From cotton. Thousands of workers, dock workers and people in the shops, people who worked in the hotels and gambling houses and brothels where plantation owner would come up and treat new york city as their home away from home during the summer months. Everybody was in various ways dependent on maintaining the cotton trade, which means they sought in their best interests to maintain the plantation system and slavery. New york workers also feared that if the four million mill enslaved in souse are south were subtly set free they would flood up north and take their jobs away. The big irony there is that the 12,000 free blacks in new york city, the exact opposite was going on. White workers took their jobs from them, froze them out of the unions, so there one really going to be a problem with fighting for the white white guys fighting for jobs again black workers. So because of cotton and because of to the ties and that long and Enormous Economic tie to the cotton south, the majority of, inners not all but the majority of new yorkers were approximate south and antian legislation is, they were in effect what people called copperheadses at the time. Northerners who were sympathetic to the south. And new york was northern hub of the transatlantic slave trade. But there was still a Huge International transatlantic slave today, and ships out of new york were picking people up in africa and taking them to be slaves in cuba and brazil and places like that. Congress had declared this piracy, which was hanging offense, as early as 1820, and then everybody turn a blind eye. And it was an open secret that new yorkers were investing in slaveships and the profits were enormous. Many, many slaveships were fit it out in new york harbor sailed out of the hash er under the eye of the harbormasters. If they were caught the slave ship captain s didnt have buff if a captain got caught brought back to new york to are 0 trail it was very, very, very rare for them to be convicted. They were allowed to the slip out of the jail. Judgers and injuries were notoriously lenient with them. If they worn convicted and sentencees to anything it would be two months four months in jail as opposed to being huge. And the whole long history of new yorks involvement in the transatlantic slave attraction only one slaveship captain was ever hanged for and it that was because he had the bad luck to get caught after lincoln was in the white house and the civil war had started. So, the politics shifted. You can onehalf this and other programsum at booktv. Org. Heres a look at what is on primetime tonight. At 7 30 p. M. Eastern, a couple of this Years National book ware finalists. First, Heather Thompson discusses the attica prison uprising of 1971. Followed by kathy oneill on how data algorithms impact society. And on this weeks after words at so p. M. John sickerson, host of face the nation, recalls memorable president ial cam pay campaign moments at 11 00, programs on the current president ial candidates. First, dick morris, his book how trump can beat hilary and at midnight, the critical talk about the making of donald trump. And all happens tonight on cspan2s booktv. [inaudible conversations] good afternoon, everyone. And thank you for coming out this afternoon for our second session of the washington history seminar this season. My name is eric larsen, aim from the department of history at George Washington university, and i am the cochair of the washington history seminar. Our usual cochair from the Wilson Center, clines irman is out of country, so we are joined today by someone to fill his shoes, a longtime wilson participant and member of the broader wilson community. This seminar, as you know, is a joint effort of the american Historical Associations NationalHistory Center and the Woodrow WilsonInternational Center for scholars. Efforts are made possible by the assistance of a number of people. The we also have with us today, the director of the National History center, dane kennedy, and we would like to thank, as we always do, the society for historians of americans far relations, schaeffer, which generously helps to underwrite this seminar year after year, and also thanks to the History Department at George Washington university for it soninlaw its Financial Support as well. Ill now turn the microphone over to phillip who will introduce todays speaker. Thank you. I am a former director of the vision of u. S. Studies at the will son center, and i met matt dallek when he had a fellowship under my program, more or less, in 20072008. He is currently associate professor at George Washington universitys graduate school of political management, and a prolific author. He is the author of the right moment, Ronald Reagans first victory and the decisive turning point in american politics, and is acoauthor of a book entitled inside campaigns elections through the eyes political professionals. And matt combines experience in politics with experience in scholarship because he is a former Communications Aide and speech writer for House Minority leader richard gephardt. His articles and reviews have appeared in a number of scholarly and popular magazines. He has been a visiting scholar at the center for the american west. He isnt in other words the kind of combination of personal knowledgeable about the policy process and scholarship that the Wilson Center tries to foster. So, matt, over to you. Thank you. Come up here. So, i just want to say thank you north just for the spree introduction but she has been a wonderful critic in best sense of the word of this book and the manuscript. She has been a friend and really become a mentor over the past eight, nine years, and im really indebted to her and i just its really an honor for me to be up here on the stage with you. I also want to thank Eric Christian who is not here, dane, mainda, peter, for inviting me here, for making this possible, and just a brief word about my tet to the Wilson Center. Was a fellow here and also a Public Policy scholar, and the see shell peck to all environment and tee and imFinancial Support was just simply invaluable to making this book possible, and i want to thank the centers fellows and staff, both then and now, people like mike van duesen, rob lip washington, dc, kim, lizzy, so many others who made the time here so extraordinary and again made this book possible. So now the book. The roosevelt years are typically depicted as a fight against fear. In 1933, ftr, referring to the depression, said americans had nothing to fear but fear itself. In 1941, of course, he vowed freedom from fear to combat fascism abroad. When i wrote this book, partly to highlight what i consider a less wellknown set of fears that royleed the United States during the 1930s and 1940s, the fears that fascist planes would bomb u. S. Cities, that they would topple the government. That chemical and biological weapons would kill civilians. That mass panic would upend law and order and even put a dictator, perhaps in white house. There were two bold, drastically distinct liberal visions for what Homeland Security, then called home defense, and i use that term intentionally and it was in circulation at the time. For what home defense should mean in the lives of americans. There were exemplified, these visions, by Eleanor Roosevelt and la guardia. This book at one level is an account of the roosevelt Administrations Office of civilian defense, which i argue is a kind of precursor so the department of Homeland Security today. But the book isnt a history of a wartime agency. Rather it is ultimately a story of the debate that set first lady Eleanor Roosevelts social defense vision