don t take my word for it. here s john nicolai, the grouchy gatekeeper of lincoln s presidential office. the secretary whose job it was to say no on behalf of the busiest man in the world and, boy, was he ever good at it. people called him irascible. that was the only one of the names that i can repeat in on c-span. when congress adjourned in mid july after about 7 1/2 months in session, having wrenched american history from the dead end of slavery toward the hard, slow course of freedom, having created our modern monetary and fiscal machinery, having established the united states as a world class military and naval power, having opened the frontier to homesteading settle lers and supported their toil through a bureau federal bureau of agriculture. having authorized a rail length from the atlantic to the pacific across the same daunting mountain pass that doomed the donner party, and perhaps most visionary of all, having provided for the world s greatest system of widely
his nar roreading on the constitution. al of which helps to explain why there was no statue of the 15th president until almost a century after his presidency. in 1862 as the civil war was being fought, the 37th u.s. congress met under an unfinished capitol dome with confederate members absent. the lack of opposition proved productive as members passed the homestead act, the more am land grant colleges act and pacific railway act and revenue act. the 37th congress also created the department of agriculture and ended slavery in washington, d.c. coming up, time magazine editor-at-large talks about 1862 and the 37th u.s. congress. the university of nebraska lincoln hosted this event. it is about 50 minutes. will s probably several hundred people more appropriate to talk about 1862 than i, i feel a little overmatched by the expertise in the room but if you will bear with me, this will be over soon. i would like to thank bob sutton for the very warm introduction and for the
pivotal year of american history. 1862 was certainly the most eventful year in american history. perhaps the most misunderstood. the year in which the civil war became a cataclysm. the federal government became a colasses. and yet, suffered the key losses that led to its doom. it was the year that abraham lincoln established his greatness. it was the death nail of american slavery. and it was the forge of the generals who would eventually win the war. then with names like grant, sherman, sheridan, farrugut, thomas. the blueprint of modern america, as we have been talking about here, was indelibly inked in 1862 and american continental expanse, rapid communication, networked transportation, widespread education, and industrial might and high finance. at the same time, the cost of entrance into that future payable in blood and missery was revealed on battlefields from shiloh to sharpsburg, fredericksburg. never has there been a moment in history when so much was all compressed
he copied and was a good emulator and eventually developed a style of his own that was peerless. everyone who has ever heard clay remembered the first time they heard him and often they say, well, this is the best speech clay ever made, was the first speech that they heard him make. he could make women cry and men stand on their feet. i assume there s no voice track anywhere on him. no. would that there were. he died 1852. go back to the two of you. where did you meet? we met in graduate school. where? auburn university. in fact, we met in our first class together, in graduate school. we didn t necessarily hit it off right away. and began actually seeing each other, dating when we were taking a graduate seminar on the american civil war. i always tell people that, oh, that s just so romantic. do they mean it? no, they re just joking. what do you remember from those early days? oh, it was grand times. we were care free, young, and had the whole future ahead
585-3 going to show you a good bit of the house to885 earlier. where also like to share your reaction from the we are also going to share your reaction from the vote. a reminder to the conversation from this morning from washington journal is still open. you can post your comments on line. danielle is covering the debate in house today. what does that vote mean? it includes the unemployment insurance will not become law. this was the two month extension. instead they have rejected it. they said they want to go to the conference committee with the senate and work out their differences. it became clear that other republican leaders are feeling that way. they have done their work. the house bill was 36-30. it reside in senate. what do they want to the senate to do? they informed us that they what a yearlong extension of the payroll tax cut benefits and a two-year extension of the mechanism that shortens its to treat medicare patients. the also want the keystone provisi