Transcripts For CSPAN3 Actor 20240705

It took place in 1876. The Bipartisan Commission voted to give the electoral of the disputed states to the republican hayes. In exchange, democrats got something they wanted. Hayes to withdraw union troops. The south. With that assurance. The deal went through. The election of 1876 ended with a compromise that ensured the continuation of racism and racist violence in our nations culture and politics that has lasted to this day. Hello and to Washington Post live, kate with some a writer and with Washington Post opinions. And today, im so pleased be joined by Academy Award winning filmmaker and author hanks. And geoffrey robinson, the founder and executive director of the who we are project. Theyve teamed up on a new animated short documentary, how to rig an election. The races of the 1876 president ial contest. Gentlemen, im so glad were together. Thank you for having us for the intro intro. So lets lets start with the origins. Geoffrey, youre a civil rights lawyer now in the film making this. What was the catalyst, this collaboration with tom . Well, the who we are project produced a film who we are a chronicle of racism in america. And Sony Pictures classics, the distributor. And they suggested that we send copies the film to different people before was released. And one of those people was tom. And so i wrote an email and we off a copy of the film and i thought that would be it. And then i started getting emails from somebody that was t. H. And i thought, who is this guy . And then i thought, its that guy. And that started a collaboration, because i found out that tom has a compelling interest in and the who we are project is all about part of our history that has never been told. And so that was the beginning of our collaboration. And i should say maybe, tom, you can talk about it. Tom had written an op ed on the 100th anniversary of the tulsa massacre, and that was one of the reasons that we thought, well, well send the film to him because sounded kind of outraged that nobody taught me this. Yo, whats up . And that how our collaboration started. Tom, why tell this part of history now . Well, i grew up in oakland, about as diverse racially as cities youre going to find in the United States. I had, i had always loved history, my favorite class and in school in fifth grade and seventh grade in 10th grade in junior college. And ive always read history for pleasure because you cant make this stuff up. And it wasnt until was 64 years old that i had heard about the tulsa massacre coming from after years and years of official study in which i learned about the boston massacre. I learned about custers last stand. I learned about any number of other massacres in the history our country. And yet heres something central to who we are, to to to to coin a phrase as far as social just it just the civic unrest and the racial equality that has sort of been promised to us for the better part of 100 years. The that i had never been told this, i realized we greatly impacted my sensibilities of of the city that i lived in oakland, california, at a time when racial strife was part and to do do every day despite. The fact that oakland is is about as as integrated lets use that word the city as youre going to find by. Yeah i just wrote it sort of as as i wrote the op ed pieces of a sort of how come i wasnt who decided that this lesson this moment this this incredibly devices that think impactful record of American History was not taught us in a time when there was no reason it not to be outside of some sort of fear that we couldnt handle it. So to to get that to get that email right the time was awfully good. That did deal with tulsa massacre from Jeff Jeffries movie. It just made me think that there is a lack of trust that we as americans, we are stewards. History can dispassionate really learn about what happened 100 years ago, 60 years ago, or in some cases i think even 40 or 22 years ago. I think i think were all big kids and none of us. I think going to be subjected to some sort of mind altering change if we learn the truth about our own individual history, its easy to accept because. One of the things that that jeffrey so magnificently spoke at the very beginning of the who we are project is the great George Orwell quote if you control the present, if you control the path to control the control the president unmooring the words of of George Orwell, orwell jeff we can hit it off better. But i dont think anything more in to the powers of ignorance or the the accumulate the power of a certain around the world than the altering of the narrative the revisionist and the controlling of the past in order to control not only the present but also controlled the whole of that whole entire concept of who are we . Who are we as americans . Were conflicted and we have an history that once learn even more about it, it helps us understand who we are now and where we can go tomorrow and so much. I think, of our understanding or acceptance. A part of history is shaped by our personal experiences in our backgrounds, the lens through which we look. One of the things i find so special about collaboration is that while you were getting to know each other, you found out that you you were born a month apart. Both grew up in midtown. Your cities in america, oakland and, memphis. So you were walking some of the same lines, but in a very different way. Take us back 55 years ago this week when Luther King Jr was assassin ended. What was that you and how did your lenses. Jeff . This was provoked, these conversations and, i think both of us came away. It just remarkable. I grew up in memphis and so everyone knew that dr. Was in town and. Everyone knew, unlike when he is deified. Martin Luther King Jr and muhammad ali were two of the most hated men. America. When i growing up. And that night there were fire stations around the city and back during that time, there was still the Civil Defense system. The alarm would go off and we heard an alarm at the fire station. And i