against new york mayor la guardias planned of National Security liberalism. Eleanor roosevelt was the agencys assistant director, la guardia was its director, and i argue that their debates had consequence thursday post war world and even our own post 9 11 times. Fresh the battle will only make sense with a bit of context about how fears upended National Security. After world war i, the italian theorists, which a number of you have heard of about, julio due, predicted in any future war air power would be decisive. Air fleets would target civilians and Industrial Centers in order to destroy enemy morale. By the mid1930s, so about a decade and a half later, he seemed to be prophetic. News of fascist atrocities in ethiopia, china, spain, frightened americans. But most americans were obviously still isolationists. They increasingly were awash in fears that technological advances coupled with fascist militarism had underendded the long standing Monroe Doctrine that only internal threats affected the nations security. Radio dramas, such as air raid featureed sounds of children screaming as bombs whisked through the war. This is or sewn wells of war of the worlds fame, and another radio dramaist. Some americans bread about new super bombers that soon can fly nonstop across thelettic and bomb u. S. Cities. Fantasies about air posterior air power obscured the real world limitations of technological advances. So, theories about how we in the United States would be attacked started into seep into the culture. The nazis it up bases in ice happen, bur immediate da or brazil the continental United States was going to be bombed it the nazi arer terroristing civilians on different continents and the accommodation of military advances and civilian targeting meant that the security bulwark afforded be to great twin ocean protections that United States long relied on in at the pacific and atlantic, those bulwarks had been desteroid. And destroyed and these developments alarmed new dealers, including the three depicted here. In the back seat in 1939 on their way to the worlds fair. In january 1939, Franklin Roosevelt said the world has grown so spall and weapons of attack so swift that the distant points from which attack may be launched are completely different than what they were 20 years ago. Arguing in seeps that in the past 20 years, since world worli there has been a revolution in military technology. And by the spring of 1940, as hitler roll across the french countryside, fdr gave what i found in my research to be one of his more remarkable speeches, and he announced this is on page 72 of the book and i quote this passage at length because i found it to be so interesting to me. The started this passam by saying the atlantic and Pacific Oceans were reasonably adequate defensive barriers when fleets could sail more than an more at an move at an average of five miles an hour. But then he goes on to describe that there is a new element, air and a half face, that has been introduced air navigation and the cribbled how that element sped up attacks because these planes flew at 200, 300milesanhour. And then he goes on and he describes in, i would awe graphic detail the flight times and he described from brazil to venezuela, two and a half hours, or whatever it was of flight time. From venezuela to cuba, he says it would take three hours. And then from cuba to mexico, another thought two and a half hours and from mexico to kansas city, omaha, and st. Louis, two a quarter hours. And of course these cities can in the midwest, the interior of the most isolationist part of the country, and he is basically vague in the sprung of 1940 even the heartland is vulnerable to this new menace. And he ends the section by saying, we have had the lesson before us over and over again. Nations that were not ready and were unable to get ready found themselves overrun by the enemy. Socalled imimimpregnable fort ticket indications no longer exist. Isolation, then, was prescription for national suicide. To sum up political and military officials and people in the media and many other influential voices in the country, it was only a question of time before americans were attacked. The political rhetoric and raidey dramad, called win signs europe what verge ago nazi domination, credited a move in the United States that made tales of mass panics social collapse so believable. I dont know if you can see this in the back. Youll want to hard hazard a guess what that it is from or about . Yes, war of the worlds. So, to understand the panic has likely been exaggerated as a number of scholars have shown. The scope of the panic, what was so fascinating to me was the debate on the assumption that there was panic and what kind of country have we become if people could run for the hills as Eleanor Roosevelt put it, based on fictitious radio program. People wondered how rational thought would survive even when millions of citizens felt bee sieged with the dread of some of the dangers of mod learn life. Concerns asked hour democracy would withstand the power of hit heros military might and fascist pedestrian. Now deal liberals began to grapple with some new National Security questions for which they had few good answers. How should government keep civilians safe from enemy attacks . Should bridges and defense factories be protected by armed soldiers and machine folks . Should cities be blacked out and civilians and citizens militarized to prepare for invasion, fifth columns and air raids. This is in manhattan, air raid warden. How should home defense keep civilians calm and morale intact. And this is one among many posters and warnings you can find, and the idea of panic and morale, which obviously predated world war ii but they were very much central to the debate about how the home front was going to be protected and defended. Here you see the message that the enemys purposes to cause panic, panic spreads like a bush fire and can be as disastrous and so the message of course is, keep cool, and all capitol letters. Makes you wonder about the mixed message there. Finally, final question, should home defense improve peoples lives by combating malnutrition, poverty, joblessness, and despair. Defenseless it matily is a study of in the divisions within liberalism that Eleanor Roosevelt and la guardia embodied in reaction to these upheavals. Its an argument that i hope builds on ideas of new deal liberalism as a more fluid concept than is sometimes depicted in the literature. Liberals bowed over governments role and citizens were responsibilities to the war effort in more ways than we typically appreciate. So just as the depression prompted liberals to think anew about the governments rule in the economy, fascist threats prompted them to rethink the new deal liberal creed. The first lady is often characterized as the conscience of 20th century american liberalism. For those of you who cant see this is a cartoon, the dallas morning news, and its miss fr, miss Franklin Roosevelt, fifth are a ride to town of the forgotten women. She fought for womens right and eighted the unemployed and underprivileged. After world war ii she helped author the u. N. s declaration of human rights and became a leading voice for justice. The image we have is a shy ac ward girl who used painful upbringingbringing and marriage ultimately to assist forgotten americans. But these images are unfinished. Tdr was also a hard line antifascist, dug the midand late 10930s she relinquished her pass simple and campaigned to persuade that knew insure neutral what as up tenable possibility. You dont want to go to war and i dont want to go to war she told one pacifist