Professor of history at the university of virginia where he focuses on international and diplomatic history. In particular the era of the world wars and the cold war in addition to the age of i eisenhower. He is author of the bitter road to freedom, which was a pultizer prize finalist. Following his remarks, ann compton will join dr. Hitchcock for a conversation on this great book. Ann was the first woman to cover the white house for Network Television and was on the air for 41 years with abc news. Her wrolongevity and impact are unparalleled. She spanned 10 president s of the United States. She anchored from the white house and she went to all 50 states and six continents. Ann was twauactually with presi george w. Bush on september 11th, 2011, and she was the only reporter allowed to stay on Board Air Force one with the president. She was on air force one on behalf of the entire press core. She is also a very good friend of the White House Historical association. She will moderate a number of lectures this summer. It will be a wonderful series. But tonight for our feature presentation, please welcome dr. Hitchcock. Thank you so much, what a treat this is. It is just a splendid setting, room, so many distinguished guests in the audience. I hope i will do him justice but really she a great man and i think we have to work hard to live up to his reputation. I just want to thank the staff for putting together this event. A lot of work goes into these events. Juliet levine, i want to say thank you for your work. Ann is a woman that i watched on tv for many years, im a little star struck, but i also want to acknowledge the presence of general rodell who is a local hero who is organizing and leading the push to get the great memorial built so finally washington dc will have an appropriate monument for this very important general and the 34th president. So i want to congratulate you on your success. May 8, 2020 there will be a ribbon cutting, so what a great day that will be. So lets goat it. I want to start tonight out with a president ial puzzle. If you look at American History from 1965 to 1971, one figure stands out as the most dominant figure in that period. Whoops. Not those guys. Not those guys. Oh, i see. That guy. He was the most popular, respected, and admired man in that period. He served the country as president and he garnered massive approval from the public having won two landslide elections. His average approval rating, ladies and gentlemen, while president for eight years, was 65 . Average. The next president that comes closest to that is bill clinton at 55 , and Ronald Reagan at 53 . Theyre way in the rearview mirror. When he set out to run for president from 1951 all of the way through his eight years in the white house and his ten years after he left the white house, he was consistently under rated. Senator dae eor taft laughed a eisenhow eisenhowers lack of experience. They mocked him as a light way saying he was just a tool of the right wing corporate figures. President harry truman campaigning said the voters should send ike back to the army where he belongs. He was basically just a general who should stay there. A book that came out was given the labels, it was titled a captive hero. Ize eisenhower was a dummy mouthing words said by other people. And collascholars agreed. Arthur slesinger was never doing that. But eisenhower in that poll, 1962, rating of the president s, lac placed eisenhower 22nd out of 31. He was between chester a. Arthur, a figure who i dont know if well have a book talk on chester a. Arthur. We might get there, but there is a lot of other guys you would rather hear about than him. And in the kennedy years, the camelot clan used him as a foil to reflect glory on their young and dynamic john kennedy. It is harder than it looks. You know, wouldnt you if you were kennedys advance man use ike as the counter point. They may be playing scrabble, i think that looks very pleasant and lovely, but they had to work with this guide. So naturally there was such a sharp contrast. And it worked against his memory that was given to the public. By the time of his death, at the age of 78, the press was uninterested in ike. They concluded that he was more of a figure head than a president. They said he was out of touch with his people. He was a great soldier, but maybe a failure as president. Starting in the 1980s classified information started to become available to scholars. If you look at the eisenhower library, you can read to many juicy details. It showed thattize ize tiz izttn eisenhower was deeply involvemented in the details of American National security issues. But the emphasis of the scholarship that started to come out was to attack him for being a kind of an evil genius. What about cuba . What about the congo. Suddenly we had a new branch that depicted him as an evil figure when before he was snooze worthy. Look, im a history waianhistoro know what impact did he have on the country. What is the real impact that he had on the country, and how should we understand his political appeal. Why was he so popular. People said i like ike but why . What can they like . I am going to touch on two big answers to that question. First, i want to talk briefly about his policy achievements. If you want to know why he was popular, look at what he did. Look at his accomplishments in eight years. Then i want to talk about the man and his character. So let me talk about the substance of his presidency first and give you a gist of what is in the book. I want to give you something to sink your teeth into what he accomplished. He did not go to war for eight years while in office. He said it didnt just happen, i will tell you that. He probably said it more heatedly and colorfully than that. He says he worked hard to keep the United States at peace for eight years. When he came into office the korean war was waging. Unpopular, sieisenhower was determined to stop it. Before he was sworn in, he went to the front, and said it was an unwinnable war. He said the only way to win