinaw island and gets them to agree that the republicans will support an organization after the war, what became the United Nations. Even as roosevelt was planning the creation of the United Nations, he wasnt talking about it. Because he didnt want to have the british with their colonies or the soviets with their concern about Eastern Europe starting to argue and jockey for position, because they were our allies, and we needed them to finish fighting the war. So vandenberg was addressing things that the democrats anded roosevelt had kept bottled up, kept from being debated. So hes taking the republicans, who had been the isolationists to such a degree, hes taking them, expressing support for a new form of league of nations for what became the United Nations at a time when nobody else is talking much about it. And so that identified him with a new way of thinking both for the republicans and because the democrats werent talking much about it for the americans. When the United Nations was being discussed, Franklin Roosevelt knew that he couldnt make the mistake that Woodrow Wilson did after world war i when they created the league of nations and wilsons american delegation to the league which he led himself contained no republicans of any stature. And so he brought it back to the senate, and the republicans who were then in the majority said whats going on here . You havent even consulted us. So roosevelt, despite roosevelt, despite seeing vandenberg as a rival, also knew that he needed him for the credibility of the american delegation to the United Nations. He didnt want to choose him, but he had no choice. So, and this is in february and march of 1945. And then in april of 1945, roosevelt dies. Harry truman becomes president. Roosevelt had really functioned as his own secretary of state. He had a secretary of state nam state who was a capable u. S. Steel executive but really out of his depth in major Foreign Policy discussions. And so the secretary of state is not strong. Poor president truman, who had lunch once with Franklin Roosevelt and really had not been clued in on what roosevelt was planning, is unschooled in where things stand x. So roosevelt so vandenberg goes to San Francisco as really the most influential american delegate, and he has truman deferring to him, he has secretary of state deferring to him, and hes helping set the stage for what the United Nations charter is going to look like. No nation hereafter can immunize itself by its own exclusive action. Only collective security can stop the next great war before it starts. And so he found himself being lionized and found the country really looking to him as an outspoken voice for a rational approach. Not, nothing utopian. It wasnt going to be one world. One of his republican rivals, Wendell Willkie, had written a book called one world, and there were people who thought maybe we should have a world government. And then there were isolationists coming back out of the closet like robert taft saying bring the boys home, and lets wash our hands of whats happening in the world. And vandenberg said, no, we cant do that, but weve got to look after american interests but as part of a global structure. And then vandenberg was an early advocate of dwight eisenhower. Vandenberg and robert taft were friends and rivals for control of the Republican Party throughout the 1940s. The tacit understanding was that vandenberg does Foreign Policy and taft does domestic policy. But taft was more isolationists, so hes always chipping away at vandenberg, and while vandenberg supports a lot of tafts domestic policies, sometimes taft takes a harder line. But, so in 1950 vandenberg is back here ill, but eisenhower is his hope for the future of the country. And eisenhowers rival for the republican nomination in 1952 was taft. And so eisenhower would later say that vandenberg was one of the people he most admired, and vandenberg in his last months of his life, weeks of his life talked about hearing a radio broadcast of eisenhower and feeling like my legacy is going to live on through eisenhower. And so theres the strains of the Republican Party that we still see today being played out that vandenberg was just immersed in and helped define. His greatest legacy is the notion of bipartisanship. When the first gulf war comes about and you have a republican president and democrats in control of congress, the cry goes up where is there a vandenberg among the democrats, when among to opposing party . When a few years later clinton is contemplating, i think it was response to bosnia and youve got republicans in control of congress, the cry goes up, where is there a vandenberg . That role of a leader of the loyal opposition whos not going to sacrifice their own principles, but who is going to work with the president in these really tough Foreign Policy moments thats when we most miss vandenberg and when he is most iconic, is the best in american government. Welcome to grand rapids. Up next, we visit the Grand Rapids Public Library to get an inside look into their Furniture Design collection and rare books. We are in the grand rapids history and special Collections Department at the Grand Rapids Public Library, and we have one of the largest archives and special collections in the state of michigan. So we are in the purposeture room at the grand furniture room at the Grand Rapids Public Library, and we have over 35 be 00 volumes 3500 volumes on books on furniture, Furniture Design, woodworking, carving, all different topics, and that doesnt even include all of our furniture periodicals and trade catalogs of different Furniture Companies as well. Grand rapids was one of many cities that were manufacturing furniture in the late 1800s, and theres a lot that went into why grand rapids became the furniture capital of america. And one of those reasons was, actually, this collection of books on furniture. In the 1870s three major grand rapids companies nelson and matter, bear key and gay and the Phoenix Furniture Company