group, but war, she said, may come to us that was a message she repeated of and over again. She detested hitler, thought he was the embodiment of evil, and in the late 1930s she became a leading antifascist voice. Most crucially, her vision of wartime liberalism featured a governmentlid and citizenpowered movement to make americans, quote, as much interested today in seeing citizens well housed, wellclothed, and wellfed, obtaining needed medical care and recreation as in military security. She insisted that the country had to life it values. In wartime she argued, quote, every place in this country must be made a better place in which to live and are therefore, more worth defending. To whorl war to was struggle to defeat mash. She mill tarly and also required a wartime new deal, to secure a Better Future by mounting a National Effort to attack americans up met u. Met human needs to fine finish the new deal. She call on government to help citizens set up daycare centers, teach citizens about nutrition and Consumer Rights and build housing for newly arrived workers. Americans, the first lady insist i would, had to believe their lives were better in a democracy than if they were living under a totalitarian regime. And in the battle for hearts around the globe, american democracy, she argued, had better show that it was superior to fascist slavery. So this idea of countering the fast fish ideologyat appeal was on her mind, and finally social defense would improve the publics health, qualify more americans for military service and increase defense productivity so she tied in of some of these social reforms directly to the war effort, arguing that they would have a beneficial effect on americas able to mobilize militarily. In january 1941, dozen of the nations most influential women listened in the white house as she and her allies unveiled a plan to set up what they called the American Social defense administration. Under their machine, think how remarkable this plan is really. I found it remarkable and would submit it is. The government would provide volunteer roles for every american woman. Volunteers gary together improve the education system, sanitation, public health, housing, some train women in skills so they can find good paying jobs. Five million women were going to cultivate garrens to feet their fellow citizens and women would be trained in first aid and other defense activities. Fdrs focus, of course, was on the military draft and lendlease aid to britain, and he considered her plan too radical. Even at the same time he was encouraging Eleanor Roosevelt and Florence Kerr to drift the planned but he considered it to ambitious. Nevertheless a version of Eleanor Roosevelts plan was enabled in fdrs order establishing the office of civilian defense. In september of 41 he named her as the agencys assistant director in charge of volunteer participation. For the first time a president s spouse held an official administration job, and as far as i can tell it was Eleanor Roosevelt, september 41, and then Hillary Clinton in the Healthcare Task force, and those were the only two times. Eleanor roosevelt succeeded in casting the war as a struggle ensure a government as concerned with peoples welfare as it was with warfare. She helped recruit more than 10 million volunteers, including an estimated 40 million who performed some type of social defense role. You can see on the slides a arm band which signaled a particular job and volunteer role in is office hoff civilian defense. Citizens fed women and children, providedle and child cair, trained defense plant workers, led salvage campaigns, improved transit systems, planted Victory Gardens and helped women learn about nutritious diets. He campaign made it santaable for liberals to champn big go, both in terms of military affairs and social democratic experimentation. A government devoted to both guns and butter. Dont thick nye first lady has ever waged a campaign quite like this and some of you may take a different position but i would love to hear any comparisons but i really think this was a lot of historians like to declare its unique but i think her campaign was unique. She outlined her version in her sixdaya week nationally sin did indicate any day column, and delivered a weekly radio address, and theres so many pictures of her in front of these rateow microphones, which to me is revealing about her public voice really some ways almost as powerful irnot more powerful at type as Franklin Roosevelts public voice gave countless talks to liberal and civic groups and built her on informal Political Coalition through the thousands of letters she and her staff wrote and the other can tacted with leading liberals and understood citizens alike. Liberals such as Florence Kerr. And joseph lash, and eleanor relevants top aide, the wife of the treasury sect secretary, and so liberal such as these put their faith in Eleanor Roosevelts leadership more than they did even in fdrs, and harry hopkins, told Florence Kerr that if you have to report to both franklin and eleanor its like being caught between the two playeds of scissors. Not the place be you want to be. And obviously many white house aides were first and for most loyal to president roosevelt, but many people, both in ill nor roosevelts sixle and around the country, were more loyal to her, and believed in her and her vision the most. During the war years, she prodded fdr to defend the new deals gains and secure position north america allies in the administration in 1941 when fdr announce hit vision of freedom from want and then in 1944 when he issued his call for an economic bill of rights he was channeling Eleanor Roosevelts notion that social and military defense constituted the wars two fronts and im not saying she simply kind of injected this into this thinking and into his speeches but she was a driving force behind and really an architect of this idea of the two front war. Ultimately, though, social defense took a back seat to military security. But the idea of social defense lived on, long after she had been ousted as assistant director. Laguard guard ya, the mayor of new york. La guardia was the gun side of the debate. This is him in his First Press Conference of being named director of the office of civilian defense. So the image of him is as new york citys crusading reform mayor. He helped make modern new york. He formed a partnership with fdrground on the new deal. In doing so he modernized and humanized the nations most populist city and helped the poor immigrants and africanamericans to weather the great depression. His leadership restored faith in city government. But la guardia also worried about social disorder. This poster, which was actually done we roland kirby, the political cartoonist and who also did that earlier war of the worlds cartoon that i had showed you, this is obviously not the planes, bombing manhattan, and you probably cant see it but at the bottom it says fh la guardia, mayor. He has signed the poster saying if the blitz comes to new york and you lose a family, child or friends or just change your dress, and tells you where to report. So, an effort to kind of get people a rational step they think they could take in the face of terror coming to manhattan. During world war i, he is flying combat play are plains in italy and air power terrified him. Like the first lady the mayor renounced his pacifism. She likened hitler to street trash and in fact he was as many biology groovers and others noded he was incredibly colorful and flamboyant and at one point he called hitler a perverted maniac. And he urged military preparedness. Watching rotterdam are