first thought, its the russians. But turning on the tv and the radio, we heard shots fired, the Lorraine Motel and everybody knew who was staying there. And a couple of minutes later we heard king taken to the hospital. Then we heard he was. And i say sometimes that was the evening that i up. I was 11 years old. And i thought my parents were super heroes. They were. But that was the first time i saw them as vulnerable people. They were crying and they were. And they didnt know what going to happen next and what were scared of is that the white folks were coming to get the rest of us and what what was your experience. Okay. So were both were both, what, 11 years old . Ten years old. 11 years old. My the part of oakland that i lived in was geographically colored, not white in oakland, down in the flat areas thats thats where essentially the the black folk live. The white folk lived up up towards hills. My school was, im going to say 99. 9 white. We were let go early day because Martin Luther had been assassinated in memphis. Martin luther king at that time was a face in the. We had we had studied to some degree the i have a dream speech from 63. He was a public figure that spoke out on social issues but other that he was to me was just know he was he was a guy in the news. We did know that he was famous, that he was a reverend, and that he was working in what the grander aspects of civil rights at a time when, you know, look, monkees were on tv, you know, and it was kind of cool to be working towards civil rights and and understand between between the races but that day when were when we were walking home from school word went out like that that were already riots down and in the flats of oakland in east oakland there were already signs of armed armed black people coming up in cars. There was already story that someone had seen a car full of black guys driving fast over over the hill on tompkins. And it was there was already a story about someone had seen a black guy in the neighborhood and he was carrying a gun already. None of this was true, but its the type of its type of story that went out like lightning. And so i have an experience today like that in my memory not since we were released from school. John f kennedy was assassinated and the world seemed very quiet. There was a hush sort of in the air that the hurly burly of the day had given away to some other thing. In 1963, it was of sadness. In 1968, it was a fear. And we as a bunch of white kids walking home from from our school in west oakland in the hills of oakland. We were afraid that the black people were coming to get us because we had killed Martin Luther king. So youre both essentially afraid of each not knowing, you know, the other existed. But these stories grow in your mind how when when fear can build up like callus does. How did you decide, each of you to stand it down and take a different route. You go first. Well, i. I was i, i reaped the benefit from living in oakland, near berkeley in san oakland. I knew i grew up riding the bus. The Public Public with everybody of color in the city there was always asians are always latinos. There was always there was always whites on the same transit busses. We to the same oakland as games. We rooted for the same oakland raiders. We went to the same warriors games. And we we actually about the city went outside of any sort of the as i said geographical debate other than geography ethical divisions elsewhere i thought i lived i thought the rest the world was was like oakland and up there knowing that ongo this there was there was a tide that was sweeping both and out both ebbing and flowing because i grew up in oakland where the black panthers were certainly making headlines and even i knew that you could read some some of the quotes that were coming from both sides of the reportage of the of the black panthers. And there was there was an awful lot of but there was also any number of things that you i couldnt help but read from the words of Something Like Eldridge Cleaver and think, well, thats not necessary wrong. What is being said and to to to live in the city that was that was a piece relatively i say actually peacefully on the front lines of the divide between black and white. That the racial divide in america provided me with i think an opportunity, a sensibility that there was a way in order to study this. There was a way in order to listen and, to learn and to and read and communicate that would actually progress us from a place of some degree, common knowledge. And this is one of the other reasons that i was relatively outraged at never being told about tulsa because i had learned in fifth grade about the tulsa massacre, it would have very much helped to be given me a perspective on the way i felt about. Oakland on the day Martin Luther king been assassinated. And i want to pull us back a little bit a lot further in to the documentary. It is about. The first president ial election, the civil war. Walk us through how it was rigged. It was a couple for that before one, but it was one of the first ones after the civil war because it was 1877. Facts matter. And thank you for checking. Jeffrey, walk us through 1876 election and why do you say it was and what were the stakes at this point . The stakes of this were huge because have to remember, this is 11 years after the civil war ended. And i think its important people to remember that the civil war was based on concept about black americans that had been steeped in our culture for quarter millennia, for 246 years. And so its important to remember. Do you really people are going to give up beliefs have been honed over that period of time simply because they lost a war. So the White Supremacy that was a part of what caused the civil war. It didnt go away at the end of the civil war was still bubbling there in 1876, the president ial election came came down essentially three states, florida South Carolina and louisiana. And the delegates from those were going to decide election. And there were disputes what