showed their furniture at the philadelphia be exposition in 1876, and they won awards, a all of them. They really impressed everyone at the show, and that put grand rapids on the map. And then as things kept on developing, the collection of books here was another thing that helped to elevate the status of grand rapids. Not only did we have all of these manufacturers making really quality, beautiful furniture, but we also had one of the largest collections of books on furniture. So it really showed that we were serious about furniture, and we were going to make this a big thing. As we look at material, were going to look at photographs that show how this collection developed, where it was located, how it came together. Were also going to look at some of the other kind of notable local connections like furniture periodicals and furniture catalogs and news leathers newsletters, and then were going to look at a couple of the really kind of gems of the collection. A book by thomas chippen dale and also robert adams and james adams. And those well also talk about how those connect back to the collection and how it developed. One item that i found that was very exciting is this picture, and it says on the back that these are furniture books in the reference room. So this is from the early 1900s. We dont have an exact date. But it is showing the early collection, and this other next picture shows us the room that it was in which is our current reading room today. So i just love seeing this room back in the early 900s, seeing 1900s, seeing the books where they originally were. Theres something about that thats really cool. As the Furniture Design collection grew and they acquired more books, they ran out of room to put all of those books. So most of them were kept in this reference room, but they were also stored throughout the library. So what we have here is a couple of Furniture Trade catalogs from berke and gay. They were one of the largest and most well known Furniture Companies in grand rapids from the late 1800s into the 1930s. And then also from berke and gay we have a collection of newsletters called the shop mark, and these were written by the employees, for the employees, and they contain a lot of information about just daytoday lives of employees, the Different Things that they did leading up to world war i. About35 of the work force consisted of women, and as men went away to war, they had to fill in with women. So it jumped up to about 15 during world war i, and women were doing everything from running machines and staining and sanding pieces of furniture to working in the office. One part of our collections here is a large volume of periodicals on the Furniture Trade. Because grand rapids was the center of the furniture industry, there were a lot of magazines that were based here as well. One of these that i have here is the furniture and manufacturer, there were five or six magazines based here in town, and i pulled out this specific book because it has a very nice article on the collection that we have here at the Library Including the Library Director, samuel rank, talking about some of the different books that he was purchasing. The library was really aggressively pursuing furniture books at this point and trying to fill in gaps in the collection and really get some of the notable books in the field. So they were sending away to different places in europe and around the country and purchasing books. And one thing that samuel rank said that he learned was that they couldnt just send a letter to request a book when they saw it for sale, because by the time the letter got there, the book would be gone. So they had to send a telegram so they could secure that book, and no one else would get it before them. The local newspapers reported on the growth of the collection, and in 1916 they thought that it was one of the finest collections in the country x be they guessed that the Grand Rapids Public Library might have more books on furniture than the library of congress which, i think, is actually not too much of a stretch in this very specialized area. Right now we are in the archives of the Grand Rapids Public Library in the history and special Collections Department, and you cant feel it, but it is cool in here. We keep it temperaturecontrolled and humiditycontrolled so that we can preserve documents and photographs and everything that we have for as long as possible. And behind us we have extension of our Furniture Design collection. These are mostly oversized folio works, and we keep more of the kind of Decorative Arts and architecture volumes in here. Were going to look at one of the gems of the librarys Furniture Design collection which is a 1754 volume by Thomas Chippendale, and i first want to talk about this small book is a list of books on furniture that are held in the Grand Rapids Public Library. This was published in 1928 in connection with the 100th semiannual furniture market held in grand rapids. And this book mentions the book that were going to look at and says that it is the First Edition of the most famous book on furniture ever published. And this is one of the volumes that samuel rank felt particularly strong about, one that he really looked for and wanted to secure for the collection. Thomas chippendale was a cabinet maker in england, and he was active in the 1700s. Cabinet makers at that time were thought of as tradesmen. Architecture was kind of the more fine art. So Thomas Chippendale was the first cabinet maker to publish a really, like, elaborate, nice volume of his designs which would have been considered a little bit audacious at the time thinking that Furniture Design was as important as architecture. He selfpublished the work, and he had a list of about 300 subscribers that said in advance that that they would buy book when it was published, and those subscribers, the list is included in the volume, and it includes both gentlemen and cabinet makers. Hence, the title. So if you were more of a member of the aristocracy