paris and ron didnt being bombed from city hall, he thought that American Cities could eventually meet the same fate. This is coventry, king george at the front and over king georges right shoulder is a man named herbert morrison, the home secretary and in charge basically of the home defense Home Security in london and throughout throughout england. La guardia actually sent his fire and Police Officials to tour bombed out london and learn the lessons of british home defense. The pupil comes to the master to learn. That was how a new york city firefighter described this mission at a News Conference in london at the hugh height of the blitz. Historian daniel rodders argue that the transat rick form shaped and inspireds american policies and that insight applies to home defense. Britains home secretary, herbert morrison, who is pictured her, his home defense agenda inspired and informed laguards are approach to home defense as fdr once called it. La guardia was incensed that the administration in early 1941, the roosevelt administration, had not yet established a home defense agency, and you see hi is actually trying on a helmet that morrison sent to him and is on hi radio phone, beloved car radio phone, he irquite about getting consider enfired about get an imagine radio system show he could communicate across all new york city radio stations in case of emergency and this was a war game drill the new york before pearl harbor and he i nope if its the same hat but a similar steel helmet and obviously a relished relished this role. So he lobbied the white house, and fdr signed the executive order in may 1941 and tapped pa laguard ya to be his home defense chief while stayed on as mayor. La guardia bran dished a new form brandished a new form of liberalism that pryer to tate is military over social in a time of crisis. Under this supervision a government civilian partnership would mail tearize civilians lives. He listened to some of his ideas. He proposed requiring by city workers to require them to volunteer as firefighters and learn how to handle a chemical weapons attack, such as this liquid attack a drill depicted in this slide here. And liquid vesicants were agents like mustard gas. La guardia recommended distributing gas masks to 50 million civilians. Why 50 million . Well, there is would the army designated 300 mild so, called target zones that stretched 300 milessenland from all of the coasts. And he lobbied constantly for congress to so he could procure the funds to deliver the masks. Proposed putting a mobile water pump on every city belong block and establishing fire brigaded for every city brigade. A Fourth Military branch would prepare cities to endure air raids. I want to show you a few slides. Lower manhattan. That is a drill in which home defense volunteers are showing how they douse incendiary bomb fires, la guardia reportedly was watching this drill. Anybody know what is happening here . Where is that . Times square. Times square, at least thats what the times square. This is actually government photos that the office of civilian defense took to des moines straight how they could clear the government could clear one overseest sections in at the d busiest sexness the country in five minutes. So they took the before slide and then air raid drum and the afterslide. Is it government propaganda and i knock book about peoples multifast selfed reactions to these drills because Many Americans who supported the drills who complied, who believed they were matters of life and death actually and a lot of letters and then there are were many others who defied them or ignored them and to thought they were absurd and the reason why, in seattle after pearl harbor when some citizens refused to dim their lights, and more than a thousand people rioted a few days after pearl harbor. This is newspaper row in boston during an air raid drill. This is chicago block wardens who i have since learned, theyre doing the pledge of allegiance. And apparently the reason we dont do it anymore is because obviously it looks like the nazi salute. But what actually appreciate about this picture is that the critics of home defense, especially on the right, conservative criticness at the midwest, argued that the home Defense Program is just a backdoor way to establish a communistic dictatorship, and where individual liberties will be taken away you. ll have these kind of mass people reduced to masses. Compelled to serve the government, and american liberty will dedestroyed. That was the argue. And this picture is an interesting one. I apologize for the poor quality of the slides. These are three women, fire watchers in detroit. Theyre watching for fires in the middle of the country. This is la guardia. When i first saw this i actually thought, was this a real did a bomb hit or was this the real thing and this is just a drill. When you look at it closer you can tell. A couple people seem to be smiling but this is la guardia looking on at rescue operation basically, preparing for air raids. But the thought that most haunted la guardia was an air raid panic. He urged new yorker i just want you to consider some of his rhetoric, his language. He urged new yorkers to, quote, imagine what would happen in the area below city hall if all those employed there should try to live their skyscrapers at the same time and crowd into subways during an air raid. He warned that people, quote, would be piled eight feet deep in streets and panishing and disorder might cause more casualties than enemy fliers. Months before pearl harbor la guardia informed los angeles resident that air raids may turn them who what the called frantic mobs. He predicted civilians, quote, dropping like flies, and bleeding to death in the street. The horror would cause what the corfully termed these are his words, not mine a sweeping conflagration of insanity. La guardia used fear. Fear of attacks was both hit greatest asset and his chief defect. Although he used fear shake people out of their isolationist stupor, he came off like orson welles or steroid and wells that the master mind of wow war of the worlds. Ty the public was fearful, it would be inspired to mobilize in its own selfdefense. He aided fdr in wayneing the americans of nazi peril he difference spenced with civic niceties and Civil Liberties so on freedom sunday in November November 191941. A month before pearl harbor part of weeklong designated civilian defense week which the administration had so deaths desnated and was supposed to celebrate free only of religion, feed dom of speech. La guardia sent priests and rabbis his recommendation what should say about home defense in their sermons. He asked citizens to spy on other citizens. Shuttered japaneseamerican restaurants and clubs after park harbor and calls he media critics japs and friends of japs and ordered just con tuned to their homes until the golf to determine their status. He did this on his own accord, his own authority, and theres i havent seen evidence that he coordinate this with the administration. Just wasnt on the raid you and ordered these thing. Shortly after pearl harbor, riding in a Police Cruiser in washington,guard ya shouted, calm, calm, calm. Not exactly calming, right . So i ironically americas leading urban reformer pushed liberalism in a novel direction as he fought to use the federal government to militarize civilians in order to maximize their safety. Both roosevelt eventually soured on la guardias fearmongerring. Critics pilloryied familiar for abandoning new york after pearl harbor. And the president ousted him in 1942. When congress and the presidency reported that Eleanor Roosevelt had hired