we told you that it is an interdiction to all the turmeric events that have happened over the past almost 300 years. it have guest speakers who would bring to class something that the two of us can bring, their personal experiences. their personal experiences and richmond. i can't imagine a better person to talk about his personal experiences in richmond, how it has changed, what the future might hold, that our former governor, former mayor of the dale douglasond, wilder. [applause] >> before we bring up the former governor, i want to say couple of words. as we talked about many times a semester, we have a great resource here the weather school. we are closed the state capital, not far from washington, d.c. as a graduate student here, i took advantage of the applied nature of this. i hope you're getting some of that in the exploring neighborhoods richmond project, getting out into community, meeting people, interview people, talking about lee legacy of neighborhoods from the folks on the ground. we know that is an important thing. further, just a reminder that the wilder school that many of you are a part of has a center for public policy that offers research and offers technical expertise to individuals to local governments, to private institutions when they are looking at exporting their cities and the local governments like we are doing in this class. the semester, you heard from the woman in charge of richmond's rest -- master plan, about what we want to be when we turn three and years old as a city. lastly, you heard from the man who wrote the book on annexation in virginia. i watched your mouth drop like my mouth dropped in shock at some of the things we have had uncovered about what richmond is, who we have been, and where we are headed. today, we have our schools the ise here with us in an attorney, distinct professor, a bronze star veteran, and the driving force be had an ongoing effort to establish a national slavery museum douglas wilder has been a lifelong public servant for more than 30 years, dedicated to improving the quality of life in the commonwealth of virginia. he has been the mayor of our city. he won all nine districts. remember how we talked -- talked about how we have to rearrange the way did voting in richmond because of identification? , aton all nine districts first at-large mayor in the city richmond. he has been in the general summary. as you know, he was the first elected african-american to serve as governor in the united states. he is also a lifelong resident of our great city of richmond. he knows more about our city than pre-much anybody you can talk to. as we continue this semester-long journey of uncovering richmond, it is my distinct pleasure to introduce governor l douglas wilder. [applause] >> thank you very much to all of you. happy halloween. i'm going to take my mask off tonight. while everybody else puts theirs on. he is a good friend. he knows a great deal about our .ity some of what i may say may be repetitious, but you will deal with it and we will answer your questions when you ask them. it is important to start at the outset by recognizing that richmond is an independent city. virginia is the only state that has independent cities. you know what i mean by independent city snow cities in city?ty -- independent no city is in a county. you don't tell people you live there. you tell them i live in richmond. we had all of the banks. then the branches were not established because the law would not allow them. they were local banks. the bank of waverley. the bank of this. people who knew all of the banks were members of the general assembly. [laughter] that was changed. -- because we to did not have the branch banks, we are going to charlotte. show ahead of slowly nothing. of the 41 independent cities and dust in the united states, all but three of them are in virginia. the other three are baltimore, st. louis, and carson city, nevada. we are operating under the so-called dillon rule state. you have heard that expression given before. john force dylan was the chief justice of the iowa supreme court during the 1860's. to have a real understanding of the city of richmond, one has to be aware of the so-called legal constraints imposed by the adoption of the dillon rule. he is quoted as saying those best fitted by their intelligence, business experience, capacity, and moral -- doter do not hold of not hold oval office. the dillon rule is still in effect in virginia. so what is the dillon rule? it is also known as the rule of statutory construction and is used to interpret when there is a question of whether or not a local government has certain power. powerstrues the grants of to localities very nearly. the bottom line is, where there is a question about local government's role or authority, the local government does not receive the benefit of the government. so one must assume that the local government does not have the power in question. in legal leverage, the first part of the dillon rule reads like this -- local governments have only three types of power. one, those granted by express words and eight -- in the charter, those implied or powers ofto the granted, and three, the central to the declared objects and purposes of the corporation, not simply convenient to my but indispensable. is the part that tightly limits a local governments powers because it , if there is any reasonable doubt whether power exists or not, then that power has not been conferred. words, there is not an information of power. either it is expressly given or you don't have it. put that on the side. then you have to take into consideration baird versus board of education. down,hat decision came people in virginia were quick to recognize that it would have a substantial effect. , in that decision came down was working -- i was working in the state medical examiner's