or well off, you could use the book to look and see what furniture you wanted to purchase or have made, and if you were a cabinet maker, you could use it to make that furniture. So we have the title page of the gentlemen and cabinet makers director here, and you can see that it is a very bold book. This is a First Edition of the 1754 work. It was published again just a year later in 1755 and then a third edition in 1762. So the 1754 edition is a little bit harder to come by, so its unique that we have one here. And i want to point out one of the pages in here, this is full of designs on furniture, and the ribbonbacked chair was said to be Thomas Chippendales personal favorite. This is the design that he felt was the best that he had done and just a really nice piece of work. This book contains 161 engraved plates, and it is said to be one of the most famous books on furniture ever printed. Its really notable work in the field. This is a very notable work, works in architecture by robert and james adam. It is a very large, 25 inches by 18. 5 inches and has very nice design on the cover. And this is a book that the Library Director searched for for 20 years. It is, this is the first volume. There are three volumes, and it took him a long time to find a complete set, and it is still very rare to to see a complete set. This is the title page of the book, and you can see this amazing fullpage illustration. There are over a hundred illustrations in the volume. The book is showing some of the most notable works that robert adam and his brother, james adam, completed. Robert adam was a scottish architect, and he was known for really changing design in england and bringing a kind of a light feel to arking tech Church Church architecture. These volumes show the work that they did and allowed people to see their designs, see how they went together. Robert adam was known for being very detailoriented. He wanted everything about the design to fit together and be harmonious. So he wasnt just worried about the architecture of the outside of the building, he was also looking at the inside. He even, you know, wanted to make sure that the ink stand on the desk was of a design that would fit in with the rest of the house. So you you have all of these illustrations in the book showing their designs and showing how they all fit together. Out of the over 100 illustrations, there are several that are handcolored. And here we see one of them. This was an example of some of the most highly noted engraving work of the time. And thats even more amazing to have this handcolored version. Now that we have taken a glimpse at the Furniture Design collections here at the Grand Rapids Public Library, i hope you take away how complex this area of Furniture Design and Decorative Arts is. And we collect this information at the library because it is part of our culture and our heritage and also part of our future. It is our role here at the library to collect the history and the story of our community, and were here to preserve those things because if we dont do it, theres no one else that will. Youre watching booktv on cspan2. This weekend were in grand rapids with the help of our local cable partner or, comcast. Next, mark richards, Political Science Department Chair at grand valley state university, tells us about the ways the Supreme Court has approached cases involving freedom of expression. Ive always had a huge interest this freedom of expression. Why do the justices vote the way they do. So with the Supreme Court justices, its this interesting question of to what extent are the they influenced by law and to what extent are they influenced by politics. So the history of freedom of expression at the Supreme Court has been very long, and weve seen different phases over time. So we know that freedom of expression was important enough through the constitution that it was the First Amendment and the bill of rights. So, clearly, its important. But usually when we start really studying freedom of expression, i mean, theres some people who go back historically and look at, like, the sedition acts at the time of jeffson and things like that jefferson and things like that. But the more modern look at the Supreme Court is more or less starting in the 1900s. Freedom of expression is cast very broadly. So it includes a number of Different Things. Were used to talking about freedom of speech, right . But then theres also freedom of the press and the First Amendment also mentions the right to peaceably assemble. And the Supreme Court has recognized theres a right of association thats intertwined with those things as well. So freedom of expression is really cast very broadly. Its not just narrowly your ability to speak or to write an article, but, you know, more broadly the right to associate with other people for a political cause. And be there even gets theres even an area called symbolic expression rights. So what about Something Like burning a flag or burning a draft card . Thats a physical act. Some people might say thats just conduct, but it also has a component of expression to it as well. So for my book, basically, i begin with the warren court, and then i go through to the Roberts Court in 2012. So, basically, i start 1953 with the Earl Warren Court and then cover a 60year period. And what i actually did is i read every Supreme Court decision that related to freedom of expression during that period, and i actually coded every one for a variety of different variables and put it into a database. So one of the things that i talk about in the book is how i analyze things statistically, but it also gave me a really great opportunity to just kind of see how things change just by reading those opinions. So in the 1950s, one of the things that we had was mccarthyism, right . So there was really a witch hunt against communists in the United States. And there are any number of cases where, you know, people who are just alleged to be communists, not even proven to be communists, are fired