her friend, a dancer, paying her 4,600 a year. Which was more than colonels salary and about 72,000 in todays income. A year, she hired cheney to teach dancing to children and raise their morale. She became the focus of the nations first scandal after pearl harbor. She resigned shortly after la guardia and theres a whole obviously back story to this and i try to take this scandal, if you want to indicate that, this uproar over this news i tried to ticket seriously and try to understand the reasons for hiring cheney. Why she didnt anticipate this avalanche of criticism and also the really misogynistic outpouring that came after this hire was known and that helped push her out of office. The book begins with the war of the worlds and ended with fd rs economic bill of rights address, and it explores other facets of home defense for which i do not have time, but but this is Eleanor Roosevelt in tacoma, washington, bat week after pearl harbor. Thats the mayor, shes talking to home defense officials. And this is her also in tacoma, talking to a group of japaneseamerican youth. She actually had this picture publicly released along with a comment in which she said, japanese she said japaneseamericans are just like every other american. They have the same rights as every citizen and she said, quote, give. The every consideration. The Los Angeles Times this typified the reaction the Los Angeles Times reacted to comments like that, that she made, and said that Eleanor Roosevelt eder toized that Eleanor Roosevelt should be forced to retire from public life for having defended the snake wes call japanese. But ill end just want to end by saying that there are debates la guardia, Eleanor Roosevelt debate, guns very butter and security vs. Liberty, had consequences for the post world world post war world. The Civil Defense emphasized a shelter constructing erick vac waiting cities, and this concept of socalled selfhelp. Social defense was omitted from the cold war program in part due to this lingering backlash to ers social democratic experiment. But ers vision ultimately never died. Elements of ers ideals were expressed in trumans fair deal. Jfks new frontier, and lbjs Great Society. All of which rested at least in part on the notion that without achieving sodemocrats at home, the United States would be ill equipped to project its values, freedom, opportunity, human rights, efolktively overseas. The peace corps and the war on poverty asked citizenned to get engaged and live americas values during the wartime. Ers bottomup campaign to bolster life for and all spread democracys fruits to more americans, i think, echoed in these cold war programs, even if the people who divide those cold war programs were not or cold war era programs were not necessarily aware of her influence. Even today, in our 9 11 times, liberals, i think, even though theyre not really called that anymore but liberals argue with conservatives and among themselves about the proper balance between individual freedom and National Security. Some liberals argue that, quote, nation building right here at home, as president obama said in 2012, is more important than cracking down on suspected terrorist threats and spilling blood and temperature in meet. These debates are traceable to to struggle among liberals to alert citizens to the war on two fronts. As home and abroad, during the ralph years. As long as america has enemies overseas and threats from within, the fight over the best balance between guns and butter, i think, will remain central to Americas National identity. An enduring legacy of the campaign by liberal sun as Eleanor Roosevelt and la guardia in world war ii, to liberate meshes from the grip of fear. Thank you. [applause] thank you,. Thank you, matt now. We have time for questions we ask that you wait for the microphone to reach you before you speak. Please identify yourself when we call on you, and use the microphone once you have it. Lets stalling right up here. Was there any group of people point thought paradoxer about a regiment addition on behalf of liberty . Yeah. You mean in the civil Defense Program . Yes. Well, ridge e regimen addition was one of the greatest objects most consent thus topics at the time said we should take a page out of of what the massties are doing with the home Defense Programs. Thees auxiliary police the u. S. Should wear boots, carry guns and have trench coats, and the response from a major who was involved in this program, to the mayor of milwaukee was basically your going to create a political fire storm like you have never seep the Washington Post has an editorial about universal national service. Eleanor roosevelt in 1940, started promoting the idea of mandatory national service, especially for youth. Fdr opposed it and actually at one point Eleanor Roosevelt went to it was a womans club in new jersey. She said if i keep talking about this idea of mine, mrs. Roots head will come off because it was quite controversial. On the left, people said this is military conscription. This is what they said to Eleanor Roosevelt. The great progressive hero. On the right they said this is a form of new deal dictatorship. And obviously that Program Never got enacted, although it bubbled up from time to time, and i think actually fdr in 44 endorsed some version of service. And the right was really the conservative isolationist in the midwest, for example, like the chicago tribune, were really relentless, in pounding on both la guardia and el lower roosevelt and basically saying, Eleanor Roosevelts program or idea to recruit 50 million american women they likened it to theit hitlers frau front, just akin to nazi germany. So the short of it is that in this debate, liberals came up with this idea of from the bottom up, local control, volunteerism. That would make it democratic and contrast the communist and fascism. The problem was by feeding so much local control you had a lot of choose, very little ability to control the program, and people definedded what home defense should be very differently depending on where they lived, so its a very interesting question and it was very contentious. Thank you very much for your preparation. I was fast presentation, it was fascinating. Pass ordinary quickly the fact that Eleanor Roosevelt was ousted as the deputy in the office of civilian defense. Could you go a its built more into the details of that and just one quick question. We had somebody here that did a biography of herbert hoovers are wife and i was curious if she did anything comparable but when the depression set in whether she was involved at install the efforts on that . Dont know if the fir lady had as much of a presence as Eleanor Roosevelt. So this ouster. Actually, Eleanor Roosevelt was the timing is so interesting. She stepped down from the office of civilian defense day before Franklin Roosevelt signed his executive order, establishing the internment camps, and she it was around february 5th, so about ten days prior. It was reported as i said that she hired this dancer and then she hired melvin douglas, the Hollywood Star to do an art program and the official reports she was paying both of these people exorbitant sums. The media not just the conservative columnists, went after her and basically said, she has overstepped her role. She should not be in any kind of official position. She should basically be stick to here look, as some of the letters that were written to her by people people wrote in did said stick to your knitting. They said, leave a mans job to a man. They said basically youre a woman. You have no business being in this position. The part of the i try to get into