office in virginia. . was working in toxicology the drugd all of driving tests or the state of virginia. the driving limit at that point was 0.15. you could really be drunk. [laughter] really was concerned. i never really was interested in chemistry. i only went into chemistry because i thought i should be a because john was going to be a doctor, the, too. "me too" counseling iat ill-fated me because could do it, i could get by. i had just got back from korea and i could understand several things, how i was sent to defend koreans and died there if necessary for rights that i could enjoy back home. it didn't make any sense. it still doesn't. there were numbers of things that were still going through my mind. a confusedout being veteran coming back. i was still messed up, but i took it out on different -- in different ways. when that decision came down, it's so affected me that i had the chiefmedical -- medical examiner himself was a doctor and a lawyer. the toxicologist received the news of the brown decision. it was as if it was free and him. , did you read this decision this morning? i said, yeah. he said, what do you think? i said, it's great. it's hard for me to believe that nine white men finally decided that they had been wrong. of an admission. >> he said, what does that mean? truth, to tell you the it means that i'm in the wrong field. here and do stay this. i don't want to get a masters in chemistry or a phd. i didn't have the smarts for, quite frankly, or the patient's, or the interest. about 1955, i had started thinking i wanted to go to law school. obviously, i had to go to southern virginia unless i wanted to file a lawsuit and spend a bunch of money. i went to howard law school. my interest was that i wanted to be a part of this social engineering to change what was. watch, i can't sit by and what is taking place too much longer. happened, the majority of school populations were in independent cities. that's why i referenced be theon rule to begin with city's were authorized by law to annex the counties. if richmond wanted to annex half of chesterfield county, they could have. all they would have to do is have the approval of the court, and the court would have to approve the price of it. when that decision came down, the thrust was made to make certain that the majority of people would be living in the cities, that that would be some annexation. vote because black they said it was growing in population, in numbers. sure enough, what that city did, they saw to annex part of henric o first. that plot all out by willow lawn and beyond, the and right go officials put a price on it. the city officials decided it was too much. they regret it now. they look south and saw portions of chesterfield county. they said, will take that part. , duringt took place that period of time, i was in the state senate, and had decided that, since i'm running for this position in 1969, when the annexation took place, i'm , i had for this position better be a little careful in terms of what i wanted -- in terms of whether i wanted the annexation or not. if the annexation people are successful, i have to appeal to these voters. i pretty much didn't do anything. quite frankly, that was the attitude of the majority of the african-american leadership. it did nothing, absolutely nothing. it was surprising. sometimes in court the morning and i would run into the lawyer that was representing the people in chesterfield had been annexed. he said, doug, are you guys going to stop this or try and fight it? toould give him enough satisfy him for the moment, but he knew it wasn't me because i don't usually stay like that. i'm usually here or there. in the process, he kept asking me what was going on. finally, one of the persons who had run for the office of the , he council, curtis hope was a tenant's-rights advocate. decided to bring the action himself to stop it. lawyerassisted by a neble.ve veneble was not supported that much by those who thought it should happen. the elections were held up for some seven years. until the matter was resolved in court. --n it finally got to court and by this time, i'm elected to the state senate at large. that was the first time anyone had been elected at large to the state senate -- or elected to the state senate of color since the reconstruction. -- the reconstruction period in virginia. when that case finally was determined, it was determined based on whether it could be settled. there were those who said, we have 6 -- i'mou sorry, six districts, three at-large representatives. richmond had nine and still does have nine districts. there were those who would have said no, we should make sure that it's a majority minority. there were those who said, let's make it 4-4 in one even. i came out on the side of 5-4. the richmond get crusades of voters which, at that time, was very influential politically for the minority vote. we were able to get that done. the other people were saying, why don't we do it with 4-4 and one even. i said, i don't think that's going to work. 5-4, which isth a --urrent circumstance today well, it is more than that now in terms of the composition of the districts. think, when that took , it gave rise to the reason why i think richmond has the -- what some of you have heard, the city of no left turns. a one-way going up street, you will have to go to or three blocks to get where you want to go. planners do those things. they make those decisions. why do you think they did it? where were the jobs? enrichment. -- in richmond. city asere running the you always have, then you don't live in the city and you want to be able to get in and out of the city as quickly as possible. that's why you have what you have in terms of the street makeup in the city of richmond. the i-95 expressway to disrupted large portions of the african-american