from their government job, denied an opportunity to travel or even put in prison just for doing things like planning to publish a newspaper that would express some communist ideas. And so really during that era a majority of the court turned a blind eye to freedom of expression. And time and time again, it seemed like the court at least a majority of the court was really kind of caught up in the hysteria of the era. Now, justice black and Justice Douglas remained absolutely steadfast in their support of freedom of expression through this entire period and eloquently pointed out, you know, weve got this cold war going on with the soviet union. What makes us different . What makes us unique . What are the values that stand out in america . Obviously, one of them should be freedom of expression, right . We dont want to criminalize people just because they may have joined a communist group back in college or attended some communist speeches or offered a different viewpoint. You know, part of freedom of expression should be the ability to make mistakes, to offer up opinions that may not be popular, and the solution to that is that other people can respond to those ideas and correct them. Now, of course, at this same time in the 50s and and more into the 1960s, we get the Civil Rights Movement becoming more active, right . And so there are any number of cases where, basically, the power of the state is brought to bear upon groups like the naacp or other organizations. So theres the a case in 1963, naacp v. Button, where virginia tried to make it very difficult for the naacp to organize. And, basically, they passed a law limiting the solicitation of legal business. And be it was pretty clearly targeted at the naacp. They didnt like the idea of the naacp having meetings and telling people the governments actually not allowed to do this to you under the constitution. Has anybody had any experiences with this type of discrimination, right . And theyre looking for clients, and then they would go out and litigate when they had a strong set of facts. And so virginia tried to clamp down on that, but the court recognized, no, freedom of expression including freedom of association as well protects unpopular ideas. Just because the government of virginia doesnt like what the naacp is doing doesnt mean that that can be shut down. And so we start to see that the court is going to stand up for less popular views or at least views that are being politically marginalized by those in power. So that kind of starts to give us a little bit of a hint of, you know, we do need freedom of expression, and we need it to apply equally to everyone, right . And they hadnt quite at that time, you know, come up with this fullblown idea of different standards of review for contentbased and contentneutral laws. Another probably wellknown case in the United States is New York Times v. Sullivan, decided in 1964. Now, this was an interesting case where a Civil Rights Group had taken out an ad in the New York Timeses, and it had described some things that had happened in terms of suppressing protesters in montgomery, alabama. Now, mr. Sullivan who was a party to the case was an elected city commissioner of montgomery, alabama. And although he wasnt mentioned by name in the ad, he claimed that basically he was libeled by the content of this ad. And he said that there were some factual inaccuracies, none of which really seemed that material to anything specific to him. It was really not that germane to the case. But alabama libel law made it pretty easy for him to win a judgment against the New York Times. So this case goes all the way to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court really decided to both rule in favor of the New York Times which was a victory for National Media, right . Because we dont want, you know, you can imagine a system where every state makes it easy for its citizens to sue a National Media company for libel. I mean, you could bring those companies to their knees quite quickly, right . So it was a victory for the New York Times, but it was also a victory for the Civil Rights Movement. And one of the things that the court said in that case is that debate on public issues needs to be uninhibited, robust and wide open. And that type of spirit really informed the courts Decision Making then later on in the mosley case in 1972 where they directly cited New York Times v. Sullivan and talked about we need this robust debate in america. We want to have a battle of ideas. We want people to disagree. Thats how were going to make our government stronger in the long run, but holding it accountable. So i would say from an interpretive sense, you know, the Civil Rights Movement did have an influence by helping to build up those precedents. But probably when i look statistically, the two biggest factors in how the justices are going to vote are, yes, their political values, right . The extent to which theyre liberal or conservative makes a difference x. Then the other thing that i find is before and after 1972 when the government regulates in a contentbased way or a contentneutral way, that does make a difference to the justices. So going back to the communist example in the 1950s, the government was discriminating against communist expression, and it was, you know, these were laws that we pretty clearly look at today and say, yeah, those were contentbased, the court should have looked at them more strictly. The court didnt look at it that way in the 1950s, so the government won a lot of those cases. After 1972 when they settle on content neutrality, the justices start to look a lot more strictly at anything that discriminates on the basis of subject matter, content, the idea of the message thats expressed. So its always interesting to think about how does the First Amendment apply to new situations and new types of expression, and so one of the recent cases that the court has looked at, Citizens United involved this Nonprofit Group that wanted to both run ads and