is with nuclear weapons. Joseph stalin dropped dead in march of 1953 and he got lucky. They said were not going to win this war, but eisenhower saidly take that deal, and many in his own party, the republican party, criticized him. The point is that ike took the deal. He says that they wanted him to do that. He also decided to keep the kroops out of vietnam in 1954. The french were fighting, trying to hand on to their empire. They had one big battle at the end they thought might turn the tide, and it was a disaster. The Prime Ministers came toizeen hour and they said send the troops to vietnam. Rescue our colony there. Eisenhower said no, and he said no again and again. I cannot con seize of a greater america. It is an all out win. Many of his advisors, here are two of them, disagreed and privately coaxed him to aid the french the chairman of the joint chiefs, no one liked to tellizeen hotell ize izeen eisenhower things he didnt like to do. He said this war would absorb our troops by divisions. So america did not go to war. Izeen hour then helped to build the state. He built up future commitments. But he had a choice to make, and despite some of his most powerful and important allies, he said no, were not going to wage that war, it is the wrong war in the wrong place for the wrong regions. Again in 1956 there is another conflict in egypt, britain, france invading, should the United States join in and overthrow the strong man . You would think maybe there would be an argument for doing that. He said that is a outrageous violation. Humiliating the Prime Minister in the process. Again when they put pressure on the divided diseaecision of ber he invite d khrushchev. He had a great time. On the contrary he invested huge sums in building up defense establishment. This is a number, take a way with you. Here is one. In the eisenhower years, the United States spent 10 of gdp on defense in the 1950s. The size of the economy is very different, but a huge sum on investing in defense. The man who did so much to alert us to the dangers of the military Industrial Complexion did a lot to build that complexion. The u. S. Nuclear arsenal soars in the eisenhower years from a few hundred weapons to 20,000 warheads. The more powerful atlas and titan. They all came online in his terms and he knew all about it. He poured over the plans, he was deeply engaged at pushing the agenda and these developments forward. The purpose was to deter the communis communists. This was the formation of peat through strength that won the cold war. Every president since has followed it. And it is very much the strategy that helped to win the cold war. So he is a paradox. He wanted to avoid war, he did, and he invested hugely in the tools of war. That is the nature of his choices that he made. A second area i want to talk a little about the substance of his achievements is in the economy. Here is a fact you might not have known. He balanced three budgets of eight, and he came close on the others, but he was a budget hock. This is a record of fiscal dismin that was unmatched. I want talk about a figure that is held up as a leading conservative figure. I want to talk about Arnold Reagan to is the conservative leader. The reason is he was more interested in cutting taxes. Here is a really really vaveali difference. Eisenhower was very stern about taxes. He demanded that the u. S. Budget should be balanced before everyone got a tax cut. Boy does that date him. What he said repeatedly, and he wasnt private about it. He gave public addresses about taxes, and here is the gist. The good american, ieisenhower said, is proud to carry his share of the national burden. I dont think that will be on the Bumper Sticker in 2020, whoever is out there. It is just a different would and this was simply his view. Paying your taxes is part of your patriotic duty. When he was just coming out, they viewed him and they happied abuse on him throughout his time in office. He thought of himself as a conservative, but early on in his presidency he made his peace with the new deal. He expanded Social Security to include ten million additional recipients. He raised the minimum wage. He founded the department of health, education, and warfare. The interstate highway system through building thousands of miles of the roads, it cost billions but eisenhower came up with a clever way of doing it. The gas tax, a user fee, that went into the highway trust fund. The more you drove, the more gasoline you bought, which paid for more roads. So strong on defense, but stronger on diplomacy. Great on a budget hawk, but also a progressive for securiocial security and human wellfare. I also want to talk about area where not many of you realize what a significant legacy he had and that is the field of civil rights. In the 50s, it was gaining attention, they were using the courts to challenge the segregation of Public Schools and Public Places across the country. The practice of jim crow was in practice it is conflict. And black americans ro were demanding so much. Ike was a fascinating study. He didnt know much about the civil rights movement, and he was not all that interested initially before he became president. He fwru up his entire career being in the segregated United States military. Most of his coworkers were southerners. He liked going to augusta, georgia. So he didnt really÷t have a pot of reference. But i think this is interesting and worthy of note. He accumulated a progressive record on civil rights. He and his attorney general worked through the courts to weaken jim crow segregation. They appointed five reasonably adjusted justices. Warren would write brown versus the board of education. Eisenhower had some qualms, but he didnt denounce it, seek to under mine it, or question the supreme court. And he never would dream of doubting it publicly. He would sign into law the 1957 Civil Rights Act. And it took an enormous risk. A real risk uncharacteristic when he ordered federal troops to surround Central High School in little rock, arkansas. Eisenhower saw the