delegates were going to be seated, what they be for the republican. Hayes or for the democrat. And so they couldnt literally decide congress had to pass a law creating a commission to decide who was going to win the president ial election. And commission took several months. What we wanted to do in this film is to give folks a summary what was going on. And i think just to go a little bit deeper should understand the country is in chaos. The election is in november. One side says weve won the other side says weve won things in chaos. And by late. February there are three meetings that occur. On february 26, one in the House Appropriations committee room, one in the finance committee room, one at a hotel called warmly house. And in these rooms there, negotiations between, the republicans and the democrats and what they came down to is the democrats wanted run the south the way wanted to run the south and they needed the northern troops and they needed an assurance that theyd be able to do they wanted to do. So i just want to finish by reading you to messages that were delivered on february 27 and to show you how this was the that dispute was about South Carolina and louisiana. But the two people who sent these messages from the hayes camp, Stanley Matthews an ohio lawyer and counsel for the republicans before the commission to the presidency. And Charles Foster an ohio congressman who became governor of ohio. And they didnt write these notes to from South Carolina or louisiana. They wrote them to senator john gordon, the state of georgia, and governor young brown from kentucky this was the first note, gentlemen, referring to the conversation had with you yesterday in which governor his policy as to the status certain Southern States was discussed. We desired to say that. We can assure you in the strong as possible manner of our great desire to have adopted such a policy as will give to the people of the states of South Carolina and, louisiana, the right to control their own affairs. They wrote another note about an hour later and they said is subject only to the constitution of the United States. They kind of forgot that part, but they were saying was, you be able to run things the way you want to run things. And thats what tom talked in the second part of our little short. What happened . That decision . You know, youre pulling from primary documents, reading from actual texts that we have in history and yet these these might be erased from certain textbooks in florida now. Right. There are memory laws being passed. We have the politicization of the very primary facts that youre talking about. Why are you into this . Youre a storyteller, not a politician. Why is this important in this in our country . Well, as ben bradlee said, hes run the Washington Post, the truth, no matter painful, is much dangerous than a lie in the long run. The idea that some of learning about our is going to be made either illegal or. So, so, so far removed that youll have to go off and work order to determine the truth of what happened our past. Number one, i think, is to us as americans and as grown, who can take who can who can take our past and learn from it and understand, well, hey, look how far weve come. If i was going to say what it would be the best thing that could come about by this specific teaching of such things as american. Any number of things are to try to be banned by any number of states, not just just florida. Is this is look, its going to rob us of the progress that we made as america, the content of the preamble, the constitution states these beautiful words in order to form a more Perfect Union. If we can no longer discuss faults, if we can no longer be taught about the mistakes that nine generations prior to us living made, how in the are we going to progress towards . Making a more Perfect Union . We have to see our missteps and i think we have to see them to a degree of dispassion and passion is being brought into a place in which its i think its just used in order to maintain some sort, you know, status quo thats beyond my pay range. I got to you. But heres how were going to learn. Then somehow. Like in his fabulous mass, a master of the senate about Lyndon Baines johnson, how then the margin was a victory that Lyndon Johnson won the senate race in texas year he first entered the senate. Or how John F Kennedy won. The presidency advanced Richard Nixon by a paper thin margin from a bunch of votes from illinois. We have to know this stuff because otherwise we are not going to get one step closer to the Perfect Union than we had in the late in the late 1700s. And i think this why we why would anybody who likes to read history books for pleasure, not wade that and simply say, i got to say, man, that is so wrong. The whole idea of saying no, no, no you must not read books based on our history is some degree of its like living the bizarro world from an old superman comic book, which which jeffrey and i know an awful lot about old superman come about. And i just want to say real quickly, when i first met tom, that concept put his focus on a more Perfect Union and the constitution. Really interesting to me because. It is a it is an acknowledged by the people who wrote the constitution. Hey, were not getting this thing all right. Right now. This is what we can come up with and we have a job to make this more perfect. And so the things that were in the original that are no longer there that horrific. Thats a showing of how we advance forward if we dont know our history and tom, ill pull you out from the George Orwell. Who controls the past controls future. If you wipe out the past, you can bring up things today and call them new when theyre actually 100 years old and they come from a really ugly place. But if wipe out the past, nobody will ever know that, you know, there is so much ugliness and darkness in our history and and yet this film also like i want to play a clip from the film that is that offers some joy in the decades following the civil the United States emerged as