why she hired cheney. Part of it was the physical fitness was seen as a legitimate piece of the new deal. Just sort of supporting writers and artists. Fitness was seen as legitimate in wartime, Eleanor Roosevelt would visit camps and see people who were mall nourished and needed food and needed to be healthier. Dance was also seen as a way to lift up peoples morial morale because around the world, mothers and children were trapped in war zones and so the idea that cheny, whom Eleanor Roosevelt saw as a professional. Sometimes im allowed to speak my mind, you know, the country is not ready for this. If i could just followup on that. If you put aside the massageny and the conservative and the Republican Party or the southern democrats who simply want to take aim at Eleanor Roosevelt and this is such a convenient issue. There does seem to be kind of a tone deafness to what shes doing. Shes putting two friends on payrolls at fairly high salaries so she essentially walks into it and so i couldnt quite tell from your treatment of this. The response is in part both not surprising, but is it justified and i wasnt quite sure where you came down on that. So look i try are to i try to argue in the book that this was politically completely blind that it was politically to pay that you know as he said to pay her friends this absorb using years to install her also alleys in key positions. And so this was, i think, politically disastrous. The reaction, i think some of the reaction was over the top was was massage and ting this incident it sort of opened ohmed the gate and it just poured forth forth and getting so many letters from the public just about the scandal that her aids in the roosevelt library, her aids divide the letters up. Basically vitrialic and favorable and way tilting in the of the most acidic so i think some of it was over the top. But i do think that politically yeah, i mean, you know, its hard to i think, you know, she had this line. Eleanor had this line that you know if your intention is pure. If it is a good intention, then you should be ab solved or everyone should be given sympathy. But i think that was a real kind of blind spot and so part of what i wrestle with is this contradiction really that someone so politically astoop could make such a huge political blunder and remember this is two months after pearl harbor that this happened so the timing was and the last point which doesnt quite you know get on your question. But one of the things i try to suggest in the book is that i dont think anybody would have stopped the camp. But she could have been a more powerful voice of the set. Or were not for this skanks potentially because it did sideline her and chaisen her for a while. [inaudible] i have something. Can i invite you to move a little bit out of your comfort zone and move at this notion of fear that you discuss and fear is actually the last word in the book so it really is, though, a running theme. Be afraid. [laughter] and im just thinking about the american prepencety to fear in times of crisis. The american politics and one with of the things that i really liked about New York Times columnist frank buni wrote after ebola crisis he wrote, we americans do panic really well. [laughter] and im thinking, pushing it back historically, world war i, you get over 2,000 prosecutions of people who said things that somebody thought might interfere with the war effort. And yet world war ii you have a very small number of prosecutors as if maybe we learn something. Okay, so world war ii you get concentration camps, after 9 11, you get the rounding up and incarceration of Muslim Americans and mum immigrants but then you dont have this same kind of total frenzy that you have. Is there something in your thinking when theres something about the American Mind that leads us to particularly frank maybe this is human name of at large. But i wonder what in the american Political Climate can be said to be responsible for all of this. I wonder its a great question. But i dont have a great answer but i wonder if in our democracy we meet enemies, and i know thats a kind of loaded and sweeping statement. But im certainly i think you know political leaders can sometimes benefit from tapping into some of these fears that i think people genuinely feel. At least some people genuinely feel, so theres some political benefit. I think the media can, i mean, at least in the episode that im looking at, you know what you see is how easy it is for the media to sort of overwhelm any kind of sense of of you know any space to step back and think a little bit more rationally. And then i think that world war i is an interesting case but certainly world war ii one of the things im arguing is that we enter into this modern era in which we see ourselves as part of much more vulnerable to the world and to its, into european and other parts of the world an sort of militarism, and so ting that vulnerability in a sense has made americans or made the American Mind even more fearful. Now, obviously, it predated. But you know, if you with look at all of your examples in the 20th century, and this sense that, i think theres another fear of which is long standing. But of internal enemies right the idea of fifth columnist alert, alert the country, that you know, obviously, today you know there are stories about people, you know, panicking or being afraid in new york, new jersey, and elsewhere. This idea that you know there are those others quote unquote inside the country that somehow want to harm United States. They dont like democracy. You know, theres president bush i guess said after everyone in they hate our freedom. And i think that is a long, running theme, and look i also wonder if it in part has to do with the countrys birth in a way. Sort of separation from from britain and this yesterday that we are distinct and that if we let you know alien ideas so the world alien in world war ii and then world war i as well was really very much in use to describe a foreign enemy alien for example. Was a popular word for this idea that theres something foreign kind of coming into the country to infect democracy to take away our freedom i think is you know so i dont think i have a great answer. But i think some of those are some of the maybe themes that we appearing time and time again, and then last thing ill say is one would hope would have hoped it that after 9 11 rights, we had hope to learn from historical episodes but as you said in world war ii, the prergses were fewer. But of course the japanese americans were the targets. Itin some ways if not measures more taken by the way without no i evidence that there were japanese american spies or threats. And present campaign leads to explain that we havent made progress as much as one would you say like to think. Dane one is coming. Kennedy terrific talk and fascinating story, and you know, i think all of this sort of heard contemporary and peoples in your accounting so you made a convincing case that this is sort of the foundations of something is that is persisted to present day. One of the things im struck by and would like to sort of push you on is is not just the contrast between these two characters that you examine but similarities the fact that, in fact, both pass fistism and no longer isolated by threats across oceans. That both have to even need for the state to organize citizens in a way to sort of address those challenges. [inaudible] given that context, and in light of those similarities im curious about their conservative critics and i would assume that there are others who are saying those threats dont face us. Or we should respond to them in