issue of one of federal power versus state power. He had the right to impose and enforce the law. And he may have been a reluctant war i warri warrior, but he was a determined defender. He did not publicly or personally embrace the civil rights cause as his own. He did not speak up about civil rights as a moral issue. As an issue of justice and equality. He spoke about it in the terms of the law. The law is the following and we must envoforce it. But i think you could also seep the opposite, and president s face crisis theyre not able to manage a lot. Well, ladies and gentlemen, i could go on, but it was probably not his policy achievements that ende endeared him. I want to reflect on his character and well go into some q and a. When americans looked at Dwight Eisenhower, and i love this picture. This is after the war. His chief of staff, it just looks what is one word that comes to mind. Maybe there are many, but he is confident, relaxed, but the word that comes to mind is that he is a winner. A man playing football at army and then running the Second World War and liberating europe, winning two elections, and never looking like he was trying that hard. People loved being around him. One of the things that struck me was the reports about his personal physical charisma. He was a guy that every head in the room turned and said wow, there he is. He was very forward, athletic. Carried himself, people loved his persona. Another reason for his appeal was his authenticity. He knew where he came from and he never forgot it. He used it politically, and he loved where he came from. He grew up in a family of six boys, and he shared a bed, not just a bedroom, a bed with one of his brothers. Until he left to go to the army. They were poor. His father worked at the creamery. He sold vegetables out of a wagon in the summer to make a few extra pennies for the family. They knew what it was like to live on a few nickels to make it to the end of the week. They lived in a small house that i hope some of you have seen. If you go to abilene, you can see it, it is lovely, tiny, and imagine raising six boys in this place. I imagine there was a lot of get out of here and go play in the yard. At the same time, here is the thing that i want to emphasize. He had a ton of glamour about him. He was a five star general. Who are his mentors . You know, douglas mcarthur. Millionaires who are titans of try. He was at home and working with church hill and roosevelt. He met stalin, all around the world, he was a global star and what a shaim shake. He wrapped up this wonderful story in his own political personality. Im an ordinary guy that is not ordinary at all. That was part of the magic. Now let us not forget part of his appeal to the public was his wonderful wife mammy. She met him after he left west point, they married in 1916 and this is a photograph of her about the time they met. That is why im using it here. I think she is beautiful and i love this picture. I think it has a lot of style and personality to it. They married in 1960. She devoted herself to his career. She was social, fashionable, and she proviovideepresided over th mansion. She had charm, personality, like eisenhower. A person who was comfortable in any setting and was able to make herself and make her guests comfortable. A lot of people forgot mrs. Iz i izeen eisenhower. Americans of the 50s adored her. She also had the sympathy of Many Americans because the public knew perfectly well they suffered through the loss of a child. He died of scarlet fever in 1921 at the age of three. Neither one of them ever overcame the loss. Eisenhower said it was the greatest disappointment and disaster in my life. The one i have never been able to forget completely. It was just another element of their lives that made them feel that much closer to the public. Perhaps their sorrow, sadness, and vulnerability. It linked them to the public in a very endearing way. They also liked him for his wjs faith. A fascinating detail of his life. He was raised by parents who were members of the river brethern. An off shoot of the mennonite sermennonites. He read scripture every night, but after he left home he rarely went to church. It was in his mind and heart, but she did not practice publicy until he was elected. He was not baptized as a child, but he decided after he was inaugurated that he would join the presbyterian church, and he was baptized by the reverend edward elson. The only president to have been baptized while in officer. He made every effort to place religious faith in the public eye. The 50s was an era of revival, eisenhower was fine with that. He started the National Prayer breakfast. He brought the original Billie Graham to the white house. And he would go on to serve many president s. He hardly approved of the words under god in our pledge of allegiance and to have in god we trust but our our national currency. It squared with the values of his time and americans loved this about eisenhower. Another aspect of his appeal. And then finally, ladies and gentlemen, on the subject of his charact character we look back, a lot of my students, certainly. Look back at ike as someone from the stone age, and he was the last president to have born in the 19th century. He is a man of a rather distant past, but at the time he wanted to be associated with innovation, new technologies, science, education, and he was in his time in office a great champion of those things. He was the first to hold a Television Conference in front of the cameras. And they would be recorded and rebroadcast from 1955 and onward. He used tv advertising very effectively. After the sputnik crisis, he champions Space Research and nasa and invested large sums into education if he became the first president to ride in a helicopter, and he did so regularly. This is why, i think, it is a wonderful choice to have the White House Christmas ornament to feature the helicopter. He may have been the first man to reach the ripe old age of 70 in the white house, but he saw himself as the future. The cutt