communities. parkwaye po-white did the same relative to other parts of the city from east to west. 1980's, when 295 was contemplated, i was at that time the chairman of the transportation committee in the state senate. come aserything i could long as the -- as well as the chairman of the house committee, 295 run, don't make around the city because it is going to hurt the city. you want people to come through your city, to see your city, to stop at your city. antonio, go around san you go into san antonio. ditch that you can spit over. they are so proud of it that they call it the riverwalk. we have one of the oldest rivers in the country that we still have as yet not developed to the extent that people can enjoy. i tried to stop it circumventing but i wasn't able to do it. i was introduced as a mayor. ase i finished my tenure governor, i had thought i was finished with politics forever. unfortunately, i started seeing things take place in the city what was taking place in richmond -- the city of corruption and inefficiency. a cesspool, i called it. boy, did they come after me for saying that, the leadership. several council members had gone disgrace. petition totarted a elected, notr selected by the majority of the council members in a search audio -- in a ceremonial role, but to be the authoritarian leader of the city, elected by the people at large. out -- and iointed know john spoke about it as well -- but what john may not have told you is that not a single political leader supported the movement. not one. voters, down.r the naacp, down. elected leadership, down. nobody anywhere supported it. council, wouldty you at least put the measure on the ballot so that the people can decide? people toallow the vote on it? they didn't do that. kaine time, i think tim was the mayor of the city. tim, can you work something out to at least get something on the ballot? he said, i can only get four votes. to goat we had to do was out and get the people to sign the petition. the percentage of people to sign the petition, that it can go on the ballot. you are able to get about 15,000 signatures to make certain it would go on the ballot. even though the entirety of , whenship was against it the people voted 80% to say, we want a change. in 2003 here. if 80% of the people felt that way then, that sent a message to me. the leadership is totally out of touch with the people. it didn't have anything to do with me, it had to do with the message that have been resonating, that people didn't believe that the leadership was doing the job for us. i carried 80%. i didn't want to run for mayor. i told the business community, said, we'reng me, i going to get a mayor. we're going to get somebody. they said, when? i said, give me a couple of weeks. one person that i had in mind couldn't do it because of the residency requirement. another had just committed to something that he could not get out of. and they little report said, we are going to have to have somebody. i said, no, give me another week or two. i almost got the same amount of votes that the petition passed by. i think it was close to 80%. i committed to staying there only that one term. there are problems that still need to be addressed. problems is that the mayor should have more involvement rather than just furnishing the budget on schools. building 15 new schools, i found a way to do it without raising a diamond taxes. how do you do that? if your business is coming into -- ok, you don't have to pay taxes for x number of years or you want to pay this tax for wantber of years, or you to get this coming to you. i have fixed it so i could build 15 brand-new schools without a dime's worth of tax increase. the money would have been rolling through at a certain period of time. i have established with bait -- with bank of america what we called justin line credit. i have fixed it so our interest rates on bonds were so low because we were fiscally managed and we were doing an excellent job. we had just in time financing. 150 said, we can put million dollars of year. i said to the schools, i want you to close the schools that are not operating. they are vacant, we are still playing -- still paying upkeep, insurance,g for the still paying for maintenance. they still haven't done the job with armstrong school over in the creighton court area. that has been unoccupied for school purposes for about 30 years. the mayor, in my judgment, should be in a position to say we are just going to furnish the money. i will give you an illustration. the superintendent left the city of richmond about a year or so ago. every time he was opening his mouth, we are broke, we need money. wasme to find out there $540,000 sitting around that no one even knew about. that's why i think it is so important for us to recognize that the uncovering of richmond is one thing, but to know where we are is quite another. i think it is so important that we make certain that the people are there, that the people should be represented. about, and you will be talking about, as you said, the removal of statues and monuments. position on that -- i've only spoken twice on it. one was a piece i wrote for the richmond times-dispatch. i said i always believed in constructing and building -- i wanted to put an arthur ashe statue on monument avenue. ultimately, we were able to get that done. it wasn't easy. we had to fight some of the same -- it wasn'tidn't a black-and-white issue. it went so far as that some people even tried to divide the ashe family. i carried it to monument avenue and had the show being conducted from that point. if you look at the statue, he is wearing a tennis racket in one hand but he's wearing books in the other. is to understand learning. i want to tell a story about ashe. he's a good friend, good man, always been supportive of efforts of mine. i remember when he was a youngster. his