an industrial giant railroads crisscrossed country steel bridges connected cities skyscrapers and ferris wheels reached for the heavens electrical grids, powered homes and businesses oil refineries, fuel and nationwide products. The telephone and typewriter. Transformed communication. By the end of the century, we had coffee pots, escalators, elevators, cars, chewing gum, paper clips, and even jello. Jello mixture. Who can argue with jello . You know, this was one of the things that came out about it, because my my learning and my when i was studying American History, i remember reading about this intellect submission of 1876, which celebrated the great kick job america was doing as far moving the world forward. Technology and ingenuity, what have you. I mean, anything from escalators to coffee and certainly jello. We deserve pats on the back for it wasnt until jeffrey brought up and i learned from him about the race of 1876. That made me think, well, there is an of how we can handle both things as americans who are paying and want to know about our history. We can certainly celebrate steel bridges and the coffee pot and ferris wheel and Everything Else on the typewriter along with experi saying that the machinations of racism and control maintaining the status quo and in in in the political race. Why did i know so much about coffee pots and ferris and so little about the the Electoral College between tilted and and hayes we can handle them both but only if we have opportunity to hear both. And that was such a pleasure for me as we were doing this, because quite frankly, i didnt know most of those things in that part of the film. And im like, holy. I mean, holy, whatever. Youre right. You know that those kind of things were being made. And one of the things that we stress in documentary film is that countries can be more than one thing america has demonstrated greatness time and time again. And we also have ugly history of racism. And so dealing with both of them is the way we become more perfect. To coin a phrase, you know, this happens between jeffrey and i quite a bit, because we end up comparing notes. He asks me say, hey, hey, white kid, what was what was the History Lesson that you got . Seventh grade. And i say, hey, guys, what what was this stuff that you guys were talking about around here around the table . And it is different stuff almost right down to different different nouns and verbs and were talking about the same period our lives. My 13 year old america was the same america that jeffrey grew up in, except im at ten degrees this side of north that hes looking at, at ten degrees. The other side of north. You know, we we have one question left and we got lots of questions from the and many of them were essentially, is our democracy safe and what can i do to protect it from each of you . What is one thing. Who is to inform yourself if you are going to have conversations about why america looks like does today, then you have to be armed to have conversations and i mean armed with facts. The 19 project, the who we project, there are all kinds of resource is out there to gather information about the truth about our. And so i would just end by saying its important to understand that action causes hope. Its not the other way around. Hope does not cause action. So if you are looking for the first place to look is in the mirror what have i done to inform myself . What organizations am i going to study and maybe become a part of to advance this kind of work . What am i going to say to . My family, my workplace and my community . These are things that we can do as individuals. Thanks, tom and in the process of, constantly seeking out the truth. Listen, without prejudice rather rather rather than accuse somebody sources you tell me more about that. The listen prejudice to be curious to be ever curious of not what just happened. But what can what can be done. I think the cacophony of everything that that comes from news sends out a cynic will default setting. I that this is how messed up is and this is how this is who is it up and this is why. And here are the pros and here are the cons and here are the victims and here are the victors. And its never as simple as protagonist, antagonist, circumstance. Not now not in 2022. There is there is a position be made, but it has to be made from a place of well, lets find out what is the and whats lets find out what is the narrative. I think that i think the concept of narrative is supplanting the concept of, you know, of a facts and that narrative is anybody who is going to tell you a very specific story is doing it in order to gain some degree purchase. I dont know of id be hard pressed to find out that the type of historic reading that that i like to do that is meant to change us some into way of thinking or some action. That said just that it always just is think about this. Think about how it has affected you and think about how to we can guarantee these of liberties to ourselves and our our our posterity. Thats our job right now is to sure that our america, the one that we envision right. The one that is closer a little bit to a more Perfect Union can continue on that and not for us because were going to be gone and, not even for our kids or even our potentially grandchildren, children. Thats why think, as weve seen just recently, that the powers of democracy do turn around. Everybody just sees if we dont make if we dont do this now, if we dont take these motions now. If we dont learn now, then unless it is going to be lost for for our our posterity and that in america. So powerful, so important. I wish we could continue this conversation. I know you both, but thank you for this time with us. Jeffrey and tom, its been such a pleasure thank you. Kate and, tom, ill see you soon. All right jeffrey. Take care of yourself. And and our audience. Thank you for taking time. And i hope youll watch their film and read their op ed. You can find it on washingtonpost. Com. Theres a short link. Its w ap0 wapo dot s2. Slash 1876. Until