different ways than are being proposed here and weekend for you can say more about that line of argument. Yeah, look i dont think i emphasize in my talk as much as i try to do in the book even though i fundamentally see this rift or schism they share all of the things that you identified all hardline fascist and both support arming, they both really are two of the leading critics of hitler and most vocal antifascist and these are leading new dealers, in fact, they collaborate on for example, helping poor people find jobs in new york city. And, of course, theres a whole bock not mine, but written about the relationship with fdr in modern of new york city ambitious. So theres a lot of overlap and pell mother roosevelt never really comes out and says all of this militarized stuff that wants to do, i dont think we should do it. She never says that. In fact, she supports it. She supports it and she comes out now it is not her fox but she thinks these are legitimate operations but doesnt want other piece to be forgotten. Having said that, so conservative critics, the isolationist conservative isolationist, America First committee, the lindberghs and others are arguing even in 1940s all you need are two oceans to protect us, and you need military but as long as we have our oceans there is no threat. And so the charge leveled against Franklin Roosevelt most pointedly. But also against lagarde why this is where he gets into political trouble and against Eleanor Roosevelt they are and warmongers that they want the country to be afraid and they want us to go to war. And so one of the things that interested me about this study at least is how do these not just these leaders but other leaders in position of military and media and Cultural Authority how do they handle fear . How do they talk about fear . How do they use this idea . On the wrong side historically and lindbergh most would agree they were on the wrong side of this. You know, that they were the ones who were saying theres really nothing to be afraid and dont listen to these scare amongers. And that was, obviously, a very powerful force in the country, especially in the midwest. And then there were, obviously, the antiwar in the left and lumped into each other by conservative critics and also seen as you know by many is wanting to expand the state to take more control over peoples lives not that individualism and that really this had is a back to dictatorship that was the language that was used. And final thing ill say, though, is that when after pearl harbor especially but even before Eleanor Roosevelt saw she had a con seption of herself and role as trying to calm people down. Not to say there arent threats she said there were threats but she said you know basically, you know we have to act as if were not afraid. Thats that was her laguardia i think agreed that using fear would drive the mobilization. And in fact, he goes to San Francisco few days after pearl harbor and people in San Francisco think that theyre in danger of being bombed. And louisiana guards laguardia said i predicted this attack. I predicted that it was going to come out of the west. I didnt get that kind of information out of my hat. He said so you better and im paraphrasing he said you Better Believe me when i tell you that San Francisco is a target and, in fact, when they were flying to the west coast, this was told in other books, that Eleanor Roosevelt gets report from pilot saying that San Francisco is being bombed and laguardia sayings well if thats true were going to San Francisco instead of los angeles where they were supposed to go, and they checked in when they at a refueling stop and turned out it was just a rumor. But they they believe that this was totally legitimate. And so laguardia really again used fear to kind of sell. They make an interest and i dont know if they fully answers your question. But thanks. Yeah. But laguardia is used to fear, the sense that i get from the book is that it is actually very sincere in using it, so hes not a politician who had says awe u, i can mobilize masses by whipping them up into a frenzy. He kind of goes off the deep end perhaps with some good reason. But nonetheless he is fearful. He communicates fear, it is the basis of what hes trying to do. But my question comes back to back to what had dane started off by talking about and, though, the commonalities between laguardia and e. R. One of the framing devices of the book is a by that occurs during the war and one branch is represented by Eleanor Roosevelt who puts torte the social defense liberalism. So were going to expand the new deal under the guys preparing for a National Emergency and then fighting a war and laguardia who sort of loses interest in that and simply wants to make everyone a fire warden pass out gas mask. Get everyone ready for blitz that is coming to new york, San Francisco, or anything else. So you have social to sense liberalism versus National Security liberal i. And that this is a split within liberalism that has ratifications for future this political philosophy and yet when laguardia loses his job and fdr administration goes back to new york, he puts back on his new deal hat and becomes the ultra liberal to make new york into kind of a a paragon of i guess you could call liberalism. Health care, i think he did health care reform. Yep. And the liberals who continue in the e. R. Tradition themselves become kind of kind of fused those to parts in when the cold war begins trimming the fair deal on one hand. But the cold war and fightings it with all of his might on the other. Theyre both parts of that. And americans with democratic action on e. R. Part of this also fuses both of these things. So this split within liberalism that exists at a very particular point does it really persist. And those who carry the liberal banner afterwards do they not in a certain sense take both parts of this equation and thats the redefined liberalism Going Forward . Its not one or the other. But it really is too much they cant get it because conservative block them from social part of liberalism. S yeah, i think its a really interesting question. Yods think that theres a lot of fusion thats happening in the kind of post world war ii era. Just to step back so one of the reasons why i see this split and argue that there is a bifercation eleanor rose vement is fierce critic of laguardia and she does not see the kind of social defense volunteer programs being championed by him. That she thinks should be in place. And so he brings her aboard and says you keep criticizing me, and if theres anyone in this country who i do not want to criticize me is you. So you know, 130 other million americans that criticism wouldnt touch me. But yours does. So and they never really sink sync up thats partly a personality tension. But i think it is also partly rest on what it is a prioritize. How they see one another, and their larger ideas of what liberaltism shob in wartime in the governments role. And in terms of the post war, world my senses waxes and wanes that there are particular moments as qowld say the Great Society where we get a huge burst of social reform legislation but still at the height of the cold war as vietnam war is beginning. But that vietnam war, the korean war, it makes it in many ways tougher. But to you know sustain that kind of reform liberalism, and thats to say that you know people like john f. Kennedy or truman or johnson or many others or people in a. D. A. Theyre not supportive theyre both anticommunist and theyre reform rs. Reformers. But the question is how many resources how much energy . And the country and really our political leaders, if