father was the park superintendent over at brookfield swimming pool, a segregated pool, as well as the the tennis was. i used to joke with him. , the way you represented us and we even tried to compete with you is one thing. process, he was here once and he had a speaking engagement. i was governor at the time. i said, what are you doing this evening? i said, why don't you come by the mansion and will have dinner ? he said, i want to check a few things. he called me and he said, would it be all right if i would bring a couple of people with me. i said, not a problem at all. came.r so, he relatives.all we came for dinner. i said, everything is fine. the staff at the mansion was great. timeok so little amount of for them to be ready. i said, why don't you sit at the head of the table? he pointed out, he said, i want you guys to pay attention here. look and see who is looking down on us. ,eorge washington on one side george -- thomas jefferson on the other. to be in a position of recognizing that we are virginian's. governor -- it think, the only governor -- ever to be elected from richmond. most of the others have come to to live after their election. 28 and p streets, the only house my family ever had was there. my father had that half built. a friend of his, who was a wasenter, his daughter , the firsty furman african-american architect ever licensed in virginia. as we sat there and that moment passed, i said to arthur, i can't tell you what it means to see this taking place. when he passed, his widow called me and said that arthur had always wanted to be buried with his mother in the cemetery in richmond. i said, i would love very much to have his body to lie in state at the mansion. she said, do you think you could get that done? i said, i might know somebody. he was the first person to lay in state in the mansion since jefferson davis. days -- il you these am telling you these things not bragging, but telling you the history. the question still comes up now as to who runs the city. that to be answered so that the people know that as an extension of the people's choices. with the accountability of removal and replacement where necessary --here we were chatting briefly up here as it relates to this class. i was telling him how pleased i am because of class is taking --ce, because you are larry because you know more about the city of richmond in many instances than the people who are charged with the responsibility of running it. i can say that unabashedly because i know of where i speak. thank you. we will be taking some questions. [applause] >> what is with this independent city business? i thought we were going to get rid of independent cities in virginia? why not? wilder: my answer today would be, no, they are not going to get rid of it. the voting strength is not in the cities. it is in the counties in suburbs. where are the votes? enrichment? -- in richmond? no. counties adopted to be cities. virginia beach was not a city. princess and county. suffolk was not a city. all of these places have become cities. hard time forbe a you to be able to get the votes because the suburbs and rural areas. the interesting thing, politically, people sometimes overlook the strength of the rural areas as it relates to the suburbs. the suburbs of richmond, for , hanover, chesterfield, strong. you have got judgeships to be selected. --ave a one word definition can anyone guess what that is? one word that would define politics? money. something that is a proposition for any tribunal that doesn't involve money. that one certain here of you is going to tell me the magic answer. can you think of something that doesn't involve money that people are discussing politically? thisesting that we have silent agreement. then, someone thinks they've got it. abortion. are you crazy? aboutole argument is where is the money going to come from and how am i going to be able to -- if these people are so rich, they can travel this place to do what they had to do. i got it, lgbt. you are talking about inheritance rights. if that is the case, you need to know where the money is being spent on whom it is being , who makes the decision for him to get spent, and where does it come from? much that we have talked about here today relates to money. it's hard to get away from it. case, i think it is going to be very difficult. >> i'm curious what additional measures you would have liked to notted had the dillon rule prevented you from taking those actions. what measures you would have taken if the dillon rule had not restricted your power. mr. wilder: restricted your power as a city, a state, or what? well, unless it is expressly put that you canter meet with the superintendent of schools -- meet with the city -- the to determine mayor of richmond has absolutely nothing to say about who the superintendent of schools is going to be. now, does that sort of raise a question as to why not? because of the dillon rule. is it expressed in the charter that you have that? no. should it be amended? yes. veto rightthat the that the mayor should have relative to the actions of the city council. rule is not all bad to the extent that it doesn't allow you to just run all over the world, say i'm going to do this, that, and the other. for instance, the issue of the statutes that come up -- the how arethat come up, you going to remove a statue that doesn't belong to you? city property or state property? we have a statue not far from this place, the one on harrison with the artillery pieces. that was given to the city -- given to vcu by the city of richmond with the express there is nothing to be done with it. if there's anything to be done, the city has to approve of it. i get back to education. less would -- unless we can have the best approaches, the city council could. it raises another question. that is, the election of school board members. i think it is good. as a matter of fact, i signed the legislation when i was governor that it's they could be elected. i think that was one of the last things i did. however, i did put an amendment because i knew we were constricted by the dillon rule, that no locality should have elected officials on their school board and less the locality itself votes for that. >> did your feelings on the dillon rule change when you versus when you had served as governor? mr. wilder: [laughter] good. .es it is a natural thing that you would want to know. why can't we do things together? itas moving pretty well as relates to getting a better relationship with the local school system, i had even moved -- one of my good friends, bill, education,tment of was helping me. from someopposition of the vested groups because they felt that, if richmond does this, it will be spread to other places. yes, when i was governor, that was one way to look at the dillon rule. when i was mayor, that was another way. large, thereby and has to be some understanding of relaxation. it shouldn't be as rigid as it relates to our cities. one of the finest speeches i heard barack obama make -- i was mayor at the time and we were in miami. unfortunately, our cities are looked upon as being roadblocks to economic development and the opportunities for enhancement. he said, they are the real engines for that to take place. we need to reinvest in our cities. trump saying what donald is saying today. when he said it, the room erupted in applause and agreement. this was a room full of republicans, democrats, independents. unfortunately, he had gone through the first stimulus package to get the money to the people who opted to get that money back because of the recession and such. second part for the of the money, he couldn't get it. unfortunately, now, people are looking at our cities. i was decrying, what is going on in st. louis. i knew that st. louis was a very prosperous city. how did ferguson exist? i found out that ferguson is only 25 or 30 miles away. st. louis is an independent city. consequently, they didn't have anything at all to do with ferguson. i thought, how can i be critical of anything. i've been living in richmond and go down andersburg down. we have a responsibility to see what laws need changing. we are changing demographically. businesses pretty much have left. great effort is bringing them back. i have had different feelings. dillont thing, on the thing, is that no locality can raise any tax unless the general assembly says you can. youcan't raise a tax unless ask the general assembly of virginia. >> you mentioned economic development in cities. how can individual neighborhoods economically advance without introducing gentrification? there's nothing wrong with that in terms of gentrification. i don't look upon gentrification as being racially oriented. unfortunately, some people have. in terms of the redlining that took place years ago -- not now. i lived on hawthorne avenue in , beautiful area. then, and still is, a beautiful area. i have seen people leaving from that area. they are also so huge. the one i had on hawthorne avenue had 15 rooms for five of us. that's a whole bunch of space. i've seen some people who are moving over to parts of church hill, 34th street, the area near the cemetery. church hill has been gentrified, as people would call it. when you look at the top of the fulton area, the you can see homes and developments. when of the things i would like to see more of in that area is, particularly, the citizens having a view of and participating in the river. i'm very glad to see some of the road improvements that are taking place. i would like to see more people and more younger people. here's the problem again. education. notle with children are going to bring their kids to the city of richmond to go to the public schools in less there is improvement. they will bring their kids to the city and live in the city but they will send them to the private schools. that's not right. again, why, gentrification, education, they run hand-in-hand? do you agree? good. we made it. >> edo squid, what is your favorite thing to get? mr. wilder: when they make it, gumbo. they make the finest gumbo in town. they do a great job with squid. it is very difficult to come by any bad meal at all. that is why, when i need in richmond, i go there. what is yours? ed --ike the feel scallop scallopini. >> as governor, were you able to implement rules to preserve predominately african-american neighborhoods? mr. wilder: no. it would never come up in that context. again, they are local decisions. they have to be made by the cities and counties. that i wasthings very much interested in was making certain that we had the schools in those districts , if you don'tause have the schools working efficiently, you are not going to have any preservation. that --rtunate thing is i have spoken about this here, -- verycolleagues here few people today are aware of the history of richmond. , i lived at 28 and p, as i said. the boundary lines were from 34th street to 25th street. that is going east and west. north and south, it was from street, the, grace nine mile road. pretty much in there, that was the african-american community. when you went away from that, you went down into the bottom, where there was very little residential involvement. there were the via docs -- the ducts that went across what is now marshal street, and you would catch the streetcar. underneath that, they had an elevator. on could take the elevator the 17th street side and go up -- you could take the streetcar. all that has pretty much been gone. there has been some efforts. -- i-95 --borhoods well, the one going to petersburg -- neighborhoods were wiped out. there was nothing to preserve, quite frankly. >> in your time in office, did