theres only so much kind bandwidth what do you prioritize and what do you go after . And so i think that it you know, there is a tension i guess i would say. Between the people who are you know, cold warrior you know liberal cold warriors and those who are also at times advocating for social programs and they might embody kind of the same person at times if that makes sense. But that again, it ebbs and flows and we see these periods of kind of burst of reform. But that you know, it is i think it in some ways the war is the cold war is both justification for doing these reforms but they also can have a styling effect. Right up here on the left. Overstepped when he brought the nazi scientist to the u. S. In operation paper clip . That i dont know. Does anybody want to take that . [laughter] yeah, im sorry. I dont i dont know, but you know, bringing nazis is to become a part of Scientific Community is an odd, odd thing to do. All right is there a hand back here something i havent spoken . From the heritage foundation, you mentioned the connections with the United Kingdom particularly warriors connections with the United Kingdom. So many of the themes that you related really have much longer comparisons in the u. K. And indeed in western world as a whole. The idea of the fear of bombing, creating social panic is certainly not simply an american idea. Its a british idea and many other theorists have similar ideas ands i reminded as your honor speaking in my own work that there are distinguished military theorist in 1949 and 1940 argue best way for u. K. To win what becomes a Second World War is to establish National Health service and prove this superiority of britain by instilling germans what british can do what they sort of stick to it. And indeed even during world war ii its a period of social reform in gestation which happens after world war ii at the at league government. So to what extent apart from laguardia im sure fascinating tour of london and what part into this story of learning from the u. K. And maybe other places that goes back before the bombs start falling into the midor early 1930s. So i have a section in the book and i didnt talk about it in my talk but i have a section in any book that i actually talk about the influence of of a lady sell stellar red in social defense ideas in 1930s britain, and also during the blitz on Eleanor Roosevelt, and on many other liberals. Its not just the firefighters and fbi agents and Police Officials who are going to london to study how to prepare against bombing. It is also somebody named i think bittle in charge of a welfare agency. Eleanor roosevelt wanted to send a number of prominent women on a bomber in order to get good publicity. Right before pearl harbor she wanted to send them over to england to study what the british womens volunteer service was doing. And i think in Eleanor Roosevelt is struck up a very close i think a cor correspondent and for lady and she and many other liberals who wanted to keep or looking for ways to keep the new deal alive and connect to the war effort also saw a model in britain. And were inspired by what , in fact, Eleanor Roosevelt i think in one letter writes that i dont you know im not sure that the british, this was the blitz but i dont think that the british and the londoners would be able to survive if it wrnght for the kind of social programs. That you remember doing and hot it and not to trivialize but basics of people. But im a little less familiar in terms of the early 30s. But absolutely in world war i even and it predates as well but zeppelin and gotha raids and london and more than 1,000 british died 37. And panic was very much a real concern, in fact, there were antigerman riots i believe during world war i in england, and the british newspapers would praise londoners for staying calm. Because this fear that you know, society was going to fall apart which again was ever present, and look you know back to erics good point. Earlier too you know laguardia and Eleanor Roosevelt and i think maybe other character believe these things. Im not arguing that they simply exploited a political opportunity to make the case for war. I think they used it to make the case for war. An they used it effectively. But i also think that they believed it and the reason i say this because theres a lot of letters and a lot of memos that were not public you know not released to the public in which they talk talk about defeg bridges. Defending a dense plan. And you know, Aviation Technology and capabilities. These are real, real fears that they have. And so, you know, this is you know i think the rhetoric in part what makes it so interesting and what makes their argument so interesting is that they really did feel like it was exponential threat and again, eleanor res vet read this idea that society will collapse in a heap of panic especially because france when france was overrun you know, as with poland and many other places basically you dont story of the United States was that whether persians were not prepared and department believe in democracy in the same kind of way. Didnt have the same commitment so that social peaces is for a lot of people critical and england experience in 30s and 40s also was essential not just on military defense piece but social as well. Mack [inaudible] to what extent a separate propaganda in u. S. Government at this time not just through that opposite civilian defense. But fdr was trying to get through lynn lee trying to get the draft passed in congress and so on. Was there a separate parallel east to what was going on that was coordinated and so on . This was both part of the problem of all of these war agencies set up, i mean fdr qowld set these things up essentially left and right and tons of overlap. You know, if you look at the executive order for exampleing this office civilian had four different components. Morale building and the office of war information. There were many agencies and Eleanor Roosevelt produces a a poster or nutrition, and the federal Security Agency which is led by a former indiana governor paul mcnutt who thought that her agency was encroaching on his mission. I said weve already basically produced this poster you know weve already done this. And so the duplication and lack of coordination mcleash who comes into the government and helps i believe not overstating propgandize he has ideas for i believe laguardia wont listen to him so theres kind of a really kind of chaos i think to to the setting up of these different agencies and a lot of overlap and a lot of confusion about who is at when apartmently partly why more of an inside story i guess but with outside effect. But the jockeying for supremacy in the oval office and you know to affect policy is is in part so intense because theres so many kind of competing interest and just last point on the on the publicity, the information. I mean, even james landis talk about him but hes a successor to Eleanor Roosevelt and louisiana dward ya they district his agency i guess millions of peoples of literature, films, and this has just one agency. And so it is you can watch the world war ii era wheels and it pace from world war i right the wilson concept of using persuasion right and you know using the fill force of the government to even in schools right and disools kind of talk about you know how do we talk about germans and spin to use a modern term and world war ii very much and look you can reads ever our speeches too and you see really one of the masterful you know who is also you know framing the debate in a particular way. And is at the top of this architecture. Gentleman right here. [inaudible]