you have any first-hand experience with issues of pollution, environmental issues, with respect to the james river? could you talk a little bit about that experience if so. mr. wilder: when i was first senate, things were so bad in the plant in hopewell that they stopped any fishing. you couldn't eat any fish that came out of the river. that's how bad it was. it depends on what part of the river. i was down at charleston and we ate our fish. it was so bad. that is in the richmond area. we had other places around the state that had businesses, -- the end of the james starts up near the roanoke area and falls all the way on down to the chesapeake. we had so many environmental concerns that, not only was the water bad, but we were losing wildlife. governory fortunate as to be able to institute a policy of re-nesting for the bald eagles. my secretary of the interior at who was verya lady much involved. -- the eagles were on the endangered species list. they have been taken off. we have one of the largest nesting areas of eagles in the country. i have a conflict of interest because, in my backyard, they sit in the trees. it is a beautiful site to see. why did we spend all the money to get the eagles to come live in this backyard? i think the environmentalists today have a much better reputation than at that time. theseimes, there were all environmentalists that were always determined to be on the far left of a different variety, not really concerned. i think people now are beginning to see, something has gone wrong here. essential to our being. in the absence of that, we are not going to do well. the effort -- and i hope you were part of that effort to determine, whatever was bad in terms of water in the james -- i was talking to my nephew who was here yesterday, visiting me. he's a retired federal judge in detroit. we were talking about flint and how bad things were and are there. and we were talking and we were talking about flint. the real question then becomes, yours is a good question, where the elected officials when it happened in flint? did they live, did they breathe air? could they have done something about it? why didn't that? just there.re not they are everywhere. our job and all of our jobs is to demand what is right of government. and to criticize what is wrong. don't care who agrees with you. do it. and you will see the results. the more noise you make about it, th emore people will want to tell you, no, no. all right, i will be quiet when you do this. if you don't do that, you are going to see me again and again. and again. they would say to me on so many governor, not just as i knew so little about politics and government when i ran for the state senate. i didn't know anything. and i was going to the floor of the senate, and before the session would start, i'd -- guys'd be a couple of talking. i said guys because there were no women at the time. i'd stand right beside them. they'd start doing that. i had no idea what they were talking about. getting ready to go into session now. the president is getting ready to call us in session. can we get together after the session? that ok? fine with me. sharp. elbows. that is what is necessary particularly for young people. i don't reference millennials. i mean young people period. demand what is right and criticize what is wrong. we have our discussion. you know now, in your class, you are learning more about the city of richmond than the people who represent the state in many instances. i add that last part. in many instances. and many of them, as you agree, resent being told what they do not know. but that's why it's so important. we may need to insist that the waters remain clean. i even stopped -- rock creek fishing. and when i was governor. couldn't do it till we cleaned up the waters. i had a. hard time people did not like it. but the rock fish were going away. 27 inches before you take them. and they, they were taking them even like this, throwing the back. now they are back. lots of things are back, but a lot of effort went into it. who did it? people who never get mentioned. but the demand was right. that is why you'd continue to demand what is right and criticize what is wrong. all right. there. >> what is your stance on the atlantic coast pipeline? i know there are many democrats that have varying views on the subject. mr. wilder: the question the question-- i think the question is going to come up later this week get the, at the symposium we are going to have talking about the debate about debates. what issue should come about. is there, first, two things. i've taken note. the civic position as to whether i favor or disfavor it, because i always like to go into the vittles. what are you looking for? and what do you expect to receive as a result? what assurances do we have relative to pollution that could ensue? what is different about this than other things, like the pcp. the peopleain, watch on either side on it. who gains? and who loses? it's goinghink, um, hasequire a bit more than been put forth for the people of virginia to say, ye this is goods,. itto condemn it or oppose because you can say this is bad. i would have, if i were governor, i was get, i hwould have as much factual evidence as i could from people respected who should be speaking and i should let that information be fully known on a continuous basis. by saying this is what "the people" want and this is what others want. and when you do that, virginians are - to thewho are not wedded past. they'll change, but you have got to make the case. i don't know whether the case has been made strongly enough at this point. now, let me turn it around. what is your position on it? why? guess --ll, i mr. wilder: you know why, but you have never taken the time to explain it to yourself. i know. now, take the time. explain to yourself. and then articulated to an extent that it makes sense. it's not knee-jerk. this until something else comes along. were asuld think, if i my at that stage or in -- position may very well be just like yours. yes, sir. the nations opioid and overdose issues rising, how do you think richarmond can help his residents that suffer from that addiction? mr. wilder: th candidates for are both saying that they have a plan for it. but that issue has so many interrelated issues involved with it, right? first of all, how can drugmaceuticals and companies be permitted to do this? bet, how can physicians authorized to prescribe these things? importantly,more money. where is the money going to be coming from to offset the effects of drug addiction? period. ok, well, it is not as bad as heroin. does not taste as bad as heroin. but it's another issue as well. why can a drug that costs x amount of dollars to make and r&d needed,and no no research involved, 500 or 600,000 times more than it actually cost to make it. so, you're taking on the lobbyists. at is iny lobbyists, tht their interests. i'm leaning towards being against those people who seek to in measures to skies in them as being helpful for your health they are not. . and they need to be called just what they are. muck rakers who are involved in ripping the public off. at every opportunity they can and then disguise it as some way to help. you can't hide it. and it's, that's bad. let me hear from you. what you going to do about it? >> i personally think we should follow portugal's approach and make all drugs legal. externally controlled. i know there are a lot of different population and all that kind of stuff, demographics in other countries, but i think it would be an interesting theory to test. mr. wilder: to make heroin legal? >> controlled, not -- government and well thought out. mr. wilder: let me try some of those things in europe. portugal, the netherlands. with someve a problem of that. let me tell you on one of those issues. see what happens. when i first got into the senate, i had no idea how little marijuana was necessary for you to -- 35 grams ofssed marijuana, it was presumed that you possessed it with the intent to distribute. said, if you were kicked up with 35 grams in you or 3how little that is, 2 roaches or maybe more. you all know what a roach is. the max, the sentence was 20 years in the penitentiary. none of which could be suspended. nor could it be paroled. so you had to serve 2/3 of that time. you would've had to serve, if you were picked up. i didn't know it. and that law awas changed without debate that i ever heard. it was changed without any great deal of ceremony. why? person's son got picked up at a place not far from here. and the law was changed. schider usedoy to come down to the, journalists would be advocating for legally serve -- for legalization of marijuana. everyone try to stay as far away from them as possible. yet made a lot of senseh as you look back on what he was sayinge. and america puts or people in jail that anyplace in the world. criminal acts is one thing, decriminalizing is another. we really, the opioid thing, to ped many, has hel people recognize the seriousness hisdrug addiction in t country and the need to prescribe meaningful treatments for it. we have this coming up. all right. >> that is all we have time for today. mr. wilder: i've enjoyed you guys. good seeing you. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2018] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] join us every saturday evening at 8 p.m. and midnight students and join college classrooms to hear lectures on topics ranging from the american revolution to 9/11. lectures in history are also available as podcasts. visit c-span.org/history/podcasts or download them from itunes. monday, president's day on american history tv. historian and biographer richard o'connor addresses the question before george washington in 1777, could the britishness of do the american rebels by capturing the capital philadelphia? here is a preview. >> washington, in addition to the british, he's also fighting rear,haos in his own because as he has lost at brandywine and again at germantown, there are people in congress who are now cooped up in new york and they are having doubts. they are having doubts about this man. there are also officers who would like to displace him. >> replace them, also? >> take his place, exactly. there is general gates. hero, given a gold medal. by congress. he would like washington's job. there is a french volunteer by the name of conway. that is an irish name but he headed irish family, a catholic family who came to france. he's a frenchman. but, you know, he thinks a little later when france becomes our ally, but he thinks he ought to be winning the whole war effort. so, this is an ongoing thing and it really want end -- won't end until the following year, 1778. these little plots. it is also hard for historians to figure them out. because they were plots. you know, people were not like writing diaries about what they were thinking of. so, you know, we have to sort of speculate and figure out, but washington himself felt very beleaguered by this. and then he has people sticking up for him. hamilton among them, who is by now on washington staff. washington's own staff is very loyal. most people who serve with washington directly are very impressed. the entirewatch program with richard werkheiser this monday, presidents' day at 8 p.m. eastern, here on american history tv. only on c-span 3. starkt, author walter talks about the relationship between abraham lincoln and his secretary of war stanton. starting from where they first met as attorneys through lincolns assassination in 1865. this discussion was part of the annual lincoln form symposium in gettysburg, pennsylvania.

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